Ex-Cop Transforms His Experiences Into Words

Author George Ascher

By Eric Goodman

George Ascher admits that he doesn’t write for the money or the fame but rather because he loves creating stories based on his life experiences. But the former New York City police officer and Army veteran knows that his writing is nothing more than a hobby that allows him to fulfill a lifelong dream of becoming a published author.

“I’m not looking to become the next James Patterson,” joked Ascher. “I’m simply satisfying my lifelong ambition of writing books that are loosely based on my experiences gained as a 66-year-old man living in Brooklyn my entire life.”

The Brooklyn native, who has lived on East 56 Street in Mill Basin for the last 35 years, has had three books published by IUniverse.com, an Internet publishing company that prints books on demand.

Ascher is currently working on an as yet untitled detective novel, which focuses on a murder investigation on a farm in rural Pennsylvania. Ascher’s first book, published five years ago, was a detective novel entitled, “Code Four Confidential” that follows an investigation of a suspected murder in a rural town.

“I’d be lucky if more than five people bought that book,” Ascher said chuckling. “But after roaming the streets of New York for ten years as a police officer from the late 1960’s through the late 1970’s, I felt I needed to write a story that incorporated some of my experiences.”

A year later Ascher wrote a sequel, “The Hunt for Rudy Sellers.”

“I really enjoyed writing my first detective novel and I felt that I had much more to tell about the story, so I decided that my next book would simply be a continuation of the first,” said Ascher.

For his third book, Ascher decided to stray from the fictional detective novels and write about something that was dear to his heart. In “A Look Back Into The Old Neighborhood”, Ascher wrote about the East New York neighborhood where he lived until around 1964 when he married Anne, his high school sweetheart.

“There were just so many great people and places in East New York that I felt as if I needed to write it all down as sort of a retrospective of a time that has long past,” said Ascher. “I loved that old neighborhood and this book allowed me to reminisce while also sharing a little bit of Brook-lyn history with whoever reads it.”

Ascher, who was also a maintenance worker at SUNY Downstate Medical Center, is retired and enjoys gardening, golfing, fishing and traveling with his wife to visit their son, daughter-in-law and two grandchildren in California.

The writer joked that he is prepared for the big time if some large book publisher decides it wants to mass produce his books.

“I’d grab the chance at a little bit of fame if someone wanted to take my books worldwide,” Ascher said. “But, for now, I’ll just continue to write books that I find enjoyable.”