Register 16 Seats Remaining

Author Talk | Victoria Christopher Murray

New York Times bestselling author Victoria Christopher Murray discusses her novel, "A Pair of Aces," about two trailblazing women who team up to bring down a notorious Mob boss in 1930s New York.

Eunice Carter, assistant district attorney for the City of New York and Manhattan’s first Black female prosecutor, has her sights set on the one and only Lucky Luciano, head of New York City’s five largest organized crime families. Other prosecutors have tried to bring down Lucky, but they’ve all focused on the crime syndicate’s traditional businesses—bootlegging, gambling, loan sharking, and drug dealing—or tax evasion. No one has thought to approach the mob through its role in prostitution. Until Eunice. But she can’t get Luciano alone.

Polly Adler has worked long and hard to build up her high-class brothel business. Her client list is filled with well-known names, both the famous and the infamous, who all know her booze is top-notch, her music first-rate, her food exquisite, and her girls the best. But Lucky has gone too far, putting her girls in danger, and Polly finally sees the chance to end his reign once and for all.

Together, Eunice and Polly fashion a case utilizing a network of women. Bridging the enormous divide between them and risking their own lives, they assemble evidence bit by bit, under the nose of the man they’re trying to convict. It is this very alliance—of two women from vastly different worlds—that launches the most sensational trial New York City has ever seen.

Books will be available for sale and signing from Charis Books & More.

Registration is requested. 

* By registering, you consent to signing up for the monthly Adult Programs newsletter. 

Victoria Christopher Murray is the New York Times bestselling author of more than 30 novels. Her novels, The Personal Librarian and The First Ladies, which she co-authored with Marie Benedict, were both Instant New York Times bestsellers and her novel, Stand Your Ground, won an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work - Fiction. Four of her novels, Lust, Envy, Wrath, and Greed, have been made into TV movies for Lifetime. 

Moderator Dr. Jacinta Saffold is a visiting faculty fellow in the James Weldon Johnson Institute for the Study of Race and Difference at Emory University. She is an Assistant Professor of African American Literature and Culture at the University of Delaware and a digital archivist who teaches 20th and 21st century African American literature, Hip Hop Studies, and the Digital Humanities. Saffold is currently working on her first monograph titled Books & Beats: The Cultural Kinship of Street Lit and Hip Hop and the Essence Book Project, a computational collection of popular African American Literature.

Presented by Adult Services.

Upcoming events