Excerpt – Crossing the Bronx by David Hirshberg
Synopsis
Set in the gritty, working-class streets of The Bronx in the 1950s, Crossing the Bronx is a modern retelling of the Biblical story of rival brothers Jacob and Esau. It blends crime and a love story with an uncompromising sense of realism and explores themes of family division, political corruption, and clashing cultures.
Crossing the Bronx follows Jay deVenezia, who discovers his brother, Eric, and father are involved in a corrupt scheme to bribe New York City officials to build the Cross Bronx Expressway that will destroy the heart of their neighborhood. Jay and his girlfriend align with a community group to fight against powerful figures including the mob, city politicians, and Robert Moses, the “master builder” of New York. Their valiant efforts, which include illegal wiretapping and a well-planned neighborhood uprising, don’t win this battle, but do succeed in the war by rousing public opinion against future community-destroying building projects.
Like Hirshberg’s previous two novels, Crossing the Bronx examines the evolving nature of the American Dream through the lens of first- and second-generation Americans trying to navigate a rapidly changing city. With cinematic naturalism, readers will connect with the vividly drawn characters, who reflect the essence of the human condition and show what causes us to change.
With Crossing the Bronx, Hirshberg has created another gripping tale that has it all: crime, romance, family dysfunction and betrayal, corrupt city politics, moral tension and ultimately, triumph over adversity.
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Excerpt
[A scene between Jay deVenezia and his court-appointed therapist after his release from jail]
I could tell from the diplomas on the wall that she was ten years older than I, but if I hadn’t seen the dates, I would’ve assumed she was my age. She was about 5’6” and had short, black hair cut in the Audrey Hepburn style, as opposed to the Lauren Bacall look, which was all the rage with the girls from The Bronx, who admired the queen of film noir even more, knowing she’d grown up in their neighborhood as Betty Joan Perske.
“I’ve had dreams. About Eric.”
“Tell me,” Dr. Silverman said.
“The snowball, the one with a stone in it, hit him and not the other kid. He was all bloody.”
“Did you help him?”
“No. I gloated. From behind the house. I didn’t want him to know I threw it.”
“What happened? Were you punished?” she asked.
“No one knew I threw it. I went into the house as if nothing happened. A few seconds later, Eric came in. His face was red, and there was blood streaming out of his nose.”
“Did your mother’s maternal instincts take over?”
“She wasn’t there,” I said.
“Ah, so you erased your mother such that she couldn’t minister to him. That would’ve diminished your standing. Eric was competition for your mother’s affection. No mother, no loss of station for you. Did you do anything?”
“No. I went upstairs to do my homework. He was in the kitchen with a paper towel with ice pressed against his face.”
“And then?” she pressed me.
“Another dream. I was sneaking back around the house with the stone snowball, peeked around the front expecting see Eric in a fight. He wasn’t there. I never threw the snowball.”
“Were you disappointed?” she asked.
“You know, strangely, I was relieved.”
“Now that’s a surprise,” she said. “You erased your mother in the first dream and Eric in the second. Maybe on account of the fact that you were going to see him the next morning. It was almost as if not throwing the snowball in a dream was going to make your meeting less confrontational.” She paused. “Guilt; you’d suppressed it all these years. Did you feel shame?”
I nodded. “I was morose.” I sighed. “Then, you know, I had a third dream: I missed him and hit the other kid in the face like it really happened, but when I came into the house, I never said anything to my mother.”
“No tricking her into thinking that Eric had done it to the other kid?” Dr. S. asked.
“No.”
“An equally important admission that the wrong wasn’t just to Eric.”
by David Hirshberg, Text copyright © 2026 by David Hirshberg, Published by Fig Tree Books
About the Author
David Hirshberg is the pseudonym for an entrepreneur who prefers to keep his business activities separate from his writing endeavors. As an author, he adopted the first name of his father-in-law and the last name of his maternal grandfather, as a tribute to their impact on his life. His first novel, the #1 Amazon bestseller My Mother’s Son, was published in 2018 and won nine awards. His second novel, Jacobo’s Rainbow, published in 2021, was also the winner of nine literary awards. Reviewers have compared Hirshberg’s writing to Michael Chabon’s and Saul Bellow’s, among others.
