Author Spotlight: Kieran Shields

In Kieran Shields' superb debut thriller, The Truth of All Things, brilliant but troubled private detective Perceval Grey is aptly named. Being of mixed American Indian and Caucasian racial heritages, he's forced to battle deeply ingrained late 19th century New England prejudices, even in his own family. Grey is indeed a gray man in the society he lives and works in -- neither an Indian, nor a white man, but straddling some murky, shifting ground in between. At times during an investigation of horrific murders tied to the infamous Salem witch hunts that happened 200 years earlier, Grey's mixed race is a valuable asset. Mostly, though, Grey finds himself forced to confront an array of bigotries to save the very people who belittle him from an unholy conspiracy that attempts to resurrect in their town's midst a long-dead evil.

We at Gazalapalooza are fortunate that our collective powers of persuasion were sufficient to briefly tear Shields away from toiling on his debut's sequel long enough to subject himself to the Author Spotlight's fearsome glare. Given the riveting nature of his writing's subject matter, this is no easy task. So now, without further ado, let's see how well Shields retains his composure as he tackles our questions.

Gazala:    In my omnipotence, I've sentenced you to be stranded alone on a desert island for offenses best left unnamed. In my beneficence, I've decided to allow you a limited amount of reading material to make your stay a little less bleak than it would otherwise be. I'll spot you your religious text of preference, and the collected works of William Shakespeare. In addition to those, name the one fiction book, and the one nonfiction book, you'd choose to take with you, and why you choose them. 

Shields:    Tough choice on the fiction side, but I’ll take a one volume complete collection of Sherlock Holmes. Two great characters, one great friendship, countless great deductions.  What more can you ask for?  As for non-fiction, I’d have to select some sort of Gilligan’s Island Survival Guide so I could learn to make a radio, and anything else I need, out of coconuts and bamboo. 

Gazala:    Your debut book is an excellent and gripping thriller, titled The Truth of All Things. I've read it. I enjoyed it immensely, and recommend it highly. Shockingly enough, however, from time to time my bare recommendation doesn't always motivate a book's potential reader to become a book's actual reader. Tell us something about The Truth of All Things, and why its potential reader should make the leap and become its actual reader. 

Shields:    In my not-so-humble opinion, The Truth of All Things is a flat out good story with memorable characters pursuing a terrific mystery.  And who doesn’t like a good mystery?  Even if you’re not a mystery buff, it’s brimming with murder, intrigue, creepy occult stuff, interesting historical details, dry humor, an imperfect but brilliant hero, and an intrepid heroine.   

 

In a nutshell: It’s fun and clever.  More importantly, when people see you with a copy, they’ll think you’re fun and clever too.

 

And if that’s not enough, a single hour of reading The Truth of All Things contains your daily requirement of 42 essential vitamins and minerals.  (**This statement has not been evaluated by the FDA.  Side effects of this novel may include sleeplessness, temporary confusion, and feelings of delusional well-being.  If you experience criminal detection lasting more than 4 hours, seek immediate professional assistance.**)

Gazala:    What are books for?

Shields:    For feeding the imagination, the intellect, and the soul.  Plus, when you move to a new place and have to haul an endless series of heavy boxes out to the truck, books make you feel like you’ve accumulated something worthwhile instead of just a load of junk you don’t remember buying.

Gazala:    W. Somerset Maugham said, "There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are." Do you agree, or disagree, and why? Shields:    They’re more like guidelines than rules, but I agree that no one can identify them with any certainty.  It’s a waste of time trying to figure out what they are; that time should be spent at the keyboard figuring out what works for you. 

 

Gazala:    Something wicked this way comes that requires my immediate attention. Ask yourself a question, and answer it. 

Shields:    Q:  Kieran, how can you most shamelessly promote your new book in this limited space?  A:  By mentioning it’s available March 27 at your favorite local bookstore or online.  You should probably pick up multiple copies since you’ve got family and friends who love a good mystery and you’ll want to share this story, but you don’t want them hogging your copy.  P.S. The sequel should be out in the not too distant future.

Your appetite sufficiently whetted, you're likely hungry to scoop up your copy of The Truth of All Things. Not to worry, because you can do so at Amazon simply by clicking here.

Author Spotlight: Tim Wendel

About a year ago, when it was still savagely cold in these parts, I had the pleasure of interviewing today's Spotlight Author Tim Wendel about his baseball book, High Heat, for Viva Tysons magazine. It was a great interview, and I appreciated it all the more because talking with Wendel about High Heat filled my frozen head with visions of spring and baseball and ebbing frostbite.

A year has passed since then, and though it's only mid-march here in northern Virginia, I'm clad in nothing but shorts and a tee shirt as I write this post welcoming Wendel to the roster of brave authorial souls willing to subject themselves to the high heat of the Gazalapalooza Author Spotlight. As you'll see from our interview below, Wendel's newest book, Summer of '68, is baseball-centric, but it's attracting rave reviews from all corners in part because it's much more than strictly a book about the momentous baseball season of 1968. It's really a thoughtful and intriguing book about our whole world during that tumultuous year, and how the pivotal social, cultural and political events inside sports and out in 1968 echo loudly to this very day.

The Klieg lights are flaring, yet Wendel's sporting a sleek pair of Oakley shades and looks unperturbed by the glare. Without further ado, let's see how well Wendel takes to the heat of the Author Spotlight.

Gazala:    In my omnipotence, I've sentenced you to be stranded alone on a desert island for offenses best left unnamed. In my beneficence, I've decided to allow you a limited amount of reading material to make your stay a little less bleak than it would otherwise be. I'll spot you your religious text of preference, and the collected works of William Shakespeare. In addition to those, name the one fiction book, and the one nonfiction book, you'd choose to take with you, and why you choose them.

Wendel:    On the fiction side, I'd choose In the Skin of A Lion, by Michael Ondaatje. That's one of the titles I pull down and reread every year or so, along with The Great Gatsby and several Hemingway short stories. (See, I had to find a way to get past that single-choice criteria.) Ondaatje is better known for The English Patient, but I really enjoy Lion. The novel is set in Toronto, back at the turn of the last century. In many ways, Toronto was the city of my youth -- a glittering skyline that I saw from the opposite side of the Lake Ontario, where my family lived during the summers. This novel swirls and moves, almost like a fever dream, around several memorable characters. Nonfiction? I'd have to go with Joseph Campbell's The Hero With A Thousand Faces, which details and emphasizes the importance of myth -- those old stories that may be a part of our very DNA. Anybody who writes has to at least acknowledge these tales of yesteryear, their structure, and how they can still reach out to us today.

Gazala:    Your latest book is an excellent and gripping true story of baseball and cultural history, called Summer of '68. I've read it. I enjoyed it immensely, and recommend it highly. Shockingly enough, however, from time to time my bare recommendation doesn't always motivate a book's potential reader to become a book's actual reader. Tell us something about Summer of '68, and why its potential reader should make the leap and become its actual reader.
 

Wendel:    The year 1968 rocked our world and we're still dealing with the aftershocks. Culture wars? Political discord? A divisive presidential campaign? Things were far worse when it came to all those elements in 1968. Of course, the year has been written about in terms of cultural, political, even musical events. What I did in Summer of '68 was move sports to the forefront and write about a great collection of teams and personalities. Two of the most racially integrated organizations in the country -- the St. Louis Cardinals and Detroit Tigers -- met in an epic World Series in baseball. Football moved to the top of the U.S. sports mountain, thanks to Joe Namath and the rise of the old American Football League. And we had the Mexico City Summer Games, which made live TV viewing of the Olympics a must for American households. I follow several top athletes -- Bob Gibson, Mickey Lolich, Denny McLain, Luis Tiant -- through this tumultuous time. What they learned and how they struggled to move ahead, I believe, is as important today as it was then.  

Gazala:    What are books for?
 

Wendel:    To help bring order, or at least a glimpse of it, to a world that often borders upon the insane and bizarre.
 

Gazala:    W. Somerset Maugham said, "There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are." Do you agree, or disagree, and why?
 

Wendel:    Well, you start with the rules. Those are your flickering lights as you move into the darkness when you begin any new book. And then, too soon, you realize that you have to invent some more rules and techniques to try and carry the day.

Gazala:    Someone let the dogs out. Ask yourself a question, and answer it.
 

Wendel:    Q: What's the future of books? A: I sometimes tell my students at Johns Hopkins that I don't have any idea what format we'll be writing for in a decade or two or three (e-books, iPads, some blend of the internet and movies?), but I believe people will still be hungry for story. For a good story can not only entertain us, it can give us a bit of a clue about who we are and what's really important in the world.

Wendel's Summer of '68 just came out yesterday. You can find it all over, and if you want to order it from Amazon, you do that by clicking here.

March (Literary) Madness -- NCAA 2012 Battle of the Authors

The annual NCAA men's and women's basketball tournaments are nearly upon us. If you're not in a tournament pool, you know someone who is. Everyone's looking for a edge -- how to choose that Cinderella team, or the "sleeper" that shocks the so-called cognoscenti. Sure, you could go the tried-and-true way of the Vegas smart money, playing the best odds after eons of scrutinizing reams of arcane data and injury reports. But then there's always that person you've heard of who won a fat pile of pool money because he made his selections based on which mascots he liked, or the teams' colors, or which cheerleading squad is peppiest.

Gazalapalooza is an authors' and readers' site, and the folks in the back-office accordingly have devised an entirely new way to approach the tournament pool selection process. It's author-centric. The methodology is simple. Rather than comparing teams' stats or colors or mascots or cheerleaders, we advocate having a battle between each school's respective literary alumni to prognosticate the winner of each game.

Applying these metrics, let's explore how this year's men's tournament pool might look:

First Round, South Regional: Kentucky (Elizabeth Madox Roberts) takes on the winner of Mississippi Valley State (Jerry Rice -- the only published alumnus on MVSU's list of famous alumni) versus Western Kentucky (whose alumni list includes no book authors). You have to pick Kentucky. Iowa State (Robert E. Kowalski) versus Connecticut (Joel Rosenberg). I'm going Connecticut and Rosenberg. Wichita State (Omar Khalidi) plays Virginia Commonwealth (David Baldacci). Who bets against Baldacci?  Indiana (Meg Cabot) versus New Mexico State (faculty member David Boje) goes to Cabot. When UNLV (Guy Fieri) tips off against Colorado (Jean Stafford), I'm saying Fieri because he cooks so hot it burns. Baylor (Robert Fulghum) takes on South Dakota State (Tom Daschle) and Fulghum comes out on top. Nicholas Sparks is a Notre Dame guy, and Howard Hendrix is Xavier's gleaming literary light, but Sparks is the correct call. The last first-round South Regional Game is Duke (Peter Maas) against Lehigh (Richard Harding Davis). Got to pick Mass on that one.

Second Round, South Regional: Kentucky (Elizabeth Madox Roberts) will take on Connecticut (Joel Rosenberg), and you have to stick with Roberts. Virginia Commonwealth (David Baldacci) battles Indiana (Meg Cabot). Again, who bets against Baldacci? UNLV (Guy Fieri) plays Baylor (Robert Fulghum), but Fieri's skills at cooking begin to outweigh his literary prowess enough to make the call for Fulghum in this game. The last game in this regional round is Notre Dame (Nicholas Sparks) against Duke (Peter Maas), and regardless of what the pundits say, we all know they're not considering Nicholas Sparks when they make their predictions as we are. It's Notre Dame.

South Regional Semifinals: Now its Kentucky and Meg Cabot suiting up against Virginia Commonwealth and David Baldacci. The smartest money in the room's on Cabot. Have I mentioned it's foolish to bet against Baldacci? So leave the room, and go with VCU in this game. What about when Robert Fulghum's Baylor team challenges Notre Dame and Nicholas Sparks? Notre Dame is the sounder choice.

South Regional Final: Only one of our two remaining teams, Kentucky (Meg Cabot) or Notre Dame (Nicholas Sparks), will make it out of this game to advance to the glorious Final Four. Cabot or Sparks? With all and immense respect due Kentucky and Cabot, it will be Notre Dame and Sparks going to New Orleans.

The complete Official Gazalapalooza 2012 NCAA Men's Tournament Bracket "Battle of The Authors" Edition is pictured below. It turns out Hunter S. Thompson wins it all this year. Hey, stranger things have happened. 

(Right Click on Image to View/Enlarge in New Tab)
(Note: Pressing CONTROL and PLUS Keys Enlarges Image More)

"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."

~~Hunter S. Thompson~~

(Gazalapalooza thanks the inestimable "Dangerous" Dan Miller for his kind assistance above and beyond the call of any reasonable duty with the bracket imaging.)

Way Before Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

Last month, I wrote about my trip to Savannah, Georgia. Its historic district is gorgeous and enthralling. If you've never been there, go. If you have been there, you're fortunate. If you live there, I'm jealous of you.

Whenever I visit a city for the first time, I try to read a book about it before my trip. After I arrive, I mosey through local independent bookstores and buy a few books so I can learn more about the town's saints and scoundrels. Those books are always my favorite souvenirs.

It's Savannah, so of course the week before my journey I grabbed my copy of John Berendt's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. I had read it when it was released in 1994, but not since, so I considered re-reading it a mandatory pleasure before my Savannah jaunt. I enjoyed my re-read as much as I did my first, if not more given my impending trip.

As readers of Midnight know, the book's central story is about antiques dealer Jim Williams' four trials for the murder of Danny Hansford in May, 1981. One of the things that always puzzled me in Berendt's book was why, between his first and second trials, Williams abruptly sought to bolster the efforts of his crack legal team with the assistance of a local occult practitioner named Minerva. Prior to his suddenly employing Minerva (a disciple of a dead local "root doctor" named Dr. Buzzard), there was nothing substantial in Midnight to indicate Williams placed any faith in spell-craft and the like. Given Berendt's consistent depiction of Williams as a highly sophisticated and worldly man, it seemed out of character for Williams to retain Minerva's services and hang around in graveyards at midnight to secure an acquittal via such patently extrajudicial tactics, much less to stick with those tactics so ardently for years.

But thanks to my wandering the shelves of some of Savannah's local book shops, I don't wonder about Williams hiring Minerva anymore. A book by James Caskey titled Haunted Savannah aimed me in the direction of finding the light I've sought to solve that little mystery.

I learned Minerva wasn't the first person Williams engaged to perform supernatural services in troubling times in Savannah. Nearly 20 years before Hansford's murder, Williams' second historic home renovation project in Savannah was the Hampton Lillibridge House. Completed around 1799, the house was originally situated on Bryan Street. However, its foundation was faltering badly when Williams bought it in 1963, so he had it moved a couple blocks east to its current address on East St. Julian Street, and began his restoration work.

The restoration did not proceed smoothly. Williams had considerable difficulty keeping craftsmen on his payroll, because the house he bought was and remains renown as the one of the most haunted houses in the most haunted city in America. Following the move, Williams' men discovered a crypt in the house's bowels. The waterlogged crypt was very old, and it wasn't empty. Workmen quit in droves, citing malevolent presences, disappearing tools, unexplained footsteps and voices, apparitions, and lights and music emanating from unoccupied parts of the three-story building. While Williams was abroad on a buying trip, one of Williams' friends ventured into the house to check out some supposed strangeness, only to be rescued by a pair of his buddies who found him terrified on the third floor, screaming that something unseen was trying to throw him down a nearby 30 foot chimney shaft. Eventually enough work was completed for Williams to move into the house himself. His brief tenure included a ceaseless nightly barrage of unidentifiable footsteps, mysterious dark figures that vanished in an instant, and at one point arming himself with a pistol and chasing a specter from room to room until the entity entered a room, slammed the door and locked it from the inside. The disturbances occurred so often Williams took to calling the Savannah police to investigate the house on many occasions, but the cops never found anything. Finally, a police captain visited Williams at the house and told him the department was going to have to start charging Williams to cover the costs of attending all the false alarms. During that conversation, an organ started to play in the house. Williams told the captain that Williams was alone in the house, and didn't own a player organ. The men walked into the parlor, and watched the keys on an organ move by themselves while music flooded the room.

At the end of his earthly rope, Williams hired an Episcopalian bishop from Atlanta to perform an exorcism. That happened on December 7, 1963. It didn't take, because after a few days' respite the paranormal activities returned in full force. Then Williams took a last shot, soliciting an examination and advice from Hans Holzer, a famous paranormal researcher. Holzer confirmed abundant otherworldly presences in the house, but like the good bishop before him, he couldn't make them go away. He was able to write a book featuring Williams' house, though, so it wasn't a total loss for Holzer. Long out of print, the book's called The Phantoms of Dixie.

Incidentally, the Hampton Lillibridge House (it's a private home -- don't go snooping) retains its lofty place among America's most haunted homes to this day. A parapsychological research team from Duke University says the house is the single most haunted building they've every investigated.

So by the time of his successive trials for Hansford's murder in the 1980's, Williams was very well-acquainted with hauntings, exorcisms, and things paranormal. Viewed from that perspective, I no longer wonder why in Midnight Williams "suddenly" brought Minerva onto his legal defense team after his conviction in the first Hansford trial. It wasn't so sudden after all. He couldn't beat them in 1963, so he joined them 20 years later.

"You believe what you choose, and I'll believe what I know."

~~Jim Williams~~

(As played by Kevin Spacey)

Author Spotlight: Kira Peikoff

Many of Gazalapalooza's regular readers are authors, who well understand how excited our Spotlight Author Kira Peikoff is right now. Peikoff's debut novel, an exciting thriller titled Living Proof, just came out last Tuesday. All of us remember what and how we felt the day our first book was released. We all know how energized and electric Peikoff feels on this momentous occasion, and I'm confident everyone joins me in wishing her great fortune and fun not only with Living Proof, but also with all the books she has yet to write.

Why, you might ask, would a debut author like Peikoff so bravely subject herself to the sweat-inducing glare of the Gazalapalooza Author Spotlight? After reading Living Proof, you'll see Peikoff has no fear of jumping into controversy. It's a well-written and compelling thriller that boldly examines some of the most contentious medical, legal and philosophical issues confronting us today. Arianna Drake, a brilliant young doctor specializing in infertility treatment, runs a clinic that attracts scrutiny from the U.S. Department of Embryo Preservation. Trent Rowe, the DEP agent tasked to gather evidence sufficient to shut down Drake's clinic and end her career with imprisonment, instead finds himself allured by Drake despite her past radicalism, and the illness that threatens to take her life very soon. The more Rowe learns about Drake's life and her illegal but miraculous work, the less sure he is of things he took for granted before meeting her. With lives and an unprecedented medical breakthrough on the line, Drake and Rowe find themselves facing danger, ruin and death against the backdrop of one of today's prevalent sociocultural conflicts. The story's set 15 years from now, but Peikoff's plot could spring from fiction to fact far sooner than that.

Sounds good, doesn't it?

Peikoff's no dewy ingenue. She seems like a brave woman. Let's explore that. So without further ado, we'll get Peikoff comfortably seated in the cushy Spotlight chair, and then blast her with the Author Spotlight.

Gazala:    In my omnipotence, I've sentenced you to be stranded alone on a desert island for offenses best left unnamed. In my beneficence, I've decided to allow you a limited amount of reading material to make your stay a little less bleak than it would otherwise be. I'll spot you your religious text of preference, and the collected works of William Shakespeare. In addition to those, name the one fiction book, and the one nonfiction book, you'd choose to take with you, and why you choose them. 

Peikoff:    I would bring a sweeping epic like Gone with the Wind to keep me distracted for a long time, and Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird to inspire me to keep writing. I probably wouldn't have my laptop, but could you at least throw in a pen and some paper? 

Gazala:    Your debut novel is an excellent and gripping thriller titled Living Proof. I've read it. I enjoyed it immensely, and recommend it highly. Shockingly enough, however, from time to time my bare recommendation doesn't always motivate a book's potential reader to become a book's actual reader. Tell us something about Living Proof, and why its potential reader should make the leap and become its actual reader. 

Peikoff:    Living Proof will take you to a place you've never been before, but it's a place you might very well end up in your lifetime. As it pulls you in, it will also make you think. You may surprise yourself by sympathizing with a character you were prepared to dislike; you may even find yourself questioning some of your own beliefs. If you like your thrillers timely and smart, this is the book for you. 

Gazala:    What are books for?

Peikoff:    For me, books are my drug of choice--my regular and much-needed dose of enlightenment, entertainment, wonder, and inspiration.  

Gazala:    W. Somerset Maugham said, "There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are." Do you agree, or disagree, and why?

Peikoff:    Partially disagree. I think everyone can agree that a novel needs a beginning, middle, and end, plus a central conflict. Beyond that, it's pretty wide open. 

Gazala:    I smell something burning. Ask yourself a question, and answer it.

Peikoff:    Q: What will I get if I buy your book, besides a gripping read? A: I'm so glad you asked. For everyone who buys the book the week it comes out (2/28-3/5), I will mail you an autographed book plate! Just send a picture of your receipt to kira@kirapeikoff.com. 

Even after all that, Peikoff still looks calm, cool and collected. Not a drop of sweat to be seen on her. Impressive. I'd say it's a sign you ought to check out Living Proof. You can do that at Amazon by clicking here.