A Book and a Chat with Lucas R Baker

Some people get their ideas for novel in dreams, or while they sleep making sure they keep a notepad next to the bed, others like my guest today thoughts come to them while driving. For Lucas R Baker the guest on today’s “A Book and a Chat” he comes up with plots and ideas for books while driving his truck. Mind you it has taken a long while for the original idea of for his first book Jess and Zoe to grow from the idea stage to seeing the story in print. Ten years in fact from the time he first came up with the idea to having it printed. He wrote the story while virtually homeless, living in a tend with just paper and pen to create the story.

Jess and Zoe is about a young girl Jess who finds a hidden book in a forgotten root cellar. The book is filled with a strange language that nobody knows, and she is able to track the book back to a woman who was imprisoned during the Salem Witch Trials. Could this be magic? Using the internet, Jess learns this new language until her little sister Zoey is kidnapped. Since the authorities are unable to find Zoey, Jessy must use her limited skill in magic and go out on a journey to rescue her sister.

That however is not the end of Jess and Zoe, as their story continues in another of Lucas’s book “Sisters” which finds the two girls in the jungles of Mexico. They must get home and Jess must explain how she found Zoey. They face new challenges as they grow up and continue to learn magic. They have encounters with new villains as they face fresh obstacles. They make discoveries and fight for their lives.

As well as the young adult fantasy novel Lucas has also written a book “Running from the Mafia” based on his own life and events that had himself literally running from the mob.

His latest novel is “No Malice Towards Humanity” a sci-fi futuristic novel which has Nick is an assassin who has a computer implanted in his brain with which he can completely control his body but he doesn't like his job. He wants a real life and, when his chance comes, he fakes his own death and assumes the identity of someone else. But things are not so simple. In his pursuit of a wife, he must deal with new and unexpected challenges when he decides to live outside the fenced-in utopian cities in the non-citizen zone. When the authorities discover that he still alive, he is forced to work for them in exchange for keeping his new life. But the new threat he faces has stolen the components to a nuclear weapon and may be even more dangerous than Nick.

Lucas has now branched out into writing screen plays with inerest already being received for both “Jess and Zoe” and “Running from the Mafia.

So listen now and share an interesting,and entertaining thirty minutes with my guest Lucas R Baker.

If you have enjoyed the blog or the radio show, why not become a follower?

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Lucas R Baker

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Lucas R Bakera

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:"Lucas R Baker - Jess and Zoe"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry

A Book and a Chat with Kristina McMorris

The last time today’s guest Kristina McMorris was on the show we found out much about this talented author, how she had been host of weekly TV shows since age nine, including an Emmy® Award-winning program. We also learned the facts behind her debut novel “Letters from Home” which has since become a huge hit for her, bringing well deserved rave reviews.

We learned, how while interviewing her grandmother for a cookery book she was writing, she learned of her grandparents war time romance, sharing within “Letters From Home” not only some of what was in her Grandparents letters but also some of the recipes from war time America. The book was critically praised and was declared a must-read by Woman's Day magazine and achieved additional acclaim as a Reader's Digest Select Editions feature, a Doubleday/Literary Guild selection, and a 2011 Goodreads Choice Awards semifinalist for Best Historical Fiction.

Kristina’s new "Bridge of Scarlet Leaves" (March 2012) has already received glowing reviews from Publishers Weekly and Kirkus Reviews, among many others.

About “Bridge of Scarlet Leaves” (Taken from Celticlady’s blog)

Los Angeles, 1941. Violinist Maddie Kern's life seemed destined to unfold with the predictable elegance of a Bach concerto. Then she fell in love with Lane Moritomo. Her brother's best friend, Lane is the handsome, ambitious son of Japanese immigrants. Maddie was prepared for disapproval from their families, but when Pearl Harbor is bombed the day after she and Lane elope, the full force of their decision becomes apparent. In the eyes of a fearful nation, Lane is no longer just an outsider, but an enemy.

When her husband is interned at a war relocation camp, Maddie follows, sacrificing her Juilliard ambitions. Behind barbed wire, tension simmers and the line between patriot and traitor blurs. As Maddie strives for the hard-won acceptance of her new family, Lane risks everything to prove his allegiance to America, at tremendous cost.

During the show Krisitna shared how her research for the book included visiting Manzanar relocation camp, talking to several Japanese American WWII vets who bravely served in a secret branch of the U.S. Army and a flight on a B-17 bomber. Also that the book included some more culinary details this time about Asian Fusion cooking. Mix this together and you get a book I highly recommend.

With comments such as those listed below already received, I am sure that with “Bridge of Scarlet Leaves” Kristina has another huge hit on her hands.

"This gripping story...hits all the right chords."
-- Publishers Weekly
.
"A sweeping yet intimate novel that will please both romantics and lovers of American history."
-- Kirkus Reviews

"An unputdownable love story...[McMorris'] attention to detail is meticulous, the East meets West clash between cultures--revelatory."
-- Lesley Kagen, New York Times bestselling author of Good Graces

"Readers of World War II fiction will devour [this] poignant, authentic story..."
-- Jenna Blum, international bestselling author of Those Who Save Us
.
"Impeccably researched and beautifully written...I highly recommend this book!"
-- Karen White, New York Times bestselling author of The Beach Trees

"Fascinating and moving...an absolute pleasure to read."
-- Whitney Otto, author of How to Make an American Quilt

"A beautiful, timeless love story...McMorris' words reach right of the page and grab at your heart."
-- Sarah Jio, author of The Violets of March

"An epic romance...I followed Maddie and Lane's fast-paced journey to unexpected places with my breath held and fingers crossed."
-- Margaret Dilloway, author of How to Be an American Housewife

So listen now and share an interesting,and entertaining thirty minutes with my guest Kristina McMorris.

If you have enjoyed the blog or the radio show, why not become a follower?

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Kristina McMorris

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Kristina McMorris"

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:"Kristina McMorris - Bridge of Scarlet Leaves"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry

A Book and a Chat with Will Robertson

Comic srtrips could be said to go back to the caveman drawings in caves, though in England the start of the modern day type strips in papers goes back to the likes of Rupert the Bear which started in the Daily Express in 1920. The following years complete papers or “comics” were produced for children, titles like “Rover” Hotspur” and Wizard came out. These were followed by such titles as “The Beano” and “Dandy” which were produced in war time, coming out alternative weeks due to the shortage of paper and news print. In the US the Sunday “funnies” as they are sometimes known meant people were raised on the likes of Bloom County, Garfield, Calvin and Hobbes and Peanut. These were the inspiration of my guest on today’s program “Will Robertson” who started to draw his own cartoons while at middle school.

He had early success when one of his cartoons was featured as best 100 Editorial cartoons by students across the US.

In 2007 he started began to draw a series of cartoons based on his two boys. Those early drawings became the strip Casey and Kyle, which debuted online at comicsherpa.com (a new comic showcase developed by Universal Press Syndicate and gocomics.com) on February 6, 2008.

From that he produced his first book published his first book of Casey and Kyle comics and began to shop his work to print as a self-syndicated feature. His work now appears in several publications across the Northwest, where it is read by nearly 200,000 readers.

Those first two smaller books merged into his first full size novel “Casey and Kyle – So much for being on your best behavour”. This has now been followed by another full length book “Casey and Kyle – I’m saving for a big brother”

His cartoons cover the craziness and fun of children that all parents and children can relate to from the danger of Nerf guns to kids writing on your hands.

As one reviewer put it…

I quite like comics of all sorts, but this one really made me smile. It's easy to forget the strange, often funny, logic we have as children when we're trying to make sense of everything. Robertson really taps into this and is no doubt inspired by his two boys. I like that he is also inspired by his wife, who, in the comics, has her own funny star moments.

My favourite strips of the lot have to be the ones where Casey is covered in black marker. That sent me into giggles remembering how many times I got yelled at for drawing on myself.

I loved this comic so much that when I finished `I'm Saving Up for a Big Brother', I went straight on to `So Much for Being on Our Best Behaivior!' Now I can't wait to get Casey and Kyle Sketchpad.

As Casey and Kyle enters its fourth year of publication, it's exciting to see the many ways that it continues to grow and develop in new and funny ways.

New Casey and Kyle cartoons are published on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

When not creating cartoons, Will not drawing cartoons, spends his days working with other self-published authors to bring their work to print.

So listen now and share an interesting,and entertaining thirty minutes with my guest Will Robertson

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Will Robertson

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Will Robertson"

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:"Will Robertson - I’m saving for a big brother"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry

A Book and a Chat with Mary Jane Paris

Mary Jane (MJ) Paris my guest on today's "A Book and a Chat", she is the "positive energy" source and founder of Positive Impact.

She brings a broad base of experience in leadership, management, and employee development gained from more than 25 years in sales, retail banking, training, recruiting, coaching, project management, fundraising event planning and community leadership. Her common sense approach and practical experience combined with her dynamic presentation skills provide a solid foundation for understanding her client's needs and challenges.

MJ is the author of “A Positive Workplace Means Business! It Just Makes Cent$!” and has also been named as an "Expert Author" with original "Positive Workplace" articles published on several online sources.

Now though she has used her positive thinking approach mixed or perhaps we should say blended with a special brew of wit and wisdom to produce the wonderful “Positiv-a-Tea, A Special Brew of Wit & Wisdom" a fifty page little tea-table book that is a collection of some of her favorite motivational quotes, poems, and verses.

Many of which are so meaningful to her that they made it onto the front door of her refrigerator or office bulletin board to remind me to slow down, breathe, and think, but not too much!

Not only that but she has also developed her own blend of Hand-Blended
Naturally Caffeine-Free tea “Positiv-A-Tea” a blend of Hibiscus, Lemon Balm, Rose Petals, Orange Peel, Cinnamon, Lavender.

As she explained during the show these six ingredients match with the six steps to a positive attitude that can only help you in your life and workplace, mix with that the messages from her book and you will have something that will uplift you, refresh you on your journey, and bring you peace, joy and serenity in heart, mind, spirit and soul.

So listen now and share an interesting,and entertaining thirty minutes with my guest Mary Jane Paris

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Mary Jane Paris

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Mary Jane Paris"

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:"Mary Jane Paris - Positiv-a-Tea, A Special Brew of Wit & Wisdom"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry

A Book and a Chat with Michael Charney

The guest on today’s “A Book and a Chat” is Michael Charney an award-winning author and publisher from Bedford, New Hampshire, he is also one of the few people I have had on my program that would understand the term “smeggggggg head” that comes from Red Dwarf, and as we found out during the program was a frequent purchaser of the late “Punch” satirical magazine. All of these things could well explain a lot about his debut book "Chasing Glenn Beck: A Personal Experiment in Reclaiming Our Hijacked Political Conversation".

When Glen Beck, long a symbol to Michael of everything that's wrong with the national conversation, made some really outrageous comments about the Japanese earthquake/tsunami victims and the apparently supernatural warnings we should all note thereof. The angry Michael thought he might try and take Glen Beck down a peg or two using today’s modern equivalent of the Roman forum “Twitter”.

Setting himself a few ground rules, he established a twitter account --@BeckIsALib-- and began tweeting, writing, watching the news, researching, tweeting and writing some more, always taking into account the real-world events around going on. Originally he started tweeting odd things about Glenn Beck: his liberal tendencies, his love for the environment, his disdain for big business and Wall Street. Things got interesting rather quickly, as you might imagine. There was a lot of virtual shouting in upper case with many exclamation marks and asterisks.

Shortly after he realized that there was more to say: logic had left our conversations and it was time to put it back. With other “tweeps” he discussed items such as the death of Bin Laden, the GOP primary campaigns, the push to end bullying — even the status of the Senate Candy Desk.

His book "Chasing Glenn Beck: A Personal Experiment in Reclaiming Our Hijacked Political Conversation" chronicles thirteen weeks (with an intro and epilog), with each chapter covering current events, personal narrative, actual tweet conversations and his own opinions.

As one reviewer put it...

…I lost count of the times I laughed out loud, as well as nodded my head in acknowledgement of a sad truth and then glimmers of hopefulness for a society that often seems to drift toward the gravitational pull of whomever is the loudest and most hyperbolic….

For me, this is a book about us as a society and what blind faith and extremism is doing to erase what little civility, rational thinking, and reason is left in American politics and the discourse surrounding it.

Buy it! Buy it for your Tea Party uncle and your Occupy Wall Street nieces and nephews. Buy a copy for yourself, too.

For me in brings back fond memories of reading Punch magazines and watching “Spitting Image” on English TV, it is full of humor and satire, yet also brings over the point that there is a silent majority just waiting to have their say, all be it via social media.

So listen now and share an interesting,and entertaining thirty minutes with my guest Michael Charney

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Michael Charney

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Michael Charney"

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:"Michael Charney - Chasing Glenn Beck"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry

A Book and a Chat with Richard Tillotson

Richard Tillotson is my guest on today’s “A Book and a Chat” his life reads a bit like his book or is it his book reads like his life? Whatever it is, his debut novel “Acts of God While on Vacation” has already been recognized as a National Semi-Finalist for the 2009 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award and named "Hawaii's best fiction book of 2011"

Richard has been a Peace Corps volunteer in Borneo, a playwright in New York, a copywriter in Hawaii, and is a relative of an English Lord, all of which helped him write “Acts of God While on Vacation”

The book begins with a death threat received by a philandering general manager of a lavish Hawaii resort, jumps to an anthropologist researching headhunters in the jungles of Borneo (sound familiar), then to a demonic, scandal-mongering paparazzo in New York (we know about that one) , and on to a gorgeous, party-loving English aristocrat in London (see what I mean about the book and Richard).

The book is alternately desperate and hilarious as their adventures draw them all to Waikiki, where their arrival coincides with an international conference on shamanism and a catastrophic, force-five hurricane.

It has received numerous glowing tributes such as…

A rollicking page-turner … This is Hawaii’s best fiction book of 2011.”- HONOLULU STAR-ADVERTISER

“A shamanically-skewed romp of brilliant insight and slapstick comedy”- HAWAII PUBLIC RADIO

“As entertaining as it is enlightening”- PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

“Laugh-out-loud funny, while also ringing true”-- HONOLULU WEEKLY

“It’s a comic novel with serious edges. Even more remarkable: It’s one of the few fictions set in Hawaii that gets all the details right.”- HONOLULU MAGAZINE

The book is one all will enjoy. As one reviewer put it…

What a magnificent book! The author achieves a well told tale of four individual souls who meet on a day of reckoning during a hurricane in Hawaii. What made it so fun, entertaining, and enjoyable to me was the author's ability to build four very different voices and make it interesting enough that I wanted to follow them through multitudinous settings and adventures. I loved the diversity of people and places and the underlying spiritual questions that were interwoven and finally, on the fateful day, addressed under circumstances that given the brevity of the subject, left me laughing.

As Richard shared he is already a thrid of the way through his second book based in Washington DC, as well as following up on a screen play.

So listen now and share an interesting, and entertaining thirty minutes with my guest Richard Tillotson

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Richard Tillotson

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Richard Tillotson"

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:
"Richard Tillotson - Acts of God While on Vacation"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry

A Book and a Chat with Megan Bostic

My guest on today’s Book and a Chat is one of this year’s debut YA authors, a member of the Class of 2K12 Megan Bostic. Let’s first get the name right it’s Megan with a long “e” so it’s more like “Me gan”, now that’s out the way let’s chat about this great new author. Megan is the author of “Never 18” a YA book that has received great reviews from teens and adults alike.

Megan lives over on the west coast, but not the sunny climes location that one thinks of, the rainy and gray northwest weather that makes her extremely “angsty” (one of her favorite words). Megan loves the color black, monkeys (has a collection of sock monkeys), and is a notorious Facebook addict. She migrated from early writing of poems and songs, though the poetry is making somewhat of a comeback to writing her first novel which she completed in 2008. That novel still has to see the light of day and in 2009 she produced “Never 18”.

She writes in the “seat of your pants” style, typing away with reckless abandon to get, with the aid of numerous sticky notes, the story that is bursting out of her head typed out. Once written, then starts the editing and smoothing out process.

While “Never 18” is only 200 pages long it is filled with emotional scenes, though some the language and topics are perhaps not for the younger end of the YA market, “Never 18” is a book for all ages, and can and should be shared by adults as well as children as it relates to real life situations.

About “Never 18”

Austin Parker is on a journey to bring truth, beauty, and meaning to his life.

Austin Parker is never going to see his eighteenth birthday. At the rate he’s going, he probably won’t even see the end of the year. The doctors say his chances of surviving are slim to none even with treatment, so he’s decided it’s time to let go.

But before he goes, Austin wants to mend the broken fences in his life. So with the help of his best friend, Kaylee, Austin visits every person in his life who touched him in a special way. He journeys to places he’s loved and those he’s never seen. And what starts as a way to say goodbye turns into a personal journey that brings love, acceptance, and meaning to Austin’s life.

While Never 18 is Megan’s debut novel there are already several others either completed or in the pipeline, including another contemporary YA tentatively titled, Sad. I call it a story of loss, loathing and lacerations. It’s about a girl suffering from depression who ends up being a cutter, and her healing process.

As one reviewer put it…

New author Megan Bostic makes writing look easy. Her new novel, NEVER EIGHTEEN, is so clear, so smooth, so effortless, that the reader is completely immersed in the story, living it along with the characters. This story is so moving, so touching that I could not put it down. I read NEVER EIGHTEEN from cover to cover in a matter of hours. And normally, I would never look at this kind of book. It just isn't my normal genre. But I knew of Ms Bostic, and I had heard a lot about this book, so I leaped at the chance to give it a try. And, OH MY, I feel honored and privileged to have read NEVER EIGHTEEN. Megan Bostic it a true talent, and NEVER EIGHTEEN is a brilliant debut.

I for one, totally agree with that!

So listen now and share an interesting, and entertaining sixty minutes with my guest Megan Bostic

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Megan Bostic

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Megan Bostic"

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:
"Megan Bostic - Never 18"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry

A Book and a Chat with Frances Gilbert

When you have a person who lives in the same area as yourself, is a fellow anglophile, collects tea cups and whose ambition is to own a flock of sheep, then you know that person is a must for “A Book and a Chat”

Frances Gilbert from a very early age, often necessitated by long stretches of war time boredom in bomb shelters, listened to family stories, and created her own. Later the sharing of stories with her four children and reading with them beloved books from her own childhood became an ongoing family activity.


It wasn’t until she passed a signpost birthday that she began to write for publication, encouraged by her daughter, Sarah, also a writer, who is the illustrator for the first two books. Frances has published seven children’s books: Turtle on a Summer’s Day, Celeste and Regine in the Rain Forest, To Know the Sea, and A World of Numbers, all with GreeneBark Press; and Goodnight World Outside, Elephant Blue for her own company Frances Gilbert Books.

Her latest children’s book is “The Cookie Thief” written after she retired from her career as teacher, and illustrated by Ben Quesnel who was just starting his teaching career. Although separated by fifty years, the two have made a great team, and “The Cookie Thief” is a book that children will love to read and have read to them.

About “The Cookie Thief”

The Cookie Thief is meant to be enjoyed by parents and kids. It is a delightful story that leads children on the hunt to find the cookie thief.

Thomas is visiting Granny's house when he hears a patter, a swoop and a rush and oh no. "Cookie thief! Cookie thief," Grandma shrieks. Cookies are disappearing, the whole family is in a state of shock. There are no more cookies to be had. People take precautions and start hiding them, "No cookie thief is getting my cookies!" they say. Even the animals are put to work and placed on guard. There are no more cookies to be found anywhere.

It is not just children’s books that Frances produces, her debut adult novel a psychological suspense novel, Where Is She Now? has received some great reviews and is being followed by a second mystery novel “Murder In The Gun Room”

Frances’s books have also been produced by Calibre tapes for blind children in the UK and now she has embarked on a new venture is CDs for children. The first is the wonderfully narrated Stories for Listening, which reveals the truth behind the Loch Ness Monster legend.

So listen now and share an interesting, and entertaining thirty minutes with my guest Frances Gilbert

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Frances Gilbert

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Frances Gilbert"

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:
"Frances Gilbert - The Cookie Thief"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry

A Book and a Chat with Sabin Howard

Like authors create many forms of the written word, so the term artist can cover numerous styles and types, when you hear of a person being a sculpture one thinks of weird shapes and squares with holes that you might see in parks of malls.

Figurative sculpture or sculpture of real people mainly brings to one’s mind statues from ancient Greece or Rome, this though as we learned during today’s show is not the case.

Sabin Howard grew up in New York City and in Torino, Italy. He studied art at the Philadelphia College of Art and then earned his MFA from the New York Academy of Art.

On October 18th 1982 at around 4pm, he desided he'd had enough of his then job and started out into the world of art.

For twenty years, he taught at the graduate and undergraduate levels. He has been elected to the board of the National Sculpture Society. He has received numerous commissions and has showed his work at more than fifty solo and group shows. With over 45,000 hours of working from life models in the studio, Sabin is the creator of three heroic scale pieces, HERMES, APHRODITE, and APOLLO, as well as many smaller pieces. His works are owned by museums and private collectors all over the world

According to the New York Times…

Sabin Howard, is a sculptor of immense talent, has created some of the last decade’s most substantive realistic sculpture. When viewing his works, visitors may be reminded of the time when Donatello and Rodin walked the earth...

His wife Traci Slatten is an author in her own write, who shares her husband’s love for Renaissance Italy which inspired her to write the historical novel IMMORTAL and her contemporary vampire art history mystery THE BOTTICELLI AFFAIR.

FALLEN is the first in a romantic trilogy set during the end times; COLD LIGHT the sequel is forthcoming. DANCING IN THE TABERNACLE is her first book of poetry.

She has now though with Sabin written the sculpture book, THE ART OF LIFE.

Art can sometimes be very dry, and be tiring and plain boring reading except perhaps to those involved in the study of the art and sculpture.

However with Traci’s obvious writing talent The Art of Life they have created a beautiful collection of almost personal essays mixed with visually stunning content that makes "The Art of Life" an entertaining novel that will provide its readers with a vivid glimpse into the world of sculpture and in particular the work of a classical figurative Sabin Howard.

So listen now and share an interesting, and entertaining thrity minutes with my guest Sabin Howard

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Sabin Howard

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Sabin Howard"

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:
"Sabin Howard - The Art of Life"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry

A Book and a Chat with Debra Winegarten

You can always tell how good and interesting a show is, by how quickly the time goes by when your hosting one, normally I am fairly lucky and the thirty minutes just seems to fly by, today was one of those shows. It seems I had just started chatting with my guest Debra Winegarten, when I checked the clock to find there were just a few minutes left.

Debra is one of those writers who was creating written work almost as soon as she could hold a crayon, the fact that her mother Ruthe Winegarten was a writer of note in Texas, meant that instead of Debra been put to sleep buy the noise of their mother's sewing machine, Debra was often comforted by the sound of her mother typing on her IBM Selectric.

Debra’s first completed book was a memoir she was ked to write "Strong Family Ties: The Tiny Hawkins Story", however this was not the first book she had started and after a break of some years that first book saw the light of day when she published “ an S inspiring biography about female aviator Katherine Stinson in her book , Katherine Stinson : The Flying Schoolgirl.

As I have said in the past one of the things I love about hosting my radio show is that you never stop learning, and today was no exception.

Debra shares in her book that Katherine Stinson was the fourth woman in the United States to receive her pilot’s license in July 1912. Besides that, she was the first pilot in the U. S. to carry pioneer airmail, the first woman to fly alone at night, the first woman in the world to perform the loop-the-loop, and the first pilot to perform skywriting in 1915. Add to that the story Debra shared with us about how she ended up flying in the first place and how she was credited with instituting pre-flight checks you know this is a book about one great lady.

Now Debra has returned to her roots as a young Jewish girl being raised in Texas with her award winning book “There’s Jews in Texas?” a small, but packed book of poems that was winner of the Poetica Magazine, Contemporary Jewish Writing 2011 Chapbook Contest.

Winning that award is of no surprise when you read the book, as the title would indicate, there is some humor in Debra’s poetry. And coming out of Texas one would expect to find some anti-Semitism as well and the author does not let the reader down, often combining humor and anti-Semitism appropriately in a manner that Jews and non-Jews can both appreciate. An example is from when she was in second grade…

A grown man stops me on the sidewalk
Eyeing my Star of David necklace and asking if I’m Jewish.

When I nod yes, (I’m not supposed to talk to strangers),
He tells me that’s really too bad for me,
Because didn’t I know that
Jews burn in Hell when they die?

Tears falling so hard I could barely see,
I dropped my weekly treasure and ran home
To Mom so fast I thought
I might keel over before I got to her
And be snatched right down to Hell.

When I told Mom what happened,
She put both hands on my shoulders,
Knelt to my height where she could look square in my eyes,
And in that Dallas drawl of hers, said,

“That’s okay, honey, don’t worry.
We’re Jewish.
We don’t believe in hell.”

As one reviewer put it…

"Debra L. Winegarten writes frank, funny, poignant, punchy poems. This collection shines with radiant spirit."

So listen now and share an interesting, and entertaining thrity minutes with my guest Debra Winegarten

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Debra Winegarten

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Debra Winegarten"

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"Debra Winegarten - There's Jews in Texas?"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

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Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

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A Book and a Chat with Deby Eisenberg

Deby Eisenberg, is my guest on today’s “A Book and a Chat”. She is the leader of an established Chicago area Book Club, a former English teacher and journalist, loves literary research, art, architecture, Jewish history, and travel in the United States and Europe. You mix all of those together and you can why her debut book “Pictures of the Past” is such a formidable and “must read” novel.

Using her vision of a multi-generational love story that would inform as well as entertain, that would broaden the mind and open the heart. And with many authors, lead by her characters, Deby has with this book created something that will touch the hearts and keep the pages turning for many a reader.

About ”Pictures of the Past”
(Taken from “The Girl Who Stole the Eifel Towwer” Blog)

The novel takes us through generations of hardships, each unique to their era, beginning in modern-day Chicago where an Impressionist painting on display at the Art Institute, a treasure donated by celebrated philanthropist Taylor Woodmere, is charged as a Nazi theft. The claim takes us back to 1930s Paris, where the story of Taylor Woodmere truly begins. As he journeys to Europe on his first independent venture for the business of his forefathers we learn of the would-be fiancé he left behind, of his instantaneous connection with the city of Paris, of the Impressionist painting that captivates him and finally of his meeting with the German Sarah Berger.

Their blissful romance is beautifully depicted amid the simple treasures of the German country whilst the shroud of the Nazi regime lingers threateningly in the background, inevitably proceeding to wreak havoc on Taylor and Sarah’s dream world. Together – and apart – they face the garish realities of an unjust war and Sarah takes a centric role in the center of her terrorizing quandary as a Jewish woman alone in a perilous place. Woven betwixt their tale is the story of Rachel Gold, a young girl left pregnant and abandoned by Taylor’s son, Court, in the 1960s. In her quest to secure a better life for herself and her son, Jason (aka Rusty), she travels from Chicago to New York where she pursues a life of normalcy with Aunt Ida, a Holocaust survivor and great friend.

Through Ida’s connection to the life and times of Sarah Berger, and Rachel’s connection to the heroic Taylor Woodmere a bond is forged through the eras, weaving the history of one family and illuminating the tragedy of the Holocaust, a tragedy that still resonates through time and space to our world today.

As one reviewer put it…

Deby Eisenberg has combined a compelling story of love and loss during the Holocaust with a modern love story that is a must read for anyone who enjoys well-written fiction. Her command of the subject matter brings believability to her characters & makes you want to keep reading.

To me this is a must read, it covers all your emotions and wants in a good book. Deby’s challenge to herself was to write a novel that her avid readers could not put down and would love to discuss. With “Pictures of the Past” she has done that and so much more.

So listen now and share an interesting, and entertaining show as I chat with my special guest today on A Book and a Chat with Deby Eisenberg

Barry

Direct link to the show
A Book and a Chat with Deby Eisenberg

or you can download the mp3 file of the show from
"Deby Eisenberg"

You can find out more about my guest and their books at:
"Deby Eisenberg - Pictures Off The Past"

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:

Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond

Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat

Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry