I am an attorney with a practice in New York. I've published three books through John Hunt Publishing ("JHP,") as well as 13 articles in local and national publications on topics including watchmaking, wheelchair sports, baseball, food & drug law and politics.
My first novel, Visions Through a Glass, Darkly, a dark tale of psychological horror, (John Hunt Publishing, Cosmic Egg Books, 2015,) won the Reader Views Literary Award (Best Adult Fiction – Classics – 2017,) the Global E-books Award (Bronze - Horror Category – 2017,) the Eric Hoffer Award (Best Commercial Fiction – 2019,) and was nominated as a finalist in the Forward Reviews Editor’s Choice Awards (Horror Category – 2016.)
The Midwest Book Review called Visions "an unforgettable, dizzying kaleidoscope of a thrill ride." US Book Review said Visions "grabs readers by the shoulders and refuses to let go...Readers will find themselves flipping through the pages in anticipation, only to be blown away by the result."
A sequel to Visions (Again, Dark Visions,) has been completed, but is unpublished. The novel was originally planned to be a trilogy.
What followed were two contrary collections of irreverent, autobiographical essays entitled “Snapshots From My Uneventful Life” ((John Hunt Publishing, Roundfire Books, 2d Ed., 2018,) and “More Snapshots? From My Uneventful Life” (John Hunt Publishing, Roundfire Books, 2018.)
Readers' Favorite Book Review called Snapshots "an inspiration and a joy to read," and said of More Snapshots? "the author's tales continue to enthrall, bemuse, and outright entertain."
With The Heartbreak Hotel, the novel submitted here, I return to psychological horror, but adding a surrealistic tenor and a touch of the supernatural to an utterly original theme.
“To many the past is a comforting thing, like a warm blanket that protects oneself from the icy cold of dark and lonely nights. But to others, it is a wraith that stalks the mind and haunts the soul, destroying the spirit, and murdering the present day. “
The tale spans the course of nearly two centuries, and follows the history of a nineteenth century rooming house in Greenwich Village. In 1872, during a blinding snowstorm, eight disparate people seek its shelter and, that night, witness a gruesome murder they do nothing to prevent. The next day, the hotel burns to the ground, with no trace of the occupants ever being found.
In 1933, a magnificent hotel is constructed upon the site, under the most mysterious of circumstances, and by owners that are nothing more than phantoms. The reader ultimately realizes that the employees of The Hotel are the reincarnation of the very souls that had occupied the original rooming house destroyed 61 years earlier.
“There are secrets we hold in our hearts that we wish no one to discover, secrets so painful we hesitate to admit them to ourselves, terrible secrets that lie in us like fugitives, but that can never be fully concealed, no matter how deep the hole we dig to bury them, no matter how many years we try to fill the hole with.”
The story proceeds with the tales of the desperate, tortured people that check in to The Hotel Albert.
“Welcome to The Hotel Albert. Check in is at three. Check out can be at any time.”
Ultimately, The Heartbreak Hotel is a parable. It is my masterwork, a story of purgatory, and unforgivable sin ultimately forgiven, and of love, and the power of love to redeem even the darkest soul.
