Dark Horse: An Eddy Harkness Novel

Dark Horse, a brand of particularly potent heroin, is cutting a broad swath through Boston’s South End in Flynn’s overly ambitious second Eddy Harkness novel (after 2014’s Third Rail). Meanwhile, a hurricane hits Southie hard, displacing many residents, some of whom take advantage of a strange old law that allows them to seek sanctuary in the quiet suburb of Nagog. Boston mayor Michael O’Mara and some of the city’s most powerful organizations—the Manchester Group and a “private civic think tank” called the Harbormasters—aren’t too upset by the havoc, as it represents a chance to rebuild the working-class neighborhood into an affluent enclave. Flynn is an extremely observant, skillful writer (“Stealing Yankee money arouses a special kind of anger, since each penny is so carefully pinched”). And Harkness is an attractive character, but the plot becomes so broad—drug trafficking, conspiracy, gentrification, political machinations, even a subplot involving the Boston Public Library—that the book loses focus and urgency. [em]Agent: Dan Conaway: Writers House. (June) [/em]