Gordon Kuhn's Blog
March 25, 2017
Wonderful Interview
I had a wonderful interview this past week with Claire Harris-Perkins of The Book Talk Radio Club. www.booktalkradio.info . I highly recommend to every writer here that you should....NO...you NEED to contact her and have an interview with her. It is a Skype interview and is incredibly professional. She then distributes it to a variety of places. She is warm, enthusiastic in her support of you and is an author herself. So, she knows the ups and downs in trying to get your work out there and properly represented with advertising. My suggestion, write her, nothing ventured, nothing gained.
February 17, 2017
Interview - Do You Know How To Fly?
I was interviewed yesterday by a local newspaper journalist. The interview was because of the new book: Do You Know How To Fly? It took well over an hour and left me with a headache. This young lady was asking questions and writing notes as fast as she could. The last interview I had took about 25 minutes and done. This young lady (age 23) - I put that here because at one point she asked, "When's the last time you were around a 23 year old." I think she thought she was making me nervous, no, wrong. What was making me nervous was that we were tying up a table at my favorite restaurant. In any case the interview went well and then she wanted to come to meet me in my office at my home and take pictures. My office is a mess and my wife instantly vetoed that idea. Oh well, have to figure out where would be a good place for a photo.
Have a great day, Gordon Kuhn
Do You Know How To Fly?
Have a great day, Gordon Kuhn
Do You Know How To Fly?
February 14, 2017
New Review
Received the following review from Onlinebookclub.
http://forums.onlinebookclub.org/view...
3 out of 4 stars.
http://forums.onlinebookclub.org/view...
3 out of 4 stars.
January 14, 2017
Kirkus Review of Do You Know How to Fly?
KIRKUS REVIEW of Gordon Kuhn's Book
Do You Know How to Fly?
Kuhn’s debut true-crime story shows how a violent man’s life led him to death row.
The author uses interviews and other sources to piece together the life of Delmer Smith, a seasoned career criminal awaiting execution in Florida. Smith was born in Detroit in 1971, on the cusp of the city’s economic decline. By age 14, he was convicted of raping a woman at a carwash where he worked. The 18 months that he spent in a juvenile reformatory dashed any possibility of rehabilitation; instead, he learned “how to be more proficient as a criminal” as he became “a creature without a conscience.” As a young adult, Kuhn writes, Smith carried out burglaries, carjackings, and bank robberies, which eventually led to a 15-year incarceration. After his second prison stint, he moved to Florida; there, Kuhn writes, Smith assaulted and beat multiple women—all the while leading a double life as a “wise and loving uncle” to his two nieces. Eventually, the violence led to a murder conviction. The author interviewed many of Smith’s victims and found that the women were now “desperately seeking someone or something to fully trust again.” Thanks to these firsthand accounts, readers receive a nuanced portrait of a predatory man. Kuhn’s decision to jump between accounts of Smith’s early life and present-day interviews is an effective one; by regularly pulling readers back to the present, he reminds them of the painful, enduring impact of his subject’s actions. Moreover, Kuhn shows a great deal of sensitivity when recounting the crimes, evoking deep pathos instead of graphic sensationalism. That said, the book does include some unnecessary background information, including three pages on Smith’s birth alone; it also bafflingly overuses section breaks, which disrupt the otherwise strong narrative flow.
A thoughtful, engaging account of a brutal life and the carnage that it left behind.
Pub Date: Sept. 11th, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-692-77405-2
Page count: 298pp
Publisher: Poet in the Rain Productions
Program: Kirkus Indie
Review Posted Online: Jan. 13th, 2017
Gordon KuhnDo You Know How To Fly?
Do You Know How to Fly?
Kuhn’s debut true-crime story shows how a violent man’s life led him to death row.
The author uses interviews and other sources to piece together the life of Delmer Smith, a seasoned career criminal awaiting execution in Florida. Smith was born in Detroit in 1971, on the cusp of the city’s economic decline. By age 14, he was convicted of raping a woman at a carwash where he worked. The 18 months that he spent in a juvenile reformatory dashed any possibility of rehabilitation; instead, he learned “how to be more proficient as a criminal” as he became “a creature without a conscience.” As a young adult, Kuhn writes, Smith carried out burglaries, carjackings, and bank robberies, which eventually led to a 15-year incarceration. After his second prison stint, he moved to Florida; there, Kuhn writes, Smith assaulted and beat multiple women—all the while leading a double life as a “wise and loving uncle” to his two nieces. Eventually, the violence led to a murder conviction. The author interviewed many of Smith’s victims and found that the women were now “desperately seeking someone or something to fully trust again.” Thanks to these firsthand accounts, readers receive a nuanced portrait of a predatory man. Kuhn’s decision to jump between accounts of Smith’s early life and present-day interviews is an effective one; by regularly pulling readers back to the present, he reminds them of the painful, enduring impact of his subject’s actions. Moreover, Kuhn shows a great deal of sensitivity when recounting the crimes, evoking deep pathos instead of graphic sensationalism. That said, the book does include some unnecessary background information, including three pages on Smith’s birth alone; it also bafflingly overuses section breaks, which disrupt the otherwise strong narrative flow.
A thoughtful, engaging account of a brutal life and the carnage that it left behind.
Pub Date: Sept. 11th, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-692-77405-2
Page count: 298pp
Publisher: Poet in the Rain Productions
Program: Kirkus Indie
Review Posted Online: Jan. 13th, 2017
Gordon KuhnDo You Know How To Fly?
November 20, 2016
Predator: Book One
Predator, The Man Who Didn't Exist, "Do you know how to fly?" is out on the market. It took me 6 1/2 years to write it. I have over 6,000 pages of documents, hours of interviews, photographs of locations. I also have hours of wasted time sitting and staring at the computer screen unsure of what I was doing. But it is done! Book one is done and book two soon will be as well.
