Who Is Abe March?

The full name is Abraham Firestone March.  My mother, a very religious person and prayer warrior, took the name Abraham from the Bible. She gave me her maiden name Firestone as my middle name.

My name Abraham has been a blessing and a curse, depending on where I happened to be. When I worked in New York, it was a blessing. In some areas, it was not a plus and I began using only the nickname Abe, as in Abe Lincoln.

My feet have trodden the earth in more than 30 countries. I have seen the sun rise over the Persian Gulf and the sun set in the Canadian Rockies. I sunbathed by the Mediterranean, roasted in Riyadh and dined in Damascus. I was beggar-beseeched in Baghdad, short-changed in Saudi Arabia and saw blood shed in Beirut.

I have been called Mister, Monsieur, Herr, Sayyidi, Kirios, Signor, Sir and other names.

I have eaten with Bedouins and dined with Royalty. I have also been rich and I have been poor. I like to think that I have a world view on many subjects and that I have a certain amount of wisdom. My experiences are reflected in my writing. 

At ATTMP, my book, They Plotted Revenge Against America was inspired by America’s invasion of Iraq.  My book, Journey Into The Past was inspired by my love of hiking and exploring ancient castles in Germany.

They Plotted Revenge Against America

http://tinyurl.com/3bomrdl

Journey Into The Past

http://tinyurl.com/3ghv6xg

Who Is Jessica Chambers?

Soon after Jessica was old enough to walk and talk, her parents realized two things.

The first was that she had an incredibly vivid imagination. Unlike many small children, she was content to spend hours at a time amusing herself, inventing ever more dramatic games of kidnap, runaway orphans and wicked stepmothers. When she wasn’t playing, she could often be found listening to an audio book, Roald Dahl, perhaps, or her favourite Enid Blyton, becoming lost in the tales woven by others. Even as a child, Jessica cherished a dream that one day she would be a writer herself. Always a shy person, she reveled in the ability to escape into another world, something that remains true to this day.

The second thing which gradually became apparent to her parents was that there seemed to be something wrong with her sight. She was forever tripping over toys left lying around on the floor, or being chided for sitting too close to the television (“You’ll get square eyes if you don’t watch out.”) It took several years of appointments with specialists, of brain scans and visual tests, but   when Jessica was five years old, experts diagnosed her as having Retinitus Pigmentosa, a degenerative disease affecting the retina.

At school, Jessica’s teachers did everything in their power to make life as easy for her as possible, including providing her with a CC TV and computer. However, as she approached her ninth birthday, her sight had deteriorated so severely that the teaching staff no longer felt equipped to meet her needs. It was decided that she should transfer to Dorton House, a weekly boarding school for the visually impaired. For Jessica, this was a dream come true. Having devoured all the boarding school stories she could lay her hands on, from Billy Bunter to Mallory Towers, she couldn’t wait for her own adventure to begin.

Of course, her time at Dorton House wasn’t quite the round of classroom pranks and midnight feasts she had anticipated. Nevertheless, her nine years there were extremely happy. In addition to the standard subjects, she learned to read Braille and to use a computer with speech output, was introduced to talking kitchen scales and white canes, and mastered countless every day skills to help her adapt to life as a visually impaired person. Outside of lessons she tried her hand at horse riding and archery, fell in love, and had her first painful dose of heartbreak. When she left at eighteen, she did so not only with top grades in her exams, but most importantly with the encouragement of her English teacher, which gave her the confidence to pursue a career as a writer.

Perhaps as a result of going away to school, spending more time in the company of her peers than her own family, Jessica developed an intense interest in people. Everything about them fascinates her. She loves to observe the ways in which they interact, their steadfast loyalty and tendency to hurt those closest to them, their capacity for both cruelty and kindness. It’s this understanding that makes her such a skilled writer. In the words of multi-published author Molly Ringle, “Jessica has an amazing talent for creating true-to-life characters, throwing them together in a gorgeous setting and letting the sparks fly.”

This insight into the best and worst aspects of human nature comes to bear particularly strongly in her novel “Dark is the Sky”, soon to be published by All Things That Matter Press. An emotional read fraught with tension and unexpected twists, the novel follows a family’s struggle to come to terms with the past. Twelve years after tragedy tore them apart, the Camerons reunite for the first time since that terrible summer’s day. Far from being allowed to lay their ghosts to rest, however, a shocking revelation almost destroys them for a second time.

Want to know more? Keep up to date with all Jessica’s news, including the release of “Dark is the Sky”, by joining her Facebook fan page

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jessica-Chambers/177537202257347?ref=sgm

or subscribing to her blog.

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For more information about Jessica and her novels, visit her website

http://www.jessicachambers.co.uk/

#9 Grundpark Road

Tonight was the night. After months of effort by me and my editor, we’ve decided that my novel is ready for publishing. I did one final check and sent it in to my publisher, ATTMPress. I can’t wait to deal with the cover. Although you can’t read a book by one, it sure makes an impression.

Tree in the Woods Conundrum

If a tree falls in the woods and there’s no one there to hear it, does it make a sound? This is an old question that I took literally as a child. As a writer, I realize that this might not have been a question for actual pondering, but metaphorical instead. Here I sit thinking that today I have nothing of value to share. I haven’t blogged in a bit and the mundane day to day requirement s of life seem to have taken over.

As I write this blurb, I wonder who, if anyone will read it. Not many, I imagine. Though this tree has fallen, I find myself speculating whether or not I have made a sound.

Will Ereaders Eventually Replace Physical Books?

I never imagined how fast things would change. As a child growing up in the 70s, I listened to LPs. Later I listened to 8 tracks, tapes,CD’s and now we buy our music almost exclusively on line. When my daughter was 5 (in 1995) we gave her a little set of Barbie accessories. It included a turntable and record. I said, ‘You know what this is, honey? It’s a record.’ She said, ‘No it’s not, dad. It’s a CD.’ We’ve watched beta and vhs disappear and I still have several sets of encyclopaedias on my shelf that neither I nor my kids use.

When we’re a few years older, it’ll be easier to see what’s really going to happen. No matter how comforting a physical book is, it may not represent the same comfort to future generations as it does to us. After all, you don’t really need a light to read a kindle.

Visiting the Northwest

The family and I took a little road trip this weekend. We left Vanderhoof early Friday morning and drove west toward the coast. We stopped briefly to see a pretty view of Moricetown Canyon (http://www.northbceh.com/smithers/moricetown.htm) and then off to The Village of Hazelton (http://www.village.hazelton.bc.ca/) before finishing the day at Hyder, Alaska (http://www.stewart-hyder.com/hyder.html) where we took pictures of grizzlies feeding on salmon in Fish Creek.

We stayed the night in Stewart, British Columbia and decided to leave early the next morning right after breakfast. Well that didn’t pan out so well. The only restaurant open early enough was the local watering hole and it was already filled to the point of bursting. Everything else was closed until 11 a.m. We chose to have breakfast in the next town...4 hours later. Needless to say, we were famished by the time we sat down to eat.

We spent the following day in Prince Rupert, British Columbia where we enjoyed fresh seafood meals. The weather was great and we stocked up on halibut and prawns before returning home on Sunday morning.

As tiring as it was, the scenery was breath taking, the locals were entertaining and the food was delicious.

#9 Grundpark Road

Today was a neat day! I received another query about my next novel. I can’t express how gratifying that experience is. I can only hope that sort of thing continues to happen and that interest continues to grow. Most importantly, I wanted to thank all of you who have read my first book and I wanted to let you know that it shouldn’t be too long before “#9 Grundpark Road” is available.

Thanks again, everyone!

Censorship in Schools

Censorship in schools—now that is an emotionally charged issue. I am a teacher as well as a writer and I do not advocate censorship. I’m a proponent of common sense, the not so common kind, it seems.

In my twenty years or so of classroom teaching, I have seen the odd lynching and it’s a phenomenon that every teacher usually does the utmost to avoid. Whether or not any given resource is appropriate classroom material is irrelevant.

I don’t think that all materials should end up in the classroom, but those that do, ought to be justifiable. Several things need to be considered when choosing a resource. How does the material relate to the curriculum? Is this the best resource for the lesson? What is the nature of my clientele? A teacher can’t ignore the fact that every student in the class is someone else’s #1 concern.

A seasoned and intelligent teacher will not ignore these issues. The appropriate information should go home explaining the nature of the project and maybe even a sample of what students will be exposed to. A portion of that letter should explain how the lesson cannot be taught without the use of the selection. Finally, parents should sign at the bottom denoting their approval.

Parents who are adamantly opposed might be reasoned with or be given other options, but unless the opposition is a screwball looking for a fight, confrontation should be able to be avoided.

Why do I Write what I do?

Yesterday I was thinking about this thing called writing. I don’t think it’s a term that adequately defines what it is that I’m doing. Everyone who has gone to school and learned to scrawl his name is a writer. I ask myself, what is it that makes me a writer and another person not a writer?

I think that we should be called expressers or creationists or idea makers. I can’t think of a good word right now, but there must be an eloquent phrase that describes what it is we do.

What we create has very little to do with the market place. I create because I like to. I enjoy it. It’s taken a long time for me to come to terms with criticism and I think I’ve made the journey. I know that the value of my writing cannot be reflected by market trends or any other kind of popularity contest. If I’ve expressed myself well, then it’s up to other individuals to respond to it. Maybe they'll buy it, maybe they won't.

I do hope that one day I’m able to sell enough to make a living, but that doesn’t really matter. My writing is how I express myself. Any idea that I might claim to be unique or have a smidgeon of truth, can only be called such if it comes from within me as an interpretation of my knowledge and experience. It can’t come from a chart or graph or someone who claims to know what will sell.

Protocol

Some years ago I ran onto an old book at my grandmother’s house. I believe it was called Answers to Questions (printed in 1926). There was an entire section on etiquette. There were questions such as:

Does a woman precede or follow her escort down a receiving line?

When stepping by people already seated in a theatre, should a man face the occupants of the seats or the stage?

When a couple leaves a street car, should the woman go first?

Should a young lady ask her escort to come in when he brings her home from the theatre or from a party?

How long should a formal call be?

These were only a few of the questions and when I first read through the book, my thought was that they were the oddest things to worry about. But then I pondered it awhile and I realized two things. The first was that, most of the answers were simple logic—for anyone concerned about others. The man in the theatre should avoid knocking knees with those already sitting. When leaving the street car, the man should get off first so that he can help the lady down.

In 1924, there seemed to be a concern about the rule, but not so much about the why of the rule. That was interesting to me as well. But when I thought about it, it seemed that in many cases the answers were not necessarily straight forward. Should food be passed to the right or left? I realized that one important advantage to observing protocol is that reduces the chances that any person is inadvertently embarrassed. Again, something very important to someone concerned about the wellbeing of others.

I think that what we have lost over the years is actual caring for our fellow man. We may claim it. We may send $24 to an orphan in Africa or help out at the homeless shelter now and again, but what do we do to protect the feelings of others every day? These are concerns worth revisiting.

Combat Criticism

One haunting question that writers have is, how do I withstand and rise above criticism. Criticism comes in all kinds of forms. It can come from a family member who doesn’t think you’ve got what it takes. It can come from a reader who is offended by or doesn’t like your subject matter. It can come in the guise of a critic who challenges your writing style. It can even come from an editor or agent who questions your skill.

Developing a thick skin is not the solution. One cannot become impervious to negative feedback. The real coping skill comes from understanding criticism and embracing it.

Family members do not always have it in them to recognize you as a writer until you’ve already become successful, or persevered. You are the only one can know whether you are a wannabe writer or not.

Getting past the armchair critic takes only a keen ear. These critics don’t have the writing skill necessary to offer any depth to their ideas. They usually hate your writing or love it. Neither of these positions is helpful to the writer if there is no solid reasoning to back it. The hater is easier to deal with because we naturally want to ignore groundless negative criticism, as it should be. But we should also ignore the armchair critic who praises without substance. As nice as it is to hear an ‘at-a-boy’, what use is it if it carries no substance?

Good criticism contains an element of reason. Since writing is all about reason, writers should be able to listen to criticism and judge the value of it. If a writer validates a particular point of view, then heeding that perspective can only strengthen a project and therefore improve a writer’s skill.

Listen with your own critical ear and act accordingly.

I've Returned

I’ve been gone a long time and I’ve probably lost every reader I’ve ever had. It’d be great if you’d prove me wrong and join my blog. In the meantime, I’ll work at writing new and interesting articles. I hope you enjoy, comment and then ultimately—stay.

Human Rights

As I walked around town today, I couldn’t help but notice the silhouettes of women attached to many doors. I stopped and read of few of the tags attached to each that informed passersby of the issue of abused women. Let me state simply that I think women’s rights is a very important movement, but I think we need to move passed that.

We ought to be thinking in terms of human rights. In any given situation where one human being usurps the rights of another, a crime has been committed. That’s a simple fact. We live in a world where a crime is more severe depending on the person committing it. For example, if a woman were to hit a man with a baseball bat, the general question would be, what did he do to deserve that? It may be what you’re thinking right now. If a man were to hit a woman with a baseball bat, the perception of the crime is astronomically worse.

I propose that we have one set of rights. We already have a title...human rights. Every situation should be able to fall into those rights. They should include every visible or invisible minority. They should include all men and women and all gays or lesbians. If a crime is committed, it should be a crime committed by anyone. Reverse racism should be just as bad as racism.

On the playground at school people aren’t supposed to play favourites. If Sally comes in complaining that Johnny called her a name. And Johnny’s complaint is that Sally hit him. The solution is not to figure out who did what first. The solutions are that Sally is reprimanded for hitting and Johnny is reprimanded for name calling. We often feel justified in retaliation, but if we bought into the idea that every action deserves a reaction, then road rage would be a justifiable solution to being cut off by a bad driver. If the roles were reversed, the consequences should be equal as well. It is the same bad to hit someone or call someone a name no matter who that someone is. We don’t need labels. We just need one set of rights that applies to everyone. We are all equal and we need to be treating each other as such.

An Article Promoting "#9 Grundpark Road"

Here is an article from Northern BC Business. Enjoy!
http://fb.me/MrE0eP6f

#9 Grundpark Road

Well, my new book, #9 Grundpark Road has been accepted for publishing by All Things That Matter Press. It’s about Daniel, a foster child, who is sold by his foster parents. His new owner forces him to work in a secret mine on the property. Daniel discovers much more than gold and is determined to find a way to escape.

Gun Registry Vote

In Canada, 75% of the population live within 100km of the southern border, a statistic provided during a university geography class I once took and a significant fact when considering where in the country a vast proportion of the population live; certainly not where one is likely to spend a whole lot of time hunting. This bill will never be defeated if the urban population does not develop a realistic perspective on the issue.


Guns are divided into three categories (prohibited weapons, restricted weapons and non-restricted weapons). Here is a simple breakdown.

Prohibited weapons are simply illegal to own. When they appear on the streets a crime has already been committed. These are all fully automatic weapons and many modified weapons such as sawed off shotguns. The gun registry has no impact on the use or distribution of these weapons. Only criminals do.

Restricted weapons include handguns. In Canada, providing a handgun is legally obtained, the only way to transport it is with a permit. Any civilian using a handgun in public is also automatically committing a crime.

This leaves non-restricted weapons, or weapons specifically designed for hunting, the only kinds of weapons anyone hunting in Canada may use. These guns are not typically the ones we hear about in the news.

The question that every mother and father living within 100km of Canada’s southern border should be, what benefit does the gun registry provide me and my family? Other questions that should be asked are, how many lives have been saved by the registry that would not have been saved without it, how many police investigations have been aided by it, how many times did the registry accurately determine the number of guns in a household, and what is a reasonable amount to pay for such a program?

Anyone who says it is not a cumbersome process has not completed the course, applied for a Possession and Acquisition Licence or tried to change the ownership of a rifle. When a PAL expires, it means that the holder is no longer licensed to own guns. Does that make this person a criminal?

Am I for or against the registry? Against it, of course. But, how about I say that I’m all for common sense and the wise use of government funding? How about we enforce the laws that already exist to keep handguns and automatic weapons off the streets?

One Stupid Interview of Ryan Miller

In times gone by, the Olympics have been tainted by stressed or broken political alliances somewhere in the world. It has always been ‘sometimes the case’ that one country or another cannot bring itself to compete in the Olympic Games. But during most years, most countries agree to put aside their differences and compete under a common set of rules laid down by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).


Once upon a time, each country was responsible for its own Olympic programs. Countries strong in a particular discipline would invariably dominate in their specialty at the games. These days, borders are blurred when it comes to the Olympic Games. One Japanese competitor gave up her citizenship in order to train in Russia and then compete for Russia. A Canadian hockey player with dual citizenship competed for Germany.

Competitors do what they must in order to win a berth at the Olympics. They train where they must and wear the colors available to them on game day – the colors of the country that will embrace them.

Men’s hockey is strangely reversed. Men who have built professional alliances must now put those alliances aside in order to compete. Americans playing with Canadian teams and Canadians playing with American teams in the NHL put all of that away to play their best for their mother countries. They play their best, of that I have no doubt, but the rest? I know that they do not forget who their friends are when they are battling it out on the ice, all the while Canadian fans scream their support for Canadians or boo for the Americans. These men do not have differences to put away, so I can only imagine how difficult it must be for them to pretend to forget their bonds. As they shook hands and gave each other their manly hugs once the game was over, it was clear that nothing had been forgotten or put aside.

It is with this complexity in mind that I voice my disappointment in the CTV newscast at the end of the gold medal game. It is sickening to hear a question like, “so how does it feel to lose your family in a plane crash?” This kind of question is not as uncommon to hear as it ought to be and it is detestable. Yesterday a CTV reporter took Ryan Miller aside to ask him how he felt about the final goal. This question was inexcusable. How do we think he felt? It took nothing more than a glance at the American team to see their disappointment. Anyone who has ever played a team sport knows that every loss is a team loss. No matter whom they would like to blame or what circumstances might have been, the fact remains… the whole team lost.

What determined that win was not the dominance of one team over another or one country over another. The end score was simply a result of the day. The game could have just as easily turned the other way on any other day. The men from both teams are highly skilled professionals who provided us with an incomparable emotional ending to the Olympics. The emotions would not have run so high had the teams not been so nearly equally skilled. There as no ass kicking; there was no pounding. Canada won. Hurray. But, let’s not forget the sportsmanship that we are supposedly known for. And sportsmanship does not include kicking an opponent when he’s down. I for one am glad that Ryan Miller won most valuable player. CTV should not have singled him out to ask him such an insensitive and stupid question.

It's hard to believe that a kid who looks the way this one does is capable of some of the things that he is. Just a few days ago, he and a buddy of his went into a salon in Vanderhoof. They strode up to the nail technician and peircing expert to make an appointment. While this young hooligan distracted the woman, his partner grabbed her purse and left the building. The moment she finished making the appointment she noticed her purse was missing and called the boy back inside. He came, but when she told him that she was calling the police he took off running.

A Good Samaritan came out of his store just across the alley and ran after the boy. He didn't catch him, but he did retreive the purse. Unfortunately the deposit for the day had already been stolen - a sum greater than $600.

The story doesn't end here. The police were called and they did eventually arrive. They were provided with the boy's name and this picture, but nothing has been done. In the space of this year the salon has been broken into or vandalized five times including this instance of theft. What has the response been from the RCMP? They say, you are located in an alley. You should expect this sort of thing. This excuse seems ludicrous. Every business on main street has an entrance in the alley. And every business (like the salon) is fortified with steel bars or the like.

A cliche is 'to serve and protect'. Maybe the phrase means to serve citations and protect criminals. I can't help wondering whose rights I may be infringing upon by posting this. I am certain that those rights are more important than the rights of the innocent.

I know that the slogan for the RCMP is 'he always gets his man.' That's easy to do if there is never anyone on the list of criminals to apprehend.

Unfortunately for the ladies working at the salon, they are held responsible for the actions of others by the virtue of the location of building they work in. For the RCMP, the simplest way to ensure success seems to be to have have low expectations for themselves. In that sense, the RCMP in Vanderhoof excels. When a crime is reported, the RCMP is very good at following up to let you know that the criminal is known, but nothing can be done at this time... Maybe next time.

'Get out and go home' seems to be the subliminal message for these entrepreneurs. Personally, I'm not even sure why they continue to pay for a business license. There doesn't seem to be any benefits.

Get a Life

What is the perfect example of a waste of time? Let’s say you have a game of scrabble which allows you to play against the computer and you combine that with a website that allows you to find the best word possible under each circumstance, thereby allowing you to cheat against the computer. Now, that is a consummate waste of time!

Carrying On

I don’t know whether I should blow steam off on the world or count my blessings. I guess I should do the latter. Around me wonderful people die every day. Others live their entire lives with disabilities so great that it’s difficult to comprehend how they cope from day to day. Comparatively, I have nothing to complain about.
Until recently, my medical file consisted of maybe four pages and a few x-rays which served to prove that nothing was wrong with me. Now I’m faced with one physical crisis after another and feeling like my body is sabotaging me. Here, on the other side of the better half of 40, I’m faced with the prospect of living with a permanent disability. What I have learned in the last two years is that from the moment we are born we begin a journey of slow deterioration.
Some of us are lucky enough to live our entire lives having avoided the genetic pitfalls potentially inherited from our mothers and fathers, the follies of our youth, our poor habits as adults and every other mishap that could leave us relying on machines to communicate, to get around or even to live.
I’ve taught hundreds of children and raised one daughter (so far) with the hope of helping others avoid mistakes that might steal away their enjoyment of life as adults. Maybe I’m hypersensitive to the issue since I feel as though I’ve made so many unnecessary mistakes of my own. So many times I’ve been too stubborn to learn from others.
But not everything is avoidable or foreseeable. Even when a person lives the very best life style, there are no guarantees. We must simply persevere.