Brian McDonald(III)
- Writer
For over forty years there was a restaurant in Manhattan, New York, which attracted famous writers. Brian McDonald was a bartender there for over a decade, so had a front row seat watching some of the greatest novelists and non-fiction writers of the 20th Century in their most contemplative moments. He once saw Hunter S. Thompson set himself on fire drinking flaming shots of 151-proof Bacardi rum. They had to smother him with a tablecloth. Perhaps it was that night, or one like it, when Brian began to believe that maybe he too could become a writer.
Since that impertinent beginning, Brian has been able to assemble a modest body of work that includes the memoirs Last Call at Elaine's: A Journey from One Side of the Bar to the Other (St. Martin's Press); Five Floors Up: The Heroic Family Story of Four Generations in the FDNY (Grand Central Publishing); In the Middle of the Night: The Shocking True Story of a Family Killed in Cold Blood (St. Martin's True Crime); Safe Harbor: A Murder in Nantucket (St. Martin's Press); Indian Summer: The Tragic Story of Louis Francis Sockalexis, the First Native American in Major League Baseball (Rodale Books); and My Father's Gun: One Family, Three Badges, One Hundred Years in the NYPD (Dutton). "My Father’s Gun" was made into the award-winning feature-length documentary of the same name My Father's Gun (2002).
Brian has also written the New York City Trivia trilogy which consists of: book 1 "NYPD True: 99 Trivia Questions: Legendary Cops, Killer Cases, and Hollywood Heat;" book 2 "ResQue Me;" and book 3 "Trash Talk : Ultimate San-Man Trivia."
Brian has ghostwritten or acted as a book doctor on half a dozen successfully published memoirs, and has collaborated with Malachy McCourt on Death Need Not Be Fatal (Center Street), a humorous and poignant memoir of facing the Great Hereafter. As Brian waits for his next inspiration, he spends his time crafting masterpieces for others.
Since that impertinent beginning, Brian has been able to assemble a modest body of work that includes the memoirs Last Call at Elaine's: A Journey from One Side of the Bar to the Other (St. Martin's Press); Five Floors Up: The Heroic Family Story of Four Generations in the FDNY (Grand Central Publishing); In the Middle of the Night: The Shocking True Story of a Family Killed in Cold Blood (St. Martin's True Crime); Safe Harbor: A Murder in Nantucket (St. Martin's Press); Indian Summer: The Tragic Story of Louis Francis Sockalexis, the First Native American in Major League Baseball (Rodale Books); and My Father's Gun: One Family, Three Badges, One Hundred Years in the NYPD (Dutton). "My Father’s Gun" was made into the award-winning feature-length documentary of the same name My Father's Gun (2002).
Brian has also written the New York City Trivia trilogy which consists of: book 1 "NYPD True: 99 Trivia Questions: Legendary Cops, Killer Cases, and Hollywood Heat;" book 2 "ResQue Me;" and book 3 "Trash Talk : Ultimate San-Man Trivia."
Brian has ghostwritten or acted as a book doctor on half a dozen successfully published memoirs, and has collaborated with Malachy McCourt on Death Need Not Be Fatal (Center Street), a humorous and poignant memoir of facing the Great Hereafter. As Brian waits for his next inspiration, he spends his time crafting masterpieces for others.
