This review of Cop in the Hood comes from Largehearted Boy. He keeps a music blog and is also reading and reviewing 52 books in 52 weeks:
With our images of policemen and their work too often coming from dramatic television these days, a book like Peter Moskos’Cop in the Hoodis refreshing. A sociologist, Moskos spends a year in the Baltimore police department and shares his experiences from the police academy to the day he leaves the force to return to graduate school. What he shares is eye-opening. Police with the least experience patrol the most crime-ridden neighborhoods, the failure of the “war on crime” (and why it failed), the negative effects of modern policemen cruising by police car versus walking the beat.
Moskos keeps an open mind, and reports his experience without bias. He experiences not only adrenalin-surging action, but also the often mind-numbing drudgery and daunting bureaucracy of police work, and notices the effects of a career in law enforcement on his fellow cops.Cop in the Hoodnot only puts into perspective the job of a 21st century police officer, but also examines the sociological effects of modern policing and its true effect on crime.
For one month, enter the coupon code “LHB001” at Atomic Books and receive 15% off this title.
My next book is the graphic novel A People’s History Of American Empire by Howard Zinn, Paul Buhle, and Mike Konopacki.