BOOMTOWN

Capt. Delia Mariola of the Baxter Police struggles to contain a tidal wave of felonies spewing forth uncontrolled from a place where she has no jurisdiction.

Moments after Nissan announced its plans to build a new auto assembly plant just over the line in Sprague County, Boomtown, an enclave of trailers and Quonset huts financed by shadowy figures who’d just as soon stay shadowy, sprang up to accommodate all those construction workers. Faced with nonnegotiable deadlines for every stage, the workers are naturally eager to fill their time off with life’s simple pleasures: drugs, gambling, whores. New York gang leader Ricky Ricci, spotting an opportunity from more than a thousand miles away, has designated ambitious Charlie Setter manager of Boomtown’s criminal operations. That’s why Charlie, in Carter’s opening scene, is driving through town with the body of overdosed prostitute Corey Miller in his trunk, ultimately ditching her in Oakland Gardens when enforcer Dominick Costa announces that the ground is too frozen to dig a grave. Determined to end any competition from the Horde, a local gang, Charlie executes biker/pimp Titus Klint when he won’t listen to reason, and the discovery of both corpses puts him squarely in the crosshairs of Delia—and of Aaron and Maggie Miller, Corey’s father and sister, who respond without advance notice to a “DO YOU KNOW THIS WOMAN?” poster bent on revenge and highly skeptical that it can be brought about through official channels. Carter uses the alternating perspectives of Charlie, Delia, and Maggie to explore the moral, legal, and sociological depths of Boomtown, subordinating mysterymongering to a pitiless anatomy of a Midwestern hell. The most striking feature of Carter's representation of Delia is that although she's utterly tough and professional in her job and open about her relationship with child-abuse investigator Zoe Parillo, she's surprisingly bashful about appearing with Zoe in public as a couple in her conservative Midwestern town. This conflict at once humanizes her and complicates her relationship to the hometown she's sworn to protect and serve.

A rich and reeking swamp full of exploitation, despair, violence, and summary justice.