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15 October

11/9/2015

Tie Carefully
I have a grandson that loves to tie ropes in and around trees and other objects on our property. They are works of art. The colors, the variety of ropes, straps, discarded hoses and yarn, as well as the objects selected, are surprising yet natural. I have never watched the process. He prefers to accomplish the work without spectators. I asked him why he does this and his answer was, “I was helping the tree let me to climb it. It needed to be that way. Sometimes I needed to hold things in place.”
Here is my take on his work and my translation of his then 8-year old statement. If the earth turned a little faster, we would fall off. Do we ever feel like we need to slow things down? Or tie things down? Or increase our mass by connection so we overcome the centrifugal force of the modern compartmentalized world? We all need something or someone to tie ourselves to or we are doomed to the perpetual insecurity of being flung off into the void. What we tie ourselves to informs our identity, purpose, efficacy, and self-value. As we daily face the whims and currents of the Zietgiest, we need to tie carefully.
Is my grandson's art a product of the social circumstances of the time? Is his art a reaction to the negative aspects of the zietgiest, a metaphor of his generation's quest for security, or just rope in trees?

Meaning Marketplace Scale: M--Significant meaning 66

(I will provide the scale in the next mid-month newsletter. It's not back from my graphic designer in time for this newsletter)

I have received quite a few requests for a hard copy of version of Conversations Among Butterflies. It is now available! Click here to purchase a hard copy. Available in digital form on Kindle, Nook, Kobo, and S mashwords.

“As she said the last words, she looked up and stared directly at Diego. The room was silent, but full of blushed smiles. Even Harold was overcome with the simple beauty of the event. He hadn't understood the conversation which led up to it, but what touched him was that he was here, present, during this intimate occasion. "This would never happen in the United States," he said quietly.

Consuelo whispered, "This hardly ever happens anywhere. I am so glad it happened in my home. I will be able to warm my hands with the fire of its memory for a long time to come."

Conversations Among Butterflies, chapter 19
Purchase

Treasure Hunt! The launch of Kitab Kabbani is only days away. More about the book here. Semi-spoiler:On the surface this is a Middle East adventureand race to find a secret book. I am planning an international launch event where I place a hard copy book in secret locations around the United States, the Far East, Europe and the Middle East. I can't tell you where because this is a treasure hunt. More specifics on this event after I get the books in place and hidden! I am also planning an on-line treasure hunt for a digital copy. I have had almost as much fun planning and executing this event as I did writing the book. I will announce the event on my Facebook page, so sign up here if you haven't done so yet.

This month's pass-along tip is a book for children and adults. The Forgotten Food Forest is a story written by Educator, Author, and Rock Star Matt Powersand illustrated by well-known Disney animatorAsayo Janice Kubo. Two brothers living in Morocco get separated from their family during a sandstorm. They take shelter in a food forest and slowly begin to realize that it is both manmade and ancient. They also learn that they are not alone! Adventure, historical fiction & permaculture - all in one. All based on a food forest Geoff Lawton discovered in the 1970s. This is a book to put on everyone’s list. The story is entertaining and edifying. Every page is a work of art suitable for framing. Pre-order the book by messaging here.

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1 October Newsletter

10/1/2015

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September was a great month. Our youngest daughter Rosemary was married to Tanner Hansen at the beginning of the month. We celebrated in Fresno California and Nampa Idaho. This is the happy couple. I am an adjunct professor (on-line) for BYU-Idaho and since we were only a few hours away in Nampa, we drove over to the inauguration of the new university president. On the way home, we ate at a restaurant in Winnemucca Nevada that I need to work into a future novel. It is good to be home and as an unsettled empty nester it is cathartic to get back to writing. Happy reading! More about me at Mike-Mitchell.com

A quick look at the Past, Present, and what's Coming Soon

Conversations Among Butterflies is now published as an ebook for Kindle, Nook, Kobo, and Smashwords, and in hard copy.

At one point during the month the book was in the top 2,500 in three categories on Amazon--out of the millions of books on sale. I should have taken a screenshot. If you've read it, please post a review on Amazon here. I spoke at a book club that just read Conversations and even got to read a few passages. It was a lot of fun and I answered some great questions. I also participated in a local authors' faire at our community library. It's been an exciting month. Purchase.

To be published this month: Kitab Kabbani

The Middle East is spinning out of control, but what does that mean to a simple fast-order cook in Central California? Everything—his family, his love life, his future, his purpose. And it may be that he means a great deal to the Middle East. Some want to kill him and others are willing to risk their lives to protect him.
This adventure takes the reader to Turkey, Iran, and Arabia. Themes of historical religions of the Middle East, modern interpretations, truth, understanding, and what the future holds for this volatile region are interwoven throughout the book. Romance and its seeming impossibility provide a metaphor for all that is wonderful about this region, and all that may be suffocating hope. The unspoken question through most of the book asks is something more happening as this adventure unfolds?
More info.

To be published before the end of the year: Chinese Circus.

This is the working title of a spinning sextet of speculative fiction. As bricoleur, I construct a polyphonic novel through six novellas of alternative history, fantasy, science fiction, and perhaps a few actual facts. These stories initially appear on stage as solitary spinning plates, but join together to celebrate life in our mobile, flat, and ever accelerating society, where the battle of dependence, independence, and interdependence rages. I hope to have this book available for pre-order by late November for an early December release. More information soon on my website mike-mitchell.com and through my Facebook page.

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Fresh, Concise, Meaningful

9/11/2015

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The plan for Zeitgeist Muse

What catches our attention and incites us to action has always interested me. The middle of the month newsletter will bring you a provocative pluck from the zeitgeist and I will rate it according to the feared and lauded Meaning Marketplace Scale. For more on the Meaning Marketplace, the zeitgeist, and measuring meaning, click here. Stay Tuned!

Below, in each of the thee legs of the zeitgeist stool, I will feature a quote from one of my books that I hope you will find meaningful, a Story Alchemist event that you might find interesting, and a person, place, or thing external to my writing that is worthy of your attention. Sign up for my bi-monthly newsletter, if you haven't already, here. This is the last of the unsolicited newsletters.

I have received quite a few requests for a hard copy of version of Conversations Among Butterflies. It is now available! Click here to purchase a hard copy.

“It is my fault Emma. Diana asked why I never carved anything out ofPau d’arco. I told her the wood is very hard and more like sculpting stone than carving wood,” Alejandro explained.

“So then I asked papa how he knew so much about trees. Was it because he had cut up so many? And he told me it is impossible to understand life by slicing it into pieces. When you cut the tree you kill it. How can you understand the living tree when it is dead?”

Conversations Among Butterflies, chapter 7
Click to Purchase

Treasure Hunt! The next book I will launch is Kitab Kabbani. More about the book here. In short this is a Middle East adventure and race to find a secret book. I am planning a launch event where I place a hard copy book in secret locations around the United States and a few international locations. I can't tell you where because this is a treasure hunt. More specifics on this event soon!

This month's pass-along tip is a book for children that was illustrated with nature-based colors. The story is uplifting and the illustrations are inspiring. More at: Magic Beans. The book was published to celebrate the launch of the Permaculture Life School online. Check out the school here. Best wishes to the school and its students!

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August 1 Newsletter

8/27/2015

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This is a sample of the bi-monthly newsletter I will send out to my mailing list. At the first of the month it will have this kind of content--short note and book infomation. I will send out the other newsletter in a couple of days that will be published at the middle of each month--different content, different format. That will be the last you will hear from me unless you sign up for my mailing list. Thank you for those how have already signed up. If you haven't signed up you can do so here: http://eepurl.com/bviacf . Thanks again, and sorry for the intrusion to your email. Mike

Hi. My name is Mike Mitchell and I am a writer. I am also a retired U.S. Air Force officer, pilot, business CEO, and university professor. But most of all I am a writer. I hope you enjoy this monthly newsletter that will share a little of what I've recently published, what I am doing now, and what's coming. I will also highlight a few events and something unique or special I have discovered. I promise to inspire and never share your contact info. Happy reading! More about me at Mike-Mitchell.com

A quick look at the Past, Present, and what's Coming Soon

Purchase. Non-fiction memoir. Shared experiences between my Grandfather, me, and those around us from those long summer days on the Iowa farm. These seeds were planted by a wise grandfather in my heart and mind over the summers between my tenth and sixteenth years. Those seeds grew to fruit-laden trees in later years--in many cases, long after my Grandfather passed away. This book is a celebration of grandparents.More Info

Purchase. Literary Fiction. A honeymoon turned nightmare, a faltering revolution, a military junta with crumbling legitimacy, and a family of campesinos comprised of a philosopher father with a secret, a mother who “… uses poets’ words to explain awkward moments, or to create them,” a daughter who is the romantic interest of the local Army commander, and two mysterious brothers who might be revolutionaries, all trying to simply survive. More info.

Pre-order. Literary Fiction. Publish date late September 2015. The unstable status quo of the Middle East is in the hands of Thaddeus Allen, on his first ever trip abroad. This adventure takes our American Everyman to Turkey, Iran, and Arabia to save his family and to find an ancient hidden book. He is joined by a beautiful and beguiling Turk, Leyla Celebi, with her own secrets. They are threatened at every turn by two ruthless groups that want the book and are willing to kill to get it. More Info.

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Long Live the Art of the Book

2/20/2015

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Warning, Warning!!! Soap Box diatribe ahead...

http://www.webinknow.com/2009/02/does-a-new-literacy-call-for-a-new-book-model.html

Interesting thoughts in the linked article, but this would be a tragedy..., to replace a book with basically a website, in print or digital... although millions of iPads and Kindles have been sold since the Christmas shopping season last year alone... Geeks and the tech savvy would not consider me one of their own, but IT in particular does not scare me and in most cases I happily embrace it. Information is important, but it's not just about the information and the efficiency. Or is it? Maybe more is said with less construction, but you have to think--the suggested layout and content might be the lazy way--the basic tech way, but not the artistic and pure science way. Remember why the world was falling apart in the first book of Asimov's Foundation Trilogy? Nobody knew how to think anymore or what the human or pure science foundations under the tech were. Not everything should be boiled down to a tech manual. I can just see To Kill A Mockingbird in this suggested style; the publisher could put a "contact us" link to the NAACP, or the KKK, or PETA (someone is going to kill a bird!?) depending on the reader's viewpoint, and a video of scenes from the movie, and links to other books written about this subject and about travel to the South, and of course some ads focused on the behavioral research on the type of person who would read this book, maybe a coupon for Expedia... Wow, really makes me want to curl up by the fireplace (a digital one on my computer screen of course) and get into the story.

I will die loving books and the simple art of the word and what is said and not said in the white space between the words and if I really think about it, the letter font and the binding and the dust jacket (all really great books have a hard cover edition), and handwritten notes and fountain pens and different types of ink and handmade paper and the art and tactile nature of it all... (And a few people that follow me on Twitter would probably say--metaphorically speaking, "better off dead.") So, I have published these thoughts on a blog; now isn't that ironic.

Maybe I should just title the article: Sui Generis and say "so be it."

And then there is the library itself. In my personal library in my previous home my daughter had painted the words above the entrance: "When I step into this library, I cannot understand why I ever step out of it." -- Marie de Sevigne. Could a digital library ever look like this?

Check out some of the beautiful libraries of the world at:

http://curiousexpeditions.org/2007/09/a_librophiliacs_love_letter_1.html
You won't be sorry.

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15 October

1 October Newsletter

Fresh, Concise, Meaningful

August 1 Newsletter

Long Live the Art of the Book

Mike Mitchell

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