Let's Discuss "Tabloid City" by Pete Hamill

Tabloid City Protected content a crime novel set in post-9/11 New York that also serves as a lament for the fading age of print journalism.

The story centers on Sam Briscoe, a veteran reporter who has become city editor at a struggling New York tabloid. As the paper battles falling circulation, corporate pressure and the steady erosion of traditional newsroom culture, Briscoe oversees coverage of the murder of Cynthia Harding — a wealthy socialite, philanthropist and devoted book lover — and her young protégée, Talia, a Jamaican immigrant she had brought to the city.

The prime suspect is the son of a retired NYPD officer: a troubled young man who has embraced a radical strain of Islam. His alienation and fanaticism connect to violent extremism in the city, including an attempted attack linked to the World Trade Center. As he goes on the run, the novel unfolds as both a manhunt and a psychological portrait of a city wrestling with fear, division and change.

At its core, however, the book is less about terrorism than about journalism. Through Briscoe and his colleagues, Pete Hamill vividly captures old-school newsroom life—hard-drinking, sharp-tongued reporters chasing crime scenes and political corruption—now threatened by corporate ownership, shrinking budgets and the rise of digital media. Ultimately, Tabloid City is both a crime thriller and an elegy for a disappearing era of New York's rough-edged, passionate journalists who once defined its tabloid press.