The Stories
Low Light
Why did J. Edgar Hoover deny that there was a national crime syndicate operating in America? He claimed that criminals were too dumb to be organized. LOW LIGHT is a novel that suggests that the FBI Director might have been the victim of blackmail. The story is narrated by Al Rubin, a man seduced into taking the blackmail pictures by promises too tempting for him to refuse. Hoover pays a visit to Atlantic City during the summer of 1929, unaware that Al waits on the other side of his hotel room wall with a pair of 1929-style, high tech cameras. When the photo shoot goes awry, Al escapes into the world of bootleggers, IRA gunmen, big time gamblers, anti-Semitic sea captains, African American race jockeys, flappers, gun molls, G Men, and powerful politicians.
Readers who like the HBO miniseries “Boardwalk Empire” will find much to enjoy.
Click here to buy or download the book
Click here to send me an email
Click here to read why Stan writes
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The Homefront (available 2012) is a Second World War mystery thriller about a Nazi scheme to stop traffic on the Delaware River in the summer of 1944 by sabotaging the battleship USS Wisconsin on her way to the sea..
Dave Levitan, an Atlantic City police detective, finds a Luger bullet that killed an Army recruit on the fishermen’s wharf. Levitan assists the FBI by solving the murder while they investigate possible espionage. A deeply embedded Abwehr spy cell has targeted the narrow channel of the Delaware which can be blocked if the just-built dreadnought, longer than the width of the channel, is holed by the bow while underway at the top of a bend. The detective and the FBI capture three of the four members of the sabotage team. The fourth survives to launch the attack and disappears in the explosion of bargeload of amatol moments before it would have accomplished its mission.
Levitan is a Spanish Civil War veteran. His girlfriend, Helen Rubin Lowenthal, is a jazz pianist and music teacher. His almost father-in-law, Al Rubin, is a small businessman with powerful political connections. Ida Rubin, Al’s wife, receives a letter from Central Europe describing the kidnapping of her family along with all the other Jews from their Hungarian city. FBI Agent John Brixton, a man who lied on his application form a dozen years before, shares more than an interest in the case with Levitan.
The Second World War changed everything. Levitan straddles pre-War anti-Fascism and post-War Palestine. Brixton, a former aide to J. Edgar Hoover, helped to invent ‘unlawful enemy combatants’ and broke a racially motivated labor strike that threatened war production. The USS Wisconsin was the last dreadnought battleship ever built. The great American empire, rising to replace those withering in the war, will rely on aircraft carriers.
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Hardly a Pulse, takes place in the 1950s.
The old Atlantic City is in its death throes. Efforts at revival are stymied by the effects of television, airplanes, and air conditioning. Politicians, if they can be persuaded to legalize gambling, hold the key to saving the city. The Rubins find themselves involved in a plot to change the balance of political power by murder, extortion and blackmail.
Why did J. Edgar Hoover deny that there was a national crime syndicate operating in America? He claimed that criminals were too dumb to be organized. LOW LIGHT is a novel that suggests that the FBI Director might have been the victim of blackmail. The story is narrated by Al Rubin, a man seduced into taking the blackmail pictures by promises too tempting for him to refuse. Hoover pays a visit to Atlantic City during the summer of 1929, unaware that Al waits on the other side of his hotel room wall with a pair of 1929-style, high tech cameras. When the photo shoot goes awry, Al escapes into the world of bootleggers, IRA gunmen, big time gamblers, anti-Semitic sea captains, African American race jockeys, flappers, gun molls, G Men, and powerful politicians.
Readers who like the HBO miniseries “Boardwalk Empire” will find much to enjoy.
Click here to buy or download the book
Click here to send me an email
Click here to read why Stan writes
********************
The Homefront (available 2012) is a Second World War mystery thriller about a Nazi scheme to stop traffic on the Delaware River in the summer of 1944 by sabotaging the battleship USS Wisconsin on her way to the sea..
Dave Levitan, an Atlantic City police detective, finds a Luger bullet that killed an Army recruit on the fishermen’s wharf. Levitan assists the FBI by solving the murder while they investigate possible espionage. A deeply embedded Abwehr spy cell has targeted the narrow channel of the Delaware which can be blocked if the just-built dreadnought, longer than the width of the channel, is holed by the bow while underway at the top of a bend. The detective and the FBI capture three of the four members of the sabotage team. The fourth survives to launch the attack and disappears in the explosion of bargeload of amatol moments before it would have accomplished its mission.
Levitan is a Spanish Civil War veteran. His girlfriend, Helen Rubin Lowenthal, is a jazz pianist and music teacher. His almost father-in-law, Al Rubin, is a small businessman with powerful political connections. Ida Rubin, Al’s wife, receives a letter from Central Europe describing the kidnapping of her family along with all the other Jews from their Hungarian city. FBI Agent John Brixton, a man who lied on his application form a dozen years before, shares more than an interest in the case with Levitan.
The Second World War changed everything. Levitan straddles pre-War anti-Fascism and post-War Palestine. Brixton, a former aide to J. Edgar Hoover, helped to invent ‘unlawful enemy combatants’ and broke a racially motivated labor strike that threatened war production. The USS Wisconsin was the last dreadnought battleship ever built. The great American empire, rising to replace those withering in the war, will rely on aircraft carriers.
********************
Hardly a Pulse, takes place in the 1950s.
The old Atlantic City is in its death throes. Efforts at revival are stymied by the effects of television, airplanes, and air conditioning. Politicians, if they can be persuaded to legalize gambling, hold the key to saving the city. The Rubins find themselves involved in a plot to change the balance of political power by murder, extortion and blackmail.