Precinct Command

Lt. Joe Dante #6

by Christopher Newman

Even cynical New York City is rocked by the brutal murder of Congresswoman Cora Davis. An outspoken advocate of warning labels on rock music, she is censored forever when she's bludgeoned and strangled in a Manhattan hotel room.

Lt. Joe Dante's prime—and only—suspects are the last two people to see Davis alive: the lead singer of the rock megaband Crucifixion and the wife of a right-wing Southern senator. Polar opposites in the public eye, these two are secret lovers.

Heading up the homicide investigation, Dante is thrust into a tangle of hypocrisy and intrigue. While angry NYPD brass breathe down his neck, Joe's up to his chin in blackmail, sex scandals, cover-ups... and a mounting body count. Dante's in double jeopardy: if he doesn't crack the case, his badge is on the line—but trapping his vicious prey means putting himself in the line of fire...

Genres: Fiction

286 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 24, 1993

About the author

Born in San Francisco, California in 1952, Christopher Newman was educated in Bay Area Catholic schools, the University of California at Santa Cruz and Birmingham University, England. He travelled overland from Europe across the Asian subcontinent to Singapore alone in his late teens. Before he was 21 he'd worked for a year aboard a tanker plying trade between the Persian Gulf and ports around the Pacific rim. He wrote the first draft of his third published novel, Manana Man, while in residence in Cali, Colombia his senior year in college. At 27, he moved to New York City, working as a trim carpenter for five years in Manhattan before publishing his first Joe Dante novel, Midtown South, in 1985. When that title met with considerable commercial success, his publisher convinced him to turn his protagonist into a series character. Eight more Joe Dante novels followed, all making various national best seller lists. Midtown North, published in 1991, was nominated for an Edgar Allan Poe Award by the Mystery Writers of America. Chains of Command, left unfinished at the time of best-selling author William Caunitz death in 1998, was completed by Mr. Newman at the estate's request. It was named a 1999 New York Times Notable Book of the Year.

Mr. Newman left New York in 2002 and currently resides in Lexington, Kentucky.