Publishers Weekly
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Faye once again skillfully evokes the early days of the NYPD in this gripping and moving sequel to 2012's The Gods of Gotham, an Edgar finalist. One winter evening in 1846, Lucy Adams, a free black woman, calls on copper Timothy Wilde at police headquarters in the Tombs for help. Lucy's sister, Delia Wright, and her seven-year-old son, Jonas Adams, have vanished from their Manhattan home. Wilde quickly ascertains that even though Delia and Jonas aren't slaves, men seeking to profit from capturing them are responsible. Later, Wilde is horrified to discover the still warm body of a murder victim in the quarters of his police-captain brother, Valentine, and removes the body to a shanty near the Hudson to protect Valentine from being implicated in the crime. As this episode shows, Wilde makes mistakes-but his fallibilities are at the core of his appeal, even as his doggedness and insights enable him to tease out what really has been going on beneath the surface. Simple but effective prose, a brilliantly constructed plot, and three-dimensional characters add up to another winner for Faye. Agent: Erin Malone, William Morris Endeavor. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Library Journal
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In the wake of her Edgar-nominated debut mystery, The Gods of Gotham, Faye returns to 1840s New York and to her protagonist, young Timothy Wilde of the newly formed New York City Police Force. Promoted to detective, Tim lends his hand to investigating while trying to keep clear of his brother Val's Tammany Hall politics. Hoping to help a pretty girl, Tim stumbles on to a highly connected ring of slave smugglers, who kidnap escaped slaves and freeborn citizens for a price. It is dangerous to be an abolitionist in a New York as divided as the rest of the country in the years leading up to the Civil War. Tim confronts danger on all sides as he struggles with what is right and what will get him killed. VERDICT Faye's first novel won popular and critical success with its pairing of early police work and the criminal underworld of 19th-century New York. Her second novel is doubly impressive. Readers of historical and genre fiction will appreciate the twists and turns of this original series.-Catherine Lantz, Morton Coll. Lib., Cicero, IL (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Book list
From Booklist, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission.

*Starred Review* In crime-ridden New York City in 1846, the year after the NYPD was established, 28-year-old copper star Timothy Wilde is the solver of the chief's nastier puzzles. He intuitively solves the theft of a valuable painting, along the way establishing good will that will serve him well later. But beautiful, high-yellow Lucy Adams, wife of a white man, presents a knottier problem when she seeks him out personally after her son and her sister are kidnapped by slave catchers. This requires Timothy to enlist the help of his older brother and sole remaining relative, police captain Val, who alternately scandalizes and saves him. What seems a quick solution soon mushrooms into politically tinged murder, involving Timothy with members of the Underground Railroad trying to counter the slave-catching trade, in which both escaped slaves and freed blacks are captured in the north and sent south into slavery. Like its predecessor, Edgar-nominated The Gods of Gotham (2012), this is fiction based on thorough research, and it captures the tumult of its time and place in an action-packed plot with elements of tragedy and hope, featuring a protagonist who fights for what is right in the face of corruption. Superlative historical mystery.--Leber, Michele Copyright 2010 Booklist