Alabama at the Louisiana Book Festival

On a recent Thursday Dianne and I headed to Baton Rouge to meet up with our son Amos and attend the fifteenth annual Louisiana Book Festival. Amos arrived around lunch time on Friday, and we all took in the festival on Saturday. Amos appeared on a panel that afternoon with two other authors of recent short story collections. 

More details are below. 

On Friday the weather was chilly and raining in Baton Rouge as you can tell from this view of the I-10 bridge. 

We stayed at the Hampton Inn only a short walk from the park and buildings where the festival was held in downtown Baton Rouge. The hotel uses some interesting room number plates. 

Barnes and Noble sponsored the large book and signing tents at the site. Here is Amos' book and to the left the new books by his fellow panelists. More details are below. 

The rain finally ended mid-afternoon on Friday, so we walked to the festival site. Here's a view of the book tent with the Louisiana capitol building in the background.

Many festival events were held in the state library building.

Here's the wall of books by festival authors in the foyer of the state library. Amos' collection of short stories can be seen in the very upper left corner. 

Here's a close up of that upper left corner.

The site of the Louisiana state capitol building and park contains the former Pentagon Barracks military post which was later used as housing for LSU cadets. A portion can be seen here in the foreground, with the capitol in the background and framed by one of the areas neat old trees. 

The substantial program for the festival featured artwork by William Joyce, author and illustrator of various children's books. His work has also appeared on covers of New Yorker magazine and in galleries and museums.  

We went to a couple of panels in the morning before having lunch and heading to the capitol building for Amos' appearance. The first panel was "Writing and Environment: A Multi-Genre Perspective" with environmental historian Jack E. Davis, poets Martha Serpas and Neil Shepard, novelist Kent Wascom and moderator Jack B. Bedell. 

The second panel, "Family-Influenced Fiction" featured two novelists, Nicole Seitz and Spencer Wise; the moderator was Olivia Clare, a poet and fiction writer. 

At this writing information about these authors and their works can be found at the Festival web site.  Both panels were stimulating and gave me several possibilities for future reading. 

The 34-story Art Deco Louisiana state capitol opened in 1932. Legendary politician Huey P. Long was assassinated in the building in 1935 and is buried in the park. Dianne said the building looks like something out of Ghostbusters.

Here Amos and David Langlinais are waiting for the panel to begin. Not pictured is Genaro Ky Ly Smith.

One end of the festival's signing tent opened toward the cooking tent, which was behind me as I took this photo. The festival also included music, various food vendors, an exhibitors tent and many authors and publishers at tables lining the walkway up to the capitol. 

Here are the panel members David Langlinais, Amos Wright, and Genaro Ky Ly Smith in the signing tent. 

After the festival we retired to the Bengal Tap Room and enjoyed a local beer, a Tin Roof Voodoo. 

Amos' book is available here. You can learn more about the book and his other writing at his website. 

David's book is available here. 

Genaro's book is available here.

Alabama Book Covers (2): To Kill a Mockingbird

So much has been written about Harper Lee in recent months and previous years that I will forego any comments on her. The Encyclopedia of Alabama has a nice entry. 

I will note the story my mother Carolyn Shores Wright tells the family. When she was in high school in the late 1940's she did some modeling for Avondale Mills. That job required occasional travel, and sometimes local people would offer the models a room for the night. On a trip to Monroeville she and another model got to sleep in the Lee house and mom in Harper's bedroom. Mom remembers a very high bed. The future author wasn't there, but mom did get to meet her mother, who served them refreshments. Mrs. Lee talked about both her daughters and seemed especially proud of the one who was writing a book. 

The show in Monroeville was held in a local department store that carried products from Avondale Mills. The models were trained by the Dallas Modeling Agency. In a store setting temporary runways would be set up across the counters. Mom opened the show as if she were just waking up and dressed in pajamas and yawning. Near the end she appeared in an evening dress. In between a day's worth of fashions were displayed.

Mrs. Lee offered mom and the other model breakfast the next morning, but they had to decline and join the rest of their group on the bus to their next destination. 

The audio book...

And of course the film....

Alabama Book Covers (1): Novels by Octavus Roy Cohen

Octavus Roy Cohen was an extremely prolific author of dozens of novels and hundreds of short stories. He lived in Birmingham before World War I and during the 1920's; many of his stories are set in the city. During his time in Birmingham he was a member of a group of writers and journalists known as The Loafers. 

Many of Cohen's stories and novels feature detectives and criminals. Covers of paperback editions of three of his novels are below. Follow the BhamWiki link for more information about Cohen. During his lifetime many films were made based on his stories and novels. 

Octavus Roy Cohen [1891-1959]
Source: BhamWiki

Alabama Book Spotlight: Starett by Arthur V. Deutcsh

I'd like to begin this intermittent blog series with a book barely connected to Alabama, a novel by Arthur V. Deutcsh. He came to Birmingham in 1981 and served 10 years as the city's Chief of Police. He may thus be the only published novelist among police chiefs in Alabama history.

This front and back cover is the Dell paperback edition published in January 1980. The third image is the front cover of the Arbor House hardback edition which had appeared in 1978.

The hardback dust jacket announces the book as simply "A novel by Arthur V. Deutcsh". By the time the paperback appeared, the cover declared that Starett was "A Scorching Novel by a Twenty-Year Veteran of the N.Y.P.D." 

Deutcsh apparently published only this one book. His dedication reads, "I have dedicated some off-duty hours to this book and the entertainment of fiction readers. In real life, I've dedicated twenty-two years to my city's finest profession, the police force. Neither of these dedications would have been possible without the help of my lovely wife and six children."

Deutsch was tried for tampering with governmental records while in Birmingham and received a 12-month jail sentence and a $2000 fine on the misdemeanor charge. He and three other officers were indicted for altering arrest records of Mayor Richard Arrington's daughter Erica in December 1990. Deutsch filed an appeal in July 1992. 

I have found curiously little about Deutsch online. I did not find the outcome of his appeal or an obituary. I did find a 1987 article about Deutsch's pursuit of a thief while he and his wife Elaine were out walking near their home. 

I have yet to read Starett but hope to get to it one day. Who could resist a novel with a cover tag like "His business was death. Both the cops and the Mafia called him one of their own."

Arthur Deutsch is not the only Alabama policeman to publish fiction. James Byron Huggins, who worked in the Huntsville Police Department among many other jobs, has published a series of popular novels. Sorcerer published in 2006 seems to be the most recent.

Lee Kohn worked for the Mobile Police Department from 1977 until 1993. He has published several novels such as Badge 13. 

[Added 8-23-14]

 I recently came across a copy of the "Just A Chat" feature the Birmingham News ran years ago dated June 12, 1991. The subject was David Harris, an Irondale police lieutenant at the time. He mentions having written one novel, "The Visitation," about a policeman who fights a demon in a small Southern town. He also notes he's far along on a second novel, "All Creatures Here Below," "a futuristic love story." I've been unable to find any further information about these novels. 

If you know of other Alabama law enforcement officials who have published fiction, please comment below. Join me again next time for another obscure book somehow related to Alabama!

[Added 8-29-14]

I found an old file I had on Chief Deutsch that contained some further articles. "Deutsch may have had a stroke, his doctor says" ran in the Birmingham Post-Herald on January 27, 1995. This article noted that "Since falling down a long flight of stairs at Birmingham City Hall three years ago, the specifics of Deutcsh's declining health were never publicly disclosed." The article notes his misdemeanor charge of record tampering as noted above had been overturned on appeal. His attorney Mark White said Deutcsh did not understand due to his mental status. 

Earlier articles in my file focus on Deutcsh's literary career. "New chief's book about cop-gone-bad gets attention now" the Birmingham News noted in a November 11, 1981, article. A brief note in the News on September 28, 1986, described his upcoming appearance at the Avondale Community School for a talk on mystery writing and his recent workshop at the Birmingham-Southern College Writers Conference. 

An April 20, 1984, article in the UAB Kaleidoscope declared, "Police chief finds second love as aspiring writer." This item notes an episode Deutcsh wrote for the television series McCloud that starred Dennis Weaver as a policeman from the west working in New York City. Deutcsh's script for "The 42nd St. Cavalry" featured McCloud riding a horse through the city.

[Added 3-2-23]

Richard Arrington's 2008 memoir, Richard Arrington: There's Hope for the World devotes a chapter to Deutsch: "The Controversial Reign of Chief Artie Deutsch" pp 91-114. 

Source for paperback edition: my collection

Source: Amazon

Source: Amazon

Source: Amazon