In his long-awaited eighth novel, filled with the same suspenseful storytelling that shot Mystic River and Shutter Island to the top of the charts, award-winning author Dennis Lehane again puts all of his literary talents on display. The Great War is ending; the Bolsheviks are overthrowing the Tsar, the Kaiser is running roughshod over Europe, and the Spanish influenza is beginning its deadly rampage. On American shores, communist and socialist movements are swelling in numbers and anarchists are tossing bombs in the street. Harsh labor conditions, barrel-bottom pay, and the disenfranchisement of the working class have branded Strike! onto the national consciousness. Set in an era of unprecedented uncertainty, THE GIVEN DAY tells the story of those who learn the true consequences of demanding change of asserting one s worth in a world bent on devaluing one s time and effort; of building common good from astonishing feats of uncommon strength; and of asking not to accept the way of the world, but to remake it. Boston, 1918. Foot patroller, amateur boxer, and eldest of three brothers Danny Coughlin is Police Department royalty the son of Captain Thomas Coughlin of Precinct 12. Danny monitors activities in the poor, predominantly Italian neighborhoods of the North End, a prime recruitment area for every major communist and socialist organization. Political dissent is in the air, fresh and intoxicating, and Danny is drawn into the ideological fray as a favor to his father first as a mole in the policeman s own union, the Boston Social Club, then as an undercover agent infiltrating various radical circles. But Danny s experiences among underpaid workingmen and their forward-thinking leaders quickly turn him to the other side. To the tremendous embarrassment of his well-respected father, Danny s oratorical talent unexpectedly vaults him to a position of leadership in the BSC, just as the policemen s union sits at the cusp of securing recognition from the American Federation of Labor. In the eyes of Captain Coughlin, the once quietly humming city has become an angry hive of insurgent activity, unrecognizable to Danny s father and the cadre of Old Men that built Boston with their own knuckle and grit. Cherished tenets of peace and order lie in the balance, and rumors of an impending policemen strike fuel fears among the higher-ups that Boston will quickly turn to ashes. The sudden eruption of a molasses tank on the North End seems like an evil omen perhaps the work of anarchists, and a warning of more deadly explosions to come. eanwhile, former munitions factory worker, baseball player, and father-to-be Luther Lawrence is on the lam. Fingered in a deadly drug-related shooting in Tulsa, Luther has fled to the house of family friends in Boston while news of the killings cools down. Leaving behind his pregnant wife, Lila Waters, and the idyllic life they had begun to create in one of Tulsa s African-American neighborhoods, Luther begins work as the personal driver and repairman of the Coughlin household. After striking up an alliance with Danny and a fast friendship with the family s Irish domestic servant, Nora O Shea, Luther comes to see that a powerful bond once connected Danny to Nora. As the mystery of their relationship unravels, Luther witnesses the gradual rekindling of love between the pair and grows determined to return to his own wife and now newborn son. But Luther s law-breaking past has followed him north, and first he must settle scores with those hot on his trail. In a story of families given and families chosen, bonds created and bonds destroyed, THE GIVEN DAY gives voice to the deepest meanings of union the love and friendship that link Danny, Luther, and Nora; the working men that band together to fight for their rights;... Set in Boston at the end of the First World War, New York Times bestselling author Dennis Lehane's long-awaited eighth novel unflinchingly captures the political and social unrest of a nation caught at the crossroads between past and future. Filled with a cast of unforgettable characters more richly drawn than any Lehane has ever created, The Given Day tells the story of two families?one black, one white?swept up in a maelstrom of revolutionaries and anarchists, immigrants and ward bosses, Brahmins and ordinary citizens, all engaged in a battle for survival and power. Beat cop Danny Coughlin, the son of one of the city's most beloved and powerful police captains, joins a burgeoning union movement and the hunt for violent radicals. Luther Laurence, on the run after a deadly confrontation with a crime boss in Tulsa, works for the Coughlin family and tries desperately to find his way home to his pregnant wife.Here, too, are some of the most influential figures of the era?Babe Ruth; Eugene O'Neill; leftist activist Jack Reed; NAACP founder W. E. B. DuBois; Mitchell Palmer, Woodrow Wilson's ruthless Red-chasing attorney general; cunning Massachusetts governor Calvin Coolidge; and an ambitious young Department of Justice lawyer named John Hoover.Coursing through some of the pivotal events of the time?including the Spanish Influenza pandemic?and culminating in the Boston Police Strike of 1919, The Given Day explores the crippling violence and irrepressible exuberance of a country at war with, and in the thrall of, itself. As Danny, Luther, and those around them struggle to define themselves in increasingly turbulent times, they gradually find family in one another and, together, ride a rising storm of hardship, deprivation, and hope that will change all their lives.