Blanche Gatto’s Baked Goods
“Remember, all entries must be mailed in before noon on March fifth. Make sure to send one dessert recipe. Then attach a brief bio of yourself, and most importantly, write on the envelope, ‘2017 Battle of the Bakers.’ The three chosen contestants will present their desserts at our St. Patrick’s Day celebration at our Market Square Pavilion. Wow, this should be interesting… the morning show sampling sweet desserts then drinking pitchers of beer with corn Read more [...]
Literary Review for Marshall Boyd
"What is unusual in Miami…? Everything is unusual." No one other than Marshall Boyd, author of the Falk McCoy mystery series, can mirror the Magic City's crime, passion, and diversity.
Faker, Death of a Dead Man, Miami Lovers, Wanton Needs, and Rue are perfect novels for those who have a penchant of the Mystery genre.
Faker
Marshall Boyd is a prolific and meticulous story-teller in this murder mystery based in Miami. Falk McCoy, the tough as nails and tenacious Read more [...]
Donald Goines
The selection is a review of acclaimed novels by Donald Goines:
Dopefiend, Whoreson, and White Man's Justice, Black Man's Grief are what Greg Goode of the University of Rochester called, "A new fictional genre...ghetto realism."
Dopefiend
Raw. This is the word that describes Dopefiend. Based in a Detroit ghetto, Goines tells you the story about his experiences as an addict. He places the reader in very uncomfortable situations: junkies getting their fix, prostitutes with their Read more [...]
Stephan Bailey: A Valise of Doubt
“You’ve got this all wrong,” Tim Derr said to his best friend of thirty years, Stephan Bailey who sat next to him on a stool at a tavern in Miami called, 305 Brass. “First and foremost compadre, as a person who has known you the most, and the best wingman that a guy looking for a girl could ask for—it’s not a blind date.”
“Remember when Tara and I went to an all-inclusive in Key West?” Tim asked.
“Of course,” Stephan said.
“Well, Read more [...]
Albert Joseph’s Bravado
Black and White Television Shows
Golden Age of Radio
Stories about his childhood:
Melancholy in Monessen,
A football star’s future—
Shortened by the family’s business.
Met a woman from Charleroi,
“Virginia is for Lovers.”
Completed a Family in 1971:
A corner house he purchased at Henry Street
In the borough of N. Belle Vernon.
I recall (those 14 vivid years
And the 16 visiting years),
What I want to recall…
A mill custodian, a provider,
A man Read more [...]
A Delivery from Dorothy Jane
Black and White Movies
Big Band Music
Stories about her childhood:
The lonely air in Lowber,
No joy in Charleroi.
Met a man from Monessen,
“Virginia is for Lovers.”
Completed a Family in 1971 :
A corner house at Henry Street
In the borough of N. Belle Vernon.
I recall (those vivid 14 years)
What I want to recall …
An artist, a baker, a craft maker.
I waited for mom to watch
Black and White Movies and
Listen to Big Band Music—
Stories about my Read more [...]
American Comandante
Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so shall you become—James Allen
William Morgan was a pipe dreamer of sort who, over the course of his formidable to fatherhood years, became a hero to some, a traitor to others, but most notably a man with conviction.
The documentary, American Comandante, illustrates the story of how a young man from Toledo, Ohio converted to a commander in the Cuban Revolution under Fidel Castro.
His lifetime was measured in a plethora of positions: Read more [...]
Rotted Orange among the Apple Orchards
A man from Miami wearing brown sandals, drawstring tan pants and a white guayabera appeared large between dead apple orchards. Two turkey vultures pecked on his body nailed between the long grass blades with a bullet. Their beaks had been breaking his skin since the scent stirred the air of a farm field in the eight hours of his death. The body was later identified by the sister of the deceased man: Charlie Snow.
Twelve hours earlier at the Merry Mountain Read more [...]
Miami Babylon—Gerald Posner
“Too Much is Never Enough”
Bienvenido a Miami Beach—A place that is pure, scenes that are graphic, people who are greedy, and a multi-cultural society which is collectively colorful.
Miami Babylon, published in 2009, is a social and historical timeline of Miami Beach. This is not your average text of footnotes which are marked by milestones for those who reside in a particular place, like the beach, to be docent guiding visitors to the important figures, symbolic Read more [...]
