By Ginny Cooper
Journal intern
Maury Levine, a lifelong Vestavia Hills resident, is a jack-of-all trades. A quality assurance manager by day and drummer by night, he recently penned his first novel, “Shopping Bagged.”
“Shopping Bagged” is a humorous mystery novel that follows the story of shopping center developer Beauregard Henry, who has a body buried under the fountain in one of his malls.
“It isn’t just a random murder,” Levine said. “The novel answers the questions: Why did he put it there? Who is it? What is happening to make it come to light?”
The real impetus for the novel, Levine said, was the unexpected death of his literary hero, Donald Westlake, a prolific mystery writer.
“It (Westlake’s death) was kind of sudden, and it made me think. I had this singular idea for a while, and so when he died I thought, ‘I’m just going to write a book,'” he said.
The novel, Levine said, was also inspired by his childhood desire to be a mall manager. Levine’s father, Herk Levine, had an office in Birmingham’s Eastwood Mall, which was the first enclosed mall in the South when it opened in 1960. Levine recalls many vacations spent roaming the stores of the mall and said the mall in the novel is “very similar” to Eastwood Mall.
Levine, who studied business management at Birmingham-Southern College, said writing has always been an enjoyable experience for him.
“In high school and college, I loved writing,” he said.
His father said Levine’s teachers always remarked on his talent.
“His first year at Birmingham-Southern, his English teacher told me, ‘Maury writes beautifully.’ I didn’t even know he was literate! Now that I’ve read the book, I know it’s true,” Herk said.
Writing this novel, Maury Levine said, was “fantastic” and “very, very fulfilling.”
The hardest part of the process, he said, was shopping the book to publishers.
“It’s hard to mentally prepare yourself for the constant rejection,” he said.
Levine was sitting in the children’s section of the Vestavia Hills Library in the Forest with his 8-year-old twin daughters when he got the email notifying him that Black Rose Writing was going to publish his book.
Levine said his family has been very supportive throughout the whole process.
“One of my daughters, Mary, who is very thoughtful, said, ‘Daddy, what if nobody likes your book? Will you cry?'” he said.
This, however, doesn’t seem to be a problem Levine will have to face. He celebrated the release Dec. 17 at a book signing at Homewood’s Little Professor Book Center, where the book sold out within half an hour.
Betty Bell, the last person to snag a copy at the event in Homewood, said she would be taking the book with her to California.
Though he is very excited about the success of his first novel, Levine said he’s not finished writing.
“I already have an idea for my second book,” he said.
“Shopping Bagged” is available on amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com and booksamillion.com as well as at Little Professor Book Center.
Levine will participate in the Local Author Expo at the Birmingham Public Library on Feb. 1 and the Southern Writers Festival at Barnes & Noble at The Summit on Feb. 22.