Schaffer Goes Over

That Dylan Schaffer sure is one funny guy. Whether he’s explaining how cartoon canine Scooby-Doo inspired his crime fiction--as he did in a 2004 January Magazine interview--or telling novelist and blogger Elaine Flinn that he’s never seen his wife, Jane, sleep and that he daren’t mention Spiro Agnew around her, author Schaffer has a reputation for not taking himself too seriously.

Knowing all of these things, perhaps this reporter can be forgiven for not quite believing it when she heard that Schaffer’s new book is not another in the series of crime-fiction works that have brought him his reputation, nor anything remotely related. Instead, it’s a memoir called Life, Death & Bialys: A Father/Son Baking Story, and it is, in Schaffer’s own words, “the story of how my dying dad and I found truth, reconciliation, and the key to a perfect homemade baguette, during an intensive baking class.”

The memoir, published by Bloomsbury U.S. on September 6, is doing well right out of the gate. Barnes & Noble chose it as a Discover New Writers pick, and Publishers Weekly says, “The baking class is not just a sharply focused backdrop but a buffer from the most painful revelations about the suffering Schaffer endured in adolescence--unfortunately, the class ends halfway through the memoir, and the last sections deal with his father’s final days at home. The disruption to the narrative momentum is jarring, but Schaffer’s dark humor holds the two stories together.”

Schaffer is touring heavily in promotion of the book. His appearance schedule can be found here.