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    Among The Shadows: A Detective Byron Mystery
    Unavailable
    Among The Shadows: A Detective Byron Mystery
    Unavailable
    Among The Shadows: A Detective Byron Mystery
    Ebook422 pages6 hours

    Among The Shadows: A Detective Byron Mystery

    By Bruce Robert Coffin

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    Maine Sunday Telegram #1 Bestseller

    "A first-rate novel. Suspenseful and highly entertaining." -- New York Times bestselling author Gayle Lynds

    Fall in Portland, Maine usually arrives as a welcome respite from summer’s sweltering temperatures and, with the tourists gone, a return to normal life—usually. But when a retired cop is murdered, things heat up quickly, setting the city on edge.

    Detective Sergeant John Byron, a second-generation cop, is tasked with investigating the case—at the very moment his life is unraveling. On the outs with his department’s upper echelon, separated from his wife, and feeling the strong pull of the bottle, Byron remains all business as he tries to solve the murder of one of their own. And when another ex-Portland PD officer dies under suspicious circumstances, he quickly realizes there’s much more to these cases than meets the eye. The closer Byron gets to the truth, the greater the danger for him and his fellow detectives.

    This taut, atmospheric thriller will appeal to fans of Michael Connelly and John Sandford.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateSep 13, 2016
    ISBN9780062569462
    Unavailable
    Among The Shadows: A Detective Byron Mystery
    Author

    Bruce Robert Coffin

    Bruce Robert Coffin is a retired police detective sergeant and bestselling author of the Detective Byron Mysteries. He lives and writes in Maine. brucerobertcoffin.com

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    Reviews for Among The Shadows

    4/5

    17 ratings3 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Great police procedural. had some cliches--guy about to divorce his wife, drinks too much, cares too much, but the murder mystery is excellent and the cliches either stayed in the background or moved there. Good place for them. Highly recommended if you like thrillers or police procedurals. The pacing and characterization is spot-on.
    • 1/5
      Detective John Byron is a burnt out alcoholic cop working homicides for the Portland, Maine police department. His personal life is in shambles and his wife has recently served him with divorce papers. But Byron has to push all these problems aside when someone starts murdering former police officers. Soon it's clear that there is a serial killer on the loose and he's working his way through the former membership of an elite drug squad that operated back in the 80s. Detective Byron's father was a member of that team as well, but he's been dead for many years after committing suicide. It seems that this team of police were corrupt and stealing money from crime scenes. Byron is now in the awkward position of believing that the crimes were motivated by this corruption within his own department. He must keep his suspicions close because one of the former members of the team is now his boss's boss. He is also trying to interfere with Bryon's investigation. Meanwhile, Bryon is also juggling his growing attraction to his partner. They have both been having feelings for each other for a long time but they never acted upon it because Byron was married. Now that his wife and he are permanently split, they are having trouble maintaining their composure.Can Byron catch the killer before more cops die? Can he trust the people who are helping him? Woof, this book is just real bad. I was given this book by my in laws, because they live in Maine and thought it was cool that it was set in Portland. I also love Maine, so I thought I would give this book a try. First of all, if you are reading this book because you want to read a book set in Maine, choose a different author. This one does not spend much time describing anything, much less the city of Portland. Beyond a few place names here and there, it's really not much of a factor in the story.Moreover, the writing relies really heavily on tropes. Byron is the most stereotypical hard boiled cop you can imagine. He's incredibly generic and there is nothing special or interesting about him. In fact, he's not very likeable and is actually a danger to the population. In this book, he fails his shooting test and is only allowed to continue because his partner cheats to make it look like he can actually hit what he's aiming at. The person giving the test knows what happened but inexplicably lets it slide. Later, Byron drives around while blackout drunk. He wakes up hungover in a parking lot. He doesn't even seem to care that he might have killed someone. He just sort of shrugs and says, "oh well" and drives home. It's horrifically irresponsible behavior and honestly, it's pretty shocking that the author thinks his readers will continue to root for Byron when he's such a demonstrably dangerous person to be in a position of power.Next on the list of troubling elements in this book is Byron's relationship with his partner. Their relationship comes out of nowhere and makes no sense. The author makes no attempt to explain why a successful, attractive, young police officer would be interested in dating Byron - a man with nothing going for him. The two have no chemistry and reading their sex scene was an exercise in cringe.To make matters worse, Byron's partner is a black woman, an issue which is handled in a gross and exploitative way. Let's just say, it comes up a lot and feels very demeaning and tokenizing. I'm not 100% positive, but I'm pretty sure she's the only person of color in the book and she is definitely the only woman with more that an extremely passing mention in the narrative. Her only motivation seems to be to help Byron succeed, and she seems to have no real ambition of her own. Byron himself is a picture of toxic masculinity, male fragility, and white privilege. We are constantly being told that he is a great detective, but we are given no real evidence of it. We are however, given many scenes where he is putting innocent people in danger or becoming violent, petulant, or immature at even the slightest impediment to his wishes.Finally, there is the troubling narrative this novel has around issues of suicide. Byron's father supposedly killed himself when Byron was young. All his life, he's hated his father for being a coward. Byron spends a fair amount of time complaining about how pathetic his father was, as is anyone who would kill themselves. Even though Byron apparently had a good relationship with his father, he just discarded his memory after what he perceived as this betrayal. Again, this is the book's protagonist, and it's pretty glaring that he doesn't seem to think this will make the reader loose sympathy for him. Later, it is revealed that his father was actually murdered. So.. you know, whew! I guess Byron isn't the son of a coward after all. What a relief! This is obviously a pretty terrible perspective on mental health issues. This is only underlined when his partner suggests that he might what to get some counseling to deal with all the troubling revelations he's faced. He immediately dismisses this as waste of time and not something that he will even consider. It's hard for me to imagine someone who more desperately needs counseling than this walking sack of shit human being, but of course he's unwilling because he thinks he's great. Obviously, the author expects us to agree with Byron. Beyond these complaints, the book is just dry and tedious. The plot is essentially Byron driving from one location to another, asking questions and eating at various diners. There are no stakes for the reader as the only people being killed are corrupt cops, and it was pretty clear that one of these corrupt cops was silencing the others. Even the climactic shoot out what just so stupid and boring, and just served to underline how fucking dumb Byron his. He's walking into a shoot out - he knows this, but decides not to put on a bullet proof vest because a retired FBI agent he's working with tells him not to. HUGE SHOCKER, that FBI agent is one of the bad guys. How does that comment even make sense? And just because the FBI agent has a death wish, why would that influence Byron not to wear one? Is he just that macho? If he puts a vest on will that make him less of a man? Gay? What exactly is he afraid of?Then, in the end, Byron's partner, who's in the hospital with a concussion, has to check herself out and race across the city to save his ass. Literally, what does she see in this guy? She takes a bullet for her troubles so now she's back in the hospital. Literally, Byron was the only person who didn't get hurt in the shoot out. Exactly what did he contribute to the situation by being there? Seriously, Byron is the worst cop/person I've even seen.Later, when he's giving his statement, he storms out of the interview room and petulantly quits when they ask too many pointed questions. I mean, get real bro, it looks fucking suspicious that you're the only one that didn't get hurt and you also killed someone. Like... of course they're going to have questions. But also, you probably shouldn't be a cop. You're really bad at it. Anyways, this was a bad book. I don't recommend it.
    • 4/5
      If you want a police procedural that rings true, Coffin is the writer to go to. A detective in the Portland, Maine police and then worked with the FBI on terrorism he knows his stuff. This one is about killings of retired police officers. Packs a punch.