Harvey, Michael 1958- (Michael T. Harvey, Michael Thomas Harvey)

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Harvey, Michael 1958- (Michael T. Harvey, Michael Thomas Harvey)

PERSONAL:

Born October 3, 1958. Education: Holy Cross College, B.A.; Northwestern University, M.A.; Duke University, J.D.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Chicago, IL.

CAREER:

Writer, journalist, television producer, and novelist. Investigative Reports, A&E Network, producer, including episodes "Investigative Reports: Meth's Deadly High," and "Investigative Reports: First Lady on the Front Line"; Cold Case Files, A&E Network, cocreator and executive producer, including episode "Investigative Reports: Cold Case Files No. 7: One Night on the Bayou—The Buckeye Misdemeanor."

WRITINGS:

The Chicago Way (novel), Knopf (New York, NY), 2007.

The Fifth Floor (novel), Knopf (New York, NY), 2008.

SIDELIGHTS:

Chicago-based writer, journalist, and television producer Michael Harvey is the cocreator and former executive producer of one of television's more popular true crime programs, A&E's Cold Case Files. The program reexamines unsolved crimes that have been dormant for several years, looking for new evidence, unexplored angles, or overlooked details that could help bring killers to justice long after their crime has been committed. Harvey has also been a producer for A&E's Investigative Reports, which examines in depth a variety of crimes, their victims, and their often colorful perpetrators.

Extensively educated, Harvey holds a B.A. in classical languages from Holy Cross College, an M.A. degree in journalism from Northwestern University, and a J.D. from Duke University.

Harvey's varied education and his experience as a producer of true-crime programming provides the background for his debut novel, The Chicago Way. "This may be a first novel for Michael Harvey but it's far from the work of a new writer," observed reviewer Jules Brenner, writing on the Jules Brenner's Critical Mystery Tour Web site. The book opens with the kind of "wry, dry narration that goes down as smoothly as a pulp paperback with a shot of rye," remarked Keir Graff in a Booklist review. The main character, Michael Kelly, "has an entertaining voice that keeps the story moving quickly and prevents the dialogues from becoming boring," commented Sarah Dudley on the ReviewingTheEvidence.com. Jerome Weeks, writing on the Book/daddy Web site, remarked favorably on Harvey's writing style, nothing how he "was struck with how lean and controlled Mr. Harvey's prose was—in the voice of Michael Kelly, his P.I." A Kirkus Reviews contributor found less to admire in the prose, but concluded that "If you can shrug off the mannered narration, ex-TV producer Harvey ends up delivering the goods."

Protagonist Michael Kelly is a former police officer in Chicago. Now a private investigator, he closely follows Cubs baseball, reads extensively in the classics (and in the original Greek), and ekes out a living in a rough-and-tumble profession that leaves little room for error. Harvey's interest in piqued when he is visited by his former police-force partner, John Gibbons, who asks for his help in reopening an eight-year-old rape and battery case. Back then, Gibbons had saved the victim, Elaine Remington, from certain death at the hands of a deranged serial killer named Grime. To his amazement, however, the suspect disappeared from jail the day after being apprehended. The chief of police wanted the case ignored, and Gibbons was essentially bought off with awards and promotions. Now, perhaps feeling the cumulative effect of years of guilt, and with Remington's urging, Gibbons wants to reopen the case and bring the original perpetrator to justice. Kelly, enticed by a fat packet full of money, agrees to help, which sets in motion a modern-day string of murders and deception.

When Gibbons is found shot the next day, suspicion falls on Kelly. He encounters a cold and cynical television reporter who is investigating Gibbons's death. He meets Elaine Remington herself, at the end of her 9mm automatic, who thinks Kelly murdered the man who rescued her all those years ago. An old friend, state DNA analyst Nicole Andrews, becomes involved in the case. As the case heats up and Kelly's interest in answers and retribution becomes more intense, he has to navigate some tricky negotiations with some mafia crime bosses. Worse, he discovers that Grime is in prison on death row, even though his DNA is repeatedly found at new active crime scenes.

Harvey "composes punchy noir sentences that he stacks into punchy noir paragraphs that have all the rhythm, irony, and wit of the genre's manly classics" from the classic detective era of the 1920s and 1930s, observed Jennifer Reese, writing in Entertainment Weekly. "Harvey's diction and wit mark a swift, easy reading traipse through Chicago with his tough and courageous hero negotiating the mean streets, forensic labs, and dank alleys," Brenner commented. A Publishers Weekly critic concluded that Harvey "skillfully" brings "Chicago to life," and is "poised to take the crime-writing world by storm."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, August, 2007, Keir Graff, review of The Chicago Way, p. 42.

Entertainment Weekly, August 24, 2007, Jennifer Reese, "Just Say Noir," review of The Chicago Way, p. 138.

Kirkus Reviews, July 1, 2007, review of The Chicago Way. Publishers Weekly, June 25, 2007, review of The Chicago Way, p. 30.

Tribune Books (Chicago, IL), June 2, 2007, Kristin Kloberdanz, review of The Chicago Way, p. 8; August 25, 2007, Adam Langer, "Just the Facts: City's People and Texture Missing in Debut Crime Novel Set in Chicago," review of The Chicago Way, p. 4.