An Interview with Debby Applegate

Debby Applegate’s Madam (Doubleday. $32.50) is the best portrayal of Prohibition New York—in all its bawdy, violent, beautiful, profane madness—I’ve ever read. It’s a biography of Polly Adler, the city’s most famous and infamous purveyor of the finest prostitutes. She and her girls were favorites of the literary lions, legendary gangsters, politicians, and Hollywood’s biggest … Read more

Books by Mike Mayo