Oceanside author reads debut novel at Gazebo

After years of introducing local authors at the Summer Gazebo Readings, Tony Iovino finally took the stage himself on Aug. 18.

Iovino was reading excerpts from his recently published debut novel, “Notary Public Enemy.” And though it wasn’t an official part of the Summer Gazebo Readings, it still took place on the Schoolhouse Green in Oceanside.

“I’ve never read anything at the Gazebo,” said Iovino. “My feeling at the Gazebo has always been, for me to read would be like me inviting someone over for dinner and then showing my vacation slides.”

The book follows Peter De Stio, a Long Island attorney who’s coming out of alcohol rehabilitation and trying to put the pieces of his life back together.

“He had been a high-flying litigator, but he lost his practice, lost his wife, lost his relationship with his child,” Iovino explained. “He’s trying to live a very quiet life — taking nothing but no-pressure cases and living very simply — when his notary stamp and signature show up on forged mortgage documents and deeds. And there’s millions of dollars missing, there’s dead bodies, and everything is pointing at him.”

Iovino wrote the novel about two years ago, when it was purchased by his publisher, Diversion Press. “The initial draft took me about three or four months,” he said, “and then it’s gone through I can’t tell you how many revisions over the years.”

Already a published poet, Iovino said that he had started many more novels, but never got past page nine in any of them. “But this one kind of flowed and came together,” he said.

A trial litigator for nearly 30 years, Iovino based many of the occurrences in the story on real-life court cases he had either heard about or his personal experiences. He simply changed the names and fictionalized some of the details.

The book officially launched at the event at the Gazebo on Aug. 18. In addition to the reading, Iovino was taking questions from the audience and also selling copies of his book, which is now available at Amazon.com, Barnesandnoble.com and at Chapter One Books on Long Beach Road in Oceanside.

The reading also served as a fundraiser. All the proceeds from the books that were sold (about $400) were donated to local charities — Oceanside Community Service, the Oceanside Education Foundation and the Oceanside Kiwanis Club.

“I just thought [donating the proceeds] was appropriate,” Iovino said. “I do a lot of stuff around town. I’m more interested, quite frankly, in getting the book out there than making a lot of money on the book.

“And it also hooks back into the book,” he added. “One of the ways the main character kind of gets himself back into life is that he winds up doing some volunteer work. It’s something that I personally believe very strongly in.”