I Am Not A Dunkin' Donuts Fan

I worked as a proofreader at the iconic New York alternative newspaper, The Village Voice, in  1982 and 1983. Back then Monday nights were special because around 7:30 or 8 o'clock the editorial staff were treated to a different national cuisine. I remember, for the first time, eating a pierogi, a sort of Polish dumpling.

At 8:30 or so, we got in a van and headed for the printing plant in Hackensack, New Jersey, working until seven the next morning, checking the page proofs for any last-minute errors that crept in before we went to press a few hours later.

Before arriving at the plant we would stop at a Dunkin' Donuts shop to pick up a couple of boxes of donuts. There might have been coffee purchased, too. Although my memory of that is kind of hazy, it seems unimaginable to eat donuts without something to wash them down.

I say all this because I recently picked up from the Little Free Library a book called Chowdaheadz: A Wicked Smaaht Guide to All Things Boston by Ryan DeLisle and Ryan Gormady, two Bostonians, with humorous illustrations by Kevin Mulkern, another Bostonian (Globe Pequot/ Rowman & Littlefield, 2017).

In this book I learned that Dunkin' Donuts began in 1950 "as a single donut shop in Quincy, Massachusetts" that "has morphed into a Massachusetts icon." The authors further state that "[t]he endless drive-through lines at every location at any given hour prove that Boston runs on Dunkin." (The book spells Dunkin' without the apostrophe. Store signage puts it in. I chose to follow the latter.)

This might sound sacrilegious to a Bostonian, but I don't like Dunkin' Donuts. They remind me too much of those terrible donuts sold at the Winchell's donut chain stores in the Los Angeles area. My go-to donut store is Krispy Kreme, of which there are too few in New York. I like their soft, sugary, and somewhat greasy texture, especially after they are freshly made.

So if I ever get a chance to visit Boston (don't call it Beantown), I would be hunting for a Krispy Kreme shop, not a Dunkin' Donuts one. And I would make sure to carry with me a copy of Chowdaheadz* as well as a good street map.

*The authors explain what a chowdahead is. It's "someone who lives, or has lived, in Boston and maintains a wicked big sense of regional pride."

Reminder: National Donut Day is celebrated on the first Friday in June. In 2024, it will be on Friday, June 7th.

Customer Service With Courtesy And Know-How

It's been a while since I read the late journalist Nat Hentoff's Boston Boy, a memoir of his youth, but I remember a section of the book regarding a Boston candy store where he worked. The store management required all employees to master from cover to cover the store's rule book before they could be promoted from,say, a stock person to a counter person.

I wonder sometimes how many stores today are as meticulous as that Boston candy store was about training their employees in dealing with customers (especially the difficult ones) as well as the merchandise.

Murder At The Ballet

Dead On Your Feet by Grant Michaels (St. Martin's Press, 256 pp.)

Who knifed Max Harkey, the director of the Boston City Ballet? That's the question hairstylist/amateur sleuth Stan Kraychik must answer in Grant Michaels's mystery, Dead On Your Feet. And the killer could be one of six suspects, including his lover, Rafik, the company's choreographer. Each has a motive, and an alibi. (Of the six, five "at some point had been a contender for Max Harkey's love.")

For Stan, finding the killer is as difficult as getting Rafik to let him see a rehearsal of the new ballet. Stan's primary goal is to clear Rafik's name from the list of suspects. Each attempt draws Stan deeper into the morass. And face to face with an old assortment of characters who include Marshall Zander, the foul-smelling benefactor with the hots for Stan and Sharleen McChannel, a psychic, who, while having her tresses blow dried, brings the salon to a standstill when she receives a revelation about Stan--"Very soon you will take a long trip."

The prediction comes true. Stan's investigation takes him all over Boston--and London, in search of Max's missing diary, which may help Stan identify the murderer.

Throughout his investigation, professional as well as romantic jealousies among the suspects come to the surface. Stan discovers that Max Harkey was not above manipulating the rivals for his heart. Also,Stan believes Rafik is having a fling with co-suspect, Toni di Natale, the female musical conductor. Both deny there is anything going on between them.

I found Dead On Your Feet not a very engrossing read. Michaels is clearly no John Grisham. The book is strictly for laughs, at the expense of giving the reader a real page-turning mystery. Even the chapter titles tip you off that Dead On Your Feet is not to be taken seriously("Singing in the Rain," "She Could Have Danced All Night," "Change Partners and Dance"). When the killer's identity is revealed, it doesn't really matter, even when the killer is pursuing Stan several stories above Boston clutching a stiletto. The killer is presented as a buffoon "with the same demented grin that King Kong used on Fay Wray."

 I much prefer the more masculine demeanor of Joseph Hansen's gay insurance investigator Dave Brandstetter or Robert B.Parker's Boston sleuth Spenser. Stan Kraychik is too campy, too swishy, and too whiny to be an authentic detective hero, who can pry loose information from even the most recalcitrant suspect. When one of the suspects says to Stan, "I don't know why I'm telling you this," my response was: "Me neither."

Ballet lovers may get some pleasure from Dead On Your Feet because it offers a behind-the-scenes look at the ballet world, but I doubt many hardcore mystery fans will.

This article was originally published in the Lambda Book Report (November/December 1993). It was reprinted in Savage Male magazine (San Francisco) in February 1994.