THE
RED ALBUM OF ASBURY PARK by Al Austin (VirtualBookWorm.com)
In his second novel, Al Austin takes us to the
Asbury Park of the late 1960’s, when the
city still loomed as the gem of the Jersey shore
and rock ‘n’ roll blared from bar
rooms up and down Cookman Avenue. This is the
story of Sam Nesbitt, a Vietnam vet who returns
home to his dysfunctional family - a working
class mom still reeling from the death of her
abusive husband, and a kid brother who only
cares about surfing and pot – and an Asbury
Park that’s teeming with gangsters and
wannabe rock stars.
The story’s set up by a series of events
that happen on the night of Sam’s arrival
back in Asbury, happenings whose consequences
reverberate throughout the story right up through
the final pages.
Sam starts a band, falls in love with two very
different women, confronts the birth father
he never knew he had, and butts heads with both
the city’s nascent music scene and its
seamy underground – gangsters, grifters,
surfers, and a variety of lowlife characters
who feed off the still vibrant Asbury Park boardwalk
the way small fish and sea creatures peck sustenance
from an underseas reef. A murder mystery knits
its way through the fabric of Sam’s story,
as he slowly assimilates back into Asbury Park
and works his way up through the city’s
music scene from unemployed outsider to the
brink of rock ‘n’ roll stardom.
By the story’s conclusion, every minor
character and seemingly random incident in the
book come back to complete a puzzle; both with
his deft plotting and his knack for true-to-the-ear
dialogue, Austin displays a gift for weaving
the minutiae of everyday life into the fabric
of a tightly-constructed whodunit with the skill
of an Elmore Leonard or Robert Parker. Anyone
who knows the decaying facades of Asbury Park
today will also be fascinated by Austin’s
period detail, bringing to life the days when
the city still teemed with life and promise
and the Casino and Convention Center played
hosts to thousands of upscale tourists each
summer. With its rich mix of New Jersey history,
rock ‘n’ roll roman a clef, and
mystery, The Red Album of Asbury Park will beguile,
inform, and entertain you. – Jim Testa
The Red Album of Asbury Park
is available at virtualbookworm.com,
amazon.com, and other online booksellers.
Alex Austin can be reached at alaust70@aol.com
Click
here to read an interview with author
Alex Austin.
