3 Quarters

Explosive, street-savvy, and authentic, acclaimed columnist Denis Hamill's novels are drawn in the gritty ink that can only flow from the pen of a native New Yorker...and a superbly talented writer.

Now, blending sinuous prose with a hair-trigger delivery, Hamill etches a novel set in a mercenary New York—where friends become enemies, cops are corrupted, and some must die, all for the sake of Bobby Emmet was a desperate man, an honest New York City cop, framed for the murder of his fiancée, and given one last chance to save himself—by an unlikely benefactor. Bobby didn't murder his fiancee, Dorothea Dubrow, and then cremate the body—but he has an idea who is responsible. His murder trial interrupted his investigation of a police medical pension scam—and revealed how little he really knew about Dorothea. Now suddenly free, he is imprisoned in a web of corruption, lies, and the kind of secrets people kill for.

Beginning his search for the truth at a shady security firm that employs able-bodied ex-cops, all of whom have mysteriously qualified for medical pensions—equal to a cool three-quarters of their salaries—he stumbles upon a startling discovery: the cremated remains that led to his conviction didn't really belong to Dorothea.

Bobby has a few allies: his policeman brother, his hacker daughter, his flamboyantly unprincipled lawyer, a cop or two who stood by him through the trial. But the same forces that landed him in jail more than a year before are putting a smothering squeeze on him now—and all roads lead to a powerful politician who will let nothing get between himself and the governor's mansion.

As the struggle to find the truth—and Dorothea—intensifies, Bobby begins to suspect that those around him are not as loyal as they appear. His liberty and very life depend on whether or not he can discover how high—and how near—the conspiracy goes before the trap closes on him.

At once lyrical and riveting, Three Quarters crackles in its electric setting, reverberating with a "relentless energy" (Lawrence Block) fueled by Hamill's intimate knowledge of and intense passion for New York City.

Next, we visit Bobby Emmett in the Wallkill State Correction Facility. Bobby is an ex-cop who was imprisoned for the murder of his girl friend, Dorothea; however a body was never found, and Bobby was obviously framed. Prison is not a good place for an ex-cop, and he is taunted, threatened and assaulted with constant banging on the steel bars. Bobby is visited by a sleazy lawyer, Izzy Gleason, who is just getting off a one-year bar association ethics committee suspension, and wants to restore his reputation by re-trying Bobby's case.

When Bobby starts to investigate his case, he finds that evidence was suppressed and there was a conspiracy among police and lawyers who are involved in a big-time scam to approve three-quarter pensions for corrupt cops. He is convinced that Dorothea is still alive, and his efforts to locate her and uncover the scam place him in constant peril.

The dialogue is gritty and vulgar, and the level of violence and corruption is frightening. The line between the good guys and the bad guys is blurred, and lives are cheap and quickly extinguished if they interfere with the ambitions of the corrupt cops. The plot is riveting, and the tension of not knowing who Bobby's real allies are keeps you turning pages rapidly.