First published 2012
Theodore Roosevelt arrives at police headquarters determined to transform New York City. The young commissioner faces a metropolis drowning in corruption, where forty thousand prostitutes work the streets, casinos glitter through the night, and police captains pocket bribes while looking away. Roosevelt launches his crusade against the brothels, gambling dens, and illegal saloons that define 1890s Manhattan. He clashes with Tammany Hall's political machine, walks midnight patrols with reformer Jacob Riis, and attempts to persuade two million New Yorkers to embrace respectable entertainment. But Roosevelt's moral campaign succeeds too well for his own good. Even his allies abandon him when his reforms bite too deep. The commissioner discovers that New Yorkers prefer their vices to his vision of virtue, and the city's appetite for sin proves stronger than any one man's righteousness.
Genres: historical-fiction, 20th-century, mystery, crime, 19th-century, american-history
Vibes: suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, fish-out-of-water
Setting: Manhattan, New York City
Period: 1890s
431 pages · Hardcover · Doubleday