Joyce Maynard's New Novel, After Her, and the Current Movie Based on Her Novel, Labor Day

Wednesday night, I had the pleasure of attending one of Joyce Maynard's book talks at Warwick's independent bookstore in La Jolla, California. She was promoting her current novel, After Her. When her presentation ended, we chatted briefly afterwards and exchanged books.

After Her is a novel loosely based on The Trailside Killer case in Marin County, California in the late 1970s. Joyce tells the tale of two sisters and their love for their philandering, detective father whose job it is to capture the Trailside Killer. After Her is a complex thriller and a real page turner.

Joyce may be best known for the novel To Die For, which was made into a movie directed by Gus Van Sant, starring Nicole Kidman in one of her best roles ever.


An aspiring local weather girl will do whatever it takes to make it in television, even having her husband murdered by three teens. The movie is better than I make it sound. It is a dark comedy based on a real incident.

Joyce Maynard's book, Internal Combustion, is about Nancy Seaman, an award winning fourth grade teacher, who went to Home Depot and bought an axe to kill her ex-Ford Motor Company engineer husband in the garage of their Farmington Hills, Michigan home.

Mrs. Seaman attempted to use the "battered wife" defense, but her trial revealed a disturbing history of family dysfunction and a pattern of sociopathic behavior on her part. When Joyce started writing this story, she instinctively sided with the wife, but upon closer examination of the facts and her own research, another picture of Nancy Seaman emerged which made Joyce change her mind about the case.

Joyce Maynard's novel Labor Day has been made into a film and is currently showing in theaters. It is directed by Jason Reitman and stars Kate Winslet, Josh Brolin, and Toby Maguire. I haven't seen this yet, so I won't comment on it.

Joyce did say she met documentary filmmaker, Michael Moore, at the Telluride Film Festival recently after a screening of Labor Day. He was coming out of the men's room and spotted her.

"You won't believe what's going on inside the men's restroom, Joyce," he said suppressing a grin.

"What?" she asked, waiting for the punchline.

"Grown men are in there crying their eyes out."

I have to see this movie.

Joyce Maynard

In the link below, Joyce criticizes the new Ken Burns' documentary about J.D. Salinger, having been an eighteen year old victim of the predatory Salinger.

When asked why she participated in the biography, she replied, "I decided that I would speak for myself rather than have others speak about me."

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/thomson-reuters/130904/telluride-joyce-maynard-slams-salinger-documentary-says-author-

Fornology on Web Radio - This Friday, September 6th - 8:30 PM Eastern/5:30 PM Pacific Time

My interview cancelled from last week had technical difficulties but was rescheduled for this Friday. I hope you can listen in. Call me if you have a question. Thanks!

 

This Friday, September 6th, I’ll be doing a live web radio interview for The Patrick Walters Show out of Roxboro, North Carolina. I’ll be talking about my book, Zug Island: A Detroit Riot Novel and topics related to it. I hope to steer the interview towards the subject of my current project, serial killer John Norman Collins and The Rainy Day Murders.

This live webcast is on

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/trianglevariety

8:30 PM Eastern time/5:30 PM Pacific time

Friday, September 6th, 2013

This is a call-in show. If you have any questions about my books or my blog <fornology.blogspot.com>, the number to call is (949) 272-9578. Drop me a line!

Public School Education - Not a Melting Pot - But a Rich, Savory Stew by guest blogger Roger Huie

I've long considered myself lucky to have spent my career as a high school teacher, particularly in a school that served a multi-ethnic and multi-socioeconomic student population. I saw that regardless of background almost all students want an education and worked to get one. That even the ones who didn't appear to care about their education actually did care. Sometimes I wouldn't recognize this until years later when I would run into an apparent underachiever who was doing quite nicely in his/her life, who was pleased for the opportunity to share this and to tell me that I and other teachers had made a difference.

I also realized that not every student starts with the same opportunities. The children of the poor and illiterate, even if they have the same native intelligence, start out considerably behind the children of middle and professional classes. If you've not been read to, if there's no reading material in the home outside of food labels, if you are not surrounded by the products of success or even the hope of it, then academic achievement, let alone financial achievement may not be a priority or even seem a realistic goal.

Nor is every student destined to be a rocket scientist. Most teachers take each student from where they are when they enter their classroom and try to take them as far as they can go. This is why, even though I coached most of my career, I minimized competition in my classroom: If we are trying to lift all students why create an environment in which there are winners and losers. The ultimate competition is with yourself, whether in academia or in sport. We should encourage students to achieve to the best of their ability, and understand that not all of them will achieve the same heights.

Finally, I was lucky to work with colleagues from a variety of ethnic groups and all walks of life that were, no matter our differences, united in our efforts to help our students achieve. Knowing white, black, Hispanic, Asian, Christians, Muslims, and Jews (I could go on) as professional educators helped alleviate many of the prejudices humans are heir to. And to those who are still engaged in teaching, I commend you for your efforts. Regardless of the bad press that swirls around our profession, if you are doing your job, your students know it, even if they don't recognize it or acknowledge it now.

One teacher answers the question, "What do you make?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5yg0u1MkDI

Zug Island: A Detroit Riot Novel by Gregory A. Fournier - Book Review by Dr. Robert Rose

Tuesday, 13 August 2013

When Greg sent me his book, I assumed it was going to be about racism and the causes of the Detroit Riot in 1967. During that time I was teaching in an all black school of 800 in San Bernardino, California, and I knew full well how the tentacles of racism were choking the life from my students.

I was somewhat correct that it was about racism, but seen through the eyes of an eighteen year old white boy (Jake) who had never even been close to a black person. It is much more than that, it is a wonderful story about two young men, one white and one black who transcend their backgrounds and group prejudice to see one another as - human beings. The ending brought tears of joy and pride in what could be accomplished when we can erase what we’ve been taught and see one another freshly and fairly as uniquely human.


The long section that describes his time on Zug Island was interesting and terrifying. It reminded me of when I read The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. My uncle had told me when he had worked in a meat packing plant in the Thirties he had been standing on a large piece of meat. When his shift was over he threw it into the garbage. 

The foreman saw him and ordered him to put it on the conveyor line to process. My uncle refused and was fired. That was minor compared to the horrors the children and poor immigrants endured in losing limbs and lives without insurance or medical treatment in the factories.

Zug Island was a living Hell. The furnaces were insatiable and the heat was unbearable, the smoke and dust were destroying their lungs, and the physical work only a man desperate for a job would take. 99% of the laborers were poor blacks, mostly from the deep South. Jake stood out as one of the few whites. It was the fact that his grandfather and father had worked there and were respected that he was given the chance to prove himself. That he did.

Theo, a young married black who worked to make enough to hopefully get out of there and move his family back home, became Jake’s mentor and friend. Through Theo and the others, Jake saw a side of America he had no idea existed. The overwhelming frustrations from lack of a decent education, the fact that last hired, first fired was a reality that black men dealt with by taking it out on each other. Attacking any of the causes or any white person meant facing a justice system that they knew was unjust for them.

It didn’t make sense to most people why during the 1967 Detroit Riots, and other such outbreaks, that blacks destroyed their own neighborhoods. It was a build-up of intense anger from the reality of their helplessness against so many societal institutions that were keeping them down.


As teachers, Greg and I taught minority students and found ways to overcome their helplessness by building trust and caring relationships. Changing their negative mindsets through activities proved to them that they could be academically and socially successful and responsible for their actions.


Unfortunately, despite all the money poured into the minority schools and the pathetic attempts at real integration, and the fact that many lives did improve, the sense of inferiority and helplessness is the reality for millions today.


Greg’s book with his emphasis on the possibilities of real friendship between different races is proof that it can happen. It is a feel good book that you won’t want to put down until the end.

http://zugislandthenovel.com

Photographic History Brought Back To Life

Will Holland and friend - 1925

In 1925, Will Holland stopped into a photography shop with a friend and had a novelty photograph taken. He and my grandmother had immigrated from Tennessee to Detroit in the 1920s looking for work. 

One of the first jobs he was able to find was driving a truck, running bootleg liquor from Canada throughout the Detroit area for a group of Irish entrepreneurs. In the winter, he would drive across the frozen Detroit River to make pickups and deliveries.

My grandfather gave this photograph to my mother before he died in the late 1930s. Not much is known about him because my grandparents were divorced, and my grandmother attempted to purge all memory of him from her life. My mother kept the photograph of her father secretly hidden.

When my mother passed on several years ago, I received the photograph in an envelope with some more recent family photos. I tucked the envelope away for safe keeping and forgot about it until last week when I was looking for something else.

The quality of the photo really deteriorated. It had gone from bad to worse. Not only had it faded over the decades, it had turned brown and the photo paper was beginning to separate. I decided to see if it could be restored because I wanted to preserve this bit of family history and make prints for the rest of the family.

I discovered the name of a local San Diego photo restorer from an ad on Facebook and gave him a call. Paul Hartsuyker is a retired Mesa College professor who has taught Photoshop workshops for twenty years. After he retired, he decided to go pro. See the link.

Restored photograph

I was able to sit next to him while he explained what he was doing.

"Digitally manipulating an antique photograph is an exercise in give and take. For example, do you sacrifice detail for contrast and brightness?"

He went back and forth like an optometrist, "Do you like this one or this one?" He allowed me to make decisions as he worked on the photo.

I was quite pleased with the result. I would have liked more clarity, but there was only so much that the original had to give. This picture freezes a moment in time and captures a gag snapshot which is one of my most cherished family photographs.

http://www.hartworks.net/photorestore/offer.htm 

My 200th Fornology Blog Post

When I started writing my Fornology blog in May of 2011, I was a techno-dweeb. 

My publicist, Paula Margulies, explained the importance of blogging in this brave new world of digital publishing for launching a novel, establishing a brand, and building an audience. It takes time and persistence, she said. Truthfully, I wasn't enthused and thought I'd be long finished with it by now. That was more than two years ago.

Now, after over 40,000 hits and 200 posts on a variety of subjects, I've graduated to the rank of cybernaut. I actually enjoy the routine of writing a post every week and the immediate gratification of instant publishing. 

Content is king and despite some of the dark and sordid subject matter in some of my posts, many others deal with lighter topics. Several of them talk about blogging and writing like this one does.

Forty of my posts deal with the topic of John Norman Collins and the Washtenaw County, Michigan murders of the late 1960s. Blogging has allowed me to focus on bits and pieces of the larger story, which will be woven into whole cloth when my true crime history of these murders comes out late next year. The Rainy Day Murders will be the culmination of three years of intensive research into these matters and forty-five years of thinking about them.

As well as raising awareness of the topic, Fornology has also been a vehicle for people to come forward with information about John Norman Collins, their personal connection regarding these tragic murders, or their knowledge of the victims.

Some people still support Collins and maintain that he is innocent, but they never contribute any evidence to support their claims. Then there are the people who need to tell their story. Some of these stories don't always pass the sniff test, but many of them do. We try to corroborate every story before we use it.

Blogging is helping me create an audience for The Rainy Day Murders project while I finish writing it. 

I am astounded at the global reach of my blog and often wonder who my readers are on the world wide web and how many of you are regulars.

Recently, it has come to my attention that Fornology has a new fan. Not a fan so much as a critic - John Norman Collins no less. 

Prisoners don't have unrestricted access to the internet, but they can send emails, write and receive written or typed letters, and make collect phone calls to landlines. 

Collins has heard about some of my posts from people who write to him and even from some of the prison guards. He may not have internet services, but nonetheless, John Norman Collins has one Hell of a grapevine.

Through a Rapist's Eyes - Cautionary Advice for Young Women

Read this good advice for young women going off to college. It seems that a lot of attackers use similar tactics to get away with rape. 

Not many people know how to take care of themselves when faced with such a situation. Everyone should read this, especially each and every woman in this world.

 A group of rapists and date rapists in prison were interviewed on what they look for in a potential victim and here are some interesting facts:

1] The first thing men look for in a potential victim is hairstyle. They are most likely to go after a woman with a ponytail, bun, braid or other hairstyle that can easily be grabbed. They are also likely to go after a woman with long hair. Women with short hair are not common targets.

2] The second thing men look for is clothing. They will look for women whose clothing is easy to remove quickly. Many of them carry scissors around to cut clothing.

3] They also look for women using their cell phone, searching through their purse or doing other activities while walking because they are off guard and can be easily overpowered.

4] The number one place women are abducted from/attacked at is in grocery store parking lots.

5] Number two is in office parking lots/garages.

6] Number three is public restrooms.

7] The thing about these men is that they are looking to grab a woman and quickly move her to a second location where they don't have to worry about getting caught.

8] If you put up any kind of a fight at all, they get discouraged
because it only takes a minute or two for them to realize that going after you isn't worth it because it will be time-consuming.

9] These men said they would not pick on women who have umbrellas, or other similar objects that can be used from a distance, in their hands.

10] Keys are not a deterrent because you have to get really close to the attacker to use them as a weapon. So, the idea is to convince these guys you're not worth it.

POINTS THAT YOU SHOULD REMEMBER:

1] If someone is following behind you on a street, in a garage, or with you in an elevator or stairwell, look them in the face and ask them a question, like what time is it, or make general small talk: can't believe it is so cold out here, we're in for a bad winter. Now that you've seen their faces and could identify them in a line- up, you lose appeal as a target.

2] If someone is coming toward you, hold out your hands in front of you and yell Stop or Stay back! Most of the rapists interviewed said they'd leave a woman alone if she yelled or showed that she would not be afraid to fight back. Again, they are looking for an EASY target.

3] If you carry pepper spray, yelling I HAVE PEPPER SPRAY and holding it out will be a deterrent.

4] If someone grabs you, you can't beat them with strength but you can do it by outsmarting them. If you are grabbed around the waist from behind, pinch the attacker either under the arm between the elbow and armpit or in the upper inner thigh - HARD. One woman in a class this guy taught told him she used the underarm pinch on a guy who was trying to date rape her and was so upset she broke through the skin and tore out muscle strands. The guy needed stitches. Try pinching yourself in those places as hard as you can stand it; it really hurts.

5] After the initial hit, always go for the groin. I know from a particularly unfortunate experience that if you slap a guy's parts it is extremely painful. You might think that you'll anger the guy and make him want to hurt you more, but the thing these rapists told our instructor is that they want a woman who will not cause him a lot of trouble. Start causing trouble, and he's out of there.

6] When the guy puts his hands up to you, grab his first two fingers and bend them back as far as possible with as much pressure pushing down on them as possible. The instructor did it to me without using much pressure, and I ended up on my knees and both knuckles cracked audibly.

7] Of course the things we always hear still apply. Always be aware of your surroundings, take someone with you if you can, and if you see any odd behavior, don't dismiss it, go with your instincts. You may feel little silly at the time, but you'd feel much worse if the guy causes you trouble.

FINALLY, PLEASE REMEMBER THESE AS WELL ....
I know you are smart enough to know these pointers, but there will be some who will say, "Hmm, I must remember that." After reading this, forward it to someone you care about. It never hurts to be careful in this crazy world we live in.

1. Tip from Tae Kwon Do: The elbow is the strongest point on your body. If you are close enough to use it, do it.

2. Learned this from a tourist guide to New Orleans : if a robber asks for your wallet and/or purse, DO NOT HAND IT TO HIM. Toss it away from you.... chances are that he is more interested in your wallet and/or purse than you and he will go for the wallet/purse. RUN LIKE MAD IN THE OTHER DIRECTION!

3. If you are ever thrown into the trunk of a car: Kick out the back tail lights and stick your arm out the hole and start waving like crazy. The driver won't see you but everybody else will. This has saved lives.

4. Women have a tendency to get into their cars after shopping, eating, working, etc., and just sit doing their checkbook or making a list, etc. DON'T DO THIS! The predator will be watching you, and this is the perfect opportunity for him to get in on the passenger side, put a gun to your head, and tell you where to go. AS SOON AS YOU CLOSE THE DOORS, LEAVE.

5. A few notes about getting into your car in a parking lot, or parking garage:

a. Be aware. Look around your car as someone may be hiding at the passenger side. Peek into your car, inside the passenger side floor, and in the back seat. DO THIS TOO BEFORE RIDING A TAXI CAB.

b. If you are parked next to a big van, enter your car from the passenger door. Most serial killers attack their victims by pulling them into their vans while the women are attempting to get into their cars.

c. Look at the car parked on the driver's side of your vehicle, and the passenger side. If a male is sitting alone in the seat nearest your car, you may want to walk back into the mall, or work, and get a guard/policeman to walk you back out. IT IS ALWAYS BETTER TO BE PARANOID RATHER THAN DEAD.

6. ALWAYS take the elevator instead of the stairs. Stairwells are horrible places to be alone and the perfect crime spot.

7. If the predator has a gun and you are not under his control, ALWAYS RUN! The predator will only hit you (a running target) 4 in 100 times, and even then, it most likely WILL NOT be a vital organ. RUN!

8. As women, we are always trying to be sympathetic: STOP IT! It may get you raped or killed. Ted Bundy, the serial killer, was a good-looking, well educated man, who ALWAYS played on the sympathies of unsuspecting women. He walked with a cane, or a limp, and often asked "for help" into his vehicle or with his vehicle, which is how he abducted his victims.

Please forward this to all the women you know. It may save a life. A candle is not dimmed by lighting another candle.

Send this to any woman you know that may need to be reminded that we live in a crazy world and it's better safe than sorry.

Helping hands are better than Praying Lips. Give us your helping hand.

SHARE THIS WITH ALL YOUR FRIENDS WHO HAVE DAUGHTERS GOING TO COLLEGE THIS AUTUMN.