In an interview on Trial By Jury (with Video)

The Friends of Eddie Coyle by George V Higgins.

This is a thriller that really captures the low-rent squalor of most criminals’ lives and the cynicism of the police and the lawyers. It’s about the kind of trade-offs that people make – Coyle is sold down the river by his friends and you see how the police and the lawyers co-exist with the criminals and the symbiotic relationships between these walks of life.

How does Higgins know about these things?

He was assistant district attorney in Boston for years. It’s the first book, I think, that captures how things really are and it’s stylistically interesting because most of the text is dialogue and he conveys the sense of place and the information so efficiently and effectively that you understand what these people and these lives are like.