From Library Journal
More media fallout; here a reporter struggles with his conscience. Should he write the story that could win him a Pulitzer or risk his career by denouncing his newspaper's greedy ways? From an Edgar Award winner.Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The New York Times Book Review, Abby Ellin
We've heard it before, but that doesn't make it any less entertaining.


"Flawlessly plotted, seamlessly written, it portrays investigative reporting accurately."

From Booklist
The 1970s are a big pop culture phenomenon these days: the clothes, the hair, the music, even the television shows being made into movies. This novel takes a look at journalistic practices of a fictional New York paper, the Globe, in the post-Watergate era. Billy Burke, the quintessential battered newspaperman whose integrity outweighs everything else, including the shady maneuverings of his opportunistic editor, is assigned to a tearjerker/hospital-exposestory. A big private hospital won't operate on a young Latino boy with a hole in his heart, yet surgeons are falsifying records left and right. The dashing Burke, dating a gorgeous reporter, falls for the young boy's mother--until his own ex-wife comes back into the picture. He still has feelings for the ex, and they have an autistic child. Heffernan obviously means well here, and despite the white hats worn by Burke and the women in his life, all the bad guys aren't necessarily all bad. Joe Collins

From Kirkus Reviews
Tough-talking, two-fisted tale from Heffernan (The Dinosaur Club, 1997, etc.) of a Manhattan tabloid newspaper reporter whosurprise, surpriselearns that his employers are just as morally bankrupt as the bad guys he exposes in print. Sprung by one of his cocky editors after he's busted for taking a swing at a drunken cop, Billy Burke, a gung-ho assignment reporter for the sleazy New York Globe, gets the story that might garner him a Pulitzer: a nurse, angered at a cardiac surgeon's sexual importuning, tips the Globe that the wealthy doctor won't operate on a boy dying of a perforated heart until his uninsured, impoverished single mother comes up with $72,000 in cash. Burke's manic, foulmouthed editor, Lenny Twist, wants a series about the boy that will play off an investigative one about University Hospital's fraudulent billing practices, and warns Burke not to get emotionally involved. But Burke, separated from his wife and sharing support of an eight-year-old autistic daughter, naturally falls for Roberto Avalon's beautiful mother Maria. While he masquerades as a doctor to dig up dirt inside the hospital, the paper (which could easily pay for the operation or put pressure on the hospital to write off the cost) launches a charitable drive, encouraging readers to chip in for poor Roberto. Burke's story is almost ruined when Maria is arrested for running numbers for the mob in an effort to raise the cash. Not to worry, though: the newspaper's colorful, street-smart staff call in favors on both sides of the law so that Maria and her child remain a fitting subject for public largesse. Burke feels plenty of pressure, but doesn't smell a rat until the Globe fails to come up with the money for the operation when the boy needs it. Set during the simmering summer of 1975, when journalists everywhere are lusting for circulation-building exposs that can top Watergate, Heffernan's peppy tale crackles with profane, darkly comic insider lore that almost, but not quite, patches over the holes in his plot. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Review
"Funny, sad, clever, original, heartwarming, timely, and terrific . . . A must-read." -- NELSON DEMILLE

Review
"Funny, sad, clever, original, heartwarming, timely, and terrific . . . A must-read." -- NELSON DEMILLE

Book Description
In his highly acclaimed and bestselling novel The Dinosaur Club, William Heffernan turned the world of corporate greed and downsizing on its head in what USA Today called a "page turner" and a "funny and witty tale." Now, Pulitzer Prize nominee Heffernan takes readers behind the scenes at a major New York newspaper. Set against the backdrop of the '70s, when a bankrupt town danced its nights away to a disco beat and attack journalism as we know it today was born, Cityside brings to life the ever-eccentric, sometimes endearing, and always devious cast of characters who populate a big-city newsroom. New York Globe reporter Billy Burke is down on his luck -- an unfortunate "misunderstanding" with New York's Finest has landed him in jail overnight, the wife and daughter he loves are no longer part of his life, and his mercurial city editor wants his head on a platter. But things start to look up when Billy is handed the story of his career: A dying child has been denied life-sustaining heart surgery because his impoverished mother lacks the money and the insurance to pay for it. It is a classic tale of human indifference, the kind of story that wins circulation wars and Pulitzer prizes. But in the world of post-Watergate journalism, telling the story of a needy child is no longer enough. Billy Burke must also find villains to pillory if his newspaper is to win the prizes it covets. And he must do it quickly, before his editors lose sight of the innocent child whose life hangs in the balance. With the crisp pace and sharp characters that are hallmarks of his writing, Heffernan again tackles issues as real as today's headlines in this tale of ruthlessness and power. Once one of New York's most respected investigative reporters, Heffernan is the perfect writer to tell this story, and in his hands Cityside becomes a compelling novel that readers won't soon forget.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

In his highly acclaimed and bestselling novel The Dinosaur Club, William Heffernan turned the world of corporate greed and downsizing on its head in what USA Today called a "page turner" and a "funny and witty tale." Now, Pulitzer Prize nominee Heffernan takes readers behind the scenes at a major New York newspaper. Set against the backdrop of the '70s, when a bankrupt town danced its nights away to a disco beat and attack journalism as we know it today was born, Cityside brings to life the ever-eccentric, sometimes endearing, and always devious cast of characters who populate a big-city newsroom.

New York Globe reporter Billy Burke is down on his luck -- an unfortunate "misunderstanding" with New York's Finest has landed him in jail overnight, the wife and daughter he loves are no longer part of his life, and his mercurial city editor wants his head on a platter. But things start to look up when Billy is handed the story of his career: A dying child has been denied life-sustaining heart surgery because his impoverished mother lacks the money and the insurance to pay for it. It is a classic tale of human indifference, the kind of story that wins circulation wars and Pulitzer prizes. But in the world of post-Watergate journalism, telling the story of a needy child is no longer enough. Billy Burke must also find villains to pillory if his newspaper is to win the prizes it covets. And he must do it quickly, before his editors lose sight of the innocent child whose life hangs in the balance.