Blog Archives
Knights of New York – Book Trailer
The New York City Fire Department, better known as the FDNY, is one of the most storied organizations in American history. Their longstanding traditions and acts of bravery are well documented, from their sacrifices on 9/11 to how they handled the Covid-19 pandemic. These brave men and women are the example for others to follow. Knights of New York is a detailed look into the leadership, management, and commitment to service taught by the greatest fire department in the world. Not just for firefighters, this one-of-a-kind book is the definition of what it means to put the needs of the people before yourself.
The views within the book are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of the City of New York or the FDNY.
Woke, The Spiritual Awakening of a 9/11 Rescue & Recovery Worker – Book Trailer
On this 20th Anniversary of 9/11, Anthony “Tony” M. Losito, a US Special Agent who responded to the attacks on the World Trade Center, breaks his silence and describes the events of that horrific day.
Only that day would change Tony’s life in ways he never expected.
“Woke” is the chronicle of Tony’s spiritual awakening and how a near death experience, the attacks of 9/11, and other key events impacted his life and spiritual journey.
Following 9/11 Tony began to see specific repeating number sequences and angelic signs. He would later come to know these special number combinations as “Angel Numbers”. It took time, but through various methods, he decoded these angelic communications and began to understand their divine messages.
“I receive divine messages from the Angelic realm, and I have been asked to share them with the world.”
A very personal mission and journey was assigned to Tony from the highest office in the land, and now Tony shares that message with you.
Join this 25-year law enforcement and military veteran as he shares his experiences with well-known evidential medium Steve Spur, the “Cowboy Psychic”, and his personal conversation with best selling Irish author of “Angels in My Hair”, and renown peace ambassador Lorna Byrne, and takes you through his very personal spiritual transformation to deliver a message of hope, faith, love, and unity to the world.
It will inspire you on your spiritual journey and bring you closer to your Guardian Angel.
From Rubble To Champagne
![From Rubble To Champagne: Rising from the ashes of war-torn Berlin to a life of grace, beauty and gratitude by [Vivianne Knebel]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51SG-hRgx3L.jpg)
In the memoir From Rubble to Champagne, author Vivianne Knebel tells us the story of her life. Vivianne’s early life was full of hardships. As an illegitimate child in Nazi Germany she realized very early on how cruel life could be. Dealing with poverty, her family had to figure out how to keep afloat amidst war-torn Germany, as many other Germans had to do during that period of time. This is an impassioned story of survival and love: through Vivianne’s narration we can see vividly the life of a child that starts with tragedy but that, with time and with the right attitude, flourishes and becomes something awe-inspiring and incredibly beautiful.
The book is splendidly written, Vivianne tells her story in such a way that one can both learn about a relevant and dark part of human history, and also feel inspired by the beauty of human life and its resilience. Moreover, this book showcases a story that many times is not told and gets ignored in our history, and that’s the story of the Germans that saw themselves affected by all this conflict, just wanting and trying to survive and save their families from poverty and from the war. Vivianne mirrors this point of view by sharing with us the story of her mother, who as a single mom had to deal with poverty and many times needed to search for shelter to protect both of her young daughters from the constant bombings that were so common during that period. Reading this story, one can not help but feel empathy and total support for Vivianne’s journey: despite the terrible realities of what she had to endure from a very young age, she finds a way to build a new life for herself, dealing with immigration and walking the long path of self-discovery and self-fulfillment, ending the story with a relevant reflection about the importance of love, family and gratitude.
It was a pleasure to read this book and I feel honored to be given the opportunity to learn about Vivianne’s story and her teachings. Her entire life is a demonstration of what we, as humans, are capable of going through and building for ourselves. It is a story about the hard, terrible realities of human life, but also of the beauty that’s always awaiting all of us, of love and of happiness. There’s always something better for all of us and Vivianne does an excellent job portraying this to her readers.
Through her book, Vivianne guides us and helps us reflect about our own lives. From Rubble to Champagne is an inspiring story about survival and resilience, filled with important teachings that pushes us to live, work hard, better ourselves and find beauty in even the most adverse situations.
Pages: 208 | ASIN: B08NFMSJYV
My Hidden Fear
My Hidden Fear by Luan Vu Nguyen is a compelling memoir about a Vietnamese boy who was born in Saigon in 1973. He escaped South Vietnam when he was thirteen with his younger brother after several failed attempts. They traveled across Cambodia to Thailand where they lived as refugees until they received permission to come to the United States. Arriving in Minnesota as minors, they were put into foster care, where the two brothers ended up separated. The next thirty years were a nearly continuous cycle of making poor decisions and repeating the same mistakes as he battled loneliness, depression, fear, and addiction. Through it all, he missed the family he left back in Vietnam.
This is a candid and contemplative memoir that was very interesting to read. This book follows an individual’s personal experiences as a refugee, but also provides a first hand historical account of what happened to people in Vietnam after the end of the Vietnam War. The author also includes family photographs that I really enjoyed as it provided context and allowed for a deeper connection to the people in the book. Through the author’s candid admission of the many mistakes he made in the past, this book shows the human capacity to change, and triumph over trauma. The author suffered through hardship and abuse as a child, and he used drugs and alcohol to try to cope, becoming caught in a dark place for many years. But I found this memoir inspiring because, although he stumbled many times, he kept trying to be better.
While I enjoyed the memoir, I really wanted more details. For example, the author never mentioned what happened to his uncle after they parted ways following his first escape attempt, except for a brief note at the end of the book that his uncle eventually made it to the United States at some point in the thirty years after his nephews arrived. I was completed engrossed in the story and wanted to take a deeper dive into events that were skimmed over. The story spans more than three decades but is a very short book. The tone of the narrative was very matter of fact, and the story centered more on retelling the events that took place rather than delving deeply into the emotions that were experienced during these events.
My Hidden Fear is a memorable story of one persons life, unfiltered, and raw. Readers will quickly devour this short but potent memoir.
Pages: 76
My Evolution As An Artist
Where Paint Goes is a captivating autobiography detailing your life as an artist. Why was this an important book for you to write?
After surviving over fifty years of living life as a creative or an artist and being told by numerous folks along the way, “you should write a book.” I thought it might be a good time to chronical my adventures, not so much to tell a story of my personal life, but to portray in parallel my personal life and my evolution as an artist or a creative.
Being intrigued by two statements I was familiar with, from studying art history:
- “Art imitates life,” Aristotle, around 300BC
- “Life imitates art,” Oscar Wilde, 1889
I found that I subscribed to both of these concepts, which gave me the foundation for writing the book and is why I subtitled the book “The art that affected my life and the life that affected my art.”
I appreciated the candid nature with which you told your story. What was the hardest thing for you to write about?
Being a novice author, I did not realize that to chronical my life in the written word, it would be necessary for me to intimately revisit the periods of my life I wished to depict in the story. Recalling certain parts of the story in this way proved to be highly difficult. Writing about the passing of my wife Kathy in 1989, I cried while I was writing about it and I cry today when reading the passages.
What do you hope is one thing readers take away from your book?
A bit of insight into what it is to live life as an artist, a creative.
Author Link: Website
Being Authentic
Small Fingernails chronicles your life as a college student and explores how toxic relationships impact our well-being. What were some key ideas you wanted to convey in this memoir?
Firstly, I wanted to express the extreme savviness needed to manage a mental health disorder and embark on a romantic relationship for the first time. Such an endeavor requires guidance, support, and troubleshooting from close friends and family. These folks need to be present and available for the person with a disorder and aware of their friend’s new relationship’s precarity on their mental status. Not to mention the ability, stamina, and health to complete college without incident and not let potential issues from their relationship complicate this critical time in their life with unnecessary hangups and avoidable with collateral support. I hope the various characters in Small Fingernails, especially the character Mcdaggot, and his ongoing failure to be truly supportive to Jacques, make all this visible to the reader.
I appreciated how candid and authentic the book is. What was one of the hardest things for you to write about?
One of the most challenging aspects of being authentic was that I still have connections with the ‘friends’ I talked about so freely in the book. Many of them today are very isolative, unhealthy, unkind, and quite frankly destructive people.
Mcdaggot is the perfect example of this uncouth behavior among my supposed friends. He even threatened me on several occasions with a lawsuit while I was writing the book and published it. I think I still get emails about it… very similar to the emails about small claims court that would bring my character to his knees later in my book University on Watch when my dispute with Kim went viral in the group.
To this day, some refuse to read or acknowledge this work as a vital part of my healing (from their callousness) and a literary work calling upon them for recognition as educated folks I attended college with at Binghamton.
What advice would you give to first-year college students that are struggling with their emotions?
Should work or education prove to be ‘too much’ or triggering, look inward, and ask yourself: are you taking the best possible care of yourself as possible? If you cannot identify the reason or roadblock that triggers or activates your symptoms and makes it difficult to work or study, consult with a therapist. Troubleshoot with a psychiatrist.
Just don’t give up or throw in the towel because of a label. A mental health disorder is only as disabling as the power you give it to rule over your life. Sure, there will be days when you can’t make it to work because of your symptoms, but that is OK. Just like the flu, some signs make it too uncomfortable to go in and do our job correctly. Heck, going to work or school in such cases might even be a bad idea, should you be contagious from the flu or tired from depression to get your work done correctly. But these are blips and moments and should not influence your potential for lifetime achievement.
What is the next book that you are working on, and when will it be available?
Wales Middle School: the rise of J. Peters It is already available.
Author Links: GoodReads | Twitter | Facebook | Website
The sages say love can blind us; however, sometimes, that love transforms our lives into radically altered states–states in which we must learn how to cope for the relationship to survive and thrive. These altered states are often difficult to manage without help from friends and family. If left to our own devices, without these critical supports, the very creative energy that once nurtured our passion has the potential to destroy the very foundation of our love and caring that was once manifest.
Small Fingernails chronicles my life as a student at college in Freedomtown and in love. It evaluates the impact of toxic relationships on our well-being and our capacity to pursue friendship. Through transgressions, fear, loss, grief, and misfortune, even my profound love could endure. Ultimately, my ethics and belief in what is right collapsed on its head.
Love needs to be free and rid of all elements that can destroy its beauty. This book signals the need to reevaluate our closest and most personal spaces, friends, and family members. The complications that interfere with our pursuit of happiness will one day be more easily overcome by people who follow their hearts and seek only the best for those they care about the most.
Put It On Your Shelf
My Fight For Survival is an impassioned memoir that takes readers through your personal struggles to inspire them and show them that anything is possible. Why was this an important book for you to write?
I find it is Important to let other people know there are other people who understand what you may be going through and to reach out. I find it is important for people to know you can make it through your struggles.
I appreciated how candid you were when telling your story. What was the hardest thing for you to write about?
The hardest thing for me to go back to are the sexual assaults I went through.
What were some ideas that were important for you to explore in this book?
Some important ideas were the way I handled some situations in my life and how to get out of them.
What do you hope is one thing readers take away from your book?
There is a very important rule I live by that was once told to me by a very wise person. The things that are controlling your feelings because they are bad and you can’t do anything about it, are things that absolutely everyone experiences. If it’s one thing I remember which helps me a lot is to “put it on your shelf”. It’s an imaginary shelf that you set your problems on and leave them there until you can pull it off that shelf and something can be done. No point in worrying and carrying around sad and horrible things when you can’t currently do anything about it. You, and you alone will know when it’s time to pull that off your shelf and handle it then.
Author Links: GoodReads | Website
I yearned to be a therapist of some sort to help those who experience the struggles in life I have. I want to reach people on a personal level. I want to help people understand, they can get through anything.
My Fight For Survival
My Fight for Survival by Misty Long starts off with a bang—Misty awakes in a jail cell, knowing that something has gone horribly wrong. We don’t know just how she ended up in that cell, only that Misty has been suffering for some time and putting her family through a tense sort of agony. What caused this stress and terror? What exactly is Misty fighting for?
Misty takes us back to her childhood and the beginning of her long battle with her unseen demons. From the very first chapter, we see how Misty’s life was intertwined with drugs at the hands of her unreliable mother. From the start, terrifying instances of assault happen to Misty, and the reader watches as she fights her way out of traumatizing experiences. While she suffers from mental health struggles and a cruel world around her, it’s clear that Misty is a strong woman as she perseveres.
I found My Fight for Survival incredibly inspiring. Misty acknowledges mistakes that she made while allowing herself to be vulnerable and share the hardships that were thrown her way. I loved watching her find herself with the births of her children and her desire to push through substance abuse to become a better person.
While this book is dark, it calls to light some of the sweeter moments in life. I really enjoyed hearing about Misty’s care for her children. I would have loved to read even more about Misty’s own childhood and the experiences she had growing up with her parents being separated. However, I found that the pieces of her life she did share were so impactful that it still made for a riveting story.
My Fight for Survival is an impassioned story about the importance of believing in yourself and fighting for the life that you want. I think anyone who needs a reminder that they have support around them and hope for a great world should read this book and hold Misty Long’s inspiration close to them.
Pages: 86 | ASIN: B099168V7G
LITERARY TITAN 