Main Library

Paul Firstenberg and Norm Leopold will discuss Paul’s novel, Murder in the Land of Cotton, and how it illuminates current issues about race in America. The novel is about the murder of the first black mayor of an historic southern city by unknown assassins. It draws on Paul’s experience as Chancellor of Tulane University in New Orleans. There, he witnessed the struggle of a southern city to overcome its legacy of racism. 

Paul Firstenberg’s career includes: private law practice, the US foreign aid program, a year living and working in Russia for the Russian government, a senior executive at Prudential, a member of the Board of Directors of Vanguard Mutual Funds, and a leader in the management of nonprofit organizations including Sesame Street. In addition to his role as Chancellor of Tulane, he served as Financial Vice President of Princeton University and as an adjunct professor at the Yale School of Management and the Baruch College of Public Affairs. He is the author of four nonfiction books about nonprofit management. Murder in the Land of Cotton is his first novel.

Norm Leopold is an attorney and former judge and radio host. 

Local author J Dominic reads from and discusses his recently-released novel Reaching Montaup. 

J Dominic was born John De Pasquale on New York’s Long Island. When John was five, his family moved to Rhode Island. While enrolled at Lindenwood College in St. Charles, Missouri, John worked extensively in the theater department and in 1976, he earned a bachelor’s degree in communication arts. He went on to stage-manage and floor-direct television studio shows at the NBC, ABC, and CBS affiliates in Providence and Boston.  

In 1982, John moved to Ketchum, Idaho and the Sun Valley ski resort. He worked trail crew, washed dishes, performed and directed local theater, was a food-purchasing agent, a restaurant manager, a lift attendant, and the last, officially posted, U.S. Forest Service fire lookout atop Ketchum-Sun Valley’s, Bald Mountain.  

John earned his second bachelor’s degree in 1989 and taught drama and English in several Idaho public schools.    

At a Ketchum Community Library event in 1993, John met the award-winning novelist Tom Spanbauer who encouraged John to study “Dangerous Writing” in Portland State University. After two summers in the University program, John was then invited into Spanbauer’s distinguished Dangerous Writing workshop.  

With accomplished authors and novices alike, Spanbauer kept expectations high, challenges daring, and humanity central. John credits his own author’s identity to a love of cinematic & theatre arts, the unwavering support of a beneficent friend, years of cross-country travel, and the Dangerous Writing workshops.

More about the novel can be found here.

Amy Waeschle reads from and discusses her latest novel Going Over the Falls.

Waeschle is an author, professional editor, and wilderness medicine instructor for the Wilderness Medicine Institute. She lives in Poulsbo, Washington, and is the author of Going Over the Falls, and Chasing Waves, A Surfer’s Tale of Obsessive Wandering. Her stories have appeared in publications such as The Seattle Times, The Bellingham Herald, Surfer, Sierra, and Surf Life for Women.

Book synopsis:

Surfer and Seattle E.R. doctor Lorna Jacobs is pulled into a dangerous journey to find her estranged mother, who is dying from a mysterious illness. Lorna finally finds her, deep in Mexico, but Alex is more concerned with rekindling their mutual love of surfing than preparing for her last days. The secret big wave she plans to share with Lorna could bond them forever, or destroy them.

David Abrams reads from and discusses his latest novel Brave Deeds. The novel will be available on the evening from Iconoclast Books.

Starred review from PW:  Publishers Weekly (06/05/2017):

Army veteran Abrams (Fobbit) returns to the Iraq War in his second novel, which tells the story of six AWOL American soldiers defying orders by crossing Baghdad to attend the funeral of their squad leader, Sgt. Rafael Morgan. It’s a journey made more difficult by the fact that their stolen Humvee has broken down and they now have to cross hostile territory on foot, mapless and without a radio or medic. During these tension-filled hours, we get to know the squad members: new leader Arrow, who is beginning to have doubts about his sexual orientation; Cheever, the overweight screwup; Park, “our quiet one”; Fish, the twitchy FNG (“fucking new guy”); Drew, who dreams of being unfaithful to his wife back home; and O, short for Olijandro, who is everyone’s friend. Their personal mission is interrupted by the search for a bomb factory, a diversion that turns unexpectedly bloody. The journey is also punctuated with nightmarish flashbacks to earlier in the war and the heroic act that cost Sgt. Morgan his life, and glimpses of civilian life. It all builds to an emotionally wrenching and tension-filled climax as the squad attempts to crash the funeral in a hijacked civilian van. Filled with vivid characterizations and memorable moments, this novel–as with classic modern war literature from John Hersey’s Into the Valley to David Halberstam’s One Very Hot Day–turns a single military action into a microcosm of an entire war. Agent: Nat Sobel, Sobel Weber Associates. (Aug.)
Copyright 2017 Publishers Weekly, LLC Used with permission.