Undoubtedly, this is the great American crime novel of the decade and it’ll be the book which in future everyone will associate with Don Winslow. They’ll probably use it as a required text in literary degree courses – an epic of both grand and human proportions which thoroughly exposes the conflicts in the human condition in western society, using the NYPD in post-911 America as its malign and magnificent example. It’s probably not Winslow’s best book (that might be Frankie Machine, or Savages), but it’s certainly one of the best American crime novels of this century.

Where Winslow excels is in exploring the clichés of the genre, in validating the aspects which led them to be true which rejecting their ridiculously romanticised or sanitised aspects. The Projects aren’t comfortable places, run by benevolent gangsters for the benefit of the inhabitants. They’re powderkegs on a short fuse, where any household could easily encompass perpetrator and victim, citizen and criminal… sometimes in one single person.

Racism and corruption are rife, not simply on the streets but at every level of society and in all institutions, both the legal and the illicit organisations. Winslow’s craft is in pulling a solid story out of what could so easily be an extended piece of factual journalism – of giving recognisable faces and big hearts to the men who hold the line and the men who break the rules. You end up rooting for Detective Malone even though you know he has crossed the lines in the worst kind of ways.

While the story sweeps you along, and you try to figure out how Malone might escape the net which threatens to ensnare him, his team, his family and his friends, you also get an education on the reality of urban policing. On what happened to PD budgets when the funding was transferred to anti-terror efforts. On how junkies can be anyone, a working professional as easily as a gangbanger. On how lax gun laws in some states facilitate the flow of arms into the big cities. It’s all delivered with an emotional gut-punch because Winslow doesn’t lecture – he leads us by the nose and shows us the men in conflict, the dirty money, the ruined lives and the blood in the gutter.

Afterwards you might sit back and applaud his meticulous research into modern policing, the correct language and procedures, the gritty gun stuff and the outright nasty street stuff, plus all aspects of inter-agency interactions – but while you’re reading the story then all you care about is Malone’s personal implosion and the pounding sound of your own pulse. Yet, despite the compelling narrative none of the cast of characters escape from the page to embed themselves in the reader’s psyche. I’m still a little bit in love with Ben and Chon and O from Savages; I might’ve gotten something in my eye when the final fate of Frankie Machine was played out. By contrast, Denny and Monty and the rest of Da Force were well constructed and sympathetically written, but they exist to serve the story without achieving fictional immortality for themselves.

This is a meaty story so set aside plenty of time to be utterly engrossed. Inevitably it’s been optioned to make into a movie – Scott Free will have fun cramming all of this into two hours – and that kinda shows up in the final chapters which lose some of the credible realism of the overall book and lapse into more cinematic show-boating. Winslow also can’t resist some speechifying in the closing stages which, for me, was overkill. I got the message loud and clear all through the gripping story: life matters; black, blue or any other colour.

8/10

Quite simply Don Winslow is up there with the best and rivals the likes of Michael Connelly and Wambaugh. This is an epic morality tale of the NYPD and the drugs squad who are on the take whilst still busting criminals.

Brilliantly written, wonderfully plotted description of evil and human frailty. Breathtakingly good.

Don Winslow has long been a force to be reckoned with in crime fiction. Novels such as Savages and The Winter of Frankie Machine have been hailed to much acclaim. To my mind though it was his duo of titles on the Mexican drug wars that elevated him into the A-list. The Power of the Dog and its sequel The Cartel, were rightly seen as masterpieces, sagas that chronicled the rise of the drug cartels, the narcotic border wars, the corruption and devastation they wrought on Mexican society. It’s no surprise to learn that The Cartel is set to be made into a film, with Ridley Scott as director and Leonardo di Caprio as lead. Nor does it come as a shock to learn that Winslow himself is now one of the hottest writers around. For example, the director Michael Mann is now in collaboration with Winslow to write a novel about the relationship between the infamous organised crime figures, Tony Accardo and Sam Giancana.

In the meantime, we have The Force. If anyone thought that Winslow would rest on his laurels after the success of The Cartel, then The Force should rudely strip them of that notion. Denny Malone is a legendary NYPD detective sergeant, he’s “the King of Manhattan North”, the unofficial leader of The Manhattan North Special Task Force, an elite squad of officers whose job it is to keep a lid on crime in the city, allowing the wheels of commerce to keep turning in the post-Rudy Giulliani, zero-tolerance era. He’s a corrupt officer, as most of his squad are, but they’re not wicked as such. Their corruption has a pragmatic quality, a weary knowingness that all around them others are profiting – drug dealers, most obviously, but also politicians and property developers – and they’re own skimming is just a means of looking after their families, supplementing their meagre incomes.

Throughout though, there’s a sense that the situation as it stands is ephemeral, that Denny and his squad are living on borrowed time. Winslow is a master plotter and is adept at building tension. Obstacles and adversaries mount: the rival taskforce detective who wants Denny’s crown, the approaching drug war between two rival syndicates, the boss who knows he’s corrupt but wants results, the investigators breathing down his neck. The novel starts with Denny in a cell having been arrested, so we the reader know this is all going to come a head, the questions is how and will Denny and his squad emerge the other side?

Some might read this review and think that there’s nothing original here, that TV series such as The Wire and The Shield, films and other novels, have covered similar ground before. To an extent, they would be right. But Winslow elevates The Force above much of the competition, through both his skill as a storyteller, and his original slant. There are two aspects that make The Force special. The first is that this novel is set very firmly in 2017. Black Lives Matter and the tensions caused by police shootings across the Unites States are constantly in the background. But perhaps more importantly for the story’s narrative is the modernity of the City of New York. Gone are the crime ridden days of the 1970’s and 80’s where New York was almost written off as a bankrupt hellhole. 2017 New York is a place of million dollar condos, gentrification, with the poor and disenfranchised firmly kept in their place. In fact, Winslow creates the firm impression that the NYPD’s job as whole, that of Denny’s taskforce in particular, is exactly to enforce this status quo so that the wealthy can continue earning and enjoying the lifestyles that they’ve grown accustomed to. This brings me to the second aspect that elevates this novel beyond the norm and that’s the sense of place Winslow conjures. Normally, when a writer talks of sense of place, they mean setting. So, an author will set a novel in New York, describe streets, smells, vernacular, etc. At its worst this can take a form of tick box travelogue. In Winslow’s novel on the other hand, we get a sense of New York not just as a physical locale, but as a socio-political environment. There’s simply nowhere else this novel could be set. Winslow’s The Force is more than just a crime novel set in the city of New York, it’s a critique of what makes that city tick.

In conclusion, I’ve read quite a few of Don Winslow’s novels. Some I’ve enjoyed more than others, some have been better than others. I loved The Power of the Dog and The Cartel, thought them both crowning achievements, but the Force is his best yet. The Force is also Winslow’s most subversive book to date, it’s imbued with subtle but ever-present anger and outrage, something which is even more effective in a crime novel. Where a ‘literary’ novel which wears its social conscience on its sleeve might be wearying, when done well, as Winslow does here, a crime novel can distract with the obvious crimes – the drug dealing, the robberies, the murders – while feeding the reader a steady diet of indignity at the more insidious crimes of the powerful. This Winslow does with aplomb. I read recently that The Force too has been optioned by 20th Century Fox. This is yet something else to not come as a surprise. For truly, The Force is to date Winslow’s magnum opus.

Possibly the best thriller (or novel) of the year?

The Force is the first of Winslow’s novels that I’ve read. It will definitely not be the last. There was a lot of pre-publication buzz surrounding this novel, and I can certainly now see why: it’s superb. On almost every level, this novel is a triumph.

It is tempting to wax rhapsodic, at length about this novel. I will, however, restrain myself. It’s gritty, it’s brutally honest (even when that’s uncomfortable), it’s epic in scope, and it’s utterly gripping. I ended up reading the final third of the novel well into the wee hours of the morning, needing to find out what happens. I was genuinely hooked. Winslow’s prose is excellent, and the story is gripping throughout. Winslow doesn’t shy away from uncomfortable topics, and does a great job of presenting multiple sides of an argument (the sane ones, anyway). The issues of cop-shootings, racism (institutional and general), city corruption and politics… Everything is laid bare in all its ‘glory’.

Each character in the novel is flawed, often deeply. There are no paragons of virtue. Even the ‘heroes’ commit some heinous acts. This will make some readers uncomfortable, of course, but the fact that the entire novel exists in the various shades of grey is one of its strengths. I suppose good parallels could be found in The Sopranos and The Shield TV shows. The good do good, but they have no qualms over taking shortcuts to do the best for the city, the Force, and/or themselves. One theme of the novel is how corruption can be gradual, and that sometimes it can be borne of the best intentions. It is also about brotherhood and tribalism. The fierce bond between members of the titular Force, as well as the larger NYPD; but also the bonds among the gang bangers; the unexpected bonds between cops and their CIs; and between cops and their oft-neglected families.

New York is brilliantly, grubbily portrayed in the novel. From the projects in Harlem, to the halls of justice, to the glittering penthouses — everywhere is presented as having a patina of corruption and moral rot. Sometimes, this rot is the result of long-time persecution, neglect or despair. Other times, it’s the result of greed and unchecked (or highly privileged) ambition. But, at the same time, each has moments of light and hope. Or decency, when a wayward inhabitant is presented with a better option. The side-characters throughout are pulled from all over the New York spectrum, salubrious and not (and many areas across both). They are excellently drawn characters, and all are realistic (and, if you’ve spent much time in New York, often familiar).

The ending is possibly the most epic I’ve ever read in a thriller. Perfectly executed, absolutely gripping. If you read only one crime novel this year, make it The Force.

Very highly recommended, The Force is a must read.

A New York tale that delivers with a masculine potent prose in a rat a tat formation he has you hanging on in the developing momentum, in the web.
This plays out like a chess game you have your pawns and your knights and then your kings and just how will it all end keeps you in the hook.
A good cop that’s all he wanted to be, but in the miles that contain New York many powers are at play upon the stage and behind the scenes, in a chess match, right from the poor man on the street wanting a fix of food, or drink, or home, or a fix of another kind, a high, there is entrapment and enterprise to be had for the taking, people’s lives that don’t matter in play, pawns with odds against them, this cop Denny Malone makes moves some that he will regret and some that just had to be done to keep the bad guys not so badder and the guys at top not so comfortable.
Relevant writing for todays times, stripped from the headlines, with Cops and policing, and the crossing over to crooked or staying clean and following the rules, the politics, the racism, the hard job of being a good cop amongst corrupt, all have their time of day upon the page with the main character, an irish American cop, Denny Malone, one that loves New York, he has policing in his blood a New Yorker through and through, an unprejudiced cop, a likeable cop for the reader, caught in some intricate goings on that just has you wandering who’s in the right.
The main protagonist, Denny Malone, the author handles with some great character development.
The thrill is there, the empathy for this cop against it and part of it and in the thick of it, has the reader find himself hooked in the narratives sharp and potent prose with brevity and well crafted dialogue (that does have profanities so be aware).
Read the book, and when its out, watch the movie.

I'd never heard of Don Winslow before but thanks to social media, I was made aware of a new title hitting the shelves. The Force is a brutal and raw novel about a hero cop and his downward spiral to dirty cop. Mr Winslow paints a vivid picture of the NYPD and its neighbourhoods and inhabitants and explores the close ties cops have with their partners. A truly stunning novel that hooks you from the start and never lets up.

This sub-The Shield take on an elite police squad in NYPD is certainly pacy and action-packed but... but... but... it is *very* similar to The Shield. Top-dog Malone is a Vic Mackey-style street cop who treads a narrow line between doing good and being as corrupt as the criminals he's chasing - until he crosses that line by lifting a cargo of drugs and distributing them on the street, a take on the heist sub-plot of The Shield.

The political commentary, the concern with race and gender, the internal power struggles and the sheer doggedness of modern policing in a complex city like NY all feed into the story, but again lack freshness following The Shield, The Wire and other TV series. Malone is a version of the iconic morally-ambiguous cop: doing bad things for what he sees as good ends, and his final attempt towards some kind of moral redemption is fitting.

I like Winslow and his depth of research is impressive but this pales in comparison to the smart writing and hard-hitting human stories that The Shield brought us - sorry, but this feels like a tamer, paler, less snappy version of something that shook up the police genre years ago.