DETAILS ARE UNPRINTABLE

Patricia Burton Lonergan was a 22-year-old wealthy New York City socialite when she was found murdered in the bedroom of her Beekman Hill apartment. Charged with her death, and tried and convicted, was her husband of two years, Wayne Lonergan.

Details Are Unprintable is a suspenseful true crime account that builds from the moment Patricia's body is discovered, in October 1943, to the arrest and conviction of Lonergan in April 1944. The case focused on the tantalizing rumor that Lonergan, a 26-year-old cadet and playboy, was a “homosexual” or “bi-sexual” – as the press labelled him – who killed his wife in a fit of rage when she removed him from her will and threatened to forbid him from seeing their infant son.

Part fast-paced drama and part social history, this is a chronicle of Lonergan in denial living in an intolerant and morally superior heterosexual world, contrasted with Patricia, rich and entitled, a seeker of attention, who loved a night out on the town. Details Are Unprintable transports readers to the New York World's Fair of 1939 where Patricia's father first encountered Lonergan, the glittering 21 Club where Patricia enjoyed champagne cocktails, the Broadway strip where gay men were entrapped by undercover police operatives, and the muggy New York courtroom where Lonergan's fate was decided.

What truly happened on that tragic night? Should we accept Lonergan's confession at face value as the jury did? Or was he indeed a victim of physical and mental abuse by the state prosecutors and the police, as he maintained for the rest of his life?

With the intrigue, mystery, and perspective on the human condition of Michelle McNamara's I'll Be Gone in the Dark and the in-depth historical research of Killers of the Flower Moon, this book will appeal to our endless fascination with the sordid details – and sometimes the tragedies – that plague the rich.

ALLAN LEVINE has written fourteen books including Seeking the Fabled City, which was longlisted for the prestigious RBC Taylor Prize for Non-fiction, and Coming of Age: A History of the Jewish People of Manitoba, which won the McNally-Robinson Book of the Year and the Best History Book Award at the Canadian Jewish Book Awards, and was the co-winner of the J.I. Segal Prize in Canadian Jewish History. With a Ph.D. in History, Levine has spent his career bringing history to life and commenting on current events. He is also the author of five award-winning historical mysteries.