Harbor Nocturne - Softcover

"Joseph Wambaugh has been one of those necessary voices through the years--sometimes angry, sometimes illuminating, often wise, always funny and fascinating--and without him, the lives of many readers would be smaller. Including mine." -Stephen King "Joseph Wambaugh took crime fiction to a whole new level, to something beyond classification. These are stories with depth of character and humor and a cold, hard honesty that rings true with every read. I'm one of the few lucky enough to have already read a copy of Harbor Nocturne. It's Wambaugh at his best!" --Michael Connelly "Highly entertaining... Razor-edged dialogue punctuates the vignette-filled plot. Realistic criminals are well matched by Wambaugh's equally authentic police...in this darkly comic, gritty look at life on the streets." -"Publishers Weekly" (starred review) "Wambaugh embeds the stories he hears from cops within fiercely and ingeniously plotted mysteries...A very fast ride-along, enlivened by cop gallows humor, snarky street altercations, and an insistent pull to the dark side." -"Booklist" (starred review) "The sideshow acts Wambaugh presents mix legal justice and rough justice, laughter and tears, so inventively that it's hard to tell until the very end who'll come out on top." -"Kirkus Reviews" "The legendary Wambaugh's newest is chock-full of his trademark cop talk and offbeat side vignettes. His ability to weave a complex story together out of seemingly disparate elements lightens up some of the grittiness of big city police work." -"Library Journal"

Joseph Wambaugh, the former LAPD detective, multiple New York Times best-seller, and MWA Grand Master, is known as the father of the modern police novel and now, in Harbor Nocturne, he has produced one of the outstanding books of the year. Some LAPD characters from the acclaimed Hollywood Station series are here: the surfer cops known as Flotsam and Jetsam, aspiring actor Hollywood Nate Weiss, and young Britney Small, along with new members of the midwatch, all gamely coping with the wackiness of Hollywood. The story begins in the southernmost Los Angeles district of San Pedro, one of the world's busiest harbors, where an unlikely pair of lovers is caught up in terror and peril through no fault of their own. When Dinko Babich, a young longshoreman, delivers Lita Medina, a young Mexican dancer, from the harbor to a Hollywood nightclub, his life is forever changed as an unexpectedly tender and moving love story develops. Comedy and tragedy are intertwined in the everyday life of the cops and residents of San Pedro Harbor.