Dog Bites Man: City Shocked: A Novel

From Publishers Weekly Retired attorney Duffy author of seven Reuben Frost mystery novels under the pseudonym Haughton Murphy delivers a droll spoof of New York (city and state) political and social pretensions. Running against a Republican so disreputable that even Randilynn Foote, the somewhat shaky incumbent Republican governor, withholds her endorsement, Eldon Hoagland, a political science professor at Columbia, is elected mayor of New York City on the Democratic ticket. After a rather credible first year and a half in office, the highly intoxicated mayor departs a boozy reunion at the Fifth Avenue digs of his old Princeton roomie and is attacked and bitten after stepping on the leg of a pit bull urinating at the curb. His bodyguards shoot the animal as the dog's walker a hunky Albanian with an expired green card flees across Fifth Avenue into the bushes of Central Park. With no witnesses, the mayor decides to keep the incident mum. The dog's socially prominent owner, Sue Nation Brandberg, the mid-50-something Native American widow of a philanthropic billionaire, can't report the shooting to the authorities because of her houseboy lover's illegal status. Sue enlists the aid of the sleazy publisher of a British-owned tabloid newspaper to track down the culprits. When the story breaks, animal rights crusaders and the clergy join the fray. His Honor admits the truth, and all hell breaks loose. The governor, who resents Hoagland her former Columbia professor because he once gave her a B-minus, seizes the opportunity for revenge, only to discover that vengeance can be a two-edged sword. This erudite comedy of errors is the equivalent of Damon Runyon in white tie and tails. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc. From