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Wednesday, November 4, 2020
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Saturday, October 31, 2020
Gary Roen Nationally Syndicated Book Critic and Author Interview
Gary S. Roen graciously accepted an invitation for an interview. I asked questions and he answered comprehensively. I know readers of the New Book Review are going to enjoy this information.
1. Please describe the many
places for which you write book reviews.
My reviews have been running for a long time in different publications throughout the nation, that includes Midwestbookreview.com, bUnike Magazine, Lake Legal News, Hernando Star, Veterans Voice and Bivouac Magazine to name a few. Many years ago, when newspapers had book review sections I wrote for The Orlando Sentinel, Miami Herald, Florida Times Union, St Pete Times, Times Picayune, Baltimore Sun and Philadelphia Inquirer.
2. Tell us about your career.
In the 1970’s I got
into the publishing world by working for a family owned publishing company
where I learned the trade of a salesman, something I had never done before. I acquired
skills on how to promote authors that are still true today even with all the
new ways we have to do so. I set up press junkets dealt with bookstores and
events and all kinds of other things that I try to teach to other authors as a
consultant
3. Which
recognitions/achievements have encouraged you the most?
I have received
several things, one that I that I put in a frame that hangs proudly in my house
is a letter from former president Jimmy Carter acknowledging my review of his
book on fishing and how much he appreciated it. Others are my contribution to
teacher days at schools and tokens of appreciation of my contribution to publications
I have written for through the years.
4. What writers have
influenced you the most?
Ian Fleming with his James Bond novels that I grew up with, Donald E. Westlake for his comic mysteries of the Dormunder Capers and other hysterical works like The Busy Body. For Science Fiction there are Fredric Brown, Richard Matheson, Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Arthur Clarke, Robert A. Heinlein, Ben Bova, Andre Norton, Leigh Brackett and Harlan Ellison.
5. What classes have helped
you the most?
At several schools ranging from high school, junior college and UCF journalism was most helpful of learning to write quickly, concisely and to meet deadlines. Also, at UCF many courses of fiction writing. There I broke rules of the University of Central Florida because I took several fiction courses at the same time that administrative people said you could not do. Well I did it and many of the stories in my collection Journey came from those courses. So much for rules.
6. What are some magazines in which you have appeared?
Strange New
Worlds that was about different aspects of science fiction movies and TV shows,
Florida National News Daily, are ones that I can recall off the top of my head.
7. When did you begin writing?
To be honest that was back in 1969 Boone high school in Orlando when I almost got thrown out, for a story I wrote that was a bit of science fiction. Later I continued to get things published like The Test in Computer Legends Lies and Lore Ageless Press and some other online publications. They are in the realm of the great TV show The Twilight Zone that is still fabulous watching today
8 What are you working on now?
A story with two
different alien races that are dealing with a virus on one of them.It
has been a lot of fun creating some of the characters' names and describing them. There are I am sure some underlying premises but I do not consciously put them in. All I am trying to do is tell a good story.
9 Why do you review books?
I love reading
and fell into it many years ago when I was on WPRK in Winter Park, Florida. I
did the show with Patty Flanigan of WDBO at the time who wanted to expand with
a show on another station about science fiction. I was the go-to person on
getting books because of my connections in the publishing world for us to talk
about on the show. To expand the listenership, we branched out to include print
as a way to promote the show. Later we dissolved everything but I kept doing
print reviews that have continued to this day
10 What
genres of books do you prefer to review?
I write and talk
about everything. I do not do a lot of religious books but do include some. I do
a lot of self-help, mysteries, suspense, science fiction, and fun ones of kids’
books like Saved By A Sniff Sniff Sniff Book or the Franky a pink
Flamingo, or Ka’iwi, the Hawaiian Monk Seal Get to know me, I have
to say I have learned quite a bit with books for kids more so than adult titles
like the Monk Seal is very educational
11 Where may the readers learn more about you online?
People can type in my name Gary
Roen or Gary S. Roen and there are plenty of places interviews I have done like
In the DZone, Hanging With Web TV or they can find my reviews in many different
publications.
12 What is your literary background?
I was lucky to go
to a junior high in Orlando that had a wonderful teacher in John W Shank who taught
us the classics. In junior college I had courses of literature but did not
learn as much as I should have because of the teachers who did not like my
perceptions of what we read. It had to be what they saw that really turned me
against poetry and it's funny because I am the author of two books in that
genre Look at Me World and The Forgotten Father Coping With Grief.
13 Tell us about the books you have published.
I did a
collection with another author Cats Cats and More Cats, Journey, Slotski’s
World and The Forgotten Father Coping With Grief. I write short stories of science
fiction that are receiving very positive feedback and are a lot of fun to do
because I highlight aspects of Orlando Florida that are not related to Disney
and the theme parks. I am always working in some way on new stories and having
fun with them
14 What advice would you
give others?
Keep writing, do
not get discouraged, learn your craft better if possible, by taking courses or
hook up with writers’ groups that really work with authors on their work. Keep up
on what is selling in the industry, do not strive to be the next whatever but
do the best work you can possibly do and always be humble. Most of all have
fun.
Gary Roen, point of contact
www.legacypublishing.com
He is the author of two books of poetry. The
Forgotten Father Coping With Grief (Taylor and Seal Publishing) and Look at Me
World (Chateau Publishing). His work has been included in the short story
collection; Computer Legends Lies and Lores (Ageless Press) and online
magazines including, Anotherealm, and Mercury Sky. He is also the author of a satirical play
entitled Vamp.
Roen is also a nationally syndicated book
critic/writer, consultant who has been writing close to 45 years. His syndicated reviews have appeared in
hundreds of daily, weekly, and monthly, publications that currently include
Midwest Book Review, The Beachside Resident, Orlando Advocate, St. Cloud in the
News, Osceola News-Gazette, Bivouac Magazine, and Arrhythmic Souls.
His
articles have run in; Living Well and Live Wisely, bUnike Magazine, The Beach
Side Resident, Strange New Worlds, Crime Book Digest, Eleven Magazine, Backstage
Pass, and West Orlando News.
Over the many years of his career Roen has
been a book salesman, as well as a publicist setting up press tours for authors
for several publishing houses. He has been an agent working with authors and
publishers in many different genres including true crime, horror and non-fiction.
He has been a regular on-air contributor
to many different types of radio and TV shows throughout the United
States.
For a number of years, he worked for numerous
companies in the field of market research, in Central Florida, as an
independent contractor. This gave him many diverse experiences, that have often
found their way into much of his fictional stories.
His books can be found at these retailers
And watch for a guest post on using videos to promote great reviews and resources for doing that from one of Gary's grateful reviews, Wanda Luthman. It's coming here on #TheNewBookReview. You can subscribe using the Google Gadget in the right column of this blog so you don't miss any or our precious tips for getting reviews...or precious reviews!
Thank you for reading,
Carolyn Wilhelm
Thursday, August 27, 2020
Dr. Wesley Britton Reviews Volume 2 of Cushman's Star Trek 1970s
These Are the Voyages: Gene Roddenberry and Star Trek in the 1970s Volume 2 (1975-77).
Author: Marc Cushman
Publisher: Jacobs/Brown Media Group
Release date: July 1, 2020
Number of Pages: 650 pages
ISBN-10: 1733605320
ISBN-13: 978-1733605328
Purchase at Amazon
Reviewed by: Dr. Wesley Britton originally for BookPleasures.com
Volume Two of Marc Cushman's three volume coverage of everything that happened in the Star Trekuniverse during the 1970s is the tenth of Marc's books I've read and reviewed to date. Starting with his single volume book on I Spy, I've read everything from Marc's first three books on Star Trek: The Original Series, his three volumes on Lost in Space, not to mention his explorations of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and The Moody Blues. All these books share one major attribute. Comprehensive is too mild a descriptor. Exhaustive is much more on target. Marc is the master of never leaving any stone unturned, no memo unread, no potentially useful data is left out of any of his tomes.
In the case of Cushman's Star Trek journalism, Marc was given unprecedented access to apparently every scrap of paper associated with Gene Roddenberry and everyone involved with the original franchise. In this volume, this resulted in a very comprehensive overview of all the scripts and stories we never saw in the never filmed Star Trek Phase 2 TV project. These chapters were my favorite passages in this history, reading about some adventures I'd like to have seen, some I'm glad were never produced. No Star Trek fan will want to miss these descriptions.
In addition, we get detailed histories of Roddenberry's lesser-known TV attempts like The Questor Tapes, Genesis II, Spectre, and The Nine. On top of that, Cushman tells us about projects featuring Star Trekcast members like Leonard Nimoy's In Search Of . . . documentary series and William Shatner's short-lived Barbary Coast. We hear about how cast members fared in their lives outside of Star Trek, like the sparring between Nimoy and Roddenberry involving Nimoy's possible participation in any Star Trekrevivals.
A healthy portion of the book explores the growing fan support for Star Trek including the nationwide success of the show in syndication, the beginnings of Star Trek conventions, the expanding bonanza of Star Trek merchandise, and the public speaking tours of Roddenberry, Nimoy, and Shatner. Cushman also talks about the state of science-fiction television shows of the era, most notably a detailed overview of Space 1999, a program clearly influenced by Star Trek. Toss in generous samplings of contemporary reviews of all these items and it's no wonder the book reaches 650 pages.
As Cushman told me in a recent interview, he doesn't target his books to the casual fan but instead aims for the serious aficionados of his various subjects. In the case of Star Trek, that's a pretty hefty audience who will treasure this authoritative history of a cultural phenomenon. Sure, even this readership will likely find chapters and sections to skim over, other sections will be devoured for all the information never made available before. If you're a Star Trek lover, casual or serious, you won't want to miss any of Marc Cushman's extraordinarily researched studies. No previous histories match him for detail, fresh insights, corrections to popular myths; every possible stone is turned over and examined.
As I write this, I'm about to dive into Volume Three of this set which means one last long summer read. That's before Marc dives into all the movies and later series in the '80s and beyond. Stay tuned . . . six books later and the voyages have just begun . . .
To hear Karina Kantas and Wes Britton interview Marc Cushman about his Star Trek books, here's a link to Karina's "Behind the Pen" Podcast: https://youtu.be/kchFuD9p64o
Explore the Beta Earth Chronicles website:
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This blog is a free service offered to those who want to encourage the reading of books they love. That includes authors who want to share their favorite reviews, reviewers who'd like to see their reviews get more exposure, and readers who want to shout out praise of books they've read. Please see submission guidelines on the left of this page. Reviews and essays are indexed by genre, reviewer names, and review sites. Writers will find the search engine handy for gleaning the names of small publishers. Find other writer-related blogs at Sharing with Writers and The Frugal, Smart and Tuned-In Editor.
Saturday, July 25, 2020
Chelsea Falin Reviews Karen A. Wyle's Second in Cowbird Series
common” romance bloom.
I highly recommend this title to anyone who wants a realistic yet swoon-worthy romance that will leave you begging for more. I also recommend it to anyone who enjoys westerns, historicals, or mostly clean romance.
The cover is engaging and offers an accurate depiction of what readers should expect inside the story.
This blog is a free service offered to those who want to encourage the reading of books they love. That includes authors who want to share their favorite reviews, reviewers who'd like to see their reviews get more exposure, and readers who want to shout out praise of books they've read. Please see submission guidelines on the left of this page. Reviews and essays are indexed by genre, reviewer names, and review sites. Writers will find the search engine handy for gleaning the names of small publishers. Find other writer-related blogs at Sharing with Writers and The Frugal, Smart and Tuned-In Editor.
Thursday, May 21, 2020
Dr. Wesley Britton Reviews First in Dragonlite Legacy
The first pages of Paddy Tyrrell's Lumina are a perfect model for how to start a novel. First, we're dropped into the middle of an action scene. Second, we are vividly introduced to two of the book's primary characters. Third, we immediately get insights into one of the main conflicts of the book, a cultural clash that defines a world in turmoil.
In but a few pages, we get striking samples of Tyrrell's descriptive gifts and begin to see the themes of intolerance and prejudice that are analogous to too many eras of our earth's history. I liked the fact this is the breed of science-fiction where character, world building, and cultural interaction are the thrust of the story and not exotic weaponry, space flight, or really strange creatures, although we get no shortage of the latter. I admit, these days I dread the idea of yet another overused dragon in my reading, but I have to say Tyrrell has a number of clever ways to play with dragons and baby dragons in her yarn.
Very quickly in Lumina, we can see the various paths of various distinctive characters in what opens up to be an other-worldly epic although many of the plots seem very grounded in earth lore. For example, one storyline involving the royal court of one country seems based on the life of concubines in an ancient Asian country. Other stories are obvious takes on the heroic quest involving the search for a lost brother, finding unlikely allies in a brewing war, and overcoming intolerance between humanoid species, especially against the golden-skinned genetically-engineered "Bronzites" who are excluded from human society.
So many characters in this book are memorable, some extremely admirable, such as Davron Berates who has to choose between friendship and his people along with his internal conflict over accepting his love for a strange Bronzite woman, the magical Chrystala who transforms in ways no one expected. Then there's my favorite, the lovely Salazai who suffers from the slowest-acting poison ever conceived. These characters and their friends and enemies are all center stage as war explodes in a multi-layered conflict spreading over a very wide and bloody canvas. The carnage of the climatic battle scenes is so epic it's amazing how this volume of the series could end on such a gentle note.
While this volume is a very long read, it's a welcome thought to know there is more to come that will hopefully resolve issues set up in the final chapters of book one. I want to know what will happen to the survivors of the war that left many heroes dead on the battlefield.
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This blog is a free service offered to those who want to encourage the reading of books they love. That includes authors who want to share their favorite reviews, reviewers who'd like to see their reviews get more exposure, and readers who want to shout out praise of books they've read. Please see submission guidelines on the left of this page. Reviews and essays are indexed by genre, reviewer names, and review sites. Writers will find the search engine handy for gleaning the names of small publishers. Find other writer-related blogs at Sharing with Writers and The Frugal, Smart and Tuned-In Editor.
Monday, April 27, 2020
Insecure Writers Group Releases Its 2020 Anthology
History Comes Alive for Children
New Anthology Offers an Entertaining Glimpse into the Past
The Insecure Writer’s Support Group hosted their fifth annual anthology contest last year and Voyagers: The Third Ghost is the result. A Writer’s Digest Top 101 Site for Writers, the IWSG called for juvenile historical fiction stories with the theme of “voyagers.” The group’s 20,000+ members responded, and once the administrators selected the top stories, they were forwarded to the official judges—a panel of authors, agents, and publishing industry experts.
This is the first children’s title produced by the group and by focusing on history, the book teaches as it entertains. The stories touch upon a wide variety of time periods, which adds extra appeal to teachers and librarians.
Yvonne Ventresca, who also appeared in the second IWSG anthology, Hero Lost: Mysteries of Death and Life, won the top spot in the contest. Her story, The Third Ghost, received the subtitle and cover art honor.
Journey into the past…
Ten authors explore the past, sending their young protagonists on harrowing adventures. Featuring the talents of Yvonne Ventresca, Katharina Gerlach, Roland Clarke, Sherry Ellis, Rebecca M. Douglass, Bish Denham, Charles Kowalski, Louise MacBeath Barbour, Beth Anderson Schuck, and L.T. Ward.
Hand-picked by a panel of agents, authors, and editors, these ten tales will take readers on a voyage of wonder into history. Get ready for an exciting ride!
Founded by author Alex J. Cavanaugh, the Insecure Writer’s Support Group offers support for writers and authors alike. It provides an online database; articles; monthly blog posting; Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram groups; #IWSGPit, and a newsletter.
Voyagers: The Third Ghost will be available May 5, 2020 online, retail, and for all eBook platforms. Published by Freedom Fox Press an imprint of Dancing Lemur Press, L.L.C. Juvenile fiction – historical/action & adventure/fantasy & magic. Trade paperback $13.95 ISBN 9781939844729, eBook 4.99 ISBN 9781939844736
Judges for the contest were: Dan Koboldt, author and #SFFpit founder Dan Koboldt is the author of the Gateways to Alissia trilogy (Harper Voyager), the editor of Putting the Science in Fiction (Writers Digest, 2018), and the creator of the sci-fi adventure serial The Triangle (Serial Box, 2019). As a genetics researcher, he has co-authored more than 80 publications in Nature, Science, The New England Journal of Medicine, and other scientific journals. He is represented by Paul Stevens of Donald Maass Literary Agency. Lynda R. Young, author Lynda R. Young is an Aussie writing fantasy novels as Elle Cardy. Wielder’s Prize is her debut YA epic fantasy. She is also an editor, game developer, 3D artist, graphic designer, photographer, gamer and more. Colleen Oefelein, agent, The Jennifer De Chiara Literary Agency Colleen Oefelein is an author of YA, picture books, and author promotion guides, a devourer of books, and the owner of the book review site North of Normal. Formerly an associate agent and PR manager with Inklings Literary Agency, Colleen has hosted numerous “Pitch Perfect” and “Rejection Correction” workshops on Facebook and at conferences nationwide, and she’s mentored several authors one-on-one through online pitch contests such as Pitch Wars. Damien Larkin, author Damien Larkin is an Irish science fiction author and co-founder of the British and Irish Writing Community. His debut novel Big Red was published by Dancing Lemur Press and went on to be longlisted for the BSFA award for Best Novel. He currently lives in Dublin, Ireland and is working on his next novel Blood Red Sand. Ion Newcombe, eidtor and publisher is the editor and publisher of AntipodeanSF, Australia's longest running online speculative fiction magazine, regularly issued since January 1998. His qualifications and employment range from horticulture through electronics into literature and communications. Julie Gwinn, agent, The Seymour Agency Julie Gwinn most recently served as Marketing Manager for the Christian Living line at Abingdon Press and before that served as Trade Book Marketing Manager and then Fiction Publisher for the Pure Enjoyment line at B&H Publishing Group, a Division of LifeWay Christian Resources. Recently, she was awarded Editor of the Year from the American Christian Fiction Writers and won B&H’s first Christy award for Ginny Yttrup’s debut novel Words. David Powers King, author David's works include Woven, The Undead Road,, and Full Dark: An Anthology. He currently resides in the Mountain West with his wife and 4 children.
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LEARN MORE ABOUT VOYAGERS AND BUY LINKS: Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/dp/193984472X/ Barnes and Noble - https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/voyagers-yvonne-ventresca/1135912991?ean=2940163430857 ITunes - https://books.apple.com/ca/book/voyagers-the-third-ghost/id1493413956 Kobo - https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/voyagers-the-third-ghost Goodreads - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/50364415-voyagers |
This blog is a free service offered to those who want to encourage the reading of books they love. That includes authors who want to share their favorite reviews, reviewers who'd like to see their reviews get more exposure, and readers who want to shout out praise of books they've read. Please see submission guidelines on the left of this page. Reviews and essays are indexed by genre, reviewer names, and review sites. Writers will find the search engine handy for gleaning the names of small publishers. Find other writer-related blogs at Sharing with Writers and The Frugal, Smart and Tuned-In Editor.