Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief (USA 2012)

From the Publisher:
It's January. The weather is cold -- and it's about to feel even colder. Detectives Carella and Kling of the 87th Precinct stand at the edge of their jurisdiction staring down into a ditch filled with six naked, murdered bodies. But who put them there and why?

As Carella and Kling dive deeper into the mystery of the six, they find themselves walking into a deadly battle among three teenage gangs: the Hispanic Death's Heads, the African American Scarlet Avengers, and a white gang known as "the clique." Racing to put together the clues before a criminal mastermind and a full-blown gang war tear the city apart, Carella and Kling need to use every trick in their arsenal.

Hail to the Chief is one of the finest in bestselling author Ed McBain's 87th Precinct series. An edgy thriller with marvelous characters that speeds toward an explosive final act.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief. An 87th Precinct Novel. Thomas & Mercer, ISBN: 9781612181639 (March, 2012), 174 p., $13.95.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief (USA 1997)

From the Publisher:
THE 87TH PRECINCT
In the 87th Precinct the best cops get smarter every day. On the other side of the law, the criminals are getting more violent, more organized. And among them, one man is calling the shots...

HAIL TO THE CHIEF
Six naked bodies on a cold winter night. Different races. Different sexes. One of them a baby. Above them, the red light of a patrol car turns like a disco ball. And two cops, Carella and Kling, who have seen everything, have never seen anything like this. Now their investigation will begin. But while the men of the 87th Precinct do their job, a criminal mastermind is doing his. And he is the best there is...

"AN ALLEGORY FOR OUR TIMES." -- New York Times Book Review
"THE BEST WRITER OF POLICE PROCEDURALS WORKING TODAY." -- Houston Chronicle

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief. 87th Precinct. Warner Books, ISBN: 0446604054 (May, 1997), 183 p., $5.99.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief (USA 1987)

From the Publisher:
SLAUGHTER ON TENTH AVENUE
The murders were the worst Bertram Kling and Steve Carella had seen. After thirteen years in the 87th Precinct, that meant they were bad. Real bad. Six bodies naked in a ditch, all of them young, two of them female, and one of them an infant.

Six corpses added up to six mysteries because nobody knew who the bodies were. Then an anonymous phone tip leads Kling and Carella to a private street war -- organized violence in the dark underbelly of the 87th, where even two veteran cops can get caught in a crossfire of power and revenge.

"ED MCBAIN'S 87TH PRECINCT SERIES... SIMPLY THE BEST POLICE PROCEDURALS BEING WRITTEN IN THE UNITED STATES" -- THE WASHINGTON POST BOOK WORLD

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief. An 87th Precinct Novel. Avon Books, ISBN: 038070370X (March, 1987), 151 p., $3.50.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief (UK ca. 1979)

From the Publisher:
'Gang warfare ghetto violence... ghe the chill of power lust. Capone lives' -- EVENING STANDARD
Carella looked in the frozen ditch. Kling fanned his flashlight over the naked bodies. Who was responsible-Death's Heads, Scarlet Avengers or the Yankee Rebels?

A couple of detectives with six corpses on their hands needed all the help they could get. They wouldn't get it from the gangs, that was for sure. Those guys didn't fool around. You were either their friends or you were their enemies.

All hell was set to break loose...

'The best of today's procedural school of police stories - lively inventive, convincing, suspenseful, and wholly satisfactory' -- NEW YORK TIMES

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief. London: Pan Books, ca. 1979, ISBN: 0330244914, 139 p., 80p.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief (UK 1975)

All hell was set to break loose...

'The best of today's procedural school of police stories - lively inventive, convincing, suspenseful, and wholly satisfactory' -- NEW YORK TIMES

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief. An 87th Precinct Mystery. Pan Books, ISBN: 0330244914 (September, 1975), 139 p., 45p.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief (USA 1975)

From the Publisher:
DITCH OF DEATH-
They were sprawled in the bottom of the frozen ditch, six naked stiffs filled full of lead. And Steve Carella, Bert Kling, and the boys of the 87th Precinct were stuck with the job of tracking down the cold-blooded killers and putting them on ice for good. But how do you find the murderers when you don't even know who the victims were?

It would take some lucky breaks, clever detecting, and a pile of corpses to put Carella and Kling on the right trail, and if they missed even one clue the payoff would be the biggest and bloodiest gang war the city had ever faced...!

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief. An Explosive Sizzling 87th Precinct Mystery. Signet Books #Y6548 (July, 1975), 205 p., $1.25.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief (UK 1973)

From the Publisher:
They found six bodies in a ditch on the northernmost extreme of the 87th Precinct. One of them (black) was a baby. This was not the end of the death-roll before three gangs, the Yankee Rebels, the Death's Heads and the Scarlet Avengers have fought it out in the streets of the city.

Most sinister of all is 'Randy', chief of the Yankee Rebels, a cold-blooded murderer, with a strange puritanical side, forbidding his gang or 'clique', as he prefers to call it bad language, abortion, dope. He calls himself 'the President'; his function, as he sees it, is that of 'the elected leader, to end this war and take care of the people I am serving. Going, one hopes, to the electric chair, he tells Detective Steve Carella: 'I did it because I'm the President, that's why.'

Ed McBain has never more graphically portrayed what corruption and gang warfare can do to a big city. But his wonderful sense of irony soars above all the pollution, human and material, of this enthralling story: Detectives Carella and Kling are in great shape and Detective Meyer Meyer's lecture to a girls' college on Rape and How to Prevent It instantly qualifies as a classic.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief. London: Hamish Hamilton, 1973, ISBN: 0241024781, 182 p., £2.00.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief (USA 1973)

From the Publisher:
"They found the bodies in an open ditch on the northernmost extreme of the 87th Precinct. The six bodies were lying in angular confusion on top of the mud-colored ice. There was another color staining the ice. The color was blood. The bodies were naked. Their nakedness made the night seem even colder than it was."

The time is January. The detectives: Steve Carella, of the 87th Precinct, and his partner, Bert Kling. And as the case unfolds, it becomes clear that the multiple corpses are casualties in a street war between 3 teenage gangs: the Death's Heads, who are Spanish; the Scarlet Avengers, who are black, and a white gang known at first only as "the clique" and led by a tough customer named Randy Nesbitt. By the time the case is closed, Carella and Kling have come across 2 more murders and a shoot-up of such ferocity that they refer to it as World War III.

As always, this 87th Precinct novel is filled with marvelous characters: Detective Meyer, assigned by public relations to give a lecture on rape at a girl's college. He is also being hounded by an avid reporter, Montgomery Pierce Hoyt, who is doing an article on the connection between crime and television. Andrew Kingsley, fresh from California and believing that he can stop the gang war. Lisa Knowles, from California, too, and so beautiful and appealing that she nearly causes Carella a moment of uncharacteristic weakness. And besides the other cops, the Homicide detectives, the gang members with their passwords and switchblade. And overall, the tone of absolute authenticity which marks the 87th Precinct.

Ed McBain: Hail to the Chief. An 87th Precinct Mystery. Random House, ISBN: 0394485815 (October, 1973), 182 p., $5.95.