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More books and Les Roberts
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BY: TED S. STRATTON, Staff Reporter
He works the room like a well-liked local politician. That’s because Les Roberts knows almost everyone at Jack’s Deli in University Heights.
“See that woman over there? She’s been eating here since I first came to Cleveland,” he notes. Deli owners Alvie Markowitz and Gary Lebowitz ask Roberts when his next book is coming out. Between the fan appreciation and the schmoozing, it’s getting hard for the dean of Cleveland mystery writers to tuck into his beef brisket with a side of gravy.
“This is one of the places where you just feel comfortable,” says the smiling, almost beatific Roberts, author of 13 Milan Jacovich mystery novels and his latest, We’ll Always Have Cleveland (Gray and Co. 180 pp. $24.95).
The book, a memoir of Roberts’s life in Cleveland, reads like a travelogue of the people, places and events he has encountered. Because Roberts knew the city as well as any native, his publisher originally suggested the book be a guidebook from the point of view of his characters. Instead, it turned into a reminiscence and rumination on things in Northeast Ohio, notably, Roberts’s favorite restaurants.
He likes going to restaurants near his house, he says, like Anatolia Café and Sun Luck Garden, because he sees people he knows.
What most people don’t know, however, is that Roberts is Jewish. He doesn’t talk about it in his books, and religion does not play a large part in his life, he says. “I’ve always been spiritual, not very religious,” he admits. I respect people who are religious, as long as they don’t get in my face about it.”
Roberts grew up in the Edgewater area of Chicago with his Jewish father and mother. His father, the son of an English cantor, fled the East End of London and became a dentist in Illinois. He married Roberts’s American-born mother, and Les was born at the beginning of World War II.
Roberts, who estimates his high school was 70% Jewish, left Chicago to pursue acting in New York; he moved to Los Angeles a decade later. He’s also lived in Georgia and Hong Kong but “likes Cleveland best.”
He came to Cleveland on a three-month assignment to help develop the Cash Explosion game show. He knew nothing about the city, and thought he’d be back in Hollywood in no time. But something about the city grew on him. “Every time I came back, I didn’t want to leave.”
Roberts’s friends in Los Angeles didn’t look kindly upon his move to Cleveland permanently in 1990. But it was a natural progression. Roberts had transitioned from producing game shows to writing fiction, and he had already created his archetypal Cleveland sleuth, Milan Jacovich.
“A woman came up to me at a party,” recalls Roberts. “She said, ‘Cleveland, eh? You’ll be back here in a year.’” So far it’s been 16 years, a baker’s dozen of books, and a large community of friends and admirers.
“I’ve never felt like an outsider,” he says. “(My background) makes me more interesting. I’m not stuck here because I was born here. I chose to live here.”
Among those Roberts counts as friends are actors Reuben and Dorothy Silver, and Forest City co-chairman Sam Miller, whom he talks about in his book.
He recounts how he heard that Miller visited all his friends and delivered a fresh sack of bagels to them from Bialy’s Bagels every week. When they were first introduced, Roberts blurted out, “So, I understand you’re a baker.”
Despite the faux pas, the two became friends, and Miller even visited Roberts in the hospital when he was battling cancer. “When it comes to business, (Miller’s) a shark,” says Roberts. “But he’s the nicest and kindest person otherwise.”
Roberts finds Cleveland’s ethnic diversity “immensely nourishing as a writer. There’s more to write about than in any other city.” His books bear it out. Besides his Slovenian protagonist, Roberts often includes Italians, Irish, Jews and blacks as major characters.
Roberts’ next book isn’t about a private eye. It’s a mystery novel set in a concentration camp in World War II Europe. The period novel took a lot of research and has been “a reexamination to some extent” of his past, says Roberts. “This book is very personal. It’s an ordinary murder mystery in an extraordinary setting.”
Roberts expects his detective protagonist Milan to return sometime in the future (“I miss him,” the author says), but Roberts is not sure where his literary trail will lead. Only one thing is certain. “Whatever job I do, I will conduct it in Greater Cleveland,” he says. “It’s part of the rhythm of my heart.”
ILes Roberts, author of"We’ll Always Have Cleveland," will speak and autograph copies of his new memoir on Sat., June 3, at Barnes & Noble at Eton Collection in Woodmere from 12-1.
tstratton@cjn.org
“See that woman over there? She’s been eating here since I first came to Cleveland,” he notes. Deli owners Alvie Markowitz and Gary Lebowitz ask Roberts when his next book is coming out. Between the fan appreciation and the schmoozing, it’s getting hard for the dean of Cleveland mystery writers to tuck into his beef brisket with a side of gravy.
“This is one of the places where you just feel comfortable,” says the smiling, almost beatific Roberts, author of 13 Milan Jacovich mystery novels and his latest, We’ll Always Have Cleveland (Gray and Co. 180 pp. $24.95).
The book, a memoir of Roberts’s life in Cleveland, reads like a travelogue of the people, places and events he has encountered. Because Roberts knew the city as well as any native, his publisher originally suggested the book be a guidebook from the point of view of his characters. Instead, it turned into a reminiscence and rumination on things in Northeast Ohio, notably, Roberts’s favorite restaurants.
He likes going to restaurants near his house, he says, like Anatolia Café and Sun Luck Garden, because he sees people he knows.
What most people don’t know, however, is that Roberts is Jewish. He doesn’t talk about it in his books, and religion does not play a large part in his life, he says. “I’ve always been spiritual, not very religious,” he admits. I respect people who are religious, as long as they don’t get in my face about it.”
Roberts grew up in the Edgewater area of Chicago with his Jewish father and mother. His father, the son of an English cantor, fled the East End of London and became a dentist in Illinois. He married Roberts’s American-born mother, and Les was born at the beginning of World War II.
Roberts, who estimates his high school was 70% Jewish, left Chicago to pursue acting in New York; he moved to Los Angeles a decade later. He’s also lived in Georgia and Hong Kong but “likes Cleveland best.”
He came to Cleveland on a three-month assignment to help develop the Cash Explosion game show. He knew nothing about the city, and thought he’d be back in Hollywood in no time. But something about the city grew on him. “Every time I came back, I didn’t want to leave.”
Roberts’s friends in Los Angeles didn’t look kindly upon his move to Cleveland permanently in 1990. But it was a natural progression. Roberts had transitioned from producing game shows to writing fiction, and he had already created his archetypal Cleveland sleuth, Milan Jacovich.
“A woman came up to me at a party,” recalls Roberts. “She said, ‘Cleveland, eh? You’ll be back here in a year.’” So far it’s been 16 years, a baker’s dozen of books, and a large community of friends and admirers.
“I’ve never felt like an outsider,” he says. “(My background) makes me more interesting. I’m not stuck here because I was born here. I chose to live here.”
Among those Roberts counts as friends are actors Reuben and Dorothy Silver, and Forest City co-chairman Sam Miller, whom he talks about in his book.
He recounts how he heard that Miller visited all his friends and delivered a fresh sack of bagels to them from Bialy’s Bagels every week. When they were first introduced, Roberts blurted out, “So, I understand you’re a baker.”
Despite the faux pas, the two became friends, and Miller even visited Roberts in the hospital when he was battling cancer. “When it comes to business, (Miller’s) a shark,” says Roberts. “But he’s the nicest and kindest person otherwise.”
Roberts finds Cleveland’s ethnic diversity “immensely nourishing as a writer. There’s more to write about than in any other city.” His books bear it out. Besides his Slovenian protagonist, Roberts often includes Italians, Irish, Jews and blacks as major characters.
Roberts’ next book isn’t about a private eye. It’s a mystery novel set in a concentration camp in World War II Europe. The period novel took a lot of research and has been “a reexamination to some extent” of his past, says Roberts. “This book is very personal. It’s an ordinary murder mystery in an extraordinary setting.”
Roberts expects his detective protagonist Milan to return sometime in the future (“I miss him,” the author says), but Roberts is not sure where his literary trail will lead. Only one thing is certain. “Whatever job I do, I will conduct it in Greater Cleveland,” he says. “It’s part of the rhythm of my heart.”
ILes Roberts, author of"We’ll Always Have Cleveland," will speak and autograph copies of his new memoir on Sat., June 3, at Barnes & Noble at Eton Collection in Woodmere from 12-1.
tstratton@cjn.org
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