From Publishers Weekly
While last year's Cranks and Shadows saw the retirement of Mario Balzic, Rocksburg, Pennsylvania's top cop, Constantine here passes the series baton to Detective Sergeant Ruggiero "Rugs" Carlucci. Balzic's still hanging around, dispensing advice from the sanctuary of his uneasy retirement, but this is Rugs's book. First in line for Balzic's old job, he has to deal with his own self-doubt, the duplicitous mayor and a very difficult mother. He's also first on the scene when a half-dead rape victim calls 911 from the office of a stoneworks. While the victim turns out to be the widow of the company founder, the actual case isn't what makes this effort so good. After 12 works, Constantine is a grand master of expositional dialogue. Rugs has a deceptively simple gift for understatement and staggered, yet logical, expression. He has learned well from the wily Balzic, but he's definitely his own man, as all concerned-not least himself-discover. Imagine a fully functioning mystery placed inside the complex structure of a novel by the likes of Richard Russo, and you begin to get some idea of the depth Constantine routinely brings to his mysteries.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Rocksburg, Pennsylvania, may be as familiar to mystery fans as Winesburg, Ohio, is to American lit majors. It's home to police chief Mario Balzic and a memorable population of working-class ethnics who lived and died in 11 first-rate novels. When the author "retired" Balzic, this reviewer was one of many fans who went into mourning. So Good Sons is a true joy. Rocksburg endures, and Detective Sergeant Ruggiero "Rugs" Carlucci, Mario's self-deprecating protege, must persevere. He's investigating a brutal rape that becomes murder, being a good son to his demented mother--she's writing threatening letters to Jeopardy's Alex Trebek--and alternately hoping and fearing that he'll be selected to replace Mario. (Rugs' investigation turns up a stupid scam gone murderously wrong. It also demonstrates to those around him, if not to Rugs himself, that he's a talented, tenacious, and caring cop and human being.) Constantine is in top form here. Good Sons is filled with fascinating characters, wonderful dialogue, and a subtle but knowing indictment of the loss of an economic safety net for the working poor. And best of all, somewhere 30 miles from Pittsburgh, and halfway between apathy and anarchy, Rocksburg endures. Thomas Gaughan
Review
Police career underachiever Carlucci faces a test of his abilities and a challenge which could make or break his career when a battered woman's plight comes to his attention. His search for the culprit and a motivation leads him to a big-crime family - and into a case which may prove too difficult for his resources. An involving plot evolves. -- Midwest Book Review
From the Back Cover
It's been months since Mario Balzic retired, and the position of Rocksburg's police chief has been open ever since. To the dismay of Detective Sergeant Rugs Carlucci, Mayor Angelo Bellotti is holding his cards close to his chest. A career underachiever with some surprising inner strengths, Rugs isn't even sure of his own ambitions. Carlucci's aging, incessantly demanding mother is already complaining about her son's hefty overtime duty, unwilling to understand that without it he couldn't afford the care she needs. And Rugs knows the job itself would be more pain than prestige, with a department out of money and dirt-low on staff. Now Rugs faces a grisly, unexpected test of his suddenly elevated status. A woman has been found horribly raped and mortally battered.
