Payback

Bestseller Carcaterra’s rambunctious sequel to 2019’s Tin Badges finds former NYPD cop Tank Rizzo enjoying the good life. He lives in a Greenwich Village brownstone he inherited mortgage-free from his parents, and eats most of his meals down the street at the restaurant owned by his old friend Carmine Tramonti, a former mobster, whose daughter, Connie, is his one and only love. Tank also looks after his 15-year-old nephew, Chris Rizzo, whose parents recently died in a car accident, and his old police partner Frank “Pearl” Monroe, who was wounded in their last case for the NYPD two years earlier. Each of them now needs Tank’s help. Chris believes a shady investment firm was behind his parents’ deaths, and Pearl wants justice for convicted murderer Randy Jenkins. Randy went to prison 17 years earlier after Det. Eddie Kenwood, a dirty cop, persuaded him to confess to a crime he didn’t commit. The two cases intertwine in an action-filled plot spiced with gangster lore and New York history. Those who like their cop novels to take retribution to wild and wicked extremes will have fun. Agent: Suzanne Gluck, William Morris Endeavor. (Aug.)