Death by Pastrami

In these seventeen wry stories, Bernstein introduces us to the unsung residents of NYC’s garment district―proud lace sewers, unscrupulous ragmen, and salesmen with a penchant for stolen pens. Bernstein is a master of brevity―most stories clock in at under ten pages―and he is most concerned with the particulars of human yearning. A man offers a million dollars for a “first-rate” human heart. An engineer chooses the suit he will wear every day for the rest of his life. A funeral salesman discovers the deadly power of the pastrami sandwich. In their breadth, these stories capture a New York that recedes further into memory every year: a garment district populated by people with at least a passing acquaintanceship with the old country and older ways of making things.


Terse, funny, poignant, honest―like Malamud's before him, Leonard Bernstein's stories attempt to sanctify the ordinary, and in the process they provide the reader with an experience as humanizing as it is entertaining. ―Steve Stern, author of The Frozen Rabbi


Most of Bernstein's stories end with the literary equivalent of a shrug ― a distinctive New York gesture. These stories are both quaint and timeless, a fanciful addition to the literature of place... ―Maureen Corrigan, Fresh Air


Leonard S. Bernstein is the author of five books, including Getting Published and How's Business? ― Don't Ask. He is also an executive in the apparel industry. He was born in Brooklyn, NY and currently lives in Westbury, Long Island. He graduated from the University of Michigan.