Demarest Kill - Paperback

by Frank Eberling (Author)

DEMAREST KILL is a murder mystery and coming of age/loss of innocence novel unlike any you have read before. The Demarest Kill is a stream that threads its way through New City, behind The Dutch Garden and the Rockland County Courthouse, and serves as a metaphor for the events that unfold over a fifty-year period. Richly described with period detail and local color, DEMAREST KILL is the story of a generation of baby-boomers who grew up in the post-World War II years in New City, New York, just thirty miles north of Manhattan. Will, a fifth generation home-town boy, befriends Tom, a child prodigy pianist from a wealthy family. In the fifth grade, Will meets and falls in love with Beth, the artistic daughter of a famous sculptor who lives in an artists' enclave in this small town. The three friends form a strong bond, and from fifth grade through college they are inseparable, as they explore the perfect, pastoral world New City had to offer in the 1950s and 1960s. As they mature from elementary school students to adults, they explore the Demarest Kill from its source to its spilling into the Lake DeForest Reservoir. The winding stream becomes a centerpiece of the novel as it flows north. After high school, the three leave New City and seek their own futures, and as they do, they are caught up in the turmoil of the late 1960s, and become estranged; separated by the forces of history that rent our country asunder during that era. Decades pass, and in the autumn of 2000, Beth is found brutally murdered and dumped into the Demarest Kill at the back of the Dutch Garden. Will, now an investigator with the District Attorney's Office, becomes a suspect in the murder of his former lover. DEMAREST KILL is a long journey into our past, filled with music and events that defined those years. If you grew up in New City, or know the town, there are hundreds of touchstones to those magnificent days of fifty years ago. For those not familiar with the town, the story provides universal themes of unrequited love, nostalgia for days gone by, an enormous betrayal of horrific scale, and a brutal murder mystery that is both devastating and allegorical. Filled with characters you will never forget, DEMAREST KILL is the tragic story of a generation of young people who grew up in the glory days of small town, post-World War II America. The author's attention to detail, and sense memory of a time and place, make this novel unforgettable. The highly controversial, provocative ending will have readers debating for years to come. The author, Frank Eberling, is a fifth generation New City boy who grew up listening to New City history from older family and friends. After graduating from Clarkstown High School in New City in 1964, he moved to Florida to attend the University of Florida. Following five years as a high school teacher in Palm Beach County, he became a television news journalist and documentary filmmaker for over forty years. He produced over 3,000 television projects for local and national television, Florida PBS, and The Armed Forces Radio and Television Service. His work earned him an Emmy and numerous other writing and producing awards. He has written over thirty screenplays and four novels, several of which are available on AMAZON. ENSUEÑO is a literary murder-mystery set in Palm Beach in the 1950s and 1980s, and SWEET CITY BLUES is a goof-ball comedy set in Belle Glade in the 1970s. Eberling has written and directed two feature films set in Palm Beach County. He is currently developing a slate of several low-budget indie-films set in Florida.