My friend Steve Fiffer back in Chicago (okay, Evanston...) is a wonderful writer, with many non-fiction books to his credit -- including three books written with Morris Dees, co-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center, and Jimmy Lee and James, about two lives and their deaths which lead to the Selma-to-Montgomery March and the Voting Rights Act.
All of Steve's books are not about the Civil Rights movement -- some are on politics, he's got a fun book on watching baseball, an excellent autobiography of his own inspiring journey overcoming a debilitating disability -- in which, okay I'm biased -- he mentions my dad, who was a doctor, twice...), and perhaps my favorite of his books is So You've Got a Great Idea, which is full of profiles of successful entrepreneurs and how they made it, along with a "case study" of Steve and his wife Sharon -- also a fine writer of the "Jane Wheel" mystery series -- coming up with an idea and seeing if they could use the lessons learned from the others to pull it off. However, his new book is not only again about Civil Rights, but one of its major figures. His upcoming collaboration, It's In the Action: Memories of a Nonviolent Warrior, is an autobiography of Civil Rights legend C.T. Vivian, which he wrote with Steve. Vivian sadly died this past July at age 96, although happily the book had been completed. You may have seen the memorial ceremony that was carried in full on C-SPAN (which you can watch here, with video tributes by Joe Biden, Oprah Winfrey, Hank Aaron, and others), Among many things, Vivian helped organize the Freedom Rides with Rev. Martin Luther King and in 2013 was awarded the appropriately-named Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama. I mention all this because, though the book won't be published until March 9 next year, Amazon has it listed for pre-order -- and I know that publishers look at pre-orders in determining their marketing and promotion plans. This is not a push for people to order it. To each their own. Mainly, I was pleased to know about Steve co-writing such a prestigious book and wanted to bring it up. But also, given the subject matter, I thought that if anyone does, in fact, have interest in the Civil Rights Movement and C.T. Vivian's autobiography and might be considering getting it anyway, I just wanted to at least note the pre-order option here. (Know that if the price lowers, Amazon lowers it for those who have pre-ordered it, as well.) At the very least, I'm very happy for Steve.
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AuthorRobert J. Elisberg is a political commentator, screenwriter, novelist, tech writer and also some other things that I just tend to keep forgetting. Feedspot Badge of Honor
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