Open Road Integrated Media has just released three remarkably memorable Stephen Doster works!

Open Road Integrated Media has just released three remarkably memorable Stephen Doster works!

Georgia Witness is a compilation of twenty-six interviews with some of the most influential Georgians of the 20th and 21st Centuries: Griffin Bell, Ruby Crawford, Willie Mae Robinson, Bill Brown, Irene Cordell, Sam Massell, Jr., Patrick Demere, William Ladson, Floyd Faust, Lucian Sneed, Clarice Strother, Vic Waters, Chuck Leavell, Pat McDonald, Ron Edenfield, Harriet Gilbert, Bob Woodward, Ted Dennard, Lewey Cato, Bootie Wood, Charles Gowen, Sonny Gibson, Dot White, Oscar Cruz, Mack Mattingly, and Billy Winn.

Her Finest Hour is the biography of Terry Doster, a teenager who joined the WAAF (Women’s Auxiliary Air Force) in London, during WWII. She accomplished so many things cutting-edge for women of that day: worked in RAF (Royal Air Force) Operations Rooms, was an ATC (Air Traffic Controller), volunteered to do assignments no one else dared simply because she had never done them before, and, after the war, she was one of the first female flight attendants for the BOAC (British Overseas Airways Corporation), now known as British Airways. This memoir is a faithful transcription of Terry Smith’s own words. Her Finest Hour serves as a reminder that freedom isn’t free and the most unlikely people, including a typical girl in art school, can rise to life’s greatest challenges.

Jesus Tree is a compelling, captivating story of a man’s search for his past and his soul – rendered vividly by a writer of unique gifts. Stephen Doster has given us that very best thing of fiction: a rousing tale, beautifully told.

Coastal Georgia in the depths of the Great Depression. A white minister is murdered and a young African-American man is convicted of the killing and sent to a brutal prison farm. Forty years later, Ben Jordan finally emerges a free man, struggling to understand a world that has undergone profound change, and sets out on a mission to bring the true killer to justice.

Stephen Doster was born in England and grew up on St. Simons Island, Georgia. He is a student of history and has extensively researched the Gullah and Geechee cultures of South Carolina and Georgia. He received a degree in Marketing from the University of Georgia and has a Master of Liberal Arts and Science degree with a certificate in history from Vanderbilt University. Doster has appeared at BookExpo, the Southern Festival of Books, the Amelia Island Book Festival, The Southern Kentucky Book Fest, and has spoken at colleges, historical societies, and library associations in Georgia, Kentucky, and Tennessee. He has been interviewed on public radio and television in Mississippi, Tennessee, Florida, and Georgia. Currently, he is an editor for the Vanderbilt School of Medicine Basic Sciences.

His works include: Published by Open Road Media – Georgia Witness, a compilation of twenty-six interviews with some of the most influential Georgians of the 20th and 21st Centuries and Her Finest Hour, the biography of Terry Doster, a teenager who joined the WAAF (Women’s Auxiliary Air Force) in London, during WWII and was one of the first stewardesses for British Airways. Published by John F. Blair – Lord Baltimore, nominated for the Pulitzer the same year, the fictional account of a young man’s travels through Gullah country along the Georgia coast and Voices from St. Simons: Personal Narratives of an Island’s Past (nonfiction), an oral history of St. Simons Island, Georgia. Published by Argus Publishing: Shadow Child: Tales from The Georgia Coast – Sixteen Works of Fiction & One True Story chronicles a historical artifact and the people it impacted from 1597 to the 21st Century, Rose Bush, a southern novel depicting a conflict between environmentalists, a paper mill, and the aristocracy of a rural Georgia town, and (OMG) Don Quixote and Candide Seek Truth, Justice, and El Dorado in the Digital Age (LOL) penned as Stefan Soto. A documentary of his beloved island St. Simons, Video: St. Simons 360: A Historical Tour of the Island, is available for viewing on YouTube and Cumberland Island: Footsteps in Time (University of Georgia Press), a photographic tour of  St. Simon’s sister barrier island. He is represented by Loiacono Literary Agency.

 

 

 

 

Clean Speech Kids by Bracha Goetz

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Author and Retired Court of Appeals Judge John Douglas McCullough has passed away.

Retired Court of Appeals Judge John Douglas McCullough, age 77, of Las Vegas, Nevada, passed away on Tuesday, October 18, 2022. He is survived by the love of his life, Lucci.

Judge Douglas McCullough served twenty-nine years in the United States Marine Corps, and was a federal prosecutor in Philadelphia before becoming Counsel to the Senate Ethics Committee in Washington. He returned to his home state, North Carolina, in 1981 and became the Senior Assistant United States Attorney, where he served until 1996. After four years in private practice, he won his first election to the North Carolina Court of Appeals and was re-elected in 2010.

Former U.S. Attorney Douglas McCullough prosecuted a sophisticated group of drug smugglers and money-launderers that had successfully gained access into Texas, North Carolina, Louisiana, Kentucky, and Michigan, amassing over $50,000,000, which was placed in Panamanian banks with Manuel Noriega’s (1934-2017) assistance. The investigation and apprehension of these smugglers eventually led to the exposure of Noriega as a drug lord and money launderer, although on occasion he’d provided intelligence to the CIA and DEA, and even received an award from President Reagan. A conspiracy that spanned this hemisphere, stretching from Colombia to the Grand Caymans, Jamaica, and the United States, involved local politicians, businessmen, celebrities, and entertainment agents as well as Noriega and members of Colombian drug cartels. This is the only occasion in history where a head of state has been prosecuted in a federal court like any other criminal. Sea of Greed is based on the true story behind the arrest of Manuel Noriega and the invasion of Panama pursuant to “Operation Just Cause.”

Judge McCullough’s military service will be held Friday, November 18, 2022 @ 2PM at the Coastal Carolina State Veterans Cemetery, 110 Montfort Point Road, Jacksonville, North Carolina. Following the ceremony, a celebration of life reception will be held at Captain Ratty’s Seafood & Steakhouse in New Bern @ 4PM. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital. https://www.stjude.org/donate/donate-to-st-jude.html

Amanda Matti, author of Voicing the Eagle, is a 2022 San Diego East County Chamber of Commerce Women in Leadership Award winner!

Amanda Matti, author of Voicing the Eagle, is a 2022 San Diego East County Chamber of Commerce Women in Leadership Award winner!

This annual luncheon draws over 500 attendees comprised of San Diego political and business leaders who come together to honor female leaders from across San Diego County. The event recognizes deserving women leaders for selfless acts, leadership achievements, community contributions, and dedication to their professions. On average, five winners are honored each year who influence their peers, encourage other women to take on more, and inspire the next generation of leaders in the business community across San Diego. Past winners are a roster of who’s-who in the San Diego political and business spheres and include San Diego District Attorney Summer Stephan and former San Diego County Supervisor Dianne Jacob.

  

Open Road Media has just released Ed Protzel’s literary masterpieces!

Open Road Media has just released Ed Protzel’s literary masterpieces!

The Southern DarkHorse Trilogy: The Lies That Bind, Honor Among Outcasts, and Something in Madness, AND the first in the David Greenberg Mystery Thrillers, The Antiquities Dealer are now available.

Ed Protzel’s darkly ironic antebellum Southern mystery, The Lies That Bind, is the first book in the DarkHorse Trilogy. Book 2, Honor Among Outcasts, is set in Civil War Missouri. Book 3, Something in Madness, takes place in the South during reconstruction. The Lies That Bind is based on Protzel’s screenplay which was recognized by the Missouri Playwrights Association. It had brief Hollywood exposure; was called “a great script” by 20th Century Fox’s Murray Silverman, Paramount’s Sherry Lansing, and Chelsea Studios producer Stan Zuckerman.

Ed’s most-recent novel is The Antiquities Dealer, a futuristic mystery/thriller about a Jewish antiquities gallery owner drawn by his former lover into a scheme to clone the great minds of history—purportedly beginning with Jesus Christ.

Protzel is the author of four novels and five original screenplays for feature film, and has developed scripts/projects for 20th Century Fox. Ed’s expertise as a novelist and screenwriter is in the American tragicomedy movement, science fiction, Shakespeare, and a variety of historical periods. He has a Master’s in English Literature/Creative Writing from the University of Missouri-St. Louis and a B.A. in English, with a minor in history, from the University of Hawaii. He is represented by Loiacono Literary Agency.

Open Road Media releases Voicing the Eagle by Amanda Matti!

Open Road Media releases Voicing the Eagle by Amanda Matti!

A young Iraqi shares the true story of his wartime experiences after he was recruited by the US Army as an interpreter.

Fahdi was a twenty-one-year-old, upper-middle class, English-speaking student at Baghdad University when he was recruited right off the street to serve as an interpreter for a US Army unit just days after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime. Over the next two years, Fahdi would go on to translate for US drill sergeants training new Iraqi Army recruits in Ramadi; serve alongside US Marines during the first Battle of Fallujah; and eventually land a position as a linguist with Iraq’s newly formed national intelligence agency in Baghdad.

Along the way, he suffered combat injuries, faced the challenges of integrating with American soldiers in US camps, was hunted by local insurgency groups for assisting the “infidels”—and eventually fell in love with an American service member. As told to that service member—now his wife and the author of her own memoir, A Foreign Affair—this is a unique firsthand perspective on one of the United States’ most controversial foreign conflicts.

Amanda Matti is an Iraq War veteran and served as an Intelligence Analyst in the U.S. Navy. Following her 2005 deployment to Baghdad, Amanda assisted her Iraqi translator, Fadi, (now her husband) in escaping Iraq after receiving multiple death threats from Al-Qaeda for his service to U.S. forces. Since then, Amanda has been helping Iraqis and Afghans who worked for American forces seek refuge in the U.S. and navigate the complicated resettlement process. After the fall of Afghanistan in August of last year, Amanda leveraged her experience in military intelligence and refugee resettlement to assist in the launch of the Evacuate Our Allies (EOA) Operations Center in downtown Los Angeles, a 24/7 international call center that aided U.S. Citizens and Afghan allies in evacuating the country following the Taliban takeover. Today, the EOA Ops Center is an official department within the Human Rights First organization in New York City and works in partnership with the U.S. State Department. Amanda continues to oversee the information sharing relationship between the EOA Ops Center and the State Department to assist in the safe relocation of U.S. allies still trapped in Afghanistan. Amanda holds a bachelor’s degree in International Relations and is the author of three books, including A Foreign Affair, a memoir of her experiences in Iraq and the fight to be reunited with the love of her life. She and her husband, Fadi, live in San Diego with their two daughters.

Voicing the Eagle tells Fadi’s story of serving as a local translator for U.S. Military and Government forces in Iraq from 2003 to 2009. Published by Open Road Media. Represented by Loiacono Literary Agency.  Amanda Matti

 

 

Open Road Publishing has released JJ White’s novels Deviant Acts and Nisei!

Open Road Publishing has released JJ White’s novels Deviant Acts and Nisei!

Deviant Acts

by J.J. White

Published by Open Road Media

Jackson Hurst is not in a good place. The only thing that eases the pain is the heroin he’s been addicted to since his time in Vietnam—and it’s already cost him his job and his girlfriend. The downward spiral is only going to continue unless something changes. Then he’s given an opportunity by his aunt Camille, a Vermont millionaire who wants to hire Jackson to rescue her twenty-year-old daughter from kidnappers.

Camille will spare no expense to get Cheryl back—she also wants the kidnappers dead. And Jackson desperately needs the money. The question is whether he can stay clean long enough to do the job—and more importantly, whether he can bring himself to kill again . . .

From the award-winning author of Nisei and other novels, this is both a gritty detective story and a portrait of one down-and-out man’s quest for redemption in 1970s America.

A haunted, heroin-addicted Vietnam vet’s new PI gig might turn his life around—or end it. “Hurst is crazy as a loon, funny as hell, and deadly serious.” —Sterling Watson, author of Night Letter

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Nisei

by J.J. White

Published by Open Road Media

In this gripping novel, a man in despair stumbles upon the secrets of his Japanese father’s World War II experiences, and the past that shaped his family.

Robert Takahashi sits in the empty attic of his mother’s old home in Hawaii, a home he has to sell to cover financial losses from her nursing home care—and his own massive gambling debts. Once his affairs are in order, he can proceed to the next step: suicide. His wife is done with him anyway. His daughters—well, he’s nothing but an embarrassment to them.

Robert barely remembers his father and knows little about his parents’ past. But a manuscript he’s just found—left under an eave and contained in a dusty box along with ten medals from the US military—will enlighten him about many things. As he reads his father’s words, he discovers a story of a Japanese boy born in Hawaii, a life uprooted by internment, and a young Nisei’s harrowing quest to prove his patriotism by serving with the renowned 442nd Regimental Combat Team. He also learns about a long-ago forbidden love—and how prejudice can derail a life—in this sweeping tale of family, war, and two generations of men battling powerful forces both externally and within themselves.

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JJ White has written over two hundred short stories, and has had articles and stories published in several anthologies and magazines, including, Wordsmith, The Homestead Review, The Seven Hills Review and The Grey Sparrow Journal. “The Nine Hole League” was published in the Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, Volume 14. He has won awards and honors from the Alabama Writers Conclave, Writers-Editors International, Maryland Writers Association, The Royal Palm Literary Awards, Professional Writers of Prescott, and Writer’s Digest. He was recently nominated for the Pushcart Prize for his short piece in The Grey Sparrow Journal.

White’s short story, “In Nobody We Trust,” won the St. Martin’s Press “Who Can You Trust” contest. Published with four other winners in the St. Martin’s Press, A DIVIDED SPY by Charles Cumming. White’s first novel was Prodigious Savant.

Represented by Loiacono Literary Agency

 

Open Road Integrated Media has just released John L. Flynn’s Kate Dawson Mysteries and THE ULTIMATE Bond Book

Open Road Integrated Media has just released John L. Flynn’s Kate Dawson Mysteries and THE ULTIMATE Bond Book

Everything I Know About Life I Learned from James Bond by John L. FLynn and Bob Blackwood is a light-hearted but thoroughly researched look into the world of James Bond.

Everything I Know About Life I Learned From James Bond

Celebrate the heroic swagger of Agent 007 with the ultimate fan’s guide to all things James Bond.

For the adolescent male growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, 007 was everything that young men were not. He was sexually irresistible to women, well-dressed and well-groomed, socially astute, clever, witty, athletic, debonair, dangerous, and heroic. He drove the coolest cars, possessed the greatest gadgets, traveled to the most exotic places, made love to the most beautiful women, and had the most fun of any cinematic hero. James Bond represented everything that authors John and Bob wanted to be. And now, as they look back over the years as middle-aged adults and college professors, both realize how much Bond helped re-define their understanding of what it meant to be manly, particularly at a time in our culture when the roles of men and women were becoming so fractured and confused. This book provides witty and insightful aphorisms about everyday things, ranging from girls to food and drink, cars to clothing and style, and life lessons to fun facts about culture and civilization as reflected through the prism of James Bond, the world’s most stylish and cultured secret agent.

From Sean Connery to Daniel Craig, Bond’s debonair reigns supreme.

 

In this volume, authors Bob Blackwood and John L. Flynn think back on the importance of James Bond in their lives, and the lessons they learned from his movies and novels. Covering everything from cars and clothes to how to order a martini, this is a loving celebration of the man they call “Bond, James Bond.”

 

The Kate Dawson Mysteries

Architects of Armageddon


Published by Open Road Media

A San Francisco detective puts her life on the line to stop a doomsday cult from stoking the fires of Armageddon in this tense thriller.

When Det. Kate Dawson is called to investigate a mass murder, she has no idea how grim and disturbing the situation truly is. The charismatic leader of End Times Ministries has ordered his followers to put their own children to death. Many of the followers willingly complied, believing it to be part of God’s plan. As the Chosen Ones, they are destined to inherit the Earth. And the time has come for them to prepare for a holy war.

With murderous fanatics hell-bent on starting Armageddon, Kate knows she must find the diabolical mastermind behind their horrifying crusade. But as San Francisco descends into violent chaos, and the Doomsday clock ticks closer to midnight, it may be too late to stop an apocalyptic plot already in motion.

“It’s five minutes to midnight…”

Murder on Air Force One

Published by Open Road Media

When a woman dies under mysterious circumstances aboard Air Force One, a San Francisco detective uncovers presidential conspiracies and cover-ups.

When Insp. Kate Dawson is called in the wee hours of the morning, she had no idea what would be waiting for her on the tarmac of San Francisco International Airport. Air Force One landed with a corpse in the lavatory, and everyone on board is a suspect—including Madame President, the First Man, and a slew of reporters and other presidential personnel.

The female victim was engaging in kinky foreplay at the time of her death. Did her penchant for limited oxygen simply go too far? Or did someone take advantage of her compromised position and finish her off? Kate’s highly sensitive investigation is about to uncover international politics, conspiracies, affairs, and cover-ups—all involving the First Family.

Terror at G-20

Published by Open Road Media

The murder of a San Francisco sex worker puts a female detective on the trail of a geopolitical conspiracy against America in this international thriller.

What begins as the simple murder of a sex worker becomes so much more as Insp. Kate Dawson follows the clues to a human trafficking ring which specifically targets Asian women. But as the G-20 Summit in San Francisco draws closer, Kate realizes that the stakes are much higher than she could have imagined.

The disappearance of five Asian women appears to be connected to the schemes of a mad North Korean general. With a nuclear submarine deployed into American waters, he’s planning to bring about economic chaos across the West. As world leaders and economists converge on the annual summit, Kate must prevent terror from breaking out at the G-20.

Merchants of Death

by John L. Flynn

Published by Open Road Media

A San Francisco detective must stop a deadly conspiracy from terrorizing the city through the subway system.

When a BART car arrives at its destination with twenty-four dead passengers, detective Kate Dawson must find out who is responsible. Her investigation takes her from the treacherous back streets of Chinatown to a luxurious chateau nestled in the Northern California hills. But nothing in this case is what it first appears.

Pitted against a young rival in the department who covets her job, Kate must face a brother and sister duo of illegal arms dealers and a deadly underground organization known as Task Force Red. And when a runaway train loaded with deadly toxin speeds toward game one of the World Series, it’s up to Kate to protect the crowds gathered at the stadium . . . where the President of the United States is scheduled to throw the first pitch.

Dr. John L. Flynn is an author, psychologist, and retired college dean. Born in Chicago, Illinois. He earned a Bachelor’s and Master’s Degree from the University of South Florida and a PhD from Southern California University. He is a member of the Science Fiction Writers of America and the Mystery Writers of America, and has been a regular contributor and columnist to dozens of science fiction magazines.

In 1997, John switched gears from writing and literature to study psychology, and earned a degree as a clinical psychologist. His study, “The Etiology of Sexual Addiction: Childhood Trauma as a Primary Determinant,” has broken new ground in the diagnosis and treatment of sexual addiction.

In 1977, he received the M. Carolyn Parker award for outstanding journalism for his freelance work on several Florida daily newspapers. He sold his first book, Future Threads, in 1985, and has subsequently had nineteen other books published, including Cinematic Vampires: The Living Dead on FilmThe Films of Arnold SchwarzeneggerDissecting AliensVisions in Light and ShadowWar of the Worlds: From Wells to Spielberg75 Years of Universal Monsters50 Years of Hammer Horror101 Superheroes of the Silver Screen2001: Beyond the InfiniteThe Jovian DilemmaPhantoms of the Opera: Behind the Mask, the Introduction to Signet’s new edition of Gaston Leroux’s Phantom of the Opera, and the Afterword to Signet’s new printing of The Island of Dr. Moreau by H.G. Wells.

From 2002 to 2004, he was nominated for three Hugo Awards for his science fiction writing. John also received an honorable mention for his unproduced screenplay for The Jovian Dilemma in the 2003 Screenplay Festival writing competition.

His first novel in the Kate Dawson series was Intimate Bondage (BelleBooks, 2014).

Represented by Loiacono Literary Agency

Persistence U with Lizbeth – Bracha Goetz

Persistence U with Lizbeth – Bracha Goetz

The Goetz Bookshop

As a Harvard graduate, Bracha could have worked in any number of high-paying fields. But she longed to make a difference in the lives of young people and became a prolific children’s author.

You will learn:

Creating books for children that would have helped Bracha when she was young, dealing with eating disorders, has created opportunities for her to enrich the lives of her grandchildren and other readers by introducing her Jewish faith.

Many of us  try to fill our empty feelings inside, often with external things like food or substances, which Bracha says will never satisfy the inner longings of the soul.

Author bio

Bracha Goetz is the Harvard-educated author of 40 books that help children’s souls shine and a candid memoir for adults about overcoming food addictions joyfully and spiritually.  Her books can be found at www.goetzbookshop.com.

Bracha Goetz can be contacted for presentations at [email protected].