With that line this novel is set up perfectly.  This is a novel about dirty cops but it ask you the audience does the ends justify the means. This novel is really great a good follow up to the amazing The Cartel. A lot of people are comparing it as the Godfather for cops, which I think is fair. I would say it’s The Shield meets Carlito’s Way. this novel blend the gangster novel with the police procedural seamlessly. This Novel has it all double and triple crosses that all make sense. 

Stephen King says, “The Force is mesmerizing, a triumph. Think The Godfather, only with cops. It’s that good.”

The Plot: Denny Malone is a leader of a task force that works Northern Manhattan. He’s a cop with mostly good intensions, but he’s slowly taken a turn for the worst, after he steal half of a drug dealers stash with intentions of selling it. The feds get involve on some minor stuff that ends up being the end all to Denny and his team, is there a way for him to get redemption and not turn on his crew?

What I liked: The Pace is really fast, the novel jumps around a little with time but I never became lost. There’s a lot of characters, but the voices and the descriptions are so unique that I was rarely confused, in my other reviews this is something I criticize often. The twist are really good, I was convinced it was the end, but there’s a final twist. The writings good a couple memorable quotes,

What I did not like: Sometime the novel felt false, it bought up that he was a king a little too much, that it became redundant. I liked everything else though.

This Novel started a bidding war between movie studios for the rights, and will soon be a movie.  James Mangold will direct, his last movie was Logan, so I’m excited!

I would greatly recommend this novel for people who want a little more from police procedurals.   I would rate it 4.5 stars if I could. I liked the Cartel a little bit more then this one, more to the fact that the Cartel felt more real and raw, but not to knock the Force, the Cartel is really high on my scale of close to perfection, so the Force is a really good read. So far Winslow has been two for two for me I will have to read his earlier work very soon.