Motown (Detroit Crime Series #2) - Hardcover

Loren D. Estleman

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0553074210 ISBN 13: 9780553074215

Publisher: Bantam Books, 1991

Synopsis

Hired by a big car company to spy on a consumer advocate group calling for stricter safety standards, Detroit ex-cop Rick Amery becomes involved in a vicious street war between the mob and a tight-knit African-American community

About this title

From Kirkus Reviews:

Sinewy second volume of Estleman's projected three-part paean to crime in Detroit. It's 1966, and much has changed since the Prohibition days of Whiskey River (1990): now Detroit is famed for cars, not booze; its crime has spread from saloons to boardrooms; and its upstart gangsters are black, not Jewish. But much remains the same: The Mafia still dominates crime, and crime still gives the city the husky, hard-nosed nature so vigorously limned here by Estleman. The story unfolds through three intercut plotlines. The briefest, yet most resonant historically, follows police inspector Lew Canada as he digs into the early sins of labor leader Albert Brock (read: Jimmy Hoffa) for dirt to leverage Brock into staving off an incipient race war between black and Italian mobs. With help from the now-aged reporter Connie Minor--who narrated Whiskey River- -Canada finds the mud in an incriminating photograph and flings it at Brock in a confrontation redolent with the stink of the blood and sweat that built Detroit. Canada also figures in the galvanic second plotline--pointing to the city's future rather than its past--as he monitors two black racketeers about to mix it up with the Mafia. Caught in a squeeze between rival father and son Mafia bosses, Quincy Springfield and Lydell Lafayette prove the story's richest, most endearing characters, whose efforts to save their numbers rackets from mob takeover end in affecting tragedy and a political firestorm. Then there's the third plotline, detailing the conversion to consumer advocacy of an ex-cop hired by GM security to dig dirt on auto-industry gadfly Wendell Porter (read: Ralph Nader); though sleek and informative of Motown's corporate sins, it seems an anomalous, even superfluous, subplot. Less a painstaking re-creation like Whiskey River than a brawny--if patchy--urban portrait that's close in spirit to the author's Amos Walker p.i. series. As usual, Estleman's sly prose is good enough to make you read more than one page twice. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Publishers Weekly:

The second installment of Estleman's Detroit trilogy ( Whiskey River ) is terrific: fast, intricate and often funny. Choreographing the movements leading to the August 1966 Detroit riots, Estleman focuses on three main characters: Rick Amery, an ex-cop hired to spy on a Ralph Nader-like consumer advocate; inspector Lew Canada, trying to prevent a war between the Mafia and black gangs, and a likely race riot; and Quincy Springfield, numbers racketeer and "blind pig" (after-hours club) operator. But the author does not stint on minor characters, and they, too, leap off the page. A crippled mob boss resolves to oust "the coloreds" from the rackets while his exiled father schemes to reclaim the family business; there's also a retired newsman right off The Front Page , plus a Jimmy Hoffa-type labor leader. Set pieces are no less than stunning, notably a publicity stunt to embarrass GM chairman James Roche, and a big black funeral. Period details work wonderfully as well: the clothes, cars, songs, political references, even the price of lamb chops at the A & P are right on the money.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Bantam Books
• Publication date: 1991
• ISBN 10: 0553074210
• ISBN 13: 9780553074215
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 292