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Historical novel out in 2024

Suspension Bridge, Niagara Falls

Late in the summer of 1864, a young woman with a troubled past reluctantly returns to Niagara Falls and the border with British Canada. Her assignment? Somehow keep rebel spies John Yates Beall and Bennet Burley from seizing the lone Union gunship remaining on the Great Lakes.

 

If Beall and Burley can commandeer the U.S.S. Michigan, they plan to bombard Cleveland and Buffalo on the eve of upcoming presidential election. This will certainly end Abraham Lincoln's chances of a second term. To a desperate attempt to stop them, Secretary of State William Seward turns to inexperienced agents like Rory Chase, his daughter Fanny's best friend.

Soon time runs out for Rory and the Union operatives. Can they stymie the Confederates before the Michigan falls into rebel hands? In a climactic scene atop the Suspension Bridge spanning the Niagara River, during a raging blizzard, Rory has a final chance to redeem herself.

 

Based upon true events, REBEL FALLS tells a forgotten chapter of the epic struggle. A time when the clash wasn't between armies and generals, but spies and unlikely allies. A place of extreme beauty where the Civil War briefly hung in the balance.

 

A hardcover Spring 2024 release from Three Hills, the trade imprint for Cornell University Press, REBEL FALLS has garnered advance praise. "This is history that goes down smoothly," writes Burt Solomon, author of THE MURDER OF WILLIE LINCOLN. "You feel like you're there."

 

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We have a cover for Cancer Crossings

Publication date: April 15

Thanks to the good people at Cornell Press, especially designer Scott Levine, for this great cover for Cancer Crossings: A Brother, His Doctors and the Quest to Cure Childhood Leukemia. I love how it pops.
To go along with it, I recently received a gracious endorsement from filmmaker Ken Burns: "For as long as  Read More 

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Finishing Galleys edits for Cancer Crossings

Coming down the homestretch. These edits need to be back to the publisher by mid-September.

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Audio rights for Cancer Crossings sold to Blackstone

Since January, I've been working with a voice coach, improving my delivery for the classroom at Johns Hopkins and with an eye on the next book tour. It's been fun to take on some commercials, animation and narration. Learning how to vary the pitch, cadence, dare say the feeling of what I'm saying.
In the course of the lessons, with the amazing Mark Neely, I realized the audio for several of my books (Red Rain, Night on Manitou Island, Down to the Last Pitch) has yet to be done. I think I'm now going to tackle them myself.
Last week, I did a demo tape at Bias Studios in Springfield, Va., where Danny Gatton, Emmylou Harris and my friends Eddie From Ohio have cut albums. It was a bit unnerving to walk into Studio B and go through multiple takes of my scripts for commercials and narrations. But, all in all, it went pretty well.
Meanwhile, the good folks at Cornell Press, the publishers for Cancer Crossings: A Brother, His Doctors and the Quest to Cure Childhood Leukemia, sold the audio rights to the new book to Blackstone Audio.
In a nice twist, Blackstone is interested in having me do the narration for Cancer Crossings. At the very least, I have a quality demo to send their way. Read More 

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