Last Respects

A Novel

Reminiscing after his mother’s death, Benny Kramer remembers the chaos and hardships of his youth, indelibly marked by a brief turn as a bootlegger

For most of his life, Benny Kramer’s mother was an inescapable presence in his life. But on the day of her death, her body disappears on its way from hospital to morgue. While scouring New York in search of her body, Benny remembers the first adventure his mother sent him on, fifty years before.

At the height of Prohibition, little Benny’s mother gives him a simple task: Deliver eighteen bottles of bootlegged hooch to a wedding. Along the way, the would-be rumrunner encounters sinister slumlords, a sadistic rabbi, and enough slapstick obstacles to give the Marx Brothers fits. Reliving each moment as he searches for his mother, Benny comes to understand that this is just another day in the life of a boy desperate to find his mother’s love.

This ebook features a foreword by Alistair Cooke.