Creatively employing song lyrics of that genre as segues, the reader is hopefully guided to and experiences reading on multiple levels. Life’s events unfold from Louisiana, to California, and ultimately culminate in Okinawa, Japan. Wild Tales from the East is a suspenseful emotional thriller that chronicles the travels and encounters of a black twenty-one-year-old recent college graduate (1968). About to be drafted, he enlists for four years in the US Navy as a medic. Hurling headlong into a turbulent transitional period in our nation’s history, the narrator’s inner journey, in many ways, reflects the upheavals of that day. He soon finds himself in Southern California and discovers there that the simplistic world of rural Louisiana has ill prepared him for the waves of change heading his way. With the war in Vietnam dividing loyalties, conflicts also abound within the narrator as he searches for self-identity, his place in the sun, and that elusive thing called love. Experiencing a metamorphosis of kind, his gradual inculcation into the counterculture movement often places him in conflict with himself and the military’s ideals. He struggles to bridge two worlds: one of the status quo and the other of a world that reflects his emerging sense of independence and freedom. Although he still harbors emotional attachment to a doomed illicit affair, he opts to marry a hometown girl and thus maintain normalcy. Shattered, all wedding plans are off when he unexpectedly receives orders to Okinawa. With all familial supports abandoned and an inner renunciation of the so-called American values, arriving in the Oriental world of the East, he presents himself essentially as a man without a country. The narrator finds the world of the East to be mysterious, seductive, and populated by warm and open people. A yearlong sojourn ensues. It is a world that he becomes intimately one with. The warm, balmy, tropical island of Okinawa is tailor made for him. Likened to a fantasy island, it is also one ideally suited for the raucous and outrageous times of that era. He finds Okinawa to be a place that caters to the desires and appetites of those who would dare pursue them. It’s a place where eroticism and mysticism meet. Into this Wild West–like cauldron, much like the biblical prodigal son, the author submerses himself. With his “old self” disintegrating, barriers that hinder total interaction in the moment, for him, no longer exist. Along with a “band” of associates often fueled by psychedelics and other contraband, he and they plow fearlessly into the nights and heights of exhilarating extremes, and thus comes Wild Tales from the East. The narrator’s nights and days are relentlessly driven by a deeper inner longing created by his ill-fated but defining love affair. His personal search for unification and fulfillment is haunted by that ever-present undertow. Often tortuously painful, his search for redemption is played out against the backdrop of an ancient culture that is also confronting the arrival of a “new age.” A walking wayfarer in a strange land, he uncovers hidden mysteries and secrets of the universe from unanticipated sources. Along his path, varied individuals present themselves and their individual struggles for survival. En route, he also stumbles across travelers of the night; and casting his lot among these sojourners and seekers of truth, he severs ties with his land of birth. Aside from his bosom buddy RL, a Southern white kid, he lives deeply inside his own head. He discovers that in many ways, the Okinawan people are also oppressed. Aided by cross-cultural relationships that he establishes, he identifies deeply with them and their circumstance. Unaware, in the process, he is gradually immersed in the Okinawan way of life. In the hazy aftermath of self-medicating, the narrator descends into a harrowing self-destructive vortex. As the accumulated “road” fatigue takes
So, we know what you're probably thinking. It probably goes something along the lines of "Well writing a book sounds great, but are you kidding me! I don't have time to write a book!"We get it. Writing a book can seem overwhelming. It can also be time and effort intensive (the first one Chris wrote took over 150 hours and more than a year from start to finish). But it doesn't have to be this way. If you go through the process we break down for you we know you can complete a solid book that helps both your clients and your practice with as little as three to five hours of focused attention. Further, with the ease of self-publishing (kdp.amazon.com), the availability of internet "freelancer" help communities (upwork.com and fivrr.com), and cheap and reliable transcription apps that you can download to your phone (rev.com) you can write your book without actually writing anything and get the entire project done for less than $100. Although writing a book can sound like a huge undertaking, we'll show you that it really isn't all that hard to do. We tend to guess that if someone told you how three to five hours of your time and less than $100 could allow you to better help clients, and get more clients, you'd do it in a heartbeat. That's why you should get started reading this book so that you can write your own!For more helpful resources from the Bruce Law Firm, including our free books, go to DivorceInformationBooks.com.
This is the first book to tell the inspiring story of near tragedy and ultimate triumph behind the dazzling work of one of today's most respected and best-loved artists. Chuck Close is one of the most acclaimed American artists to emerge since Andy Warhol. His larger-than-life portraits look out from the walls of museums and galleries around the globe. His virtuosity and variety of technique, combined with the ambition and accessibility of his chosen subject matter the portrait re-invented on a heroic scale has made him a great favorite with the public and has won him the respect of his peers. Chuck Close has achieved fame, yet his full story has never been told until now. Author Christopher Finch has known Close since the late 1960s when the artist was creating his first masterpieces in an unheated SoHo loft. Finch chronicles Close's childhood battles with illness and dyslexia and his rise to the pinnacle of the art world. At the age of 48 he was struck down by an occluded spinal artery that left him a partial quadriplegic. With extraordinary determination, Close overcame this potentially career-ending disability, not only learning to paint again but producing work of extraordinary richness that equals or surpasses his previous achievements. With style and authority, Finch reveals the human reality behind Close's visually eloquent but eternally silent portraits.
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Funny, I don't feel like a legend." -- Barbra Streisand She is a one-name legend, a global icon, the ultimate diva. Yet most of what we know about Barbra Joan Streisand is the stuff of caricature: the Brooklyn girl made good, the ugly duckling who blossomed into a modern-day Nefertiti, the political dilettante driving to the barricades in her Rolls-Royce, the Oscar-winning actress and bona fide movie mogul, the greatest female singer who ever lived, a skinflint, a philanthropist, a connoisseur and a barbarian, the woman whose physical characteristics are instantly identifiable around the planet -- the tapered nails, those slightly crossed eyes, that nose, the voice. Even to the multitudes around the world who idolize her, Streisand remains aloof, unknowable, tantalizingly beyond reach. Until now. In the manner of his #l New York Times bestsellers The Day Diana Died and The Day John Died as well as Jack and Jackie, Jackie After Jack, An Affair to Remember, and Sweet Caroline, Christopher Andersen taps into important sources -- eyewitnesses to Streisand's remarkable life and career -- to paint a startling portrait of the artist . . . and the woman. Among the revelations: Surprising new details about her wedding and marriage to James Brolin. New information about her many failed love affairs, including her never-before-revealed relationships with Prince Charles and Princess Diana's doomed lover Dodi Fayed -- as well as Warren Beatty, Ryan O'Neal, former Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau, Steve McQueen, Richard Gere, Kris Kristofferson, Don Johnson, Jon Voight, Andre Agassi, newsman Peter Jennings, and more . . . A provocative inside account of what really went on between Streisand and Bill Clinton in the White House, what their relationship is like today, and how Hillary feels about Barbra. From Funny Girl and The Way We Were to Yentl and The Prince of Tides -- and in the recording sessions that produced some of the biggest hits in music history -- new behind-the-scenes details of the brilliance, the obsessive drive for perfection, and the Callas-sized ego. New insights into Barbra's relationship with her only child, Jason. Whether you love her, hate her, or are simply spellbound by her titanic talent, Barbra is one thing above all others: a true American original.
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