A review by veenasoujanya
The Murderers by W.E.B. Griffin

5.0

It is generally a wonderful feeling when you randomly pick a book from the roadside and it surprisingly turns out to be one of the brilliant reads. I neither much heard about the author nor the book but once I started reading I couldn't keep it down. (Imagine reading 500+ plus pages in a single day). Though the title of the book and the script on the back cover gives us an impression of the murder mystery (I kind of felt the backstory to be misleading), actually the book is about the cops; specifically of the state of Philadelphia. The book gives us knowledge about the hierarchy in the Police department, various segments, specialized units along with nicknames for cops. Including the graphic pictures of memorandums, case reports, and investigative reports the author took us into the world of cops teaching us about 'Miranda' warning, radio frequencies of the police cars, and patrol vehicle codes. Unlike the regular run in the mill kind of cops solving a case, the book is all about police politics and comradeship between the men in blue. Even though the book refers to a couple of dirty cops and petty jealousies and ego in the department, it mainly focuses on the dedication and brotherhood of the police. The characters, though there are many are all well etched sticking to their traits. If you prefer reading about good cops and honest officers working together side by side, this one is for you. Atleast for me it was a fresh perspective on not only cops but people in general as the author managed to portray the maximum characters in the book to be good and honest (atleast spent more time on those) compared to only a handful of bad people. For me this was a tought feat to pull off in a book about murderers which the author did brilliantly.