Bob Dylan New York Book Honors the Musician on his 70th Birthday

Bob Dylan celebrates his 70th birthday today.  The original North American troubadour, Dylan’s career spans six decades and shows no signs of ending - good news for his ardent fans.

June Skinner Sawyers has penned Bob Dylan New York, the newest addition to the MusicPlace Series.  The cover photo, courtesy of PBS, depicts a young Dylan not long after his arrival in New York City in 1961.  The night Dylan arrived he scored a gig at Cafe Wha?, the free spirited epitome of Greenwich Village coffeehouses.

According to the author, Dylan was in search of his musical hero, Woody Guthrie, for whom he wrote, “Song to Woody.”  His inimitable poetry set to music has maintained its clarity and commitment to Dylan’s values and integrity.

New York City serves as Dylan’s home base and the maps designed by Kim Rush create context.  For those not intimately familiar with the cafes, shops, taverns, live music locations, hotels and neighborhoods, the maps parallel Dylan’s adventure from the early 60s to the present day.
Since 1962, Dylan has recorded more than 50 albums of his inimitable poetry set to music.  Many consider Dylan a Folk Singer but that moniker does not scratch the surface of a man who has worked without a pause.

A.O. Scott presciently wrote in the New York Times on May 17, 2011, “Devotees who use the age of their idol to calculate their own dismaying senescence may be shocked that he is so old, but to many more of us he has always been around.”
Many around the world grew up with Dylan as the soundtrack to exact moments in life, relationships, and whereabouts.  One’s momento mori comes into sharp focus when a particular track is heard.  Skinner Sawyers’ compact book is a primer for those who are unfamiliar with Bob Dylan and a cherry atop a hot fudge sundae for those who can recite every lyric to every song.

Search the Internet and one will find more than 38 million entries and 1.3 million birthday wishes, articles and celebrations dated within the past few days.  Look again and there are more than 1,700 books in print about Bob Dylan.  For a man who rarely granted interviews throughout his career to date, there is a mammoth range of music and print media to draw on.

Cue up whichever albums make you sing and dance along and in Dylan’s words, may you stay “Forever Young.”

About the author: June Skinner Sawyers’ themes include music, literature, and travel.  Her credits include more than 20 books and untold articles and reviews.  Her subjects have included the Beatles and Bruce Springsteen.  She currently teaches at Loyola University’s School of Continuing and Professional studies and at the Newberry Library.

About the publisher:  Roaring Forties Press’ MusicPlace Series portrays the links between musicians and the cities they call home.  According to the publisher’s note, each book in the series is “Packed with details about the musician’s life, and work and stories about the city’s neighborhoods and night spots, each volume in the series captures the mood, the culture and the sounds of a revolutionary ear in popular music.”

Copyright Dindy Yokel 2011

Bob Dylan New York
Roaring Forties Press
ISBN # 978-0-9843165-9-5

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Peace in the Heart & Home by Charlotte Mikulka

Amidst all the chaos today of natural disasters, financial implosions and the general "decline and fall," of our hemisphere, aren't we all looking for peace and harmony?  Charlotte Mikulka gives readers just that in Peace in the Heart and Home.

Ice Pop Joy by Anni Daulter

Summer is nearly upon us and our minds and palates turn to yummy cooling treats.  Anni Daulter's Ice Pop Joy features easy-to-make recipes with organic ingredients, fruit, vegetables, agave nectar and coconut sugar.

Alexandra DeFurio's gorgeous photography firmly places the reader in idyllic meadows, backyards and parks with lush flora and fauna and smiling faces.

Haiti Noir Anthology Edited by Edwidge Danticat

Haiti churns out bad news daily whether it is a cholera epidemic, a returning dictator or two or the aftermath of the earthquake of 2010.  Visitors to the island nation know there is beauty, culture and miraculous people.  The armchair traveler has a plethora of news books out this year written by Haitian authors to choose from.  The best way to jump in feet first is with Haiti Noir edited by Edwidge Danticat.  

Authors and publishers are taking up the mantle of doing well by doing good.  Rebecca Skloot and her foundation for the Lacks family benefitting from book sales is a superb example.  In Haiti Noir a publisher’s note informs readers that, “a portion of the profits will be donated to the Lambi Fund of Haiti, a nonprofit organization working toward economic democracy, and alternative sustainable development in Haiti.”  As if one needs a reason beyond outstanding fiction writing to indulge in this superb anthology.

"Even before the earthquake, life was not easy in Haiti.  There was always the risk of dying from hunger, an infectious disease, a natural disaster, or a crime.  But there was also hope, laughter and boundless creativity," writes Danticat.

A series of readings and appearances is scheduled now through May 13, 2011, for details please visit the publisher’s website.  Authors included in the Haiti Noir anthology will accompany Ms. Danticat  to locations in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Baltimore, MD.  

Each story is fresh and heart wrenching whether for the lost people, lost beauty or lost time.  Danticat has orchestrated an outstanding selection of voices that reach into every nook and cranny of life in Haiti.

18 new stories, including one by Danticat and two by non-Haitians, Madison Smartt Bell and Mark Kurlansky, bring the sounds, aromas, colors, and landscape of Haiti to life.  The Rainbow's End by M.J. Fievre is a father-daughter story that transcends the island's borders to resonate with fathers and daughters everywhere.  The story is Haiti-specific in the rhythm and syncopation of the words including the oft-repeated "Because Ben Knows Where I live."

Gary Victor's The Finger shocks and surprises in a creepy crawly way but leaves readers Googling him and the 17 other authors craving more work to read by these sensational voices.  Paradise Inn by Kettly Mars pays homage to the magical realism of Isabel Allende.  Mars has a superb voice and her lyricism gallops without stumbling from word one. 

Izzy Goldstein is the protagonist in Mark Kurlansky's The Leopard of Ti Morne and possesses a unique and funny voice and spirit.  Kurlansky puts the reader smack dab in the middle of Goldstein's Miami Beach apartment with his lush and intimate description.

In an email conversation with Madison Smartt Bell about his story, Twenty Dollars, Bell said.  “I started going to Haiti in 1995, once or twice a year, to research my books and then because I got to love it.”

This is not the first time Bell has written about Haiti and when asked about his fascination with the island the author sums it up with a declaration by his character and alter ego in Twenty Dollars, Charlie Chapo.  “Haiti is a place where magical thinking actually works.”

Born in Haiti in 1969, Edwidge Danticat moved to the United States at the age of twelve.  Create Dangerously, Danticat’s new memoir just out from Princeton University Press, is a collection of essays exploring the responsibility of immigrant artists “to bear witness when their countries of origin are suffering from violence, oppression, poverty, and tragedy.”

Danticat is the author of Breath, Eyes, Memory, an Oprah Book Club selection, Krik? Krak!, a National Book Award finalist.  Brother, I'm Dying, her memoir, was a 2007 finalist for the National Book Award and a 2008 winner of a National Book Critics Circle Award.  In 2009 Danticat was awarded the prestigious grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.  She lives in the Little Haiti district of Miami with her husband and daughter.

Akashic Books launched the Noir Series in 2004 with its award-winning best seller Brooklyn Noir.  The anthologies include all new stories, each set within a distinct neighborhood or location within the title city.  Haiti Noir is the 36^th book in this series.

Haiti Noir

Edited by Edwidge Danticat

Akashic Books

Hardcover ISBN# 9781617750137

Trade Paperback ISBN# 9781936070657

Cover Photo: Steve Lindridge/istockphoto.com

Cover Design: Jon Resh/Undaunted  

www.examiner.com/literature-in-long-island/dindy-yokel

December 10 - Reverb10 Prompt - Wisdom

Gave my old laptop in excellent condition to the grandkids of the woman who cleaned my apartment in Atlanta.  Made her life better as she didn't have to sit around in the library after a day of hard work while the kids waited in line to use the computer.  In fact, I centered most of my giving on these four little girls.  Information about Women's History Month and a book from the website - anything to add some education on top of what they get in school.  Another joy, mentoring at Kipp Strive in Atlanta via the Wren's Nest former home, now a house museum, of the gentlemen who wrote the Uncle Remus books.  Met some super people, was happy to learn about a school that does what a school is supposed to do - enrich, educate and enliven.  Loved meeting my 5th grader mentee, Kwesi, and working with him to write the essay about his grandfather which was included in a book published in time for the Decatur Book Fair.  He is a cutie patootie and so bright.  Good decisions both - got me out of my box and out of the house among kids.  Ignited fire in my soul encouraging kids to write.  Loved getting the book reports I assigned.  Being with kids is wondrous, calming, inspiring and joyful.  Noisy, aggravating and exhausting too.  Spend more time with kids in 2011 was a wise decision and is on my to do list for 2011.