I have noted in the past my arm’s-length relationship toward personal finances, and my ongoing efforts to be, if not on more intimate terms with money, at least more cordial ones. Which is why I’m always happy to see the subject addressed head-on in crime fiction. Class, the eternal third rail of American society, animates the action in two strong new novels.
Chris Pavone, whose previous books focus on international intrigue, takes a swing at a Richard Price-style Big New York Novel and clears the bases with The Doorman (2025). Chicky Diaz holds the title post at the Bohemia, one of Manhattan’s most-storied residences. He understands the job, knowing that when the building’s well-heeled tenants ask how he’s doing, they’re not interested in an honest answer. They don’t want to hear that Chicky is now a widower drowning in so much medical debt he’s about to lose his own tiny apartment, that he’s been forced to take on a side hustle to keep himself afloat, that a choice made at that gig has left him vulnerable to external pressure. That Chicky, always sharp in his uniform, quick with a smile, and ready to lend a hand, is at the end of his fucking rope.
The book primarily plays out over the course of a single fraught day after NYPD officers have killed a Black man; following massive protests, a second such incident has the city on a knife-edge. Pavone introduces us to a pair of Bohemia residents whose lives are not as tranquil as they appear. Emily Longworth, dwelling in the penthouse, came to New York determined to blaze her own trail only to settle for marrying into extreme wealth. She’s now grappling with the knowledge that her husband is unscrupulous, not only in their union but in every aspect of his life. Downstairs, Julian Sonnenberg puts up a genial front despite a troubling medical diagnosis and his gallery being on the ropes. Pavone delivers incisive, frequently savage commentary on life among the one percent, especially in the left-wing urban bubble. Julian soldiers on through the blatant but euphemistic racism on the Bohemia’s board, as when a prospective tenant who just signed a massive contract with the Knicks is bounced because he might attract, ahem, the wrong element. Emily, meanwhile, contends with other affluent wives and mothers who strive to be on the correct side of every issue, blithely certain that the complaints of the hoi polloi can’t possibly apply to them. Chicky provides a potent counterweight, his scramble to stay solvent leading to thoughts like, “Maybe college was just another way to trick poor people into a lifetime of consumer debt. To redistribute income upward.” By the end of the night, mayhem will be unleashed on the streets and throughout the Bohemia. The Doorman is a book fortuitously suited to the Zohran Mamdani moment.
It resonated with me for several reasons, chief among them the presence of the New York Mets. Chicky is devoted to the team, as was the real-life doorman who inspired Pavone.1 When Emily needs a cap to serve as a disguise, she thinks, “The Mets seemed like too much of a fan allegiance, but the Yankees meant nothing more than you needed a hat.” That echoes the comment from comic Roy Wood, Jr., late of The Daily Show, that “Only real baseball fans claim the Mets in public. Yankees half the time is a fashion statement.” I was also struck by Chicky’s observation that his Irish predecessor “was borderline illiterate but his handwriting was like a wedding invitation. Say what you want about those old Catholic schools but nobody has penmanship like that anymore.” My father, an immigrant from the north of Ireland, hated to write but had the most beautiful script I’ve ever seen. I asked how he acquired the skill, and he said the Christian Brothers beat it into him with rulers. Chicky’s neighbor “had headphones around his neck like a guy with one of those good union jobs out at LaGuardia.” My old man had that exact union job out at LaGuardia. He and Chicky would have gotten along, grousing about rich bastards and the Mets’ rotation.
Income inequality also looms large in Killer Potential (2025) by Hannah Deitch. Evie Gordon arrives at her standard Sunday afternoon gig, tutoring a Beverly Hills daughter of privilege for the SAT. Only this time she finds the girl’s parents murdered and a woman bound inside a closet, begging for help. When Evie’s student stumbles upon the carnage, a split-second decision sends Evie and the mystery woman on the run, media sensations and targets of a nationwide manhunt.
Deitch writes evocatively; the garden of what will soon be known as the murder house is full of “Lovecraftian cacti and succulents, with thick spiked tongues furred with spiderwebs.” Her protagonist’s voice is barbed yet knowing. Evie hails from rural North Carolina, her academic triumphs priming her to anticipate continued success. But “without the reliable narcotic drip of an education to remind me how special I was or steady employment to occupy me, my self-worth became unstable and indeterminate.” Her knowledge and adaptability have yielded only a stopgap existence as an accessory for families that have already reached the pinnacle of the pyramid, coaching disinterested teenagers in constant proximity to luxuries she will never be able to afford. She recognizes a simpatico sister in the woman she freed. Their relationship deepens as they continue to elude the authorities in a section Deitch calls Bootstraps from the abiding sense of shame that results upon realizing that pulling oneself up by the bootstraps, that cornerstone of the American Dream, is a physical impossibility, the phrase beginning as a joke. Evie shares a revelation from her companion.
She explained it like this: When you don’t have money, it doesn’t just transform the way you think, the way you’re perceived, the way you navigate the world. It transforms space itself. You live under a completely different sky ... When you don’t have money, your imagination is forced to expand beyond the limits of what’s tolerable to rich people, who don’t need imagination at all.
Killer Potential’s third act moves in a direction I didn’t anticipate, with Deitch sticking a tricky landing. The result is not just a sterling debut, but one of my favorite novels of 2025 so far.
What I’m Watching
If, like me, you’ve been longing for a mordant, atmospheric noir fueled by lust, long walks, and mushroom foraging, your prayers have been answered. Misericordia (France, 2024) received a scant theatrical release in the US earlier this year despite acclaim at home. Now it’s exclusively available on the Criterion Channel. It begins like a forgotten Claude Chabrol adaptation of Patricia Highsmith. Jérémie (Félix Kysyl) returns to his bucolic hometown for the funeral of the man who taught him how to be a baker—along with quite possibly a few other things. The deadpan prodigal decides to stay a few extra days, tromping through the forest and stirring up feelings among former friends, the surviving family (including the new widow played by Catherine Frot), and fresh acquaintances like the village priest. With passions popping up like the morels everyone covets, little wonder there’s soon a corpse to be hidden. At times Misericordia seems like the embodiment of Eddie Izzard’s bit on French film characters: “My name is Pierre … I have come to have sex with your family.” But writer/director Alain Guiraudie, whose riveting, erotically-charged thriller Stranger by the Lake (2013) is also on Criterion, is not only in on the joke but pushes past it to something absurd, unsettling, and unique. Advisory: Beaucoup de pastis consumed.
What I’m Drinking
I was in a whiskey-and-chartreuse mood not long ago and flashed on the Armistice, created by Erik Hakkinen when he was at Seattle’s Zig Zag Café over a decade ago. The cocktail was even better than I’d remembered, the dueling herbaceousness of the maraschino and chartreuse kept in line by an equivalent pour of dry vermouth. (Although I tinkered with it, as you’ll see.) Erik is now the proprietor of Roquette, deservedly crowned one of the 100 best bars in North America earlier this year and celebrating its sixth anniversary today, July 3. Join me in raising an Armistice to Erik and the Roquette crew.
The Armistice, by Erik Hakkinen
1 ½ oz. rye whiskey
½ oz. dry vermouth2
¼ oz. green chartreuse
¼ oz. maraschino liqueur
2 dashes whiskey barrel-aged bitters3
Stir. Strain. Garnish with a cherry.
What I’ve Been Doing
My thanks to everyone who donated to my Defeat Multiple Myeloma Run/Walk. As threatened, I completed the 5K on June 29. I survived intact, the course I plotted allowing me to take in some of the Seattle Pride Parade and the full sweep of the city’s newly remodeled waterfront. Even better, I raised over $1,800 for multiple myeloma research at Fred Hutch Cancer Center, an amount that earned me an invitation to the check presentation. I can never resist an oversized novelty check. Again, I’m indebted to the generosity of everyone who contributed.
That the Mets have retained their working-class mystique despite now being the personal property of the wealthiest owner in professional American sports continues to give me fits.
I subjected this to what I’m now calling the Keenan Treatment, using ¼ oz. each dry and blanc vermouth to excellent effect
Angostura makes a worthy substitute
Be sure never to leave your less-than-fresh undergarments lying around on the couch, especially after copious pastis consumption.
Happy Anniversary Roquette! Great bar!