The Night Clerks

In 1960, there were strong taboos regarding sexual orientation. Revelation resulted in social, economic, and political reprisal. That world is visited, and insensitively handled, by the NYPD in this thriller focused on the brutal rape and murder of an aspiring actress employed at the prestigious Essex House Hotel.

The accused, a college student from a blue collar Queens' neighborhood, is freed through the work of a dedicated investigator. The story's surprising developments focus on the New York Public Library, where closet doors are opened on the story's suspects revealing the victim's other life. Before the mystery is solved, another hotel clerk is murdered, but not before the reader meets an interesting lot of gritty and sympathetic characters.