The life of a New York City police officer, with the NYPD running through his veins: a highly anticipated nonfiction epic-destined to be a classic. The excitement began from the moment of its acquisition in the fall of 1998, when major news organizations, including The New York Times, reported the sale of a book by the NYPD officer who wrote the "Cop's Diary" in The New Yorker, under the pseudonym Marcus Laffey. Now delivered, Blue Bloodis a bona fide literary masterpiece, an important book about what it means to protect, to serve, and to defend among the ranks of New York's finest. Conlon's canvas is great and complicated-he is the product of generations involved in law enforcement, good cops and bad-and the story he tells is impossibly rich: it presents an anecdotal history of New York through its police force, and paints a vivid portrait of the teeming street life of the city in all its horror and splendor. It is a story about fathers and sons, partners who become brothers, old ghosts and undying legacies. Here you will see terms like loyalty, commitment, and honor come alive, in action, on a daily basis. With brio and a thrilling literary style, Conlon depicts his life on the force-from his first days walking a beat in the South Bronx to his ascent to detective. The pace is relentless, the stories hypnotic, the scope nothing less than grand. Edward Conlon is a son of the Bronx, who still lives and works there. His father was a police officer who left the NYPD to join the FBI. His uncle was a lifelong officer of the NYPD. His great grandfather was a crooked cop-a dandy who "carried the bag on Atlantic Avenue"-during the Tammany Hall era. Blue Blood brings together a gifted writer with a subject he owns: Conlon captures the exquisite detail, the hilarious exchange of dialogue, the tragic and the marvelous, experienced firsthand, day after day. He has the Irish gift of storytelling, an old-school delivery, a killer sense of irony, and a sentimental heart. Conlon's father envisioned bigger things for his son, the Harvard graduate; but to Conlon, there is no greater job in the world. He answered the call. In the end, you know why he's a cop, why anyone becomes a cop. Without question, Blue Bloodwill be one of the most talked about and celebrated books of the year.