In Joyce Wadler’s new comic novel, The Satyr in Bungalow D, the veteran journalist and humorist blends Greek mythology with the Catskills of the 1950s and early 1960s, bringing to life an era that she remembers as vibrant, romantic, and culturally rich.

A former New York Times reporter and humor columnist, Wadler also wrote for New York Magazine and Rolling Stone. She grew up in Fleischmanns – in Delaware County – where her family operated the Maplewood House, a small hotel that serves as the inspiration for the book’s main setting.

“My memories start in the ’50s, and although many of the really grand hotels were starting to go, there were still a lot of smaller hotels and there was excitement,” recounted Wadler. “Fleischmanns had a population of a few hundred people, but in the summer it just exploded. You know, there were thousands of people, and there was romantic excitement because people came with romance on their mind, maybe a little adventure.”

The novel’s premise imagines satyrs — half-human, half-goat creatures from Greek mythology — living quietly among the vacationers. In Wadler’s version, the horns are small, the hooves are hidden in shoes, and the charm is irresistible. “That great-looking guy your aunt had the fling of her life with at a Catskills hotel, who wouldn’t take off his hat? Probably a satyr,” she joked.

Wadler first had the idea for the book several years ago, but her reporting career left little time for fiction. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she finally sat down to write.

Her satyr protagonist, Danny, longs for an idealized love after reading The Great Gatsby, a decision she made deliberately. 

“It’s my favorite novel. I reread it at least once a year,” Wadler said. “Danny’s the equivalent of a 17-year-old guy. He hasn’t been out in the human world much, so Gatsby’s longing made perfect sense for him.”

Much of the book draws directly from Wadler’s own upbringing. She based several characters on family members, including her father, uncle, and grandmother, who ran the hotel after being widowed. Guests at her family’s working-class hotel were cab drivers, tradespeople, and, like many in Fleischmanns at the time, refugees from Hitler’s Europe.

She also includes period details from the town — historic hotels, multilingual conversations on Main Street, and summer evenings when guests dressed up to follow favorite bands from one hotel to another. Some episodes, such as her cousin giving cha-cha lessons on the porch while cows grazed nearby, are lifted straight from her childhood memories.

Wadler hopes readers take away both the humor and the richness of the era. “I hope it gives them the flavor of a time that’s never going to come again,” she said. “[And ] maybe makes them a little more satyr-like: enjoying every peach, every flower, every summer day.”

The Satyr in Bungalow D is available at Rough Draft Bar & Books in Kingston, Oblong Books in Rhinebeck, The Golden Notebook in Woodstock, and the Inquiring Mind Bookstore in Saugerties, as well as in e-book and paperback on Amazon.