Breaking the Mold: Why My Detective Isn’t an Alcoholic

Frank Leland walks the hardboiled streets of noir fiction — but his vice isn’t whiskey. It’s food. And that changes everything.

We all know the trope: the gumshoe with a bottle in his drawer and a hangover like a recurring subplot. He's brilliant but broken, loyal but self-destructive, and he drinks like it's part of the job description. I’ve read him. I’ve watched him. Hell, I respect him. But when it came time to write Working Stiff, I knew I couldn’t give the world another alcoholic detective.

So I gave you Frank Leland. A man who doesn’t drink.

Instead, he eats.

Not the occasional late-night slice. I mean eats — compulsively, mindlessly, sometimes hiding it from himself. Red licorice and greasy burgers, shame and sugar in equal measure. He knows what he’s doing. He just can’t always stop. Frank’s addiction doesn’t come in a glass. It comes in a paper bag.

The Hunger That Can’t Be Slaked

Compulsive overeating doesn’t always make for flashy noir — no smashed glasses, no broken barstools. But it cuts deep. It’s the kind of addiction that hides in daylight. That gets judged differently. You don’t get called a tragic hero for eating your feelings — you get called weak. Or worse: invisible.

But that’s what made it worth writing.

Frank Leland is overweight, over it, and still doing the job. He’s self-aware but not self-pitying. He’s funny, flawed, and far more likely to OD on pastrami than pills. And when he screws up, it’s not because he’s drunk — it’s because he’s human.

A Different Kind of Sponsor

Frank used to go to Overeaters Anonymous. Emphasis on “used to.” He dropped out the way a lot of people do — quietly, without fanfare. But one person stuck: Ruthie Luft. NYPD homicide. One of the first nine women ever inducted into the unit. Frank and Ruthie don’t know each other from work. They know each other from the rooms. And that changes the stakes.

Ruthie was Frank’s sponsor. She lost the weight. She stayed in the program. She made it to homicide. And even though Frank never quite made it to recovery, she never gave up on him. That’s not just backstory — it’s the emotional heart of the novel. Their bond is intimate, unspoken, and carved out of the kind of honesty you don’t find at roll call.

Why It Still Works in Noir

Frank’s not a parody of the noir detective. He’s part of that tradition — just bent a little. He’s still got the wisecracks, the street smarts, and the moral bruises. But the switch from alcohol to food lets the story explore vulnerability in a new register.

Food is comfort, but it’s also punishment. It’s how Frank copes when the case hits too close, when the loneliness kicks in, when the past shows up with a knife. And unlike booze, it’s everywhere. Socially acceptable. Culturally coded. Nearly impossible to escape.

Frank doesn’t drink to forget.
He eats to feel something.

Making Space in the Genre

The genre’s strong enough to stretch. The detective doesn’t have to fit the trench coat anymore. He can be fat. He can be in pain. He can struggle with something that’s as common as it is misunderstood. And he can still be a hell of a detective.

I didn’t write Frank Leland to be an icon. I wrote him because I hadn’t seen him before. And because the genre I love — the broken, beautiful world of noir — has room for more than one kind of wound.