“Over the years, Toperoff has been a master at blending fact and
fiction…and in this book his handling of the Hammett/Hellman
relationship and the Hollywood of their time is exemplary and
brilliant.  He has a great ear for their speech, and Toperoff delivers
the historical period with not only credibility, but insight as well.
And of course it’s a book about writers and writing, and thus the
relationships between ego and talent, success and the lure of
self-destruction.”

“I have been reading Sam Toperoff’s fiction for
decades. He is a wonderful writer, shamefully underappreciated…Fascinating and
engrossing, one of those rare books that would help you through an airplane
flight without insulting your intelligence. In a word, it’s literature. It also
happens to be dark and sexy and, I would think, ripe for the movies.”

“This is a novel that reimagines their relationship…with a strong dose of Golden Age romanticism.”

“A canny exploration of the long affair between writers Dashiell Hammett (1894-1961) and Lillian Hellman (1905-1984), which endured alcoholism, war, and McCarthyism…Toperoff locates the private passions in an intense, public, and ultimately tragic love story without indulging in glitz or melodrama.”

“Toperoff captures time and place and most
importantly two vital people. It is not easy to write about writers, but with
energy and wit and skill, Toperoff brings Hellman and Hammett’s talent and pain
directly into the present.”

“Toperoff’s speculative novel about the affair between writers Lillian Hellman
and Dashiell Hammett is thoroughly entertaining…The audio version is equally
impressive, with narrators Mark Bramhall, Lorna Raver, and Bernadette Dunne
complementing each other and enriching Toperoff’s engaging dialogue. They
succeed by bringing to life the words and personalities of two celebrities who
were known almost as much for their personal lives as they were for their
writing. Winner of the AudioFile Earphones Award.”