(Darktown #2)
Officer Denny Rakestraw and Negro Officers Lucius Boggs and Tommy Smith have their hands full in an overcrowded and rapidly changing Atlanta. Its 1950 and racial tensions are simmering as black families, including Smiths sister, begin moving into formerly all-white neighborhoods. When Rakes brother-in-law launches a scheme to rally the Ku Klux Klan to save their neighborhood, his efforts spiral out of control, forcing Rake to choose between loyalty to family or the law.
Across town, Boggs and Smith try to shut down the supply of white lightning and drugs into their territory, finding themselves up against more powerful foes than theyd expected. Battling corrupt cops and ex-cons, Nazi brown shirts and rogue Klansmen, the officers are drawn closer to the fires that threaten to consume the city once again.
With echoes of Walter Mosley and Dennis Lehane, Mullen demonstrates in Lightning Men why hes celebrated for writing crime fiction with a nimble sense of history...quick on its feet and vividly drawn" ( Dallas Morning News).