SAL'S PLACE

JUST WHO IS ANNA MULLINS ANYWAY?

2011-11-08T06:57:00.000-08:00

ANNA MULLINS

“Why I have the kind of vivid Technicolor memory I do has always been a mystery to me and to the few who knew of it.”

The above quote is the first sentence of my memoir and for the next 327 pages I explain in detail what I meant by that and the reason I believe I was blessed/cursed with so many colorful and distinct memories, both good and bad, funny and sad. Two of the worst memories drove me straight to mental hell in agony that refused to relinquish. The first time it happened in 1967 during the Viet Nam War and I chose to have six shock treatments to cure me, they did in two weeks. The second time was seven weeks after my beloved mother’s agonizing July death from Alzheimer’s. That inspiration struck on 9/11/2001 when the horror I was watching on T.V. reminded me of my Great Grandmother Fox, my mother’s grandmother I only met once when I was very young, but she instilled in me a memory that had haunted me many times throughout my life. In 2001 I chose to cure myself by writing about why I was so distressed. That cure worked also, after a decade of edits, though it did raise a few eyebrows from family members. Oh well, not the first time I messed with their brows or the grey matter behind them.

I was born with a Pisces artistic nature I couldn’t ignore. I took piano lessens from second grade through twelfth. The initial inspiration for that musical obsession I got from a religious picture of St. Cecelia in my parents bedroom. I decided when I was four or five years old I wanted to play a piano in heaven when I died so I insisted mamma buy me one to practice on. Actually, my first piano became a bribe she used to get me to do something I really didn’t want to do, go to first grade at a Catholic school. I finally caved in after a lot of family persuasion and several other bribes I required, daddy’s paint quarter horse, a puppy, and five new chicken feed sack dresses. I’m sure some of those nuns wished I had not allowed myself to be bribed to go to that awful “purgatory” in 1944-45. Old unjust ladies in black I was forced to give a little piece of my mind to every once in a while. If something doesn’t make sense to me, I can become an instant rebel.

My unique childhood logic was always considered rather strange by adults but that never deterred me. When I made my mind up, there were few on earth who could change it, and that stubborn quirk still haunts me to this day. Oh well, after I ordered my natal horoscope in the 1970’s I found I could blame all my idiosyncrasies on the alignment of the stars above my head on the day I was born…so I still do. It’s easy to blame it on those professional astrologers who claimed my star alignment was rather strange and unusual who gave me a detailed opinion of why I was so “different.” It’s not my fault…it’s my Gods. At least that’s the excuse I’m going to use in the afterlife, if I ever get the chance.

At various times in my life I also became obsessed with learning how to cook, sew, paint, sculpt, and conquer fast horses. I’m a Texas native with a few drops of Apache blood flowing in my veins. When I was six, I insisted on learning how to shoot a rifle and hit the bull’s-eye, so my legend of a superman Daddy took me out in the pasture with a Winchester 30-30 and taught me. I realized that was a handy thing to know when I was seven years old guarding German POW’s on a big horse with a Federal rifle still in its saddle holster on my grandpa’s cotton farm in 1945. The “official” guards allowed me to do that while they took naps on the back porch because they didn’t think the prisoners would run off and I didn’t think they would harm me. I was their favorite entertainment on their lunch break. The guards explained to grandpa, “Where would they go, they can’t find a big enough boat to get back home on, and besides, they like earning enough to buy cigarettes and cokes and candy.” My singing and dancing was the most torture those lucky POW’s ever had to endure in America…but I would peel their oranges for them.

See? My logic isn’t all that “crazy” compared to some adults I have known in my lifetime.

My adult logic hasn’t been much different than my childhood, except that I know a whole lot more about how the world works now than I did back then. After I was forced out of my church by a couple of bad apples, I decided to launch my own religion that consisted of the Creator of all that exists, with Jesus and my “spirit” as my mentors, and me as the pastor. For over two decades I researched religion until it jelled into a creed I could accept and I’m still happy with it. I doubt the T.V. evangelists would be because I quit believing in Hellfire and Damnation they charge for telling you how not to get there.

Motherhood was the only vocation I ever lusted for and I did accomplish that. I have five wonderful children who blessed me with eleven grandkids and they are now the focus of my senior years. I live on the outskirts of San Antonio and stay involved with my three youngest grandchildren’s projects. I still love to write, paint, cook, and still drag out my sewing machine when they want new patches on their jeans they consider badges of honor, usually required because of another pain in their butt that rips denim and skin.

I never intended to become a writer or an author but destiny had plans I felt I couldn’t alter. When I chose to publish my life story, I wanted it to be as honest as I could remember and knew I was going to have to confess all my sins if I was going to write about anyone else’s…so I did. I do hope I don’t make your eyebrows too uncomfortable if you choose to read Confessions Of A Crazy Fox.

Confessions Of A Crazy Fox is available on Amazon in soft cover and for Kindles

http://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Crazy-Maria-Kolojaco-Mullins/dp/0984639284/ref=sr_1_1_title_0_main?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1311704034&sr=1-1

And in print on my Publishers Website

http://allthingsthatmatterpress.com

It is also available as an E-book at Barnes & Nobles Nook Book Site

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/confessions-of-a-crazy-fox-anna-mullins/1104319515?ean=2940013614499&itm=1&usri=confessions%2bof%2ba%2bcrazy%2bfox

2011-11-02T06:48:00.000-07:00

SANDY COHEN

JUST WHO IS SANDY COHEN ANYWAY?

I’m a former professor, jazz musician, big deal movie star (okay, co-star of one movie shot in Northern China, Do Not Disturb) public radio commentator, star of a public television series, and currently a full-time writer, and part-time kayak fisherman, bookbinder and chauffer to my nearly-perfect children. My novel, Revelations, is an always funny, sometimes poignant, occasionally wise story about an ordinary guy, Manny, who goes to Greece after his wife dies and meets an extraordinary guide, Abis, half Native American, half madman, who leads Manny through crazy series of misadventures and eventually back to life. I promise you it’s the funniest book you’ll read this year

When’s the last time a novel made you laugh out loud? When’s the last time you fell in love with a character? In Revelations by Sandy Cohen you won’t be able to help yourself, you’ll do both. Join Abis, trickster-god or mad man, you decide, as he guides Manny Markowitz, and you, through the wilds of Greece and the bogs and barrier islands of south Georgia, and ultimately back to life as they search for Abis’s boss, Willy Love. Goofy, wise, and ultimately enchanting, this is the guidebook not just for anyone who has gone through one of life’s great tragedies, but for anyone who wants to return to the pure joy of living. There are three ways to learn the meaning of life, namely reason, intuition, and revelation. In Revelations, you’ll learn Abis’s, and your, great lesson—that life has no meaning any more than a flower has meaning, or needs to. It is the beauty and fragrance that enchant. Life is simply an experience to enjoy and exalt in. For here, and now, dear hearts, is your eternity to enjoy.

Revelations http://www.amazon.com/Revelations-Sandy-Cohen/dp/0984621695/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1320241590&sr=1-1

JUST WHO IS GLENN PARKHURST ANYWAY?

2011-10-29T08:29:00.000-07:00

Glenn Parkhurst

Glenn Parkhurst surprised himself when he started to write. Glenn was more of an outdoor enthusiast, fisherman, hunter, father of two boys who looked at life through the eyes of Ward Cleaver. But life took him to places he didn’t expect. Divorce, death, and sobriety all impacted his outlook on life. Travel, volunteerism, grandchildren and new friends rearranged his outlook. A fear of wasting life drives this man. He has a belief that you can either focus on one thing and become very good at it or you can dive into many things and enjoy a little of all of them. So, in addition to writing Thrillers, Glenn writes humor, does photography, travels, works a full time job, takes care of his house, and dips his fingers into any opportunity. Glenn pulls from the well of his past to fill his novel Bled Out with visual clarity. See the Amazon and his website reviews.

Website - Laughathorror.com

Facebook Writing - https://www.facebook.com/#!/profile.php?id=100000487534705

Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/#!/glenn.parkhurst

Blog - http://graytale.blogspot.com/

Bled Out The Book Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/#!/BledOutTheBook

Bled Out - http://www.amazon.com/Bled-Out-Glenn-Oliver-Parkhurst/dp/0984639225/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1318768846&sr=8-1

All Things That Matter Press - http://www.allthingsthatmatterpress.com/

JUST WHO IS ROBERT RUBENSTEIN ANYWAY?

2011-10-23T12:07:00.000-07:00

ROBERT RUBENSTEIN

I am the author of Ghost Runners, and The White Bridge, soon to be published by All Things That Matter Press—but not for everyone. A trilogy, finishing next year with a treatise on Howdy Doody and the nuclear bomb is sure to raise eyebrows, but not book sales, unless you are also compelled to make sense of the time that had the greatest influence on our lives. In The White Bridge, my flapper gal reporter, Ginger Lee Smythe, concludes that truth is nothing, and nothing is truth. My uncle, Jack Ruby, is given a play as a street tough in old Chicago. Buy my books because he was my uncle and I, his nephew? I don’t think so. Maybe I am lying about that, you say. Well, maybe I am.

Most of my life anyway I was told to hide that truth—that’s why you will not see my middle name, Jack, on my books. But Uncle Jack did have a point. My first reaction when I heard Lee Oswald was shot dead was,”thank you, uncle jack, it’s good for the bastard.”

I grew up with television and learned to write history from Crusader Rabbit, Rocky and his Friends, and Fractured Fairy Tales. I believed in Dudley Do Right and Mighty Mouse. When I was three years old, I crawled onto the tenement fire escape and spread my arms to the heavens. “I want to fly like Superman,” I told my mother.

You see, now you are getting closer to why you should buy my books. I believed in fairy tales. I hid under my mother’s skirts when I saw the infamous “Bambi,” in the movie theater. I was shot dead with three – D. Hondo’s rocks that came hurdling out of the celluloid screen to put a dent in my head. I was attacked by King Kong and Godzilla. I am in therapy to this day because they shot John Lennon.

I grew dizzy in the fifties, and I have seen Nazis ever since. Every man should be required to say his prayers about what he has witnessed and what was the cost of the history he bears. I am fortunate to be entering the twilight years, a little wiser and not yet suffering from Alzheimer.

I know I was lied to, and was traumatized by the country I never left, and fought to change, though I heard voices during the hearing test and was deferred from serving our nation. I said, “boo hoo,” that I did not kill or maim anyone in Viet Nam. But I sure wish I could wear a cool hat to say I was a war protestor.

The Olympics are coming—seventy-five years since an outrage occurred. Ghost Runners is about American anti-Semitism and sports. It is about the heart that can conquer hate. It is the same thing with The White Bridge. Why should you buy me?

I am, as old as I am, representative of a new breed of writers that sell our wares by way of a small independent family of authors who are quite good and avante -garde. I have seen that the rest of our little group can pack a mean, competitive pen.

I believe my parodies are vital to the understanding of racism and history; they are, though fractured, but vital about knowing who we are, and where we are going. There is no living room conversation with smart – sets about the Olympics without Ghost Runners. There is not a complete understanding about racist America without The White Bridge. Taken together, you will be inoculated forever.

Buy me because it took me a lifetime to get to this declaration. There is sometimes a great notion as Ken Kesey said. If its warped history you seek—horror, hysterical and uproarious—I think I may be worth the price of admission. If you don’t like my books, I’ll pay you back … someday.

Can’t wait to begin the last book of the series with your support … “in a red – bricked classroom, a little five year old boy crawls under a desk filled with inkwells, trying to protect his little head from the shards of glass of the window that he was told not to view. If I were a good boy, and kissed my dog tag that would survive me, I would go to heaven, the teacher cried, when the nuclear bomb came. This is a drill now, she said, but you willbe dead very soon, anyway.”

The Boy Who Looked Through A Crack In The Window ends my trilogy. Why should you buy my book? Because you are the future, and I would like to scare you a little—you see, I still see clearly because I have studied the past through Howdy Doody’s eyes.

Robert Rubenstein

http://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Runners-Robert-Rubenstein/dp/0984621652/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1317343885&sr=1-1

http://scribblercom.blogspot.com/

JUST WHO IS KENNETH WEENE ANYWAY?

2011-10-20T07:28:00.000-07:00

KENNETH WEENE

JUST WHO IS KENNETH WEENE ANYWAY?

Life itches and torments Kenneth Weene like pesky flies. Annoyed, he picks up a pile of paper to slap at the buzzing and often whacks himself on the head. Each whack is another story. At least having half-blinded himself, he has learned not to wave the pencil about. Ken will, however, write on until the last gray cell has retreated and there are no longer these strange ideas demanding his feeble efforts. So many poems, stories, novels; and more to come.

So far, Ken has two novels published by All Things That Matter Press and a third will be out soon.

The first is Widow’s Walk, the story of a woman restarting her life and her two adult children. Widow’s Walk is a tale of love, sexuality, religion, and spirit. A box of Kleenex is an essential accessory when reading this emotional and meaningful novel.

Memoirs From the Asylum is set in a state psychiatric hospital. Full of tragedy, humor, and pathos, Memoirs reminds us that there are many forms of asylums and that it is all to easy to give up the most essential human freedom, the freedom to choose who we are. More than anything, Memoirs From the Asylum is a book for people who love words; it is a book that asks to be read aloud.

Coming soon is Tales From the Dew Drop Inne: Because there’s one in every town. The folks who hang out at this neighborhood bar are struggling to know that they too belong. This is a book of intersecting stories that illustrate the humanity of us all and our search for a place in which to belong.

Trained as a psychologist and an ordained minister, Ken knows that the human heart is the most elemental place to begin any story. Having also written a good amount of poetry, he strives to make the language of his books unique. Ken also brings the clear-eyed realism of a born and bred New Englander to his writing. The overall results are books that are especially moving and well-written.

You can learn more about Ken athttp://www.authorkenweene.com

A good link for more about Widow’s Walk is:

http://vidego.multicastmedia.com/player.php?p=wbgzb2yk

For Memoirs From the Asylum visit

http://vidego.multicastmedia.com/player.php?p=nqm74a8k

Both Widow’s Walk and Memoirs From the Asylum are available in print as well as Kindle and Nook.

2011-10-18T12:11:00.001-07:00

OANA NICULAE

Healing through laughter is not a dream, but a recipe for survival.

If you were to read a book about Oana's life, you might easily decide it was a work of fiction.

Born in Bucharest, Romania, Oana lived twenty years under the grotesque dictatorial regime of Ceausescu. After the fall of communism in 1989 she studied languages at the University in Bucharest, then received her Master’s degree at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland. English is her third language.

She has worn many hats, working as a translator, as a teacher, and eventually caring for animals both domestic and wild.Volunteering in both the U.S. and Canada, she worked for wildlife rescue and rehabilitation centers.

Currently residing in Arizona, Oana continues to dedicate most of her time to her animals and to writing.

Her first book, The Healings, debuted in November 2010. It is a hard-to-put-down, laugh-out-loud series of adventures of an eccentric duo: a man and his feline partner walking from ‘healer’ to ‘healer’ and hoping to achieve awareness.

Oana’s take on depression is simple and effective: witticism and laughter coupled with the understanding of the frailty of human nature help us heal. An animal companion, real or imaginary, can be very therapeutic as well.

Many a reader – depressed or not -- will recognize the insanity of most of our daily routines and the elusiveness of Truth.

Oana’s current projects include a memoir titled,Romanian Rhapsody, a children’s book, Dr.Schnauzer and Nurse Lhassa, as well as other stories, all written in the same witty humorous style.

She is also an active member of Central Phoenix Writing Workshop http://www.paloverdepages.com/ and a co-host of Two Unsychronized Souls Radio Show http://www.blogtalkradio.com/monicabrinkmanandoana

To learn more about Oana, visit her author’s website www.thehealings.net

To read excerpts from The Healings go to http://www.thehealings.net/excerpts-from-the-healings.html

The Healings is available in paperback on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Healings-Oana/dp/0984615482/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1289455146&sr=1-1

In Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/The-Healings-ebook/dp/B004BSH0RI/ref=tmm_kin_title_0/192-1862715-7132302?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&qid=1289455146&sr=1-1

and Nook format

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-healings-oana/1029789781?ean=2940012775313&itm=1&usri=oana#

WAKE-UP CALL by Salvatore Buttaci

2011-10-08T07:11:00.000-07:00

Once there lived a little boy named Giovanni Romano whose parents came from Italy, a country way across the ocean. They had to book passage on a ship that took more than ten days to arrive in America. Giovanni's parents knelt and kissed the ground at Ellis Island. They raised their arms towards the blue sky and thanked God in Heaven for their good fortune.

In Italy, a country they loved, it was impossible finding work. The land would not produce healthy crops. Opportunities were nowhere to be found, only frustration, hunger, and even widespread sicknesses. With heavy hearts the newly married Carmela and Francesco Romano emigrated from the land of their ancestors to find new lives in America.

A son was born shortly after Francesco found a job building city roads with pick and shovel from dawn until nightfall. Yet despite back-breaking labor, he was grateful to be employed, to be earning money for his wife and their new child.

On the job the other workers who were not Italians, and the bosses demanding that he work harder and harder, and the city folk passing by, all of them hurled at Francesco derogatory names like "Dago," "Guinea," and "Greaseball." Still, Francesco raised his pick high over aching shoulders and sank it into the cracking rock, then took the shovel and dug into the deepening dirt. He ignored them, unwilling and unable to jeopardize the few dollars a week he earned by standing up to them. He would take the verbal abuse as long as he could continue working an honest day's work for what even he realized was not nearly enough pay as the others earned for the same labor.

Giovanni grew with the passing years, detesting all things that were not American. He hated the Italian language the three of them spoke. He was ashamed to introduce his friends to his parents because their accents were so heavy Giovanni could not bear it. One day he said to his parents, "Don't call me 'Giovanni' anymore. My name is Johnny." Needless to say, they were hurt by their son's insistence that he was an American and he wanted to fit into American society, not be ridiculed because he was different, and at the same time they understood how difficult it was for their Giov--Johnny. People could be cruel.

Not content with being Johnny Romano, he legally changed his name to Johnny Logan! By then his mother had died of cancer and his father, living alone now in his Brooklyn apartment, hardly saw his son at all. He was too busy. He had no time. Life was short. There was money to be made. When Francesco passed away, Johnny was in the Bahamas. The funeral took place without him.

Then, as it happens, Johnny too grew old and alone. His wife left him. Took his children. Johnny Logan had become a very lonely man. He'd spend his time watching TV late into the night. Shows like "The Sopranos" and later on "The Jersey Shore," though he watched them, made him sad. His parents were nothing like those people. They were honest. They went to church on Sunday. They never used foul language. Never wanted anything that did not belong to them.

Perhaps one can say it bordered on stupidity that Johnny Logan who had fought against his Italian roots all his life would in his final years decide to become Giovanni Romano again. He thought back on the stories his father would tell about what he went through, the name-calling Americani who looked down on him and all his paisani as if they were all gangsters, fools, the very dirt they walked on.

It was a late wake-up call for Giovanni, but better late than never. He joined Italian American groups in their efforts to fight media prejudice against their ethnicity. He finally realized that what his father had suffered, along with the millions of immigrants who came here from Italy, was a gross injustice. A slap in the face to the people who gave the world Columbus, Michelangelo, Fermi, Garibaldi and thousands of others who helped shape the world and our country.

Now when Giovanni lays his head down to sleep, the old nightmares are gone. Sometimes he dreams his mama carries to the kitchen table a hot steaming dish of farfalle topped with her rich red meat sauce. "What does 'farfalle' mean?" he asks her. She smiles as she spoons the macaroni into his plate. "Butterflies," Mama says. "Like a miracle they leave the flowers and come to rest in my delicious sauce!"

And the two of them--Papa as well--laugh before grace.

Salvatore Buttaci is the author of two short-short story collections available at Amazon.com: Flashing My Shorts and 200 Shorts, both published by All Things That Matter Press. He is also in the process of editing his novel Carmelu the Sicilian, about a man who fights back against the biased media and wins.

Second Sight

2011-09-26T10:35:00.000-07:00

Second Sight

I'll Get You, My Pretty

2011-09-14T13:19:00.000-07:00

I'll Get You, My Pretty

WHAT IS A PUN-KU ?

2011-09-13T06:34:00.000-07:00

Poetry today continues to entertain readers, inspiring poets to write a greater number of poems according to the requirements of established poetic forms. The sonnet, for example, did not die with Shakespeare, Milton, Petrarch and the other masters. It is still being written according to the required iambic pentameter and rhyme patterns set down centuries ago. In most instances all that has changed is that poets write sonnets without the antiquated language of the past.

Because poetry is dynamic, because we are not restricted to reading only the works of famous poets, most of whom are gone from the literary scene, modern-day poets are creating new forms.

Here is a partial list of them with poet-inventors’ names in parentheses:

ALLOUETTE (Jan Turner)

ARAGMAN (Salvatore Buttaci in 2005)

BINA (Bob Newman)

BLITZ (Robert Keim)

BOP (Afaa Michael Weaver)

CAMEO (Alice Spokes)

CASCADE (Udit Bhatia)

CLEAVE (Phuoc-Tan Diep)

DETEN (Johnn Schroeder)

ETHEREE (Etheree Taylor Armstrong)

HAY(NA)KU (Eileen Tabios)

JORIO (Niels Stegeman)

LEFT-HANDED POEM (Johnn Schroeder)

NOVE OTTO (Scott J. Alcorn)

ROTHKO (Bob Holman)

SEVENLING [Anna Akhmatova (1889 - 1966)]

ZENO (Pat Lewis in 2009)

I would like to add still another new poetic form which I call the PUN-KU. Here are the requirements for writing one.

(1) Unlike the haiku that allows for a less than strict adherence to the 17-syllable rule, the pun-ku must be exactly 17 syllables long.

(2) It contains only four (4) lines arranged syllabically as follows:

Line 1: 4 syllables Line 2: 5 syllables Line 3: 4 syllables Line 4: 4 syllables

(3) As for the end-rhyme pattern, Lines 1 and 2 do not rhyme. Lines 3 and 4 do.

(4) The pun-ku must contain a pun on one or more of the words used in the poem. The subject matter deals with human nature, is light, humorous, or witty.

(5) The title of the pun-ku can only be one- or two-words long (or short).

Here are two of my pun-ku for examples.

LOVE’S MYSTERY

nothing is more

paradoxical

around these parts

than two cleaved hearts

TIMBER

strong lumberjacks

locate forest trees

then saw their bark

despite the dark

In the first example, the pun is on the word “cleaved,” which has two opposite meanings: “to cling together” and “to split apart.” In the second example, the pun is on the word “saw,” which can be defined as “a tool for cutting” and “the past tense of the verb ‘to see.’ “

You might have fun writing a few pun-ku of your own!

Here are a few sites to visit if you’re looking to learn more about poetic forms. You can also do a search of “poetic forms” or type in a form and search for it.

http://www.poetrysoup.com/poetry_forms/index.aspx?Letter=D

http://www.freewebs.com/itllnever/poemstylesandterms.htm

http://www.poetrybase.info/forms/origin.shtml

Salvatore Buttaci is the author of two flash collections published by All things That Matter Press and available at Amazon.com in book and Kindle editions. Flashing My Shorts and 200 Shorts.

POEMS OF 9/11/01

2011-09-09T15:02:00.000-07:00

(c) 2001 Sharon Bateman Buttaci

FOR THE VICTIMS OF SEPTEMBER 11, 2001

beneath the rubble and debris
down the shafts of steel and concrete
far from autos yet abandoned
past grey clouds of soot and dust
below the boots of feet still shuffling
crushed against the tumbled walls
only God can hear the moaning
see the souls drift to the light

someone calls out to an old friend
but the old friend can't reply
and the day grows old to nightfall
all the weary trudge on home
but down beneath the broken sidewalk
in the darkness of ground zero
only God can hear the moaning
see the souls drift to the light

one by one He guides them upward
past the billows of thick smoke
one by one they say, "Forgive them,"
and like night birds fly to freedom
fly these souls above the city
to a heaven celebrating
someone calls out to an old friend
to an old friend recognized

oh, the joy of souls rejoicing
as they dance in God's Good Light.

#
© 2001 Salvatore Buttaci

SAVED

How blessed you are to have found God again!
Eighty-four stories high in what was once
the World Trade Center. Outside your window
pulverized stone hailed down from clouds blazing
red-blue on a Tuesday morning, and slabs
of concrete falling from the upper floors
you learned later were trapped workers
who would not wait for death
hand in hand plunging from fiery windows.

For the first time in years you said your prayers,
called God's name, prayed away your fears
of perishing there, then with the others
calmly took to the stairs down towards
ground-level freedom. Through the smoke and dust
you imagined you saw angels, ghostly
white, ascending the stairs towards you,
but they were firefighters crowned with
sooty helmets, oxygen tanks strapped on
their backs like wings-- heroes racing to their deaths
in a desperate futile rush to save lost lives.

You don't say much in your mourning.
Memories are painful to express.
It will take time before you walk
those New York streets again,
but in all your quiet moments
safe at home, you thank the God
Who saved you. You pray. You pray.

#
© 2001 Salvatore Buttaci

RESCUERS

Don't say, "It's over now. Leave this place.
Go home." Don't shake your heads convinced
we won't find a living soul beneath
this man-made hell. We will go on
passing buckets hand to hand.
We will not leave the wounded buried here.
With all our strength we'll go on digging.

Underneath the surface of the street
lost in a tall heap of collapsed floors
tower victims are waiting to be saved.
They hear our shovels clang against
the glass and steel of tumbled walls.
They're holding on; they know we're near.
With all our faith we won't stop digging.

Don't say how we sacrifice our time
and sweat sifting through the rubble
as if we, not these buried, were true heroes.
We do not dig because we are brave;
we dig because we are afraid
to walk away. At night in sleep
we hear their pleas and we tremble.

There are people still alive here.
Don't hold your breath that we will quit.
With all we've got we'll stand our ground;
we'll go on digging

#
© 2001 Salvatore Buttaci

REMEMBRANCE HOUSE

In a room dark as cobalt blue
Lady Sorrow will sit
with the gentleman Grief.
From the same deep cup
(inconsolably)
they'll sip with quivering mouths
the bitter tea of loss and longing.
"My heart breaks again,"
Sorrow will say to her love,
but Grief will not reply.
With trembling hand he'll toss
away a waste of words;
he'll remind here where they are.
How misfortune sealed their love.
Then into the empty cup he'll pour again.

#
© 2001 Salvatore Buttaci

HOW PROUD WE ARE

America, how proud we are
to be counted among your children!
Mother and father to us all,
you have nurtured us since birth.
When we fall, you raise us up,
tend to our scrapings, teach us right
from wrong, make us unafraid.

America, how glad we are
to be your loving sons and daughters!
In history's darkest hours
you have placed upon our shoulders
the stars and stripes forever.
Like a shawl against the elements,
your flag has kept us warm and brave.

America, how blessed we are
to walk the streets of this great land!
Protector of your citizens,
you turn back the brandished swords
upon those who try to steal our freedom.
Sweet America, angel mine,
under your wing, keep us free from harm.

#
© 2001 Salvatore Buttaci

THAT TUESDAY

A flag in the window,
some candles on the step.
A neighbor cries easily now.
He tells us, "I cannot leave
my brothers resting there.
I will pick my way past
jagged steel and listen
for their whispers climbing
from the ruins."

A flag in the window,
some candles on the step.
A little girl kisses
the framed picture of
her smiling father.
She and her brother
want to know,
"When is Daddy coming home?"
In the other room Mommy gags
her tears into a handkerchief.

A flag in the window,
some candles on the step.
A survivor races
from the fallen tower
like a grey statue come to life,
then races back to save
a stranger. "She was lying there,
dazed and bleeding," he says.
"I carried her out but
she died in my arms."

A flag in the window,
some candles on the step.
A Tuesday-morning moment
changes our lives forever.
Now we question our own laughter,
we own up to our mortality,
and while the TV flashes
scenes from hell, you and I hold hands
to keep from feeling lonely.

   #
© 2001 Salvatore Buttaci

IN THE MADNESS OF A MORNING

I will remember you
for as long as I live
though your footsteps
are silent now

once I could know you
by the sound of your walking
I could expect soon
there would be laughter

who would've believed
our world would change
that in the madness of a morning
I would lose you

in the clearing of smoke
in the smoldering ashes
the small voice of hope
says only this: Life goes on

I will remember you
for as long as I live
though your photographs
are all I have

who would've thought
death could force itself
upon our joy
hush forever the kindest heart

the patter of footsteps
laughter loud as song
echo down the twists and turns
of my courage

I will never forget you
I will live on
though I walk alone
I will be strong

#
© 2001 Salvatore Buttaci

Salvatore Buttaci is the author of two short-short story collections published by All Things That Matter Press and available at Amazon.com in book and Kindle editions.
Flashing My Shorts:   http://tinyurl.com/6772fps
200 Shorts:   http://tinyurl.com/3o5w84e

Buttaci lives in "Almost Heaven" West Virginia with his angel wife Sharon.

Prime time for crime

2011-09-09T12:59:00.000-07:00

Prime time for crime

LAST BLOOMING

2011-09-05T13:13:00.000-07:00

he watches her now
birdlike
on the rack
quivering with pain

dying

last moments crawl by
studded
with sharp thorns
on blooms bleaching white

dying

how will I go on
he asks
the women
(mother, sisters, friend)

dying

she’ll be gone from me
hordes of
nightmare beasts
reminding me she’s

dying

she’s crossing the bar
into
forever
one last kiss before

dying

#

Salvatore Buttaci is the author of 200 Shorts, a collection of short-short stories, published by All Things That Matter Press and available at Amazon.com in book and Kindle editions.
http://tinyurl.com/3o5w84e

He wears short shorts…

2011-08-29T13:01:00.000-07:00

He wears short shorts…

A SICILIAN SONNET - OREN COUSINS COVE

2011-08-08T08:19:00.000-07:00

A SICILIAN SONNET - OREN COUSINS COVE

200 Shorts with author poet Salvatore Buttaci 07/28 by Monica Brinkman | Blog Talk Radio

2011-07-29T06:44:00.000-07:00

200 Shorts with author poet Salvatore Buttaci 07/28 by Monica Brinkman | Blog Talk Radio

All Things That Matter Press: PODCAST-MONICA BRINKMAN

2011-07-27T15:13:00.000-07:00

All Things That Matter Press: PODCAST-MONICA BRINKMAN

200 Shorts by Salvatore Buttaci

2011-06-16T17:34:00.000-07:00

200 Shorts by Salvatore Buttaci
Master of the Flash is back! In his new collection of 200 short-short stories, Salvatore Buttaci introduces us to characters hard to forget. In less than 1,000 words they tell stories of humor, hidden emotions, love, nostalgia, violence, time and space travel, and downright horror. The author’s flashes appeal to all readers in search of a good read worth the purchase price. It won’t be so easy putting this book down.

Order your copy or Kindle edition at Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/3o5w84e

About the Author
Salvatore Buttaci is a retired English teacher who has been writing since childhood. His first published work, an essay entitled “Presidential Timber,” appeared in the Sunday New York News when he was sixteen. Since then his poems, letters, short stories, and articles have been widely published in The New York Times, Newsday, U.S.A. Today, The Writer, Cats Magazine, and elsewhere in America and overseas. In 2001, Pudding House Publications included his work in the Greatest Hits Series with his chapbook, Greatest Hits: 1970-2000. He was also the 2007 recipient of the $500.00 Cyber-wit Poetry Award.

What Others Are Saying:

A Fun and Unpredictable Collection,
Short ‘flash’ fiction is a tricky art. A writer has to be able to incorporate the potency of poetry and the plot and character development of a short story. Well, if you want to learn how to do it well, read Buttaci’s book. Likewise, if you just want a book of 200 dynamic and riveting stories for sheer entertainment, buy Buttaci’s book. It’s a great collection for anyone who enjoys a good short story (or 200 of them).
–Jen Knox, author of To Begin Again and Musical Chairs

Salvatore: a beautiful writer
Drawing on his Sicilian heritage and his experience as a writer and a teacher, Salvatore Buttaci has excelled in this presentation of 200 Shorts (flash fiction).
In bite-sized stories, and with humor and grace, Salvatore treats us to a compilation which has us laughing, crying, smiling, thinking.
He’s a beautiful writer! His last book Flashing My Shorts won much acclaim. Go on: add these books to your reading lists – treat yourself and buy one, or two, or three. Friends will love you and will love the gift you give!
Well deserving of the five stars awarded.
–Eliza Earsman, author of A Collection of Verse + 3 other books.

Flash Fiction at Its Best
Sal Buttaci is a master of flash fiction, those short prose pieces that tell a story in two sentences or two pages. This is his second publication of short fiction…In these 200 stories the reader will discover the talent of the author to narrate a story that keeps the reader with him all the way. This is a collection for those who enjoy brief stories well told, and who will finally come to the close of the book hoping for a third collection by Sal Buttaci.
–Jean Rodenbough, author of Rachel’s Children: Surviving the Second World War.

200 Shorts

Paperback: 238 pages
Publisher: All Things That Matter Press (April 24, 2011)
ISBN-10: 0984639241
ISBN-13: 978-0984639243

Order your copy or Kindle edition at Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/3o5w84e

ONE SHORT FROM 200 SHORTS:
THE COLONEL IN APT. 4-E
Why would an American astronaut hero who walked red Martian miles up there return home to Earth and become a recluse? My father had all the answers, but not this one.
President of GreEnergy Corp., Dad had enough americos to buy, outright, ten third-world nations and enough left over to treat the whole world to lunch at Sardi’s. We were the wealthiest family at the Carlton Arms, a landmark in a sleepless city where hyperbole was always a simple stretch away.
Colonel Benjamin Riggs lived on our floor, down the Persian-carpeted corridor, in Apt. 4-E. Before he conquered Mars and into its rich red-oxide soil planted New Glory with its fifty-four stars, he was Ben, our neighbor, the only one who could make Mother laugh.
Those were the golden days before Ben, the sunshine of the Carlton Arms, had been summoned from his Apt. 4-E by the president himself and his lackey crew of hotshots at WASA. Shortly after, Biff Monroe delivered his now famous line carried by every newspaper in the world, “Go get her, Riggs!”
“Her” being Mars. Rich in crimson spice. Untapped red-oxide mines in the Olympus Mons Mountain Range. A base station for a possible Red Rock Colony, which my father had generously helped finance.
Two Julys later Ben came home. Father, who had never liked him, hypocritically praised him on live TV: International hero. Blah blah blah. Crimson spice and everything nice. Blah blah and more blah about the red-oxide and that New Glory flag waving for all the universe to see. And God bless America and Colonel Benjamin Riggs.
After the tumultuous welcome he received in every major city WASA scheduled him to appear, at last Ben returned to Apt. 4-E. We hardly caught a glimpse of him. Surrounded by a squad of military men and women, he walked past our Apt. 4-K door without shooting a single glance at us as we stood like all the others lining the corridor on both sides. He had for some reason become a stranger.
The colonel never left his apartment again. I would keep an eye on the soldier who would come visit him with what I assumed were meals. The soldier came everyday, turned a key in the lock of Apt.4-E, entered, shut the door, and within less than half an hour the door would open, first a slim crack, then wider, until the soldier, still carrying the suitcase, exited the apartment and headed for the elevator.
“What’s he doing in there?” I asked Father. “He catch the Mars Flu or something?”
Father puffed out his lips, something he did when he tried to keep himself from admitting something someone else said was funny.
I handed Father the decanter of wine and he filled his glass again. It was just the two of us still at the dinner table. Mother, deep in her bi-polar malady, had managed to eat a few nibbles of Salisbury, which she spit out, then fell to her knees to gather up. We ignored her because when we’d offer to help her, she would transform herself into some ferocious beast, clawing and spitting and screaming.
“But he never leaves his apartment,” I said.
Father shrugged. What did he care? I thought to myself. The colonel made him the world’s richest man.
So I decided to find out for myself what the hell was going on. Why the soldier with the suitcase. Why the secrecy. Why a hero self-imprisoned in Cell Block 4-E.
I managed to wait outside the door one morning as the soldier entered. My hands extended towards the door, I waited for the sound of the turning doorknob, the signal for me to push the door in as the soldier cracked it open.
What I saw lasted only a horrible fraction of time. Maybe longer would have cost me my sanity. Ben was humped over on the carpet, on his hands and knees, face bloated, blood gushing like a fountain from his lips. In his raised hand a large rat struggled to free himself from Ben’s clutch. Ben slapped its dark hairy body into his mouth and chomped it in two. Around the room other rats, scurrying from the suitcase, were racing about the apartment, desperate to find a way out. For that one second, Ben jerked his head up and locked eyes with me. If he remembered, he didn’t show it. Instead, he turned away, then like a beast hopped on the carpet, then pounced on another rat, which he proceeded to devour alive.
Then the soldier had me in an arm lock, dragged me to the other side of the threshold and slammed shut the door to 4-E.
“What did you see, Kid?”
“Nothing. I didn’t see anything.”
Slowly he released his grip. I rubbed my sore arm.
“How long you figure you can keep seeing nothing?”
He walked me down the corridor.
“Where you taking me?” I asked. A witness to something like this? Maybe curiosity does kill.
“How long?” the soldier was asking again. “Stay away from the colonel’s door. Next time we bump into each other, Kid, I’ll feed you instead of the rats. Clear?”
Questions flashed in my head but I extinguished them one by one until my brain felt like a dark tomb. Mars Flu, I had jokingly said. What I saw in there was no flu, no damn flu from anywhere in the galaxy. What happened? What turned gentle Ben into a rat-devouring monster on four legs?
I nodded to the soldier. “It’s clear.”
I kept my word because I wanted to keep my life. Less than six months later the colonel died. A closed casket was placed in the White House rotunda and dignitaries from all over the world, including Father, paraded past, touched the wood, bowed, and moved on. President Monroe called Ben the greatest American of the 22^nd Century. After all these years, I still call him my friend.
#

200 Shorts by Salvatore Buttaci

2011-06-16T17:31:00.000-07:00

200 Shorts

Paperback: 238 pages
Publisher: All Things That Matter Press (April 24, 2011)
ISBN-10: 0984639241
ISBN-13: 978-0984639243

Order your copy or Kindle edition at Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/3o5w84e

A & W Radio

2011-06-16T09:54:00.000-07:00

A & W Radio

WritingRaw Home

2011-05-02T06:11:00.000-07:00

WritingRaw Home

Candid Interview with Author Salvadore Buttaci 04/20 by Poetic Energy Radio | Blog Talk Radio

2011-04-22T07:03:00.000-07:00

Candid Interview with Author Salvadore Buttaci 04/20 by Poetic Energy Radio | Blog Talk Radio

SAL'S PLACE: MAMA AND ST. JOSEPH'S DAY by Salvatore Buttaci

2011-03-16T07:23:00.000-07:00

SAL'S PLACE: MAMA AND ST. JOSEPH'S DAY by Salvatore Buttaci: " St. Joseph's Day, March 19, was always a day of celebration in our family. It was my late mother's saint's-name ..."

MAMA AND ST. JOSEPH'S DAY by Salvatore Buttaci

2011-03-16T07:21:00.000-07:00

St. Joseph's Day, March 19, was always a day of celebration in our family. It was my late mother's saint's-name day, and we would eat dishes to which my mother would give a traditional touch, like red-sauced spaghetti sprinkled with muddichi, toasted breadcrumbs, instead of the usual grated cheeses. For dessert, unpeeled oranges were cut into thin slices. Of course, Mama baked her delicious cream puffs!

Mama's parents named her Giuseppina, Josephine, in a deal they made with Sicily's patron saint, San Giuseppe, Saint Joseph, foster father of Jesus. It was a difficult birth and my grandparents needed all the prayers they could get. They prayed St. Joseph would join them in those prayers. Several years before, they had lost their young daughter Rosalia, named after the infant's paternal grandmother, and now they chose not to give that same name to my mother. Years later, when Mama and Papa lost their first daughter Giovanna, who was only three, they chose instead to also name their third daughter Giovanna, but they called her Joan, rather than Jenny, “the baby we lost.”

I also remember the Happy St. Joseph's Day greeting cards my mother received, which she displayed on top of the TV. My Aunt Fannie Giambrone and Aunt Rosie Palazzola never forgot my mother's special day. The cards came from relatives and friends, here and from their old village in Acquaviva Platani, Sicily.

My mother had a strong devotion to the Blessed Mother Mary and to several of the saints. St. Joseph was just one of them. San Antonio di Padua, whose feast day is June 13, was another favorite. My middle name is Antonio because she too made a deal with a saint on the day of my birth, June 12. A healthy baby to carry the name of a saint!

Another favorite of hers was Santa Lucia, St. Lucy, patron saint of the physically blind. Every December 13^th, on the saint's feast day, she would not eat anything made from regular flour. Instead, she would cook wheat flour and make a dish she called cuccia. She said she made that small sacrifice so that all of us would enjoy good eyesight. In fact, I believe I made it through three laser eye surgeries because Mama and good St. Lucy were looking out for me.

Mama prayed constantly. Growing up, I would tease her about her rosary, how she would say five of them a day! Once I told her, “Ma, you should've been a nun!” then thought, How dumb. Where would I be if she had been Sister Giuseppina instead of my mother!

One of the proudest memories I have of both my parents is walking in on them one early evening. They were kneeling before their huge crucifix in the living room, reciting the rosary, Papa beginning the prayers in Latin and Mama completing them in Italian. No way did I expect them to stop their prayers, so I sat on the sofa and read the newspaper.

And all those nights we kept her up worrying and working those beads. She couldn't sleep until we walked through the door, but I am certain before letting herself drift into dreamsville, she prayed an additional string of beads in thanksgiving prayers.

Once my cousin Betty told her, “No wonder you're up all night, Aunt Josie. You're praying for everybody! Why not just say, 'God bless us all,' and let it go at that,” but my mother said she preferred naming each of us by name in the prayers she offered up to Heaven. She prayed for the people she knew, the people she did not know, the so-called enemy nations of our country, and for the poor souls in Purgatory. I asked her in her last years, “Ma, who will pray for me when you are gone?” She smiled and said, “I will go on praying for you and all my family until we are reunited in Heaven!”

In my godless days in college and beyond, I had little use for church and religion. I had fallen into that old trap where I felt competent enough to look at the world's sorrows and blame God, or worse, question God's existence. After all, would a good God allow genocide or infant deaths or a host of so many other unexplainable misfortunes? But like St. Monica who prayed for her atheist son Augustine, later a saint of the church, to change his unbelief in God, Mama prayed for me. If I ever reach Heaven and they let me in, it will be because of my mother's prayers.

This is the first year for as long as I can recall that I do not send Mama a St. Joseph's Day card. On September 18, 2010, she left her pain and suffering behind and winged her way to the God she loved with her whole heart and soul. We miss her terribly, but now when I pray and ask my mother's favorite saints to pray with me, I include Mama among them. After all, who, more than my mother, knew precisely how to pray, how to ask for graces and then end all her prayers with, “Your will, not mine be done.”

###

Salvatore Buttaci, author of Flashing My Shorts

and the soon-to-be-released 200 Shorts

MY BROTHER ALPHONSE by Salvatore Buttaci

2011-03-09T13:28:00.000-08:00

My brother Alphonse, our mother, and I (1995)

MY BROTHER ALPHONSE

He was my big brother. In a family of eight children, he was the oldest child; I was the middle one. He spent his early years in the Great Depression while I was born six months before the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941. Nine years separated us. We called him “Alphonse,” and sometimes “Al,” but my parents called him by his birth name, “Alfonso.”

We were hardly close back then.

During those 1940s Brooklyn days gone by, Al was studying to be a priest, a straight-A student at the Pallottine Fathers Seminary in Sag Harbor, New York. I can still vividly remember those long train trips from New York City, past Poughkeepsie, and finally the taxi ride that stopped at the main hall. We'd visit with him, take black-and-white pictures of the family with Papa's old Kodak camera, and take the train back to our tenement apartment on Graham Avenue.

After three years at the seminary, Al decided against a religious vocation. He joined the U.S. Marine Corps and we saw even less of him than before. Upon his discharge from the service after four years, he took a salesman's job selling magazines in various American cities, one at which he met his future wife Celia Ann Hitechew. Together they had four children: Michael, Jodi, John, and Alfonsina.

Al was an excellent believer in the old adage, “Believe in yourself.” From magazine salesman he advanced himself up the executive ladder until finally he was a vice-president in a leading janitorial maintenance corporation that boasted offices all over the country. He had a knack for winning friends and influencing potential buyers. A super-keen sense of business helped him earn money for himself and for the corporate people he worked for. We were proud of him.

It was not until the 1970s that we two brothers seem to meet on common ground. I was no longer the kid brother. He had become less distant. What brought us together was the fear of losing our mother to a serious brain tumor. He had come to visit; we talked, perhaps one can say, we bonded. As for Mama, her brain tumors miraculously disappeared! About that same time, Al became a Born-again Catholic and looked at life in a much different light than ever before. For me, he was easier to talk to. He cared about the important things in life. He put his trust in the Peace of Christ and life became more meaningful than ever before.

In the 80s, he, my friend Aldo, and I began collaborating on country and gospel songs. Al and Aldo wrote the music and Al and I, the lyrics. In fact, four of our country songs were used as background music in a B-film called Fortress of Amerikkka. We were Saldo Music, ASCAP members!

By the time 1990 rolled around, Al and I decided to spend three weeks in Sicily, visiting the Sicilian mountain village of Acquaviva Platani where our parents originated. We went again in 1995, and those two vacations were filled with such happy memories: two brothers rattling off our Sicilian, drinking homemade wine, singing in the streets, laughing with our Sicilian cousins. Those days were priceless.

Alphonse died one year ago today. He had beaten cancer in 1999 when the two of us struggled with it and our sister Anna had died from hers, but it came back and took his life. Sharon and I drove from West Virginia to the hospital in Hackensack, New Jersey, hardly expecting to find him in his last hours. Though he was unconscious, I spoke to him, told him how much I loved him, said prayers with Sharon and the family gathered at the sides of his deathbed. All the while I kept thinking of an old Janis Joplin

song line, “Take another little piece of my heart now...” Papa, Anna and Frankie were gone. Now Alphonse. One more heartbreak.

Two weeks before, Al and I were talking on the phone, something we did quite often. He was explaining how the cancer, first in his bladder, now showed up in his lung, and the doctors suspected it had also traveled to his liver.

“I'm worried, Al,” I said.

“No, don't worry.”

“If the cancer's moving--”

Then my brother said something that reflected his strong faith in God, his trust in God's Will, that same trust our mother had taught us would see us through all things.

“Way I look at it,” Al began, “if it spreads and I'm meant to die, I'll die. If not, I'll survive. Either way, I can't lose.”

It's been a year, March 10 again, and I miss him terribly, but I know one day we'll all meet again. Whatever made us joyful, whatever made us laugh, will do so again, but in that timelessness of life beyond this finite one we shall dance and sing in the Light of Christ!

Salvatore Buttaci, author of Flashing My Shorts

DEAR OBJECT OF MY PINING by SALVATORE BUTTACI

2011-02-18T07:33:00.000-08:00

In darkened rooms throughout the world, away from hives where crowds assemble to exchange malicious slander, pining hearts are prey to horrid loneliness, lives rearranged

by lovers versed in saying, albeit kindly, “No, I do not love you.”

Alone, they harbor deep resentments as do I. Worn down by a failed affair, devoid now of boundless faith in love, these malcontents lack the strength to fight despair. They prefer instead the darkened room to rail against the false allure of light.

This heart of mine, beyond repair, accepts its doom. In solitude now, I still wish for love to shine. For me I won’t believe it’s much too late.

Imagine me, Catherine, on life’s stage tonight attired in white suit and black mask, a Punchinello in classic pose. In white-gloved hand I strum a lute to thunderous applause. I bow: a brute who masquerades a gentleman without sorrow. The world sees my façade, only what I show, not this tormented fool riddled with the stabs of heartbreak. They see the friendly comic Mr. Punch whose fall elicits belly laughs, not the man you threw away. The stick with which I whack those on the stage is hardly humor. A second encore brings me back. I bow and they say, “How sleek!” No one, least of all, you, dear Catherine, can delve beneath this suave veneer and see, not Punch, but Punched, Laid Low, Victim of Unrequited Love.

How dark a time, you ask? The weight that crushed my heart, how heavy? None can say in prose nor poetry what words describe the void you left. What slush of wordy drivel could dare speak of my lament! Verses, paragraphs, hardly come near the telling. The love of my life has closed the door to heaven. You have dismissed me with a wave of your once healing hand. “I do not love you,“ you said from lips I have kissed and dreamed I would press with mine forever. “I do not love you.“ The door was shut. We disappeared from each other. Life that only days ago was filled with warm celebrations, now leaves me cold. No longer can I speak the language of my heart that in mourning lies silent. And what could my heart say? Whirling once in the eddy of love’s madness, your estrangement jolted it to dazed stillness. It merely beats to keep me alive to pine away.

Yesterday from afar I saw you in your garden, red roses in hand. These misty eyes delighted in stealing a glimpse of you. Your face, your form… The usual fantasy took hold of me and I imagined true love grew wings and battled victoriously against unrequited love, and this dream to have you mine came true.

I saw you, roses in hand, and wished to take their place, feel your gentle kindness. In your presence the summer breezes hold their breaths and time stands still. Only in my mind we kiss and bid goodbye, not to each other, but to the lonely past, the wasted loveless time in whose vise I am prisoner. I pretend our love is a flower no frost can kill.

I make believe you will read this letter and recant. I wait humbly for your reply.

The man who loves you,

Vincent

APOSTLE RISING by RICHARD GODWIN

2011-01-06T06:25:00.000-08:00

PRESS RELEASE

Publication Date: MARCH 2011

Contact: Rose Carrano 646.638.2181 (NYC)

rosecarrano@earthlink.net

“A brilliant new cop duo with a plot to die for and a killer that will terrify you."

--Sheila Quigley, author of Thorn In My Side.

"Engrossing, exquisite, and extra-scary. Richard Godwin has accomplished a rare literary achievement with his full-length debut novel, Apostle Rising. It is at times by the numbers cop procedural, at other times horror so disturbing but beautifully and uniquely written, I could almost feel the cold sharp steel blade slowly entering my own flesh. Inspector Frank Castle and his partner Jacki Stone speak to every man or woman who is both fallible but determined to uncover the truth and to right a grave wrong, even if that determination becomes an obsession so profound, they lose all that is dear to them in the process. Including their sanity. Apostle Rising is not just another detective novel. It is also not for the faint of heart. It is noir tour-de-force that will leave you breathless and teary-eyed."

--Vincent Zandri, best-selling author of The Remains and The Innocent

"Richard Godwin's 'Apostle Rising' is a police procedural and psychological thriller of the first order. If you love Ken Bruen and John Connolly, Godwin's the man you'll be following next."

--Scott Phillips, author of The Ice Harvest, The Walkaway and Cottonwood

APOSTLE RISING

Richard Godwin

A serial killer is targeting British politicians and the crime scenes are signature replicas of the Woodland Killings that took place twenty-eight years earlier. The case became an obsession for Chief Inspector Frank Castle, a case he was never able to solve and which led to his nervous breakdown, his vilification by the press and the end of his marriage.

As Castle and his partner Detective Inspector Jacki Stone start their investigation, they run into the eerie figure of Karl Black, Castle’s nemesis and the man he still believes is responsible for The Woodland Killings. In the years since the original Woodland Killings, Black took up residence in an ancient parish on the outskirts of London where he trains “recruits” in the teachings of The Last Brotherhood, a sinister and mysterious cult that is out to change the world, as we know it.

Now years later, again mauled by the press, and traumatized by nightmares, Castle is faced with a copycat killer with detailed inside knowledge of the original case. They call in a profiler who tells them they are dealing with a religiously motivated psychopath with an obsession about politicians and who is working along with someone else.

As they work with this profile, the killer changes direction and kills one of Castle’s colleagues, placing the Met under great strain. With the aid of their colleagues on the force they begin to dig into the original case for clues. A second serial killer now emerges, leaving mutilated bodies of prostitutes in Richmond Park and another series of killings is soon underway that are even more brutal and torturous.

The killer starts to play dark mind games with the police. The profiler digs deeper into the killer’s psyche as Castle and Stone try to figure out whom he will target next.

In a race against time they try to catch him before he can kill another high profile figure and a huge shock awaits Castle when they do.

# # #

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Richard Godwin is a novelist and playwright. He writes dark crime fiction and his stories have been published in A Twist of Noir, Pulp Metal Magazine, Danse Macabre, Disenthralled, South Jersey and Gloom Cupboard among others.

His play ‘The Cure-All’ has been produced on the London stage. It is a dark satire about a group of confidence tricksters using the New Age to rip off their greedy venal customers. His works in print include ‘Chemical’, in the Anthology ‘Back In 5 Minutes’, published by Little Episodes Publishing in February 2010, and ‘Doll’, in ‘Howl: Tales Of The Feral And Infernal’ by Lame Goat Press in March 2010 and ‘Face Off’ in Crime Factory Issue #5, by CreateSpace in October 2010.

Richard Godwin received his B.A. at King’s College London University and went on to receive his M.A. there with distinction in American and English Literature. King’s College awarded him a teaching scholarship and a stipend for lecturing. He continued lecturing and obtained an MPhil in English and American literature. He taught in and then ran the English department at Davies’s College.

He lives in London and APOSTLE RISING is his first crime novel.

Richard Godwin's Chin Wags At The Slaughterhouse are interviews he has conducted with other crime and horror writers and can be found at his blog on his website here http://richardgodwin.net/ where you can find a full list of his works.

APOSTLE RISING

Richard Godwin

MARCH 2011

$14.95 – Trade Paperback Original

ISBN: 978-0-9567113-0-4

Published by: Black Jackal Books, 143 Kingston Road, London SW19 1LJ

Distributed by: Book Masters/Atlas Books

WHOSE BIRTHDAY IS IT ANYWAY? by Salvatore Buttaci

2010-12-25T07:17:00.000-08:00

Papa, Mama, and me in 1985

“Is that what you think Christmas is all about?” Papa asked me that long-ago 1950 Christmas in Utica, New York. I was nine years old. What did I know! As with most children, my idea of Christmas was the one the media made millions of dollars promoting with their steady barrage of newspaper toy ads, radio spot ads, and even television commercials, primitive as they were back then.

My father was a man short in stature, perhaps 5’6,” but standing over me, straight as a board, he seemed a giant. When he spoke, we listened. We knew beyond a doubt he loved us, and like our mother, would do only what was best for us. “Presents?” Papa was asking me now. I nodded. “All those expensive toys the stores sell at prices who knows how people could afford?” I stood there, no longer nodding. I could hardly look my father in the eye.

He was a hard worker who was holding two jobs: one in the daytime as a welder at the railroad yard, the other in the night hours baking bread in a local Italian bakery. He never complained, but now especially, this Christmas season, though he slaved away, he did not earn enough to buy beyond life’s necessities. My mother tried hard to stretch the money he brought home so we lived on a tight budget. I didn’t have a clue about our family finances back then because life seemed good and the family laughed a lot. Along with my parents, sisters Anna, Joanie, Baby Sarah, and older brother Al, we seemed to me to be wealthy enough to make Christmas something to remember.

On the sewing machine the scrawny little tree sat decorated with an excess of colorful ornaments that only last year dotted a much grander Christmas tree. But now it stood there, a bit askew, and under it a few neatly wrapped presents––enough for each of us––

in boxes too small to fit the gifts I had jotted down on my Dear Santa list. No pair of boxing gloves for me. No wooden sled. On each package tag in my father’s florid writing each of our names after a huge drawn “TO.” And on all of them another largely drawn “FROM” and under it “With Love from Papa and Mama. Merry Christmas!”

But I had spoiled it all. We had just returned from midnight Mass at St. Agnes Roman Catholic Church on snowy Blandina Street, anxious to rip open our presents that traditionally were safely locked away somewhere––our parents’ closet? Under their bed?––and now suddenly appeared like a disappointing dream under that embarrassing tree.

“Is that all the presents?” I had asked as I headed quickly to the sewing machine console upon which sat that tree with its skimpy needled branches hanging over the gifts.

Looking at the faces of my sisters and brother, it was apparent they too were disappointed, but Al, the oldest and wisest, said, “Look, there are lots of presents for everybody!” His words may have been wise but nowhere near consoling. I knew without tearing through the wrapping that my Christmas present would be none of the items I had told Santa, in whom I no longer believed, that I wanted.

We were all hungry. In our family an after-midnight dinner followed midnight Mass. As we did daily, we would say grace before meals and then feast on Mama’s lasagna and her braccioli, beef stuffed with salami, cheese and eggs. It was a gastronomical treat, but now as Papa loomed over me, disappointment with a touch of anger on his face, no one

dashed for the kitchen. Except for my mother fixing places at the kitchen table, we were waiting for Papa to go on or maybe my sisters and brother were waiting for me to all at once start crying. At nine I was too big for that. Still, inside me a little boy was sorry he had spoken out of place. That little boy was crying.

“Pa, I’m sorry I said that. I didn’t mean––”

“What did you mean? Was I right? Christmas with lots of expensive toys?”

I shifted onto my other leg. I still do that when I am nervously uncomfortable. Then I shifted back on the other leg. “It’s just that we wait all year. And I wrote that Santa letter.” Papa nodded. He had found it on the closet shelf above where he hung his winter coat. “I figured maybe I could have––”

Papa interrupted with a raised voice. “’I could have! I could have!’” he mimicked.

“Christmas. The day Jesus was born. In a poor stable with donkey hay for his mattress. His mother who brought God’s Son into the world. What presents for Him? The Three Wise Men brought––”

Papa turned to my sister Joan and shook his head. He was not about to explain the gifts of the Magi.

Papa ran his hand through his wavy black hair, tamped down his moustache, and continued. “This is Jesus’ birthday! What do you think? It’s yours? It’s the birthday of every kid in the world who’s crying for presents?” Then Papa folded his arms the way he did when the punch line was coming or the life lesson or the gist of his stories. We all waited attentively. “Jesus Himself was the gift! Can you understand?” Then he turned around and looked at all of us kids, not just me. “He came into the world to save us all. You’re looking for big presents I cannot afford to give you. I don’t have the money to make Christmas the Big Day of Toys.” At this point my sisters are all crying. I want to but I can’t. Al and I stay strong. “He died for us so we could go to heaven someday. He did not die so we can all buy presents and forget why He was born on Christmas Day. The only true Christmas tradition is thanking Jesus Christ for being born!”

I stood there learning one of the most profound lessons of my lifetime. I wanted to say again how sorry I was, but once was enough because words don’t always do what we mean them to do. Instead I hugged my father and let the tears come and wet his white dress shirt. He bent down and hugged me back.

Then Papa stood up, his hand on my shoulder, and winked at me. “Come on,” he said to all of us. “Don’t keep Mama waiting. Let’s sit down now and eat. Later we can open some presents.” We all followed him into the kitchen.

Salvatore Buttaci, author of Flashing My Shorts

CAN WRITERS BE PROPHETS?

2010-12-14T09:58:00.000-08:00

Have you ever heard of the Infinite Monkey Theorem? It states that if you set a monkey in a chair in front of a computer keyboard (or as originally expressed: “in front of a typewriter keyboard”), and allow that monkey an infinite amount of time, it will almost surely type the complete works of William Shakespeare!

When my science teacher back at Holy Family High School told us that, of course, we laughed, not because we rejected the theorem, but because the image of a hyper monkey scratching its armpits in between pecking away, one key at a time, was too funny for words. Now, looking back to 1958 and Mr. Sabello’s revelation, I suppose the image that popped into our teacher's head was a classroom of monkeys scratching our armpits in our infinite endeavor to type an acceptable term paper. That would explain the hint of a grin on Mr. Sabello’s face.

But I digress a bit. The title of this piece is “Can Writers Be Prophets?” It’s not about monkeys at all, but there is a connection, albeit flimsy, I suppose.

If writers, over the span of a lifetime, produce, let’s say, 1,000 stories, can at least one of those fiction pieces predict the future? One in a 1,000, I believe, would support what I have named “The Lifetime Writer/prophet Theorem.

What got me thinking about this new theorem was my own realization that in approximately that many stories which I’ve written, three of them were prophetic. Three of them in a sense came true! Did I know this at the time I pecked away on my Remington typewriter? Did I say, like Archimedes, “Eureka!” Did I feel the glow that comes from an epiphany moment? Did I say to myself, “This story will foreshadow a future event and you will be hailed a prophet in the writing community? Hardly.

In 1952, I wrote a story called “Carolyn,” in which the protagonist, whose name I do not recall (maybe it was Benjamin Shaba, one of my many pen names in those early days), was an infantryman fighting a war in 1967 in…(drum roll here!) Iraq! Why did I choose for my setting a country in the Middle East? Who knows! Since when does a prophet understand these things? Did St. John know what he was writing on that lonely island of Patmos? Did Nostradamus say, “Okay, today I shall pen a quatrain about the Kennedy brothers?" Did Edgar Cayce, the sleeping prophet, know what he was predicting while he lay on a couch, talking in his sleep?

Did I know in that year in June a Six-Day War would rage in the Middle East between Israel and a few hostile neighboring nations? I was writing a love story, mostly letters of correspondence between a soldier and his fiancée Carolyn, while the bombs bursting in air were not deterrents enough to keep him from writing love letters from the heart.

In 1960, I was a sophomore at the University of Miami, where the unkind joke is, if you attend there, chances are you are majoring in Basket Weaving. I never found that slur very amusing, despite my student participation there being, in any stretch of the wildest imagination, even remotely academic. I cut classes so many times that when I entered the classroom, the students, and even the professor, would give me a hearty round of applause. Maybe they had thought I’d dropped out. Drowned on the beach. Drank myself into a beer stupor, collapsed in some alleyway, and got devoured by nibbling rats. They were happy to see me.

Anyway, back to prophecies. Though I hardly attended classes, I did write a story I submitted it to the campus Tempo Magazine, which they not only accepted, but had one of the art students illustrate “She Never Travels Alone.” I purchased ten copies, only one of which, to my knowledge, remains extant and that is to my right at the moment on my bookcase shelf.

In “She Never Travels Alone,” my character is an irresponsible, reckless, ne’er-do-well, modeled after the writer of the piece, so it was easy to dash off lines since I had so well taken to heart the old Greek aphorism “Know thyself,” about all I learned from Philosophy I.

My character brazenly tells his boss, a fellow named Dunhill, to shove the job where clocks don’t get punched, and then walks out into the warm Miami air. That was in 1960. Here comes the fulfillment of that prophecy. In 1991, I got a job working as an account executive for a mailing list company in New York City. My boss, the owner of the company, was Mr. Dunhill! Wait, there’s more. Business got slow and the boss had to give the boot to one of his four account executives.

“Why me?” I asked Mr. Dunhill?

He smiled the way a cat smiles after he’s eaten your favorite canary.

“Because you’re the only one who came to me each year, demanding a 20% raise.”

“But you only gave me 5%!”

“Five percent each year for eleven years adds up,” he said.

So in anger, despite my liking the guy up to that point, I rose from his office chair and said in my best I-don’t-give-a-crap voice, “You can shove this job where the sun won’t shine!” He reached across the table and shook my hand. “Loretta, will give you your severance check.”

Now would you call my story prophetic or what?

And now the third time this writer was at the same time a prophet occurred in a story I wrote in 1973. It told of an attack on the United States of America, but not by fanatical terrorists but by invaders from outer space. In my story they zap the Empire Building in New York City, along with the artistic work of art, the Chrysler Building. I chose those two since they were so highly recognized as reflecting the Big Apple. The Twin Towers never entered my mind, so the prophecy was not as accurate as it could have been.

Now that I am a much older writer, I have put it all together and I don’t like what I’m finding. Three of my stories have proved prophetic (several hundred others the critics would consider "pathetic"). I don’t know how many other fiction pieces will in time join the ranks of my so-far three.

I have written stories about a world plague caused and spread by Chihuahuas; a popular vampire elected President of the United States; Satan appearing live at Radio City Music Hall to premier his hit song, “Burn, Baby, Burn!”

I’m thinking to myself, Hold off on the grim and deadly. Stop writing stories that are cataclysmic, catastrophic, post-bellum, post-diluvian, post-nuclear, post office takeovers by zombie e-mailers, post-Armageddon, Post-it’s contaminated with anthrax! No more! I shall not write about the hideous, the unclean, the giant man- (and woman-) eating ladybugs; the mad scientist who, by mistake, invents the Crime Machine that spits out new and undetectable ways to not only break the law but completely destroy it. No nursery rhymes gone horribly wrong; no Miss Muffet torn apart by blue-berry-loving spiders; no blizzards of cockroaches showering down our heads.

Writers are prophets and that’s a pity. We need to be careful what we put down on paper. It could one day bite us where we sit. Our hands are tied. Only the unconscionable among us writers would throw caution to the wind and take their chances predicting, or what is exponentially worse, bringing a future disaster to fruition by first giving it life in a story!

A new year is dawning. I shall repent by writing only happy poems that sing and dance. My flash stories will be decently dressed. My story plots will circumvent cemeteries. They will divest themselves of blood-curdling screams, bodies hacked for the heck of it, nations itching to press the red button that launches missiles.

Knowing now this hard-to-ignore connection between writings and future events, I shall cease and desist from further negativities. All my writings will feature sparrows and petunias. My stanzas and paragraphs will tell of Utopian tomorrows where war is unheard of. A future where people revive that old custom of wearing flowers in their hair…flowers everywhere. My stories will show protagonists and antagonists loving one another, settings of sun and calm waters, enough peace to go around.

There is another old adage that claims “Three’s a crowd.” Well, I’ve written three stories that came true and three is quite my limit.

Let me warn those of you who find pleasure in penning horror stories that could end up in our future. You’re playing with fire, so knock it off!

Salvatore Buttaci, author of Flashing My Shorts

MURDER BEHIND THE CLOSET DOOR:Where Mystery Transcends Reality By Christopher Pinto

2010-12-04T15:03:00.000-08:00

About the Book:

A dilapidated house with an evil secret in the basement. An auto-wrecking yard with the devious, rusted remains of a murderer's getaway car. An unsolved bank robbery with hundreds of thousands of dollars never found. A detective trying to solve an age old murder before his ticker runs out. A slow, agonizing death for an unfortunate victim and his soul reaching from beyond... Murder Behind The Closet Door is a murder murder mystery ghost story that keeps you engaged and guessing from the first paragraph. Creepy, riveting, this story reveals another existence, one just beyond our own, where the occult and the paranormal meet reality and everyday people find themselves swept into very extraordinary circumstances.

The story is set in Ocean City and Wildwood, NJ during the late 1970s (with flashbacks to the '30s & '50s), and centers around a young woman who begins her career marketing an amusement pier on the world-famous Wildwood Boardwalk. Just as Heather's adult life really begins to blossom, her torment begins. Not long after moving into a 70 year-old rooming house, Heather's mundane life takes an uncontrolled turn toward insanity. Although she refuses to acknowledge her ghost, a mysterious entity begins to taunt her, an entity impetuously determined to contact her through her bedroom closet. At first these mild encounters are merely disturbing.... Aspirations of a life of quaint mediocrity vanish as she and her friends try to discover the motives of her tormentor, finding that the truths in which she believed her entire life had been nothing but an elaborate veneer. As Heather falls deeper into the mystery, she finds the physical world around her is much stranger - and more terrifying - than she could ever have imagined. Note: This murder mystery/ghost story deals with adult themes and language, and is not intended for children.

About the Author

Become a Fan of Murder... on Facebook! http://www.facebook.com/pages/Murder-Behind-The-Closet-Door-Ghost-Lovers-Fan-Page/112744805423946

Christopher Pinto is the author/editor of Tiki Lounge Talk (http://tikiloungetalk.com), a web-lounge dedicated to remembering the kool stuff from the Atomic Age and beyond, from big band music to cocktails at the Tiki Bar. He's been writing for over 25 years, has had several plays produced, and has won awards for his creative efforts. During the 1990s he was producer/director of a highly successful traveling theater company in the Atlantic City area, StarDust Productions. A lover of all things retro, he enjoys working on his 1953 Chevy Belair Hot Rod, plays jazz tenor sax and clarinet, and is an avid collector of vintage memorabilia. Pinto currently lives in South Florida with his wife Colleen, four birds, two cats, a dog and a Tiki Bar. For more info visit http://stardustmysteries.com.

Order the author’s book at Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/326bnfn

WYNFIELD'S KINGDOM by MARINA JULIA NEARY

2010-11-24T06:38:00.000-08:00

About the Book:

Welcome to 1830s Bermondsey, London’s most notorious slum, a land of gang wars, freak shows and boxing matches. Dr. Grant, a disgraced physician, adopts Wynfield, a ten-year old thief savagely battered by the gang leader for insubordination. The boy grows up to be a slender, idealistic opium addict who worships Victor Hugo. By day he steals and resells guns from a weapons factory. By night he amuses filthy crowds with his adolescent girlfriend, a fragile witch with wolfish eyes. Their tragicomic idyll ends when Wynfield falls under the spell of an elusive benefactress and leaves his bohemian, semi-criminal circle to follow her to Westminster. There, in the company of blue-blooded outcasts, he learns the secret of his origin and the role he is destined to play in the history of England. Invoking the ghosts of English anarchists, Guy Fawkes and Oliver Cromwell, Wynfield enters the world’s biggest tavern – the Parliament, where he meets the most ruthless boy gang in the world – the British aristocracy. Using the mixture of chemicals, satire and horror, Wynfield stages an unforgettable performance and subdues the ruling class – if only for one day.

"Neary writes with unbelievable power, yet never loses her sense of emotional insight.... Wynfield's Kingdom is truly an extraordinary first novel.."

About the Author:

M.J. Neary is an award-winning historical essayist, multilingual arts & entertainment journalist, poet, playwright and actor. Her poetry has appeared in various literary journals such as Alimentum and The Recorder. She serves on the editorial staff of the Bewildering Stories Magazine. Her historical tragicomedy Hugo in London, featuring the adventures of the French literary genius in England during the Crimean War, was produced in Greenwich, followed by a sequel, Lady with a Lamp: An Untold Story of Florence Nightingale. A specialist on the obscure works of Victor Hugo, she has lectured at the French Alliance.

In 2007 she was commissioned to collect and publish the memoirs of residents from a retirement community in Stamford, CT. The project involved interviewing over forty senior citizens over the age of ninety. A new Connecticut-based leisure publication Norwalk Beat has recently brought her on board as a steady contributor. She focuses on the entertainment industry in Connecticut. After having her short story accepted by Bewildering Stories Magazine, she was invited to join their editorial staff.

In addition to her writing, Neary has had a career in the performing arts. She has starred in several independent films shot in CT and NY; and, in the 1990s, she competed in various talent pageants in New England

Visit the author at http://mjneary.webs.com/

Order from the publisher: http://www.fireshippress.com/

Or from Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/24s8p5r

REVELATIONS by SANDY COHEN

2010-11-15T12:05:00.000-08:00

About the Book:

Travel along with Manny Markovitz and his guide, Abis -- part Native American, part madman -- as they take you on a wild, always funny, sometimes poignant journey from the wilds of Greece to the bogs and barrier islands of south Georgia, USA in search for Abis's boss, Willy Love. Enter with them into a world of imagination, wild adventure and absolute delight as Manny wakens back to life and love after a great personal tragedy. Perhaps you will, too. Critic Erwin Ford calls Revelations "a Candide for the 21st century."

PRAISE FOR SANDY COHEN AND REVELATIONS:

"I love it! And I'm jealous. . . you're quite a writer. Such pure, unadorned dialect; good strong story. Your characters live."

-- Janice Daugharty, author of Earl in the Yellow Shirt (nominated for the Pulitzer Prize)

"Moving . . . powerful. . . ."

-- Elizabeth S. Morgan

"A fine prose-poem."

-Wayne Brown, author of On the Coast (winner of the Commonwealth Prize)

About the Author:

Before Revelations, Sandy Cohen published two books in Europe plus stories, articles, poetry, and essays in journals and magazines in the United States, Canada, China, Germany, England, and Greece. His work, critical and creative, has drawn praise from, among others, Norman Mailer, Bernard Malamud, Patrick White and Isaac Beshevis Singer. He has been a professor, jazz musician, bookbinder, actor and, for almost two decades, a humorous commentator on public radio. He appeared in his own mini-series for public television and in a feature film, Do Not Disturb, filmed in northern China, where he lived for a year. He currently resides in southwest Florida with his nearly-perfect family.

Order Revelations from Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/26gqskb

Visit Sandy Cohen’s publisher at http://allthingsthatmatterpress,.com

SONG OF GEORGE: PORTRAIT OF AN UNLIKELY HOLY MAN by Jesse S. Hanson

2010-11-08T11:10:00.000-08:00

About the Book:

Suppose you were standing, like a tourist protected by a guardrail, over an opening into the pit of hell, when suddenly the rail gave way and you tumbled in. You wouldn't know why - consumed with fear or anger, and surrounded by utter misery, it wouldn't make sense to you. Yet the fate of many of the poor souls in our prison mental facilities is not so very different from that scenario, their crimes often resulting from the effect of some form of mental illness. Who can help them? Enter George.

About the Author:

Jesse S. Hanson is a North Dakota native, writer/musician. Jesse and his wife, Lilasuka, currently reside in Pennsylvania. He has also lived in the Pacific Northwest and in the Southwest. "I suppose restlessness is part of my nature. I'm never quite at home anywhere in the world, and that is part of why spirituality is the backdrop for all my writing.

Order Hanson’s book from Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/28dt5o4

Visit his publisher: http://allthingsthatmatterpress.com

GOD'S VACATION by MICHAEL DAVIS

2010-11-01T10:28:00.000-07:00

About the Book:

What happens when God develops a split personality, takes a vacation, is reborn as Spencer Perry, Gabrielle/Gabe Stevens, and Vrum, ends up in San Francisco, and forgets who S/he is? Hell breaks loose!

Spencer Perry becomes Chairman and CEO of the Global-Government and Business Alliance, and the most powerful man on Earth. His government rules with an iron fist; those close to him call him Father.

Gabrielle Stevens gets a sex change and becomes Gabe. He lands a job at Upside Down Books, meets Carlos Martinez, and falls in love with a beautiful Jewish woman named Naomi Peterson. They join the revolutionary movement to take on Spencer Perry's fascist regime.

Vrum, a member of a race of androgynous aliens called the Ekawa, discovers the Focal Point is located in San Francisco and travels across the galaxy to bring Gabrielle and Spencer back together, but fails. The problem is, they don't want to be God.

Legend says there's another way to put God back together, but it's a long shot. If 144,000 people can become wholly enlightened at the same time, they can insist that God become whole, and S/he must comply.

GOD'S VACATION is a fast-paced, off-beat dystopian thriller set in 2031 when global warming has wreaked havoc and outsourcing has left most people jobless and hungry. It is complex, political, philosophical, psychological, and satirical. It is a new take on an old story. It is timely and empowering.

About the Author:

Michael Davis is a retired educator. He was a political columnist and served two terms as a city councilman. He has studied western and eastern religions, mysticism, psychology and the occult. He and his wife live in northern California, where he is currently working on another novel.

Order God’s Vacation at Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/24ngbev

Visit Michael Davis’s site: http://godsvacation.blogspot.com/

Visit his publisher at http://allthingsthatmatterpress.com

POETRY, THE STEPCHILD OF LITERATURE by SALVATORE BUTTACI

2010-10-23T10:01:00.000-07:00

Our society that judges value by how well something functions or how much money it can earn obviously sees little worth in the art of poetry. After all, what can a poem do? And if it’s a good poem, can it make the financial leap into movie hood? Not really. Few are the poets who earn a living at their craft. Most write poetry as an avocation while keeping their day jobs as teachers, lawyers, factory workers, doctors––just about all kinds of occupations and professions. Poetry is for most a sideline, a hobby that delights the poet and few others. It is a nonprofit venture that never builds bank accounts.

Sadly, at the bottom rung of the literary ladder, all by its lonesome, sits poetry, sort of like a stepchild that goes unappreciated and often maligned by those literary superiors like the novel, the dramatic play, the short story, and even the song that is really a poem to which someone gave a tune and made it danceable.

As a poet I resent the maltreatment people give to poetry. In my own life, for nearly sixty years, the reading, writing, and studying of poetry have gotten me over life’s tallest hurdles and out of life’s deepest slumps. It has helped me cope with the loss of loved ones by keeping them alive in my poetry. It has served as therapy when sadness and sorrow would have crushed me and laughter seemed something I could hardly imagine could be possible again.

How can poetry do all that? After all, a poem consists of words on lines arranged in stanzas. So what! I think there is magic in poetry. In the mind of the poet myriad words vie for attention and it is his or her job to extract those that are compatible with others so that all of them can work in concert, providing the reader with sound, image, and idea. And unlike most writing, poetry operates on several layers of meaning. The poem about Allegra the Clown is on the surface about a clown and all images relate to that established theme. But for each reader there is something beneath that surface meaning, something the reader can consider a lesson to be learned, a remembrance of some event or person too long forgotten, even a solution to a problem.

I remember giving a featured poetry reading some years ago to a crowd of about thirty people. When I was done reading my poems, a woman in tears walked up to me and said, “Thank you so much for reading your poem about hearts. Not only did it touch me deeply, but it helped me make a decision I have been struggling with for years.” What exactly did she read into my poem? It was a simple three-stanza poem about how a human heart spends its typical day. Nothing profound on the surface, but underlying it there was certainly something in it for that woman.

My father called poetry “The language of the heart.” It was that tongue that never lied because it came straight from a person’s inner self, and unlike the outer self that dresses up with airs and disguises, the inner self cannot tell a lie. It’s not built that way. It’s too tied in with a person’s soul and souls try hard to stay clean and honest.

Often those who don’t like poetry are the same people who don’t want to like poetry. With disgust they remember their school days when English teachers walked on some high cloud, teaching Shakespearean sonnets as if the words were supposed to magically lift them all out from their desks and float along with their teacher. It turned them off. Language for them was meant to be spoken in the parlance of the day, the colloquial chitchat of the common folk. Poetry for them was some type of high-faluting talk that could more easily been said without flowers and song. And God help the boy who was discovered red-handed reading poetry books! Unless he was quick to tell a lie like “I found it on the playground” or “I’m holding it for my sister,” he was quickly and mercilessly ostracized from the team.

I was such a boy. Running around stickball bases at ten, I remember dropping my notepad wherein I had scribbled some impromptu poems a lá Ogden Nash, the humorous poet of the mid-20th Century,and my best friend George Newman picked it up. “Gimme dat!” I demanded in my deepest Brooklynese voice. But George had to recite too loudly all of the my Nash-like poems while the rest of the boys called me “Sissy” or “Poet-ass” or “Freak.” Did it stop me? I kept writing poems but only in the secrecy of my home and I never carried incriminating evidence when I played ball or hung out with the guys. Living two lives was not easy.

I would like to see poetry come into its own again. I would like to see people who write poetry get more serious about it in the sense that they decide they’d like to study more about it, not simply dash off lines and call it poetry. If one chooses to be a poet, part-time or full-time at retirement like myself, then he or she ought to splurge and buy a poetry handbook, learn all about poetic measures and forms and biographies of famous poets and their poems as well.

Who knows! Maybe in a future American society, poetry will have climbed up a rung or two and will have won more hearts than those of us who write it and love it so much.

Salvatore Buttaci, author of Flashing My Shorts

http://tinyurl.com/2bkms9w

THE TURN OF THE KARMIC WHEEL by MONICA M. BRINKMAN

2010-10-17T08:16:00.000-07:00

About the Book:

"What goes around, comes around." Truer words were never spoken, as evidenced by the complex interactions and fates of the characters in The Turn of The Karmic Wheel.

When the residents of Raleigh begin to hear music and voices that aren't "there", and to receive frightening messages from no discernable source, it soon becomes apparent that changes must - and will - be made: to their everyday lives, to their relationships, to their bodies, and, most importantly, to their souls.

About the Author:

Monica M. Brinkman was born and raised in Pennsylvania before moving to San Jose, California, where she co-wrote and appeared in the musical How Lucky Can You Get, the proceeds of which were donated to the Muscular Dystrophy Foundation. A lover of the arts, she has performed as a singer, actress, and radio commercial voice. Monica now lives in Missouri.

Order Monica’s book at Amazon.com at

http://tinyurl.com/37b5s5e

Visit Monica’s publisher at

http://allthingsthatmatter.press

HAMMON FALLS by DAVE HONIG and ROGER HILEMAN

2010-10-10T12:27:00.000-07:00

About the Book:

When George Hammon's teenage wife dies in childbirth in 1914, he flees small-town Iowa for Europe and the horrors of the Great War. Surviving battles, homelessness, and disease, he squanders his days on women and wine, trying to forget his lost love. But life is not idle in Iowa during his absence, and when a bitter and weary George comes home twenty-two years later, he finds a web of murder, suicide, and shocking revelations. The future of his family rests on one terrible choice...but is he prepared to make it?

Spanning the years 1893 through 2009, Hammon Falls weaves a tapestry of estrangement, loss, love, sacrifice, and redemption.

About the Authors:

Dave Hoing has been gainfully employed at the University of Northern Iowa's Rod Library for a very long time. Although he is a member of Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America with numerous short story publications, Hammon Falls is his first published novel. He has two stepchildren, Jon and Jovan Hampton, and lives in Waterloo, Iowa, with his wife Joni, a dog named Tree, and a cat named Toro.

Roger Hileman is a Test Development Associate for ACT, Inc. After spending many years as a local musician and playwright, he decided to make the transition to writing fiction. Hammon Falls is his first published novel. He has three daughters, Andrea, Rachel, and Carlye, and lives in Iowa City, Iowa, with his wife Lu.

Order Hammon Falls by Dave Hoing and Roger Hileman

At Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/2c4n6l5

Or at Amazon.UK: http://tinyurl.com/22nrb53

Visit Dave Hoing’s Publisher: http://allthingsthatmatterpress.com

MOTHERLESS SOUL by STEVE LINDAHL

2010-10-04T07:13:00.000-07:00

About the Book:

Emily Vinson's entire life was impacted by the loss of her mother when she was 2years old. At 82 Emily contacts a hypnotist hoping to draw out hidden memories and discover as much as possible about the short time she spent with the woman who gave her life. Glen Wiley, the hypnotist, teaches her more about herself than she had expected. He helps her bring out memories of many past lives, including an experience that took place on a smoke filled battlefield. All of Emily's lives have had the same tragic outcome, the loss of her mother at a young age. Her soul is caught in what Glen calls circularity, meaning that the tragedy will occur again and again unless she can break the pattern. She and Glen must revisit her past lives and use what they learn to find the other souls who are part of the circle. They must use the past to change the future. Emily's stubborn desire to know her mother is realized in intricate and unsettling ways no one could have imagined possible.

About the Author:

Steve Lindahl has published short fiction in Space and Time, The Alaska Quarterly, The Wisconsin Review, Eclipse, Ellipsis and Red Wheelbarrow. He served for five years as an associate editor on the staff of The Crescent Review, a literary magazine he co-founded. His Theater Arts background has helped nurture a love for intricate characters in complex situations that is evident in his writing. Steve and his wife Toni live and work together outside of Greensboro, North Carolina. They have two adult children: Nicole and Erik. Motherless Soul is Steve Lindahl's debut novel.

Motherless Soul is available at Amazon.com:    http://tinyurl.com/28383wp

Visit Steve Lindahl at his blogsite:   www.stevelindahl.blogspot.com

Visit Steve Lindahl’s Publisher at     http://allthingsthatmatterpress.com

BEWARE THE DEVIL'S HUG by MARVIN D. WILSON

2010-09-28T09:31:00.000-07:00

About the Book:

What if a homeless, smelly, ugly, unkempt old man had a hug so powerful it could cure cancer? Cause a
prostitute to stop hooking and seek true love? Shake the demons of addiction free from a junkie?
Make a Christian want to embrace and love a Muslim and vice versa? But rare is the beneficiary of his divine embrace - nobody wants to come near him out of fear.

About the Author:

Marvin D. Wlson has a widely varied and rich life experience background: from Hippie Rock and Roll
musician to Zen Buddhist minister to now, his chosen "golden years" career, multi-published author with the self-proclaimed "audacity to write novels".

Order    Beware the Devil’s Hug
at    http://tinyurl.com/2cp5fqc

Visit the author’s Blog
at: http://theoldsilly.com

Visit the publisher
At http://llthingsthatmatterpress.com

ECHOES OF A WOMAN’S SOUL by DIANNA DOLES PETRY

2010-09-01T13:07:00.000-07:00

About the Author:

Dianna Doles Petry is a native West Virginian who has lived in the same general area of her birth all of her life. She feels a deep responsibility to the community and the needs of women worldwide. Her poetry often reflects her thoughts on current events such as the closing of mines and the consolidation of schools. Dianna has been published in several magazines and on hundreds of web sites. She is also the author of "Memories," a collection of short stories and essays that reflect life in the mountains of West Virginia. Dianna is a proud member of the West Virginia Writers.

About the Book:

Echoes of a Woman's Soul is a collection of poetry that covers virtually all aspects of being a woman. Each poem stirs a reaction in the reader and leaves the impression that he or she has just looked directly into the author's soul. Experience the journey of life through a woman's eyes as you stroll through childhood, love, heartbreak, humor, faith, loss, and the caretaking of a mother lost in the maze of Alzheimer's Disease.

Echoes is available at Amazon.com, Xlibris.com, or by special order from the author if you prefer autographed copies.

Dianna Doles Petry is available for speaking engagements and personal appearances. Phone: 304-532-4698
Email: wvpoetress@hotmail.com

Follow Dianna here: Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/diannadolespetry
MySpace - www.myspace.com/diannawv
My Blog - http://diannasloveandwriting.blogspot.com
Twitter - http://twitter.com/wvlady59

___________________________________________________________________________________

Book Marketing Collaboration Wins by a Mile Five steps for great teamwork by Julie Weinstein

2010-08-25T10:55:00.000-07:00

Book marketing is not a solitary event. It’s not like writing a book. It’s a social process involving networking and promotions to generate buzz about your book. One of the more fun ways to get the momentum building is through marketing collaboration with other authors.

Collaboration among authors works like a track relay team where each player runs and passes the baton to the next runner. If one member of the team drops the baton and forgets to do his or her part the whole team loses.

In athletics, teamwork is a necessary component for success. The same is true in a collaborative environment like book marketing—where an idea shared can transform a good promotions effort into a great one that catches on like wild fire. Collaboration makes the sum greater than the individual components.

Instilling the attitude for true collaborative teamwork is difficult. In a way, it’s like a “think tank”—a place where ideas and strategies develop and are nurtured. Inherent in this process is acceptance of the collaborative effort without fear of recrimination or rejection. Respect is crucial.

The core elements to collaboration involve:

Setting up expectations
Developing open communication
Trusting each others input
Willing to share
Committing to teamwork

Setting up expectations

The collaborative process works best by setting up expectations from the getgo. Understand what each person wants and needs. Have fun exploring this and seeing how you can work together to help market each others’ books.

Developing open communication

Trust each one another. Respect the other’s viewpoints, and listen to what each other has to say. It also involves including each other in the process. Remember, they’re part of your collaborative team.

Willing to share

Brainstorm together. Test out opportunities that benefit both parties. Recognize when the other’s niche is needed, even if there’s nothing in it for you. For instance, one author might see a call for a column on mystery writing. The other might notice a call for something on magic realism. It takes all a couple of seconds to share this kind of information. When the other party knows you’re thinking of them in this way they’ll be quick to reciprocate.

Committing to teamwork

All parties need a willingness to work together. When one party pulls out of this process it’s as if a team mate drops the baton in the track and field race causing the process to fail.

How to do you get collaboration started?

Start talking to other authors. Get to know each other. Make friends in social network media environments like Facebook and writer related forums and in your local community.

Open the dialogue. For instance one author might say to another,” Hey, I admire your books. Are you looking to do more marketing? Would you be willing to brainstorm and see how we can help each other?”

An author might answer, “Wow, that sounds great. How about we do some joint book reviews? Why don’t we interview each other? Hey, what about guest blogging on each others’ blogs?”

The sharing of opportunities like this can not only be beneficial, but a joyful learning process. Once you agree to help each other out in this collaborative way, remember to always emphasize trust and comfort in the process. Remind each other,” Book marketing is not a solitary event. We’re running this race together. We’ll sell books and have fun.”

Visit Julie Weinstein’s Publisher at http://allthingsthatmatterpress.com

EXPRESS YOURSELF by MONICA BRINKMAN

2010-08-19T06:47:00.000-07:00

I don’t know many authors who have not ventured into joining a writers group of some sort. In fact, the publishing world, its agents, authors and editors highly recommend an aspiring writer join such groups.

When I began my journey down the serious writing road, I joined three such writers groups. Great...doing what I am supposed to do, perfecting the craft.

Little did I know that it would bring out the best and the worst in the members of these groups. There I was, submitting my blood, sweat and tears, my hours of anguish and joy, eagerly awaiting a mere suggestion or helpful hint or, dare I dream, a compliment or word of encouragement.

The e-mails poured in, one by one, and in anticipation of guidance, I clicked on the messages. Instead of encouragement, I found my wonderful, inspiring story ripped to shreds...word by word...line-by-line... chapter by submitted chapter. “It doesn’t grab me.” “No one would ever want to read a story about some stupid country man.” “The first rule is never to mix point of view.” Show, don’t tell.” Don’t ever mix genre’s” “Give up writing, you #%@”.

These were examples of critiques I am able to repeat with the foul, arrogant adjectives omitted. With tears flowing down my face, I wondered why they did not see my vision. How could they not understand the purpose of my characters? In addition, was it necessary to be so cruel? What had I ever done to deserve such ridicule? I was stupid to attempt such an endeavor.

I was also very confused. One author would say they loved the story and give helpful advice, another would vehemently suggest I put up the pen and find another hobby, of course quoting their own published works with a reputable agent. Then the people who commented on my work would argue among themselves about the critiques of my story. So heated were the arguments... so confusing to my ears...so uncertain which avenue to take, I threw my hands up in total frustration, vowing never again to write a single word.

As I stared at my empty computer screen, fearing my own abilities, a light bulb went off. It was all so clear now. Why hadn’t I seen it before? These were not the groups for me to be a part of and I would search until I found an honest, helpful, blunt-speaking group of writers, no matter how long it would take. I did just that and welcomed the feedback of punctuation assistance, suggestions of rewording or omission of sentences or paragraphs. These were my kind of writers-tactful, knowledgeable and truly supportive of one another. Instead of attempting to change my story or ridicule its concept, they would embrace its essence and encourage my vision.

In ending, I urge each ‘wanna-be-writer’ to search until they find a group of writers who belong to the group because they love the art of writing, not because they need to show superiority or have an ego the size of California. You will learn much, hone your craft and in the course make some long-term friendships.
More important, be true to yourself and the passion of your voice and vision. How very boring it would be if every single writer chose to follow the exact same format or never break a rule.

After all, without the courage to be different, creativity would die.

Monica M. Brinkman, 2010
Author, Poet
http://www.monicabrinkmanbooks.webs.com
http://www.americanauthor.webs.com

Visit Monica’s Publisher at
http://allthingsthatmatterpress.com

PERSONALITY & PUNCTUATION by JEN KNOX, Author of Musical Chairs

2010-08-12T08:21:00.000-07:00

I tend toward overuse of the ellipsis when I chat on social network sites such as Facebook and Twitter. It's almost to say, "I would go on, but I wouldn't want to bother you." Now, this is fine when it comes to Twitter, seeing as how there is a strict word count limitation, but what about in general? What impression is my use of the ... really making? Is it a passive punctuation mark?

Only a book addict and writer would think of such things, eh? Well, thinking I am, and I've set out to assign what I've determined the personality characteristic to various punctuation marks. (See below.)

?

ASTUTE One of my favorites. This is the philosopher's dream, the essayist's humility, the short story writer's nemesis, the poet's luxury. The question mark is not adaptable; it must be used with care.

!

STRONG MINDED Anyone who says they don't like seeing exclamation points, or that they are a sign of laziness needs to read Nabokov's "Signs and Symbols". Exclamation points are fiery and strong.

:

LOGICAL The sign of lists and emphasis. This sign would best be described as focused, the clarifying element in many a sentence.

;

MISUNDERSTOOD Ah, the semicolon. Here, I must digress. Kurt Vonnegut is famous for saying the following: "Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you've been to college."

Great quote, but total bullshit. The semicolon is beautiful, the epitome of a soft pause that gives cadence to an otherwise abrupt shift in ongoing thought. The semicolon is romantic and, if not overused, is what I would consider the most romantic of punctuation.

-

BORING The en dash is rather boring. The quiet kid at the party, who is only there because s/he's related to someone or is rich/famous/attractive, but is hopelessly ordinary on a personal level. It's only use is connecting others: numbers, dates or references.

—

OUTRAGEOUS The em dash is the quiet kid's cousin. The one that's throwing the party. Usually drunk and reckless, this is a punctuation mark that is often over-used by those who are over-confident. Nonetheless, if used properly, it's magical and intoxicating to readers. The em dash is what makes a 200 word sentence possible.

( )

SECRETIVE Should probably be used more often.

[ ]

ANXIOUS When I see these, I think math. So, I will not go on. Brackets = Anxiety.

. . .

PASSIVE It says, "please forgive me, I will not go on..."

,

FAMOUS The comma needs no introduction. She's famous, notorious, loved, misunderstood, passed around, worried over, and she breaks many an editor's heart.

.

The period means nothing, or near nothing, to me. It is merely a way to make my rambling self seem more deliberate.

So there you have it. Punctuation, as this writer sees it. I can't help but to wonder how this perception changes from writer to writer? Please, feel free to challenge me or give opinions of your own. I'm genuinely curious.

Jen Knox

Order Jen Knox’s Musical Chairs at Amazon.com:
http://tinyurl.com/3xso7vt

Or directly from All Things That Matter Press:
http://tinyurl.com/ygc3wmo

MY SALIERI COMPLEX by M J NEARY

2010-08-05T06:49:00.001-07:00

About the Book:

A derivative prequel to H.G. Wells' The Invisible Man, set in 1880s University College London, My Salieri Complex is a tale of rivalry, intrigue and intellectual infatuation. Samuel Kemp is a star medical student and the unofficial king of the science lab, respected by his schoolmates and engaged to his professor's daughter. His enviable position is threatened when a mysterious Welsh-born albino by the name Jonathan Griffin enrolls in the same physics seminar and becomes the object of everyone's fascination. Suddenly, Kemp finds himself left in the cold, alone with his growing Salieri complex. When Griffin ends up in the infirmary with symptoms of severe poisoning, Kemp is the prime suspect. What really happened behind the closed doors of the flat they shared?

About the Author:

M J Neary is an award-winning historical essayist, multilingual arts & entertainment journalist, published poet, playwright, actress, dancer and choreographer. Her historical tragicomedy Hugo in London, featuring the adventures of the French literary genius in England during the Crimean War, was produced in Greenwich in 2008. A sequel, Lady with a Lamp: an Untold Story of Florence Nightingale, premiered in New York in the fall of 2009.

As a specialist on the obscure works of Victor Hugo, she has lectured at the French Alliance. Her recently completed novel Wynfield's Kingdom, a narrative version of Hugo in London, represented by Sullivan Maxx Literary Agency, was published by Fireship Press.

In 2007 she was commissioned to collect and publish the memoirs of residents from an affluent retirement community in Stamford, CT. The project involved interviewing more than forty senior citizens over the age of ninety. A new Connecticut-based leisure publication Norwalk Beat has recently brought her on board as a contributor with a focus on the entertainment industry in Connecticut. Her poems have appeared in literary journals such as First Edition, Alimentum and The Recorder. After having a piece of short prose accepted by Bewildering Stories Magazine, she was invited to join the editorial staff.

In addition to her writing career, she has a career in the performing arts. She has starred in several independent art and horror films shot in CT and NY. In the 1990s she competed in various talent pageants in New England.

M J Neary can be reached at M_J_Neary@hotmail.com. She loves networking with fellow writers and actors.

Learn more about M. J. here: www.mjneary.webs.com

Order a copy of My Salieri Complex at
http://www.gypsyshadow.com/MJNeary.html

THE HAIKU of SAYUMI KAMAKURA: A CRITICAL STUDY (English and Japanese Edition) by Sayumi Kamakura

2010-07-31T09:56:00.000-07:00

About the Author:

Sayumi Kamakura was born in Kochi Prefecture, Japan, 1953. She began composing haiku while a student at Saitama University and studied haiku under the guidance of Toshiro Nomura and Sho Hayashi. In 1988, she won the Oki Sango Prize. The lyrical style of her haiku attracted attention, and in 1998 she established the haiku magazine Ginyu with Ban’ya Natsuishi, and has been its Editor since that time.

She has attended international haiku or poetry festivals held in Japan, Slovenia, Portugal and Bulgaria. In 2001, she won the Modern Haiku Association Prize. Her published haiku collections include: Jun (Moisture, 1984), Mizu no Jujika (Water Cross, 1987), Tenmado kara (From the Skylight, 1992), Kamakura Sayumi Kushu (Haiku of Sayumi Kamakura, 1998). Hashireba haru(Run to Spring, 2001), She co-authored Gendai Haiku Panorama (1994), Gendai Haiku Handbook (1995), Gendai Haiku Shusei Zen 1 Kan (Contemporary Haiku Anthology in One Volume, 1996), etc.

She also published, in both Japanese and English, A Singing Blue: 50 Selected Haiku (2000). Her haiku has been translated into English, Greek, Russian, Bulgarian, Portuguese and Korean. She is a member and Treasurer of the World Haiku Association.

About the Book:

The Haiku of Sayumi Kamakura: A Critical Study is not restricted to the critical elucidation of her masterpiece A Crown of Roses; it also relates the use of the cutting word ‘kiriji’ in her numberless haiku published in her different other collections and several international literary journals. This volume rests in part on Sayumi Kamakura’s manuscript sources, and on facts collected through interviews or correspondence. But most characteristically it is an attempt at critically interpreting the vast body of Kamakura’s published haiku in her several collections, and also international literary journals and magazines In this substantial, powerfully argued convincing collection of critical views, the authors across the globe demonstrate how Sayumi Kamakura succeeds in presenting ‘distillation of a moment’ in her haiku. It is fitting that the included essays draw extensively on illustrations from her haiku. This is a distictive presentation of her haiku transcending race, creed and ideology. I hope this critical book with deft cmmentary and up-to-date information on Sayumi Kamakura’s haiku will meet the needs of all haiku lovers.

The contributing authors are Cristina Azcona, Salvatore Buttaci, Marc Carver, Magdalena Dale, Floriana Hall, Jim Kacian, Santosh Kumar, Jean LeBlanc, Maria , Vasile Moldovan, Suzie Palmer, Adam Donaldson Powell, Patricia Prime, Fran Shaw, Joseph S. Spence, Sr, Petar Tchouhov, and and Azsacra Zarathustra.

Order your copy at Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/2fewlnv

APPALACHIAN UPRISING by SHAWN MAY

2010-07-15T08:41:00.001-07:00

ABOUT THE BOOK

Appalachian Uprising chronicles the May Family through a decade of hardship and humor. The author weaves together a story of their triumphs and their losses told largely through the mischievous exploits of four boys. The story is told through the voice of the youngest brother, who both admires and mimics his older siblings. The family goes through many changes, such as their hardworking mother marrying a much younger man and moving from one home to another, but the real meat of the story is the hilarious exploits of four young boys left to their own devices in an Appalachian world of hills and hollers.
From their homemade flying machine, to hairspray flamethrowers and death-defying sleigh rides, the reader is led along a humorous odyssey of growing up that makes one not only long for childhood, but sometimes makes the reader wonder how we managed to survive...

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Shawn May was born and raised in Morgantown, West Virginia, and grew up in the surrounding area. He has three older brothers and a younger sister. He moved to Maryland for two decades and is now back in Morgantown, along with his wife of nineteen years Beth, his three sons, and his daughter. This book, Appalachian Uprising, was recognized in the 2009 West Virginia Writers, Inc. annual contest in both the Non-fiction and Emerging Writers categories.

ORDER TODAY!

Order from the publisher All Things That Matter Press: http://tinyurl.com/26fa2q5
Or from Amazon.com http://tinyurl.com/23ffhom

THE SECRET LIFE OF WALTER MOTT by KAL WAGENHEIM

2010-07-08T06:04:00.001-07:00

About the Book:

Freedom! Security! This serio-comic novel, set in 1959, dramatizes the conflict between two human yearnings. Walter Mott, a shy, lonesome bachelor, lives secretly in his office, in order to save money, retire early, and travel the world. But life gets complicated when he falls in love with a young coworker. Oh, and after a late-night fling with a striptease dancer, he winds up giving the crabs to hundreds of his coworkers!

About the Author:

Kal Wagenheim (born in Newark, N.J.) is a journalist (formerly with The New York Times and currently editor of Caribbean UPDATE monthly newsletter), author and translator of eight books, and ten plays and screenplays. His biography of Babe Ruth was a Playboy Book Club selection and was adapted for an NBC-TV film. His biography of Roberto Clemente, published years ago, will be reissued in 2010 in an updated edition. His plays, "Bavarian Rage," "We Beat Whitey Ford", "Wegotdates.com" and "Coffee With God" have been produced off-off-Broadway. "Coffee With God" has been published by the Dramatic Publishing Co. and is being produced at festivals and schools nationwide. His poetry and fiction have been published in the online literary magazine www.jerseyworks.com. His nonfiction articles have been published in The Nation, and The New Republic. He has also taught creative writing at Columbia University and The State Prison in Trenton NJ. Member: PEN American Center and The Dramatists Guild of America. Film producers may access his screenplays on the website www.inktip.com. Further details on website: www.kalwagenheim.

Order your copy today:

From Amazon.com at http://tinyurl.com/2amc662

LAVA OF MY SOUL by IOLANDA SCRIPCA

2010-06-24T16:38:00.001-07:00

About the Book:

Lava of My Soul is a collection of Iolanda Scripca's poetry and essays inspired by her life, seen through the eyes of her Soul. Life is a volcano - impressive in color, damaging in magma, nostalgic, curious, sad and happy…

All humans have “wings”… Let's put them on…

A sample poem:

One Last Dance

Weeping willows on dead Swans’ Lake
Ballerina shoes too small, hanging on rusted nails
I keep on waking up from giggled dancing lessons
Mother still alive in the waiting room––proud…

Shaking fingers crossed, holding my fans’ bouquets
My hair not gray, teasing life on pirouettes
It started snowing glitter of way long childhood gone
I scream a violent silence through a double paned sliding dream

It’s time––the time when clocks face me without hands
I shyly grab some “What if’s” and remember to tie my shoe laces
“Stand straight, chin up”––a stage light on a solo swan
A last and gracious slide on an untangled musical key…

About the Author

Iolanda Scripca lived in Eastern Europe for the first 24 years of her life, in a loving family. Her mom was a teacher, a high school principal, and a cultural promoter. Her dad was a published novelist, poet and TV producer. An unforgettable moment was her collaboration with her Dad in the translation and adaptation of a children's book by the Bulgarian author Leda Mileva. She is a graduate of Foreign Languages and Literatures from the University of Bucharest/Romania. Nowadays she enjoys Southern California and possesses a CA Teaching Credential. Ms. Scripca publishes in several Romanian-American Newspapers both in Romanian and English. www.scripca.com Iolanda Scripca's latest poetry book is:

Order your copy:

Available on: www.scripca.com
Lava of My Soul
ISBN: 978-1-4489-5343-1
# Pages: 68 pages
Dimensions: 6 x 9
Format: Softcover
PublishAmerica LLLC

THE GREER AGENCY by HARRIS TOBIAS

2010-06-11T17:13:00.001-07:00

THE GREER AGENCY
An exciting new approach to detective novels, 15 interconnected short stories involving a different kind of private eye.

The Greer Agency is 75k words of gritty detective fiction presented in 15 separate but connected stories. The reader follows the development of private detective Mike Greer, the only PI in the Altoona, PA phone book. It’s tough to make a living in a decaying old railroad town, but with the help of an anonymous benefactor, Greer lands some interesting cases—cases that he solves with guts and determination. Throughout the stories, his budding romance with Susan grows. Eventually they realize they are right for each other.

Readers will find Mike Greer an accessible everyman with luck, pluck, smarts and a host of interesting friends. He finds his way into and out of problems large and small. Greer narrates the stories in a refreshing and original voice. Each story has its own plot and can stand on its own but, as the book progresses, the mysteries pile up and the plots get more complex until the explosive last story.

Mike Greer is a protagonist with a low tolerance for bullshit and an easy touch for the emotional pleas of the downtrodden. He works alone and struggles against an uncaring world. But throw no pity party for the man, he will have none of it. His melancholy is tightly wrapped inside his tough guy exterior, and pity just bounces off as he walks away, down the dark sidewalks of Altoona into the next story.

Now available in print and e-book format from All Things That matter Press:
https://www.createspace.com/3437279

or from from Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Greer-Agency-Harris-Tobias/dp/098425949X

PREDICTIONS - POETRY AND PROSE by Donald R. Siegel & Jeanne R. Slavin Siegel

2010-06-10T13:41:00.000-07:00

About the Book

Poetry - stories of places, feelings, action, love, all written in poetic fashion. Predictions Poetry and Prose is a small portion of our lives as we remember it, written in this, our tenth collection of poetry. We enjoy grandchildren, friends, travel to distant countries, and life at home with Bombay, our Siamese cat. Some occasional politics may creep into some of our poems. Sometimes animals come to visit us. A family of four doe and a buck deer come to visit us and listen to our poetry.

About the Authors

Donald R. Siegel and Jeanne R. Slavin Siegel live in New City, New York. They have been married for 56 years. Their works have been published in many national and international anthologies. Jeanne won first place for her haiku poetry in the Mainichi Daily News of Tokyo, Japan.They have shared their poetry with people in nursing homes and veterans hospitals.

Order a Copy at

http://www.publishamerica.net/product90248.html

THE SWINDLER by MICHELE KAYE MALSBURY

2010-06-04T09:46:00.000-07:00

“The Swindler” by Michelle Kaye Malsbury
Publisher: All Things That Matter Press
ISBN 978-0-9844219-4-7
Genre: suspense, thriller, mystery, fiction

Description

How easy is it for an investment broker to deceive clients? Very, particularly if his personal hero is Bernie Madoff. Skip Horowitz, along with his old pal A.J., has created what they believe is a foolproof scheme using commodities trading, bookmaking, and various other businesses as covers. Their plan has served them well for decades, surviving the scrutiny of government agencies lacking solid proof to support any allegations of wrongdoing. But luck can't hold forever...or can it? Catherine O'Reilley, newly sponsored in the high-risk world of investment strategy by Skip Horowitz, is about to find out.

About the Author

Michelle Malsbury was born and raised in Champaign, Illinois. Currently she resides in Florida. She holds a Bachelors of Science in Business Management and a Masters Degree in Business Management. She has just completed her first year of doctoral studies in the discipline of Conflict Resolution and Peace Studies with high hopes of helping to build nations and sustain peaceful interactions around the globe.

Here’s What Others Are Saying About “The Swindler”:

Judy Ramsook from the Austin News Service, Austin, TX 4/9/10 Review for “The Swindler”:
In The Swindler, by Michelle Malsbury, you will find yourself being pulled in to a fictional tale of romance and a lot commodities swindling through the eyes of a third person narrator.

So come along and meet true to life and memorable characters such as: Catherine, The Realtor/Commodities Broker, Connie, Catherine’s best friend, Shamus, Real Estate Broker and the man who thinks he is the right man for Catherine and last but not least, Skip Horowitz, a ruthless Ponzi Schemer who is being investigated by the Feds.
It’s a gripping tale that will make you want to keep turning those pages to see what happens next.

Set in Key West, Florida, the author displays her vast love for and knowledge of the area so well, that if you have not been there and know nothing about Key West, perusing The Swindler by Michelle Malsbury will indeed give you a rich education into that paradise.
So come on and enjoy this well written and detailed tale and see if Catherine really thinks Shamus is the right man for her, and if the elusive Skip Horowitz gets the justice he so deserves.
I enjoyed it and I think you will too.

Mike Fentem, longtime friend of Michelle Kaye Malsbury, review for The Swindler on 5/21/10:

I've known Michelle since she was fifteen or sixteen years old. We grew up in the same small town in Illinois and went to the same schools, pools, and parks. She was always fun and had a good imagination. I'll be the first to admit that back then who would have thunk that she would become a author? However, I have had the pleasure of reading both of her books and have found them to be well written and fun reading! The characters are inventive and interesting. The stories take places in fun and exotic locales. The plot builds from chapter to chapter keeping the reader engaged in what may occur next and how it will all end. The main character, Skip, is a enigma himself with a ego larger than life. His thirst for money and fast women was second to none, but I liked getting to know him while reading this book. Besides having little, to no, scruples, he does manage to keep his ponzi scheme and other illigitimate business endeavors pretty secret for a number of years while he rakes in oodles of cash and stashes it all around the globe. However, can he outlast the SEC and other regulatory agencies, who is hot on his tail or is his time up? I truly enjoyed The Swindler and I believe you will too!

Thomas Keyes Review for The Swindler by Michelle Kaye Malsbury, 5/14/2010:

The Swindler is a fast-moving, hard-hitting account of a swindler who, with his batch of subalterns, ran a Ponzi scheme in Key West and elsewhere. The tale is so realistic and convincing that you can hardly believe that it didn’t really happen and that the authoress is not in there somewhere, perhaps as Catherine, the honest realtor who gets embroiled in the mess.

The racket consisted of selling counterfeit commodities futures mostly to fairly well-heeled middle class types, and following up by generating bogus statements showing earnings. It may be difficult to feel overly compassionate for someone worth several hundred thousand dollars who gets stung for fifty, but there are a lot of smaller victims too.

The most touching was a young girl in Central America whom Skip, the swindler, got pregnant. She was hoping this pregnancy would bind them together and enable them to live a beautiful life. Then the blow fell. Skip was arrested and prosecuted, and the girl’s dreams flowed away in tears.

The pages are full of unsavory characters, and the action moves from Florida to the Bahamas to Costa Rica to Las Vegas.

The language is earthy. Read it, you’ll like it.

Billy O’Toole Pre-review for The Swindler by Michelle Kaye Malsbury, BSBM, MM
All Things That Matter’s Press, ISBN 978-0-9844219-4-7: 2/22/10

Hi Michelle,

During a long and successful career in the trucking business, I always carried a stack of books to entertain myself and hopefully learn a little something also. One of my favorites was Steven Frey because he always had some insights into the dark side of finance along with great characters. Move over Frey and make room for Michelle Malsbury!

The Swindler has great characters, some lovable, and some not, but all believable. Indeed, I felt like I already knew many and were acquainted with several others. There were the obvious evil ones but the mindset of good ones being led along and seduced by money and the good life was particularly poignant.

When my business blew up because I had no customers anymore, I began to study finance moved to being a Senior Financial Consultant. In the process of interviews and study I felt like I met many of her characters, things just didn't feel right, but oh so seductive!

All this set in quirky and sultry southern Florida, I could feel the humidity, see the pastels, and revel in the ambience. What more could anyone want in book?

Bill O'Toole
Senior Financial Consultant
Southern Commercial Corp
Columbia, Mo.
573 808 2122

Marilou Trask-Curtin Review for TheSwindler:

Michelle: First of all, congrats on an absolutely incredible book!!! Have you also written this as a screenplay????!!!! Would be amazing to watch and the timing seems right as well.

I only found a couple of blips but after I wrote them down lost the note where I had written the page numbers. The main one: There was mention of the basketball team the KNICKS...you had it written as the NICKS...that would need to be corrected as we New Yorker's who are KNICKS fans would probably retaliate by throwing soggy basketballs your way--LOL...otherwise, an incredible story...!!!

The Review: "The Swindler" - an incredibly fast-paced roller-coaster ride through the world of illegal commodities trading with enough sun and sin to heat up every reader's day (and night.) Michelle Malsbury at her finest! A definite must read!
Marilou Trask-Curtin, Author of "In My Grandfather's House:
A Catskill Journal"

Thanks again for the opportunity to read "The Swindler" and I wish you all the best with it. Also, sorry it took so long....

Take care,
Marilou

PS: I love the way you got MJ into the story with the crotch grabbing episode :-]

Purchase Information:

http://www.amazon.com/Swindler-Michalle-Kaye-Malsbury/dp/0984421947/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1272463500&sr=1-1
www.amazon.com link for The Swindler and Kindle Reader orders (see above)

TWO NOVELS by JULIE ACHTERHOFF

2010-05-29T05:22:00.000-07:00

Quantum Earth
By Julie Achterhoff

A team of metaphysical scientists is dedicated to finding out why the Earth is in crisis. The rate, size, and destructive power of hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions is out of control. All of these acts of nature have become more devastating to human life than ever before in history, but why? Is the Earth cleansing itself of humanity? Or could it be that human thought is the true cause? This is what the team is asking; the hardest question of all: Do we create our own reality?

Review by Danni Milliken:

It's not an easy thing to offer to review the work of an author you don't know very well. If it's a good friend that's one thing, because you can say something honestly if you find that you don't like it. But, if it is someone who you don't know very well, it is a scary thing to offer to do, because the thought screams loudly in your mind, "What if I don't like it?" But, one day I know that it will be me out there pimping my work. So, with that knowledge in mind I found I had to put my hand up. Because, one day I hope someone will put their hand up for me.

Still, it was with trepidation that I opened the ebook and began reading the prologue. By the end of the first two paragraphs I made a very happy discovery. This is a good book. From two paragraphs I could tell that Julie Achterhoff is a quality author. Her writing style is extremely easy to read and the scenes are painted so that you can envision their detail easily without the over the top page wasting some lesser quality authors are prone to spend setting the scene. I could have written a review based only on the first few chapters, but this book was so good that I wanted to finish all of it for the sake of my own enjoyment. An exceptional achievement on the part of Julie Achterhoff there, as I rarely read novels to the end anymore.

Quantum Earth is a unique story where a group of scientists use new age beliefs to examine whether or not humanity creates its own tragedies. As natural disasters escalate, this team of researchers use a number of methods to collate data including trance, hypnosis, and dreams prior to the event.

This is a fantastically unique story and it is incredibly well written. At the current price of $15.99, you are getting a real bargain. I have no doubt at all that Julie is a future bestseller, and you won't regret the short time it takes to enjoy either Quantum Earth, or her new book "Deadly Lucidity" which has just recently been released to amazon.com

Available from:

amazon: http://tinyurl.com/y87mahs
All Things That Matter Press https://www.createspace.com/3376306
http://earthwalkr.wordpress.com
tags: earthquakes, disasters, 2012, metaphysics, UFOs

Deadly Lucidity
By Julie Achterhoff

Caught in a tangled web of dreams and nightmares,
Marie Reilly is being hunted by a psychopath in the
dream world she can't escape. Her single ally, a
Ranger named Murphy, may be her only hope. He
must help her reach the great Fortress, where
they've been told there is a way back to her reality.
Together, they fight their way through the twists
and turns of Marie's mind so she can have her life
back. But what of their burgeoning passion for each
other? How can she leave the man she has come to
love behind in this nightmarish world he has called
home as far back as he can remember?

Review:

Official Apex Reviews Rating:
Caught in a dream world from which she can’t escape, Marie finds herself
hunted by a dangerous psychopath. Her situation is far from hopeless, though, as
a handsome Ranger named Murphy vows both to protect her and help her find a
way back to the real world. Over the course of their shared adventures, Marie
looks very much forward to getting her life back to normal – but her growing
passion for Murphy makes the prospect of leaving him behind an increasingly
difficult choice to make...
Skillfully crafted by author Julie Achterhoff, Deadly Lucidity is an engaging
suspense thriller. In it, Achterhoff has crafted a compelling alternate nether world
straight out of the darkest regions of any imagination. In addition, as Marie wends
her way through a series of increasingly perilous events, you find yourself rooting
not-so-silently on her behalf, turning each fresh page in rapt anticipation of
precisely what fate awaits her as the story progresses. Furthermore, the genuine
affection that she and Murphy feel for one another adds a layer of palpable
tension to the overall tale, drawing the reader in even more as this modern twist
on the age-old tale of good vs. evil plays itself out in fantastical fashion.
A dynamic, riveting thriller with a host of intriguing twists, Deadly Lucidity
is a recommended read for lovers of well crafted fantasy suspense tales.

Trailer: http://tinyurl.com/2esq54p
Available from:

amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/ya4ttnt
All Things That Matter Press: https://www.createspace.com/3431365
http://earthwalkr.wordpress.com

ORA AND THE GEM STAR by JACK COWARDIN

2010-05-21T06:37:00.000-07:00

Ora and the Gem Star by Jack Cowardin

Ora begins her journey as an innocent sixteen-year-old daughter of the local fishing village’s chief—having the liberty to go freely on her way each day, swimming the turquoise lagoon and reveling in the undersea beauty which nature delivers. She suddenly discovers that the Gods have bestowed a powerful Gem Star—a magical gift from the heavens—upon her shoulders, forever changing her destiny. Ora's Mayan heritage and adventurous spirit inspires her to capture the flashy, fiery ball. She absorbs all the energy and enlightenment it pours forth, setting her life and village into a new direction.† In a time when women were of a lower class and denied spiritual participation, Ora breaks these bonds and begins a journey of discovery and adventure, empowerment, and, eventually, leadership to save her people from the scourge and enslavement by the mighty King of the great City of the Gods,†Teotihuacan.

APEX REVIEW:

When the events of a sudden, terrifying eclipse show young Ora the location of the tiny, yet powerful Gem Star, the sixteen-year-old is suddenly charged with the daunting mission of retrieving the precious jewel - by none other than the gods themselves. Though her subsequent journey is fraught with peril, Ora receives the support of key allies along the way as she strives to prevent the Gem Star from falling into the hands of the ruthless King Chan, who intends to use it to serve his own selfish purposes. With such a grave responsibility resting squarely on her shoulders, Ora must summon a courage she’s never known to protect the fate of the world from the malice of evil hearts. Intriguing, creative, and with a flair for the magical, Ora And The Gem Star is an engaging fantasy tale. Skillfully crafted by author Jack Cowardin, Ora takes the reader on a vicarious journey through a time long since passed, well before the contrived “adventures” of video games, virtual reality, and other modern technological advances. A genuine fantastical thriller, Ora also doubles as an edifying guide to the beliefs, customs, and practices of cultures that thrived and prospered long ago, ultimately helping to foster a deeper appreciation of the cultural folkways and mores that preceded our time. Furthermore, in Ora herself, Cowardin has created a rather admirable heroine, one who rises to the considerable challenge of a task that requires her to step outside of her own comfort zone for the sake of countless others. Such a feat is not an easy one to fulfill - particularly for a sheltered sixteen-year-old unaccustomed to danger and with a nod to grand, sweeping cultural epics, Ora And The Gem Star more than holds its own as an imaginative fantasy tale in the proud tradition of Tolkien and Herbert. A recommended read. www.apexreviews.net

Join in the adventure of “Ora and the Gem Star.”

On the web: www.jackcowardinbooks.com
Purchase on Amazon: http://amzn.to/auosi9
Watch our video trailer: http://bit.ly/aryzs5
Facebook: http://bit.ly/cdVKyh
Twitter: http://twitter.com/JackCowardin

FLASHING MY SHORTS

2010-05-17T09:42:00.001-07:00

Salvatore Buttaci

Author

FLASHING MY SHORTS

Read Now - http://bit.ly/aFFbfi

Twitter - @sambpoet

TWO BOOKS BY KENNETH WEENE

2010-05-13T10:46:00.000-07:00

Widow’s Walk by Kenneth Weene tells the story of Mary Flanagan and her search for meaning, life, and love. It is also the story of her Irish roots and her immigration to America, her marriage, her husband’s life and death, and the lives of her two children. And it is the story of her relationship with Arnie Berger, a man who is totally different in background, religion, and approach to life. Theirs is a deep and meaningful love that gladdens the heart. If only things could always flow along with such ease. But they do not, and Widow’s Walk becomes a powerful tale of human pain and emotional conflict.

Recently released, Kenneth Weene’s new novel, Memoirs From the Asylum, is a comi-tragic tale of madness and sanity, of desperation and hope, of possibilities and fate. Set in a state hospital, Memoirs From the Asylum focuses on three main characters, a narrator, who has taken refuge from his terror of the world, a catatonic schizophrenic, whose mind lives within a crack in the wall opposite her bed, and a young psychiatrist, who is dealing with his own father’s depression.

This is a book that will have you laughing, crying, and discussing.

An Excerpt From Widow’s Walk

People like Danny O’Brien don't just wash their cars – they bathe them with deliberation. First they get ready, which starts with the right clothes. Danny always changes into his cutoff jeans, the last pair he has left from college. He has to suck in his stomach to snap them shut, and they have long ago stopped feeling comfortable, but they represent his youth so he won’t throw them out. He doesn’t tuck his Grateful Dead T-shirt in. He probably wouldn’t have anyway, but with it hanging out no one can see if the snap on his shorts has opened. His old tennis shoes go on his bare feet, and he feels like he is ready to go back in time and play Frisbee in Hollis Quad.

His equipment, too, is laid out carefully. Sponges, clean rags, a plastic pail, the garden hose, Turtle Wash and Wax, a Dust Buster, and finally cleaners for the glass, the vinyl, the leather upholstery, the chrome, and especially the tires – the car will not be to his liking until the tires gleam – not like new, but shining beyond newness. Even the placement of the car is – to his mind – just right. It is carefully parked in a specific spot so that he can get maximum efficiency from the hose.

His neighbor, Harry Brown, is tending flowerbeds. Not particularly a lover of nature, Danny leaves that task to the gardener. "Hey, Harry, how's it going?" he calls to the neighbor, who is busily weeding around the azaleas.

"Damn weeds just keep growing." It is a ritual exchange. The two men aren’t close, but they have as many rituals as any fraternity. That is one of Danny's special qualities; his every relationship has rituals built in: little sayings or a special piece of body language that makes the other person feel that theirs is a special relationship

Danny is aware of a change in the light. He looks up and sees Kathleen watching him. He smiles. “Hi.”

She half smiles in response. Embarrassed by his notice, she starts slightly as if to move away.

"Do you like cars?" He isn’t sure where, but he knows that he has seen her before. “She’s cute enough,” he thinks. “Might as well chat her up.”

Kathleen, not having really taken a step, feels she has to respond. She smiles shyly – not flirtatious but friendly. "Actually, I don’t know much about them. I’ve never even learned how to drive."

"Seriously?" Even while he is saying this, Danny is wondering if he shouldn’t perhaps take a more serious tone, one more appropriate to the classy young woman he perceives her to be.

"Why? Is there something wrong?" She can feel herself tensing, pulling back, becoming defensive. "I always wanted to learn, but I never had the chance."

He takes another look at Kathleen and decides that she might be worth his time. "I tell you what. You help me wash, and I'll give you a driving lesson."

"I don't even know you," Kathleen responds with hesitancy.

"Harry here will vouch for me. Won't you Harry?"

"Lady, I'd stay far away from that crazy Irishman. You should never trust a man who doesn't garden."

"I don't really think I should," her voice conveys doubt and a hidden wish.

"Suit yourself. If you ever change your mind, stop by any weekend. If I'm not home, my mother almost always is. I'll tell her if a beautiful woman named …" He pauses.

At first Kathleen doesn’t understand why he is waiting. Then she wonders if it’s ok for her to answer. Finally she stammers, "My name is Kathleen, Kathleen Flanagan."

"Pleased to meet you, Kathleen Flanagan. Danny O’Brien at your service." Danny winks at her, and Kathleen feels a rush of confusion – her face flushes. "We Irish folks have to stick together especially around a Brit like Harry." Danny’s sweeping gesture toward his neighbor sprays her with soapy water from the sponge he’s holding.

The cold tingle of the water makes her laugh lightly.

"Good. A sense of humor is the thing to have, but I am sorry." He offers her a clean rag.

"That's all right! I'm sure I'll dry before I get back."

"Back where?"

"Subtle, boy," Harry comments.

"I live at the hospice, the one near the Star Market, in the staff housing."

Danny smiles broadly. "The freckles on his forehead seem to dance when he smiles," Kathleen observes to herself.

"Would the nuns be upset if I were to drop by some day?"

"That would depend on your intentions."

"Better than they were when I went to Saint Edward's."

He grins again, and Kathleen is struck by the sparkle in his eyes. She waves as she walks away.

"That's a nice girl, Danny." Harry remarks as Kathleen leaves. “Not a bad looker either.”

"That's for sure." Danny turns back to the car, but his mind is following Kathleen down the street.

Words of Praise for Widow’s Walk

“Here is a story whose breadth of vision is exceeded only by the depth of its characters.” (Jon Tuttle, author, The Trustus Plays)

“This story includes the passions of everyday life that will touch you in a special way.” (Abe F. March, author, To Beirut and Back, They Plotted Revenge Against America, and Journey Into The Past)

“Written in the present tense, Widow's Walk achieves the difficult balance of urgency and character-driven action possible with this technique. With deft humor and unexpected turns, universal dilemmas and unique perspectives, I believe Widow's Walk captures all the elements of great fiction.” (Jen Knox, author, Musical Chairs)

An excerpt from Memoirs From the Asylum

Arthur and I are pacing up and down the dayroom. That way the aides don’t notice. As long as we look agitated, they don’t care about our conversations. They figure we must be ourselves: the simply crazy. If we were to sit down on the bilious green Naugahyde and chrome chairs and couches that have long since deteriorated to junkyard quality and talk like normal people, then they’d get pissed off. They count on us to be psycho, to appear nuts. It’s like the cops and the criminals. The criminals might not want the cops around, but the cops need the crooks so they have jobs. And, if the cops disappeared then everyone could commit the same criminal acts so there’d be no payoff for being a crook. So, bottom line, the staff needs us to keep getting their paychecks, and we need them to keep getting our rubber-rooms, straightjackets, and butts full of Valium.

But, the numbers are changing. The psycho drugs have reduced the size of all the hospitals. The staffs have shrunk; now they’re resisting every discharge. No normality here! Nobody should get out. That’s the rule.

So we are pacing and discussing the alleged newest member of our very nonselective club. Of course, it is all rumor and conjecture. The rolling TV never plays the news; it’s considered too upsetting.

Newspapers and magazines only make an appearance when an infrequent visitor happens to bring them, which is always well after they’re better suited for wrapping fish. Visitors are few and far between. We who have survived the medication boom and still live on the wards have few family members interested in us. The aides and nurses do bring gossipy magazines that they share with each other and then leave around for us. We always know the latest tittle-tattle from three weeks ago. We can always tell that our bleached out castaway clothing isn’t the latest from Paris.

“Maybe. But, then what’s to stop them from frying every nut case,” I pause for effect, “including us?”

“Would you do something like that?”

“No.”

“Well, neither would I.”

“Of course not, but you did attack those people.”

He giggles nervously. “God told me to.”

“I know, but maybe God told him.”

He raises his voice, always a foolish thing to do, but theology is always a hot button in the day room. “God would never tell him that – not something like that!”

One of the aides looks up at us. I catch her out of the corner of my eye, the one that I always keep directed at the nurses’ station.

“Sshhh,” I hiss at him. But he is way too far-gone. God’s prophet is on the pulpit, and nothing else matters. It only takes a minute before they drug him, wrap him, and carry him off to restraints.

They might decide I should get it, too, that I have been provoking him, that I might get others started – that I might be the “King of the Crazies” – and they talk about our paranoia. I walk away as fast as I can.

Too late! They have grabbed me and wrestled my ass to the floor. I’m not resisting. There would be no point. They still rough me up. One aide, this big hulk of an idiot, a sadist too afraid to take on anyone who can fight back, smacks me in the face – no reason, just his pleasure. My nose starts to bleed. They hold me down so that I’m coughing and choking on my own damn blood. One of the nurses brings the syringe. The big V to the rescue.

I wake up the next day on the medical ward. There is a hole in my throat where they inserted a tracheotomy tube. The bastard has nearly killed me. God, is my throat sore. I get to suck on ice chips and suffer. The bastard got to go home for his dinner.

A day later I am back on the ward. One of the women patients sidles over to me. “We heard they had to give you shock treatments,” she hisses.

“No,” I croak back pointing at my throat.

“I thought your brains were up here,” she says pointing to her head.

I try to laugh and then think better of it. I pat my ass. “No, down here,” I tell her.

She is still cackling as one of the nurses came out from behind their counter with the medication tray. My pills are different. I look at them and then at her. “Take your meds,” she commands firmly.

“They aren’t right.”

“The doctor changed them.”

“Why?”

“Ask him.”

“Come on, at least tell me why,” I plead, afraid of the side effects.

“We want to make sure that you behave yourself. No more incidents like yesterday.

I want to cry, but I just nod. I try to hold some of the pills in my cheek to spit them out once she has gone, but she checks my mouth and makes me take a second cup of the horrible juice they use. It tastes like a combination of the bug-juice they serve at summer camp and some powdered fruit drink straight from the army, and filled with saltpeter.

“Be a good boy,” she says as she walks away. I feel like I’m a dog being patted absentmindedly on the head by a totally indifferent and unfeeling clerk in a department store. “You really shouldn’t have your dog in here, mister; but keep him under control and we won’t shoot you full of meds.”

“Yes, ma’am; yes, ma’am, three bags full.”

No matter how fucked your head, you’ve got to hate the drooling and the shuffling. I try to control the tics and that damned unending pill rolling. I try, but I fail – failure is in the chemistry.

To learn more about Widow’s Walk visit the video at:

http://vidego.multicastmedia.com/player.php?p=wbgzb2yk

To order Widow’s Walk go to:

http://tiny.cc/WidowsWalkAmazon

http://tiny.cc/BuyWidowsWalk

To learn more about Memoirs From the Asylum watch:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGyl0JMTEJ4

To order Memoirs From the Asylum go to:

http://www.amazon.com/Memoirs-Asylum-Kenneth-Weene/dp/0984421955/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1273347148&sr=1-1

To learn more about the publisher, All Things That Matter Press, go to

http://www.allthingsthatmatterpress.com/

A HITCH IN TWILIGHT by Vic Fortezza

2010-05-06T14:46:00.000-07:00

About the Book:

A Hitch in Twilight is a compilation of stories of The Twilight Zone-Alfred Hitchcock variety. Most involve ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. Lucifer appears in two. Most are set in New York, particularly Brooklyn. They are designed to make entertain and to foster thought. They are 20 tales of Warped Imagination.

About the Author:

Vic Fortezza was born in Brooklyn in 1950 to Sicilian immigrants. He has had 37 short stories published in small press magazines worldwide. He contributes articles to buzzle.com. He has two novels in print, Close to the Edge, and Adjustments. You may spot him on the streets of New York, hawking his work. Website: http://vicfortezza.homestead.com/

An Excerpt:

Beneath the Boardwalk, somewhere along the Brighton Beach side, leeward of a dune formed by the bitter winter winds, lay a long, narrow cardboard box around which rats were scurrying. There was a restless, troubled murmuring within it. Suddenly the flaps flew aside and a man inside sprang to a sitting position like a jack-in-the-box, casting pages of a newspaper, his blankets, aside in his wake. He fought to regain his breath, muttering angrily, fearfully.

His attention was snared by a click. His paroxysm had been vanquished. His senses had never seemed so alive. He peered beyond the dune, past the small gap between its peak and the underside of the Boardwalk. A cigarette lighter flickered briefly, illuminating a hard though handsome face that featured a thick, neatly-trimmed black beard.

A Review:

Vic Fortezza writes about the trials and tribulations of life. Be it fiction or reality he captivates his audience with hard-boiled characterizations that catapult readers through drama and intrigue, at times with a touch of humor. Vic’s words flow with strength – he tells it like it is – through the eyes of a powerful, seasoned writer. By the time you’ve read the last page of A Hitch in Twilight, you’ll feel like you’ve lived each story.

--Victoria Valentine, Editor Skyline Review.

To purchase A Hitch in Twilight, go here: http://www.amazon.com/Hitch-Twilight-Tales-Warped-Imagination/dp/0984098410/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpi_1

Learn all about Vic at his website, read his mainstream stories, free: http://vicfortezza.homestead.com/

Follow Vic’s blog: Selling Books on the Streets of Brooklyn: http://www.amazon.com/gp/forum/cd/discussion.html/ref=ntt_mus_ep_cd_tft_tp?ie=UTF8&cdForum=Fx19PIWSO2UGA75&cdThread=Tx1J1SVA9V1ZPDV

See a video of Vic in action on You Tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYv9k5Su3wA

CANNED by Anthony Buccino

2010-05-04T13:47:00.001-07:00

About the Book:

Non-rhyming verse about being out of work, the strains that tag along and the sinking boat you feel you're riding in.

This collection deals with a difficult subject in a very real way. It's strength is its realness and that is also its greatest weakness. It's not for the faint of heart.

A must-have for anyone who deals in human resources, personnel, recruitment, job placement, or has been fired, laid-off and is out of work.

Check it out here: http://www.anthonysworld.com/canned.html

Order a copy here:

http://www.lulu.com/product/item/canned/10811150

About the Author:

Anthony Buccino published three collections of poetry: American Boy: Pushing Sixty; Voices on the Bus; One Morning in Jersey City. He has published three collections of essays based in and around New Jersey. Buccino blogs about life in New Jersey and about commuting in at NJ.Com. The Nutley Sons and Belleville Sons honor roll paperbacks recount the lives of more than 300 men who died in service to their country. Buccino is a business news editor in New York City.

Check it out here: http://www.anthonysworld.com/canned.html

Order copy here: http://www.lulu.com/product/item/canned/10811150

$15 plus P&H, Tax

Published by Cherry Blossom Press

Distributed by Lulu.com

NEWS! Check out Anthony Buccino's other books: A Father's Place, An Eclectic Collection Sister Dressed Me Funny Rambling Round, Inside and Outside at the Same Time.

Check it out here: http://www.anthonysworld.com/canned.html

Page Readers talks with author Sal Buttaci

2010-04-30T13:45:00.000-07:00

Page Readers talks with author Sal Buttaci

HUMAN TRIAL by TIMOTHY STELLY

2010-04-30T06:46:00.000-07:00

About the Book:

What happens when all that remains of the world is fear, distrust and desperation?

Daron Turner is the leader of a ragtag collection of small town Americans who've managed to survive a thermal war waged by intergalactic attackers. The survivors have gathered together in a sporting goods store, where they not only endure the heat, but ward off marauders, rabid animals and overcome their own fears and in-fighting.

Aliens hope to manufacture a new race that becomes acclimated to earth's environment. With time running out, Daron and his cohorts must force a confrontation, as the fate of mankind rests in their hands.

About the author:

Timothy N. Stelly, Sr. is a poet, novelist, screenwriter and essayist. Human Trial is his debut novel and the first part of a sci-fi trilogy. His poetry book, Stories From The Black Side Of The Rainbow is currently under consideration for publication. He has also written more than 350 essays for Useless-knowledge.com and e-zinearticles.com, ranging from social and political commentary to film noir history. In 2006, he won first prize in the Pout-erotica poetry contest for his poem, C'mon Condi. He has contributed several poetic pieces to Oysters & Chocolate.

He is a resident of Northern, California, where he resides with his three youngest children.

FOR AN IN-DEPTH INTERVIEW WITH TIMOTHY GO TO

http://sormag.blogspot.com/2009/02/featured-author-timothy-n-stelly.html

BUY PRINT COPY AT PUBLISHER'S E-STORE: https://www.createspace.com/3366977

BUY AT AMAZON.COM:

http://tinyurl.com/26pcttp

BUY E-BOOK FROM MOBIPOCKET:

http://www.mobipocket.com/en/eBooks/eBookDetails.asp?BookID=137522

THEY PLOTTED AGAINST AMERICA by Abe F. March

2010-04-22T07:49:00.000-07:00

They Plotted Revenge Against America

An American attack on Baghdad leaves heartbroken and angry survivors. Two families, one Muslim and one Christian, are wiped out; their young adult progeny are determined to avenge the loss of their loved ones. David Levy, an Israeli Secret Service Agent with a grudge of his own, knows just how to tap into the vulnerabilities that grief leaves, and organizes the training of select individuals whose desire for vengeance is strong enough to consider a deadly covert mission in America. Trainees will learn to blend in, disappear in the multicultural mix of the US and then infest the food and water supply with a deadly flu virus capable of mutating and infecting the human population. The antidote - if it works - will only be revealed under strict demands. Some team members come to realize that they could ultimately be responsible for millions of innocent deaths. Their actions could break the stalemate between the Israelis and Palestinians - or bring on unparalleled tragedy.

(Excerpt – page 148)

…Now she expected to endure the same fate at the hands of the security police, as she would have expected in Russia. She bit her lip. Her face took on a determined look. No, she would not give them what they want and they would not break her. Without her knowing it, someone had been sitting in the room observing her. She was startled when the person said,

“How did you come to know David Levy?”

“Who’s to say I know David Levy?”

“Are you denying it?”

“I simply want to know who is saying that I know him. And why was I abducted?”

“I’m asking the questions. You will answer them.”

“I am not required to answer any of your questions. You have kidnapped me and brought me here by force. And why must I remain blindfolded. Are you afraid to show your face?”

“I ask you again, how do you know David Levy?”

“Why do you want to know?”

“You impertinent sow.” He slapped her across the face. Her head snapped back like whiplash. The stinging of the slap was nothing compared to the fury she felt. If only I could get my hands on that person ,he would never slap me again, she thought…

Review by Malcolm R. Campbell for PODBRAM

”Terrorism frightens people because it operates outside the traditional rules of war. It's hard to combat because the attacks are no longer limited to people wearing military uniforms at well-formed battle lines: they can happen anywhere, at any time, and they may well target people who don't have any direct knowledge of the peoples and issues involved. Part of the terror is the pervasive feeling that nobody’s safe.

This is the arena of Abe F. March's chilling novel They Plotted Revenge Against America. The novel is chilling, not because it's filled with “just more violence” in the Middle East, but because the story occurs on American soil as survivors of the American attack on Baghdad blend in to mainstream society to personally extract revenge against everyday citizens.

They Plotted Revenge Against America is a plausible, sobering, intricate and effectively plotted story about a group of well-trained, well-coordinated teams who slip into the U.S. with forged papers and then painstakingly work through a plan that will infect food and water supplies with a deadly virus.

These team members are not the gun-wielding, grenade-throwing stereotypical terrorists we see in most TV shows and movies. They are everyday people who have suffered personal loss and who want to fight back. Once their mission is complete, they plan, if possible, to go back to their normal lives. As the mission unfolds, they alternate between excitement and doubt while trying to avoid detection, and in the process, they discover while blending into community life, that Americans are not the monsters they expected.

March’s story tends to humanize both the terrorists and their victims, showing Americans as largely unconcerned and ill-informed about the agendas and issues involved in the long-time conflicts between Israel and its Arab neighbors. On the other hand, the terrorists see themselves not as criminals but as soldiers responding to what they view as acts of war taken against their communities.

Since the overall mission leader is a double agent working for Israel's Mossad, group members must not only avoid Homeland Security and other U.S. law enforcement agencies, but the highly effective Israeli intelligence agency as well. This subplot is a nice touch in a book that suggests we're more vulnerable than we suspect.,.”

For more information:

Author’s website: http://www.abemarch.com

Author’s Amazon Profile page: http://www.amazon.com/gp/pdp/profile/A11FGLER5II4MU/102-7960507-0392150

LILY'S ODYSSEY by Carol Smallwood

2010-04-16T06:34:00.000-07:00

About the Book:

This psychological detective novel explores the once largely unacknowledged-not only soldiers get post-traumatic stress disorder: that child abuse whether it is overt or covert incest, is a time bomb. Lily's Odyssey unfolds with the inevitability, impact, and resolution of an ancient Greek play. The dialogue rings true, the journey conveyed with moods and half-tones, to portray fragmented Midwestern characters with poignancy. From child to grandmother, Lily's voyage is told with lyricism, humor, and irony through a poet's voice to distill American life in religion, marriage, and family. A contemporary odyssey without maps by a woman short listed for the 2009 Eric Hoffer Award for Best New Writing, a National Federation of State Poetry Societies Award Winner.

About the author:

Carol Smallwood has appeared in English Journal, Michigan Feminist Studies, The Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine, Journal of Formal Poetry, Mobius: The Journal of Social Change, The Writer's Chronicle, The Detroit News, and anthologies. The Published Librarian: Successful Professional and Personal Writing by the American Library Association, is her 19th book. She's in Who's Who in America; in Best New Writing 2009; Eric Hoffer Award Short List.

Review:

"I first came across Carol Smallwood's work in Best New Writing 2010 and her writing immediately grabbed my interest. Smallwood's ability to effectively contrast such emotional opposites as Christmas and death makes for unique, thought provoking reading and her skill in rendering characters so lifelike that they seemed to be in the room with the reader is quite remarkable. A writer worthy of attention."

--Chris Helvey, author of Purple Adobe and Editor/Publisher of Trajectory.

Order from All Things That Matter Press: http://tinyurl.com/y774eom

Or from Amazon.com http://tinyurl.com/y53ospp