Chicky Diaz is everyone’s favorite doorman at the Bohemia Apartments, the world-famous home of celebrities, financiers, and the cultural elite.

Up in the penthouse, Emily Longworth has the perfect-looking everything, all except her husband, whom she’d quietly loathed even before the recent revelations. But their prenup is iron-clad, and Emily can’t bring herself to leave him. Yet.

Julian Sonnenberg, in 2a, has carved himself a successful niche in the art world, and a full and satisfying life, but recently he’s been staring down the planned obsolescence of himself. And that was before this morning’s devastating phone call.

Down in the Bohemia’s bowels, all the working-class staff are Black and Hispanic except the live-in super Olek, a Ukrainian refugee with prison-y tattoos and a bone-chilling competence. And a few miles away, a Black man is dead at the hands of the police, leading to a demonstration, a counterdemonstration, and a long night of racial violence across the tinderbox city.

As Chicky changes into his uniform for tonight’s shift, he finds himself breaking a cardinal rule of the job: he’s carrying a gun. Because tonight at the Bohemia, enemies will clash, loyalties will be tested, secrets will be revealed—and lives will be lost. 

Praise & Reviews

“Smart, twisty, and sharply written, THE DOORMAN is hard to put down and harder to forget. A delight.”
—Karin Slaughter

“Sensationally good, wise, wry and perceptive – this era’s great state-of-the-city novel, up there with the very best of Tom Wolfe and Jay McInerney.”
—Lee Child

“Like the New York City subway, Chris Pavone’s novel moves at breakneck speed, twisting and turning, jostling together those who might otherwise live worlds apart—the wealthy trophy wife of a private equity crusher, a broke ex-army doorman, an art dealer on the make—intertwining their secrets, their private heartaches, and their fates as THE DOORMAN hurdles to its shocking conclusion.”
—Jenny Jackson