Mean Business on North Ganson Street

A brutal dystopia serves as the setting for this present-day detective novel from Zahler (A Congregation of Jackals). The botched handling of an interview with a distraught man results in Arizona detective Jules Bettinger’s forced transfer to the police department in decaying Victory, Mo., a town of 26,000 with an extraordinarily high crime rate. Each of 24 officers “is responsible for a minimum of seven hundred criminals, four to five hundred of which have committed violent acts.” Bettinger soon discovers that other cops, including his new partner, Dominic Williams, don’t play by the rules. Their brutality, which reduced one criminal to a shattered cripple, initiates a war that begins with the murder of two cops and turns Victory into a cratered battleground. When Bettinger’s family comes under threat, he descends to the level of his new colleagues. The over-the-top tough guy dialogue wears thin, as does the constant graphic violence. Zahler, a screenwriter about to make his directorial debut, is adapting this book into a movie for Warner Brothers, with both Jamie Foxx and Leonardo DiCaprio attached to the project. Agent: Lydia Wills, Lydia Wills LLC. (Sept.)