A Book for your Library!
First off, let me tell you that both
David Finkelstein and Jack
London are lifelong friends of mine.
When I first heard that they were going on an
extended trip to the Australian
Outback, my first thoughts were "They will kill
one another!"
Picture the original "Odd couple", Felix
and Oscar (Walter Matthau and Jack
Lemmon), spending the better part of a year trekking
through the wilds of the
Australian Outback, searching for the elusive Salt
Water Crocodile. (The
original purpose for going on this journey).
London, the "laid-back", writer with
perennial writer's block, always up for a
beer and tall tale, teamed up with his Birkenstock
clad "Felix", fascinated with
the thought of "interviewing"
"Ladies of the Evening" for the purpose of
discovering what "place in the future of
Kalgoorlie do the whorehouse play" and,
of course, to have a purely innocent "heart to
heart" with the "madam" and you
get some sense of a potentially volatile relationship,
but a exceptionally
warmhearted, winning formula for an adventure.
I don't think the book started out to be a delightful
and humorous narrative
starring dozens of Damon Runyon characters, each
with his or her fascinating
stories of adventure, hardship, love and death in the
untamed Outback region;
but to the benefit of the reader, this aspect of their
book adds a dimension to
the travelogue segments that is truly fascinating.
When I first read Greater Nowheres, back in the 80s,
it was released as a
hardback book. David sent me a copy which I took
with me to Okinawa and China on
one of my karate trips. I really enjoyed it, as in some
weird way, their
experiences paralleled mine while I was touring some
of the primitive "outbacks"
I visited in parts of China.
I was fully expecting to see the book shoot up the
New York Times list, but for
some reasons it didn't get either the publicity or
acclaim it deserved.
At the 2003 Martial Arts SummerFest, David was
honored by being the recipient of
Uechi-ryu karate's "master's" degree.
Beside all his other accomplishments,
David is an eighth degree black belt. He also was
being honored by Lyons Press;
just learning that they were going to re-release his
and Jack's book as
paperback. True to his word, David sent me another
copy, which I just completed.
This time I would like to shout to the world that this
book should be on
everyone's must-read list.
For those of us who know Jack and David, the book
offers a belly laugh with
every page. For those who don't know them, you
will, after a few chapters, come
to know and love them while appreciating their
enjoyable experiences and wincing
at those times when life in the Outback reminded us
all of the many faces of
Mother Nature.
Get online and contact Lyonspress.com and order
your copy today.
George E. Mattson
Eastern Arts & Humanities Center, Inc.
http://uechi-
ryu.com
Contact: Jane Reilly, Senior
Publicist
(203) 458-4538 - (800) 962-0973, ext. 4538
jane.reilly@lyonspress.com
