News & Events...
Event: Publisher Interview at Entrepreneurial Thursday Happy Hour, July 10, 6:30 p.m. Come hear Scott & Anita talk about the Dammit Book at CJ's in The Strip District, Pittsburgh, hosted by jazz recording artist Jessica Lee, with music from 5:30-8 p.m. No cover.
News: 8 Pittsburgh Authors On Hand to Launch Dammit, I Learned a Lot from That Son-of-a-Gun! Read what some of them had to say by clicking here.
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Brandt Street Press
PO Box 8243
Pittsburgh 15217-0243
412-600-3806
brandtstreetpress.com
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Welcome to the inaugural issue of Dammit News!
In this issue, Judi Resick-Csokai tells us how
her childhood was transformed by the power of story.
Life Beyond Middle School Purgatory
by Judi Resick-Csokai
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In 1988, I was the secret, self-proclaimed futuristic bard of my angst-ridden middle school. For the whole year, every day after school, I worked on The Soap Opera, my 50-page handwritten manifesto. I spent nights hidden in my bedroom closet reading it over the phone to Amy, my confidante and best friend.
Anita Kulina shares a story from her grade school reader.
Amid the tales of John, Jean and Judy in our schoolbook reader was an amazing tale that captured my six-year-old heart with its simple message about the power of kindness. Here’s the grown-up version of the story, from Aesop’s Fables, A New Translation by V. S. Vernon Jones, published in 1912 by Avenel Books.
The North Wind and the Sun
A dispute arose between the North Wind and the Sun, each claiming that he was stronger than the other. At last they agreed to try their powers upon a traveller, to see which could soonest strip him of his cloak. The North Wind had the first try; and, gathering up all his force for the attack, he came whirling furiously down upon the man, and caught up his cloak as though he would wrest it from him by one single effort: but the harder he blew, the more closely the man wrapped it round himself. Then came the turn of the Sun. At first he beamed gently upon the traveller, who soon unclasped his cloak and walked on with it hanging loosely about his shoulders: then he shone forth in his full strength, and the man, before he had gone many steps, was glad to throw his cloak right off and complete his journey more lightly clad.
Persuasion is better than force.
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What happens when someone shares a story with you—a true story, a story from their heart-of-hearts?
We feel connected. We realize the commonality of our emotions. How we are, as human beings, all the same. We all falter. We all fear. We all stumble. And we can all come back stronger.
This book contains those stories.
www.dammitbook.com