Steve Ross is a remarkable man. His entire family was killed by the Nazi’s in 1939 when they invaded Lodz, Poland. Steve was eight years old. He managed to escape to the woods where he hid from the Nazi patrols twice a day for six months in the harsh winter months. He survived on berries, nuts, and bark. He was captured and sent to the Budzyn Concentration Camp, which was to be the first of the ten camps he was confined in for the next five years. He was scheduled to be killed in all ten camps but somehow escaped. How he escaped and what he did in Boston, once he was liberated, is what made Little Brown/ Hachette Publishers in New York make a quick offer on the manuscript. “When I saw the list of their stable of authors I told my agent to sign quick,“ Wallace said.
Wallace joins a list of Little Brown/Hachette authors named JK Rowling (Harry Potter books) James Patterson, J.D. Salinger, James Patterson, Sebastian Junger, Tom Wolfe, David Baldacci, Michael Connelly, Scott Turow and Stephen Colbert to name a few. “That was enough for me. That is like being offered a contract to play for the Celtics when they were almost unbeatable,” Wallace laughed.
Hachette is planning on selling the book Worldwide, as they did with the Harry Potter books. “To even be mentioned in the same sentence as JK Rowling still blows my mind. To have the same editors, marketing, production team as JK Rowling had is almost too much to take in.” Wallace said. Ambassador Ray Flynn is writing the Foreword and Michael Ross, Steve’s son, is writing the Introduction. Hachette is considered one of the top three publishing companies in the world and sold more books worldwide last year than any other publisher in the world. “That is the team I want to be on, “Wallace joked. We have already received a few movie feelers. One movie producer told me that our book is a cross between Unbroken and Schindler’s List. Again, pretty good company to be keeping.
Many people in Southie and beyond know Steve Ross. He has helped thousands of kids and families as a social worker over the years. When people mention his name, it is impossible not to smile. We are glad that so many more people, across the world, will fall in love with Steve Ross too. Steve was the driving force in building that beautiful Holocaust Memorial, across from City Hall, which bears his name.
Wallace’s first book “Final Confession” has been optioned by Ellen Pompeo of Grey’s Anatomy and is now in pre-production to become a movie. There is no date on when Final Confession will open in theaters. Attorney Glen Frank is a co-author with Wallace and is a fabulous writer in his own right. He has written three books and has two more coming out. Wallace is now working on a book about a woman named Monica Iken who lost her husband, of two years, in the towers on 9/11.
Monica, like Steve Ross, is responsible for the 9/11 Memorial and waterfall that sits on the site of the fallen towers. It was Monica Iken who galvanized support from the families of 9/11 victims, and others, and told Mayor Bloomberg that he was not going to build over their dead loved ones. It is an amazing story, and she is an amazing woman.
