MJ Magazine July: Created By Authors for Authors

By Fran Lewis

The fourth issue of MJ Magazine includes Book of the Month Madiba: A-Z: The Many Faces of Nelson Mandela; Featured Authors Clint Morey and Allan Topol; Christian Fiction reviewed by Lee Harmon; Fran’s Top 5 New Authors: Mark Murphy; and recommended reading by Marybeth Zeman, Steve Berry and Daniel Palmer; and Featured Teen Columnist Jake Swerdloff. New Section — Writer’s Workshop.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Fran Lewis
• Release date: Jul 10, 2014
• ISBN: 9781604148008

Fran Lewis

Fran Lewis: Fran worked in the NYC Public Schools as the Reading and Writing Staff Developer for over 36 years. She has three masters degrees and a PD in Supervision and Administration. Currently, she is a member of Who's Who of America's Teachers and Who's Who of America's Executives from Cambridge. In addition, she is the author of three children's books and a fourth that has just been published on Alzheimer's disease in order to honor her mom and help create more awareness for a cure. The title of my new Alzheimer’s book is Memories are Precious: Alzheimer’s Journey; Ruth’s storyShe was the musical director for shows in her school and ran the school's newspaper. Fran writes reviews for authors upon request and for several other sites. You can read some of my reviews on Ezine.com and on ijustfinished.com under the name Gabina. I am a member of Whos Who of Americas Teachers and Whos Who of America’s Executives and Professionals on Cambridge. I review books for authors upon request. My goal is to get my books published by a traditional publisher and on the shelves of every school library, hospital and bookstore. I host two radio shows on Blog Talk Radio. Book Discussion with Fran Lewis is on Blog Talk every third Wednesday of the month from three to five eastern. My children’s author’s show is four times a year. I host online book blogs and book tours for authors and I review books for authors throughout the world. I have published six books the last Because We Care in memory of my sister Marcia. The proceeds going to find the cause and cure for Alzheimer’s.

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Astor Prime Meat Market

Address: 1117 Astor Ave., Bronx, NY 10469

Phone: [phone]

Owner: Michael

C&C Coffee Shop and Deli

The best food in the Bronx at reasonable prices.

Address: 2438 Eastchester Road, Bronx, NY 10469

Cuisine: Spanish, Italian, and American Cuisine

Catering available for All Occasions

Phone: [phone]/ or 25

Owner: Carlos Ramero

Central Plaza Diner-Restaurant

1686 Central Park Ave.

Yonkers, NY

Telephone: [phone]

Voted the best diner in Westchester County. Outstanding services, food that is freshly prepared. The varied menu gives diner’s many different delicious choices to choose from. Serving sandwiches, breakfast, American food, casual attire and a great place to take kids any time of day, this diner is one of my favorite places in Westchester.

Providing catering for all occasions and associations. Reasonable prices and plenty of parking. This diner is open all year round and has a menu that suits the culinary delights of all diners.

Cornucopia Ristorante

935 Saw Mill River Rd.

Ardsley NY 10502

914-479-5700

Hours: Tue - Sun: 11:00 am–11:00 pm

Find them on Facebook

Five Star Dining in an upscale setting. Chef Steven and his staff have created the perfect ambiance and menu in this unique location. With a staff and service equal to that of any restaurant in Manhattan, guests receive outstanding service, food made to fit their culinary tastes and desires. From unbelievable appetizers, to salads that are expertly created and made to order for each guest, to entrees that are mouthwatering and spiced to perfection, his restaurant deserves high marks over all the rest. Italian in cuisine yet other dishes that fill this eclectic menu that will keep diners coming back for more.

The Chef and owner of Cornucopia, Stephen Sciepura, is a graduate from the Culinary Institute of America. A life long Yonkers resident, he has worked as the head chef at various country clubs in Westchester and cooked for various corporate and private clients including Vanity Fair magazine and the founder of Artista Records, Clive Davis. He has owned other eateries in the area including Picassos Cafe in Eastchester.

Enrico’s Bakery – Hartsdale

Address: 214 East Hartsdale Ave., Hartsdale, NY 10530

Hours: 6:30 am - 8:00 pm

Phone: [phone]

Owner: Joseph Floriano

Gennaro’s Pizza

Address: 759 Central Park Ave, Scarsdale NY 10583

Phone: [phone]

Owner: John

Go Greenly

Now open in Scarsdale serving: Fat Free Fresh Frozen Yogurt, the Best Smoothies in Westchester. Banana/Pineapple and Blueberry/Banana are the best! There are so many choices, frozen yogurts and toppings. It is a yogurt lover’s haven for healthy treats.

Address: 1088 Central Ave. Scarsdale, NY 10583

Phone: [phone]

Hartsdale Hair Studio

Address: 4 E. Hartsdale Ave., Hartsdale, NY 10530

Hours: Mon - Sat - 9:00am - 6:00pm Sunday’s 10:00am - 2:00pm By Appointment

Owner: Evelyn

Phone: [phone]

John’s of Arthur Avenue Restaurant and Pizzeria

1 South Central Avenue

(Between S Washington Ave and W Hartsdale Ave/E Hartsdale Ave)

Hartsdale, NY

Pick-up or Delivery

Hours: 11 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Monday –Saturday, 12:30 p.m-9:30 p.m. Sunday

The menu at John’s of Arthur Avenue includes Italian favorites like Terranova Cheese Ravioli from the Bronx, Margarita Pizza, Penne Ala Vodka, Pepperoni Garlic Bread and much more to tempt the culinary palettes of both adults and children.

Their signature Stadium Pie is the largest in Westchester County at 24 inches!

Their Gramma pie — a thin crust, pan pizza with crushed tomatoes, basil, homemade mozzarella and olive oil — is another crowd favorite.

Choose from appetizers, Naples style pizza, Little Italy Specialities, the Athur Avenue Pasta Shop, Hero Sandwiches, Pizza by the Slice, Sicilian Pizza, Calzones and Arthur Ave. Style Pizza. There is also a kid’s menu and lunch menu. For the health conscience person watching his or her weight, there are also made-to-order salads to suit your individual needs and tastes.

Come in and feast on a large or small pie, a salad and even dessert while you enjoy family-style dining. Or, stay in and use our free delivery service.

John’s of Arthur Avenue also does catering!

Owner Jim and his staff will welcome you with a warm handshake and smile every time you dine with them, or call 914-402-4201 to get started with your first order for delivery. Either way, be sure to tell them that Fran Lewis, editor of MJ Magazine and the Host of Book Discussion on Blog Talk Radio, sent you.

Luigi of Italy

Address: 804 Allerton Ave, Bronx, NY 10467

Phone:[phone]

Owner: Tony

Memories of MJ

Memories to make you smile:

There’s a special star in the sky that shines so brightly that whenever you look at it you feel its warmth, even though it is light years away. This star that shines in the night sky will always protect those she loved, cared for and protected. That was MJ.

She was very protective of her family, especially her two children and grandchildren. She was always there if they needed any kind of help, advice, or just a warm hug. MJ never turned her back on any friend or family member.

The patients that came to her office would wait until she was free just to greet her, say good morning or ask a simple question. Nothing was ever too hard for her to figure out and no problem was too difficult to solve. Even when asked to cut her staff’s hours, she managed to do it without firing anyone.

MJ was smart, resourceful, caring and my best friend now and forever. What do I miss the most? Everything about her, especially her early morning wake-up calls and when she’d call from work to say we had a poem to write, even though the poem wasn’t due to be presented for another eight months down the line. She didn’t care; she wanted to get those ideas on paper.

We laughed, cried, smiled, never fought and enjoyed every Thursday when she came to visit my mom. My mom would always perk up when she arrived. Her favorite line and my sister’s too was, The ‘Good One’ has finally arrived! We all just laughed — that line never seemed to lose its comic undertones.

Memories

by Anne Stanmore

Dedicated to the memory of my sister, Shirley

Oh, sister dear, I miss you still.

The years go by as indeed they will.

So many things remind me of you,

Everyday things you used to do.

Buttering my toast I have to smile,

You would leave the crumbs there all the while.

At the time it seemed like such a pain,

Now I wish those crumbs were there again.

When I drive my car to somewhere new

I never fail to think of you;

The laughs we had when I got it wrong,

How glad I was that you came along.

So many times I wish you were here

Going with me either far or near.

Should we go this way or maybe that,

Or even park up and just have a chat?

On holiday we always had such fun

No matter if it was rain or sun.

We’d get on a bus and off we’d go.

Where we were going we didn’t know.

When I get sad I look round and see

What you have left — your legacy.

Your wonderful children you loved so much,

They are so good and keep in touch.

Seven years have gone by, oh sister dear.

Some days I can feel you are so near,

And I can see your smile once again

As I have wandered down memory lane.

Writer’s Workshop is new section designed to help new authors understand how to create story lines that are fast-paced, interesting and credible. This section will also host articles designed to help authors who are writing murder/mysteries understand how a police investigation is run and how different agencies work together at a crime scene, articles on how to write a courtroom scene and how to write opening and closing arguments and what the job of a jury is and the proper courtroom procedures. The goal of this section is to show authors how to create a proper setting so that readers feel like the story they’re being told might actually have happened.

Authentic Courtroom Scenes

By Larry D. Thompson

I have experienced the drama of the courtroom for all of my adult life, not as an observer, but as a participant, a trial lawyer. It’s a play that has no script with actors who perform for an audience of twelve and, occasionally, for the judge. There is no director who can say, Cut! Let’s do that scene again. Everything is at once prepared, but extemporaneous. Lawyers are forced to ask questions where they really do not know the answer. Witnesses respond in ways not anticipated by the lawyers. The judge plays referee and makes rulings on the fly that can change the outcome. Jurors are pulled into a conflict when they don’t want to leave their families and jobs. Sometimes they make life and death decisions for reasons that never occurred to the lawyers. Yet, all things considered, the outcome of the trial is usually the right result, not always, but better than 95% of the time. Trials in the United States are somewhat like democracy. They may not be perfect, but we have yet to come up with a better way to decide guilt or innocence, or to resolve a dispute among the parties.

In the real world, lawyers are bound by rules of evidence and procedure. To stray from them will bring an objection that is usually sustained by the judge. Lawyers are expected to be professional and polite to each other and to the judge. While a lawyer may be seething about something her opposition or the judge has done, she still seeks to control her temper and speak in modulated tones. She rarely raises her voice to anyone while the judge and jury are in the courtroom. That can change in the hallway or on the courthouse steps. She must ask permission to approach the witness and will never be permitted to engage in a nose-to-nose shouting match like the classic scene in A Few Good Men between Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson.

Still, an electric current runs just under the surface in every trial. The stakes can be high, up to and including death or the loss of a fortune. Witnesses are often petrified at the prospect of having to testify. I just settled a civil, business case on the eve of trial and had spent two weeks preparing employees of my client. One was a middle-aged woman, an executive in the company, who came across as the professional that she was. Only after the case settled did I learn from her boss that he found her trembling in her office after meeting with me … and I was on her side. It was the thought of taking the stand that petrified her.

To write authentic courtroom scenes, it is important to understand what happens in the real world. Then, like a writer who knows the Chicago Book of Style, the author can deviate as he sees fit as long as he does not paint too far out of the lines. The writer can choose to have his protagonist yell at the judge as long as the writer knows that the lawyer will not only offend the judge but also most of the jurors. Personally, I always control my temper but occasionally let it erupt if it is going to serve some purpose with the judge or the jury. It is always a calculated explosion. And the writer can let the witnesses show emotion, anger, trembling, crying. All really happen in real trials.

I must add that just as real trials can be monotonous and boring, punctuated by moments of the highest drama, too many questions and answers can put the reader to sleep just as they do jurors in the afternoon. To keep the reader’s attention, there must be action going on before the trial, during recesses, at lunch and at night as the lawyers prepare for the next day. It is that action that helps to move the plot along as the trial progresses.

Last, I encourage a writer to watch some of the classic movies, not television. Watch and re-watch A Few Good Men, To Kill a Mockingbird, A Time to Kill, The Verdict, Twelve Angry Men, even My Cousin, Vinnie. And, of course, it wouldn’t hurt to visit a courthouse and observe a few trials. In my first novel, So Help Me God, I had a character, Mr. Buschbaum, a retiree who found his entertainment at the courthouse. He would show up on a Monday and talk to the clerks and bailiffs to see what they had going for the week, and eventually settle into the back row of a courtroom to watch the drama unfold. He probably could have written some very authentic courtroom scenes. In summary, do like Mr. Buschbaum. Do research for writing the authentic courtroom scene by visiting the courthouse.

Writing Historical Fiction

Pieces to Help You Create Your Novel

Christoph Fischer

Sound and waterproof research for me is the most important part of any historical work. I would be mortified if a reader contacted me to let me know that an important part of my story was based on wrong data. In historical fiction you find the odd writer who only wanted an interesting setting for their stories and who actually knows little about the times and places they have chosen. That kind of fiction can be great fun and has — if the reader is made aware of this — its place in the literary scene. If you want historical credibility, however, you really cannot do enough research. The non-negotiable facts determine much of your far less restricted fictional storyline, and those two factors do need to be in harmony.

Admittedly, I did not travel abroad to visit local archives and to browse through catalogues of microfilm to pin point every last detail of clothing, street scenes, and the temperature on a day in May 1913. Partly because, for me, too much detail can become a writing by numbers and can distract from the plot, and partly because a lot of useful information is now available freely on the Internet, which can be a good initial source of information — as long as it is not used as the sole base for your book. Any data used must be verified by multiple sources.

When I had the idea for The Luck of the Weissensteiners, I began to read both fiction and non-fiction books about Slovakia, Czechoslovakia, European History and politics from 1848 until the 1980s, Judaism, Slovakian History from the middle ages, and I also read novels published during that era and biographies of writers and politicians. I made fact sheets about Judaism, Nationalism, farm life, localities, and local customs, just as I created sheets for each character: their looks, their age and their habits. Additionally, I worked with timeline sheets, a page for each month and one for each year, so I had my own little book on the history and the background of the story. 


I kept looking for further sources on the Internet and for books, often at the periphery of my subject matter, that would reassure me and confirm the data I had already collected. Throughout writing the story I continuously referred to my manual and often had to go back to the books and other sources to find out even more.


I had a general plot outline, dictated by my idea for The Luck of the Weissensteiners, and the basic historical data that I had gathered initially. Emerging new data affected the story at all stages, since continuous research brought up some unexpected issues. Occasionally the full impact of events, politics, and historical facts on the nation and on my characters became only fully clear to me when I started writing certain scenes, which often demanded re-thinking, re-writing, and ultimately a slight change of the story itself.

As I lived with the characters I created, I could feel their pain and the impact of what went on around them. They also often reacted quite differently from what I might have imagined before I put pen to paper. What would I do? became a What would Greta, Jonah, or Johanna do? and that forced the odd re-think.

Another big turning point for me was when I learned about some controversy surrounding one of the main sources I’d used. Mary Heimann, a British researcher, went to Prague, learned the language and studied the local archives for her book Czechoslovakia, The State That Failed.

While Heimann’s findings sounded perfectly competent — Yale University Press published her, after all — I later learned that they were fiercely contested and, in some cases, deemed unverifiable and speculative. For example, the number of personal exemption papers in Slovakia, which were used to save individual Jews from deportation