Homicide : a year on the killing streets ([New ed.])

The scene is Baltimore. Twice every three days another citizen is shot, stabbed, or bludgeoned to death.

At the centre of this hurricane of crime is the city's homicide unit, a small brotherhood of men confronted by the darkest of American visions.

David Simon was the first reporter ever to gain unlimited access to a homicide unit, and his remarkable book is both a compelling account of casework and an investigation into our culture of violence.

The narrative follows Donald Worden, a veteran investigator nearing the end of his career; Harry Edgerton, an iconoclastic black detective in a mostly white unit; and Tom Pellegrini, an earnest rookie who takes on the year's most difficult case, the brutal rape and murder of an eleven-year-old girl.