Machine politics is a tough business, filled with people who put far more value on power and money than on honor, friendship, or the lives of those who challenge them. Atop this maelstrom sits Chairman Eamon DeValera Collins, formerly the undisputed boss of the Irish-Catholic Fifteenth Ward and now the man who controls the entire city. In this position, he finds himself surrounded by opportunists, amateurs, criminals, thieves, and cold-blooded killers.

Those he can trust are few and far between, and they are far outnumbered those who would attempt to use their connection to him to eliminate their enemies and line their own pockets. While only one former ally is sufficiently tough-or crazy-enough to directly challenge his leadership, the Chairman will stop at nothing to put down any challenger.

In "The Chairman's Challenge, " the sequel to "The Chairman, A Novel of Big City Politics, " award-winning writer Mark M. Quinn takes the reader on a sometimes dark, but always thought-provoking, tour of the ins and outs of a political machine. It's a brutal examination of the minds of men and women who will sacrifice anything or anyone for a chance at power.

Machine politics is a tough business, filled with people who put far more value on power and money than on honor, friendship, or the lives of those who challenge them. Atop this maelstrom sits Chairman Eamon DeValera Collins, formerly the undisputed boss of the Irish-Catholic Fifteenth Ward and now the man who controls the entire city. In this position, he finds himself surrounded by opportunists, amateurs, criminals, thieves, and cold-blooded killers.

Those he can trust are few and far between, and they are far outnumbered those who would attempt to use their connection to him to eliminate their enemies and line their own pockets. While only one former ally is sufficiently tough-or crazy-enough to directly challenge his leadership, the Chairman will stop at nothing to put down any challenger.

In "The Chairman's Challenge, " the sequel to "The Chairman, A Novel of Big City Politics, " award-winning writer Mark M. Quinn takes the reader on a sometimes dark, but always thought-provoking, tour of the ins and outs of a political machine. It's a brutal examination of the minds of men and women who will sacrifice anything or anyone for a chance at power.

In The Chairman: A Novel of Big City Politics, award-winning short fiction writer and journalist Mark M. Quinn offers a character driven plot that shows the thin line between good and evil in a big city ward boss. In a way that few authors can, Quinn offers a convincing portrait of how complicated and mercurial the world of ward politics is and how, by definition, a public official is torn by conflicting motivations. Chairman Eamon DeValera Collins is a practitioner of raw, devious politics. Readers will split their time between condemning and cheering this deliciously nefarious while wholly sympathetic character. As a caricature of all that big city politics achieves and represents, this novel is a spellbinding look into the annals of America's colorful 20th century big city politics. While the urban political machine may not yet have died away completely, its swansong is composed of hilarity, tragedy, and desperation, which Quinn pitch-perfectly records.