Gerald Everett Jones's Blog: Gerald Everett Jones - Author, page 26

Anne Tyler's Angel-Eye View [Reprise]

To recap my observations from A Spool of Blue Thread in last week’s book review, here are some authors’ how-to rules she breaks:

A time-honored Hollywood maxim: The main character grows stronger as his villain opponent becomes meaner and stronger. To her credit, Tyler not only ignores this rule, she defies it. This story has no single main character – unless it’s the house.

Authors, your Hollywood agent or your book editor will tell you to raise the stakes to life and death. She quietly and bravely won’t go there. She gives us a no-fault auto accident and a sibling quarrel that ends with punch in the nose.

So how does Tyler do it? How by defying the rules does she engage us? Her narrative slows down to the pace of daily life. She gives us none of her own opinions, but a stream of meticulous detail about meals, clothes, woodwork, plants, weather, money problems, idle thoughts, and petty grievances. And in focusing on the marvels of the mundane, she helps us appreciate the joys of living our own ordinary and wonder-filled lives.

My book written for Anne Tyler fans is Christmas Karma, about a dysfunctional family coping with the holidays, narrated by an angel with a wacky sense of humor. For Thanksgiving holiday shoppers $1.99 Kindle from Amazon or EPUB from BN, iTunes, Kobo, Google...

Podcast Book Review: A Spool of Blue Thread

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Book Review - 'A Spool of Blue Thread' by Anne Tyler

There’s a saying in show business: Give them a new story that’s stood the test of time. Anne Tyler, who is possibly America’s most revered living novelist, has done just that. She’s presented us with a new, fictional extended family with all their foibles and melodrama, and placed them in the setting we know well from so many of her books – in the community of Roland Park in North Baltimore and in a hand-crafted old home with varnished hardwood floors, meticulously hung pocket doors, and vaulted ceilings.

The Whitshanks are a quirky, close-knit family of builders, craftsmen, and nurturers. And this house is their pride and joy. Its stately endurance through a family saga of three generations lends a sense of timelessness – but Tyler’s story is all about the passage of time and the influences our short lives have on each other.

This story has no single main character – unless it’s the family’s house. (Knopf)

Another time-honored Hollywood maxim: The main character grows stronger as his villain opponent becomes meaner and stronger. To her credit, Tyler not only ignores this rule, she defies it. This story has no single main character – unless it’s the house. And, as in all of her books, there are no vicious opponents. The engines of conflict whir almost entirely within the family. Adversaries that seem the most obnoxious, inconsiderate, and spiteful ultimately show us their redeeming qualities.
In every Anne Tyler novel, there’s a conspicuous bad boy. In A Spool of Blue Thread, Denny shows up on the first page. And throughout the story, he’s obnoxious, inconsiderate, and spiteful. And he’s the one his saintly mom loves best, and eventually, we do, too.

Authors, your Hollywood agent or your book editor will tell you to raise the stakes to life and death. The dreary result is on-screen violence – shootouts and fiery crashes and bloody mayhem. But Anne Tyler quietly and bravely won’t go there. She gives us a no-fault auto accident and a sibling quarrel that ends with punch in the nose.

So how does Tyler do it? How by defying the rules does she engage us? Her narrative slows down to the pace of daily life. She gives us none of her own opinions, but a stream of meticulous detail about meals, clothes, woodwork, plants, weather, money problems, idle thoughts, and petty grievances. And in focusing on the marvels of the mundane, she helps us appreciate the joys of living our own ordinary and wonder-filled lives.

My book written for Anne Tyler fans is Christmas Karma, about a dysfunctional family coping with the holidays, narrated by an angel with a wacky sense of humor. For Thanksgiving holiday shoppers $1.99 Kindle from Amazon or EPUB from BN, iTunes, Kobo, Google...

Podcast Book Review: A Spool of Blue Thread

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Christmas Karma: A Novel

I wrote this novel because I’m a fan of Anne Tyler

It’s been said that Tyler writes from the “angel’s-eye view.” That is, even her nasty characters eventually manage to redeem themselves and are forgivable. Christmas Karma is the story of a dysfunctional family when long-lost loves and resentments come knocking during the holidays. Dad, for one, has been missing for years and now shows up claiming he still owns the house and wants everybody out!

Willa Nawicki did not think she was a bad mother. Nor did she think she was an ungrateful or inattentive daughter. But she was afraid you would think so. Not necessarily you personally, but anyone who didn’t know her and attended to her story. If you learned just the facts and not the mitigating circumstances, she worried you might judge her harshly. And, although she seriously doubted there could be anything like an afterlife, if it turned out that she would indeed be judged there, she was worried it might not go well for her.

But she’s not telling her story here. I am. And who am I? That’s difficult to explain, but no need to be coy.

I live – rather, I exist – in that next life.

It’s not what people think of as heaven so much as a place in between. Now, I’m no angel (I certainly wasn’t when I lived as you do), but that notion is close enough. You might say, as an adult might explain to a curious child, that I’m Willa’s guardian angel. To someone who takes a more earthly view, I’d say I’m her sage self, a wiser part of her who lives in the future in another dimension but witnesses and participates in the here and now. Here being Pasadena and now being the advent of a Christmas season in the second decade of the twenty-first century.

Oh, and to be clear, just because I describe my situation as in-between, I don’t mean to imply, much less promise, the existence of a heaven. Like you, I haven’t been there, and I have no more information than you do about it. But you might take as evidence, as I do, that the reality of my influence on the Earth-plane is a strong suggestion that there is at least one other dimension besides yours – that is, the one I’m in. I suppose the crucial question is whether there exist other dimensions, which neither of us has yet experienced.

No need to get technical here, but I don’t have much in the way of supernatural powers. However, from my dimension, I can observe events along the flow of time – see through walls, even. I can read thoughts, not just Willa’s, as if they were spoken. I can glimpse more of the future than you are able to guess, but not too much more. And I can mine the past in meticulous detail. However, since I don’t have a body on the physical plane, I can’t take action. I can’t move so much as a saucer under a teacup. The most I can do is advise. And much of the time, my advice is either not heard or is ignored. Quite often, it’s misinterpreted. Then there’s a mess I must try to get a living human like you to help me clean up.

Another way you might think of me – I’m Willa’s karma administrator. Who gave me that job? Hey, enough with the questions. You should get it already that I’m not all-knowing.

And who are you? Honestly, I have no idea. As I write this (more precisely, as I advise the author to write this), I can’t predict who, if anyone, will pick it up and invest the necessary attention span. But I do know, if you continue to read, it’s because you were drawn here at a particular time in your own earthly life, at exactly the point at which something contained in these pages will prove valuable to you – or perhaps, just amusing.

Mind you, I’m not making claims or promises here. I can’t tell you what that engaging tidbit will be. You will be the one to discover it, and it may have value only to you. You might not even know you’ve found it, until sometime later when you find it of use. Someone else might take in the same words, ignore or miss the gist, and put the book down. And to that I say, so much the worse for you if you can’t take a joke.

Get the rest of the story here.

Or get the audiobook

Christmas Karma - The Angel’s Intro

Available from Audible.

Feed your curiosity with a paid subscription to this Thinking About Thinking blog. You’ll gain access to all the content that’s here, and you’ll be helping us build our worldwide community through storytelling and self-expression.

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Are you enjoying The Gilded Age?

It was all about vanity and status

When Julius LeBlanc Stewart’s painting The Baptism hung in the gallery at LACMA, the description on the museum card was brief and puzzling. These people might be a branch of the Vanderbilts, but no one knows for sure. It took me years of research (in the pre-Google era), and with the assistance of some Episcopal church historians, I found the answer - as well as why the subjects of the painting were scandalized by its existence. I felt I had to fictionalize the story because there were some notable gaps in the historical record, and novels after all must make sense. But even today, although the circumstantial evidence is unmistakable, the response of the museum curatorial staff has been, “It’s fiction, after all.”

But when, standing in front of the painting, I presented my findings to a roomful of curious docents, no one left early.

The Baptism by Julius LeBlanc Stewart was exhibited at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893, but it was never sold. Oddly, there is no existing evidence that it was a commissioned work. The painting remained in the artist’s estate until forty years after he died, then was sold to an art dealer. LACMA owns this huge canvas, but it is not currently on display.

In the fictional framework of the novel, in the present day, art historian Grace Atwood becomes obsessed with the painting and its hidden clues for reasons that have more to do with her personal ghosts. Either her doting husband is trying to make her think she’s crazy, or she really is in the early stages of dementia.

Art historians assumed the artist rendered an event that took place in Paris his own wealthy family. But a close study of the priest’s robe suggests an American Episcopal ceremony, and an old photograph of a Vanderbilt home that burned down in Newport, Rhode Island shows the room. If you’re curious, get the book!

Endorsements

“I must say, I am impressed with your sleuthing, your imagination and your ability to weave a story. Your theory is fascinating, and I personally would be quite excited if any piece of it proved true.”  —  Carson Joyner Clark, biographer of painter Julius Stewart

“Alva Vanderbilt Belmont would be very grateful to you for researching a Vanderbilt family painting – as will all the family. And as I do. Historians keep us alive!”  —  Margaret Hayden Rector, Vanderbilt biographer, author of Alva, That Vanderbilt-Belmont Woman

Want the facts and the crumb trail? For us obsessively curious types, there’s a Scholar’s Edition of the book, which contains the full text of the novel, as well as the white paper documenting my research with references, which appeared as an article in The Journal of Art Crime.

“Of the many inquiries we get, this has been the most interesting in a long time.”  —  The Very Rev. Harry E. Krauss (retired)

“I think you’ve done an extraordinary job of researching and speculating on the painting. You’ve certainly convinced me that this was a Vanderbilt affair!”  —  Mary Sudman Donovan, Historian, Episcopal Church USA, Author of A Different Call: Women’s Ministries in the Episcopal Church, 1850-1920

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Book Review - 'My Life on Tender: Arina and Cal' by A. G. Billig

A. G. Billig is a friend and colleague. Until the release today of this romantic novel, she has been perhaps best known for her philosophic and practical books on relationships: I Choose Love; 5 Steps to Ending a Toxic Relationship; and Open Your Heart, Rise in Love. She has also published Four Doors and Other Stories, and she’s founder and mistress of the Self-Publishing Mastery writers’-support blog.

I was a beta reader of another romantic comedy of hers, also tentatively titled My Life on Tender, but that was not the same story. I suspect it will be released as another title in her trilogy, but I’ll leave that for her to say. In this one, she casts Arina and Cal in a rockstar romance, and, as one might expect, Arina’s getting pulled into the magnetic thrall of Cal’s badass pretensions to celebrity is at the breaking heart of this story.

When I first picked up A. G.’s fiction, I was prepared for a pulpy, steamy, sweaty ride with loads of emotional baggage. I was pleasantly surprised that her confident style is more mature and thoughtful than I anticipated. Think Nora Ephron.

My Life on Tender: Arina and Cal - first of a series of (at least) three. Released today!

Yes, swiping right begins the story. The plot motors along like a Harley tour of SoCal beaches. Wrestling with male attraction, dominance, and control is the throbbing, purring engine. After all, as Aristotle no doubt advised his horny teenage students, conflict is drama. (Also, humor.)

The moment I recover my entire range of emotion, I’ll punch Hailey in the face for sleeping with Cal. She didn’t enjoy it, though—that’s good! Argh, it happened three times. Despite cheating on me and lying to me, Cal portrays himself as the victim and preaches about the importance of honesty. This isn’t fair! What am I supposed to do?

“Stop being a pushover,” Screech squeaks in the back of my mind.

Pushover? Me?

Shut up, Screech!

I never imagined myself as a doormat, yet my irritating alter-ego might be correct, and admitting it is uncomfortable. I feel my body temperature rising, and my hands clench into tight fists. My middle name is not perfection; yet, my slip-ups are not major. Or are they?

Is rockstar Cal a jerk? Is “bad boy” essential to Arina’s idea of a desirable mate - at least in bed, bent over the kitchen table, or getting a crack full of sand on the beach?

Do you wonder about the guardrails and mishaps of cruising and adventuring in relationships in the pre- and post-#MeToo eras? If Cal were courteous and considerate, would Arina cease to adore him?

Born in Romania, A. G. Billig writes in articulate, sophisticated English. Her distinctive, accented speaking voice might remind you of Ariana Huffington. A. G. makes her home in Sedona, where she thinks about thinking as she listens to the wind whistling through the red rocks.

Billig has been there, done that. She cautions this book is not a memoir, but it’s fair to say the story is informed by, ah, experience. In her Acknowledgments, without rancor, she thanks the anonymous contributors to her wise catalog of lessons learned.

My Life on Tender: Arina and Cal is released today, available here.

Feed your curiosity with a paid subscription to this Thinking About Thinking blog. You’ll gain access to all the content that’s here, and you’ll be helping us build our worldwide community through storytelling and self-expression.

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Book Review - 'The Beginner's Goodbye' by Anne Tyler

Here’s my book review of The Beginner’s Goodbye by Anne Tyler.

It’s a story about love and sudden, tragic loss. Some fans complain it’s too short. So read it twice.

The Beginner’s Goodbye by Anne Tyler (Vintage). Read it twice.

The second time through, slow down. Marvel at Anne Tyler's spare style. And ask yourself why it's not the same as other authors who limit themselves to twenty-word sentences, no more than two clauses per.

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Join me on Notes

I just published a note on Substack Notes, and would love for you to join me there. It’s a discussion thread for reactions to my posts, and from time to time I’ll show a book deal of mine or a colleague’s. And it’s focused, not flaming.

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Thinking About Thinking is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Notes is a space on Substack for us to share links, short posts, quotes, photos, and more.

Go to Notes

How to join

Head to substack.com/notes or find the “Notes” tab in the Substack app. As a subscriber to Thinking About Thinking, you’ll automatically see my notes. Feel free to like, reply, or share them around!

You can also share notes of your own. I hope this becomes a space where every reader of Thinking About Thinking can share thoughts, ideas, and interesting quotes from the things we're reading on Substack and beyond.

Why Substack Notes

Fellow writers and readers are spending time in Notes for a variety of reasons.

Ted Gioia sees Notes as a forum for dialogue.

The idea behind Notes is simple. Millions of people now participate in Substack as writers and readers—but much of this is built on long articles and essays. We now have a forum for dialoguing and sharing shorter posts.

Chris Ryan is drawn to Substack as an alternative for legacy social media.

One of my main reasons for joining Substack was to wean myself off exploitative social media platforms. I’m hoping this is going to help move us along on that journey!

Sherman Alexie wants to create a kind and creative new space in Notes.

I’m going to focus on being positive, with my own thoughts and photos and by linking to songs, stories, poems from around the web and from other Substacks.

If you encounter any issues, you can always refer to the Notes FAQ for assistance. Looking forward to seeing you there!

Go to Notes

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Searching for Jonah - The Disruptive History Version

Searching for Jonah: Clues in Hebrew and Assyrian History by Don E. Jones

My father, Donald Everett Jones, wrote this disruptive book, although the implications of its conclusions may still be apparent mainly to students of theology. It's a brilliant analysis of the Bible story, with some startlingly original insights about what might have really happened, including the strange story of Jonah's being protected in Nineveh by a gourd that grew overnight. Through linguistic analysis and some clever inference, Dad realized that the “gourd” was a coded message about Jonah’s alliance with the pro-Israel Assyrian rebel faction led by Apliya. The gourd reference is a pun on the insurgent leader’s name, Apu-lilu, or "son of the night."

Although not published until after Dad had suffered a debilitating stroke, he recognized his name on the cover, and he may have known his caregivers were speaking about him when they bragged about “our author in residence.”

Here’s the story behind the story…

Dad was trained as a chemical engineer. Having experienced the privations of the Great Depression as a child and then the stresses of WWII as a naval officer, when the war was over, he chose a career with an oil company that promised a stable income so he could support a family.

But all through his adult life, he was something of a closeted history professor, and he developed a fascination for Biblical archaeology. Over the years while I was growing up, he’d occasionally mention he was working on a book, usually providing no explanation about its subject. I eventually learned he’d formed an unusual interpretation of the Book of Jonah, including the notion that the prophet was a Hebrew diplomat on a secret mission to Assyria, where his story about surviving a shipwreck caused local storytellers to assume he was the incarnation of an ancient seafaring god.

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Mystery Writers Panel Recording

What is the essence of mystery that captivates readers?

Click this link to the IWOSC site to buy ($20 for nonmembers, $5 for members) a recording of this thought-provoking 90-minute webinar.

From cozy to crime, from gore to love betrayed, what is it about all these ways of storytelling that makes them shelved as mysteries? We convene a panel of experienced and prize-winning mystery authors to explore the vast possibilities of this super-genre. As authors and publishers ourselves, we want to know what works and what doesn’t, where to start, and—oh, my!—where and how someone ended it all!

Join us for a full and frank exchange of views, stimulated by queries such as:

Facing the blank page, how might the approach to a mystery differ from, say, writing a memoir or an investigative journalism piece?

What are the distinctions among mystery, thriller, and suspense?

Can a cozy be violent or profane? Can hard-boiled crime be in any way soft? Can dark give hope?

Should we be careful about cultural influences, references, and descriptions?

Must we always start with a dead body?

How thoroughly do you (must you) research? And how?

Okay, give us the scoop. How do you promote a mystery?

Can a standalone mystery be successful, or is developing a series a “must” these days?

Meet our panelists:

P. L. Hampton

Emerging Dark Fiction

Phillip draws readers into a world of family, ancient artifacts, and the hidden shadows of the past. Born and raised in Seattle, Washington, Hampton now serves as a college professor while also pursuing his JD, balancing his academic pursuits with his passion for writing.

His novel, Shadowland, weaves authentic familial lore with intriguing historical truths. Inspired by real events, this gripping tale centers around the mysterious Yoruba Divination Board, an artifact that spirals Aaron Langford and his family into an inescapable path. Hampton skillfully blends fact and fiction, inviting readers to ponder the origins and workings of this central artifact while immersing them in the Langford family’s unanticipated journey.

Before turning to academia and writing, Hampton spent nearly twelve years navigating various sectors of the finance industry, gaining experiences that undoubtedly shape his richly layered narratives. Currently residing in San Diego with his wife, Tonya, he continues to explore the fascinating intersection of history and horror in his works.

Pamela DuMond

Cozy, Historical Fantasy, Psychological

Pam is a USA Today bestselling author of over thirty-five novels, including cozy mysteries, romance, historical fantasy, and psychological thrillers.

A recent release from this prolific author is The Case of the Sugar Plum Shenanigans in her Cheesehead Lodge mystery series.

She pitched the real-life Erin Brockovich Story to Jersey Films. “Erin Brockovich” the movie was nominated for four Academy Awards, and Pam was featured on “ABC 20/20.”

She’s written visual novels /interactive games for Pixelberry Studios, and worked with TV/Movie producers developing Film/TV adaptations and scripts. Her books have been optioned for Film/TV, licensed for games, and foreign translations.

She lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, where she consumes audiobooks, swims like a mermaid, and is bossed around by cats.

Connect with Pamela on her website pameladumond.com.

Marvin J. Wolf

Violence, Intrigue, and Rabbinic Wisdom

Marv is a distinguished past president of IWOSC who began his career as a photojournalist and investigative reporter. He has written hundreds of magazine and newspaper articles and authored, co-authored, or ghost-authored twenty-five books, including novels, history, biography, true crime, and business.

Wolf understands human conflict, its means and its motivations. He spent more than three years in the US Army infantry, rising to sergeant by his nineteenth birthday. After two years in line units, he became an instructor in hand-to-hand combat at Fort Benning’s Infantry School. During the Berlin Wall Crisis of 1961, he served as a drill instructor at Ft. Jackson, South Carolina.

His Rabbi Ben mystery series fuses his religious heritage with intricate plots. He describes M-9, one of his edgy Chelmin and Spaulding CID mysteries, as “like being in the front seat of the world’s wildest roller coaster… When you hit that last page, you get the feeling of, ‘Ah man, this can’t be the end already.’”

He lives in Asheville, North Carolina, with his adult daughter and two neurotic Chihuahuas.

Read more about Marv at marvinjwolf.com.

Gerald Everett Jones, Host

Among Gerald’s thirteen novels (so far) are the award-winning Preacher Evan Wycliff mysteries. His “Thinking About Thinking” Substack series muses on all things literary, and he’s the host of the GetPublished! Radio podcast. He’s a longtime member of IWOSC and serves on our board.

Click this link to the IWOSC site buy ($20 for nonmembers, $5 for members) a recording of this thought-provoking 90-minute webinar.

Feed your curiosity with a paid subscription to this Thinking About Thinking blog. You’ll gain access to all the content that’s here, and you’ll be helping us build our worldwide community through storytelling and self-expression.

Thinking About Thinking is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Book Review - 'Final Warning: Return of the Neanderthals' by David Drum

David Drum is a longtime friend and colleague. At various times we’ve served on the board of the Independent Writers of Southern California (IWOSC).

I was a beta reader of his previous novel Heathcliff: The Lost Years. It’s a sequel to Wuthering Heights, and I expected a dark romance. But in recounting the details of Heathcliff’s disappearance, Drum gave us instead a seafaring yarn reminiscent of Master and Commander, combined with bitter depictions of the slave-trade brutality and British mercantilist greed.

The cover of Final Warning suggests a broad-scope science-fiction adventure, and the book is every bit of that. I was surprised to see this genre from this author, but then I reflected how Margaret Atwood turned a corner from literary to dystopian fiction in The Handmaid’s Tale, then into sci-fi with Oryx and Crake. Like Atwood as in Drum’s historical novel, the brooding social themes are there in Final Warning, just beneath the surface - including the destiny of human evolution and the fatal consequences of unchecked avarice.

Final Warning - improbable fiction with real-world consequences. Released today!

The engine of the plot kick-starts when scientists stumble upon a group of Neanderthals. To complicate matters, powerful interests in the developed world are bent on exploiting the find, compounded by their misuse of a new telecommunications technology. Oh, and if this mashup isn’t bizarre enough, there are elements of extraterrestrial visitation, Wiccan traditions, and Celtic prophesies.

Humor is clearly the intent of the entertainment. Brooding on the fate of human civilization would be all too gloomy if it weren’t so amusing.

Final Warning: Return of the Neanderthals is released today, October 31, available in Kindle and paperback here.

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