Guilty: Liberal "Victims" and Their Assault on America by Ann Coulter (2009)

One quick note: This blog is far from being a political forum, and I know that the very mention of Ann Coulter's name seems to bring out such strong reactions from people from both sides of the political spectrum. My opinion on it? Well to quote Linus Van Pelt, "There are three things I've learned never to discuss with people---religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin."

In addition to the John Grisham bestselling novel The Associate, Scranton is also mentioned in the latest book by controversial bestselling political commentator Ann Coulter.

Coulter's latest book, Guilty: Liberal "Victims" and Their Assault on America, is her commentary on liberals who claim to be victims while actually victimizing others.

In Chapter 1, titled "Liberal Motto: Speak Loudly and Carry a Small Victim," Coulter writes the following:

In the 2008 election season...it wasn't the Democratic National Committee but a newspaper reporter, David Singleton of the Scranton Times-Tribune, who invented the story about Republican crowds yelling "Kill him!" about Obama at a Palin rally.

To read the original article, click here.The footnote at the end of the book references an article from the Times Leader by reporter Andrew M. Seder titled "Secret Service Says 'Kill Him' Allegation Unfounded." To read that article, click here.

Guilty: Liberal "Victims" and Their Assault on America is available to borrow in various formats from the Lackawanna County Library System. To reserve the book, click here; to reserve the large print version of the book, click here; and to reserve the audiobook on CD, click here.

The Associate by John Grisham (2009)

My extra-ultra-fantastic former colleague and all-around groovy gal RY emailed me with the exciting news that best-selling author John Grisham (The Firm, The Client, The Pelican Brief) includes a reference to Scranton in his latest chart topper The Associate.

Grisham's latest legal thriller, published on January 27, 2009, tells the story of Kyle McAvoy, a second-generation lawyer from York, Pennsylvania with a dark secret from his past and a new job as an associate in the largest law firm in the world--where being a criminal is expected of him.

The Scranton reference appears on page 248, where Kyle is being interrogated by FBI agents in a Holiday Inn hotel room. The topic is a rape victim named Elaine:

''She was troubled. Her grades were a mess. She now claims that the rape brought on severe emotional distress. She lived with her parents for a year or so in Erie, then began drifting. A lot of self-medication, booze and drugs. She saw some therapists, but nothing helped. Have you heard any of this?''

''No. After she left school, there was not a word.''

''Anyway, she has an older sister in Scranton who took her in, got her some help, paid for rehab."

A full-text preview of the first four chapters of The Associate are available on Entertainment Weekly's website. To view the page from Chapter 3 that includes the reference to Scranton, click here (it appears a little past the halfway point of the webpage). To start reading from th beginning of Chapter 1, click here.

Circulating copies of John Grisham's The Associate are available to borrow from the Lackawanna County Library System. To place a hold, click here.

Much thanks again to the incredibly awesome RY for this reference. I owe you a caramel coffee, RY ;-)

Simone (1962- )

Me and Simone following her concert at Bloomsburg University on Friday, February 13th, 2009. Simone is the daughter of the late, great Nina Simone and presently makes her home in East Stroudsburg, PA.

Back in 2000, I had the honor and pleasure of attending a concert of one of my favorite singers, the legendary High Priestess of Soul Nina Simone in Philadelphia, in what was to be her final major concert tour of the United States before her untimely death in April 2003. Last night, I had the honor and pleasure of attending a concert by her daughter Simone, who now makes her home in the Pocono Mountains. Some things just come around full circle in the most wonderful way.

Simone was born Lisa Celeste Stroud in New York City on September 12, 1962. She was the first and only child of Eunice Wayman (better known by her stage name, Nina Simone) and her then husband/manager Andrew Stroud. Nina Simone was a major recording artist, a classically trained pianist, and an early civil rights activist whose repertoire included both her own original compositions (such as Four Women, I Want A Little Sugar in My Bowl, Mississippi Goddam, and To Be Young, Gifted and Black) and interpretations of songs by some of the best songwriters in music (from Bob Dylan to The Beatles to Barry Gibb). Simone lovingly and jokingly referred to her mom as a "covers queen" in concert because, as a child, she had no idea that her mom didn't write Dylan's Just Like a Woman or George Harrison's Here Comes the Sun.

As a child, Lisa often toured with her mother as she played venues and festivals around the world, and she explained that it was a challenge growing up sharing the woman you know only as mom with fans around the world. Lisa's mother was also friends with some of the most outstanding leaders in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, including activists Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X, poet Langston Hughes and playwright Lorraine Hansberry. She explained during her concert that these historical people were also her extended family--she was even friends, playmates and fellow campers with their children. Simone's godmother, Miriam Makeba, was also Nina Simone's best friend and a legendary singer in her own right.

In 1982, after initially planning to study to be a lawyer, Lisa joined the U.S. Air Force, where she spent the next 10 years serving her country.

It was then that Lisa decided that she wanted to follow in her mother's footsteps and become a singer and performer. Although she knew her daughter had a spectacular voice and had immense talent, Nina Simone was apprehensive at first of her daughter's decision to enter the entertainment business; although Nina Simone was very successful in her career, she was also all too familiar with the struggles, betrayals, and stresses a career in performing entails.

When she began her professional life, Lisa took the stage name Simone as a way to honor her mother--I truly think this is a wonderful thing because, unlike most children of famous performers who do their best to distance themselves from the "the daughter of" label (particularly when she pursues the same avenue as her famous parent), she embraces her mother's legacy and music and, most importantly, how much her mother's music means to so many people.

With her career plans now firmly in place, Simone landed roles in touring productions of musicals such as Jesus Christ Superstar. She also understudied the lead roles of Mimi and Joanne in the hit musical Rent on Broadway; Simone also starred in the touring company of the show.

Mother and daughter did have the opportunity to perform together when Nina Simone performed a concert in Ireland; Simone performed a powerful version of her mom's song Music for Lovers as Nina accompanied her daughter on piano (this recording opens Simone's debut CD, Simone on Simone, released in 2008 on Koch Records).

In 2002, Simone took over the title role in Elton John and Tim Rice's hit musical Aida on Broadway, which she played for 18 months. Her proud mother attended one of the performances and heaped praise on her talented daughter.

Towards the end of Simone's run on Broadway in Aida, she learned that her mother Nina Simone passed away in the south of France on April 21, 2003.

On April 21, 2006, three years after her mothers passing, Simone paid tribute to her at Town Hall in New York, at the very venue where forty-seven years earlier a 26-year old Nina Simone had enjoyed her first major show in the city.

In 2008, Simone released her debut CD titled Simone on Simone, a loving tribute to her mother's music and legacy. She is presently touring to both promote the CD and to pay tribute to her mother's outstanding musical legacy. Simone on Simone includes Simone's interpretations of some of her mother's best known and loved songs, including Feelin' Good, Love Me Or Leave Me, Don't You Play Them No Mind, Go To Hell, and the resonating and prophetic Keeper of the Flame. Also included on the CD is an autobiographical song written by Simone herself titled Child in Me, about her relationship with her mother and the difficulties of sharing someone you know simply as mom with a world that only knows her as Nina Simone.

Simone also occassionally performs with the group Daughters of Soul, which also includes the children of Chaka Khan and Donnie Hathaway.

Simone, her husband and nine year-old daughter (who sometimes joins her mother on stage for the song Love Me or Leave Me) presently make their home in East Stroudsburg, PA.

After her excellent concert at Bloomsburg University last night (where she performed songs from the CD Simone on Simone, as well as some of her own original songs and even some of my favorite Nina Simone that are not included on her CD), I had the opportunity to meet Simone. Of course, I had to ask her, out of all the places she has travelled, why she chose to make Northeastern Pennsylvania her home. Her response? "The house." She told me she simply fell in love with her house in the Poconos and just had to live there. She also told me how weird it was to have the last name Stroud and to live in Stroudsberg, which I found hysterically funny because connecting the two never even dawned on me. However, she told me that, although she loves NEPA, she HATES snow and HATES the cold, so she and her family also own a home in Florida, where they live part of the year. She was also thrilled when I told her I saw her mom in concert nearly 10 years ago in Philadelphia.

In short, Simone is incredibly sweet, incredibly talented (WHAT A VOICE!), and (out of all the places in the world) has chosen to make NEPA her adopted home.

Simone's superb debut CD, Simone on Simone, is available to borrow from Lackawanna County Library System. To place a hold, click here.

Much thanks to Simone for posing for the pic with me, for keeping her mother's legacy alive, and for a voice that made last night an evening I won't forget.

www.SimonesWorld.com

"If You Can Play Scranton" by Nancy McDonald (1981)

"The city (of Scranton) has a reputation for being a tough audience. I did not find them that way."

Jack Benny, following his performance in Scranton on December 16, 1920

While working on a question last week about vaudeville, my colleague Evelyn Gibbons and I found what can be described as an unexpected gem in our Local History collection. The gem is a little book from 1981 by Nancy McDonald titled If You Can Play Scranton.

The cities of Scranton and Wilkes-Barre are notorious for their tough audiences when it comes to live entertainment---legend has it that, early in his career, Billy Joel was once quoted as saying, "If you can play Wilkes-Barre, you can play anywhere."

McDonald's incredible book from almost thirty years ago vividly verifies this famous attribution, in terms of Scranton. It has always been regarded by theater people as "a tough town to play" but, at the same time, Scrantonians were also quick to spot new talent and to praise actors and plays when they felt it was warranted. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, the theatres and audiences of Scranton was often used as a "tryout" area for shows headed to New York.

The list alone of legendary actors and actresses that have played Scranton, according to McDonald's book, is incredible. Fanny Brice, Buster Keaton, Billie Burke, Rudolph Valentino, John and Lionel Barrymore, Betty Grable, Al Jolsen, W.C. Fields, Mae West...the list goes on and on.

The book also includes natives of Scranton who have gone on to successful careers in Hollywood--including several who have previously been featured in the blog, such as Gloria Jean and Lizabeth Scott.

There's even some dirt in the book that is absolutely fascinating. For example, Frank Sinatra (ol' Blue Eyes himself) was chastised by bandleader Tommy Dorsey himself when their tour stopped in Scranton and Sinatra blew off a local radio interview quipping, "(I was) hired to sing, not make personal appearances."

My favorite anecdote in the book is attributed to Will Rogers who, when he met a physician from Scranton at a baseball game in New York, was quoted as saying to him that there were three things about Scranton that he remembered--the Hotel Casey, the D. L. & W. Railroad, and Zenke's Restaurant.

In short, Nancy McDonald's If You Can Play Scranton is a thoroughly researched and enthralling record of a unique part of Scranton's history---and reputation.

In addition to two noncirculating copies in the Local History collection, a copy of If You Can Play Scranton is available to borrow from the library. To place a hold, click here. You can also purchase a copy of the book from the Lackawanna Historical Society Bookstore.

The New York Times Magazine (Sunday, February 1, 2009)

My favorite Groovy Gal in the Know Evelyn Gibbons showed me some really amazing illustrations from this past Sunday's New York Times Magazine that accompanies David Leonhardt's article on the economy titled The Big Fix. what's even more groovy is the fact that these amazing and vivid images were done by Jason Kernevich, a Freeland, PA native who co-founded the graphic designs company Heads of State.

To check out the article and see these incredible illustrations for yourself, click here.

Thanks again to Evelyn Gibbons for this reference.