What I’m Reading: Bellevue by David Oshinsky

My Amazon review of Bellevue by David Oshinsky (Rated 5): A fascinating review of medical and social history – David Oshinsky offers a fascinating view of medical and social history through the lens of an institution that continues to reinvent itself with each era. As he did in his Pulitzer-prize winning masterpiece, Polio, the author introduces readers to the events, and most especially the people, that were the driving force beyond the sometimes tortuous path of progress.

Learn history through fiction: The Kosher Meat Boycott of 1902

Here’s another gem from the era of my historical novel On the Shore. By 1900, the Lower East Side had over 130 kosher butcher shops catering to Eastern European Jewish immigrants. In 1902, the National Beef Trust of America (a monopoly) was created and raised the price of beef from 12 cents to 18 cents per pound, a 50% increase. Thousands of angry Jewish women stormed neighborhood butcher shops, smashing windows and destroying meat (tossing it in the street, soaking it in kerosene and setting it on fire). The women disrupted Sabbath services in synagogues to encourage a boycott of butchers. After a month of protests, the Beef Trust lowered its price to 14 cents per pound. The Lower East Side remained a hotbed of social activism for decades, with women playing a significant role. Read more in BEHIND THE STORY.

What I’m Reading: Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders

My Amazon review of Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders (Rated 5): George Saunders has hit upon a unique format for turning his gifts as a short story writer into a unified novel. I was immediately propelled by the staccato pace, although I admit that in the middle, I wished for less Sesame Street and more Fred Rogers. By the end, however, Saunders built to a sustained prose that penetrated my earthly being. A book that earns its “Bravo” reviews.

Learn History Through Fiction: Al Capone Goes from Hitting to Hits

Discovered while researching the short story “Blood and Sand” — Al Capone showed promise as a student, but his parochial school education ended at the age of 14, in 1913, after he was expelled for hitting a female teacher (presumably a nun) in the face. He then worked odd jobs in Brooklyn, including at a candy store and a bowling alley, until he met gangster Johnny Torrio, who became his mentor. Capone later moved his family to Chicago and the rest is history. [Note: The title “Blood and Sand” comes from a popular cocktail of the Capone era, made by mixing scotch, kirshwasser, sweet vermouth, and orange juice.]

Learn History Through Fiction: German Anti-Nazi Philosophy & U.S. Racism

Working on a story about Jewish professors who fled Nazi Germany and found work at historically black colleges and universities in the U.S. (often the only places that would hire them), I came across the work of Theodor Adorno of the Frankfurt School of philosophy. His critiques of Nazism apply equally well to racism and slavery in America. One example: Only a humanity to whom death has become as indifferent as its members, that has itself died, can inflict it administratively on innumerable people. As a writer and visual artist, I was also struck by his statement in favor of creativity over violence: Every work of art is an uncommitted crime.

On the Shore Submitted for Award

On the Shore (Vine Leaves Press, 2017), a novel about an immigrant Jewish family thrown into turmoil when a son lies about his name and age to fight in World War One, was submitted to the Association of Jewish Libraries (AJL) for its new adult fiction award. Judges are looking for work that grapples with Jewish thematic content including religion, history, culture, and identity. Books published in 2017 are eligible for the 2018 award. Winners will be announced in late February or early March 2018 (a long time to keep my digits crossed). To read more about On the Shore, watch the trailer, and order copies, see NOVELS.

Learn History Through Fiction: Who Invented Life Saver Candy?

Learn history through fiction. For my WWI-era novel On the Shore, I researched the kinds of candy American sailors might buy at the “gedunk stand” (canteen) in 1917. It was fortuitous that life savers, a nautical emblem, had been invented only five years earlier. Of course my character, a Navy recruit, bought a roll. Most intriguing was that the candy was the brainchild of Clarence Crane, the father of poet Hart Crane. Clarence was a chocolate-maker looking for a non-melting confection he could sell in the summer. Thus was “Crane’s Peppermint Life Savers” born. Imagine my delight when a clue in the 05/28/17 Acrostic puzzle of The New York Times Magazine read: “Candy invented in 1912 by the father of poet Hart Crane.” I knew the answer!

Short Story Collection Submitted

I’m entering my short story collection Between the Wars in contests and submitting it to prospective agents and publishers. The collection’s fourteen stories span the years from World War I to World War II (1911-1946) with narratives that go beyond the battlefield to examine how extraordinary events change ordinary lives and how, conversely, minor happenings can affect actions, feelings, and relationships. For example, “Jamming” pits the journals of an overbearing husband and his stifled wife at the founding of the Women’s Institute in Wales during World War I. In “Undark,” a budding artist paints her family’s reluctant acceptance of her older sister’s poisoning as a “Radium Girl” in the mid-1920s. A woman scriptwriter in “So I Did” battles sex discrimination and family disapproval to break into 1930s radio. Set in the Capone era, “Blood and Sand” portrays a girl’s confusion upon discovering her adored Uncle Al is behind the killing of her best friend’s father. Five of the stories have been published in journals (see STORIES) but I’d love to see the entire collection in print.

New Novel Finished

Tada! I’m sending out my new novel Nine in Ten to prospective agents and publishers. Inspired by a bizarre chapter in Toronto’s history, and set in 1976, Nine in Ten asks whether an overbearing father deserves a chance to make amends with his alienated offspring. Widower Emm Benbow, told by his doctor he can no longer live alone, must move in with one of his many children or go to a dreaded old age home. Fifty years earlier, Emm pressured his wife Izora to enter the Toronto Stork Derby, an actual contest which offered a sizable cash award to the woman who had the most babies between 1926 and 1936. They had a large family, but it was hardly the happy one Emm envisioned. Now, living in turn with each of his adult children, Emm discovers that the true value of fatherhood is not measured in big prizes, but in small rewards.

Learn History Through Fiction: Early Penny Arcade Games

Learn history through fiction. A century ago, penny arcades were a popular form of entertainment. Attractions included stereoscopes, tests of strength and lung capacity, perfume sprayers, mechanical fortune tellers, electric shockers (thought to stimulate health), and machines like “Dr. Vibrator,” the title of my latest story. Unlike the sexual association of today’s vibrators, the devices consisted of a rubber hand that users pressed against different parts of their body to “relieve specific ailments” (such as a stiff neck or aching back) and to generally “charge and replenish the body’s vital forces.” The machines were advertised with the slogan “Vibration is life!” To learn more history through fiction, see BEHIND THE STORY.