Secret Isaac

By Jerome Charyn

The ragged old man has a tapeworm in his gut and a room at a nameless Whore’s Row hotel, but to those in the know, he is one of the most powerful people in New York. Once the first deputy of the police commissioner, Isaac Sidel has lived in impoverished exile ever since the death of his detective protégé, Manfred Coen. As he wanders the streets around Times Square, Sidel spies a prostitute with a fearsome scar: a letter D seared into her cheek. His pity stirred, he asks her name and buys her a meal. Afterwards, he sets out to destroy the man who branded her. Sidel’s target is a pimp with a love for James Joyce and a hand in the pocket of the police commissioner. Taking him down will mean upending the force that Sidel once served, but if the tapeworm doesn’t stop him, no crook can.

• Language: English
• Publisher: mysteriouspress.com
• Release date: Jul 1, 2017
• ISBN: 9781786698216

Jerome Charyn

Jerome Charyn (b. 1937) is the critically acclaimed author of nearly fifty books. Born in the Bronx, he attended Columbia College. After graduating, he took a job as a playground director and wrote in his spare time, producing his first novel, a Lower East Side fairytale called Once Upon a Droshky, in 1964. In 1974, Charyn published Blue Eyes, his first Isaac Sidel mystery. This first in the so-called Sidel quartet introduced the eccentric, near-mythic Sidel, and his bizarre cast of sidekicks. Although he completed the quartet with Secret Isaac (1978), Charyn followed the character through Under the Eye of God. Charyn, who divides his time between New York and Paris, is also accomplished at table tennis, and once ranked amongst France’s top 10 percent of ping-pong players.