Coerte V.W. Felske was born in New York City and grew up in Manhattan and Quogue, Long Island. He attended Bronxville High School and received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Dartmouth College. He did his graduate work in film directing and screenwriting at Columbia University. The Shallow Man, originally published in 1995, was his first novel. His second novel, Word, came out in 1998 followed by The Millennium Girl in 2000. In 2008, the author established his independent literary imprint The Dolce Vita Press founded in conjunction with Amazon to publish and distribute his books. The imprint’s inaugural publication was The Shallow Man:15th Anniversary Edition released in September, 2009 followed by Scandalocity in May, 2010. In August, 2012 special anniversary editions of the acclaimed Word and The Millennium Girl were released along with the publication of Felske’s newest original novel, The Ivory Stretch, in January, 2013. The author launched The DVP to have significant contact with readership and to exercise creative control over his work from the editing to the covers, utilizing the top artists of the day. The DVP label derives from the Italian ＂dolce vita,＂ which translates to the ＂sweet life.＂ Felske was influenced by Federico Fellini’s masterwork, La Dolce Vita, a cinematic tale of a decadent group of glamorous partiers, nightclubbers, and exotic women as they navigate through Rome’s high society pursued by a playboy paparazzo. The author has referred to his early literature as ＂dolce vita fiction,＂ stories about nightclub impresarios, serial womanizers, fashionistas, fortune hunting women, entertainment business hopefuls, and scandal scribes entrenched in a similar dolce vita circuitry; i.e., characters living modern versions of that illusory ’sweet life’ depicted in Fellini’s film. In addition to the The Ivory Stretch, the author has two more completed works coming soon. Felske’s Chemical/Animal, his take on marriage in the 21st century and his 2nd written in first person as a woman, will be released in late 2013; A Touch of Noir will be released in 2014, a 1940s Hollywood detective mystery-thriller. All Felske titles for The DVP are available at the author’s Web site coertefelske.com, thedolcevitapress.com, Amazon.com, BN.com, independent bookstores and e-book distributors worldwide. To request a review or signed copy, write to the publisher, or for news, updates and an in-depth biography visit the author’s Web site at coertefelske.com.