Montauk to Manhattan: An American Novel

A fun, provocative murder mystery about the making of a miniseries in the Hamptons during the summer of 2016 that involves today’s streaming TV, #MeToo Hollywood, the rise of Donald Trump, Hamptons parties, the stealing of Native American lands, and a well-known New York newspaper. 

Author Thomas Maier (Showtime’s Masters of Sex, Paramount’s Mafia Spies) offers the tale of Jack Denton, a down-on-his luck writer who is happy to see his novel—about the 1880s stealing of Montauk tribal lands by a loud, greedy tycoon—made into a TV series in the Hamptons. Denton is also covering the 2016 political rise of Donald Trump for a famous newspaper. But as he shuttles back and forth between his Manhattan newsroom and the on-location TV set in Montauk, Denton becomes a suspect in the disappearance of a young actress who was part of the same TV show.

Montauk to Manhattan is a story of murder, fame, sex, ambition, and the many political passions of our time—all rolled into one.

“Yet another captivating work by Thomas Maier, who masterfully shares here his unique insider-lens on Hollywood, politics, crime, media and our often scandalous home base, Long Island.”

—Claudia Copquin, Journalist and Founder of Long Island LitFest

“Thomas Maier is in the tradition of iconic New York newspaper writers like Pete Hamill and Jimmy Breslin, whose novels were as addictive as their vivid columns. Maier blends the pacing of Arthur Conan Doyle with the cinematic flourishes of David Lynch. Montauk to Manhattan is a dizzying New York story.” —M. J. Moore, author of Star-Crossed Lovers: James Jones, Lowney Handy, and the Birth of From Here to Eternity, Mario Puzo: An American Writer’s Quest, and the novel For Paris ~ With Love & Squalor

“This wholly American novel follows Jack Denton, a reporter turned novelist who is simultaneously covering the Trump campaign while serving as a consultant for a TV show adaptation of his book. Denton contends with the denizens of Hollywood and the campaign trail, even as his own personal life seems to unravel in front of him. Maier’s novel is one in a tidal wave of books about Trump’s America and the #MeToo movement. What he adds to the discourse is to draw some intriguing historical parallels between Trump and nineteenth-century railway tycoon Austin Corbin. Maier’s superimposition of a nineteenth-century plot on a modern-day one gives life to the standard ‘Hollywood-is-cutthroat’ tale.” —The BookLife Prize sponsored by Publishers Weekly