Lone Star ReviewsMichelle Newby, NBCC,
Contributing Editor
Texas ReadsGlenn Dromgoole
>> archiveSports, celebrity photos featured in new book
This isn’t a Texas book per se, but it was published by the University of Texas Press and includes pictures of several Texans, so I’m going to mention it here anyway. Relentless: The Stories behind the Photographs by Neil Leifer with Diane K. Shah ($45 hardcover) is filled with great photos from one of the best-known sports photographers of the past fifty years. Not all of the pictures are sports related, as Leifer shot dozens of cover photographs for magazine as well as Sports Illustrated, but most are.
Leifer writes about some of the athletes, movie stars, and other dignitaries he has known and photographed over the years. They include Muhammad Ali (on the cover), Mickey Mantle, Arnold Palmer, Joe Namath, and Bear Bryant, as well as Doris Day, Clint Eastwood, Willie Nelson, Ronald Reagan, and George W. Bush.
“I started out shooting sports,” Leifer writes, “and, before I knew it, I was taking pictures of many of the greatest athletes of the past half century. “Not only that, but my career also took unexpected turns that sent me off to distant locales I couldn’t have even imagined. I ended up taking pictures of everyone from presidents and popes to movie stars and murderers — some of the most famous and infamous people on the planet. “And almost every one of those pictures comes with a story.”
The 400-page book is packed with Leifer’s color photographs and his frank and insightful commentary.
Aging gracefully: Dr. Matthew Minson, who teaches in the Texas A&M School of Public Health, has written a practical and whimsical guide to growing older. Prepare to Defend Yourself: How to Age Gracefully & Escape with Your Dignity (Texas A&M University Press, $28 paperback) looks at ways to make life more bearable and fun after fifty.
“For many,” Minson writes, “growing old is forbidding, even terrifying, and fraught with difficulty. For many others, growing old is a dynamic time of accomplishment, gratification, reflection, and reward, and, yes, fraught with difficulty. “The purpose of this book is to give you the tools and resources that will help shift your experiences toward the latter.”
Minson, also a cartoonist, sprinkles his drawings throughout the book as he discusses serious matters such as access to health care, financial resources, elder abuse and self-protection, sexuality, and end of life.
Baseball parents: Longtime Texas sportswriter Mark McDonald, now living in Midland, is the author of They Gave Us Baseball, Now Look What We’ve Done: How Doting Parents and Nut-Job Coaches Screw Up the Game for Kids ($19.95 paperback). The title pretty much summarizes what the book is about. Order at sportsandoutdoors.guru or contact the author at mark.marketing@gmail.com.
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Glenn Dromgoole’s latest book is More Civility, Please. Contact him at g.dromgoole@suddenlink.net.
>> Check out his previous Texas Reads columns in Lone Star Lit
Grand Central Publishing
Hardcover, 978-1455533831 (also available as an ebook, an audiobook, and on Audible), 608 pgs., $26.00
April 12, 2016
One night in March 1881, a woman gives birth to twins on a homestead near Gainesville, Texas. Millicent Holloway didn’t want one baby, much less two, so she and her husband, Leon, send the baby girl away with the midwife.
Twenty years later, Nathan Holloway knew he wasn’t his mother’s favorite but still “felt a part of the family scene if for the most part ignored, like the indispensable clock over the mantel in the kitchen.” Until Trevor Waverling arrives at the Holloway homestead outside Gainesville to announce that he is Nathan’s biological father and Nathan discovers that his mother is selling the farm out from under him. >>READ MORE
LONE STAR LISTENS interviews >> archive
Kay Ellington, Editor and Publisher
5.29.16 J. Todd Scott on what drove him to create his West Texas crime noir hit
If you’re traveling West this Memorial Day week to kick off a summer vacation and you find yourself in a place outside of Van Horn or Fort Stockton or Monahans, you can understand why the area might be dubbed The Far Empty, the title of J. Todd Scott’s debut novel. However, you might also see that its vast desert might prove fertile ground for a writer’s mind on the road.
That’s exactly how DEA special agent Scott crafted his Western crime noir that launches this upcoming week: while driving back and forth between Midland and Alpine. We caught up with him via email on the eve of his high school senior’s graduation and launching his first book tour in El Paso.
LONE STAR LITERARY LIFE: When you were growing up in Kentucky, do you ever imagine you might find yourself spending a portion of your life in Texas? What were your impressions of Texas as a youngster?
J. TODD SCOTT: Growing up I never really thought about ever living in Texas — of course, I never imagined all the places I would end eventually end up living, such as Los Angeles and Port Au Prince, Haiti. Until I moved to El Paso in 2013, my only prior experience with Texas was visiting some family in Galveston when I was in high school in 1983, the same week Hurricane Alicia made landfall. Needless to say, I didn’t get to stick around town very long. I actually think the rest of that vacation took place in Texarkana! >>READ MORE
Favorite Texas Bookstores
FINAL ROUND:
Vote by May 31, 2016
Texas’s only statewide, weekly calendar of book events
Bookish Texas event highlights 5.29.2016
>> GO this week Michelle Newby, Contributing Editor
News Briefs 5.29.16
Abilene’s Children’s Art and Literacy Festival lauds books across the city June 9-11
Celebrating the work of Mark Teague, illustrator of the How Do Dinosaurs Say I Love You? book series, Abilene’s Children’s Art and Literacy Festival includes a parade, dramatic readings of Teague’s books, costumed characters, art activities, animals, magic shows, balloons and more June 9-11, 2016, in Abilene, the Storybook Capital of Texas. >>READ MORE
CALF Celebrates 5th Year in Storybook Capital of Texas
Abilene, the Storybook Capital of Texas, has many literary events throughout the year, but the largest collaboration in the region is the CALF festival. The CALF draws thousands of people from Texas and beyond. The CALF was started by the Abilene Cultural Affairs Council, along with other community leaders, which realized that Abilene needed an event that would emphasize the importance the city places on families, art and literacy, as well as to involve many of the great art and community organizations located in downtown Abilene. >>READ MORE
Favorite Texas Bookstores
FINAL ROUND:
Vote by May 31, 2016
Texas has nearly 300 bookstores, and ONLY 30 of them have made the cut after last week’s finalist round of voting. Now tell us which of these are your favorites, and why. We look forward to hearing from you!
- Abilene: Texas Star Trading Company
- Alpine: Front Street Books
- Archer City: Booked Up Inc.
- Austin: BookPeople
- Austin: BookWoman
- Austin: Half Price Books-North Lamar #005
- Austin: Malvern Books
- Brenham: The Book Nook
- Dallas: Barnes & Noble #2884 Lincoln Park
- Dallas: Half Price Books-Texas Flagship Store #001
- Dallas: The Wild Detectives
- Denton: Recycled Books
- Frisco: Barnes & Noble #2060
- Galveston: Galveston Bookshop
- Gladewater: Gladewater Books
- Houston: Blue Willow Bookshop
- Houston: Brazos Bookstore
- Houston: Half Price Books-Copperfield Plaza #006
- Houston: Murder by the Book
- Houston: River Oaks Bookstore
- Lexington: 40 Acre Wood
- Lubbock: Barnes & Noble #2364
- Marfa: Marfa Book Company
- Post: Ruby Lane Books
- San Angelo: Cactus Book Shop
- San Antonio: Barnes & Noble #2353 The Shops at La Cantera
- San Antonio: Barnes & Noble San Pedro
- San Antonio: Twig Bookshop
- South Padre Island: Paragraphs on Padre Boulevard
- Tyler: Barnes & Noble #2624
If you’re an email newsletter subscriber, we’ll be sending you a ballot this week. If you’d like to vote—and you’re not a newsletter subscriber—simply send us your email at info@lonestarliterary.com
And tell us about your favorite bookstore, like this LSLL reader did this week: Front Street Books, Alpine TX. Since 1994 this store has been the best! For a small town, it has plenty of new bestsellers, whether fiction, nonfiction, nature, or regional. And is has a used book section, too. Coffee, newspapers await the visitor. But watch it. A sign on the front door advises against talking on your cell phone.” —Vivian Morrow Jones
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CONTINUING ON TOUR: FICTION
EVERY BRIDE HAS HER DAY
by Janice Thompson
Visit with Janice through May 31
5/28 A Novel Reality — Guest Post #2
5/29 The Page Unbound — Review
5/30 Margie’s Must Reads — Promo
5/31 It’s a Jenn World — Review
COMING UP ON TOUR: FICTION
THE DO-RIGHT
by Lisa Sandlin
Visit with Lisa June 6–15, 2016
6/6 All for the Love of the Word — Review
6/7 Country Girl Bookaholic — Author Interview #1
6/8 Forgotten Winds — Excerpt #1
6/9 My Book Fix Blog — Review
6/10 Blogging for the Love of Authors and Their Books — Promo
6/11 Missus Gonzo — Excerpt #2
6/12 Texas Book Lover — Author Interview #2
6/13 Margie’s Must Reads — Review
6/14 The Crazy Booksellers — Promo
6/15 Book Chase — Review
CONTINUING ON TOUR: FICTION
LOST PATH TO SOLITUDE
by Maria Elena Sandovici
Visit with Maria Elena May 23 – June 1, 2016
5/28 My Book Fix Blog – Excerpt
5/29 Missus Gonzo – Review
5/30 The Page Unbound – Author Interview #2
5/31 StoreyBook Reviews – Review
6/1 A Novel Reality – Guest Post #2
COMING UP ON TOUR: NONFICTION
FINDING DOROTHY SCOTT
by Sarah Byrn Rickman
Visit with Sarah June 1–10, 2016
6/1 Hall Ways Blog — Review
6/2 StoreyBook Reviews — Excerpt #1
6/3 My Book Fix Blog — Author Interview #1
6/4 Forgotten Winds — Review
6/5 Books and Broomsticks — Guest Post
6/6 Texas Book Lover — Author Interview #2
6/7 Missus Gonzo — Review
6/8 The Page Unbound — Excerpt #2
6/9 The Crazy Booksellers — Author Interview #3
6/10 It’s a Jenn World — Review
COMING UP ON TOUR: FICTION
No Other Will Do
by Karen Witemeyer
Visit with Dianne May 23 – June 1, 2016
6/1 Missus Gonzo — Excerpt #1
6/2 My Book Fix Blog — Review
6/3 Books and Broomsticks–Author Interview #1
6/4 StoreyBook Reviews — Guest Post
6/5 Margie’s Must Reads — Review
6/6 A Novel Reality — Promo
6/7 The Page Unbound — Excerpt #2
6/8 Byers Editing Reviews & Blog — Review
6/9 Country Girl Bookaholic–Author Interview #2
6/10 The Librarian Talks — Review
CONTINUING ON TOUR: FICTION
DEATH UNDER A FULL MOON
by Dianne Smithwick-Braden
Visit with Dianne May 23 – June 1, 2016
5/28 Books and Broomsticks – Author Interview #2
5/29 StoreyBook Reviews – Guest Post
5/30 Hall Ways Blog– – Review
5/31 Texas Book Lover – Author Interview #3
6/1 Blogging for the Love of Authors and Their Books – Review
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