BRENTSVILLE, Va. — It has happened before. Families torn apart. Crying children wrenched from the arms of sobbing parents. Uncertainty over whether the family would ever be reunited or forever separated. Lack of due process, yet actions taken under the color of law. On the steps of the antebellum courthouse here in Prince William County, […]
This Is the Week That Was: FIVE FOR FREEDOM is here and now!
I’m proud to report that the e-book version of FIVE FOR FREEDOM: The African American Soldiers in John Brown’s Army is #3 on Amazon’s list of hot new releases in the abolition category! Last time I looked. The Amazon rankings are as changeable as the weather, hot one moment, cooler the next. At the start […]
What You Missed: Schieffer, McDermott, Dionne et al
Or maybe the headline should read: Last Weekend’s News Tonight, or This Morning, or whenever you are reading it. And, what a weekend it was at the 6th annual Washington Writers Conference (#DCWritersConf), sponsored by the Washington Independent Review of Books. Held at the College Park Marriott Hotel & Convention Center, it featured TV news […]
Extra! Extra! Read all about it! Or read all about at least some of it.
I still read print newspapers–-three are delivered daily to our driveway—but I find today’s news overwhelming. Easier to retreat into the past, which on closer examination was also overwhelming to those who lived through it. It’s probably even easier to skim the “morning” headlines on my Kindle the night before. Except in our 24/7 news […]
Frederick Douglass “being recognized more and more”
As is now widely known, thanks to stories posted during Black History Month, 2018 represents the bicentennial year of the birth of Frederick Douglass, who escaped from slavery on Maryland’s Eastern Shore to become perhaps the nation’s preeminent 19th century African American abolitionist, publisher, diplomat, orator and author. His birth is said to have occurred […]
ICYMI: And Some Shameless Self-Promotion
These have been a hectic few weeks, as we ramp up the long rollout of FIVE FOR FREEDOM: The African American Soldiers in John Brown’s Army. Its official publication date is June 1, but I just learned that finished books will be arriving at the publisher, Chicago Review Press, in April. Advanced Reading Copies (ARCs, […]
Literary Agents, Engaging Panels and You! Register Now.
Registration is open for the May 4-5 Washington Writers Conference. Don’t hit the pause button. Register now. Okay, this is an unpaid advertisement. Call it a PSA, call it whatever you like. I call it Books Alive! 2018, but my SEO betters insist on calling it the Washington Writers Conference. The sixth annual whatever will […]
“The Post” and the times
The movie of the moment seems to be “The Post,” a dramatic retelling of the weeks in June 1971 when the Washington Post raced to catch up with The New York Times, which first published portions of the Pentagon Papers, a secret government study charting America’s path to war in Vietnam, before the newspaper was […]
Of Men and Memorials: The Strange Case of Haywood Shepherd
Of all the monuments and memorials erected to the Lost Cause of the Confederacy, there may be none more misleading nor more ironic than a stone sidewalk tablet inconspicuously located near the corner of Shenandoah and Potomac streets in the town that John Brown made famous. In Harpers Ferry, late on Sunday October 16 and […]
Stamped Out! But, oh, what memories.
Normally, I would not be blogging about an article I’ve written that was published elsewhere which could just as well have been, well, a blog. But, here I am doing just that, in reaction to the reaction to my op-ed published in The New York Times on Oct. 1: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/29/opinion/stamp-collecting-philately.html?_r=0 You will note that it […]