Sleepless City and Nick Ryan: From Whence They Came
When you’re in trouble, you call 911
When the cops are in trouble, they call Nick Ryan
Sleepless City is my thirty-second published novel. I’ve never written any two of them the same way. Sometimes I start with no central idea. For instance, I wrote my Moe Prager novel Hurt Machine with only one thing in mind: Moe is seriously ill. That was it. I sat down and began writing. For my Gus Murphy novels, since I had to pitch the series to my editor, I thought a lot of the first book through, but without Gus as an anchor I would have had no book. For the six Jesse Stone novels I wrote for the estate of Robert B. Parker, I had Jesse—Tom Selleck in the TV movies—the setting, and twelve books in the series, so all I needed for each book was a crime to work with. There is, however, one constant: character. For me, plot derives from character. So, no matter how each book develops, without a strong character to build around, the center will not hold.
The evolution of Nick Ryan, the protagonist of Sleepless City, is unique even for me. I was on the phone discussing the notion of taking my next project in a new direction. The person on the other end of the phone was my agent, Shane Salerno. Shane, a highly respected screenwriter, and I found ourselves kicking around the idea of a different kind of protagonist than I’d ever written before. The best way to describe my two most popular protagonists, Moe Prager and Gus Murphy, is to say they were intelligent, good-hearted, well-intentioned stumblers. Men who had been cops but had spent their whole careers in uniform. Men, who, when circumstance demanded a detective’s skills and training, were either barely treading water or in way over their heads. I loved those guys, and I loved writing them. Yes, they persevered, but only through luck and dogged persistence. Problem is, there’s a limit to how many ways to be original with that type of character at the center of a series.
What Shane and I wound up talking about was a protagonist who could work both within the system and draw outside the lines. A prince of the city who could operate in the daylight and even more effectively from the shadows. An NYPD detective who was superlatively competent, one who possessed skills he’d learned on the streets growing up in Brooklyn, on the job working undercover, and in the mountains of Afghanistan. I was clear in that I wasn’t interested in trying to recreate Jack Reacher or James Bond. Any attempt to do so, regardless of quality, would be seen as imitation. Nor am I interested in superheroes. As ultracompetent as I imagined Nick Ryan to be, he had to be as vulnerable as he was confident, a Steve McQueen for the 2020s. He had to have a heart as big as his ’69 GTO and classic Norton motorcycle were cool. And the things he had to value above all else were duty and the people of the city he served.
Once I had a feel for Nick, a man who returned from two tours in Afghanistan with a sharper sense of right and wrong, the plot of Sleepless City seemed almost self-evident. Never before had a novel of mine been so shaped by the events happening outside my office door. I’m not talking about the pandemic. Without giving too much away, Nick has to confront three huge issues, all morally complex and nearly impossible to navigate. When readers get their hands on Sleepless City, they will have to ask themselves how they would put out the fires Nick must extinguish in order to save the people and the city he loves.
Called a hard-boiled poet by NPR’s Maureen Corrigan and the noir poet laureate in the Huffington Post, Reed Farrel Coleman is the New York Times-bestselling author of thirty-one novels—including six in Robert B. Parker’s Jesse Stone series—short stories, poetry, and essays.
In addition to his acclaimed series characters, Moe Prager and Gus Murphy, he has written the stand-alone novel Gun Church and collaborated with decorated Irish crime writer Ken Bruen on the novel Tower.
Reed is a four time Edgar Award nominee in three different categories: Best Novel, Best Paperback Original, and Best Short Story. He is a four-time recipient of the Shamus Award for Best PI Novel of the Year. He has also won the Audie, Macavity, Barry, and Anthony Awards.
With their kids moved away to far off Brooklyn, Reed, his wife Rosanne, and their cats live in the wilds of Suffolk County on Long Island.
