Book Review
The Long Good-bye Don Winslow on his final novel , ‘ City in Ruins ’ By Tom Mayer , CNHI News Service , Photo by Robert Gallagher
Prolific author Don Winslow has been thrilling readers since his first published novel , the inaugural offering of his Neal Carey series , “ A Cool Breeze on the Underground ,” in 1991 . More than three decades and dozens of books later , he offers us his last . But what a way to go out . “ City in Ruins ” completes Winslow ’ s triumvirate magnum opus , a novel that along with “ City on Fire ” ( 2022 ) and “ City of Dreams ” ( 2023 ) ends the feuding Moretti-Murphy crime family , Danny Ryan saga . The trilogy sprang from Winslow ’ s reading of the classics a generation ago , and the story based on Virgil ’ s “ The Aeneid ” took 30 years and more than 1,100 pages to complete . Now that it ’ s done , Winslow says it ’ s time to liberate his working hours for other passions , and particularly political activism .
The announcement in spring 2022 that “ City in Ruins ” would be his last novel — though not last literary endeavor with myriad books in movie or series production , and much of his back catalogue revived with new publications — came as a surprise to just about everyone except Winslow , himself . For the author , it was a carefully orchestrated next step in a life of careers that has included leading photographic safaris in Kenya , directing Shakespeare productions , managing a theater in New York City , private investigation work in Times Square and finally , with the film and publishing deal for his novel , “ The Death and Life of Bobby Z ” ( 1997 ), a secure future living and writing in California .
That writing , in the past 33 years , has earned Winslow
Don Winslow talks one last novel , “ City in Ruins ,” before he turns his focus in a new direction outside the literary world .
vast accolades , awards , production deals and praise from colleagues — the “ who ’ s ” in “ the who ’ s who ” of classic and contemporary crime and thriller fiction writing — most of whom he thanks and pays homage to in the acknowledgements in this final book .
Gracious to a fault , Winslow agreed a week before the novel ’ s April publication date to take a few phone questions during the 7 a . m . hour from his home in California . We spoke about the new novel , his career and what ’ s next for the man who once claimed writing to be an “ addiction .” The following interview has been edited for clarity and length .
Tom Mayer : Don , good morning , there ’ s a lot to unpack with the Danny Ryan trilogy , and especially in “ City in Ruins .” Morality , judgment , guilt , the classics are heavy subjects for 7:15 a . m . Thank you for taking the time this morning . To begin , you completed the trilogy during the pandemic , didn ’ t you ?
Don Winslow : That ’ s correct .
Although you were working on the story long before the pandemic began , did the lockdowns or other societal quirks influence the writing ? I ’ m thinking of Danny , who is such a flawed hero . He ’ s faced at times with tremendous temptations and choices , but it seems it ’ s always in his nature to do what he believes to be the best , right thing . Like , when presented with two evils , he always tries to pick the lesser , even to his own detriment . Many of us hope it would be that way for our society , but Covid didn ’ t always bear that out . Is this sense of altruism www . meridianstar . com
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