Sunday, August 18, 2019

Three New Orleans events discuss Katrina books


Three different author events focusing on Hurricane Katrina books will occur in August 2019 at the East Bank Regional Library, 4747 W. Napoleon, Metairie.

7 p.m., Wednesday, Aug. 21, 2019
Painting Katrina, Phil Sandusky
In the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Sandusky returned home and began recording the devastation. The result is a collection that offers a vision of the beauty and fragility of New Orleans and displays the awesome power of nature. The book contains 76 color reproductions: 30 created a year before Katrina; 30 in the aftermath of the storm, focusing primarily on scenes at the lakefront and the Lower Ninth Ward; and the last 16 painted one year after Katrina, showing the city’s recovery. Sandusky prefaces the paintings with background about his style and a journal chronicling his experience.

Sandusky has been a New Orleans resident since 1984. His works are in the permanent collections of the New Orleans Museum of Art, Louisiana State Museum, Historic New Orleans Collections, and museums in Jacksonville, Fla., Framingham, Mass., New York, and Umbria, Italy. Sandusky teaches landscape, figure and portrait painting at the New Orleans Academy of Fine Art.

7 p.m., Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2019
Coast Guard Heroes of New Orleans, Captain Robert Mueller (ret.)
Mueller’s premise is that “With disaster scenarios of increasing interest and disaster preparedness of paramount importance, it’s time to take a deeper look at what went very right before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina.” The unprecedented surface rescue put into action under Capt. Mueller took place with little fanfare, and saved the lives of 25,000 people by boat and 8,500 by helicopter.

Capt. Robert G. Mueller, U.S. Coast Guard (ret.) led the surface rescue operations in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. He retired after 30 years in the service and is the vice president for compliance at Turn Services, a towboat and fleeting company. He is an adjunct professor at Tulane University teaching Homeland Security in the graduate program.

7 p.m., Thursday, Aug. 29, 2019
Panel – John Batty, Laura Dragon and Mikel Schaeffer

Voices of Angels, John Batty
Throughout the devastating winds, rising waters, and August heat, nurses stuck by their patients. They improvised new emergency procedures and methods of record-keeping and patient transport, all without power or reliable information. These angels saved lives while their world fell apart around them. Voices of Angels is a case study and planning guide essential for facilities facing hurricanes, tornadoes, power outages, and a host of other issues that affect medical centers nationwide.

John R. Batty is an experienced psychiatric nurse who interviewed the nurses who treated patients during and after Hurricane Katrina. He and co-author Gail Tumulty presented the nurses’ experiences at an American Nurses’ Association conference. Batty’s research into hospital conditions and evacuations gave him unparalleled experience in disaster management. Batty, a former writer for First NBC Bank, lives and works in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Hurricane Boy, Laura Dragon
Hollis Williams is a middle-school student in the Ninth Ward of New Orleans. His father absent and his mother dead, Hollis and his siblings live with his grandmother. He dreams of reconnecting with his father, but Hurricane Katrina strikes and devastates his home and his plans. The young boy’s family is trapped on the roof of their house, waiting to be rescued. When help finally arrives, Hollis and his family are separated and sent hundreds of miles apart. 

Laura Dragon is a psychotherapist who works with children and adolescents at River Oaks Hospital in New Orleans. Her work with children who were separated from their families during Hurricane Katrina formed the genesis of Hurricane Boy. Dragon earned a master of arts degree in addictions counseling, and a master of social work degree from Tulane University.

Lost in Katrina, Mikel Schaeffer
This book offers emotional accounts of life before, during and immediately after Hurricane Katrina in St. Bernard, a parish that seemingly disappeared from the government’s sight. While President Bush was shaking hands with FEMA director Michael Browne on the fourth day after the storm, St. Bernard Parish residents were struggling to salvage what they could. Ordinary people did extraordinary things to save the parish that found itself almost completely submerged in floodwater. 

Mikel Schaefer spent his early years in St. Bernard Parish and graduated from the University of New Orleans. He is an executive producer at WWL-TV, the CBS affiliate in New Orleans. He was among the staff honored for broadcast coverage during Hurricane Katrina, and WWL-TV was awarded the 2005 George Foster Peabody Award, one of only four television stations in the nation to be honored.





Louisiana Book News is written by award-winning author Chere Dastugue Coen, who writes Louisiana romances and mysteries under the pen name of Cherie Claire. Her first book in each series is FREE to download as an ebook, including "Emilie," book one of The Cajun Series, "Ticket to Paradise," book one of The Cajun Embassy series and "A Ghost of a Chance," the first Viola Valentine mystery.

Thursday, August 15, 2019

New and upcoming Louisiana books



There are always new books being released about our state. Or books by Louisiana authors. Here are a few of which to take note.

Louisiana author Deanna Chase publishes her fifth book in the Pyper Rayne series, "Spirits, Spells and Wedding Bells," out this week. "Power of the Witch," book seven in the Witches of Heating Hollow series, follows in September. 

Geoffrey Baker offers tours of New Orleans’ iconic neighborhoods in “New Orleans: An Intimate Journey Through a City with Soul” by Images Publishing.

“Fireworks in Jubilee,” an anthology featuring Louisiana author Linda Joyce, as well as Rachel Jones and Melissa Klein, asks the questions, “Can six totally different people really find love in Jubilee, Georgia, on the Fourth?”

Norman German offers a bone-shaking murder mystery set in the backwaters of Lake Charles with "Cripple Bayou Two-Step," published by DVille Press. The book's manuscript was a finalist in the St. Martin's Private Eye Writers of American first novel contest. 

August

Food personality Poppy Tooker’s latest book, “Drag Queen Brunch,” will hit bookshelves Aug. 27 from Rainbow Road Press. The book contains dishes and recipes of several drag queens of New Orleans. A percentage of the proceeds from the sale of the book will be dedicated to Crescent Care of the New Orleans AIDS Task Force, and the Lazarus House.

Farrah Rochon’s eighth and final book in the Holmes Brothers series, “Return to Me,” is now available for pre-order. The book will be available Aug. 30.


September

The Historic New Orleans Collection will release “Enigmatic Stream: Industrial Landscapes of the Lower Mississippi River,” a new book by New Orleans-based photographer and author Richard Sexton. Nearly 100 black-and-white photographs document the dramatic influence of heavy industry between and along the river’s banks, as well as the sometimes jarring juxtapositions between innovation and decay, the commercial and the residential, and the manmade and the natural.

Joseph Arthur Simon’s “The Greatest of All Leathernecks” by LSU Press chronicles John A. Lejeune (1867–1942), a Louisiana native and called by Simon the most influential leader of the U.S. Marine Corps in the 20th century. As Marine Corps commandant from 1920-29, Lejeune reorganized, revitalized and modernized the force by developing its new and permanent mission of amphibious assault. At the time, the corps was a constabulary force used to protect American business interests in the Caribbean, not the significant contributor to national defense it is known as today.

Also by LSU Press, “Observing the Invisible,” poetry by Kelly Cherry, the Eudora Welty Professor Emerita of English and Evjue-Bascom Professor Emerita in the Humanities at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. “Jim Crow’s Last Stand” by Thomas Aiello will be re-released this month in paperback.

October

Monique Boutte Christina heads back to her family's New Orleans restaurant with “Let’s Party at Mulate’s,” published by Pelican Publishing. We received an advanced copy and have a review coming soon so check back!

In addition to her fall books, Chase begins a new series with “A Witch For Mr. Holiday,” book one in the Witches of Christmas Grove.” The book will be available Oct. 8.

November

Globe Pequot Press will publish “Louisiana Off the Beaten Path” by Jackie Sheckler FinchAccording to the book’s press release, “Louisiana Off the Beaten Path” shows you the Pelican State with new perspectives on timeless destinations and introduces readers to new ones, such as the pirate pistol-adorned bridge that’s an homage to swashbuckler Jean Lafitte's stomping grounds, the country's largest rose garden and stories from “America's Most Haunted City.”





Louisiana Book News is written by award-winning author Chere Dastugue Coen, who writes Louisiana romances and mysteries under the pen name of Cherie Claire. Her first book in each series is FREE to download as an ebook, including "Emilie," book one of The Cajun Series, "Ticket to Paradise," book one of The Cajun Embassy series and "A Ghost of a Chance," the first Viola Valentine mystery.