Widows

Summary

Another summer. Another heat wave. And another murder so brutal it’s hard to fathom the cruelty that stalks the city’s streets. When Susan Brauer was stabbed thirty-two times with a paring knife, Detectives Carella and Brown find clues that connect her to the senior partner of a prestigious law firm. That connection doesn’t happen, however, until he is dead on a city sidewalk.

An unrelated murder—that of Carella’s own father—has turned the detective’s world upside down, and the 45th Precinct’s investigation is hitting dead ends faster than a bullet turns a wife into a widow. But the lawyer has left behind a wife, an ex-wife, two grown daughters, and plenty of hidden animosities to fill a detective’s notebook. For the men who patrol the city, their personal lives take a back seat no matter how many surprises—and sorrows—they find along the way.

A probing, emotionally rich addition to bestselling author Ed McBain’s 87th Precinct series, Widows peels back the layers of protagonist Steve Carella’s past to deliver a procedural of extraordinary depth and resonance.