The Old Turk's Load

A Deadly Pleasures Best First Novel of the Year and a Booklist Best Crime Fiction Debut of the YearAngelo DiNoto is a powerful crime lord in 1967, his empire bolstered by importing pure heroin from an old Turkish farmer. But when a five-million-dollar shipment goes missing during the Newark riots, DiNoto isn’t the only one willing to turn over every rock—and bust some heads, arms, and legs—to find it.A shady developer sees the heroin as the key to rejuvinating his fading business. His daughter Gloria, literally in bed with a band of wannabe revolutionaries, thinks the stash could be her ticket out of her father’s purview. “Mailman,” a longtime postal clerk disfigured by cancer, thinks finding the drugs is the perfect cap to a failed life. With this wild cast of characters running rampant through Newark and Manhattan, Gibson’s debut is a twisting crime novel whose disparate threads lead directly to an unforgettable showdown over the so-called ‘old Turk’s load.’