The Rackets - Tapa dura

As the novel opens, Jimmy Dolan, who put himself through college by working construction, has gotten a job as the advance man for New York's mayor, a smug Republican. But when Jimmy scuffles with Teamsters boss Frankie Keefe at a Gracie Mansion power breakfast, he is fired - and thrown back into the knockabout working-class world he thought he had left behind.
Jimmy's father, Mike Dolan, a Teamster truck driver, has spent his career trying to break organized crime's grip on the union; now he is running against Keefe for the union's top job. As Keefe's associates muscle Mike out of the running, Jimmy must decide whether to risk his life - and that of his girlfriend, Tara O'Neil, a police officer - to defend the interests of the rank and file.
The story, set in the union halls, taverns, and half-built skyscrapers of Manhattan, depicts Irish racketeers, Italian mobsters, Russian killers, a gunrunning Gulf War veteran, and a federal operative under deep cover. It is also a vivid picture of the gritty upper-Manhattan neighbourhood of Inwood and the lives its denizens have made for themselves.

Thomas Kelly worked in construction, graduated from Fordham and Harvard, then served as director of advance for the Mayor of New York. A former Teamster, he writes for Esquire. His first novel, Payback, has been adapted by David Mamet for a feature film.