MIDNIGHT APPROACHES
Kevin Egan’s sixth novel, Midnight, will hit bookstores in the early summer of 2013. Midnight marks a radical shift in Kevin’s writing. Four of his previous novels – the Conor Daly series and the stand-alone Where It Lies – occupied the sub-sub-genre known as golf mysteries. These novels, each narrated by an amateur sleuth with a serious stake in the outcome, dealt with murder and mayhem in the genteel setting of a suburban country club. In writing these novels, Kevin drew on his experiences working at a golf course during his high school and college summers. Booklist recognized the realism of both plot and setting when it called Buried Lies simply “the best golfing mystery on the market.”
In Midnight, Kevin portrays a much different environment – the iconic New York County Courthouse in lower Manhattan. Even if you never have been to Manhattan, you have likely seen the building’s wide front steps and massive columns in crime dramas like Law & Order and Bluebloods and in movies like The Adjustment Bureau and The Godfather. Kevin knows the courthouse well; he has worked there as a law clerk, foreclosure mediator, and administrator for over twenty years.
The story begins with a simple premise: when a judge dies, the judge’s law clerk and personal secretary keep their jobs until the end of that calendar year. So, when Judge Alvin Canter quietly expires in his chambers on the morning of December 31, his clerk and secretary find themselves in a difficult predicament. Their jobs will vanish at closing time – unless they can conceal the judge’s death until after midnight. Neither Tom Carroway nor Carol Scilingo can afford to lose their jobs. Tom is deeply in debt to an impatient loan shark, while Carol is a struggling single mom with a young son and an aging mother depending on her. And both have secrets they’re desperate to keep hidden.
The plan seems simple enough: make it look like the judge died at home on New Year’s Day. But that’s before a crooked union boss gets involved, and a brutal mob enforcer, and Carol’s suspicious ex-boyfriend ...
Soon, Tom and Carol find themselves embroiled in an increasingly dangerous conspiracy. And if they’re not careful, more than one body may be discovered in the new year.
Advance praise for MIDNIGHT:
With relentless suspense, cinematic pacing and a twist around every corner, Kevin Egan creates a brand new genre: legal thriller noir. Clear your calendars and alert Hollywood – this realistic, original and downright terrific page-turner will be the book everyone’s reading!
– Hank Phillippi Ryan, Agatha and Macavity-winning author
Alfred Hitchcock would have loved Midnight’s twisty, original plot.
– Phillip Margolin, New York Times best selling author of Sleight of Hand
Midnight is the most bracingly original thriller of the year. ... Here is a noirish tale layered with both style and substance, packed with colorful characters who give a new meaning to the word sinister. Great fun that is not to be missed!
– Jon Land, bestselling author of the Caitlin Strong series
My favorite noir-infused books take ordinary people and put them in extraordinary circumstances, where one false move can prove deadly. That’s exactly what Kevin Egan does with his thrilling novel Midnight. Forget sleep—this twisted tale will get your heart pounding right up until the last page.
– Hilary Davidson, Anthony Award – winning author of Evil in all its Disguises
Midnight A Forge Book published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC, New York July 2, 2013