David Klein's Blog, page 30

A Mural for the Rail Trail

I’m not someone who feels especially embedded in my community, even though mental health experts say a sense of community is important to well-being. So I’d been meaning to find ways to get more involved locally, because I always listen to what the experts say. I volunteered for the crew to help artist Fernando Orellana […]

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Long Live the Sugar Maple

I am stressed about our sugar maple under duress. Was it sixteen or eighteen years ago we planted it—I’m not so good at record keeping. We’ve watched the tree grow and every autumn its leaves have kept their promise. Sugar maples are experts at that. Every year I’m thinking I’ve never seen a more beautiful […]

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The NYS Writers Institute Resides in the Doughnut Hole

What does one do on a sunny, mild September Saturday? In my case, I spend it indoors at the Book Festival presented by the New York State Writers Institute at the University at Albany. I’ve heard people call this area of upstate New York the hole in the doughnut. They say there’s nothing really here, […]

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Is “The Culling” Catching On?

I’ve been getting some enthusiastic feedback about “The Culling,” my dystopian thriller about a woman on the run from an unjust death sentence and the mercenary assigned to hunt her. If you haven’t had a chance to check it out, here’s the link. Below is a brief scene from the novel. It takes place just […]

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A Different Kind of Mafia

Bills Mafia refers to the collective fanbase of the NFL’s Buffalo Bills. The term got its start in 2010 when Bills fan Del Reid got was sparring on Twitter with Adam Schefter, an ESPN reporter. Schefter blocked Reid, who responded with the hashtag #BillsMafia. The hashtag grew and grew. Bills fans and players both embraced […]

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The Conversationalist

1 “Yes, I was in Santa Cruz for the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. It happened at exactly 5:04 in the afternoon which I knew because that was the time when all the clocks stopped when the power cut out. I had just gotten home and was in my kitchen when the rumbling started and then […]

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Goal-Oriented on Blackdome

I’m sitting with two friends on a rock outcropping on top of Black Dome in the Catskill Mountains.  It took us three hours to reach the summit, a hefty hike including hand-over-hand steep spots, shaded cols, and endless one foot in front of the other to navigate the rocks and roots. The satisfaction of the […]

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My Father Started a Fire

I got a call from my sister who said my father was in the hospital. He’s a long-time widower who lives alone a few towns away from where we do and he’d done something that can only be considered ill-conceived and a major error in judgment. This happened during the big storm that passed through […]

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A Sizzling End-of-Summer Read

Hey there—if you’re looking for a hot, page-turning beach read to cap the summer season, I’ve just published my third novel: “The Culling.” This dystopian thriller is about a woman on the run from an unjust death sentence who teams up with the mercenary assigned to hunt her in an attempt to escape and join […]

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I Had to Write a Dystopian Novel

Genre fiction fits into defined categories in order to appeal to readers who groove on that particular type of story. Fantasy, crime, science fiction, thriller, horror, and romance are popular genres. I never thought I’d dabble in genre fiction. My other novels (Stash, Clean Break) can only be considered general fiction. Not literary enough for […]

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