The New Centurions

Joseph Wambaugh

Apr 2008 · Sold by Grand Central Publishing

About this ebook

Ex-cop turned #1 New York Times bestselling writer Joseph Wambaugh forged a new kind of literature with his great early police procedurals. Here in his classic debut novel, Wambaugh presents a stunning, raw, and unforgettable depiction of life behind the thin blue line.



In a class of new police recruits, Augustus Plebesly is fast and scared. Roy Fehler is full of ideals. And Serge Duran is an ex-marine running away from his Chicano childhood. In a few weeks they'll put on the blue uniform of the LAPD. In months they'll know how to interpret the mad babble of the car radio, smell danger, trap a drug dealer, hide a secret, and-most of all-live with the understanding that cops are different from everyone else. But for these men, these new centurions, time is an enemy. The year is 1960. The streets are burning with rage. And before they can grow old on this job, they'll have to fight for their lives...

About the author

Writer Joseph Wambaugh was born in East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on January 22, 1937. He joined the Marines right out of high school, but later earned both a B. A. and M. A. from California State College in Los Angeles. He worked for the Los Angeles Police Department from 1960 to 1974. His first novel was The New Centurions (1971) and several subsequent novels have been award winners. The Onion Field won an Edgar Award (1984), and Lines and Shadows won the Rodolfo Walsh Prize from the International Association of Crime Writers (1989). He has worked creatively on several film and television projects, including Police Story, The Black Marble, The Choirboys and The Blue Knight. Michael Connelly, Connelly graduated from the University of Florida in 1980 where he majored in journalism and minored in creative writing. After graduation, he worked at newspapers in Daytona Beach and Fort Lauderdale, Florida, specializing in the crime beat. He was writing about the police and crime during the wave of violence that came over South Florida during the "cocaine wars." In 1986, he interviewed survivors of a plane crash with two other reporters and the magazine story subsequently written on the crash was on the short list for the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing. This story led to a job as a crime reporter for the Los Angeles Times. After three years there, Connelly began writing his first novel. His first novel featured the LAPD Detective Hieronymus Bosch and was titled "The Black Echo" (1992). It was based, in part, on a true crime that occurred in Los Angeles, and "The Black Echo" won the Edgar Award for best first novel by the Mystery Writers of America. He followed up with three more Bosch novels titled "The Black Ice," "The Concrete Blonde," and "The Last Coyote." Afterwards, he published "The Poet" (1996), which featured a newspaper reporter as a protagonist, and "Blood Work" (1998), which was inspired by a friend's heart transplant and the "survivors guilt" that was experienced by his friend for living at the expense of somebody's death. "Angels Flight" (1999) brought back the Bosch series and in "Void Moon" (2000), Connelly introduced a new character, Cassie Black, who's a high stakes Las Vegas thief. Connelly's awards include the Edgar, Anthony, Macavity, Nero, Maltese Falcon (Japan),.38 Caliber (France) and the Grand Prix (France).