The Saturday Evening Post lives!

I discovered recently that the magazine is still in existence, including an on-line edition. It’s now a weekly treat when the e-mail arrives, announcing the latest issue.

In addition to current features, past articles, including fiction by famous writers of their day, are included. These inclusions are reproduction of pages from past issues.

One of this week’s reproductions, pages of the June 9, 1945, issue, included a poem that triggered a childhood memory. I was five years old that year. My grandfather decided I was old enough to accompany him to the field and begin to learn a bit about farming.

My first farming lesson that spring was learning to plant corn. I can still hear him repeating the importance of “four kernels to a hill.”

I don’t think I’ve ever heard the name, Lalia Mitchell Thornton, or have previously read anything that she has written, but I have to say, the lady knows how to plant corn.

What's in a Name if Folks Call Him Bo? With Many Variations, It's a Tale of Woe

With an apology to Shakespeare’s Juliet Capulet, I ask:

What’s in a name? That which we call Bo
In its many variations, it’s a tale of woe.

It all started when I worked at a small daily newspaper with an editor who did not believe that any news story warranted more than a one-column lead.

So it was a total surprise the night I picked up the still-warm-from-the-press edition containing my first front page, above the fold story and saw “By Bo Parker.”

The problem I later learned was this. “By Bronson Parker” didn’t fit into a one-column format when the lead paragraph and byline were bumped up in type size and marked to set in bold face.

So all my mother’s hard effort to select a first name was dumped down the drain for “Bo,” an appellation that that ranks right up there with Fifi and Fido in the dog world.

Somehow, as the years went by and I moved on to other jobs in other cities, “Bo” didn’t just follow me around like a bad credit rating. It got worse.

Over the years, when a new version on a nametag was received at a convention, workshop, or seminar, it was added to the collection mounted on an inside wall of the closet. Over the years, I assumed I had received every variation possible.

“Not only Bo, but Beau, Beaux, Breaux, Breau, Boo, Bow, and Boe are a few that come to mind. The collection was removed and the wall repainted several years ago.

For many years, I also held a job that required me to sign my name to formal documents on the average of 100 times a day. With an attorney’s approval, I signed “B. L. Parker” as my legal name, a moniker that a bit quicker and easier on the hand.

The situation took on a humorous aspect one evening after my wife and I had attended a multi-city economic conference. On the way home, she laughed and said, “I’m not certain to whom I’m married.”

She went on to explain that during the course of the gathering, three different people had spoke to me, calling me by three different names. The three had included the local businessman who insists on calling me “Bo Seefuss.”

So when the question arose as to what name would appear on the front of a novel, there was quite a discussion as to how it should read. The final decision was Bronson L. Parker.

As I began to interact with people in anticipation of the book’s arrival, I found myself spelling out my name more often. The solution was to have cards printed.

But my local printer, a decades long friend, argued that “Bronson L. Parker” would be unknown to many of the folks in the area. I’m a trusting soul, and told him to work it out.

The day I walked in to pick up the cards, the printer and his staff all yelled, "Here comes Elbow.” That’s the day when I learned that I had not heard all the possibilities. My friend handed me the box of cards. Printed on each one is, Bronson L. “Bo” Parker.

A Brookins Book Review

A Journey to Die For
By Radine Trees Nehring
ISBN 978-1-60364-020-6
Wolfmont Press, trade paper
296 pg., May 2010

Here’s a good example, if readers still need one, of a crime novel that fits comfortably into the fine tradition of fiction that relies on good writing, a fine plot, odd and usual suspects and an interesting setting. The author relies on a good story rather than tortured or crass language, logical development rather than constant physical action.

Carrie King a neighborly, bright, woman of late middling years and her husband, Henry King, a retired cop from Kansas City, are making an exploration into Arkansas history with a trip on a restored train to a small historic community on the shores of the Arkansas River. At the halfway point passengers leave the train to enjoy a brief sojourn in the town of Van Buren. When Carrie and Henry reach the river and a large historic mural to study, the possibility of encountering a dead body of the farthest thing from their minds. But alas, there it is and then there are the buttons.

A charming and delightful mystery ensues. Nehring’s unerring ear for dialog and her sense of what constitutes a well rounded character serve the reader well as the Kings travel between home, Van Buren and Kansas City where Henry had a solid career as a police officer. There have been allusions in the past to Henry’s rather abrupt retirement and in a powerful emotional scene at the Van Buren police station, Carrie and readers will receive serious and deep insight into Henry’s secret.

In the fine tradition of traditional American mysteries, A Journey to Die for is an excellent and satisfying entry in this author’s “to die for” series.

Carl Brookins
www.carlbrookins.com
www.agora2.blogspot.com
Case of the Greedy Lawyer, Devils Island, Bloody Halls

"The Seven O'Clock News" Became Daily Voice Across UT-Knoxville Campus

To the north of the main campus at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville is a high hill. In 1967, this hillside was filled with older Victorian homes that had been converted to student rooms and apartments. The movement began when one student put the speaker to his sound system in a front window and played the song. Very quickly hundreds of speakers were in windows facing the campus and playing the same song full blast. Synchronizing hundreds of systems to begin playing at precisely 7 P.M. proved to be impossible, but the message came through. The distortion, if that is the correct word, only added to the eerie effect the song had on the campus each evening. One of the city's main streets ran between the campus and the hillside. Traffic stopped along the road while the song played. There were a lot of protests in those days, but none more benign in its "physical confrontation," but few as effective in getting its message across to the public.

What Causes a Volcano to Blow its Top? Two Experts Say They Don't Know

It was the headline that caught my attention.

What remains a mystery? I read the article. Two specialists, a volcano seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey and a volcanologist at the University of Oregon, were quoted at length.

I wasn’t certain I understood all that they were quoted as saying, but the reporter summed up their comments by writing, “Scientists still don’t know how eruptions start in the first place.”

With that rather startling thought in mind, I reread the quotes from the two specialists. And you know what? The summation was spot on. At least the two experts on volcanoes were saying they didn’t know how eruptions start.

Think about that. Now I’ve watched a few programs on the National Geographic and Science Channels over the years. And I thought I knew what caused a volcano to blow its top.

I would have sworn the principle involved was the same one that applied to the time my mother was cooking beets in her pressure cooker.

A piece of beet skin plugged the pressure relief vent. When things blew, the pressure valve ended up embedded in the overhead plaster and there was a great big reddish splatter around it on the kitchen ceiling.

Now I’m wondering. What does cause a volcano to erupt?

A Brookins Book Review

Random Victim
By Michael A. Black
ISBN: 978-0-8439-5986-4
Pub: Leisure Books, pb, 323 pages,
April, 2008

By Carl Brookins, author of Case of the Greedy Lawyers, Bloody Halls, Devils Island

How did I miss this one when it first came out? I know the author, been following the man’s writing career. He gave me a copy of this book. Still, I only recently got around to reading it. And discovered to my chagrin what I’ve been missing. Delayed a really fine read. Here is Chicago, in all its grit and insouciance, its rhythm and its nasty side.

Chicago is part of Cook County, and they have a sheriff, a law enforcement presence, and all the problems an urban county can absorb. Comes now one Sergeant Francisco Leal, back after a drug bust gone bad, resulting in a grievous wound to his person. Leal, your basic resentful cynic doesn’t enjoy busting bad guys to see them get off too lightly, and he isn’t always quiet about his feelings, even in front of the judge. Thus, “the Dark Gable Incident,” which gave Leal a certain cache, positive in some circles, but negative in many others.

We get a really good look at the simmering anger that lies under Leal’s professional demeanor and now he has a new assignment. Along with two young, inexperienced detectives and another sergeant, Leal is assigned to a politically sensitive case that is so cold, the detective’s fingers get numb just paging through the files.

Almost a year previously a major player, a judge Miriam Walker, went missing, was found dead some time later, and there were no arrests, no apparent motive, no leads. A random victim, possibly of a carjacking? A very cold case. Now, elections are coming and the Sheriff is being beaten up over this still unsolved case. A team is assembled in an obvious political ploy, to re-examine the case and Leal is second in command, due primarily to his seniority. The team assembles with the initial understanding that there’s almost no upside to the situation.

The characters are precisely drawn, their actions methodical and deliberate and logical. The action and the tension are low-keyed for a long time, but the writing is so fine, I was drawn inexorably to page after page until the climax exploded off the page. This is one fine police procedural. Ultimately we learn that the assumption of randomness is not the truth.

Handicap Parking Spaces in Viginia; Conflict between Common Sense and Law

Which is more important? Save operation of a vehicle, or legal requirements established to enforce a law? That is the question senior drivers face in the Commonwealth of Virginia, specifically those who have a legitimate need to use Handicap parking spaces.

The people who collect and publish numbers tell us that twenty percent (one out of five) auto collisions occur in parking lots. That number is not broken down into categories, but collisions while backing out of a parking space has to rank high among them
.
Backing out of a parking space is not the easiest thing to do while behind the wheel. A good deal of literature exists on the proper way to back out of a parking space. All give the same advice, which can be summarized as follows.

Do not trust your mirrors. Rearview mirrors do not provide a full picture of what's happening behind your car. To back out of a parking spot safely, rotate your body to the right, looking over your shoulder so that you face backward, leaving your left hand on the wheel.

That’s easy advice to follow if one is young in age and flexible in body. But age goes up; flexibility of the body goes down. Those groups, like AAA, who provide “driving tips” to senior citizens, address this issue.

When possible, park in a space where the vehicle can be driven forward when leaving. That makes excellent sense, unless you are parking in a Handicap space in the Commonwealth of Virginia. You can’t do it. In its wisdom, our state legislature had passed into law section 36-99.11 of the Code of Virginia.

“A. All parking spaces reserved for the use of persons with disabilities shall be identified by above grade signs.
B. All above grade disabled parking space signs shall have the bottom edge of the sign no lower than four feet nor higher than seven feet above the parking surface.”

So if a senior citizen uses a Handicap space, as the driving experts suggest, in a single-lane row of parking slots, state law stymies the driver. Going forward is not an option. The driver sees, through the windshield, immediately in front of the hood, a metal pole embedded in the pavement with a Handicap sign attached at eye level.

It has often been said that the older one gets, the more one knows, but understands less and less of what is known.

A Brookins Book Review

Baltimore Blues
Author: Laura Lippman
Publisher: Avon Books, Inc.
ISBN: 0-380-78875-6
Price: $5.99
pub. date: February, 1997
290 pages, paper

By Carl Brookins author of DEVILS ISLAND and other mysteries.

[This review was written some time ago, on the release of Laura Lippman's first Tess novel. Did the reviewer get it right in his prediction? What do you think of her career and later books?]

One expects this author to become an important voice in the mystery genre. Lippman’s observant eye, her skill with the language, and her sense of pace and timing are all on exhibit here. If Tess Monaghan, ex-newspaper reporter, is not the most unusual lead character readers may have encountered, many of the other characters are unusual enough to satisfy our needs. Moreover, as a character that shines and sometimes dominates in these pages, the city of Baltimore is a star.

This excellent first mystery presents us with Tess’ buddy and fellow rower, Darryl Paxton, accused of the murder of a prominent Baltimore attorney. Out of work anyway, Tess agrees to help Paxton’s attorney build a defense. In her sometimes emotional and mistake-ridden efforts to help Paxton, Tess encounters several off-beat characters ranging through the many levels of Baltimore’s social structure. Some of them are ordinary, and some are fascinating, and some threatening.

Lippman writes with economy and verve, and if Monaghan spends a little too much time in internal dialogue, it’s a small price to pay to be present at the beginning of what will become a strong mystery series.

THE PROVIDENCE OF DEATH as Seen After Being Reduced to a Graphic

I’m trying to decide how I feel about this one⎯other than it’s kind of interesting. It’s a program called Wordle. Load in a manuscript that took two years to write, and it reduces the work to a graphic presentation in a matter of seconds.

I’ve no idea how it does it, other than it somehow counts the number of times a word was used, performs some mathematical calculation, after which, a certain number of the most-often used words is presented as a graphic presentation.

It’s almost enough to make one want to go find an old Peggy Lee recording of “Is That All There Is?”