Blue Eyes Never Blinks

I have been reading the most unpolicitally correct book ever!  And loving it.   Blue Eyes by Jerome Charyn is on tour with Tribute Books and stopped by to see me.  Now I am a fan of Jerome's but it is because his writing is so varied.  Every time I open a new book of his I see a new writing style and that intrigues me.  Blue Eyes is the first book in a series that Jerome did some years ago.  We are revisiting the series since it is working hard on becoming Hard Apple, an adult animated series.  With the look of a gritty comic book, I am so excited to see it bring new life into these wild characters. 

Issac Sidel is the main character for the series.  I did not realize it at first since there are so many characters making up the multilevel story line.  This felt like I was looking into a brownstone apartment building.  Seeing each apartment as it's own story line and seeing how they crossed each others paths and intertwined like residents meeting in the halls and stairwells.  The characters are raw and unflinching on how they present themselves, like New Yorkers one and all.  Reading Blue Eyes, book one, I know now it is going to be a struggle not to spend the 'egg money' on the rest of the series.  Guess it is time for me to start socking it away so I can build up to each book.

I do want to tell Jerome thank you.  You see I do not re-read books.  I have tried before.  But by the first few pages the whole story is flooding all around me and it seems silly to read what I remember so vividly.  With Blue Eyes I am already on my third re-read.  Why?  The depths of the interacting story lines has me mesmerized.  I am still getting all the characters down, their histories and seeing where they are traveling.  I know they will continue in the series and I want to know them well.  Guess I am slinking along the city streets right along side them.

Thanks also to the support group of Nicole at Tribute Books and Lenore (I swear she is Jerome's right hand woman).  This group of people (Jerome included) have made me feel like part of the family.  Now it seems that Issac, Emily, Joe, Marilyn and Johnny are all going to be my cousins.  What fun reunions are going to be!




Blue Eyes Book Summary
A cop and his disgraced mentor attempt to bust a white slavery ring. Before Isaac Sidel adopts him, Manfred Coen is a mutt. A kid from the Bronx, he joins the police academy after his father’s suicide leaves him directionless, and is trudging along like any other cadet when first deputy Sidel, the commissioner’s right hand man, comes looking for a young cop with blue eyes to infiltrate a ring of Polish smugglers. He chooses Coen, and asks the cadet to join his department after he finishes the academy. Working under Sidel means fast promotions, plush assignments, and, when a corruption scandal topples his mentor, the resentment of every rank-and-file detective on the force. Now just an ordinary cop, Coen hears word that his old mentor has a line on a human trafficking operation. When Sidel’s attempt at infiltration fails, he sends in Coen. For Coen, it’s a shot to prove himself and redeem his mentor, but it could cost the blue-eyed cop his life.

Jerome Charyn's Bio:
Jerome Charyn (born May 13, 1937) is an award-winning American author. With nearly 50 published works, Charyn has earned a long-standing reputation as an inventive and prolific chronicler of real and imagined American life. Michael Chabon calls him “one of the most important writers in American literature.” New York Newsday hailed Charyn as “a contemporary American Balzac,” and the Los Angeles Times described him as “absolutely unique among American writers.” Since the 1964 release of Charyn’s first novel, Once Upon a Droshky, he has published 30 novels, three memoirs, eight graphic novels, two books about film, short stories, plays and works of non-fiction. Two of his memoirs were named New York Times Book of the Year. Charyn has been a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. He received the Rosenthal Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and has been named Commander of Arts and Letters by the French Minister of Culture. Charyn was Distinguished Professor of Film Studies at the American University of Paris until he left teaching in 2009. In addition to his writing and teaching, Charyn is a tournament table tennis player, once ranked in the top 10 percent of players in France. Noted novelist Don DeLillo called Charyn’s book on table tennis, Sizzling Chops & Devilish Spins, "The Sun Also Rises of ping-pong." Charyn lives in Paris and New York City.

eBook Price: $9.99 Release: April 10, 2012
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