Tag: books

‘This Plade The Gods Touched Earth’, Montana Arts Council

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn writing2 Comments

The beauty of this place we now call Montana inspires such awe that words frequently fail us. And that’s when we call for the poets. The book in your hands is a campfire of sorts, around which eleven poets laureate have gathered. Their legacy joins thousands of years of voices speaking across this landscape.

Twenty years is a blip in the reckoning of this place, but in that time Montana’s poets laureate have chronicled the scale and shape of its grandeur and its grace, and the hardships and hopes of the people who call it home. This collection is a glimpse into their work and the importance of the spoken word to this best of places.

Published by the Montana Arts Council in collaboration with the Montana Historical Society, This Place the Gods Touched Earth collects work from Montana’s eleven poets laureate to date, celebrating their responses in words to the people and places of the Big Sky, and commemorating their two decades of service to Montana’s literary landscape so far.

“This Place the Gods Touched Earth is the first poetry anthology to come out of the Montana Historical Society Press. But it’s much more than that—speaking as the historian that I am, this anthology is the bottled zeitgeist of Montana over the past two decades of the Poet Laureate program,” says Jeff Bartos, editor, Montana Historical Society Press. “It’s a primary source for the language arts in Montana in the twenty-first century, compiling—by discretion of the individual poets—their most meaningful writings and profound observations into one volume.’

The anthology is a collection of Montana’s Poets Laureate, 2005 – 2025.

–Malcolm

Satire Used to be Easy To Write

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn writing

Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of exposing or shaming the perceived flaws of individuals, corporations, government, or society itself into improvement.[1] Although satire is usually meant to be humorous, its greater purpose is often constructive social criticism, using wit to draw attention to both particular and wider issues in society. – Wikipedia

Used to be all it took to write satire was a good imagination and a love of dark humor. Now, those days are gone with the wind–and grieved, as Thomas Wolfe might say. I loved finding absurd government actions and making up stories that were much worse and more humorous.

I was trained by the writers of Mad Magazine and Punch.

Now, the government has become much worse, and making it worse in a satirical news story is already too close to the truth to make people laugh. (Not counting crazy people who, actually, are running the county.)

In the old days, I might write a headline like this:

Pacifists kill people to draw attention to horror of killing people.

Now protests often come with violence, and it’s hard to make a joke of it.

Or:

Feds pave road to hell with mob concrete.

Now hell is right here on our doorsteps, compliments of both sides of the aisle. (As a Libertarian, I can poke fun at everyone.)

Today, I might write:

Foreign aid now headed for blue states.

And yet, with the calamity that’s befallen USAID, I can’t make myself write that kind of satirical story because–as it turns out–“Mad Magazine” has become the Feds’ policy manual. Think of the money that’s being saved by reading the magazine rather than drafting policies from scratch. Yeah, that’ll work until DOGE kills off the magazine.

I’d rather write a story with this headline:

DOGE Pulls Plug on Itself

Maybe my satirical story will become a prophecy. I can only hope.

–Malcolm

‘Path of the Panther: New Hope for Wild Florida’ by Carlton Ward Jr.

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn conservation

CBS news reports that “Three dozen endangered Florida panthers died this year, the most in nearly a decade, according to the state’s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. It’s the most panther deaths since 2016, when 42 panthers were killed.”

All the more reason to read this 2023 book, follow panther-related conservation organizations such as Wildpath, for FL residents purchase a protect the panther license plate, and keep up with news about Florida conservation efforts.

From the Publisher

“The panther is the state animal of Florida, the last big cat surviving east of the Mississippi River, and an emblem of the Endangered Species Act. It was driven to extinction in the eastern United States, except for a small remnant population that persisted in Florida’s Everglades. Panther numbers had dwindled to fewer than 20 individuals by the 1980s, but heroic conservation efforts have helped panthers come back to nearly 200 today. The biggest obstacle for the panther’s continued recovery is access to enough of its historic territory throughout Florida and beyond.

“The tale of the Florida panther has grown from the unlikely survival of a rare cat to a story of hope for all of wild Florida. Path of the Panther in now a call to action to recognize and protect the Florida Wildlife Corridor – a network of public and private land that connects the panther’s current range in south Florida to suitable habitat throughout the state of Florida and adjoining states.

“The Florida Wildlife Corridor is the panther’s path to recovery and a western-scale conservation opportunity that remains largely hidden in the east. It is now as a Last Wild Places partnership with the National Geographic Society. With 27 percent of Florida already protected as public land, this project aims to inspire the additional one million acres of conservation needed over the next decade so that Florida can be a leader in the goal of protecting 30 percent of the planet by 2030.

“Photographer Carlton Ward helped put the Florida Wildlife Corridor on the map by trekking from the Everglades to Georgia in 2012 and from the Everglades Headwaters around the Gulf of Mexico to Alabama in 2015. Through these National Geographic–supported expeditions, he and his team have witnessed that a path for the panther’s recovery still exists. But with 1,000 new residents moving to Florida every day, and more than 100,000 acres of habitat lost to development each year, to window to save it is closing quickly. Through Ward’s intimate photographs, expert essays and compelling maps, the Path of the Panther book, combined with a National Geographic magazine article, National Geographic Society Last Wild Places campaign, and feature documentary film, is poised to awaken people to wild Florida and inspire them to save it.”

Happy New Year

–Malcolm

Short Story Collection: The Land Between the Rivers features three tales set before the dawn of recorded time in the Florida Panhandle world bordered by the Apalachicola River, Ochlockonee River and the Gulf of Mexico. This diverse environment of coastline, baygalls, swamps and forests includes the beautiful and notorious Tate’s Hell State Forest. In How the Panther Lost Her Roar, you’ll meet the rare and endangered Florida Panther that could be found in Tate’s Hell as late as the 1960s. In How the Snake Bird Learned to Dry His Feathers, you’ll meet a Florida bird—also called the Anhinga—that learns to swim before he learns to fly. And, in How the Bear Found Her Favorite Food, you’ll learn what the Florida black bear eats when she has her choice. These stories begin where the Seminole Creation Myth ends as seen through the eyes of Eulalie, the root doctor in my novella Conjure Woman’s Cat, available in both electronic and print formats.

‘Tatterdemalion,’ by Sylvia Linsteadt

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn magic

Oops, I meant to say something about this wonderful book when it came out two years ago. The book is well-written and beautifully illustrated by the widely-known faerie world artist Rima Staines.

From the Publisher

“In a ruined world, what survives are the stories we tell Poppy, who speaks the languages of wild things, travels east to the mountains with the wheeled and elephantine beast Lyoobov. He’s seeking answers to the mysteries of his birth, and the origins of the fallen world in which he lives. Up in the glacial peaks, among a strange, mountainous people, a Juniper Tree takes Poppy deep into her roots and shows him the true stories of the people who made his world, people he thought were only myths. Their tales span centuries, from three hundred years in the future all the way back to our present day. It is through this feral but redemptive folklore that Poppy begins to understand the story of his own past and his place in the present. Tatterdemalion is a stunning collaboration between writer Sylvia V. Linsteadt and artist Rima Staines, featuring the fourteen original paintings that inspired the narrative.”

From the Author’s Website

“Sylvia Victor Linsteadt is an author, scholar of ancient history, and certified wildlife tracker. She studied Literary Arts at Brown University, graduating with Honors in 2011. 

“Her work—both fiction and non-fiction—is rooted in myth, ecology, feminism & bioregionalism, and is devoted to broadening our human stories to include the voices of the living land.”

“She is the author of the short story collection Our  Lady of the Dark Country, two novels for young readers, The Wild Folk (Nominated for the CILIP Carnegie Medal in 2019) and The Wild Folk Rising, and the post-apocalyptic folktale cycle Tatterdemalion with painter Rima Staines.”

To learn more about folklore/fae authors, artists, and illustrators, I recommend the blog Myth and Moor. While the blog has been on hiatus (but becoming active again), you will find faerie resources and authors in the right-hand column.

—Malcolm

Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of the upside-down faerie tale, “Waking Plain.”

Briefly Noted: Before His Time: The Untold Story of Harry T. Moore, America’s First Civil Rights Martyr

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn Florida, reviews

Those researching civil rights leaders in Florida will find this book a handy resource. The third edition, released by the Florida Historical Society Press in 2017 is the one available on Amazon. Typical of historical society and university press books, the retail price is higher than what you might expect from a major publisher, however, Amazon has used copies available at a great saving.

From the Publisher

On Christmas night, 1951, a bomb exploded in Mims, Florida, under the home of civil rights activist and educator Harry T. Moore.

Harry and his wife Harriette both died from injuries sustained in the blast, making them the first martyrs of the contemporary civil rights movement. They were killed twelve years before Medgar Evers, fourteen years before Malcolm X, and seventeen years before Martin Luther King, Jr.

The sound of the bomb could be heard three miles away in the neighboring town of Titusville, but what resonates today is the memory of the important civil rights work accomplished by Moore.

This new edition of Ben Green s comprehensive biography of Harry T. Moore includes updated material about the investigations into the bombing, and additional photographs commemorating Moore s legacy.

If you follow civil rights issues, you know that there have been several investigations of the crime, the final one yielding the names of probable perpetrators. Two would die of natural causes and one by suicide before the initial FBI investigation was complete. I doubt we will ever find true closure on this crime. The book fills in a lot of details about what made Moore a marked man and what happened in the aftermath of the bombing.

I wish the publisher’s description included, at least, a few generalities about the focus of Moore’s work since he was active so long ago and hasn’t loomed large in mainstream civil rights histories. I found this book very helpful in my research for the novel in progress and recommend it to scholars and others interested in Florida and the Klan.

–Malcolm

Malcolm R. Campbell’s Florida Folk Magic Series of four novels set in the Florida Panhandle in the 1950s focuses on battles against the KKK in a small town. Conjure Woman’s Cat is the first novel in the series Fate’s Arrows is the fourth book in the series.

Watch this space

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn writing

I just saw the cover artwork for something new, something that’s been in the works at Thomas-Jacob Publishing, and it looks great.

But I can’t tell you what it is.

I can tell you that you’re going to like it (or else). I can also tell you that I’ve been having fun working on my part of this “something new.” We had a nasty thunderstorm this afternoon, but I kept working.

Feel free to stop watching this space if you have to use the restroom, walk the dog, or get some shuteye. We understand because we’re understanding people. We’re not going to be watching this space 24/7 either because we’re busy working on the something new.

Around the clock.

—Malcolm

Thumbing my nose at authority for 50+ years

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn Malcolm R. Campbell, writing

Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies. – Groucho Marx

My problems with authority began in grade school and continue to this day. You see some evidence of that in the occasional fake news stories printed in this blog under the pseudonym Jock Stewart. I used to write these on earlier blogs and collected some of them in a book published by Lulu ten years ago. (It’s still there.)

A previous publisher saw these satircal news stories on my earlier blos and kept collecting them into novella-length collections. They’re no longer there because that publisher is no longer there.

The people who know me well (wife, neighbors, family, publisher) believe the “real me” is Jock Stewart rather than the angelic persona you see on this blog. The people who think I’m Jock Stewart believe that my thriller/satire novel Special Investigative Reporter is a memoir.

Maybe yes, maybe no.

In general, I agree with Groucho though, of course, I don’t get any traction out of that because he’s no longer there. Pratically speaking, I think politicians should have expiration dates so that they can do less damage to the country.

My superiors in the Navy knew I had this impression about them, meaning that my relationship with the brass was about like that of Alan Alda’s relationship with the brass in M*A*S*H. You’ll see some of this attitude in my Vietnam War novel At Sea.

In general, my authority problems have served me well in writing novels and short stories about people with authority problems. So that’s good, right?

—Malcolm

Malcolm R. Campbell writes satire because, well, society needs a quasi-sane voice in this chaotic old world of ours who’s not afraid to to call a crook a crook. He stands ready to swear on a stack of phone books that “Special Investigative Reporter” is fiction. Well, mostly.

A cool selection of fiction

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn books, writing2 Comments

From my colleagues at Thomas-Jacob Publishing

Child of Sorrow by Melinda Clayton

When fourteen-year-old foster child Johnathan Thomas Woods is suspected of murder, an old letter and a tacky billboard advertisement lead him to the office of attorney Brian Stone. Recognizing the sense of hopelessness lurking under John’s angry façade, Stone is soon convinced of his innocence. When John offers up his lawn-mowing money as payment, Stone realizes this is a case he can’t refuse.

In the face of overwhelming evidence assembled by the prosecution, Stone and his team find themselves in a race against time to save an angry boy who’s experienced more than his fair share of betrayal, a boy who more often than not doesn’t seem interested in saving himself.

–

An Inchworm Takes Wing by Robert Hays

In the tranquil solitude of a darkened Room 12 in the ICU on the sixth floor of Memorial Hospital’s Wing C, a mortal existence is drawing to an end. His head and torso swathed in bandages, his arms and legs awkwardly positioned in hard casts and layers of heavy gauze, he’s surrounded by loved ones yet unable to communicate, isolated within his own thoughts and memories.

He does not believe himself to be an extraordinary man, simply an ordinary one, a man who’s made choices, both good and bad. A man who was sometimes selfish, sometimes misguided, sometimes kind and wise. A man who fought in a war in which he lost a part of his soul, who then became a teacher and worked hard to repair the damage.

When faced with the end, how does one reconcile the pieces of an ordinary life? Does a man have the right to wish for wings to carry him to a summit he believes he doesn’t deserve to reach?

–

Chasing Eve by Sharon Heath

Everyone expected big things from Ariel Thompkins. Wasn’t she the girl who’d roped her friends into one madcap adventure after another, who’d met the challenge of losing both parents before turning eighteen, who’d gone on to graduate summa cum laude from UCLA? So how did this livewire end up delivering the day’s mail for the U.S. Postal Service, hunkering down each night with her half-blind cat in front of the TV, ruminating over the width of her thighs? It looked as though it would take a miracle to get her out of her rut. Who knew that miracle would come in the form of an acutely candid best friend and a motley crew of strangers—a homeless drunk once aptly nicknamed “Nosy,” a lonely old woman seeing catastrophe around every corner, a shy teenager fleeing sexual abuse, a handsome young transplant from the Midwest with a passion for acting and for Ariel herself? Not to mention the fossil remains of a flat-faced crone who just might have been the ancestress of everyone alive today? Chasing Eve takes us on a funny, sad, hair-raising adventure into the underbelly of the City of Angels, where society’s invisible people make a difference to themselves and to others, and where love sometimes actually saves the day.

–

Who’s Munching by Milkweed? by Smoky Zeidel

When Ms. Gardener discovers something has been munching on her milkweed plants, she embarks on a fun and educational monarch butterfly journey that enchants both children and adults. 

With Photographs. Zeidel is a Master Gardener.

A rare interview with Malcolm R. Campbell

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn fiction3 Comments

We found the reclusive Mr. Campbell at a mostly forgotten Bandit’s Biker Bar that fell on hard times when Hell’s Angels switched over to IHOP. Wearing his traditional Levi’s and a navy blue polo shirt, Campbell was halfway through a bottle of Talisker Distiller’s Edition Scotch when we arrived. He consented to talk to us as long was didn’t ask why he left the gigolo business for the low-paying career of a writer.

Newspaper: Do you come here often?

Campbell: It’s my second home.

Newspaper: You’ve done wonders with the place.

Campbell: My designer loves the concept of belligerent neglect.

Newspaper: Now that we’ve gotten the ambiance of our setting out of the way, do you have any secrets you want to tell us?

Campbell: I’m not the same guy who raced cars in the U.K or the guy who wrote The Hero With a Thousand Faces.

Newspaper: We didn’t think you were. Got anything else, something that will make a scandalous headline?

Campbell: I was an Eagle Scout.

Newspaper: Good Lord, are you serious? You’re such a badass, nobody would suspect you once worked on merit badges and gone on camping trips.

Campbell: You’re the first person I’ve told other than my mother.

Newspaper: So, now that you’ve finished Fate’s Arrows, what are you working on now?

Campbell: A tell-all about how to use time travel for fun and profit.

Newspaper: Aren’t you afraid most people will think it’s another contemporary fantasy being released under the fiction that it’s really nonfiction?

Campbell: Most of the world’s nonfiction never happened. Most novels are true. So in this case, readers who think the book is really fiction are ahead of the game.

Newspaper: What game?

Campbell: The game we’re playing right now where you ask me questions, I tell you lies, and you print them in the feature section of your newspaper as God’s honest truth. 

Newspaper: So, when it comes down to it, this interview is a farce.

Campbell: Pretty much. But it serves a need. The readers think they know more about me than they did before even though they suspect they’re being played for suckers.

Newspaper: One is born every minute.

Campbell: More than that, I think.

Newspaper: Are you this messed up in “real life”?

Campbell: If there were such a thing as “real life,” I would hope so. But there isn’t, so I’m not. Readers who suspect “real life” isn’t real are drawn to my books because they want to know why everything is always in a mess, so the best I can do is offer them a way to escape the illusion of the daily news.

–Stargazer News Service

 

 

Need Help Christmas Shopping

On By Malcolm R. CampbellIn books

If you have put off your Christmas shopping until the last minute, here are a few ideas from your host (AKA, me) for your quality friends. Books, of course, because books are what I do.

Special Investigative Reporter

This book can be classified as a sarcastic, satirical humorous mystery. It’s a great book for people who like to laugh and who also happen to distrust authority–as my main character Jock Stewart does.  And as I do. Jock is probably my favorite protagonist because he reminds me of me, the kind of guy who’s likely to say anything to anybody, especially people who are really full of themselves.

Fate’s Arrows

This is my most recent novel, the fourth in my Florida Folk Magic Series which began with Conjure Woman’s Cat. I’m partial to the series because it’s set where I grew up, with places and people I knew.

Continue reading “Need Help Christmas Shopping” →