Originally published as an Audible Original, THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET is now available as an e-book from Open Road Media. Here, Jim answers a few questions about the novel, which is a sequel to his NARROWS GATE epic.
How did you come to write THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET?
When NARROWS GATE was published in 2011, I considered it the end of the saga of Sal Benno, Leo Bell and Bebe Marsala. We had made it through World War II and the mob’s takeover of Narrows Gate, which sits across the river from New York City, a Mafia stronghold in the 1940s. We saw Bebe rise to become America’s most famous singer and an actor – a global phenomenon. It was a big, big story that had a resolution I found satisfying. But after a while, I started thinking that there was much more to tell about Benno and Bell. They were kids when NARROWS GATE began. Now they were adults who had to get on with their lives. I wanted to look into America in the post-war years through their eyes. It was a very exciting time in so many ways in media and show business. We had the birth of TV. Las Vegas. So many magnetic personalities.
Was there a particular reason that you first published THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET as an Audible Original?
I’m lucky to know Steve Feldberg, who is a vice president at Audible. I sent him an early draft of NARROWS GATE and he gave me great notes. So I turned to him with THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET. Again, great notes. And there was a commitment to have Edoardo Ballerini of “The Sopranos” narrate. Both novels were packaged together as mainstream literary fiction. Crime stories, to be sure. Mob fiction. But Steve knew what I was going for.
As a sidebar, Steve was a senior producer at CBS News and he made sure I was accurate in my portrayal of the early days of the network’s expansion into television.
For an author, what’s the difference between writing an audiobook and a book to be read?
I write for readers so I put my trust in Steve and Audible to make sure it’s suitable for the ear. At the same time, I’m highly dependent on rhythm in my writing, so maybe that’s an advantage with an audiobook? I don’t know.
Why did you choose Open Road?
I met with them a few years ago near where I was living in Tribeca. They revived my first three novels – “Closing Time,” “A Well-Known Secret” and “Tribeca Blues” – and did a wonderful job in packaging and promoting them. If you look at the cover of THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET, you see how much care they take. The photo is just a perfect reflection of the period. Also, NARROWS GATE was published by Amazon Publishing. They did a great job too, but it wasn’t readily available in bookstores. I thought: Let’s see how an e-book does and whether we really need THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET to be available in paper-and-ink.
In NARROWS GATE, you fictionalized the lives of several famous people, but you also featured actual famous people. You do the same in THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET. Why?
It started with Frank Sinatra. I’m from Hoboken too and Narrows Gate is a fictionalized version of Hoboken. I didn’t want to document his life. I wanted to show how hard it can be to break out of a small town. Clearly, I used some facts of his life, but the Bebe character was more influenced by what I heard about Sinatra while I was growing up. As for the mobsters, I used some of the same source material as Mario Puzo did for “The Godfather.” In THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET, quite a bit of the story takes place in Greece, Monaco, Paris and Sicily. You may say “Oh, that character is based on Aristotle Onassis,” but you’d be right only to a degree.
Back in Hollywood and Las Vegas, you might think, “Oh, that’s Jerry Lewis.” Maybe. Don Carlo Farcolini, who returns in “Mayor,” is a composite of many mob bosses from the period.
As for using real people, in THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET, I really wanted to celebrate the jazz scene based around Central Avenue in Los Angeles in the ‘40s and ‘50s. I wanted to pay tribute to Louis Jordan, who is so great and, despite being the subject of a Broadway musical, is still underrated. In NARROWS GATE, Billie Holiday appears briefly. The same with Sammy Davis Jr. in THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET. They have such gravitas that they elevate a scene by their presence. There’s a scene in THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET with John Wayne and the Narrows Gate gangster Fat Tutti that just delights me.
The hybrid characters – partly fact, mostly fiction – are fun to develop. But my favorite characters – Sal and Leo, Imogene O’Boyle and Scatta Calisi – are inventions. They’re not based on anyone I’ve ever met.
In your mind, does THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET work better for the eye or the ear?
I’m not dodging the question, but I’d say it works for both. Like NARROWS GATE, THE MAYOR OF POLK STREET is a novel that has a large scope. It takes notable periods in American history and examines them through the experiences of everyday people – everyday people who have become much larger than they ever expected and everyday people who want nothing more to have satisfying life in their hometown. There’s a need for balance in the storytelling: big settings – New York, Hollywood, Las Vegas, the Sicilian countryside, Paris, Athens, Monaco, glamorous hotels, resorts and nightclubs – but characters who are struggling with problems we all can recognize. There’s humor and tragedy side-by-side. A lot of things happen. How do people prefer to take in such stories? My preference doesn’t really matter. I’m grateful to Open Road for getting the book to readers. I’m looking forward to the feedback.
