Great Police Procedural!
The first of McBain's 55 novels in this series, published in 1956. Author is Evan Hunter (real name Salvatore Albert Lombino!), McBain being one of five psuedonyms he used.
Some nice sex in here - and even in the '50's he has people living together, and having pre-marital sex.
The HEAT. And the city he builds, which is NY, and not NY.
And love that it is a quick, pulp read.
Wonder if he drove publishers nuts with his use of atypical font. We get reports and info cards and other additions to the text that are not in the usual type font. Some complete with check marks!
Oh, and gangs/clubs. And crummy news reporters who will do anything for a story (although Steve really should have been wiser as a veteran detective).
Fun intro into police and crime of a 1950's big city. Looking forward to reading some of the others, but probably not all.