By Way of Paris : a novel

Luke's life in North Carolina sucks until things start to look up when he sets off for a writing program in London, spending the month before his course exploring Europe. But his dream trip quickly derails in Paris after he discovers a body at a party and is blackmailed into hiding the evidence. Arriving in London, Luke decides that crafting the perfect novel will help him overcome the Paris catastrophe. He befriends Shane, a gang leader, and shadows a band of criminals as research for his manuscript. Luke finds a family with the young gang, but this new world is filled with violence and toxic masculinity, which strains his academic career, eventually entangling him in the London underworld as he embarks on a slew of crimes, making dangerous enemies along the way. When friends start dying and detectives begin calling, Luke is forced back to France, realizing that he's not the hero of his own story. Searching for an ending that could free his friends from Shane, Luke wants to bring justice to the murder that happened by way of Paris.