pen4hire on July 14th, 2010

The Great American Road Trip Destination: New Orleans, Louisiana (1817) Books: A Free Man of Color by Barbara Hambly (1997) New Orleans Noir, edited by Julie Smith (2007) People of color could be classified in a dozen ways like mulatto, griffe, octoroon, musterfino and more. But whites were classified, also. Besides the Spanish, there were [...]

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pen4hire on November 30th, 2009

Destination: Cambodia Books: You Buy ‘em! Because the Khmer Rouge routinely slaughtered anyone in Cambodia who was educated, the country needs to restore literacy to its nation, but how can that happen when children are wandering the dusty roads instead of going to school? It is heart breaking. But you can help. Passports With Purpose: [...]

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pen4hire on October 29th, 2009

Destination: New Orleans Venue: The Haunted Mortuary, aka Mansion Mystére I promised I would tell you the spookiest place I had ever visited and here it is. When I was in New Orleans earlier this year, I visited the 1872 Mystére Mansion, “at the very dead end of Canal Street“, that has been certified haunted [...]

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pen4hire on August 31st, 2009

Four years ago we had a personal family crisis that took us to the far northwest of our country. But while we were there dealing with our own problems, we had one ear on the radio and television, watching the path of a hurricane called Katrina, as she made her way into the Gulf of [...]

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pen4hire on June 12th, 2009

Graham Greene’s The Quiet American uses characters to represent nations and foretells the American involvement in Vietnam.

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pen4hire on May 27th, 2009

Destination: New Orleans, LA, United States Book: Nine Lives, Death and Life in New Orleans by Dan Baum Just in case you think this book has something to do with how a tourist survives a Sazerac hangover, forget it. The latest addition to my traveler’s library tells about the lives of real people who survived [...]

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pen4hire on May 26th, 2009

Destination: New Orleans Authors: Galore Did you know that the United States organization Friends of Libraries U. S. A., designates Literary Landmarks? So when you travel in the U. S., you can check their site, visit the haunts of writers past and present, and in a few cases, stay at the same hotels. Checking state [...]

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pen4hire on May 20th, 2009

Destination: New Orleans Book: New Orleans Sketches by William Faulkner As I indicated in an earlier post, William Faulkner did not spend a great deal of time in New Orleans. He was a young  writer switching from poetry to fiction writing when he took an apartment in what is now Faulkner House Books. He wrote [...]

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pen4hire on May 19th, 2009

Destination: New Orleans, Louisiana, USA Book: Galatoire’s: Biography of a Bistro(2004) by Marda Burton and Kenneth Holditch New Orleans’ visitors intent on finding a good meal, have only one problem.  How do you choose among all those excellent restaurants? And book lovers and cooks face a similar problem if they want to learn about Cajun [...]

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