Fiction / Drama
Date Published: May 22, 2025
The Perfect Ten is a gripping tale of friendship, betrayal, and the lengths people will go to when pushed to the edge.
When three high school friends witness a disturbing event, they make a pact to never speak of it again. Twenty-five years later, their high school reunion reignites not only memories—but a dangerous new alliance. Two of the men are facing personal crises: one is drowning in debt, the other desperate to save his wife from a rare cancer. Their third friend, connected to a powerful mafia family, may hold the key to their salvation—but at what cost?
As the trio ventures into the high-stakes world of counterfeiting, an unexpected fourth member joins their scheme—a once-forgotten classmate whose transformation is as stunning as it is surprising.
Spanning the coal mines of Pennsylvania to the glittering heights of Manhattan’s finance and fashion districts, The Perfect Ten takes readers on an international journey filled with twists, secrets, and moral gray areas. With characters you’ll root for and a pace that never lets up, this smart, fast-moving thriller asks: How far would you go for the people you love?
Interview
Introduce yourself and tell me about what you do.
I was born in Toronto Canada in 1943 and given the name James Douglas LeRoy McCallum. I was abandoned at age one by a destitute and frightened 17-year-old girl and later adopted by a family who changed my name to John Richard Iredale at the age of three. There’s a hellova story there, but for another book. I spent my childhood in Woodstock, Ontario, attended Albert College in Belleville, Ontario and came to the states in 1963 to attend the Ohio College of Podiatric Medicine where I obtained my doctorate in 1967. From Clevelend, I relocated to the Raleigh Durham area of NC and set up my private practice. I practiced for 48 years, and I suppose it was during my practice that I honed my story telling skills. I saw most of my patients as interesting people who were more than just a pair of aching feet, so I engaged in conversation and shared many things with them. My wife Bev would tell you that they were captive audiences, but she would also admit that many of my patients considered me a friend and called me Dr. John rather than Dr. Iredale. The running joke in the office was that when I was behind, my assistant would stick his head in the door, hear what story I was telling and say, “I’ll finish the story, go on to room five”. I guess the trademark of any seasoned storyteller is that they don’t tell a story just once. . .
During my career as a practicing podiatrist, I had a lot of interests and stayed busy doing different things. My sub-specialty was biomechanics and I spent a lot of time and energy expanding my knowledge and was instrumental in establishing a teaching seminar which brought together expert biomechanists from eight different countries.
Outside of my professional life, my wife and I were avid scuba divers and made many dive trips to some spectacular locations. Even those trips were shared with my patients as Bev put together small photo albums with our underwater pictures and put them in our reception area. It gave me yet another topic from which to pull stories. We also enjoyed snow skiing and over the years skied many of the great mountains in the states. I ended my skiing after a trip to the Italian Alps. It was there, on those steep and challenging hills, that I realized I could no longer see the snow well enough to traverse the terrain. This was due to a loss of binocular vision from an accident with a faulty champagne bottle cork that misfired and hit my eye at the speed of a bottle rocket. Another story.
I grew up singing and playing the trumpet, so music is definitely a big part of who I am. I sang with an internationally renowned barbership chorus, The General Assembly Chorus of Research Triangle Park, NC. I also sang bass for thirteen years with an acapella gospel group known as The Master’s Men. Bev and I both sang in the choir and were active in our church. We served multiple times on the foreign mission field and went to places such as Nigeria, Ukraine, China and Nepal. I have many fascinating stories about our missions and have put several to paper.
In January of 2016 I retired, and we spent some time flipping a couple of properties in Durham. In 2017 we purchased property in Punta Gorda, Florida and commenced designing our dream home. We relocated to Punta Gorda in April of 2018 and in July that same year I survived “the widow maker” heart attack. My hobbies shifted from the physically demanding to more artistic in nature and I took up carving. I have a large shop in our new home and sometime during Covid I decided to build a classic mahogany boat. Bev found a supply of rough hewn true Honduran mahogany and the adventure began. Now that truly is another story.
One of my other hobbies is playing bridge. I play each Monday with a group of interesting and accomplished men from around the country. They quickly learned that I am a consummate storyteller, and one day one of them said, “Shut the _ _ _ _ up and deal! Why don’t you write a damn book?” What a great idea! Not that I hadn’t flirted with the notion of writing a book before. But now that someone commanded me to do it, I decided, why not? – I think I’ll write a book.
Tell me more about your journey as an author, including the writing process.
I will talk specifically about this book, as it is my only writing that has been published. The beginnings of this book are rooted in the lively discourses of a rowdy group of guys I used to share after work beers with at an establishment in Raleigh.
It was during the Carter Administration when interest rates skyrocketed to twenty percent or more and one night, as we bantered back and forth about the state of the economy, one of the guys, a paper salesman, made the comment, “I bet right now it costs more than ten dollars to make a ten-dollar bill.”
From that profound realization, we began to create a screenplay (at least in our minds it was destined to be a star-studded box-office success starring Walter Matthau and Jack Lemon) about two desperate men who embarked on a comedy filled journey into the world of counterfeit.
Each night when two or more of us slid into our booth, we would kick around how Walter and Jack would accomplish their mission. The story grew in scope and hilarity over the months and possibly even years, but it existed only at that particular table in that particular establishment.
Recovering from hip surgery in 2012, I endeavored to record our screenplay on paper in longhand. But to my dismay, I realized that many of the funnier scenes had long since faded so I found myself creating a whole new story based upon the same premise.
After my boat building adventure, I decided to dig out my old “manuscript” and finish the book. I determined that writing in long hand was way too laborious, not to mention next to impossible for anyone to transcribe, so I used “voice to text” to record what I had already written and to write the rest of the story. Clearly, typing was not a skill I had honed to perfection. It took me three months. It took my wife, Beverly, countless hours over a six-month period to correct my grammar and make sense of my unorthodox sentence structure. She chastised me routinely – telling me it was like reading an op report or a medical note. “A paragraph should not be one continuous sentence!” Hey, I can’t help it – I write like I talk.
Tell me about your Book
First, I will state that the book is a complete work of fiction. While I have used some of my friends’ names, the characters assigned those names have nothing to do with whom the namesakes are in reality. And while some of the events within the story did happen to me, they are simply threads of truth woven throughout the fabric of fiction.
There are four main characters in the storyline – Jim Thompson, Ken Bernath, Tony Cassone and Jennifer Bentley. The three boys are childhood friends very closely bound by a secret – a murder committed by one of the boy’s fathers that they all three witnessed. The keeping of the secret creates a bond between them that is unbreakable.
In adulthood, Jim becomes hopelessly in debt due to his wife’s reckless spending. The second friend Ken (who works for The United States Treasury Department) is unable to afford the high cost of medical care for his dear wife dying from a rare form of cancer. Tony and his wife are raising a family and running an Italian restaurant in Cleveland. The three unite at their 25th class reunion. The fourth character, Jenny, a high school classmate who has blossomed into a breathtakingly beautiful woman, socializes with them at the reunion and later serendipitously joins the trio in their endeavor to solve Jim and Ken’s financial problems.
Following the reunion Jim is caught in a crossfire of scandalous libel which leads to the demise of his marriage and a desperate need to climb out of a financial black hole. After learning how involved Ken is in the detection of counterfeit, he approaches him and appeals to his desperate desire to save his dying wife. Ken agrees to Jim’s idea, and they conspire to manufacture an undetectable counterfeit ten-dollar bill. Jenny ends up being part of the plan when at almost every turn she helps them out of a challenging situation. Tony, (whose dad committed the murder) is solicited to aid in the illicit business of laundering the money. He does not want any of the foursome to be exposed, nor does he want his dad to be involved, so he contacts an underling in his uncle’s mafia family in New York.
A great deal of time and energy is spent procuring equipment, materials, and manufacturing flawless counterfeit bills. The endeavor takes them to Culpeper Virginia, a grandidierite mine in Canada, a manufacturing plant in Hong Kong and a bank in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. Unbeknownst to Jenny’s company, the counterfeit bills are shipped worldwide hidden in containers filled with women’s high end under garments and high-tech raingear. Towards the end, greed overcomes the underworld thugs and Jim’s team is double-crossed. I will not divulge how things end – suffice it to say it is a full circle ending.
Story
“The Perfect Ten” is a story rooted in a dark secret shared by three high school friends who witness something so sinister that it sparks a pledge of lifelong silence. They meet up again at their 25th high school reunion, where the seed of a second secret is sown. Two of the three are dealing with dire circumstances; one whose wife has been diagnosed with a rare form of cancer and one whose wife has spent him spiraling into an abyss of debt. Desperate for solutions to their problems, they implore the third friend, whose family has mafia connections, to assist them with their venture into the underworld of counterfeit. A fourth friend, a classmate (an unremarkable and unmemorable girl in high school who matured into a stunning beauty) serendipitously joins the trio. The story is fast paced, multi-faceted and spans the coal mines of Pennsylvania, the fashion and finance districts of Manhattan, the U.S. Treasury Department, a grandidierite mine in Canada, a manufacturing plant in Hong Kong, and beyond. The characters are genuine and likeable, and you will find yourself compelled to keep turning the pages to find out what happens next.
About the Author
John R. Iredale was born in Woodstock, Ontario, Canada, and earned his
doctorate in podiatric medicine in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1967. He went on to
practice podiatry for nearly five decades in Durham, North Carolina. Known by
friends, family, and patients as a natural-born storyteller, John often found
inspiration in the lives of those around him. His deep curiosity and attentive
ear uncovered stories that spanned generations, cultures, and communities.
In retirement, John finally turned to the page, sharing the vivid tales that have been living in his memory and imagination for years. The Perfect Ten is his debut novel—a suspenseful blend of crime, loyalty, and the power of old friends with unfinished business.
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