MODERNISM, MADNESS AND THE AMERICAN DREAM
Just six week ago my wife, Sharon, got the go-ahead from the Calaveras County Behavioral Health Services to expand an after-school arts program. She was given a grant to provide studio space, Monday through Friday after school, with free art supplies to high school kids living in our region. I volunteered to build large cabinets […]
Two weeks ago we had ferocious windstorm. Two majestic oaks (albeit already dead) crashed to the ground. The PVC pipe that feeds our rainwater cistern broke off and the orchard gate blew down. Fixing the gate, which was already falling apart, had been on my “to do” list for a year. Now I couldn’t ignore […]
Both Sharon and I have been stumped as to how to write about what we are experiencing right now, but we want to share it with you. (Check out Sharon’s blog post for her account.) We are ensconced in an apartment in a old stone chateau in the medieval village of Le Broc, halfway […]
The French New Wave director Francois Truffaut once remarked that: Shooting a movie is like a stagecoach ride in the Old West. When you set out, you are anticipating a pleasant journey through a beautiful landscape. But half-way though you just hope you will make it to your destination! I am not halfway through. I […]
And now for something entirely different! A few years ago I did a solo trek in Yosemite’s backcountry to the high alpine basin of Ten Lakes. I spent a long summer day being entirely mesmerized by a stream descending from a mountain lake. I felt completely immersed in the landscape as sometimes happens when […]
It has been a whirlwind week in New York where I went to promote The Restless Hungarian at a conference of the Jewish Book Council. (Read their review here) One is invited to do a carefully rehearsed, two–minute pitch to curators for Jewish Community Centers, synagogues, and other organizations around the country. Think two-minute Ted Talk. I had […]
Since publication day, I’ve been flagrantly neglecting this blog and the concomitant social media dispatches. I have been distracted by Spring here in the foothills of the Sierras. Our twenty acres of rolling land has been carpeted by flowers, and each day, on our walks, Sharon and I discover new blossoms. The first to come […]
The Restless Hungarian was published this week. The official pub date was April 16. The date arrived with letters of congratulations from my publisher and publicist, a review in BookTrib under the catchy headline: Son Unpacks Dad’s Secrets and a flurry of breathless book blogger notices. I also got the news that The New York […]
I can see the light at the end of the passage, but as the April 16th publication date of The Restless Hungarian gets closer I am filled with conflicting emotions. I have lived a long time with the characters in my book, and though they were once living breathing people on the planet, they were […]
In last week’s post I wrote about candidates we auditioned for After The Velvet Revolution. This week is about a few hours on the last day of my initial trip to Prague when we edited the trailer for the project View Part Four here. If you missed Part One, Part Two, or Part Three click […]