Stephen Doster and The Southern Festival of Books

Stephen Doster will be a panelist at the The Southern Festival of Books Friday, October 11, 2013, 12:00-1:00 pm, Conf. Room III, Library

Doster is the author of Lord Baltimore and Voices From St. Simons (John F. Blair), Georgia Witness, Shadow Child, Rose Bush and, soon to be released, Jesus Tree (Deer Hawk Publications) www.sdoster.com   www.loiaconoliteraryagency.com

www.deerhawkpublications.com

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=stephen+doster

http://www.humanitiestennessee.org/programs/southern-festival-books-celebration-written-word

Daniel Woodrell was interviewed on NPR this morning about his new book The Maid’s Version, a fictionalized story of the 1928 explosion in West Plains, Missouri Friday, April 13, 1928.

http://www.npr.org/2013/09/05/218591578/winters-bone-author-revisits-a-tragedy-in-his-ozarks-hometown
Lin Waterhouse’s nonfiction The West Plains Dance Hall Explosion (The History Press, 2011), is thoroughly researched. 

Looking at the photos and reading the story, I was moved to help them. In 2012, I visited Lin and she took me to West Plains. It was the same feeling I had when I walked the site of the Twin Towers in NYC and the concentration camp in Dachau, Germany. You could feel them, hear their cries. Yet, no plaque, no monument – nothing. They want everyone to know the truth, which may have been hit men or geological in nature. If it is the former, most likely the culprits are dead, but the facts need to be revealed. If it is the latter, next time could be catastrophic.

Lin has touched the tip of an iceberg and has data, interviews, and stats to prove her findings. I could not put the book down for two reasons: 1) it was real, and 2) it still has not been solved. Lin has done an unbelievable job of research and has written it so well, you actually go to bed at night seeing the explosion and hearing the voices of those who have crossed over but are not satisfied; who need closure. This book may bring someone forward who knows the ‘who’ and ‘why’. Just look at the pictures and imagine.

Bob Mullins, Dimple Martin, 24 hours after the explosion, the memorial for the unidentifiable/unfound, Kitty McFarland, Paul Evans, what the dance hall looked like before the explosion

Bond Hall hosted dances every Friday night for many years. This night was like any other– young and old alike gathered to dance and listen to the live band consisting of their own local talent. At 11:00 pm that evening, not one family within 50 miles of West Plains was left unaffected by the horror that unfolded in a scant 10 minutes. An explosion ripped through the second floor dance hall located above Wiser Motor Corp, sending 39 unsuspecting people to their deaths.

Waterhouse has done a remarkable job of deciphering the historical registers, newspapers, and courthouses as well as finding and getting first-hand information from survivors and their descendants. She grabs you from the first sentence; taking you back to the day of the tragedy, carrying you through intricate details leading up to the moments before, and then combing through the testimony, coroner’s reports, and investigative findings, she brings you to where it all stands today. As you read The West Plains Dance Hall Explosion you realize you are reliving a real cold case. Intriguing and fascinating!

She has much more pertinent information to add since she finished the MS: geological statistics, personal interviews, and diaries/journals from family members who found them in trunks.

There have been pools that have mysteriously been sucked dry of water near ground zero, in White Plains there was a community septic cesspool that disappeared, and sunken foundations that all indicate an unstable terrain. If all this is substantiated, it could clear the Wiser name and bring closure to so many open-ended doubts.

It could easily prevent another tragedy as well. Explosions, sink holes, etc.

Then again, the two men in dark suits showing up at Wiser’s showroom at 10pm that night throws suspicion on gangster activity since no one came forward fitting those descriptions. Still, if Wiser was involved, I don’t think he would have stayed around to be blown up; he would have run with his family.

This would make for a great 48 Hours episode or a Discovery Chanel story; bringing national and international attention to an incident that killed over 39 people, took out a whole city block and caused eternal pain for all those who were touched by it.

Waterhouse is a freelance journalist/writer, living and working in Ozark County, Missouri. Since moving from California and Arizona to Missouri nine years ago, she has written articles for local and regional newspapers and magazines, including the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The Ozark Mountaineer, Ozark Magazine, and The Ozark County Times. www.linwaterhouse.com

Read both books and you, too, will want to know the truth.

Joyce Zeller is on FIRE!! Her new novel, Maddie’s Choice, is booking her fast!

Ozark Creative Writer’s Conference on October 11, 12, 2013 www.ozarkcreativewriters.com//

The Book Nook, Saturday, October 5, 2013 Pine Mountain Shopping Center in Eureka. Contact Pamela Stewart for more information: booknook.eureka@yahoo.com

Maddie’s Choice by Joyce Zeller is now available!

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=maddies+choice+by+joyce+zeller&rh=n%3A283155%2Ck%3Amaddies+choice+by+joyce+zeller

When an author with writer’s block inherits a working ranch in Arkansas, she also gets a lot more than she had ever anticipated: twin boys in need of a mother, a handsome ex-Special Forces guy with PTSD, cattle rustlers and a drug gang. It is what books are written about, right?….

Amber Lanier-Nagle’s PROJECT KEEPSAKE has been acquired by Native Ink Press! Release date February 20, 2014!

Amber Lanier Nagle’s anthology, Project Keepsake, is a collection of short stories told in first-person by both writers and aspiring writers about their treasured keepsakes and mementos.  From buckeyes to pocket knives to pound cake pans to rings to fishing lures, each keepsake—and each story—is unique, yet each reveals common attributes that bind us together and celebrate the glorious human experience.

Amber Lanier Nagle is a Georgia girl through and through.  In 2006 after working for eighteen years as an engineer, she reinvented herself as a freelance writer specializing in nonfiction articles. Her work has appeared in GRIT, Mother Earth News, GEORGIA Magazine, Atlanta Life, Points North, Chatter, Get Out Chattanooga and many other magazines and newspapers.

For eleven years, she penned a monthly newspaper column focusing on memories, relationships, and unique observations from her lifetime in Georgia.  In 2012, she published a selection of these articles in an ebook titled Southern Exposure:  A Few Random, Rambling, Retrospective Pieces of My Life.

She is a graduate of both Georgia Institute of Technology and Mercer University and is an active member of the Georgia Writers Association and the Chattanooga Writers Guild.

www.nativeinkpress.com

www.ambernagle.com

Wyatt Emmerich’s review of The Man Called Brown Condor by Tom Simmons appeared in the August 29^th edition of the Northside Sun, Jackson MS and 26 other Emmerich community newspapers. 

Tar Heels on Tour

By Wally Avett

Hat Tricks……Palm hat has distinctive ‘Gus crease’ but is surprisingly heavy. NC cap attracts Tar Heels far from home.

How to Buy a Western Hat in Colorado

There we were — on the main drag in a little town in western Colorado — looking for a new summer-weight cowboy hat. Didn’t want any more wool felt — got enough of them — too hot for warm weather. I was set on a straw hat made of palm leaf fibers, lots of them on the Internet. Most appear to be reasonable in price, too, which was important. I had wandered into a custom hat shop in another town and staggered out in shock after I saw $400 price tags.

The trip had nothing to do with hats. We have relatives living in California and I had read a book about Kit Carson titled Blood and Thunder by Hampton Sides, great modern-day historian.

So naturally we had to go to Taos, New Mexico on the way to California. Visited Carson’s house, visited the local Indian pueblo, drove on into Arizona and went to Canyon de Chelly.

Also met and talked with a few Navajos along the way; bought their jewelry. Had lunch at Window Rock and wandered into Southern California where you can buy fresh macadamia nuts at roadside farmers markets.

Big Trees & Flying Money

Had a nice visit with relatives in Sacramento, then off to redwood country to see the big trees. Then on north into Oregon, where the wind blows hard all the time, like it does at a lot of places in the West.

On a lonesome backwoods two-lane blacktop we saw almost no car traffic. Where a rough trail joined our road, we saw a white man on a four-wheeler, waiting for us to pass. His face was raw, burned red from the wind, like leather.

In a low gap in the sagebrush hills, we stopped the rental car, nobody in sight. Deanie got out on her side to get something from a suitcase and I got out on mine, reaching into my shrinking stash for another $100 bill.

As I transferred the money to my open billfold, suddenly the wind snatched it away and blew it across the roof of the car. I was horrified.

“Get that money,” I shouted. “Before it gets away.”

She ran a few steps and stomped on the fluttering bill. Boy, I was happy. Saved me from calling out the local rescue squad.

North Carolina Home Boy

When we travel I always wear a Carolina blue baseball cap with a big NC on the front. It identifies me and it draws other NC folks, who often come up and talk. Example:

Deadwood, South Dakota — On a Western trip we saw Mt. Rushmore and then went to Deadwood to visit the grave of gunfighter Wild Bill Hickok. The cemetery has a box office, $1 per visitor. Lady said, “Where are you from?” I told her and she started laughing. She is from Sylva, married to a local.

So in Colorado one fine May morning, we walked into what appeared to be a men’s clothing store. Manager spied the cap quickly — Carolina had fallen recently in the March Madness. “Your team didn’t do too good, did they?” he said. I admitted the Heels had fallen. We talked and I told him what I wanted. Surprisingly, he referred me to an old family clothing store up the street.

So we walked into Davis Clothing in Delta, Colorado, for a great experience. Old store, cowboy clothing, boots and hats. Floors creaked, been there a long time.

In Business Since 1907

Yes, he had palm cowboy hats, lots of them. I picked one out but it didn’t have the shape I wanted. No problem.

“I want the crease in front, like the Robert Duvall character in Lonesome Dove,” I told him.

“Oh yeah,” he said. “They call it the ‘Gus crease.’ I can do it. You and your wife walk down the street and come back and I’ll have it.”

He was reaching for some sort of a steam-iron rig like you see in a dry-cleaning place when we left. I guessed the steam would help in re-forming the crown of the hat.

It was perfect, just what I wanted. $25 for the hat, no charge for the crease and $3 for a special Stetson box to get it home safely.

His grandfather had started the store in 1907, he said, and he was still using the same cash register. We wanted to examine it. Remember no electricity, no digital, no chip. It was all metal, glass and polished wood. Pure mechanical, spring-loaded, hidden triggers and hammers struck hidden bells and opened the drawers. It sat on top of its own special oak cabinet, with five cash drawers below. Each drawer had its own special bell-sound, he said, so the old man could stand quietly in the rear of his emporium and know immediately which one of his clerks had done a transaction in the clerk’s own assigned drawer. The owner could then judge which clerk was doing the most business, which the least and which to keep. Clever.

Ladies and Gentlemen! Ken La Salle! Morgan bailey’s Writing Blog…

http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com/2013/08/31/author-spotlight-no-327-ken-la-salle/

www.kenlasalle.com

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