Two kinds of cops find their way to Portland's North Precinct: those who are sent there for punishment, and those who come for the action. Officer Hanson is the second kind, a veteran who survived the war in Vietnam only to come home and fight for his own code of justice. But in this 1996 novel by the author of Sympathy for the Devil, an enemy, this time close to home, is prying into Hanson's war record. Battling his own painful memories of the war, Hanson risks his career, his sanity—even his life—for honor.

"Every so often, you come across a crime novel that flat-out blows you away and restores your faith in the entire genre. [This] is one of those books. I think it's the best novel I've read, period, in the last couple of years."—George Pelecanos