Stephen Shaiken's Blog, page 17

WHY DO SO MANY LAWYERS WANT TO BE WRITERS?

I have posted on why so many English language writers live in Thailand, and  what an author might read after writing a book.  I have also posted about my writing group, Keybangers Bangkok and the writing prompt workshop I attend.

I have not weighed in on one question, stated above, that several people have recently asked, presumably because after more than three decades as a criminal defense lawyer, I have just published Bangkok Shadows, my first novel. I think it is a great question, very interesting, and I’d like to take a shot at answering.

                     WHAT IS IT ABOUT FICTION WRITING THAT ATTRACTS LAWYERS?

From Washington Irving to Franz Kafka, to Louis Auchincloss, lawyers have turned to fiction writing, especially about a world they know so well. Today, former lawyers like John Grisham, Meg Gardiner, Scott Turow and Lisa Scottoline dominate the mystery/suspense/thriller genre and have for many years.

Speaking from the vantage point of a criminal defense lawyer and a fiction author, I can attest that the two have at least one thing in common: each tries to create scenarios that does not exist, but which  readers or triers of fact can accept as true. (Readers and jurors aren’t all that different.) And of course, both fiction writers and lawyers work their magic with words.

There is another reason. Lawyers fancy themselves as artists of sorts-story tellers, wordsmiths, actors, directors, poets, philosophers, communicators. Indeed, any good trial or appellate lawyer must be all of these and more.

There is in every lawyer a burning desire to be free from the shackles of real evidence and demonstrated facts. Whatever the public may think of my former profession, the truth is that nearly all attorneys play by the rules and accept the findings of both the law and the facts in any given case. Sometimes those facts are devastating for their side, and the lawyer wishes they could change them, but understands they cannot.

Well, in the world of fiction “facts” do not mean anything like in the law. A fiction writer can create their facts, change them at will, have the characters judge those facts as the author sees fit, not as some jurors or judges might decide. It’s quite a liberating feeling

                        HOW DOES ONE FIND TIME TO WRITE AND PRACTICE LAW?

If I knew, my novel might have been published a few decades ago. Plus several more!

People organize themselves differently and assess priorities differently. During most of my legal career, I was devoted to making a living, taking care of and spending time with my family, and of course, doing the best possible job for my clients. When there was spare time, it was dedicated to  physical activity and spiritual pursuits, of which I have no regrets,and  politics, which may or may not have been a mistake. There were a few false starts at writing, but they went nowhere. My MA in Creative Writing gazed down at me from my law office wall but didn’t get much of a response.

Other lawyers have managed to combine both careers. Louis Auchincloss was one of America’s most prolific literary authors, and kept writing good novels into his nineties, all the while a partner at a major Wall Street Law firm. Scott Turow managed to write Presumed Innocent on his daily train commute. For whatever reason, I was not able to do the same. So now I’ve been making up for lost time!

If I could do it over again, I would force myself to find the time to write. Having managed to eke out time from my busy schedule for the gym, for yoga, for meditation, religious services, listening to music, watching television, working in local politics, surely there was room for writing. It was my decision not to write; no one else can be blamed in any way.  And if you don’t write, it’s your fault alone. 

               MY ADVICE, FOR WHAT IT’S WORTH  (Applies to all writers, not just lawyers)

If you really want to write, then you must find the time. It may not be a great deal of time, but if  you do it consistently and with focus, it will pay off. Had I spent even a half hour a day, a few days a week, writing my fiction, the re-learning curve would have been shorter and my stories and novel would have been written in less time today.

We all know how hard it is to buckle down and write; every possible excuse to not do so comes alive as you approach your writing desk. 

If you are too distracted at home, find someplace else to write. Libraries, coffee shops, maybe even staying an extra half hour after work just to write a bit.

I prefer writing at home. After decades of brutal commuting, being able to walk a few steps to my “office” is a pleasure. Both in Bangkok and in Tampa I have a room that is dedicated to writing (sometimes doubles as a guest or all purpose room, but mainly it is for writing.) When traveling, I enjoy writing by the side of a pool, by the beach, or gazing out at mountains, but that is really a bit of exotica and not a serious work regime. I have met fellow writers at coffee shops for group “write-ins” and it is fun and good to get immediate feedback, but my mainstay is sitting down at a desk at home and hoping the words flow. Find what works for you, and do it!

You should also join a writers group. This will bring you in contact with fellow writers who will help you with your work and will inspire you to keep going. If you haven’t read my post about KEYBANGERS BANGKOK, you should.

If none of this works for you, and you wind up like me, waiting until you retire or otherwise have the time, you can still write. You may need to work harder and be more productive in order to catch up, but with a good writers group to help you, and with the right place to work, you can create. With the independent or self-publishing option available today, you can definitely create quality fiction and enjoy seeing it read by others.

Don’t write for the market; write the book you want to write. You will write best about what you feel and what moves you, not about what others feel and care about. If your work is good, readers will dive into it.

Don’t write for the money. (Most writers, whether with traditional publishers or self-published, are not getting rich. Write because you enjoy it, you feel compelled or driven, or you just have a story you want to tell. As Stephen King ( a non-lawyer) once wrote, “if you write for the money, you’re a monkey.”

Good luck to all you would-be lawyers-turned-authors!

Louis Auchincloss (Photo by Tina Brady)














Franz Kafka














Lisa Scottoline (Photo by April Nanby)














Washington Irving

                   These four were all lawyers who became great writers. You can do the same.

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF AN INDEPENDENT PUBLISHED AUTHOR

It’s been a little over a month since I self-published my first novel, Bangkok Shadows, available on Amazon Kindle as an e book or paperback. Click here to go to the Amazon book page.

When we talk about independent or self-publishing, we really mean those words. Everything that a traditional publisher would do for an author must be done personally by the self-published author. Editing, proofreading, formatting for publication, cover design, all must be handled by the author, usually through the services of contracted professionals. Same with registering and protecting copyright. And of course, there’s the six hundred pound gorilla in the reading room: promotion. I don’t care how good your self-published novel may be; without promotion, no one aside from a handful of close friends, are ever going to read it. 

I have been navigating the rocky shoals of promotion, and eventually there will be a post dedicated to this painful process. But the average reader has little interest in such detail, so let it suffice for now to state that there are plenty of people out there ready to take your money, promise the sky, and deliver nothing. On the other hand, there are bargain sites which do help and are honorable and transparent. In my short life as an independent publisher, I’ve experienced both. I must be doing something right, as the novel is selling better than most and all reviews, public and private, have been five star and glowing. 

Unfortunately a self-published author has to keep on promoting so long as they wish to gain readers and sell books. After a while, it seems that the book takes on a life of its own and will sell because so many people have tweeted or retweeted, or shared Facebook posts, or passed the word on to a friend. I have found that successful authors on Twitter, both self-published and with traditional publishers, are often quite generous and retweet, post and spread the word about a new novel that catches their fancy. I’ve been fortunate to have this happen to me several times this past month. In the relatively small-ball world of self-publishing, this is more valuable than all the tweets, Facebook posts, Instagram photos, e mails or text messages you can pay to have delivered to the promotion-weary world at large. 

If there is any solace, it may be that these days traditional publishers are prone to pass promotion responsibilities off to the authors, especially new or low selling authors, on whom the publishing houses are loathe to spend much money. 

So what’s up next? Well, I intend to get to work on a second novel featuring Glenn Murray Cohen and the NJA Club, with Bangkok again a backdrop and almost a character. It is something I’d like to do as I feel familiar and comfortable with my characters and they still have a lot of life left in them. Several readers have expressed a desire to see more, and that is a real motivator. I figure that when the second book comes out, it will likely renew interest in Bangkok Shadows.

I also plan to write more short stories, in several genres, and post many on this blog. Since I started promoting the novel, traffic to this site has mushroomed, and at this point, I may well reach more readers here than in any small literary magazine. 

Much as I love the suspense/mystery/thriller genre, and much as I love writing about Bangkok, like every writer, I live under the delusion that somewhere within me lies the next Great American Novel, and it has to be what we call “literary” (a fancy way of saying not a specific genre) and deal with the human condition and emotions. Sooner or later, my entry will surface. 

The introductory offer for Bangkok Shadows is about to come to an end. One can only sell e books for $.99 for so long (paperbacks are $7.99).  Starting next week, the price for both  the e book and paperback will be raised to reflect market realities. Buy now at the introductory price.

If you liked Bangkok Shadows, please leave a review on Amazon to let others know why. (It will also make me feel good!). Click here to go to Amazon page to leave a review.

AMERICA, HERE I COME

A day from now I will be heading out to Souvarnabhumi Airport to board a flight back to America. Over the past three plus years, I’ve spent almost all of my time here in Bangkok. 

I am definitely not one of those American expats who bears America any ill will, and my time here should not be misconstrued as representing any such feelings. I have been living in Thailand because when I retired I wanted new experiences and wanted to break from my usual routines and habitats so that I could write.  No disappointment there; I have loved working with Keybangers Bangkok and have published my first novel, Bangkok Shadows, on Amazon.  In case you are the only person in the universe who has not gotten some form of promotion, the link is 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07C125MS1

Please don’t paint a picture of me slavishly chained to a chair, pounding away on a keyboard. I’ve spent a great deal of time writing, but also  managed to study speaking, reading and writing Thai (trying a complex federal conspiracy case is child’s play compared to that), studying meditation and yoga, and traveling throughout the Kingdom and neighboring countries. Every minute has been rewarding. 

I unequivocally love America, warts and all. The biggest wart at the moment is named Donald Trump, and while I am back home I intend to work for Democratic  candidates in Florida, hoping to do my share to oust Spanky and His Gang.

But I’ll also be writing. In addition to the novel,  I completed a dozen short stories in Thailand, some of which are on this blog. More will be written in America. I also intend to write as much as I can of a sequel to Bangkok Shadows.

I’ll be doing a bit of traveling within the U.S., taking a road trip from Tampa to Georgia and from the Bay Area to Colorado as well as a brief visit to New York. My country is a big, beautiful nation, and I hope to see quite a bit of it this trip. 

I will be returning to Bangkok in the Fall. Don’t know how long I will be spending there on that visit. When I retired from the practice of law, I gave up being a slave to the calendar and I like it just fine this way. I love having a foot in both worlds.

Spending so much time in Asia, I sometimes see myself as “a citizen of the world”. I suppose that in a spiritual sense, all of are. But have no doubt: I’m an American, a proud American, and I love my country. I just happen to love Thailand as well. 

Having a bon voyage breakfast with some of my fellow Keybangers at Artis Coffee Shop on Sukhumvit Soi 18, conveniently located next to the condo where I stayed. It’s easy to tell the Thais from the farangs-they speak better English. In case you are wondering, I’m the farang on the left. (Handsome devil, you must admit.) 

LIFE, DEATH, AND BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN

After finishing Bangkok Shadows, the last few weeks of which were filled not with creative writing but with proofing, formatting, downloading, uploading, side-loading and promoting, I craved sitting down and writing. So I forced myself to do so, and wrote this little story in one sitting. (Something I rarely do, even in my writing prompt group). It’s a mere thirteen hundred words; I can produce sentences longer than that!  I ran it by my erstwhile colleagues at Keybangers Bangkok (my writing group) and they liked it. If it could please this collection of critics, you might like it too. I hope so.

(Several readers have asked “Why Bruce Springsteen?” The answer: just because I’m a devoted fan of “The Boss”.

                            LIFE, DEATH, AND BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN

By Stephen Shaiken © 2018

“I’m really doing it this Saturday night. Absolutely. Killing myself.  Jumping out the window.  They’ll be scraping me off the sidewalk by midnight. Don’t try to stop me or talk me out of it.”

“Stanley, you can’t have another suicide attempt this Saturday night.”  There had been fourteen over the last sixth months.

“Why not?” Stanley asked.  He  put down his finger and screwed up his face.

“Because I have tickets for the Springsteen concert this Saturday night,” I replied.

“So Springsteen is worth more than my life?”

“Calm down, Stanley. What’s the big rush? Can’t you do it Sunday and let me see the show? I paid a hundred bucks a ticket. And Lynda will kill me if we miss this one.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said kill,” I added.

Stanley slammed a palm on my kitchen counter, rattling the mugs that dangled from a cup tree.

“Money, money! That’s all the world cares about! Human life counts for nothing!

“Don’t worry about me,” he said. “They’ll have scraped me off the sidewalk before you get back. You won’t mess up your shoes stepping in what’s left of me.”

“I’ll leave my phone on vibrator. If you really get the urge to do it, give me a call and I’ll be right there.”  Actually I would call 9/11. They’d save him and I wouldn’t miss any songs.

                                                                  #

My girlfriend Lynda did not share my compassion for Stanley. Over the year we had been together she had exhibited nothing but contempt for him.

“He wants to jump, let him jump, why does he have to keep ruining our weekends?”

“Stanley’s an old friend. He’s strange. We’ve been neighbors for ten years and I’m the only person he talks to. I may be all that stands between him and a body bag.”

“Let him jump next time,” she repeated. “This is definitely putting a crimp in our relationship. One week we put off a trip to the Hamptons because he threatened to drink poison. Another time we missed the first act of a Broadway play because he was supposed to slit his wrists. I lost track of the movies we’ve not seen because Stanley was going to jump out a window.

“You can’t save the world. You can’t even save this nut. Que sera sera.”

There was nothing I could say. No woman likes being second fiddle to a suicide.

                                                                     #

Springsteen opened with Does This Bus Stop on Thirty Fourth Street? and without a break moved into Tunnel of Love. Both lead guitarists, Nils Lofgren and Steve Van Zandt, were on stage, not to mention the occasional lead riff by the Boss himself.

In the middle of the monologue that precedes Growing Up, my phone began to vibrate. It was Stanley. I knew form all the past concerts that this would be a good five minutes and no matter how many times I heard it, it always moved me. That stuff about Bruce and his father, the doubts and difficulties he faced on his way to doing the only thing he ever desired,  play rock and roll. Him and me, but he was doing it. Probably didn’t have to worry about people killing themselves.

There was no way I could take a call over the sounds of the sax played by Clarance Clemmons’ nephew. Sounds just like the Big Man. Can’t tell the difference. That’s what I love about Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. What you heard in 1975 is what you hear today.

I looked sat my phone snd saw it was Stanley. I hit the button that sent the prepared reply telling him I would call back in an hour. Intermission should be around then.

                                                                 #

Almost one hour to the minute, The Boss told us the band was taking a twenty minute break and then they’d come back and do the second half of the show. I couldn’t wait because they hadn’t yet played Born to Run, Thunder Road, Johnny 99, or The River.  Lynda went off to buy something for us to eat. I dialed Stanley.

“I’m sorry but we are unable to reach the party you are dialing,” the metallic voice of the phone robot declared. “Try your call again later.”

“Hope everything is okay with Stanley,” I told Lynda when she returned with our free range chicken sandwiches and organic sodas.

“It might not be such a bad idea if he decided to do what he’s been talking about all the years,” she replied. “Or maybe he just ran out of power.” Sounded to me like she didn’t like the second option as much as the first.

I nearly choked on a piece of chicken sandwich. I could taste the tarragon.

“How can you even think that way? We’re talking about a human being.”

“Arguably,” she said between slugs of soda.

“Well, he’s my friend and I care about him.” I wasn’t quite sure if that was true.

“Friend? What relationship do you have that doesn’t revolve around his committing suicide?”

I thought for a moment.

“He was once a great baseball fan. We went to two World Series games when the Mets won it all.”

“That was 1986. You were in junior high school. Over twenty years ago.”

I thought for another moment.

“He always loans me coffee beans when I run out. Gets his from Zabar’s,”  referring to the high end delicacy store I could barely afford. It was a mystery to me how Stanley, who had never been known to work a day in his life, could shop there. I had no idea how he paid his rent or anything else.

Then the band started playing again, and thoughts of Stanley, his suicide and his coffee beans faded as the booming  sound of Tenth Avenue Freezeout filled Madison Square Garden.

                                                                        #

I always experience the same natural high at the end of a Springsteen concert. Forty times and it never fails. Lynda and I left the Garden, hand in hand,  our digits interlaced the entire subway trip home.

When we turned the corner before my building, we saw the flashing red lights of police cars and ambulances. Blue clad paramedics picked up what had to be a body covered by a black plastic sheet.

“Oh my God,” I screamed. “Stanley!” I stared open mouthed at Lynda.

“This time for real?” she asked.

I stared at her as my body slumped against the wall of the building. I had never realized how cold a woman she was. My face must have told her how I felt. She put her arm around me.

“Anything wrong with closure? It’s always been you, me and Stanley’s suicide threats. Now it’s just you and me.”

I was wiping the tears from my eyes when Stanley strolled out the front door of the building, dressed in pajamas, slippers and a robe. He was angry.

“Can you believe it?  Upstaged by Herman from the seventh floor. Who would have thought? He seemed so happy and normal. Not like me.”

I didn’t know Herman, Never met him. Hadn’t heard his name before that moment. I could not feel any loss over the death of  someone who I never knew  was alive.

“And he knew I had the idea first,” Stanley said. “Yet he did it anyway. Couldn’t he think of something different? He had to steal my idea? “

I pulled myself from Lynda and grabbed Stanley’s shoulders.

“Does this mean it’s all over? No more threats to jump, drink poison, stick your head in the oven?”

Stanley looked at me with sad but burning eyes.

“What good would it do? Who wants to be known as the second guy to kill himself in this building? The time has passed for that, my friend.”

“I think I’ll just have to kill someone else,” he said. “Next Saturday nigh, for sure. Kill them with a gun. No, maybe a bomb is better. Let me start thinking who.”

I wanted to be held again by Lynda. I looked for her but she was gone.

THE END

“ 

WHAT TO READ AFTER PUBLISHING A THRILLER

WHAT TO READ AFTER PUBLISHING A THRILLER

Hopefully  by now the whole world knows that I just published my novel, Bangkok Shadows.  Available as e book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07C125MS1                                                    and as paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/173214741

It is not in a writer’s nature to sit by idly and see if the promotion plan actually works, not to mention waiting for those reviews, which better be good!

Some writers immediately embark on their next novel, others dabble in short stories, or rewriting work  gathering dust on their hard drives.

I chose to take a few weeks off to spend time reading. After all, isn’t reading what I am encouraging others to do?

So here is a look at what I have been reading this week, and what is on the Kindle for next week:

The Sense of an Ending, by Julian Barnes

My British friend Paul, a fellow member of Keybangers Bangkok and Night Owls Writing Prompt Group, has long encouraged me to read his country’s premier authors, so often overlooked by we Yanks. I decided to listen to him and began with this perfect specimen of what might one called “postmodernism”  but which I prefer to describe simply as great literature.

Julian Barnes had been a respected literary figure in the U.K. for over a quarter century when this novel  won the prestigious Man Booker Award in 2011. 

I don’t want to give away anything, as every word Julian Barnes wrote has importance and meaning. It suffices to say that The Sense of an Ending is about an older man looking back on certain events in his youth which are still shaping his existence whether or not he has realized this. The story moves seamlessly between past and  present.

What I loved most about the novel, aside from Mr. Barnes’ spare yet elegant and evocative prose, is the way in which deep and haunting universal issues are raised. Character, plot, and dialogue make the points clearer and more personal than any philosophic or psychological treatise could accomplish.

The novel is relatively short and has an unexpected suspense that  builds up and will keep you glued to your device or the to the page, however you consume it.

As soon as I finish the other books listed on this posting, I will be reading more by Julian Barnes.

  

[image error]There Your Heart Lies, by Mary Gordon

I’ve been a fan of Mary Gordon since her first novel, Final Payments, was published in 1978. Since then, she has written several novels and short story collections. Her world largely focuses on Catholic Americans and the struggles of individuals with their families and their Church.

This novel, like the Julian Barnes book above, shifts effortlessly between past and present. It tells the story of a young woman from a very wealthy, very conservative, and very devout American Catholic family; after her family’s religious homophobic fervor drives her beloved brother to suicide, she reject them en toto and travels to Spain to help the clerical Republicans fight a losing battle against the Church-backed Fascists of Franco. 

Again, I don’t want to give away anything, but I can say that this novel affords a compelling look at Spain during its bloody civil war. It also provides insight into the world of wealthy right-wing American Catholics during the 1930’s, American communists, idealists and others fighting their  lost cause against Franco, the Church, and the terrors inflicted by air forces of of Hitler and Mussolini. 

As with the Barnes novel, this one will stay with the reader well after  the last page. 

The novel segues beautifully from memoir to history, to suspense in the present moment. I highly recommend this novel, along with anything else Ms. Gordon has written. 

A Man in Full, by Tom Wolfe

Tom Wolfe, in his New York City study, in 2012. He started wearing white suits in 1962Photograph by Gasper Tringale.

I’ve been a Tom Wolfe fan ever since I read The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test in the late Sixties. He has profoundly influenced journalism, fiction, and parts in between.

This novel was published in 1998 and was Wolfe’s first since the enormously successful Bonfire of the Vanities in 1987.

A Man in Full was generally well received by the literary world (John Updike and Norman Mailer being cranky exceptions) but was never glorified as was Bonfire.  This is unfortunate, because in many ways, the later novel may be the better.

A Man in Full  tells the story of Charlie Croker, a wealthy property developer in Atlanta who has pulled himself from rural poverty to the heights of Atlanta society. He lives the lifestyle of the protagonists in Bonfire but he is   a very different person in every way; I found him to be more believable and realistic than the intentionally  cartoonish, stereotypes in Bonfire, though quite a few of those show up in this novel. 

Despite his lavish and ostentatious lifestyle, Charlie is facing imminent bankruptcy due to an unwise office project he financed through loans he cannot afford to repay. 

The plot revolves around Charlie’s struggles to maintain his business empire, his lifestyle, and above all, his pride as the self-made “King of Crackers”, in the face of dismissive and insulting bankers seeking to bring him down.  In the midst of his troubles, he is dragged into a scheme by Atlanta’s African-American Mayor, who seeks to use Charlie’s image and standing ,as a rich white man with poor roots, to help save a top-notch African-American college football player alleged to have raped the daughter of the richest white man in Atlanta. Any tendency to sympathize with Charlie is tempered by the working conditions and unfair  treatment to which his blue collar employees are subjected and his paternalistic and likely racist views of African-Americans.

Wolfe thickens the plot by weaving within it descriptions and application of the ancient Greek philosophy of stoicism, introduced through a young man, a former employee of Charlie’s frozen food business, facing his own difficulties.

While Atlanta is different than New York, and the wealthy white men in this book are not as sophisticated and polished as their counterparts in Bonfire, their egos, flaws and sense of entitlement are the same. No one does a better job of picking apart the “Masters of the Universe” than Tom Wolfe.

After all these years, I’m still a huge Tom Wolfe fan. A Man in Full reaffirms that status.

Letters to Emil, by Henry Miller

These days, hardly anyone writes letters. E mail, texting, and social media have pre-empted this great art. Fortunately, great artists of the past were often limited to expression through letters, and thus a treasure trove awaits the eager reader.

In the nineteen twenties and thirties, the famous-to-be American author  Henry Miller remained unknown and unpublished. This hundred sixty page volume contains letters Miller wrote to his good friend, the artist Emil Schnellock, with whom he had attended grade school in Brooklyn. They lost contact after that, but a chance encounter in 1921, when they were thirty, reignited the bond. Miller trusted his friend to review his manuscripts and even to safeguard them, and the correspondence to Emil was written in the various places Miller lived and worked prior to his breakthrough as a celebrity author. Emil was his friend, mentor and rock of support.

Written from Paris and Clichy, the letters describe Miller’s life in France, but more important, his works-in-progress, his writing practices, and his thoughts on fiction writing and life. This book is a window into the life and mind of one of America’s most influential authors as well as a study of a fascinating historical period. Reading Miller’s letters are as much a joy as reading his fiction, and just as provocative.

For an author, the letters are instructive and inspiring. They will be for anyone else as well. 

[image error]The Autobiography of Ulysses S. Grant

In 1880, former President Ulysses S. Grant was dying of throat cancer and was nearly destitute. At the advice of his friend Mark Twain, President Grant, on his own, wrote this two-volume memoir, almost exclusively dealing with his role as the most important- and most successful- of the Union generals. The book was an instant success, assuring the financial solvency of Grant’s widow and offspring. It remains popular to this day, studied by military and general historians, professional and amateur. 

President Grant is undergoing a rehabilitation after generations of being written off as a hack, a drunk, an antisemite, and a crook. In truth he was none of these, and acclaimed biographer Ron Chernow (author of award-winning biographies of Alexander Hamilton and George Washington) has just published a biography of Grant which rejects these calumnies. Grant was at most a binge drinker, was anything but a bigot; he hired more women, African-American and Jews than any President before and after until FDR, and was a strict adherent to the Radical Republican agenda of equal rights for all. His hatred of slavery and his contempt for those who defended it are revealed  factually and objectively, without rancor or anger.

Grant was no crook and was not corrupt. His greatest flaw was trusting the wrongpeople; he did not profit one cent from the endemic corruption of the era and in fact wound up in his precarious financial straits because his cronies had defrauded him and stolen his money.

What comes across in this lengthy two volume set are both Grant’s skill as a writer and as a human being. His prose is understated, avoiding the “blood and guts” descriptions often associated with Civil War battlefield writing, and his objectivity in writing about the historical figures of his day is remarkably balanced and clear-eyed. His assessments are fair and generous, his resentments held back, and his thoughts measured and restrained. He presents complete pictures of the War and the political as well as the military battles he had to wage in order to save the Union.

I’m a Civil War buff so of  course I love this kind of writing. You don’t have to be one to enjoy this masterful autobiography. It’s been around for almost one hundred forty years and if you read it, you’ll understand why.

BANGKOK SHADOWS NOW AVAILABLE IN PAPERBACK

 

It’s not only out as an Amazon Kindle e-book!

Bangkok Shadows is now available in paperback as well.

Click here to view Bangkok Shadows paperback edition.

                                                                       For the e-book edition click here. 

Glenn Murray Cohen was miserable as a criminal defense lawyer in San Francisco, trapped in a web of stress, bills, and a failed marriage. When a client is murdered during a late-night encounter, Glenn grabs a bundle of illicit cash and starts a new life in Thailand. 

For seven years Glenn enjoys the life of a rich expat in Bangkok, until the CIA comes calling, pressuring him to accept  a dangerous task for which he is ill-suited. With the assistance of his close friends from the mysterious NJA Club, Glenn faces deadly peril, corruption, and intrigue, all the while confronting his own strengths and weaknesses. Glenn must adapt to this new environment, and he grows wiser, more street savvy and more chastened as the novel progresses.

Bangkok is a constant presence, creating a mood that is exotic and noir.

Stephen Shaiken practiced criminal law for over three decades in Brooklyn, N.Y. and San Francisco. Before becoming a lawyer, he earned an M.A. in Creative Writing at San Francisco State University. Stephen currently spends most of his year in Bangkok. He writes short stories in several genres, some of which may be found on his blog at: www.stephenshaiken.com

You can follow Stephen on Twitter: @StephenShaiken

BLACK IVORY COFFEE AND MY NOVEL

PREPARING THE WORLD'S FINEST COFFEE















(Enjoy the photos and read below to learn more and what Black Ivory Coffee has to do with my novel)

















Blake Dinkin, Founder of Black Ivory coffee, preparing the syphon for brewing.














This French made syphon is recommended and sold by Black Ivory.




















The hand grinder used to grind the beans.














After the water boils, it transfers from the opaque little kettle on right to the glass vessel on the left containing the ground beans.




















Blake recommends using this kind of glass to drink Black Ivory. Could be a sturdy wine glass.














No fine cup of coffee would be complete without equally fine pastries. These are from Paul's at Terminal 21.




















Blake and my wife Josie with a thrity five gram packet of Black Ivory Coffee beans.

Black Ivory sells the French syphon with two specially made glasses and three packets of the coffee for approximately $500. The syphon can double as an object d’ art, and you can brew other coffee so long as you keep one filter dedicated to Black Ivory. Properly cared for, the syphon should last a lifetime.Further information available at www.blackivorycoffee.com

Black Ivory Coffee supports the Golden Triangle Asian Elephant Foundation, which benefits the animals and the families who care for them.

What Does Black Ivory Coffee Have to Do With My Novel?

I recently finished what I hope is the final rewrite of my novel, Bangkok Shadows. The protagonist, Glenn Murray Cohen, is a former criminal defense lawyer from San Francisco. For seven years he leads an idyllic life in Thailand until he  finds himself caught in a maelstrom of intrigue and suspense which he is woefully ill-equipped to face. Like many foreigners or farangs, years of living in Thailand did not lead to a genuine understanding of the culture and the people. Suddenly he has to learn quickly with no room for error.

Glenn happens to be a coffee connoisseur, and as such, periodically enjoys a cup of the world’s finest and most expensive brand, Black Ivory Coffee.This coffee is unique because of its high quality and for its production process.

The finest beans are selected in Chiang Mai province in the North of Thailand, where fine coffee has been cultivated for many years.Only the choicest beans make the grade.The beans are then mixed with a blend of fruit and fed to elephants. When the elephants eliminate, the beans are hand-gathered, cleaned and roasted. Black Ivory has been adopted by coffee gourmands (some may say coffee snobs) the world over, prized for it’s mild yet earthy bouquet and its full-body, accented by  a scent of chocolate and a hint of fruit.

The complete experience requires brewing the coffee as intended. I am fortunate to have as a good friend in Bangkok Blake Dinkin, the Canadian Founder of Black Ivory coffee. Blake personally makes certain all commercial customers learn  the proper brewing method. He was more than amenable to coming over to my condo and preparing  the perfect brew using the French syphon he recommends and sells so that I could properly portray the preferred brewing procedure. (His customers are largely five star hotels and resorts, high end restaurants, and of course, individuals with discerning taste.) The pleasure of Black Ivory is not without its price. A pound of beans will run about a thousand U.S. dollars, and the individual packet containing thirty five grams will set you back eighty five bucks. It doesn’t make sense to purchase such exquisite beans and prepare them poorly. (Blake informs me that if one does not happen to have a syphon on hand, you can brew it as a single cup drip, though even the best paper filter cannot capture oils and other impurities as well as the syphon filter. Blake cautions that under no circumstances should a French Press be used!)

The first step is to hand-grind the beans, using the grinder shown above. You hold the cylinder with one hand and turn the grinder handle with the other, moving both arms in a circular motion. (You won’t be able to hold the grinder still so the movement works perfectly once you get the hang of it.)  A wonderful reward for this effort is the smell of the freshly ground beans when you open the cylinder to transfer it to the syphon.

The photos above show how the syphon is used and the attention the process requires. After carefully measuring 350 mil of mineral water (recommended; tap water and distilled water are absolutely no-nos; bottled water is acceptable), methyl alcohol is placed into the fuel container. (Be careful using this alcohol as it can strip the varnish off furniture!).The wick is lit and shortly afterward the water boils. At this point, physics and thermodynamics take over, and the boiling water from the opaque container (stainless steel and copper-plated) is siphoned to the clear vessel containing the ground beans. The brew cools and then siphons back to the opaque vessel, having passed through the powerful filter. Wait four minutes and then drink when it is at the temperature you prefer. (The process is described in the novel excerpt below).

I have been waiting some time to try this product, and I was not disappointed. I am what some might call a  coffee fanatic in the mold of Glenn; I’d rather die than drink a cup of instant and while I respect Starbucks for its corporate responsibility, I have doubts as to whether what they are selling is entitled to be called coffee. (In Thailand I find every other chain to be better than Starbucks but none hold a candle to a good independent coffee shop. In the U.S., Peet’s is the best, hands down.) So I did not wade into the world of Black Ivory without some strong beliefs and expectations.

Black Ivory, as its name implies, should be taken black. It is the unique flavor that is it’s signature, so why adulterate it with lighteners and sweeteners?

The thirty five gram packet provided enough coffee for three normal sized cups, but it was taken in smaller amounts in what is essentially a wine glass. I sipped mine, as I would an espresso, though this was milder and not at all bitter. I would describe the texture as full bodied and velvety, not nearly as thick as Turkish coffee but not quite the same as my regular brews.

I know what everyone is asking : is it really worth the money, let alone the time and effort?

I say yes, it is, especially if you are a serious coffee enthusiast, as a scotch lover yearns to taste a thirty five years old single malt, or a cognac lover seeks the very best VSOP, or a wine aficionado seeks out the perfect Cabernet. (Maybe today we can also say as a cannabis connoisseur seeks out the finest buds.) I wouldn’t urge running up credit card debt, but if you are a true coffee devotee who can afford it and the money isn’t going to change your life at all, go for it! It is never going to be your everyday brew, so live life large once in a while!

Glenn Murray Cohen would agree. He loves coffee and can afford the tab. He has all the time he needs. I have referred to Black Ivory in my novel because I would expect any affluent coffee enthusiast living in the Land of Smiles, where Black Ivory is produced, to indulge on special occasions. Not to mention that I have Blake Dinkin to make sure I get it right in the novel.

Here’s An Excerpt From Bangkok Shadows,  Featuring Black Ivory Coffee: (This scene takes place in the middle of the novel, after Glenn has been pressured by the CIA into participating in a dangerous covert action. Oliver is a gregarious Australian and the number one purveyor of information in the Kingdom; he is helping Glenn prepare for the mission. Oliver is enjoying himself in Koh Phangan, a beautiful island in the South. The reference to the transvestite drug case relates to an earlier chapter where Glenn tells an astounded retired Thai general how as a young lawyer he won an acquittal and what lessons he learned from the case.)

     I woke up at the crack of nine and made coffee. One part of life in America that followed me to Thailand was love of the bean. I know where in Bangkok to buy the best and maintain a shelf of fine equipment: grinder, French press, measures, filters with holders as backups. Over the years, coffee consciousness in Thailand has grown exponentially, which  brings  me great pleasure.  I make occasional short trips to Chiang Mai, up North, the city with the best coffee culture in all of Southeast Asia. It is worth the trip just to sit in its coffee houses.

     Feeling expansive, I broke into my treasured stash of Black Ivory Coffee, the most expensive and best brew in the world. The beans are grown in the North, fed to elephants after being mixed in a special blend of fruit and then roasted in Chiang Mai after the elephants eliminate the product. It may sound unappetizing, but don’t be fooled. The elephants’ digestion does something that gives a flavor unparalleled by any coffee I have ever tasted. The process is labor intensive and costly, especially hand picking the beans once the elephants make their deposit. A half kilo of beans sets me back over five hundred U.S. dollars, but is well worth the money.

     On top of that I shelled out several hundred dollars for a French-made syphon, which is the old-fashioned way of brewing recommended by Black Ivory.

     The syphon looks like the scales of justice except instead of  two weighing plates, one side has an opaque vessel and the other a clear one. They are joined by narrow piping. The clear one is for the ground coffee and contains a cloth filter. The opaque vessel sits atop a tiny tank for methyl alcohol. I carefully poured some alcohol into the tank, careful not to spill any. I then measured out six scoops of the precious beans, ground them by hand in my small wooden grinder, and carefully measured the powder into the clear vessel.  I poured exactly three hundred fifty milliliters of mineral water into the opaque vessel, lit the wick and stood back to watch. When the water reached boiling, the heat caused it to be siphoned over to the ground coffee in the clear vessel. Once the brew had cooled ever so slightly, it was magically siphoned back into the opaque vessel. During the four minute seeping period, I called Oliver. He told me he was in Koh Phangan and would be returning to Bangkok in two days.

     “In the meantime,”  he said “use those brains that served you well when you were defending people back in your country. Treat this like a problem in one of your cases. Dust off those skills you still have somewhere inside you. Hard as it may be to believe,” he added.

     I wondered if that advice would show up on his bill.

      As usual, Oliver was right. Countless times in my days as a defense lawyer I faced  what seemed like an insurmountable obstacle. Evidence  piled up and it always pointed to guilt. There were no obvious holes in the prosecution’s case, no exit from the impending crash, no alternative routes. There appeared to be nothing to argue at trial to present even the veneer of a skillful defense of my client.

     Somehow ideas always appeared after long hours of study and concentration. The story about the transvestite charged with drug sale was one such example. Many times these ideas  worked and my client was not convicted. Other times they failed but the jury stayed out for days, what we defense lawyers called a “moral victory.” On occasion I would run my defense past the prosecution and get my client a better deal, sometimes even a dismissal. Never give up is the criminal defense lawyer’s code. It helped me through some very challenging cases.

(From Bangkok Shadows,   (c) Stephen Shaiken 2018

Available now on Amazon Kindle:Click here to go to Bangkok Shadows page on Amazon Kindle

To learn more about Black Ivory Coffe, visit www.blackivorycoffee.com

BANGKOK SHADOWS NOW AVAILABLE ON AMAZON KINDLE

Click here to view Bangkok Shadows page on Amazon Kindle

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The novel is now available as a e-book; paperback will be available in a few days. Right now it is being offered at an introductory  discount price of $.99.

I hope you will enjoy the adventures of Glenn Murray Cohen in Bangkok’s mysterious underside, and if you do, please leave a review!    

I have a sneaky suspicion we will be hearing more about Glenn and his friends at the NJA Club.

A NATIONAL DISGRACE

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Some of the unarmed victims of police shootings 

 

 

Click here to read a moving column by Leonard Pitts, Jr.

Yet another instance of an unarmed African-American citizen shot and killed by police with no justification and no consequences.

Our President says these are simply local matters and no business of the federal government.

I say it is a national disgrace and Trump shows lack of leadership and lack of concern.

How many more times must this happen before it is clear to everyone that this is not mere coincidence? Our President says this is a purely local matter. I say it is a national disgrace and needs to be addressed.Yes, most police are good people and would never murder an innocent person of any color, but clearly there are bad ones and poorly trained ones and the more times there are no consequences, the more these killings will occur.

COMING SOON

COMING SOON:BANGKOK SHADOWS

In Bangkok, everyone gets the chance to start over. Few questions are asked.

When American criminal defense lawyer Glenn Murray Cohen took a bundle of cash from a murdered client and moved to Thailand and a new life, he thought his troubles were over forever.

Glenn forms friendships and seeks love, spending much of his time at the mysterious NJA Club. After seven years, this pleasant life is threatened when American agents come calling, pressuring him to undertake a dangerous task for which he is woefully unprepared, drawing him into an underbelly of corruption, criminal activity and international intrigue hidden in  the shadows of Bangkok

Available in April on Amazon Kindle as e book and  paperback.

Stay tuned to this blog for further information!

Follow Stephen Shaiken’s blog at: stephenshaiken.com

Follow Stephen Shaiken on Twitter:@StephenShaiken