The Mugger is a mystery novel in the 87th Precinct series by author Ed McBain.
A battered cop is on the trail of a deadly criminal, but when it suddenly becomes personal, his own life could be the next thing to be robbed.
I happened to read both books during the seasons in which they were written. I was impressed with McCain’s atmospheric writing, perhaps because I experienced the seasons as he described them. He was able to capture a sense of the city, partly because of the different seasons.
McBain describes the city as if it were a woman (his words) and so the reader can feel the dress sticking to her skin; Whether it’s the sweltering sweat of summer, or the leaves falling around your ankles on a wet sidewalk.
Once the mood settles, the actors are introduced: the criminals and the crimes they commit, the peacemakers, and the families at home.
“You know her head tilted in the molting fall foliage, Riverhead and the park. […] You’ve seen her bare paths, heard the sullen whisper of the wind in the canyon. Isola’s concrete, watched her to her senses, alive […] She was sometimes big and sprawled and dirty, sometimes she screamed in pain, and sometimes she groaned in ecstasy.
But she can’t be anything but a woman, and that’s fine because your job is to be a woman.
