Top-shelf fiction, a Crown Royal ride into the heart of Night and New York. Con Lehane's work is reminiscent of the best of Lawrence Block, which is to say that this is very good stuff, indeed.

In Europe, I'm recognized on the street sometimes. And that's cool, because I don't have to live there and deal with it every day. Unless you're Stephen King - a great writer, by the way, and anyone who says different knows nothing about the craft - you're more likely to be recognized in America if you play in a soap opera than if you're a novelist.

The thirst for knowledge is like a piece of ass you know you shouldn't chase; in the end, you chase it just the same.

But when I do book signings and personal appearances, the audiences are mostly white. Growing up here, I expected that and understand it. Black audiences won't come out for a white writer for the most part. It really is just a fact of life.

I'm a better writer now because I've worked very hard at getting better. My long-range goal will always be to write better books.

We remember when women were spoken of differently. I don't mean that we didn't speak of women sexually - that happened. It was never this crude: there wasn't the connotations, the violence. I think there's got to be a relationship between the coarsening of the culture, of which pornography was a piece of the puzzle.

I'm proud to be a crime novelist. What I've chosen is the best way to convey the questions I'm trying to raise.