Tabloid City

Praise for Pete Hamill’s TABLOID CITY

“There’s murder and mayhem in Pete Hamill’s latest novel, Tabloid City, but the real victim in his book is the print journalism that Hamill knows and loves so well. This ticking time bomb of a novel is about the end of a form of daily storytelling in which America’s big cities are like small towns — their recognizable casts of characters, dramas, and moral struggles playing out on a slightly bigger, more complex stage…. Hamill moves around the city easily on paper, with a great fondness reminiscent of the writing of Joseph Mitchell — the New Yorker writer who is a sacred name at the intersection of New York journalism and literature.”

— Susan Salter Reynolds, Los Angeles Times

“It’s hard to find a mention of Pete Hamill that doesn’t include his association with the city of New York. Over his long career, the man has come to symbolize the grittier level of the world of New York letters…. In his latest novel, entitled Tabloid City, he offers a picture of the city as he sees it today, told from the vantage points of a host of characters who could have been pulled straight from the pages of one of his tabloids, all lonely, all at the end of their rope, all entirely New York…. Gripping enough to keep the pages turning, this novel is really about the city itself, and how even though it may be in flux, it’s still the best place in the world to be lonely.”

— Nicholas Mancusi, Daily Beast

“Hamill has written a glorious homage to New York and the tabloid journalists who cover the dark corners of the city.”

— Newark Star-Ledger

“A bedazzling new book…. A vivid, nonstop, time-stamped romp around a New York that brims with authenticity. [Hamill’s] novel bittersweetly bridges tabloid newspapering’s last gasps and the emerging brave new world of digital journalism. His characters intersect in a gripping and sentimental ode to the profession and to the city that have been the objects of Mr. Hamill’s most enduring crush.”

— Sam Roberts, New York Times

“Hamill is as New York City as the Empire State Building and the Bowery, a classic newspaperman schooled in the old days of several daily newspapers. And his many novels have been based in the Big Apple. His latest is no exception, with a title that suggests both journalism and New York…. With this murder as the centerpiece of the plot, Hamill moves the story around and around through a cycle of characters all related in some fashion to the central event, each visitation to each character adding layers to the author’s knowing depiction of New York’s varied lifestyles.”

— Brad Hooper, Booklist (starred review)

“Set in modern-day, [recession-plagued] Manhattan, this book revolves around 24 hours in the life of a cast of characters whose paths intersect in surprising and sometimes alarming ways…. A page turner of a book with a somewhat complex and rapidly advancing plot. As characters begin to interact with each other more and more, you can’t help but wonder how Hamill will possibly weave it all together at the end — and when he does, it’s impressive indeed.”

— Catherine Mallette, Fort Worth Star-Telegram

“You expect an old newspaper guy to get it right. Hamill does.”

— Anne Bendheim, Asbury Park (N.J.) Press

“Sensational mayhem…. As different as they all seem, each of the players has a vital and well-crafted place in the story. And when that double homicide — at an upscale address, no less — takes place, Hamill’s round-robin technique becomes a vital way for readers to experience the wide-reaching effect of the crime without losing track of the other threads that give the book its texture and make it much more than another hard-boiled crime novel in a fedora. Tabloid City’s subplots really shine — this is where Hamill’s attention to detail and talent for writing memorable characters are most apparent…. Each piece of the story is thoughtfully crafted and written with care and cutting caricature. The frequent dropping of names — socialites, politicos, and bankers all make the cut, but a special fondness is reserved for whiskey-soaked journalists’ haunts — adds a personality and tabloid-style punch that Hamill, who has been editor-in-chief of both the New York Post and New York Daily News, clearly delights in. Tabloid City is, at its core, exciting to read. The story is engaging and the characters distinct and fascinating.”

— Adam Rathe, National Public Radio

“Be prepared to be captured by this gritty, riveting New York City drama. Covering scarcely a 24-hour period, uncommon in its style, detail, and intensity, this mystery will sink its teeth deep, shake you, move you, scare you, and, above all, entertain. Using a tough, edgy, no-nonsense style, Hamill is the master of the moment and the memory. He leaves no stone unturned and no sense unexplored as he provides deeply personal clandestine glimpses into life’s hard realities…. Written in a style that underscores that life does not occur in complete sentences, Tabloid City is not a standard mystery novel. Hamill packs a ton of life into each paragraph. That and a powerful ending give Tabloid City a definite wow factor. Buy it. Borrow it. Read it.”

— J. Curran, The Mystery Site

“In veteran newspaperman Pete Hamill’s new novel, no character has just one cross to bear, one death to mourn. Perhaps to match its setting, the book is full of big, lurid trouble, conveyed in the bluntest tough-guy terms possible. The plot throws together newspaper folk, terrorists, cops, homeless veterans, an aging painter, a patron of the arts, and other assorted New York types as they hurry about, colliding with one another in acts of lust, commerce, and crime.”

— Kate Tuttle, Boston Globe

“Tabloid City might be the most ambitious of all [Hamill’s novels]… as seen through the eyes of a disparate cast of characters as they hurtle toward an apocalyptic convergence…. Even though the major characters experience misfortune that would rival the trials of Job, the book exudes a subtle undercurrent of hope that would seem to reflect New York’s defiance in the aftermath of 9/11.”

— George Kimball, Irish Times

“Few authors are as synonymous with New York City as Pete Hamill, so it is fitting that the Brooklyn-bred darling of the Post and the Daily News returns with a story as frenetic, complicated, harrowing and alive as his beloved town. We begin Tabloid City at midnight with Sam Briscoe, an aging editor of a daily newspaper, putting the next day’s afternoon edition to bed. But the night is far from over in the city that never sleeps, and anything could happen before the ink hits the page…. As the night and the following day progress, Hamill weaves seemingly unrelated stories together in a cohesive narrative, showing both the deep chasms and the uncanny connections between the city’s many threads. He writes with an almost cinematic flair…. Hamill is, as always, a consummate storyteller, and his prose vibrates with raw energy…. Tabloid City is an exciting, thought-provoking read.”

— Rebecca Shapiro, BookPage

“In a storied career that included stints as editor of the Daily News and the Post, Pete Hamill has long been embraced as New York’s Own and likely one of its finest. Tabloid City stands as both an authentic thriller as well as a farewell to the city that was Hamill’s New York. Even as he insidiously builds the tension of a homegrown Islamic terrorist planning his final act, Hamill name-checks some of the great journalists of yesterday, then embodies them in characters like Helen Loomis, the achingly lonely rewrite woman who can tell any story on deadline, or Bobby Fonseca, the kid starting out who ardently believes in delivering the word. Throughout, Hamill conjures many recognizable New York types, then takes the giant step of connecting them. This is the veteran journalist at his best. Where others see only the grid that delineates New York by social status, Hamill eyes the intersections where all cross paths…. In Tabloid City, terrorism blindly lives among us while Hamill sees a world almost gone by. Those who would dismiss that world as nostalgia might consider what in today’s New York will they have to lovingly evoke years from now.”

— Sherryl Connelly, New York Daily News

“The story unfolds in time-stamped, you-are-there bursts that follow a large cast, including several journalists…. Hamill is at his best in the [newspaper editor] portions, rich in print anecdotes and mournful for a passing age…. Hamill nails the dying newsroom.”

— Publishers Weekly

“A large and lively cast…. provides Pete Hamill with an excellent vantage point from which to comment on — and lament over — his beloved city…. If you love New York, or journalism, you’ll love this book. And if (like me) you love both, you may not be able to put it down until you’ve finished.”

— John Greenya, Washington Times

“Pete Hamill’s engrossing new novel about a New York daily newspaper, its offices, and its editors and writers may seem like historical fiction. For readers who have been around a while, the book will in part read like a eulogy for good news sheets past. Everyone who stays with the book — which I recommend they do — will certainly regard it as a gritty tone-poem in prose on New York City life — and death. You’ll find the former on every page, depicted in Hamill’s enlivening plain style, while the latter — in the form of a double murder — plays a pivotal role in the development of his plot. The killings link a number of major characters in Hamill’s kaleidoscopic, almost hour-by-hour unfolding of nearly 24 hours of a day both typical and distinctive in contemporary Manhattan…. I found the characters so appealing…. He certainly is a good novelist, awfully good, in fact, writing, as he seems to be doing, in the literary tradition of John Dos Passos’s epoch-making Manhattan Transfer, and making a plausible contribution of his own.”

— Alan Cheuse, San Francisco Chronicle

“Tabloid City teems with life. People die in ugly ways in this riveting crime novel, but it’s also concerned with another death: the shutdown of a daily newspaper. At the same time, the book is a gritty, cynical but heartfelt love song to New York City, in days gone by and right this minute. Pete Hamill writes with authority on life in the newsroom…. [He] does a masterful job of structuring the novel, gradually revealing connections among all those people and building suspense as the body count mounts. The entire tale takes place in less than 24 hours, with the pressure of all sorts of deadlines adding to its urgency. He’s also adept at the telling detail, the kind that gives us a character in a couple of sentences…. As a thriller, Tabloid City works beautifully. But it’s just as much a fond farewell to an era of journalism that’s passing fast, with an eye toward its uncertain future.”

— Colette Bancroft, St. Petersburg Times

“[An] ambitious literary crime tale…. Veteran journalist and novelist Hamill serves up a distinctive take on the naked city with his eleventh novel. At its core, it is a lament for the ever-changing metropolis that eight million call home, a mournful love letter to the dying newspaper biz, and a tribute to the newshounds who hoof the pavement every day hungry to break a story and make their deadlines before dawn…. What makes Tabloid City extraordinary is its author’s clear-eyed observations of characters who know that their narratives are coming to an end, but who refuse to fade away quietly. He displays impressive skill binding it all together with prose that treads deftly between poetry and hard-boiled clarity. Pain, regret, and melancholy permeate the various story lines, but Hamill manages to generate compassion as well. The city may be stitched together with heartbreak, but there are also moments of tenderness and joy that resonate just as strongly…. Tabloid City will engage the crime reader who seeks a complex, thoughtful approach to noir.”

— Derek Hill, Mystery Scene

“Erstwhile newspaperman Hamill writes what he knows — New York City…. The fast-paced story travels from the Upper East Side to the Chelsea Hotel to a Brooklyn tenement and more, with an NYPD detective and an ambitious reporter as guides.”

— Billy Heller, New York Post

“The author handles his large cast with patience and clarity, and the city is well realized, as you’d expect from Hamill, himself a New York institution who has served as editor-in-chief of both of the [fictional] World’s very real rivals…. As with any reliable tabloid, there’s always another good story on the next page.”

— Allison Williams, Time Out New York