John Paul Godges's Blog

At the first annual IndieReader Discovery Awards, announced this week at the BookExpo America trade show in New York City, the award in the category of American Studies went to Oh, Beautiful: An American Family in the 20th Century by John Paul Godges.

Judges for the awards included publishers, agents, publicists, reviewers, authors, bloggers, and producers. Nina Sankovitch, author of Tolstoy and the Purple Chair, a memoir of reading a book a day for one year, offered high praise for Oh, Beautiful.

“Godges’ heartfelt and probing exploration of his own family history provides for all readers not only a fascinating story of immigration but also an inspirational anthem to the human spirit,” said Sankovitch, who is also a book reviewer for The Huffington Post and readallday.org.

“Godges shows us his family from their first individual arrivals in America, creating a portrait of how roots are planted in a new country, and then moves on through generations to show how, through feats of endurance and flexibility, his family has held together, connecting to each other and to their shared history, to survive and surpass the inevitable cycles of happiness and sorrow.”

The IndieReader is known as “the essential consumer guide to self-published books and the people who write them.” Its founder, Amy Edelman, came up with the idea of IndieReader for two reasons. “The first was to create a more level playing field for authors who choose to go it on their own. The second was to give book lovers the opportunity to discover great works that they might not have otherwise found,” she explained.

“I’m very grateful to IndieReader,” said Godges. “I’ve been impressed with the exceptional care and thoughtfulness of everyone involved in this awards program. It’s truly an honor to win this award from them.”

Click here for a full list of the 2012 IndieReader Discovery Awards.

Oh, Beautiful: An American Family in the 20th Century placed as first runner-up in the 2012 Eric Hoffer Book Award category of Culture, the awards committee announced this week. The Culture category encompasses nonfiction titles “demonstrating the human or world experience” across several cultural dimensions.

The Eric Hoffer Book Award honors the memory of the American philosopher Eric Hoffer, who wrote ten books about working-class social issues. The award highlights “salient writing” as well as the “independent spirit” of small publishers.

“It’s fitting to receive this award for Oh, Beautiful in memory of a man who was a migrant worker, longshoreman, and free thinker,” said author John Paul Godges. “I think a lot of the characters in this book could relate to Eric Hoffer.”

The Eric Hoffer Award for short prose and books was established at the start of the 21st century “as a means of opening a door to writing of significant merit.”

The full list of Eric Hoffer Book Award recipients can be found here.

Two-thirds of the way through Fahrenheit 451, I can't help but see parallels between Ray Bradbury's dark vision of the future and the dangers of social media in the present—not all social media, of course, just the way many of us, myself included, often use it.

As you probably know, Bradbury's classic novel presents a dystopian world in which firefighters burn books for a living and even the people who harbor them, all with the enthusiastic consent of the vast majority of the populace, who feel threatened by books.

Written in 1953, the paragraph below (from page 55) took my breath away. Is this prescient, or what?:

"Speed up the film, Montag, quick. Click, Pic, Look, Eye, Now, Flick, Here, There, Swift, Pace, Up, Down, In, Out, Why, How, Who, What, Where, Eh? Uh! Bang! Smack! Wallop, Bing, Bong, Boom! Digests-digests, digests-digests-digests. Politics? One column, two sentences, a headline! Then, in mid-air, all vanishes! Whirl man's mind about so fast under the pumping hands of publishers, exploiters, broadcasters that the centrifuge flings off all unnecessary, time-wasting thought!"

There are plenty of aspects of Bradbury's futuristic nightmare that have not come to pass, that seem implausible, and that might even be counteracted by the freewheeling independence of social media mavens challenging the status quo. Amen to that!

However, the eeriest aspect of Fahrenheit 451 is that the oppression is one chosen by the masses, who seek their happiness in endless, mindless distraction. The antagonist explains (on page 58):

"It didn't come from the Government down. There was no dictum, no declaration, no censorship, to start with, no! Technology, mass exploitation, and minority pressure carried the trick, thank God. Today, thanks to them, you can stay happy all the time, you are allowed to read comics, the good old confessions, or trade journals."

That creeps the heck outta me. Partly because I'm a firm believer in minority pressure. Mostly because of the larger social forces arrayed against thoughtful attention to what makes life meaningful.

It gets worse. On page 87, Bradbury, writing decades before the Arpanet, pens one of the best descriptions ever of the frenetic churn of viral marketing:

"Can you dance faster than the White Clown, shout louder than 'Mr. Gimmick' and the parlor 'families'? If you can, you'll win your way, Montag. In any event, you're a fool. People are having fun."

I don't mean to cast aspersions on technology, social media, the blogosphere, and new communications tools. Like all tools, they can be used for good and often are. But they can also be used for bad.

That's why I like Goodreads. This is a social media site for people who actually read books, reflect upon them, incorporate their wisdom into their lives, and share that wisdom with others. Whenever I find myself in a roiling debate over the merits and demerits of social media, I point to Goodreads as an example of how to do it right. I'm humbled by the quantity and quality of books that Goodreaders read.

But Bradbury offers a harrowing reminder of how we can destroy ourselves with the incessant pings of disaggregated, dis-integrated, discombobulated gunk that passes itself off as "information" these days and that is the antithesis of any good book.

I don't have the answers. Just questions. I don't know if it's fair to compare the Bradbury nightmare to social media. Do you?

At the very least, he offers us a worthy warning.

Selling at a steady clip, Oh, Beautiful: An American Family in the 20th Century rose to #3 on the Amazon bestseller list this past week for paperbacks in the category of U.S. genealogy. At nearly the same time, the family memoir hit #5 on the Amazon Kindle bestseller list for genealogy.

“It’s been gratifying to see the book grow in popularity among genealogists and family historians,” said the author, John Paul Godges. “The genealogy blogs have started lighting up and spreading the word about the book as a good example of how to bring a family story to life.”

As shown here, Oh, Beautiful stood in good company at #3 on the U.S. genealogy paperback bestseller list, landing one spot above Slaves in the Family, which had won the 1998 National Book Award for nonfiction.

Oh, Beautiful also ranked #14 on the Amazon paperback bestseller list for memoirs related to childhood and the family. The book shared good company in this category as well, falling just four spots below the 2005 Jeannette Walls memoir, The Glass Castle.

UPDATE: As of 10:30 p.m. today Pacific time, Oh, Beautiful climbed to #2 in U.S. genealogy, trailing only Lisa See’s On Gold Mountain: The 100-Year Odyssey of a Chinese-American Family.

In a high-spirited interview with the Author Learning Center, author John Paul Godges says that the decisions of his forebears to immigrate to America were the results of ferocious arguments between those who wanted to break free from the old world and those who wanted to keep the family intact. “My epiphany was that, even before people arrive in America, they come with this tension. And that is the legacy that is passed down from one generation to the next.”

Click here to watch the three-minute YouTube video.

Often called “the world’s toughest book critics,” Kirkus Reviews has named Oh, Beautiful: An American Family in the 20th Century to its Best of 2011 book list. The book titles making up the five categories of the list were announced this week.

Oh, Beautiful appears within the Best Indie of 2011 category, which encompasses all genres of independently published books. The titles named to the Best Indie of 2011 category are “books that caught our eye or blew our mind or touched our heart, some even earning Kirkus stars,” said Perry Crowe, the category’s editor.

Oh, Beautiful earned the Kirkus star, which is awarded to “books of remarkable merit,” this past September. Just 15 of the 50 titles named to the Best Indie of 2011 category also earned the Kirkus star.

The four other categories in the Best of 2011 list are best fiction, best nonfiction, best children’s books, and best teen books. Some of the better-known authors on the list whose books also received the Kirkus star are David Brooks, Joan Didion, Umberto Eco, Francis Fukuyama, Stephen King, and Haruki Murakami.

“That’s darn good company,” said John Paul Godges, the author of Oh, Beautiful. “It is a huge honor to have Oh, Beautiful placed among the works of such renowned writers. It is a very encouraging honor, for which I am truly grateful.”

The Kirkus review of Oh, Beautiful, along with the complete Best of 2011 list, can be viewed here.

To promote the global awakening of people fed up with unfair economic structures, the Huffington Post and the IndieReader have released a list of “7 great indie books to read whilst you occupy Wall Street.” Included on the list is Oh, Beautiful: An American Family in the 20th Century, by John Paul Godges.

The inspiration for the list arose from the Occupy Wall Street participants, who have set up their own free lending library and created a self-published newspaper called the Occupied Wall Street Journal.

“We thought we’d contribute to the movement by suggesting some great indie titles to fill the time between demonstrating and getting doused with pepper spray,” said Amy Edelman, founder of the IndieReader.com. “Like the Occupied Wall Street Journal, all of the books are self-published and speak to the power of the individual.”

Beyond Oh, Beautiful, which the Huffington Post calls “a sweeping narrative” of one family’s history in America in the 20th century, the list promotes three justice-oriented titles: Justice in America: How it Works—How it Fails, by Russell F. Moran; Liberty in America’s Founding Moment: Doubts About Natural Rights in Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence, by Howard I. Schwartz; and They Cooked the Books: A Humorous Look at the World of White-Collar Crime, by Patrick M. Edwards.

The three remaining titles are Misfits & Heroes: West from Africa, by Kathleen Rollins; Parts North: A Back-Roads Noir, by Kevin Cohen; and Reternity: Where Science and Faith Collide, a novel by Neal Wooten.

“I’m honored to have Oh, Beautiful placed among such great company,” said Godges.

The titles can also be viewed on the Huffington Post and IndieReader.

Lauding "Oh, Beautiful” as a “wonderful illustration for all family historians grappling with writing their family history,” Lynn Palermo, also known as The Armchair Genealogist, asked author John Paul Godges for tips about writing and publishing a family memoir and also about involving family members.

Godges stressed the importance of establishing a theme and building a complementary outline very early in the process. “I played with the theme and outline ideas for nearly a year before committing pen to paper.”

Palermo asked Godges about how he handled transitions, reconstructed dialogue from decades earlier, edited passages, and managed the sensitivities of family members who might have been reluctant to share their stories with the world.

“The whole process was like group therapy for all of us,” said Godges. “Because everyone was brave enough to take the risk of baring their souls, we came to know one another a lot better through this sort of organized process of collective introspection, and I think we love each other more than ever because of it.”

He then became introspective himself. “I learned two big lessons while writing this book,” Godges told Palermo. “The first lesson is that the most important stories of our lives are often never shared simply because the questions are never asked. Young people don’t want to ‘bother’ old people with difficult questions about painful subjects; as a consequence, old people end up thinking that nobody cares about them or the most important parts of their lives. It’s a colossal waste of opportunity, and it’s very sad.

“The other big lesson is that the most important parts of our lives also happen to be the most painful parts of our lives. When we keep those stories of pain to ourselves, either intentionally or unintentionally, we deny ourselves a great deal of wisdom that we can also pass down to our children. I decided to share the greatest family pain so that we could impart the greatest family wisdom, mostly for the benefit of the generations to come. My parents and siblings approached the book in this same spirit. It couldn’t have happened otherwise.”

The complete interview can be found at The Armchair Genealogist.

It was one of those evenings you wish would last forever. Golden-hearted people. Heartwarming homemade lasagna. Astute questions about a true story and its living characters. And reflections on the common bonds we share.

These were the ingredients of a late summer night’s dream at the Hollywood Riviera home of Patty Doyle and Diana Neidert—a home with a view of some of the Southern California neighborhoods described in Oh, Beautiful: An American Family in the 20th Century, the topic of the evening’s discussion.

“Is there going to be an Oh, Beautiful 2?” implored reader Dorothy McRell. “I miss the family!”

Now who could not miss a group like this?

See photos of everyone in the group.

Kirkus Reviews, long recognized as the gold standard for tough and impartial book reviews, has awarded the coveted Kirkus Star to Oh, Beautiful: An American Family in the 20th Century, a self-published family memoir by John Paul Godges.

Since 1933, Kirkus has published anonymous, concise book reviews for librarians, booksellers, literary agents, publishing houses, journalists, and film producers searching for good material. A Kirkus review can be anything from scathing to complimentary, but the Kirkus Star is reserved “for books of remarkable merit.”

“It’s a triumph when a traditionally published book earns a Kirkus Star,” said Godges. “But when a self-published book earns a Kirkus Star, that’s even more remarkable.”

The author was impressed with the Kirkus reviewer’s thoroughness, thoughtfulness, and care in constructing a comprehensive critique in fewer than 300 words. “It’s as if the reviewer looked directly into my mind and fathomed my deepest intentions.”

Godges felt honored on many levels. “Oh, Beautiful has received numerous wonderful accolades,” he said. “But this one truly qualifies as critical acclaim.”

According to the Kirkus review, “The intricately crafted narrative is written with the specificity of a historian, seamlessly flowing through the decades. Yet the book is also poignant and personal, capturing the intimate, intricate workings of a family with amazing clarity.”

Here is the complete Kirkus review:

OH, BEAUTIFUL

"Godges presents a vast narrative depicting what it means to be an American, told through the lens of an expressive family story.

"Written in four parts, Godges’ first memoir spans his family’s immigrant beginnings to his parents’ assimilation to a family of six kids growing up, growing apart, and finally coming back together. The memoir is rich with the cultural history of 20th-century America; the hardships of immigrants, the harrowing times of the Depression and World War II, dealing with mental illness, the tumultuous Vietnam-era social divide, and the AIDS epidemic all impact Godges’ family. The author shines a spotlight on each member of the family particularly affected by these events, hanging back until his turn to present a facet of American life deeply meaningful to him—being a gay man in this country. Roman Catholicism also permeates the book, providing a pillar of community for the Italian- and Polish-American family, but also becoming a divisive force between husband and wife and parent and child, causing the family to face questions over divorce and homosexuality. The intricately crafted narrative is written with the specificity of a historian, seamlessly flowing through the decades. Yet the book is also poignant and personal, capturing the intimate, intricate workings of a family with amazing clarity. Godges concludes that “to be an American in the fullest sense of the word meant to discover oneself as an individual within a community.” This ambitious book succeeds in negotiating the balance between individual and community, telling the engrossing story of an individual family within the greater society of America.

"A satisfying, well-crafted reminder of how one family’s story can encapsulate the cultural history of America as a whole."

—Kirkus Star Review