William Elliott azelgrove's Blog, page 8
March 9, 2020
The Expedition That Saved America
Henry Knox was a a twenty five year old bookseller with no military experience. George Washington had just taken over the American Army at Boston and had no artillery to force the British out of the city. The two meet outside of Boston on a road and Washington is immediately taken with the fatuous heavyset young man who had just fled Boston with his wife. He soon makes Knox the head of his artillery. Washington had a habit of promoting young men with little experience based on his feeling of future potential. Knox is really the head of nothing as George Washington has no cannons.
But 300 miles away is Fort Ticonderoga which the Americans had captured along with 60 tons of cannons. Knox immediately proposes he goes and drags the cannon back to the army outside of Boston to use on the British. He heads off with his brother and a small contingent of soldiers in November 1775 in the dead of winter to retrieve the cannons. This begins a two month journey over frozen lakes, rivers, and mountains using oxen and sleds to bring back the cannons to Washington. The trip is fraught with cannons plunging though the ice, blizzards, breakdowns, frozen men and beasts, and a mutiny by the men in the Berkshire mountains that almost derails the expedition .
Finally on January 27 1776 Knox returns with the cannons which Washington loses no time in putting up on Dorchester Heights to shell the British in Boston and also the British ships in the harbor. General Howe can scarcely believe the Americans were able to haul the cannons up to the cliffs of Dorchester in one night and abandons Boston, giving the Americans their first victory.
"Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
But 300 miles away is Fort Ticonderoga which the Americans had captured along with 60 tons of cannons. Knox immediately proposes he goes and drags the cannon back to the army outside of Boston to use on the British. He heads off with his brother and a small contingent of soldiers in November 1775 in the dead of winter to retrieve the cannons. This begins a two month journey over frozen lakes, rivers, and mountains using oxen and sleds to bring back the cannons to Washington. The trip is fraught with cannons plunging though the ice, blizzards, breakdowns, frozen men and beasts, and a mutiny by the men in the Berkshire mountains that almost derails the expedition .
Finally on January 27 1776 Knox returns with the cannons which Washington loses no time in putting up on Dorchester Heights to shell the British in Boston and also the British ships in the harbor. General Howe can scarcely believe the Americans were able to haul the cannons up to the cliffs of Dorchester in one night and abandons Boston, giving the Americans their first victory.
"Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
March 6, 2020
Five Things You Didn't Know About the First Victory of the American Revolution
The first victory of the American Revolution was over the British at Boston. George Washington had just taken command of the American Army in June of 1775 and had just met a young bookseller named Henry Knox. Here are Five Things you Probably Didn't know.
1. George Washington had been running his plantation for fifteen years and had no experience on how to run a siege against Boston or how to run a large army. In fact he lamented taking command an complained about the stupidity of the troops. He wrote that if he had known the condition of the army he would have never taken command.
2. Henry Knox was a twenty five year old bookseller who had no military experience at all. George Washington made him a Colonel of the Artillery and sent him 300 miles in the middle of winter to retrieve 60 tons of cannons because they had no artillery to force the British out of Boston. Nobody thought Knox was capable of getting the 120,000 pounds of cannons that is the equivalent of 28 SUVS back to Boston.
3. Knox used oxen and sleds to transport the cannons.When he crossed Lake George a cannon fell through the ice and had to retrieved. He then crossed the Hudson river where a 5000 pound cannon went through the ice and it took the the whole town of Albany to pull it back to the surface. When he crossed the Berkshire mountains the men refused to go no further. It took Knox three hours of pleading with the men to get them to continue. It took two months to bring the cannon back.
4. Washington put Knox'x cannons up on Dorchester Heights overlooking Boston in one night and when the British woke up they found themselves under bombardment. General Howe tried to attack but a freak snowstorm drove him back and he opted to leave Boston, giving the Americans their first victory.
5. Henry Knox's journey of pulling the cannons to Washington in 1775 is referred to as the Noble Train because Henry Knox wrote Washington a letter from the wilderness stating he was bringing to him "his noble train of artillery."
Henry Knox Noble Train
"Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
1. George Washington had been running his plantation for fifteen years and had no experience on how to run a siege against Boston or how to run a large army. In fact he lamented taking command an complained about the stupidity of the troops. He wrote that if he had known the condition of the army he would have never taken command.
2. Henry Knox was a twenty five year old bookseller who had no military experience at all. George Washington made him a Colonel of the Artillery and sent him 300 miles in the middle of winter to retrieve 60 tons of cannons because they had no artillery to force the British out of Boston. Nobody thought Knox was capable of getting the 120,000 pounds of cannons that is the equivalent of 28 SUVS back to Boston.
3. Knox used oxen and sleds to transport the cannons.When he crossed Lake George a cannon fell through the ice and had to retrieved. He then crossed the Hudson river where a 5000 pound cannon went through the ice and it took the the whole town of Albany to pull it back to the surface. When he crossed the Berkshire mountains the men refused to go no further. It took Knox three hours of pleading with the men to get them to continue. It took two months to bring the cannon back.
4. Washington put Knox'x cannons up on Dorchester Heights overlooking Boston in one night and when the British woke up they found themselves under bombardment. General Howe tried to attack but a freak snowstorm drove him back and he opted to leave Boston, giving the Americans their first victory.
5. Henry Knox's journey of pulling the cannons to Washington in 1775 is referred to as the Noble Train because Henry Knox wrote Washington a letter from the wilderness stating he was bringing to him "his noble train of artillery."
Henry Knox Noble Train
"Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
March 2, 2020
The Only Thing to Fear is Fear Itself
We can beat this thing. But we have to stick together. During the Great Depression President Harding took the philosophy that the market would correct itself and took a hands off attitude to the economy. It soon became clear he didn't know what to do when the Great Depression became more severe and in places like Chicago unemployment hit forty percent with a third of the banks failing. People were starving and fear was weaponized in a way that was paralyzing. Enter Franklin Delano Roosevelt who in his inaugural address told the American people, the only thing to fear is fear itself. People listened. This man had polio and could no longer walk and here he was telling people that fear was not to be feared. The world became a little brighter.
So it remains to be seen if Donald Trump will be the next President Harding, helpless before a problem he has no idea how to handle. And of course we dont know if there is an FDR on the way. But his assurance that fear is the only thing to really fear is more relevant than ever. The headlines of the New York Times, CNN, and other newspapers scream black news all day long. Of course people are afraid. China just reported the lowest number of new cases since the outbreak but this is sandwiched under the bleak news of deaths and new cases in the US. Going online now is a bit like a ride into a lurid haunted house where one remains shaken and very afraid.
But the truth is compared to influenza the new virus is still like a cousin who no one is sure of but no one wants to get near. Hope is the opposite of fear. And we need that now. The Doom and Gloom of every latest pundit with a book (yes they are coming out that fast on pandemics) is not helping anyone. I have one for the media, why don't we get off the sensationalism of bad news and switch to what people can do to fight the virus. You know, how to solve the problem instead of describing the sinking of the ship every five seconds. The man who lost his ability to walk in his thirties, knew about fear and how to handle it. His words ring true today. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
So it remains to be seen if Donald Trump will be the next President Harding, helpless before a problem he has no idea how to handle. And of course we dont know if there is an FDR on the way. But his assurance that fear is the only thing to really fear is more relevant than ever. The headlines of the New York Times, CNN, and other newspapers scream black news all day long. Of course people are afraid. China just reported the lowest number of new cases since the outbreak but this is sandwiched under the bleak news of deaths and new cases in the US. Going online now is a bit like a ride into a lurid haunted house where one remains shaken and very afraid.
But the truth is compared to influenza the new virus is still like a cousin who no one is sure of but no one wants to get near. Hope is the opposite of fear. And we need that now. The Doom and Gloom of every latest pundit with a book (yes they are coming out that fast on pandemics) is not helping anyone. I have one for the media, why don't we get off the sensationalism of bad news and switch to what people can do to fight the virus. You know, how to solve the problem instead of describing the sinking of the ship every five seconds. The man who lost his ability to walk in his thirties, knew about fear and how to handle it. His words ring true today. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
February 28, 2020
Henry Knox's Noble Train or How did a Boston Bookseller Save the American Revolution?
Pulling sixty tons of cannons in the dead of winter in 1775. That is what he did. With oxen and sleds and men with ropes and chains. It was the equivalent of 28 SUVS. He pulled the cannon 300 miles over frozen lakes, rivers, and mountains. In snow, ice, hail, freezing temperatures, thawing temperatures with the danger that Indians, the British, or the weather would stop he and his men who had become the hope of the American Revolution. So how did a twenty five year old Boston Bookseller become the man who would give the Americans their first victory over the British?It is a serendipitous tale.
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George Washington is laying siege to Boston but he has no artillery. It is the winter of 1775 and the forty three year old General is just taking over after running a plantation for fifteen years. He has no idea how to get the British out besides a frontal assault and for this he has not the men or the gunpowder. Enter Benedict Arnold and Ethan Allen who have taken Fort Ticonderoga with 60 tons of cannons within its walls. This fort is 300 miles away with frozen lakes, rivers, and mountains separating Boston from the artillery Washington desperately needs to dislodge the British. He meets a fat young man on a road while inspecting fortifications who will change history.
Henry Knox tells the general he will get the cannons. He has just left Boston with his wife and abandoned his bookstore to the British. He has read everything there is to know about artillery and while he has no actual experience he has certainly read about transporting cannons and so Washington gives him his orders. Bring back the cannons from Fort Ticonderoga. Knox sets off in November and will not return until late January. The incredible feat of bringing these cannon back from Fort Ticonderoga over sixty agonizing days in the winter of f 1775 is the story of
Henry Knox's Noble Train
"Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
\
George Washington is laying siege to Boston but he has no artillery. It is the winter of 1775 and the forty three year old General is just taking over after running a plantation for fifteen years. He has no idea how to get the British out besides a frontal assault and for this he has not the men or the gunpowder. Enter Benedict Arnold and Ethan Allen who have taken Fort Ticonderoga with 60 tons of cannons within its walls. This fort is 300 miles away with frozen lakes, rivers, and mountains separating Boston from the artillery Washington desperately needs to dislodge the British. He meets a fat young man on a road while inspecting fortifications who will change history.
Henry Knox tells the general he will get the cannons. He has just left Boston with his wife and abandoned his bookstore to the British. He has read everything there is to know about artillery and while he has no actual experience he has certainly read about transporting cannons and so Washington gives him his orders. Bring back the cannons from Fort Ticonderoga. Knox sets off in November and will not return until late January. The incredible feat of bringing these cannon back from Fort Ticonderoga over sixty agonizing days in the winter of f 1775 is the story of
Henry Knox's Noble Train
"Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
February 13, 2020
The Predators Who Prey on Authors
Occasionally I'll get a call from an author predator. It begins like this. Yeah hey this Mike from Doowop Press and we really love your work and want to talk to you. Mike will then precede to tell me how much he loves my books and they would love to publish my work...for a small fee. Usually 5 grand is where it starts. I don't return these calls but they stay on you. I haven't heard from you...are you ok? Eventually I block the number.
But many authors fall prey to these predators. Unpublished authors are looking for validation and unfortunately these companies know this. And they make their money off of authors who are desperate to get their work out there and then five or ten grand later the book dies a silent death but they are already on to their next victim. It gets even worse with the movie predators.
Hey William we read your novel and think it would make a great movie. Usually two people work in tandem. One is a person who initially contacts you and then they bring in the big gun agent who is not an agent at all. We can get your book in front of top line producers and they will make it into a movie...for a fee. Again it is in the thousands. The word Hollywood is Christmas for most authors and so this is a strong play and unfortunately many authors get fleeced finding out too late they have no contacts at all and worse they never read your book.
Publishers are supposed to pay authors not the other way around, Movie producers are supposed to pay authors. Agents are supposed to work on commission. But just hearing that someone loves your book is a tonic to the gin of years of struggle and it is that drunkenness of perceived success these predators bank on. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
But many authors fall prey to these predators. Unpublished authors are looking for validation and unfortunately these companies know this. And they make their money off of authors who are desperate to get their work out there and then five or ten grand later the book dies a silent death but they are already on to their next victim. It gets even worse with the movie predators.
Hey William we read your novel and think it would make a great movie. Usually two people work in tandem. One is a person who initially contacts you and then they bring in the big gun agent who is not an agent at all. We can get your book in front of top line producers and they will make it into a movie...for a fee. Again it is in the thousands. The word Hollywood is Christmas for most authors and so this is a strong play and unfortunately many authors get fleeced finding out too late they have no contacts at all and worse they never read your book.
Publishers are supposed to pay authors not the other way around, Movie producers are supposed to pay authors. Agents are supposed to work on commission. But just hearing that someone loves your book is a tonic to the gin of years of struggle and it is that drunkenness of perceived success these predators bank on. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
February 11, 2020
Parasite is the Great Gatsby of our Era
I said to my wife in the car after seeing Parasite that it was Gatsby. I hadn't thought about it since but the more that film resonates and now after getting Best Picture I really do believe it is a modern parable much in the same vein of F. Scott Fitzgerald's Great Gatsby. Both stories involve class stratification and ultimately class warfare. Parasite and Gatsby may be culturally worlds apart but they both tell the story of the American Dream or the World Dream gone bad.
Gatsby's telling of Tom Buchannan's world of privilege that Gatsby has bought his way into by being a bootlegger is much the same as the Kim's world of buying their way into the one percent by posing as servants to the upper class. Deception is key in both stories. Gatsby fakes his lineage and the source of his money while the Kim's fake their pedigrees of education and serving the rich. The protagonists of both parables are doomed by their efforts to move up and ultimately destroyed by the forces that hold them down.
While Gatsby is but a 1920s singular comment on the American Dream as it existed in early twentieth century America, Parasite spreads out and gives the world view that the dream of having a family and living a life of satisfying work, leisure, with a comfortable home and a better world for our children transcends the boundaries of America and reaches into the corners of the world as a modern comment on the ongoing struggle between the haves and have nots. In both cases, Gatsby being shot by Myrtle Wilsons deranged husband and the Kim's destruction at the hand of the deranged husband of the housekeeper are eerily similar in that the rich use the very people they oppress to murder those who dare to break out of their class. Ninety five years separate these two stories, but the world that is painted is much the same.
william hazelgrove"Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
Gatsby's telling of Tom Buchannan's world of privilege that Gatsby has bought his way into by being a bootlegger is much the same as the Kim's world of buying their way into the one percent by posing as servants to the upper class. Deception is key in both stories. Gatsby fakes his lineage and the source of his money while the Kim's fake their pedigrees of education and serving the rich. The protagonists of both parables are doomed by their efforts to move up and ultimately destroyed by the forces that hold them down.
While Gatsby is but a 1920s singular comment on the American Dream as it existed in early twentieth century America, Parasite spreads out and gives the world view that the dream of having a family and living a life of satisfying work, leisure, with a comfortable home and a better world for our children transcends the boundaries of America and reaches into the corners of the world as a modern comment on the ongoing struggle between the haves and have nots. In both cases, Gatsby being shot by Myrtle Wilsons deranged husband and the Kim's destruction at the hand of the deranged husband of the housekeeper are eerily similar in that the rich use the very people they oppress to murder those who dare to break out of their class. Ninety five years separate these two stories, but the world that is painted is much the same.
william hazelgrove"Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
December 26, 2019
When Christmas Is Finally Over
You are left with a hollow feeling after all that relief that you pulled it off. You fight the desire to watch A Christmas Story one more time or Bing in Holiday Inn or White Christmas. The tree is beginning to lose its needles and your bank account has been hollowed out...and still you just cant quite believe its all over. And there is some loss there. A door closing on some distant past that you as an adult can only get a glimpse of a few times. Sometimes, almost never.
And it is like being a kid again. Christmas is one big look back to when you were young, Your own children experience it as a first time but for all the adults it is a well trod road that ends on December 26th and then finally when all the ornaments and decorations are packed away for the next year. And maybe it is all the old Christmas movies that does it or it is as simple as putting the brakes on our very important lives for just a day and that's when those memories move in and you remember getting a first bike or loved ones who have passed or just the simple pleasure of being in your home and feeling for once this is enough.
But it ends. And like that incredible lookback at simpler times that is most Christmas Movies it is a nostalgia trip into your own simpler, younger self that lurks behind that adult trying to get all done all the time. So you cant help but feel wistful that it all went by once again too fast and that maybe next year you can slow it down and enjoy it more, but Christmas has its own timetable and it is but once a year and so the best we can do as we leave the attic or the basement and turn off the light on all those memories is know that in twelve months we can do it all over again. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
And it is like being a kid again. Christmas is one big look back to when you were young, Your own children experience it as a first time but for all the adults it is a well trod road that ends on December 26th and then finally when all the ornaments and decorations are packed away for the next year. And maybe it is all the old Christmas movies that does it or it is as simple as putting the brakes on our very important lives for just a day and that's when those memories move in and you remember getting a first bike or loved ones who have passed or just the simple pleasure of being in your home and feeling for once this is enough.
But it ends. And like that incredible lookback at simpler times that is most Christmas Movies it is a nostalgia trip into your own simpler, younger self that lurks behind that adult trying to get all done all the time. So you cant help but feel wistful that it all went by once again too fast and that maybe next year you can slow it down and enjoy it more, but Christmas has its own timetable and it is but once a year and so the best we can do as we leave the attic or the basement and turn off the light on all those memories is know that in twelve months we can do it all over again. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
December 17, 2019
Dont Let America Age You
The irony of our hope I did before I get old culture is that it makes people old before their time. Our marketing colossus the United States of Mass Media pushes out pictures of the young while relegating the old to the drug commercials that are mystifying in their names and what ailments they cure. But we are typed very quickly. You are either young or old in America and if you doubt this then wait for the AARP flyer to descend even as you slip through your forties. But it is more insidious than that.
American culture demands everyone remain young. Just watch the digitally altered faces of Robert Deiniro and Al Pacino on the Irishman. Old actors who are extremely famous nead not apply unless they can be turned into twenty or thirty somethings.The frustrating view that everyone is young until they are old is that everyone ages at different rates and different ways. People do not magically turn grey and appear in commericals of retirement homes or 55 plus active living communities playing tennis or sitting on a porch swing in octogenarian bliss. Moreover people go about their lives, some showing their age and many who seem blissfully unaware they have crossed the cultural boundary dividing the vibrant young from the parked and decrepit old.
But America for all of its young ethos cannot deal with people aging. They are either performing herculean plastic surgery (see Jane Fonda or Dolly Parton) or they have a walker. The middle group is largely absent from our culture. That would be the youth cultures greatest victim, adults who grew up and no longer look like they are still just ten years our of college. Uh...they are called adults. You know those people in the old movies smoking cigarettes, having drinks, and sex, and everything else that young people have. So you really are as old as you feel. Just turn off the television showing all those drugged up old people and those vibrant young people. And then just live your life. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
American culture demands everyone remain young. Just watch the digitally altered faces of Robert Deiniro and Al Pacino on the Irishman. Old actors who are extremely famous nead not apply unless they can be turned into twenty or thirty somethings.The frustrating view that everyone is young until they are old is that everyone ages at different rates and different ways. People do not magically turn grey and appear in commericals of retirement homes or 55 plus active living communities playing tennis or sitting on a porch swing in octogenarian bliss. Moreover people go about their lives, some showing their age and many who seem blissfully unaware they have crossed the cultural boundary dividing the vibrant young from the parked and decrepit old.
But America for all of its young ethos cannot deal with people aging. They are either performing herculean plastic surgery (see Jane Fonda or Dolly Parton) or they have a walker. The middle group is largely absent from our culture. That would be the youth cultures greatest victim, adults who grew up and no longer look like they are still just ten years our of college. Uh...they are called adults. You know those people in the old movies smoking cigarettes, having drinks, and sex, and everything else that young people have. So you really are as old as you feel. Just turn off the television showing all those drugged up old people and those vibrant young people. And then just live your life. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
December 3, 2019
What Did they do to Robert Diniro in the Irishman?
Love the gangster flicks. The Untouchables. Once upon a time in America. So I settled in for the Irishman, Scorsese new epic on the Hoffa era of gangsterism. So there is Deniro looking old in a nursing home telling his story. Well, he is old so it fits. Maybe not nursing home old but seventies old. And so he flashes back to his twenties and there is Deniro again. Only he is no longer old. He is digitally young now. He looks like someone inflated his forehead and nailed his eyes down into two slits. But they left his body intact after some padding around the soldiers.
So now Pacino and Deniro can play any role in the world. No longer will actors have to act their age. Just watch Helen Mirren in Catherine the Great. They worked hard on those camera angles there. But back to Deniro who is now driving a truck as a twenty something man and he bumps in Joe Pesci who looks old but that is his real age. So the digital Deniro and flesh and blood Pesci talk and then Joe delivers the line well young fella or young man. How about well, digital man. None of it really works. The suspension of disbelief gets tied up into the android that is digital Deniro
Forget the retread of every Deniro face and action. It is like watching a lot of old Deniro movies played by the new digital Deniro. But he is done in when he has to climb some rocks to toss away a gun and the digital Deniro moves like an old man. He is slow, stiff, and you can almost see him reaching for his back. But you know what, that moment was at least real. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
So now Pacino and Deniro can play any role in the world. No longer will actors have to act their age. Just watch Helen Mirren in Catherine the Great. They worked hard on those camera angles there. But back to Deniro who is now driving a truck as a twenty something man and he bumps in Joe Pesci who looks old but that is his real age. So the digital Deniro and flesh and blood Pesci talk and then Joe delivers the line well young fella or young man. How about well, digital man. None of it really works. The suspension of disbelief gets tied up into the android that is digital Deniro
Forget the retread of every Deniro face and action. It is like watching a lot of old Deniro movies played by the new digital Deniro. But he is done in when he has to climb some rocks to toss away a gun and the digital Deniro moves like an old man. He is slow, stiff, and you can almost see him reaching for his back. But you know what, that moment was at least real. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
The Death of the Book that Didnt Happen
Oh it was supposed to go the way of the IPOD. You know the book. It was over. We would all be listening to or reading our books on kindles and those anachronistic tombs would be just hanging around the shelves waiting to start a good bonfire. But...but...it didn't happen. Wait a minute. You mean the economics behind ripping a .99 cent song or spotify didn't apply to books? Come on. People are driven by economics and convenience and it surely is cheaper and easier to download a book than lugging around a pound and half of books in your backpack. So...RIP book.
But then it didn't happen. Maybe it was the college class of advanced fiction or intro English that tipped me off. I told the students on the first day. Yes you can download the books if you want. How many people have kindles? Crickets. How many people download books to their computers. Crickets. Wait a minute. The vaunted eighteen year old tech savvy demographic was not behaving. At least not for the pundits and doomsayers of books. Then sales of ebooks flatlined and I started doing back to back book signings in Barnes and Nobles around Chicago. I mean lots of them. Twenty or so around the holidays and then I got my second shock.
My books are not discounted. I am not Tom Clancy and my publishers decline to break the price on my hardcovers. So my books cost around 32.00 or 36.00 out the door. People didn't blink. They didn't even ask the price. They just bought and bought and bought. No sign of the Kindle or Nook anywhere. I sold 24,000 dollars worth of hardcovers last season....so why didn't the damn book die? Well...people who read are different animals than those who rip songs from the Internet. Also, we work on our computers. Yeah that thing we lug around and haunts us in our sleep to the point we have to get stoned or take a drink to calm our jazzed brains does not lend itself to pleasure. And reading is pleasure.
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Now there are those who say well virtual reality will replace the book eventually. Yawn. Forget about the research that says when we watch something our brain just about goes to sleep and that words are about the only sparks that conjure up a scene in the tabula rasa of our brain. Virtual reality replace books. Sure it will. Just like we all drink lattes and have tattoos and ear rings and live in urban areas and have sleek new phones and cars. Not. Most people shop at Target. Pay the mortgage. Hope their kids have a better future and if they have a moment for a good story and have a book they will read that over just bout every other delivery device So lets hear it for that old thumbed and yellowed bit of parchment between the covers. Long live the book...the book....the book. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
But then it didn't happen. Maybe it was the college class of advanced fiction or intro English that tipped me off. I told the students on the first day. Yes you can download the books if you want. How many people have kindles? Crickets. How many people download books to their computers. Crickets. Wait a minute. The vaunted eighteen year old tech savvy demographic was not behaving. At least not for the pundits and doomsayers of books. Then sales of ebooks flatlined and I started doing back to back book signings in Barnes and Nobles around Chicago. I mean lots of them. Twenty or so around the holidays and then I got my second shock.
My books are not discounted. I am not Tom Clancy and my publishers decline to break the price on my hardcovers. So my books cost around 32.00 or 36.00 out the door. People didn't blink. They didn't even ask the price. They just bought and bought and bought. No sign of the Kindle or Nook anywhere. I sold 24,000 dollars worth of hardcovers last season....so why didn't the damn book die? Well...people who read are different animals than those who rip songs from the Internet. Also, we work on our computers. Yeah that thing we lug around and haunts us in our sleep to the point we have to get stoned or take a drink to calm our jazzed brains does not lend itself to pleasure. And reading is pleasure.
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Now there are those who say well virtual reality will replace the book eventually. Yawn. Forget about the research that says when we watch something our brain just about goes to sleep and that words are about the only sparks that conjure up a scene in the tabula rasa of our brain. Virtual reality replace books. Sure it will. Just like we all drink lattes and have tattoos and ear rings and live in urban areas and have sleek new phones and cars. Not. Most people shop at Target. Pay the mortgage. Hope their kids have a better future and if they have a moment for a good story and have a book they will read that over just bout every other delivery device So lets hear it for that old thumbed and yellowed bit of parchment between the covers. Long live the book...the book....the book. "Rocket Man is the funniest novel since Russo's Straight Man."
Chicago Sun Times
"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning
