Julia Dahl – Invisible City

Our globetrotting literary tour continues.

We’ve gone from Alaska back to the East Coast – Brooklyn to be specific.  It’s nice to know that all it will take to get from there to here is a trip on mass transit – no I don’t recommend the BQE I have been in the most horrific traffic going through and to Brooklyn.

Before we get to know the characters I always like to introduce you to their creator. Our next author is Julia Dahl – this time in her own words.

I was born and raised in Fresno, Calif. I stumbled onto the staff of my high school newspaper in 1994 and have been chasing stories ever since. I have been an editor at Marie Claire, a stringer for the New York Post, a staff writer for The Crime Report, and I now work producing articles and video about crime and justice for Crimesider, the 48 Hours blog on CBSNews.com.

My first novel, a murder mystery entitled “INVISIBLE CITY,” will be published by Minotaur Books in May 2014.

I’ve written features about subjects ranging from suicide-by-cop to prosecuting rape to my own involvement in the unsolved murder of a Hurricane Katrina victim for publications including the Boston Globe Sunday Magazine, Pacific Standard (formerly Miller-McCune), Seventeen, Salon and the Columbia Journalism Review.

I have lived on-and-off in NYC since 1999 and now reside in Gowanus, Brooklyn. I am a massive Bruce Springsteen fan and consider David Simon, Joan Didion and Katherine Boo my literary/journalistic idols.(Source: http://muckrack.com/juliadahl/bio)

The Jericho Public Library subscribes to a database “Gale Literature
Resource Center” it offers a substantial biography of Ms. Dahl.  You can access this database via the Jericho Public Library website. Visit jericholibrary.org, click on the “Databases” tab and then click on “Adults.”  You can find the database either on the A-Z listing or click on the link for Literature. You will then need to enter your Jericho Public Library barcode (all fourteen numbers with no spaces.)

Sheryl Sandberg Bio

Basic information about Sheryl Sandberg

According to the database Biography in Context“:

• Born: August 28, 1969 in Washington, District of Columbia, United States
• Nationality: American
• Occupation: Chief operating officer

John H. Williams prize, Harvard University.

Sheryl Sandberg is an American businesswoman worth $ billion as of 2014. Her positions have included working as the chief of staff for the U.S. Treasury Department, acting as the vice president of global online sales and operations for Google, Inc., and serving as the chief operating officer of Facebook. Sandberg has also dedicated much of her time to issues of gender equality and serves on the board of Women for Women International. She published her book Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead in 2013.

To access more of the article please visit jericholibrary.org and follow the links to our databases.  You can find Biography in Context either alphabetically or by following the “Biography” listing on the right hand of the screen.  You will be prompted for your Jericho Library card – please enter all of the numbers (no spaces.)

For more about the Lean In initiative please visit leanin.org

 

 

 

Simon Van Booy

Simon Van Booy was born in Great Britain and grew up in rural Wales.  He is the author ofThe Secret Lives of People in Love, Love Begins in Winter (winner of the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award) and the novel, Everything Beautiful Began After.  His latest novel is The Illusion of Separateness.

He is the editor of three philosophy books, titled Why We Fight, Why We Need Love, and Why Our Decisions Don’t Matter.  His essays have appeared in the New York Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Times, The Guardian, and ELLE Men, (China), where he has a monthly column. He has also written for the stage, National Public Radio, and the BBC.

Simon teaches part-time at SVA in Manhattan, and is involved in the Rutgers Early College Humanities Program for young adults living in under-served communities.  In 2013, he founded Writers for Children, an organization which helps young people build confidence in their talent, through annual writing awards.

He was a finalist for the Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise, and his work has been translated into more than fifteen languages.

He lives in Brooklyn with his wife and daughter.

Steven Galloway

http://stevengalloway.com/bio/

University of British Columbia writing instructor Steven Galloway is the author of three novels: Finnie Walsh, the story of two friends who grow up playing hockey in northern Canada; Ascension, the tale of a Hungarian-born tightrope walker who comes to America and founds a family of circus performers; and The Cellist of Sarajevo, based on stories from the long-running siege of the Bosnian capital during the horrific civil war of the 1990s. “I’m a creative writing professor,” Galloway states on his MySpace page, entitled “StevenGalloway, Unicorn Lover.” “I teach my fiction students that good writing comes not from the head or the heart, but from one’s alicorn,” the unicorn’s horn that brings healing and promotes intimacy. “I also tell them that a good story should have the shape or ‘arc’ of the rainbow trail that unicorns leave when they prance across the sky.” (source: Gale Literature Resource Center – a database available through the Jericho Public Library with your library card)

He lives with his wife and two young daughters in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Author Information – Maria Semple

Ms. Semple has included her bio on her website.

There is some terrific information about and by Maria Semple on the website Red Room.

For more wit and wisdom and an insight into how she thinks read the New York Times article “A Novel Asks Seattle to Laugh at Itself” by Julie Bosman.

The Jericho Public Library subscribes to a database “Biography in Context” that offers a substantial biography of Ms. Semple.  You can access this database via the Jericho Public Library website. Visit jericholibrary.org, click on the “Databases” tab and then click on “Adults.”  You can find the database either on the A-Z listing or click on the link for Biography. You will then need to enter your Jericho Public Library barcode (all fourteen numbers with no spaces.)

A summary from the above database about Maria Semple:

• Born May 21, 1964, in Los Angeles, CA; daughter of Lorenzo Semple, Jr. (a television writer and producer); partner of George Meyer; children: one daughter.
• Education: Graduated from Barnard College.
• Screenwriter for television series, including Beverly Hills 90210, Ellen, Saturday Night Live, Mad about You, Suddenly Susan, and Arrested Development.
• Where’d You Go, Bernadette has been optioned for a feature film.
• Writer, television screenwriter, movie screenwriter, and novelist.
• Where’d You Go, Bernadette was named one of the ten best fiction books of 2012, Time.