The first reading/signing of the recently launched My World Book 1 was warmly received in the Big Apple, the site of the narrative’s start and where its first drafts were written. Earthdog Press and the arts boutique hotel, The Roger Smith, hosted the event in Lily’s Backroom. Turnout doubled from […]
You’re cordially invited to a reading/signing of the recently launched My World Book 1: Hitching the Globe on $10 a Day in New York City, site of the journey’s start, at the Roger Smith Hotel in Manhattan, on Monday, November 12th, 7-8pm. The bookish evening, hosted by Earthdog Press […]
The national launch of My World Book 1 at Books & Books in Coral Gables, FL on October 19th was a success. The space overfilled with 40 or more people. Travel writer/editor Tom Swick kindly introduced me, followed by the debut of the book’s trailer, after which we opened for […]
I’m pleased to announce the publishing and launch of My World Book 1: Hitching the Globe on $10 a Day, my third and most personal work. The national launch will take place at southern Florida’s premier independent bookseller, Books & Books, in Coral Gables, Friday, October 19th, at 8pm. The […]
The Outcry by Henry James My rating: 2 of 5 stars The Outcry is James’s last, and slight, novel. Adapted from a play, never performed, it bristles with uppercrust dialogues from England at the turn of the prior century. As usual, it touches on James’s preferred subject of transatlantic clash […]
Over Memorial Day weekend, Miami Beach was visited by two earth-shaking air shows, from USA Salute, as part of the city’s attempt to take back the holiday from raucous and violent beach blow-outs over the last decade. It is viscerally exciting to see up close and personal so many different […]
Turn Right at Machu Picchu: Rediscovering the Lost City One Step at a Time by Mark Adams My rating: 3 of 5 stars If you need one book while visiting Machu Picchu, take this one. Having said that, Adams’ work falls short in several ways. There’s no one to really […]
This is the second post on Howard Finster’s amazing Paradise Garden. Inspired to start building in the 1960’s, Howard explained his motivation this way: “…it just come to me that the world started with a beautiful garden, so why not let it end with a beautiful garden?” Please see the […]
Train Dreams by Denis Johnson My rating: 5 of 5 stars What an enticing, and profound, novella this book is! We find ourselves, early 20th century, with pioneer Robert Grainier in the wild northwest corner of Idaho. The characters, tales, and happenings are bigger-than-life American West, permeated by a surrealism […]
At the end of last year, my brothers were thinking of prematurely selling Mom’s home of three decades in Santa Fe. What could I do? I decided to drive out to see her colonial home, perhaps for the last time, and take an inventory of her many paintings. But what […]
A Writer’s Notebook by W. Somerset Maugham My rating: 1 of 5 stars A Writer’s [one note] Notebook The author of Of Human Bondage and reportedly one of the best paid novelists of the 1930’s reduced from fifteen volumes to one his lifetime of notebooks. He explains “I publish it […]
Sometimes I write in colors and forms. Here is a virtual factory tour from Chocolate World, Hershey, PA. Each choco-loco car was spinning madly much of the time, lending to the dizzy excitement. I so enjoyed being Charlie (less Willie Wonka) that I took the tour twice. [please hover over […]
Westward Ha! by S.J. Perelman My rating: 2 of 5 stars As follow-up to Twain’s Innocents Abroad, I recently read Westward Ha! in the globe-trotting vein. Soon after WWII, a magazine named Holiday actually suggested and financed a year-long jaunt around the world for two, shall we say, neurotic New […]
My Struggle: Book One by Karl Ove Knausgård My rating: 2 of 5 stars As usual: don’t believe the critics. This lionized work from a Norwegian media star, while an odd and, in a voyeuristic way, oddly engrossing book, is also a failure. The confusion starts with the title – […]
Heat and Dust by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala My rating: 1 of 5 stars This is a very odd, Booker-winning book. Even the title is provocative. The heat is procreation, the dust death (from whence we came). Ruth Prawer Jhabvala’s unnamed narrator, referring to her alter-ego and ex-great aunt, puts […]
In 2016 Publishers Weekly gave a prestigious starred review to the author’s To Belém & Back adventure, saying “As in the very best travelogues, the author seamlessly combines the personal, the political, and the cultural.” Later that year PW’s Bookroom Editor, Drucilla Schultz, interviewed the author. Here are some highlights: […]
You’re cordially invited to the first reading in our nation’s capital of To Belém & Back, recently given one of Publishers Weekly’s coveted ★ Star reviews. Author Ben Batchelder intends to give a brief reading, present the short film “Tiradentes2Belém,” and answer questions at his sister Lily’s apartment in DC’s […]
During a recent week in Guatemala, I climbed the Pacaya Volcano with friends from Miami Beach. It is one of Guatemala’s three active volcanoes, having erupted 23 times since the Spanish conquest, the most recent in 2010 when the cap was blown off, with lava pouring out in 2013. To […]
The Havana Habit by Gustavo Perez Firmat My rating: 2 of 5 stars The Havana Habit comes at an apropos time. Castro helped us to kick the slinky Havana habit back in the 60’s but it looks like it’s back: Cuba out of the closet. Columbia professor and poet Gustavo […]
La Vita Nuova by Dante Alighieri My rating: 2 of 5 stars Upfront, I am not a poet, and Dante wrote the book for poets about poetry (his own). How do I know? It says so, in the introduction’s first sentence, of the Penguin Classics 1980 edition by Barbara […]
