The Manhattan Confession

Green’s immersive latest in the On Central Park series (after The Hudson Collection) centers on a librarian who becomes unwittingly enmeshed in a web of crime. In 1926, the New York Historical Society, where Ivy Malone works as a librarian, publishes an excerpt of her interview with an anonymous former gang member. Unbeknownst to readers, the ex-gangster is Adeline King, an Irish immigrant who clawed her way out of a rough-and-tumble past into New York City’s upper crust. Ivy’s determined to keep her friend’s identity under wraps, but library patrons soon ask to read the full interview, and a man claiming a connection to one of Adeline’s former victims seeks retribution. Then Ivy’s cousin Gina gets detained on Ellis Island, forcing Ivy to call on Adeline’s alluring neighbor, Tom, to prevent her deportation. Things reach a boiling point when an ill-advised deal to rescue Gina lands Ivy in more trouble than she started with, and she must draw on her faith to shield her friend’s secret and her cousin’s fragile legal status. Green makes up for a meandering middle section with a fast-paced third act and a textured historical backdrop that brings the seedy side of 1920s Manhattan to vivid life. Readers will be swept up. (Apr.)