June 25. A Fun Book Launch Event of Beyond the Bukubuk Tree, with Lance Ringel at the lovely Willa Cather hall, Jefferson Market Library.
Dear friends,
From left to right: Me, Lance Ringel, Stephanie Cowell and Chuck Muckle.
A big crowd, terrific questions and post-talk discussion. Lance’s partner, actor and singer Chuck Muckle, sang a WW I song to conclude the event. The moderator was acclaimed author Stephanie Cowell.
Lance Ringel’s novel, Flower of Iowa, features two infantry privates in the last months of World War I–an American youth from Iowa and an Englishman– who meet in the French trenches,. They find a confusing but intense love and go through trench warfare and wild patrols in No Man’s Land, sometimes together.
As with my novel, Lance developed a subplot featuring a parallel male-female love relationship through which the action is experienced. Our selected excerpt readings mirrored each other. It was a wonderful and moving pairing, the inspiration of Stephanie Cowell, who knew both books. Thrillingly, I sold out the books I brought. Thank you readers and supporters! The event was audio recorded and will be put up on our Spotify channel soon, with links to my five slides.
Click for Chuck Muckle’s spontaneous launch into song.
