The Ruins

by Steve Wick

A gripping and electric thriller, where the grim horrors of Nazis in America collides with the manufacturing of the suburban dream—from a brilliant new voice in crime fiction.

On a fall night in 1954, in working-class Lindenhurst, Long Island, a woman goes alone to a bar filled with German speakers who’ve finished their shifts at different jobs—some at a groundbreaking new project run by a man named Leavitt. They are gathered to listen to the first game of the World Series between the New York Giants and the Cleveland Indians at the Polo Grounds. The game would make the history books because of “The Catch” at the outfield wall by Willie Mays.

But Lindenhurst's new chief of police, Paul Beirne, can't think about baseball. Still struggling with the demons from his time as a POW in Japan during the war, he gets the call that a woman's mutilated body is found in a field north of Lindenhurst, near where a new cemetery is being constructed to accommodate the growing suburbs. There hasn’t been a murder in the village in decades, and on top of this horrific crime, there is a suspicious accident on the railroad tracks.

Paul turns to his friend Doc, a Holocaust survivor and who, like Paul, suffers from the horrors of his past. But Paul has personal horrors, too, that are outside the purview of war. Or so he thinks. In stark contrast to the whitewashed ideal Leavitt and others in Lindenhurst are trying to create, an evil as taken root in Lindenhurst. What Paul and Doc uncover will lead Paul to another murder, one committed two decades before, as past and present, family and world war, collide in this intense and thrilling debut from a Pulizter Prize-winning writer.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Thriller

320 pages, Hardcover

Published February 4, 2025

Reviews

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

Am I to believe the hapless chief of police, Paul Beirne, himself not only a WWII veteran but a survivor of a Japanese prison camp, does not know what the tattooed number on Doc's arm means? That this passive drunk will morph into a combination of Jack Reacher and Sherlock Holmes, unraveling a complicated history of German espionage, the America First movement, a series of grisly murders, and the Lindbergh baby kidnapping, overcoming alcoholism and winning back his estranged wife and son along the way? I mean, you go Paul ... but I can't swallow it.

What kept me turning pages was the history of the German Bunds and the America First Party during the lead-up to WWII, the clandestine activities of German-American Nazi supporters and spies, and what may have been the real deets of the Lindbergh baby kidnapping and murder. Rachel Maddow has explored pre-WWII American Nazism in her Ultra podcast and a recent book titled Prequel: an American Fight Against Fascism. Steve Wick weaves into this actual history a plausible explanation of what really happened with the Lindbergh baby killing and murder. Speculation about whether Lindbergh himself engineered the kidnapping aside, The Ruins is a work of nonfiction with a thin veneer of fiction in the person of that hapless Long Island sheriff, himself the son of one of the main German plotters.

[Judy Mulder · Rating 1 out of 5]

Stopped at page 33. Not worth my time… too descriptive and gory - not worth my time.

[Carol Dimitriou · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was the most amazing book! The sense of dread that I felt from the beginning never let up. I couldn't put it down, it was that good.

[Jill · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was pretty slow to get going for me. It took me until halfway through to feel engaged in the story; and even then, though the story got interesting enough to keep me engaged the writing was choppy.

Also, I almost stopped reading quite early on given the graphic, gratuitous, and I think also unnecessary to the story manner of death for the first murder victim. It made me feel sick to read it about it multiple times throughout the book. It continued to bother me after the book ended because I don't think there was ever a clear reason given for why that particular method was chosen by the killer, and something less disturbing could have been just as effective.

[Floyd Garrett · Rating 1 out of 5]

There is a thread of a book here. This is Wick's first work of fiction. His non-fiction has won awards. My advice, stick to non-fiction.

Some of the actions of the very unlikeable main character, Paul, are so unbelieveable that it leaves you scracthing your head how this got by an editor.

There are so many characters, once introduced, Wick refers to again several pages later by their last name. Huh. Now who was that?

There is a lot of dialogue in German, much of it unexplained in a following sentence, where superior writers give the reader a glimplse of what was just said.

On a positive note, it's a quick read.

Boy, I really do hate giving negative reviews. But. . .

Life is short.

[Tom Godfrey · Rating 5 out of 5]

We are set on Long Island in the early 50s, back when the place was transitioning from mostly farmland into quintessential suburbia. One thing that people may not know about the Island is its history with Nazism, which is the main factor in this book. There were multiple towns that boasted chapters of the German-American Bund, which in the years just before the war were pro-Hitler, would parade down streets wearing Nazi regalia, and even having summer camps along the lines of the Hitler Youth. Yaphank, which in WWI was a training site for American troops, had regular trains transporting hundreds of people for rallies. In this case, we are in Lindenhurst, home to a large community of German emigres who came to the US after the Great War who still thought of themselves as Germans first. Very Nazi sympathetic. After WWII such sympathies had to go underground, but the basic hate in many people's hearts remained, including believers in eugenics, which preached the purposeful culling of all people who were "deficient". It is this theme that drives the story.

Don't be put off reading this book by the above precis. After all it is just a mystery, but with genuine historical precepts, including an unexpected slant on the Lindbergh Baby kidnapping.

[Gina Ristau · Rating 3 out of 5]

interesting move with a lot about Charles Lindbergh

This novel is long winded at times. It is thought provoking about Charles Lindbergh’s theory of having paid for the kidnapping of his son because he wasn’t perfect. History hasn’t been rewritten. The hatred of Jews in this book wasn’t what I had expected. It is thought provoking.

[Jami · Rating 3 out of 5]

Writing was amateur-ish and the story started to get very convoluted toward the middle. Lots of Germans, Nazis, and conspirators to keep track of. It all came together in the end thankfully and wrapped up nicely. This was a fun read and I think if Wick decides to keep up writing fiction he'll find his rhythm.

[angel edwards-hedberg · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this book, the time period, murder mystery, thriller, etc all appealed, but...I gave up about a third of the way through. There wasn't much depth to the characters & I didn't make it to thr Lindbergh baby bit. Maybe I'll revisit, but as another reader said life is too short & there is so much to read, why waste time on a slog.

[Naturegirl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Couldn’t put this one down, but it’s not for the squeamish. A murder has occurred and the officer meant to solve it uncovers his ties to a gruesome past. In the process of healing from his own war experience, he must now reckon with his father’s nazi crimes in the course of discovering who murdered a local woman and her husband.

[Gwenn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting ideas but there were too many characters. It was hard to remember who was who. A glossary would have helped. As far as too much German, there was always an English translation given by a character named Doc.

[Rolf · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very solid premise (Nazis in the Long Island suburbs in the 1950s!), very well-researched and based in the historical record. It took a bit for me to get in the groove of the narrative and the characters.

[Gene (for Kindle) · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting and quick read, took some unexpected turns along the way but comes together in the end. Some of the murder scene details are too graphic in my view and I could rate the book higher if that was toned down.

[Veronica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lindenhurst, Long Island New York
Oregon Road, potato farm Cutchogue NY
Pilgrim State, Brentwood, NY
Cold Spring Harbor Labs
Lindbergh baby
The Bund
Eugenics
Post WW II

[Nicole Gardiner · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

[Jack Nix · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very poorly written, but an interesting story to me due to the fact that I live where it all takes place. I ended up skimming a bit towards the end.

[Jim Willse · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terrific historical mystery with solid research behind it.

[Ellen]

Written in a "poem format," the book and its content didn't suit my reading tastes.
I stopped after a chapter or so.