Month: June 2014

JET Blog…A Reflection on CNN’s Special on th Sixties!


Brownstone I was asked to choose a quote from my first novel, A Brownstone in Brooklyn, to reflect on the unpredictable nature of life. How things are never the same and human beings have to adjust to life’s changing events. A Brownstone in Brooklyn is about growing up in the turbulent sixties, one of the most event filled decades in Black-American history.

CNN is currently running a special on the sixties every Thursday night. Tonight it was the assassination of President John F. Kennedy… A Brownstone in Brooklyn is still relevant today.

I remember the moment that changed a nation.

Where I was when it was announced that Kennedy had been shot? I was in gym class at Bushwick High School in Brooklyn, New York on a cool November Day in 1962. It is still fresh in my mind the moment my gym teacher, Coach Diamond, told us the news of Kennedy being shot.

We were stunned. Some of us cried.

A Brownstone in Brooklyn reflects that moment and a vibrant era in time.

A Brownstone in Brooklyn chronicles the life-altering events that shape the future of Andy Michael Pilgrim, a young man growing up in the turbulent sixties.

“The most special times in a person’s life are not meant to last forever. They’re like bubbles rising from a plastic ring dipped into a soapy solution. The soap bubbles rise, with the sun flashing brilliant colors, then bursts into a showery memory mist.”
― J.E. Thompson, A Brownstone in Brooklyn

Please go to the guestbook and leave your response: www.jethompson.info

Overview

J. E. Thompson Georgia Author of the Year Awards Nominee!


    Image          Saturday night is the big night for the 2014 Georgia author of the year award nominees. The year long wait is for 50th  annual Awards banquet is at Kennesaw State University in Kennesaw, Georgia.

          I’ve been nominated in the “Young Adult” Category for Phantoms of Rockwood. Please Click to see all the nominees

          Short Synopsis: Ghosts, who were young basketball players that died too early, are given an opportunity to return to life. They inhabit the bodies of living basketball players to inspire, motivate the starters to the coveted State Championship. As they themselves continue to learn life’s obstacles that can only be overcome in growing up.

         Five Star Review:  The Purple Phantoms of Rockwood are Here!

By DENNIS DE ROSE on September 9, 2013
Format: Paperback

Five talented young basketball players from Rockwood High in Georgia were all killed at different times and in different ways but they were all much too young to die. Now they have been given a chance to come back to Earth for six months to play basketball once again and help Rockwood’s currently losing basketball team, the ‘Purple Phantoms’, and their beloved Coach, Mr. Jones, who plans to reitre from Rockwood at the end of the coming year. Five young phantom basketball players, Sharon James, “JB” Brown, Dan Gnais, Walter Williams and Ivan “Pick” Brown, miss human emotions, the aroma of sweat and the noise of cheering crowds. Sharon melds with former boyfriend, Foots Wilkins, JB with Norris Nairse, Dan with Antoine Carter, Walter with Greg Reece, and Pick with Vincent Matthews, to slip into their bodies, whisper words of encouragement and coach them to play better and perhaps win the State Championship.

“Phantoms of Rockwood” is a very well-written well-edited story of a high school basketball coach, his current unsuccessful team, and deceased basketball players from Rockwood High School’s past who played the game brilliantly. The plot flows smoothly to the story’s end as the living players come to terms with what needs changing in their lives and in their game as Coach Jones talks with the five dead players, whom he still loves, misses terribly and will defend even if it costs him his coaching job. All characters, both living and ghostly, are three-dimensional; they come alive as the story progresses. Knowing that the five phantom players must go back to their place in Heaven and will take another with them will be a difficult,a somewhat teary ending . The addition of a sixth phantom is hinted at throughout the last chapters so that the reader will know what is coming. Julius Thompson has crafted a brilliant book that young adults and adult readers will adore. Julius,keep writing.

EDITED BY DENNIS DE ROSE . MONEYSAVER EDITING