'Love in the Time of the Coronavirus' Now Available

 My new book is now available as an ebook. The print book is coming soon. Please check it out by clicking here!

My New Book Will Be Available for Preorder

 My new book, Love in the Time of the Coronavirus, will be available for preorder soon. Please check back on November 12 for details.

'Love in the Time of Coronavirus' Cover Reveal

 I am happy to reveal the cover for my upcoming novel, Love in the Time of the Coronavirus.

Here is a short summary of the story:

This story takes place between February 2020 and October 2020. It follows the characters on a journey that involves life and death, illness and good health, sadness and joy, and love and loss. It also chronicles how one neighborhood in Brooklyn weathers the storm of the coronavirus, although some face a sad ending while others manage to survive and move on. In this journey one thing connects all the characters – love – love for one another and love for the neighborhood itself.

 

My New Novel 'Love in the Time of the Coronavirus' Is Coming Soon

 Earlier this year, I announced that I was writing a novel about this time of the coronavirus. The story follows the lives of people in a Brooklyn neighborhood during the pandemic. Love in the Time of the Coronavirus will be available soon. Keep checking this space for more updates.

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/55516745-love-in-the-time-of-the-coronavirus

                                    I will be revealing the cover for my new book soon. 

Escape from New York – Cape Cod

 

 

With our trip to Italy cancelled this year and booked for the summer of 2021, vacations in driving distance became appealing. A weekend in Montauk and a much longer stay in New Hampshire’s Lakes Region gave us a chance to get out of the NYC area. Still, with summer waning, we decided one more journey would be in order.

 

We looked for a place that was open to visitors from New York and truly open to us – restaurants, shops, beaches, and museums. We decided to head up north again but in a more eastern direction and headed to Cape Cod. My only knowledge of Cape Cod was its connection to the Kennedys and my love of the potato chips of the same name.  

Having never been there before, we only knew what other people had said about the cape. Much of the noise we got was that it was crowded, had very heavy traffic, and that parking was hard in most towns. I can happily say that none of this is true, but the reality is that many tourists that would have been there – especially European ones – were out of the picture, probably making this a different kind of summer there. People to whom we spoke said it was busy but not like a normal summer.

Our first stop was Hyannis for two days. Hyannis is a sprawling town, and it was very busy seemingly day and night. The food was excellent wherever we went, and on our first night I ordered New England clam chowder – it was the best I ever tasted. This would be my sentiment each time I had chowder on the cape. 

In Hyannis, a must see stop is the JFK Museum. Hyannis seems inextricably linked to the Kennedy family, and the museum is a loving homage to the famous American family that were political royalty in the twentieth century.

Unfortunately, pictures are not allowed in the museum, but I respected that rule. We toured the various rooms that were filled with many famous and familiar faces besides the Kennedys. The exhibits showed each phase of JFK’s life and rise to political power. They are moving and powerful, allowing visitors to see how amazing JFK’s short life truly was.

One room that is of particular difficulty to visit is one dedicated to John F. Kennedy Jr. Elements of his even shorter life are displayed, especially the heartbreaking photograph of him as a little boy saluting on the day of JFK’s funeral. Looking at all of his photos and thinking about his potential that never was fulfilled, I couldn’t help but shed a few tears.

Hyannis also has a busy and interesting waterfront. Along the port side of the town, there are colorful artist shacks along the path down to the water. Here artists display an eclectic array of artwork for purchase, and the prices seemed reasonable. There was a feeling here that this was an artsy place but there was no pressure and no worries. Given the beautiful setting, it seemed the perfect place for artists to create their works and share them with the visitors to this lovely seaside town. 

Our Next Stop

Add caption

We were on to Falmouth where we stayed at the beautiful Beach Breeze Inn. This is the first time that we stayed at an inn, but we did our homework before booking this place. The building is a cozy large old house, and our room had a second bedroom for the kids. There were views of the water from our windows where we could see Martha’s Vineyard – our next destination – in the distance across Nantucket Sound.

The owners are friendly, and all guests and workers were wearing their masks dutifully. There is a nice pool on the grounds, lounges, and a separate area with tables with umbrellas, a grill, and a fire pit. It was just short walk across Shore Street to the lovely white sand beach.

We liked Falmouth better than Hyannis because it is a smaller town, and there is less traffic and less people walking around. We spent days alternating between the pool and the beach, and we also explored the town that had a nice selection of cafés, shops, and restaurants. There are some on the water options that are wonderful, but there is sometimes a wait for tables.

These days provided us with time to relax, swim, and enjoy the sun. Besides a brief shower one afternoon, our weather was fabulous. The evenings got a little cooler, requiring a jacket or sweater if your planning to eat at a spot on the waterfront.

Falmouth is an enjoyable place to stay, especially if your looking to relax and get a flavor of Cape Cod. There are plenty of places to eat and enjoy the bounty of the sea.

Martha’s Vineyard

Falmouth is an ideal place to stay when planning to visit Martha’s Vineyard.  Despite social distancing, we stood on a very crowded boarding area waiting to go onto the lovely Island Queen ferry. Once onboard we chose to sit up on deck to enjoy the breeze on a lovely day. On the inner lower deck there is a bar to get snacks and drinks.

The 35-minute ride across the sound is a pleasant one, and we saw multiple watercraft on our journey. The ship docks at Oak Bluffs – one of six towns on Martha’s Vineyard. Oak Bluffs is a nice small town where there are plenty of shopping and eating opportunities. If you have the time you can stop and see the large Vineyard Vines store located there. 

We wanted to check out Edgartown – mostly for its connections to the classic film Jaws – and the bus looked very crowded, so we opted to take a taxi. We got to see some of the shoreline between the towns, and the lovely beaches were not overwhelmed with crowds of sunbathers and swimmers.

Once the taxi dropped us off by the waterfront in Edgartown, we realized this town was filled with tourists – and the driver said this was an off season due to the virus! We got to see the building that was used for the town hall in Jaws – where the sheriff meets with the mayor and the town council. On that same street is the old Whaling Church built in the 1820s when Martha’s Vineyard was a hub of whaling activity.

We had a nice lunch right on the water, and once again clam chowder had to be sampled and did not disappoint. In general, the food on the cape seemed extremely fresh, and there were many healthy options on menus, and the always welcome children’s menu seemed to be available everywhere we went.

On the ride back to Oak Bluffs in the taxi, the driver stopped at what he called Jaws Bridge. It was the bridge used in a memorable scene in the film Jaws. On this day a group of young people were lined up waiting their turn to jump over the rail and into the water. Our taxi driver – a young fellow in his twenties – informed us that he had been fishing there the night before and had made the jump a few times.

Once back on the ferry, we all agreed that we were happy to be going back to our quiet little inn rather than staying in the bustling Martha’s Vineyard for the night.

We Want to Go Back

 

After our vacation as we drove home, we all felt like we wanted to go back and explore other parts of the cape. I think that there are two ways to gauge how well a vacation went. One is if you wish you could have stayed longer, and the other is wanting to go back. Our time in Cape Cod was relaxing and enjoyable. I highly recommend a visit to the area. It is a family friendly vacation destination that will leave you with good memories and a smile on your face.  

 

 

My Book 'The Stranger from the Sea' Summer Sale!

Hello to All!

To celebrate the last month of summer, I am dropping the price of my new book, The Stranger from the Sea, to 99 cents for the whole month. It is available at some of your favorite online stores. If you're looking for a book to read on the beach or at the pool, please check it out.

https://books2read.com/b/b5586l

Book Review: 'Supra/Normal: No More Superheroes' by A.S. McDermott

In the new book, Supra/Normal: No More Superheroes, author A.S. McDermott has shaken up the concept of superheroes. In fact, in this amazing book, he takes the genre, throws it into a blender, and adds some different ingredients to the mix, making for a tasty treat. It is a kick-ass book with seemingly non-stop action, but the author takes the time to shape his characters and make them real and believable.

Julie Jackson is one fine protagonist, coping with her superpower in a world that wants to destroy her. She learns of her power when she is 12 – that is around the age that most supras discover them – and uses them to do good deeds. She lives an otherwise normal life with her younger brothers, mother, and stepdad.

Supras are outlawed by Supreme President Stevenson – a former supra who “cured” himself – who waged a war against all supras, led by the greatest supra of all, and then defeated the supra forces and their leader Dr. Simone Dalton. Dalton and many others were killed and now, a generation later, supras are hunted and incarcerated.

What worries Julie is that she is going to get a blood test at school. This will reveal whether or not she has supra blood. When it seems that her blood test comes back as “normal,” Julie wonders why she has powers (hers is super strength) and what is she if she’s not a supra?

Author A.S. McDermott

All is going well enough until the night of a basketball game. She goes to see Steve – her crush and captain of the team, of course – and a freak accident forces her to reveal her superpower by saving Steve’s life in front of the crowd at the game.

Forced to run without saying goodbye to her family, Julie is out on her own until she encounters an old woman who wants to help her. This woman turns out to be the supposedly dead Dr. Dalton, and she sets the record straight about the war, the president, and takes her in and promises to train her to use her powers.

Dr. Dalton takes her to a hideout, where Julie meets other teenagers who are supras as well. There is 12-year old Penny, a tech wiz who is a genius and already at the level of Einstein-like intelligence. Monica is a teenage girl whom Penny calls “our pyro” because she can throw flames, and then the oldest, Leon whose power is being able to fly.

The other "supras" all are relatable and are portrayed in an honest way. The author gets the teenage angst angle right, and what did anyone think would happen if you give superpowers to teens and tweens?

While this gang learns to cope with and use their powers, they also are taught to deal with a group known as the Normalizers – they are a vicious police group who have been engineered to capture the supras. When they get close to supras, they lose their powers like Superman does with Kryptonite.

They form a cohesive group, though Julie and Monica clash sometimes. When it is discovered that Steve – the basketball star whom Julie saved – has been declared a supra and incarcerated, the group makes it their mission to bust him out of a high security facility. Can they rescue him before the Normalizers come to stop them?

The rest of the way is spoiler territory, but I can attest to the fact that reading this book is like riding a roller coaster that you hope will never end. Along the swift-paced journey, there are moments when characters reveal their emotions, and it is done in such a way as to respect the characters and the reader can see how much the author cares about them.

While there is jovial thread that runs through the story – especially in our narrator Julie, who is self-deprecating and never takes herself or her power too seriously – there are some important areas covered as well.

The whole concept of “normal” is dealt with in a powerful and meaningful way. The question volleyed more than once thematically is “What is normal?” in a world where history has been rewritten, the leader is a homicidal maniac, and the people called Normalizers are far removed from being “normal” people.

This is a wonderful, awesome, and emotional story that leaves plenty of room for a sequel (fingers crossed). Watch out MCU, there is a new breed of superhero around, and this one is ripe for a film version - I can see Kiernan Shipka in the role of Julie. This is a great summer read for the YA crowd but also great for readers of all ages.

I highly recommend Supra/Normal: No More Superheroes and suggest that you add it to your summer reading list ASAP.