Best-selling author Margalit Fox will talk about her latest book, The Talented Mrs. Mandelbaum at the JCC’s Literary Luncheon on Wednesday, April 9 at 12:30 PM.

Tabloid sen­sa­tion Fred­er­ic­ka Man­del­baum head­ed her own crime syn­di­cate in New York City from the 1870s onward, spe­cial­iz­ing in “fenc­ing” stolen prop­er­ties and financ­ing bank bur­glar­ies. A pen­ni­less immi­grant bare­ly twen­ty years ear­li­er, Mrs. Man­del­baum enter­tained a var­ied crowd at her din­ing table: politi­cians and police, upper-class busi­ness lead­ers and their fash­ion­able wives, and some of her tonier under­world accom­plices. She was a Jew­ish wife and moth­er and report­ed­ly an enthu­si­as­tic mem­ber of her local synagogue.

After being immersed in Mrs. Mandelbaum’s life and times, read­ers may decide there’s real­ly no need to explain her suc­cess; she was sim­ply one of a kind. It’s a trib­ute to Fox’s sto­ry­telling tal­ents that this unique and mys­te­ri­ous woman has come to life.

Mar­galit Fox orig­i­nal­ly trained as a cel­list and a lin­guist before pur­su­ing jour­nal­ism. As a senior writer in The New York Times’s Obit­u­ary News Depart­ment, she wrote the front-page pub­lic send­offs of some of the lead­ing cul­tur­al fig­ures of our age. Win­ner of the William Saroy­an Prize for Lit­er­a­ture and author of four pre­vi­ous books, The Con­fi­dence Men, Conan Doyle for the Defense, The Rid­dle of the Labyrinth, and Talk­ing Hands, Fox lives in Man­hat­tan with her husband.