Love and Bullets:: Cafe Chronicles Book 1 (The Cafe Chronicles)

When a nightclub entertainer and a gangster take a battered teenager into their home and hearts, they become a family as real as any bound by blood, and “bringing up baby” gets a whole new meaning. There’s nothing unusual about the family living on Aberdeen Street. They’re just like every other family. They share meals and chores, watch television together, celebrate special occasions, and look after each other. They’re the kind of family Norman Rockwell would paint if he were still alive – and doing acid. “Mom” is Chicago’s most famous female impersonator – Billy Blanchard, better known as Blanche D’Almond, belle of Café Muse. “Dad” is Sammy "The Pig" Gavone, a mid-level mobster, and their “son” is the banished child of religious fanatics. Who’s to say what makes a family? But it’s not all white picket fences on Aberdeen Street. There's a greedy IRS flunky looking for a big score, an FBI agent with an axe to grind, a clingy male model with the prettiest feet in America, a meatpacking heir with a taste for S&M, a kinky trophy wife, and an unfortunate incident involving a vat of eucalyptus-scented wax. Then things get really complicated. LOVER AND BULLETS explores what it means to be a family when the family is out of the ordinary. Read more