When I was in high school, the British hard rock band Deep Purple scored a huge comeback hit with the song “Knocking at Your Back Door,” the lead single from their album Perfect Strangers. During the song, a man visits various women, from strippers to aristocrats, late at night and knocks at their back door…
Life isn’t panning out for Maureen Coughlin. At twenty-nine, the tough-skinned Staten Island native’s only excitement comes from . . . well, not much. A fresh pack of American Spirits, maybe, or a discreet dash of coke before work. If something doesn’t change soon, she’ll end up a “lifer” at the Narrows, the faux-swank bar…
Bill Loehfelm is the author of Fresh Kills, the first winner of the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, and another novel, Bloodroot. He was born…
