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Lee Lynch’s Amazon Trail: Old Stuff
Photo by Sue Hardesty By Lee Lynch
The Amazon Trail: Old StuffAll the words, all the tchotchkes, give me delight. Lately, though, this materialistic gay American has reached a time of appreciating what I have rather than collecting more …
I spend too much time and space collecting die-cast toy vehicles, especially Matchbox, a few Dinkys and other locally hard-to-find brands. I’m no expert, am not a vehicle fanatic, I drive a seventeen-year-old Toyota, but the allure of these tiny replicas of vans, utility trucks, and homely cars, many bunged up and from garage sales, most covered with months of dust, bring me a ridiculous amount of pleasure.
I love old stuff and old places. Nostalgia informs much of my work. My favorite school of art, photorealism, often portrays abandoned Esso gas stations, weathered clapboard houses, or bright-colored luncheonettes in the Bronx. Richard Estes and Ralph Goings capture Americana minutely. Among photographers, I can peruse books by, David Plowden, Bernice Abbott, and William Eggleston for hours.
Jump to buttons. I don’t have a clue why buttons fascinate me. I’m far from a seamstress. But did you ever look at buttons, really look? The designs, especially from days of yore, can be intricate, unique, even genuine art. They sport an infinity of colors and sizes, signify rank, brand, and fashion styles. I have jars full of the things, but I’m pressed for time to let them cascade from my hands into treasure piles and may give them up. Some day.
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The Twist Podcast #155: Stimulation Nation, Jim Crow 2.0, Fake Plant News, and the Week in Headlines
Join co-hosts Mark McNease and Rick Rose as we take a look at the coming flood of Biden Bucks, the GOP’s voter suppression frenzy, why fake plants are bad for real environments, and this week’s listicles and headlines.
Enjoy The Twist on Libsyn, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeart Radio, SoundCloud, Amazon Music, and TheTwistPodcast.com.
Copyright 2021 MadeMark Publishing
Join Mark’s email list for updates, podcasts, giveaways, and his monthly newsletter!
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The Twist Podcast #154: Equality in the House, CPAC Crazy, and Awards Shows from the Future
Join co-hosts Mark McNease and Rick Rose as we take a look at the recent passage of the Equality Act in the House, CPAC’s nutfest in Orlando, the future of movies, TV and awards shows, and this week’s listicles and headlines.
Enjoy The Twist on Libsyn, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeart Radio, SoundCloud, Amazon Music, and TheTwistPodcast.com.
Copyright 2021 MadeMark Publishing
Join Mark’s email list for updates, podcasts, giveaways, and his monthly newsletter!
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Q Audiobooks: Pretty Pretty Boys (Hazard and Somerset Mystery Series, Book 1), by Gregory Ashe, Narrated by Tristan James
Pretty Pretty Boys
By:Â Gregory Ashe
Narrated by:Â Tristan James
Series:Â Hazard and Somerset Mystery Series, Book 1
Length: 12 hrs and 58 mins
Publisher’s Summary
After Emery Hazard loses his job as a detective in Saint Louis, he heads back to his hometown – and to the local police force there. Home, though, brings no happy memories, and the ghosts of old pain are very much alive in Wahredua. Hazard’s new partner, John-Henry Somerset, had been one of the worst tormentors, and Hazard still wonders what Somerset’s role was in the death of Jeff Langham, Hazard’s first boyfriend.
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All Books Now Available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and Payhip
I’m focusing this year on “going wide” as they say, and I’ve made my ebooks available with a few other popular retailers, as well as direct-buy. You can now get them all at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo. And if you’d like a significant savings, you can buy them directly at my storefront on Payhip.
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February Newsletter Video: What’s Finished, What’s New, What’s Coming Up
This is my February monthly video for email subscribers (join us here!) I give a short personal update and let subscribers and visitors to my website know what I’ve been up to with my writing and creative projects the last month, and what’s coming their way with books, projects and podcasts.
Just finished: The narration of ‘Reservation for Murder: A Kyle Callahan Mystery,’ on the Mark McNease Mysteries Podcast. You can also enjoy that as an uninterrupted audiobook on SoundCloud. Next up for narration: Rough and Tumble (A Dystopian Love Tragedy).
I’m a third of the way into the second Maggie Dahl Mystery, ‘Open Secrets,’ and plan to have that out by the fall.
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The Twist Podcast #153: Rush to Judgement, Texas Toasted, Hopes for Summer, and This Week’s Headlines
Join co-hosts Mark McNease and Rick Rose as we take a look at the mess in Texas, America’s coming summer of hope, Rush Limbaugh’s exit, and this week’s listicles and headlines.
Enjoy The Twist on Libsyn, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeart Radio, SoundCloud, Amazon Music, and TheTwistPodcast.com.
Copyright 2021 MadeMark Publishing
Join Mark’s email list for updates, podcasts, giveaways, and his monthly newsletter!
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One Thing or Another: That Relaxed Fit Time of Life
By Mark McNease
It’s always One Thing or Another… a lighthearted look at aging, life, and the absurdities of it all.
At sixty-two, not having to hoist my leg over a bicycle bar is a relief. I’m not worried about body parts, just about getting my leg that high.
It hit me recently when I was out looking for a new bicycle. I told the young man working at the store that I was mostly concerned with comfort. I’m not trying out for the Tour de France, and I don’t imagine myself riding in that event, unlike many of the people I see zipping around the New Jersey countryside with brand names on their backs and Spandex hugging them more tightly than a human ought to be hugged. I’m just a guy who lives in the woods and wants to get my heart rate up a few times a week by circling the back roads of my rural community.
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The Twist Podcast #152: Turning the Page, Post-Pandemic Wish List, and This Week’s Headlines
Join co-hosts Mark McNease and Rick Rose as take a look at turning the page on Trump, Senatorial cowardice, our weekly listicles, and this week’s headlines.
Enjoy The Twist on Libsyn, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeart Radio, SoundCloud, Amazon Music, and TheTwistPodcast.com.
Copyright 2020 MadeMark Publishing
Join Mark’s email list for updates, podcasts, giveaways, and his monthly newsletter!
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‘Reservation for Murder: A Kyle Callahan Mystery’ Audiobook Now Available on SoundCloud!
It’s done! My narration for the recently released ‘Reservation for Murder: A Kyle Callahan Mystery’ is now available as a complimentary audiobook on SoundCloud. You can enjoy the entire book, chapter by chapter, by clicking on the playlist. Start and stop as you please, and you don’t need an app to listen.
This is the sixth book in the series and was recently #1 on Kindle’s LGBT mystery bestseller list.
Enjoy, and keep listening for more audio mysteries and fiction. You can also hear this as a weekly podcast, with an introduction and three chapters at a time, at the Mark McNease Mysteries Podcast.
About ‘Reservation for Murder: A Kyle Callahan Mystery’
It’s been several years since Kyle Callahan sought the help of a New York City therapist to overcome the trauma of his encounter with a serial killer, and just as long since his investigation into a teenage girl’s murder brought down the Manhattan District Attorney. He and his husband Danny Durban have decided to move away, to start a new life in the idyllic river city of Lambertville, New Jersey. They have friends there. They’ll have peace and quiet. They can leave the hustle and bustle and stresses of America’s biggest metropolis behind.
They open a bed and breakfast, and soon discover that murder and mayhem are waiting to check in. There’s a writers conference in town, with big names and big egos heading for a clash—and a killing—of titans. No sooner has the ink dried on the guest registry than Kyle finds himself pursuing another murderer, this one closer to home than they’ve ever come. He enlists the help of his old friend and local resident Linda Sikorsky, once a detective on the New Hope, Pennsylvania, police force. The two of them follow one lead after another in a race against time until the shocking truth is exposed.
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Lee Lynch’s Amazon Trail: Covid 19 Pioneer
Photo by Sue Hardesty By Lee Lynch
The Amazon Trail: Covid 19 Pioneer
As a seasoned Polio Pioneer, sixty-odd years later, it strikes me as funny that I felt a little proud, just as I had in grade school, to be part of this mass health effort. There’s a bond now, between my neighbors and myself, that we went through the unknown together, that we believed in the science and the medicine and did our patriotic duty to keep America safe.
Now that President Biden and Vice President Harris are in office, I’ve been able to have my first Covid 19 vaccine shot. It was no big deal. I went to our county fairgrounds expecting to be injected through my car window, the way I was tested. I thank my lucky stars the test was negative. I’m grateful to the medical profession that persisted in making tests and vaccines available despite the disinformation and profiteering of our former leaders.
Turned out, the vaccines were administered in the same exhibit building that’s used for our winter farmers’ market, a very familiar and reassuring space. The six-foot tables that usually serve to display crafts or local mushrooms and goat cheeses, were now place markers.
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Q Audiobooks: A Queer History of the United States, by Michael Bronski, Narrated by Vikas Adams
A Queer History of the United States
By:Â Michael Bronski
Narrated by:Â Vikas Adams
Length: 10 hrs and 29 mins
Release date: 06-12-18
Publisher:Â Random House AudioAbout ‘A Queer History of the United States’:
Winner of a 2012 Stonewall Book Award in nonfiction
The first book to cover the entirety of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender history, from pre-1492 to the present.
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The Twist Podcast #151: Calm in Gilead, Coup Fighters, Boo to Re-Boots, and This Week’s Listicles
Join co-hosts Mark McNease and Rick Rose as we marvel at the calm after the storm, discuss the need for impeachment, thumbs-down most TV reboots, and offer our own Twist listicles. Fasten your headphones!
Enjoy The Twist on Libsyn, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeart Radio, SoundCloud, Amazon Music, and TheTwistPodcast.com.
Copyright 2020 MadeMark Publishing
Join Mark’s email list for updates, podcasts, giveaways, and his monthly newsletter!