Open Wounds

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Eviction Bloomberg Style – OWS

Tent City

We took my son to Zuccotti Park last week.

He shot some video (is in the process of editing as I write this) and I took some pictures. My wife tried to explain the whole thing to him. A couple of young men in the park handing out literature did too. Mostly I wanted him to understand that there are some things you can feel strongly about – so strongly that you take action to try to change them. One percent of the population controls the majority of our nation’s resources. So it has been for a long long time. Our politicians are afraid to address it. It is a powerful system based on money and the power that comes from it.

Last night at 1AM Bloomberg sent in a host of police officers with helmets, plastic visors, and riot gear to evict the protesters. He didn’t allow news coverage. He did it in the dead of night. There’s something wrong with that. I told my son what happened and he’s not sure what to make of it. He’s nine. He likes to think these things through. “It’s a good thing we got this video then,” he said. Yup. When my son finishes his video I’ll post it if he allows me to.

What does this have to do with Open Wounds? I dropped off a copy of my book for their library last week when we visited the site. The news says that over 5000 books were dumped when they were evicted last night – Open Wounds was one of them.

What does this eviction have to do with writing?

Nothing… and everything.

Occupy Wall Street

Posted by  |  November 16, 2011 | Categories: Blog, Occupy Wall Street | 6 Comments

The Review Hat-Trick

A third review in one week! The Gods are smiling on me. It’s a reviewers hat-trick (three goals in a hockey game).

This is a review from Bryan Russell, writer, blogger, and one of the alchemists of Alchemy of Writing blog. Bryan’s review is one of my favorite. The last paragraph about historical novels in general and how Open Wounds fits into his view of them is all by itself, worth the trip to his blog. It’s insightful and wonderfully specific. Thanks, Bryan, for the kind words about my book.

Bryan mentions that he usually doesn’t read YA and that he was surprised by my book. So many people don’t read YA books because they perceive them as children’s books or not adult books and so not worth reading. I wish there was some way to help people get past that. My life is richer for reading books such as, Ghost Medicine, Marbury Lens, Stick, Sunrise Over Fallujah, The Subtle Knife, the Edge Chronicles, Hunger Games, and Crossing the Tracks.

Targeted marketing or the creation of genre ghettos?

I wonder which it is?

OWS

 

Posted by  |  November 15, 2011 | Categories: Andrew Smith, Blog, Book Reviews, Occupy Wall Street, Open Wounds, Walter Dean Myers | 2 Comments

Cambridge Library Author Trio

Going to Cambridge MA this week for two days. Cambridge public library will be hosting an Author Trio event this Wednesday the 16th that I’ll be a part of with the wonderful Amalie Howard (author of Bloodspell) and Leigh Fallon (author of The Carrier of the Mark). We’ll be reading and answering questions so I hope to see you there if you’re in the neighborhood.

I’ll also be visiting local indies in the Cambridge/Boston area and a fencing salle or two (Bay State Fencers on Thursday the 17th in the early evening from 5-7pm) before I head home late thursday evening.

OWS

Oh… and the pictures are of Occupy Wall Street Zuccotti Park. We went on Friday, Veteran’s day, and took a bunch of pics. I also gave their library a copy of Open Wounds to add to their reading list. I’ll be putting up pics of the demonstration all week.

Posted by  |  November 14, 2011 | Categories: Blog, Events, Events, Fencing, Librarians, Occupy Wall Street, Publicity & Marketing, Reading, Travel | Leave a comment

Review of Open Wounds in American Fencing Magazine

This is so cool. I never dreamed I’d get reviewed in American Fencing Magazine. Kathryn Schifferle wrote the review and it’s on page 44, under Product Review. Here’s my favorite part:

… This is a complex, well-written story. Although targeted to young adults, the descriptions of pre-World War II era New York are compelling. I could not only visualize the period, but the pain and excitement that Cid Experienced as he learned the way of the sword. In addiction the characters are diverse, multidimensional, and live in my mind still today…

Check it out! Here’s the full review.

AMFence Review Fall

Posted by  |  November 13, 2011 | Categories: Blog, Fencing, Open Wounds | Leave a comment

School Library Journal Review of Open Wounds

I thought my time had passed for a review of Open Wounds in the School Library Journal Review but it seems it hasn’t. My wife caught their review on the Barnes and Noble .com site and then looked and found it in the Journal’s October 1 reviews. I’m really pleased with it. Here it is in its entirety.

School Library Journal

Gr 6 10—Seven-year-old Cedric Wymann is raised by an alcoholic, violent father and a stoic, bitter grandmother. Going to the movies with her, he becomes entranced by the sword-fighting scenes in Captain Blood and other films of the day. A chance meeting with a famous swordsman cements his fascination with the sport. Eventually Cid and two friends fight off the neighborhood bullies. After the disappearance of his father and the suicide of his grandmother, Cid spends five years in a brutal orphanage before being claimed by a British cousin who suffered the loss of an arm, a leg, and an eye in the trenches of World War I. “Lefty” becomes a caring father figure to Cid and, along with a drunken, retired Russian fencing master, guides him through the next few years as he learns to fence and studies the great works of Shakespeare. At 16, he is hired to teach local actors how to perform swordplay on the stage. Fate brings his childhood friends back into his life, and they again face the bullies they fought off years earlier, but their tormentors are now under the protection of a wealthy businessman. Of course the final face-off is at a fencing competition. Lunievicz does a good job of portraying the New York City in the 1930s and ’40s that teems with violence and hard living. However, there is a lot going on in this novel. At times it seems too crowded with characters who symbolize many different aspects of the times, but they are generally well drawn and believable. In the end, this is a novel about fencing, and the descriptions of the instruments, the action, and the finely choreographed movements of this elegant sport are riveting.—Karen Elliott, Grafton High School, WI

Thank you Ms. Elliott for reviewing my book and for the good word on it. I’ll take “riveting” as a final word any day.

Posted by  |  November 12, 2011 | Categories: Blog, Librarians, Open Wounds | 1 Comment