Mon., August 15
Tom MacDonald, "The Charlestown Connection"

The Charlestown Connection

Dermot Sparhawk is stacking cans and tidying up in the Saint Jude Thaddeus food pantry on a deadly silent Charlestown night. All of a sudden, an unholy crashing at the door: in staggers Jeepster Hennessy, his godfather fresh off a bid, with a knife lodged in his back. Jeepster reels, gasps, hands Sparhawk a key, utters a single word, and dies in Dermot's hands.

Thus begins Tom MacDonald's new spy thriller, The Charlestown Connection. Gangs, junkies, winos, feds and flat-feet prowl the knockdown streets of Charlestown, and it's up to Sparhawk, the Irish/Native American ex-football star, with a bum knee and a tenuous hold on sobriety, to navigate the crime and degradation, to run down the mystery of Jeepster's killer and stay loyal to the few friends and family he's got laid up in Charlestown.

Tom MacDonald joins us to talk about his debut spy novel, his work in Charlestown, and treading a path where only Boston greats like Dennis Lehane and Robert Parker have walked before.