Novel Query

I am looking for a publisher of my 100,000 + word novel ‘Lieberman.’

The plot of the novel concerns the assistant to a literary critic who suffers from the dominance of the critic. After the latter’s death, the assistant believes that he has been freed, finally, from the critic’s influence. However, when the critic’s widow asks him to complete an unfinished novel written by her late husband, the assistant finds himself still under the influence of the critic, as well as his wife.

To date the following chapters of the novel, or portions thereof, have been published:


Chapter 1 in Midstream (print)
Chapter 2 in Cyclamens and Swords (online)
Chapter 6 in Paper Skin Glass Bones (online)
Chapter 7 in Sylvan Echo (online)
Chapter 8 in European Judaism (print)
Chapter 14 in Polyphony Magazine (online)
Chapter 15 in Danse Macabre (online)
Chapter 17 in Indigo rising Magazine (online and print)

The best recommendation for the novel as a whole is what European Judaism said of Chapter 8. “It is a pure delight to be able to include a chapter of a yet unpublished novel of Larry Lefkowitz called ‘Lieberman.’” Also, praise (if somewhat overstated, perhaps) from Paper Skin Glass Bones: “Your writing is classic, speaking of a legacy of style that one does not often find in our time.”

Although set in Israel, the novel is suitable for an international audience because of the universality of its plot, its feast of literary references, its sharp and witty dialogue, and its humor.

Possible jacket blurb: “If you like literature, you’ll love this book.”

Why not let me send email the first five chapters as examples.


Larry Lefkowitz

59 Leshem St.
Apt. 3
Modiin, Israel

Email: lar_lef@hotmail.com

Manifesto
Ok! Anybody with his pen [keyboard, cellphone, etc. for the younger reader] has to have a blog. So I was urged. Me, who refuse to be on Facebook (my face is not worthy of being in a book), or Twitter. So I have a blog. Don't expect great things from this blog. And anything posted will remain there for an indefinite period -- I don't have time to write for posterity AND for a blog. So check in from time to time(every few weeks or months)and maybe there will be something to titillate you.
Oh, and there's no need for comments. The uncomplimentary ones I don't need, and the complimentary ones are nice but unnerving, too, especially if I have to reply to them.
For my first posting I've chosen something that should warm the coccles of the hearts of those writers who, like me, are frustrated at never having been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. (Apparently no one ever WINS a Pushcart Prize, the trick is to be nomionated for one.) Anyhow here it is. Enjoy. (It first saw the light of day in Cafe Irreal.)

Idea fixe

  

            At first the idea (not yet fixed) seemed to him strange. To write a story about a pushcart. That if he wrote about a pushcart, he would have a better chance. To be nominated. To be nominated for a Pushcart Prize. To write about a pushcart was good. But how? Ok, pushcarts immediately raised in his mind the association: the Lower East Side. Pushcart country. He could go there. But then he remembered. They no longer used pushcarts. Pushcarts were out. Nowadays sellers sold things from minivans. There was no Minivan Prize. He was overcome by dispair. But only for a moment. Somewhere there was a pushcart. Maybe in the Smithsonian. Did they have a Lower East Side Exhibit? A New York in the Early Part of the Twentieth Century Exhibit? But he was a writer. He didn’t have to see a pushcart to write about it. He could imagine a pushcart. Maybe the Grandaddy of all pushcarts. Like the Pushcart essence that Plato claimed was reflected on the cave wall. Ok, Plato was a Greek. Pushcarts were Jewish. At least as embodied in the Lower East Side. But what was Plato doing in the Lower East Side. Shopping for shmates? Tired of togas? No, no jokes. The Pushcart Prize rarely goes to humorous writing. They are serious people, the Pushcart people. Of course he could be devious. Being nominated for literary prizes is often a devious process nowadays. And beside, there were honorably devious writers. No, no names. A word from one of them – or their executors – read: finished, kaput. For the Pushcart, I mean. The Pushcart people are not fond of controversy. But I dissemble. (The careful reader will note a subtle shift from the third person to the  first person form. The blending of the two has become an effective belles lettres technique. No, I won’t stoop to designating it a post-modern one.) Pushcart, pushcart, I urge myself, back on track. The thing, itself. The res. The essence. The sine qua non. No, no Latin. Latin goes with galleys (ships not proofs), not pushcarts. Maybe I could build a pushcart. A replica. But no, I’m all thumbs. And anyhow, what if I build it? And it is a replica? But – a replica of what? Of the prize? No, I doubt that the prize is a trophy in the shape of a pushcart, let alone a pushcart itself. The sad truth is that I haven’t succeeded in writing a story about a pushcart. I’ve been trying for some time now. Gornisht. At night, in my dreams, pushcarts assail me. In one dream I was run over by a pushcart. But as I lie or lay there (don’t bother me now with grammatical nitpicking: I am on a mission, to borrow from a non-literary context), bleeding, dirty, a man rushes up to me (stepping unaware on my plume at my side, Freudians . . .  no, never mind), and puts something in my hand. A prize! The Pushcart Prize, handed to me by Mr. Pushcart himself! And I refuse it. Yes, in the dream – no, the nightmare, I refuse it. And not out of modesty. Out of spite. Why you ask? Ask Freud. (Forget Jung, Jung was a pisher, a puts.) Maybe I don’t really think I deserve it. Or that it would corrupt me. Or I would never be able to write again (like some who received the Nobel), or if I could, it might cramp my style. And so (in my nightmare) I refuse it. And worse, I tell the representative of the prize committee (apparently I got cold feet in the nightmare, hence the committee and not Mr. Pushcart) to put the prize you-know-where,  but all of a sudden it is Mr. Pushcart I said this to!, and not the committee representative. I am so amazed by my khutspe that I wake up, in a cold sweat. I resolve to stop this mania, this obsession of mine before I go bonkers. I am not a writer of the ilk that flourishes in psychiatric insitutions. My secret hope: that this, this very writing unfolding before your amazed eyes will in itself bring me a nomination. If not in the story category, the essay. A Pushcart is a Pushcart is a . . . I repeat to myself. And apparently not only to myself. The doctors here  -- to all appearances,  I went bonkers – (N.B., they don’t like the word) try to get me off this “pushcart compulsion”, or “pushcart schizophrenia”. But they’ll never succeed. They have even threatened to take my pushcart away from me. Let them try … They will learn: The pen is mightier than the ward.