Boxing legends and a new noir hero featured in recent releases

John Florio and Ouisie Shapiro's nonfiction account of history's most famous boxing brothers came out this month to much acclaim from Lyons Press.

One Punch from the Promised Land: Leon Spinks, Michael Spinks, and the Myth of the Heavyweight Title centers around the divergent journeys of Leon and Michael Spinks as they grew up in the St. Louis ghetto, each became heavyweight champions, and then had to deal with fickle fame. The book features a celebrity cast of boxing legends, including Muhammad Ali (who Leon Spinks defeated), Mike Tyson (who Michael Spinks fought), Larry Holmes, Gerry Cooney, Dwight Qawi, Eddie Mustafa Muhammad, and many more.

Check out the thrilling trailer below, which was Trailer of the Day on Shelf Awareness:



The book has been featured on several sports broadcasts this month. Florio was interviewed by Jeremy Schapp on ESPN's The Sporting Life (listen here), Jim Rome on CBS Sports Radio (listen here), and The Rock Newman Show (listen here).

Excerpts were also featured in a Sporting News exclusive. You can read them here.

The book has gotten fabulous reviews, including the below sampling:

“Revealing detail...An excellent read for boxing fans.” --Booklist

“A great introduction to the heavyweight division from the late 1960s to the early '80s...Just as much about America's racial and socioeconomic situation as it is an exploration of the dynamics of family and the history of the sweet science...Teaches a lesson.” --Publishers Weekly

“Well written and deeply sourced, One Punch from the Promised Land fills in a lot of blanks.” --Bob Costas, a 22-time Emmy Award winner, NBC sportscaster and host of Costas Tonight

"It's a story that transcends boxing." --Jerry Izenberg, sports columnist for The Star-Ledger, four time Pulitzer Prize nominee for sports reporting, and author of Through My Eyes

“A vivid and compelling dual biography populated by the giants and demons of boxing's last golden age.” --Jeremy Schaap, ESPN reporter and New York Times bestselling author of Cinderella Man

John Florio has had quite the publishing season.  He also had a fiction crime novel, Sugar Pop Moon, released from Seventh Street Books in July. The novel tells the story of Jersey Leo, an albino of mixed race nicknamed “Snowball,” who bartends at a speakeasy in Prohibition-era Hell's Kitchen. Jersey gets embroiled in a great deal danger after inadvertently purchasing counterfeit moonshine for his boss.

Sugar Pop Moon was named to the “Best Mysteries and Thrillers” category on iTunes in July:

Florio gave an interview on The Big Thrill, in which he speaks to why he chose an albino character to be his novel's hero and how a prior stint as a music composer helped him write and structure Sugar Pop Moon. Read the full interview here.

The sequel to Sugar Pop Moon, Blind Moon Alley, will come out in 2014 from Seventh Street Press.

Below is a sampling of the excellent reviews for Sugar Pop Moon:

“Don’t miss this absolutely riveting, gritty debut coming-of-age tale. Absorbing and briskly paced.” --Library Journal, starred review

“This is a hard-boiled, Prohibition-era novel and Jersey Leo is a well-developed, engaging character. The story moves fast, the violence is appropriate to the times, and there are laugh-out-loud moments amid the mayhem. Sure to appeal to fans of Mickey Spillane, Raymond Chandler, and, more currently, Robert Fate’s edgy Baby Shark series." --Booklist

“The brisk story and its unusual hero pack a considerable punch.” --Publishers Weekly

“A fast-paced tale where you never know what’s coming next…One of those good, old prohibition-style mob stories that brings a tear to the eye and a laugh out loud …After this small taste, readers will definitely hope that the author produces more Jersey Leo stories.” --Suspense Magazine

“Crackling with Chandleresque crack-wise charm, a breakneck pace and wonderful characterizations, Sugar Pop Moon delivers the goods...Jersey is a wonderful character, in league with great ultra-outsiders like Beverle Graves Myers’ Tito Amato. Highly recommended.” --Historical Novel Society, Editors' Choice

Seventh Street Books, July 2013

Lyons Press, September 2013

A photo journey through BEA 2013

Last week, book madness descended on New York City for BookExpo America (BEA), an annual publishing conference and book exhibition extravaganza for publishers, industry experts, booksellers, librarians, and book lovers.

While educational panels, subsidiary rights meetings, and more take place throughout the conference, the most dazzling feature of BEA is always the Exhibition Hall, where publishers showcase the books they are most excited about for the upcoming fall season or that they have recently published.  JVNLA's books were featured prominently, so of course we hunted them down and snapped some photos in order to bring a part of BEA 2013 to our blog! 

To give you a sense of what the Exhibition Hall looks like, check out the photo below, showing conference attendees milling around several publishers' booths, including Algonquin and Workman.  Now, imagine this multiplied over 760,000 square feet of exhibition space! 

Clearly, many, many eyes were on the look out for exciting, new books.  We were pleased that so many of JVNLA's books were a part of the spotlight!

According to reports from the front at Sourcebooks, the line for a signed galley of Dianne Dixon's newest novel, THE BOOK OF SOMEDAY (September 2013), was long and didn't end until the last copies were given away!  THE BOOK OF SOMEDAY is the story of three women, each caught up in a web of secrets, and one haunted by a nightmare of a beautiful woman in a silver dress.  While we didn't get a picture of the galley line, we did snap one of Dixon standing beneath her cover as it presided over the Sourcebooks exhibition area.

One woman got started reading THE BOOK OF SOMEDAY right away!

The Lyons Press exhibition booth featured ONE PUNCH FROM THE PROMISED LAND: Leon Spinks, Michael Spinks, and the Myth of the Heavyweight Title by John Florio and Ouisie Shapiro (September 2013).  The book is a narrative nonfiction account of the two famous boxing brothers and the divergent paths their lives took.
 

At the Skirt! Books display table, Linda Hundt's recipe book based on her award-winning bakery of the same name, SWEETIE-LICIOUS PIES: Eat Pie, Love Life (October 2013), made passersby salivate.

C.J. Sansom's newest novel, DOMINION (Mulholland Books, January 2014), was an eagerly anticipated giveaway over at Hachette's booth. DOMINION sets readers in an alternate history in which Britain surrendered to Nazi Germany in 1940, and, twelve years later, a spy for the Resistance must rescue a man with a secret from a British mental hospital and smuggle him from the country.

Soft Skull Press's booth showcased Berlin Reed's just-released part-food memoir, part-argument for sustainable living, THE ETHICAL BUTCHER: How Thoughtful Eating Can Change Your World (April 2013). 

At the Penguin exhibition area, Jillian Cantor signed galleys of her new novel MARGOT (Riverhead, September 2013).  The novel is a reimagining of the life of Margot Frank, Anne Frank's sister, had she not died in a concentration camp in 1945.

Conference attendees were so excited about snagging a copy of MARGOT that even a baby rifled through the pages to get a quick glimpse of the story!

At Smithsonian Books, YOUR TICKET TO THE UNIVERSE: A Guide to Exploring the Cosmos by Kimberly K. Arcand and Megan Watzke (April 2013) stood out on a display table.

PASSION BLUE by Victoria Strauss (November 2012), a YA novel about a seventeen-year-old in Renaissance Italy sentenced to live in a convent when all she wants is true love, graced the display tables at the Amazon Children's Publishing booth.

BEYOND THE BEAR (March 2013), a memoir about surviving a bear attack and learning to live and love again, written by Dan Bigley and co-author Debra McKinney, was featured in the display racks over at Lyons Press.

Meanwhile, Algonquin arranged its featured books on the walls of its booth.  Just to the right and below the center, you'll find A LIFE IN MEN by Gina Frangello (February 2014), a novel of a woman diagnosed with debilitating cystic fibrosis who takes up her best friend's adventurous lifestyle across many countries and with many men after her friend's tragic death.

Jeryl Brunner signed copies of her newest celebrity travel book, MY CITY, MY LOS ANGELES: Famous People Share Their Favorite Places (March 2013) at the Globe Pequot Press booth.  We snapped a photo of her (center) with her agent Jessica Regel (left) and editor Amy Lyons (right).

In addition to Brunner, Slash Coleman was another JVNLA author selected by Globe Pequot Press to sign books at this year's BEA. Below is the sign announcing the times of the signings for Brunner's MY CITY, MY LOS ANGELES and Coleman's THE BOHEMIAN LOVE DIARIES (Lyons Press, July 2013).

And, here, check out Brunner's and Coleman's books on display at the Globe Pequot Press booth.

As you can see in the previous photo, the cover of Coleman's THE BOHEMIAN LOVE DIARIES features a young boy, shirtless and shoeless, wearing a motorcycle helmet.  Well, that boy made a special guest appearance at BEA.  Here he is below, pictured with the author.  Together, they took the BEA by storm!