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Under Color of Law
(2021)(The first book in the Trevor Finnegan series)
A novel by Aaron Philip Clark
2022 ITW Award for Best Paperback original (nominee)
The murder of a police recruit pins a black LAPD detective in a deadly web where race, corruption, violence, and cover-ups intersect in this relevant, razor-sharp novel of suspense.
Black rookie cop Trevor “Finn” Finnegan aspires to become a top-ranking officer in the Los Angeles Police Department and fix a broken department. A fast-track promotion to detective in the coveted Robbery-Homicide Division puts him closer to achieving his goal.
Four years later, calls for police accountability rule the headlines. The city is teeming with protests for racial justice. When the body of a murdered black academy recruit is found in the Angeles National Forest, Finn is tasked to investigate.
As pressure mounts to solve the crime and avoid a PR nightmare, Finn scours the underbelly of a volatile city where power, violence, and race intersect. But it’s Finn’s past experience as a beat cop that may hold the key to solving the recruit’s murder. The price? The end of Finn’s career…or his life.
Genre: Mystery
Black rookie cop Trevor “Finn” Finnegan aspires to become a top-ranking officer in the Los Angeles Police Department and fix a broken department. A fast-track promotion to detective in the coveted Robbery-Homicide Division puts him closer to achieving his goal.
Four years later, calls for police accountability rule the headlines. The city is teeming with protests for racial justice. When the body of a murdered black academy recruit is found in the Angeles National Forest, Finn is tasked to investigate.
As pressure mounts to solve the crime and avoid a PR nightmare, Finn scours the underbelly of a volatile city where power, violence, and race intersect. But it’s Finn’s past experience as a beat cop that may hold the key to solving the recruit’s murder. The price? The end of Finn’s career…or his life.
Genre: Mystery
Praise for this book
"Under Color of Law does what great crime fiction should: it kept me turning pages while I was reading it and kept me thinking about it when I wasn’t. Clark establishes himself as heir apparent to Michael Connelly in L.A. police novels." - Eric Beetner
"Not since Joseph Wambaugh’s New Centurions has a book about the LAPD arrived with the power, strength, and timeliness of Under Color of Law. This is a thriller, all right, but it’s also the portrait of a city and its institutions crumbling from within. A dynamic and important work and, still, a hell of a mystery." - Tod Goldberg
"Aaron Phillip Clark’s Under Color of Law is a dizzying, breathtaking ride through the City of Angels, offering an unflinching and compelling look at the complexities of being a Black man wearing a detective’s badge. An awesome L.A. story and a helluva page-turner!" - Rachel Howzell Hall
"Aaron Philip Clark’s Under Color of Law is extraordinary. It’s a police procedural with a conscience, as invested in examining how and why American law enforcement so often fails to uphold its mandate to protect and serve all people equally as it is in telling a compelling story. You’ll read on for the mystery at its core, but you’ll remember Under Color of Law long after the read for the things it will teach you about the challenges of being a good cop of color in the age of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor." - Gar Anthony Haywood
"Rugged, real, and timely, the authenticity crackles on each page in this unputdownable novel from Mr. Clark." - Gary Phillips
"An absolutely riveting book that belongs in the pantheon of L.A. crime novels alongside Connelly’s The Black Echo, Mosley’s Devil in a Blue Dress, and Ellroy’s The Black Dahlia. Under Color of Law is a landmine placed at the intersection of law enforcement, race, media, and politics by an author who clearly knows the volatile territory. I cannot wait to read the next Trevor Finnegan book." - Jason Pinter
"Not since Joseph Wambaugh’s New Centurions has a book about the LAPD arrived with the power, strength, and timeliness of Under Color of Law. This is a thriller, all right, but it’s also the portrait of a city and its institutions crumbling from within. A dynamic and important work and, still, a hell of a mystery." - Tod Goldberg
"Aaron Phillip Clark’s Under Color of Law is a dizzying, breathtaking ride through the City of Angels, offering an unflinching and compelling look at the complexities of being a Black man wearing a detective’s badge. An awesome L.A. story and a helluva page-turner!" - Rachel Howzell Hall
"Aaron Philip Clark’s Under Color of Law is extraordinary. It’s a police procedural with a conscience, as invested in examining how and why American law enforcement so often fails to uphold its mandate to protect and serve all people equally as it is in telling a compelling story. You’ll read on for the mystery at its core, but you’ll remember Under Color of Law long after the read for the things it will teach you about the challenges of being a good cop of color in the age of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor." - Gar Anthony Haywood
"Rugged, real, and timely, the authenticity crackles on each page in this unputdownable novel from Mr. Clark." - Gary Phillips
"An absolutely riveting book that belongs in the pantheon of L.A. crime novels alongside Connelly’s The Black Echo, Mosley’s Devil in a Blue Dress, and Ellroy’s The Black Dahlia. Under Color of Law is a landmine placed at the intersection of law enforcement, race, media, and politics by an author who clearly knows the volatile territory. I cannot wait to read the next Trevor Finnegan book." - Jason Pinter
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