A whopper of an endorsement for 'The Fracking War'

WATKINS GLEN, New York - When your writing is referred to in the same paragraph as a book by John Steinbeck (The Grapes of Wrath) and another by Harriet Beecher Stowe (Uncle Tom's Cabin), there is only one rational response: You blush.

So Sunday afternoon I had a thoroughly beet-red face for quite a while after I read a book-jacket blurb kindly offered by environmentalist, biologist and author Sandra Steingraber.
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Sandra Steingraber

"It was Uncle Tom’s Cabin, not economic data, that turned the page on slavery.  It was The Grapes of Wrath, not demographic reports that opened a nation's eyes to Dust Bowl dislocation.  Out of that tradition comes Michael J. Fitzgerald’s The Fracking War.  Here, within a smoldering crucible of social crisis, is a tale of power, money, fateful choices, and consciences aroused.   If you like your drill rigs served up within the context of a fast-moving plot line, you’ve got what you want right in your hands.” 

  —Sandra Steingraber, author, Living Downstream and Raising Elijah

The beet-red blush was also because Sandra Steingraber is one of my heroes. Working here in New York as a journalist, I've published reams about her courage in fighting the hydrofracking menace, helping to lead the struggle against a manifestly dangerous propane storage project in Watkins Glen, and her arrest and jailing earlier this year on trespassing charges following a protest.

So to have her praise The Fracking War so highly, well, I'm blushing again.

Book cover art by Will Sweeney

All of the pieces have fallen into place - with a little pushing - for electronic publication of The Fracking War this week. There may be some last-minute surprises from the publisher to delay the e-launch. But as they say at NASA, 'Confidence is high.'

And the print version is on track to be available in early 2014.

By the way, my sincere thanks to all the folks who supported The Fracking War through the Kickstarter.com campaign. We made our goal. And right now Adm. Sylvia Fox and I are scrambling to get the promised T-shirts done and mailed out. I'm also trying to put together an author's website.

At a fabulous end-of-the-season party last night at The Stonecat Cafe in Hector, several people asked me about a sequel to The Fracking War. The answer is yes, there will be one. But I won't say much more about it until Wednesday at the book publishing celebration at the Hector Wine Company, which not surprisingly, is in Hector, too.

The Fracking War WRFI FM radio interview is posted

WATKINS GLEN, New York, USA - Posting the audio from my radio interview with Bob Fitzsimmons Tuesday on WRFI-FM Watkins Glen-Ithaca seemed like it would be easy.

I took my Olympus DS20 digital recorder into the studio, flipped it on for the entire 27 minutes of chat and then flipped it off.

Tuesday's interview at WRFI-FM in Ithaca, NY

That truly was the easy part.

Back at my home office/studio, the software to move that digital recorder sound file onto my Mac was so outdated it wouldn't run at all. And attempts to update and/or find a new package didn't work.

For nearly two days of on-again, off-again attempts, it didn't work.

Finally, I did it the old fashioned way, using a microphone, Apple's garage band software, and iTunes.

Easy-peasy.

But make that easily accessible for a mass audience proved complicated, too.

Consequently, a link to a recording of the interview is posted below. The link takes you to a YouTube video. It seemed like the easiest way to post it. Unfortunately, I only had a single still photo - and no video - of what turned out to be a great conversation.

Regardless, it was the first stop on The Fracking War book tour, and fun.

Here's the link to the video/sound recording: WRFI Interview

'The Fracking War' book tour begins - with a radio show

ITHACA, New York - The beginning of a book tour to promote The Fracking War started Tuesday in the studios of WRFI-FM here, with a friendly host named Bob Fitzsimmons, who coincidentally, is a friend, too.

I had been on Bob's Tuesday afternoon news-discussion program earlier this year with local winery owner Lou Damiani. This time I was on there solo to talk about hydrofracking, a lot of specifics about why I wrote the book and what's really inside the covers of The Fracking War.

On the air with Bob Fitzsimmons at WRFI

The Fracking War is being set up by the publishers as I write this, with - I hope - a e-book edition out in one month. The printed book should roll off the presses in 8 to 12 weeks.

The radio interview was excellent practice for what Adm. Sylvia Fox promises will be a very busy spring when the print edition is available. She is already eyeballing places where hydrofracking for natural gas is particularly contentious and looking into setting up stops with local media and at local bookstores.

You can pretty much stick a pin in any map of any state doing hydrofracking and find controversy and contention.

The Kickstarter.com campaign is rolling along with the pledge of one $250 donor missing. Her pledge doesn't appear yet on the tally because she has to get an Amazon.com account to preorder books as well as sign up for dinner with the author.

If you are interested in preordering a book, click here for Kickstarter. The book will be available for purchase after the Kickstarter campaign is over through bookstores and online. But anyone who has preordered with Kickstarter will get their e-books and printed copies much earlier than people who chose to go through a book retailer.

Will Sweeney

Tuesday was also a big day for The Fracking War because we hired Will Sweeney, a noted New York artist whose work is being featured heavily in efforts of the NY anti-fracking movement. Will is going to do the entire cover design for us, including a piece of original artwork. That artwork will also be used on t-shirts, posters and other Fracking-War-related items.

After our a 45-minute chat, we felt confident Will is going to produce some great sketches, one of which (or a combination thereof) will eventually make powerful cover.

It will be great to have the book out soon and printed copies shortly thereafter.

But my notebook full of plot and character ideas for the sequel to The Fracking War is already overflowing.

And the name of that book? It's too fracking early to say.

Read Chapter 1 of 'The Fracking War' on Kickstarter

WATKINS GLEN, New York, USA - Last year at this time I was daydreaming about the characters and possible plotlines I thought I might include in The Fracking War. At that point The Fracking War was a book idea with a catchy title that had been banging around in my head all summer and into fall.

The manuscript of 'The Fracking War', heading to the publisher Wednesday

Then today, Adm. Fox and I launched a Kickstarter campaign to get the book to market quickly and get the word out to readers that what was once a book idea with a catchy title was about to be an honest-to-God published novel.

Honest-to-God!

Kickstarter LINK to The Fracking War

Many of you have followed the week-to-week, keystroke-by-keystroke process as I wrote The Fracking War via a website that I use to talk about writing and editing called Writing for Money. LINK: Writing for Money website

That website reveals a lot about the process, the occasional bouts of angst I had, and how I discovered what most fiction writers already know: Characters sometimes just refuse to do what you ask them to do. Obstinate little schmucks.

But that website - and posts on this page about the book - were part of a Muhammad Ali strategy to keep me moving. Or to extend the Ali idea, to keep my fingers dancing on the keyboard writing The Fracking War.

Just like when Ali would predict in what round he would knock out his opponent, once I declared publicly I was writing a novel and it would be published this fall, I was putting myself on the line.

It worked.

Now that The Fracking War is within a month or so of being published, I feel like my opponent is on the canvas and I am just waiting for the referee to get to a count of 10 and declare a knockout.

The first chapter of The Fracking War is already published on the Kickerstarter website as a sample for readers. (Here's the link again: LINK: The Fracking War on Kickstarter) Please take a look and see what you think.

If you like it, please let me know: CLICK FOR MY EMAIL. And if you really like it, consider ordering a first edition or choosing one of the other pledge options. There's books, t-shirts, visits to book clubs, dinner on the shore of Seneca Lake...

And please consider passing along the Kickstarter link with the sample chapter to friends and acquaintances. Hydrofracking for natural gas and natural gas production are very quickly becoming the focal point for all manner of political and social upheaval.

Protests in New Brunswick, Canada

If you have been following the national and international headlines about hydrofracking, you know how quickly the whole issue is heating up. Events in the Canadian province of New Brunswick mirror some of what takes place in the fictional settings of The Fracking War.

Life imitates art. Or vice versa. I'm never sure.

And, yes, a sequel is already in the works. Here's a hint about one of the plot lines in the sequel: Don't live anywhere near propane storage, especially salt cavern propane storage.

The Captain and the Admiral finally getting back on the water

VALOIS POINT, New York - The summer has flown by. It started slow after I had to have a hernia repair (ouch), which meant about a month of relatively limited activity. There went June.

Then the Star-Gazette newspaper and a regional magazine called Mountain Home called me for duty a lot. The assignments were all fun, but all seemed to coincide with the best boating weather.

A great day to head down the lake

We also had a hot spell - a really hot spell - that sent Admiral Fox and I diving not only into Seneca Lake, but into air conditioning. It was actually hard to breath at times. High 90-degree temperatures and 90-percent-plus humidity does not make for comfortable living. Ask anyone who lives in Florida in the summer.

And then, there's the book.

The draft of The Fracking War is now safely in the hands of three expert editors to read, critique and eventually return to me for rewriting, editing or a trip to the landfill. What a relief! (Though this morning I woke up rewriting a chapter in my head...)

Spirit of Louise at Village Marina

Today the Spirit of Louise pontoon boat will head out for a down-lake adventure to Watkins Glen. I just arranged for a berth at Village Marina for a few days - right next to the Sheriff's Boat. We hope to explore the south end lake, perhaps even the wilds of Montour a few miles down the channel.

Then on Saturday, the Spirit of Louise will become a press boat for the day. I will be covering a floating protest against a proposed propane storage project that has the community united - united against it.

About 100 kayaks and other boats will join the floating entourage. I'll be shooting still photos and taking video for the newspaper. I'm really hoping for calm water. Really hoping.

The summer also ended up with virtually no blogging for me - the book and commercial writing assignments took up all the writing energy I had.

But at least until the beta readers return The Fracking War, I'll hit the keyboard more often. In fact, I just finished the latest novel by James Lee Burke - Light of the World. A review of it is definitely in order. A great book. But then, his books are all great.

Josh Fox's 'Gasland II' - another game-changer movie

ITHACA, New York, USA - Admiral Fox and I journeyed to the Cornell campus Friday night for a showing of Gasland II, Josh Fox's followup film to his amazing first film Gasland. That movie was so powerful that it gave the natural gas industry such gas, it is still sputtering.

Gasland II's Josh Fox

In fact, while Gasland II was being shown in Ithaca, the natural gas industry was showing its own pr-firm pro-hydrofracking film at another New York location.

It's doubtful that the audience there was as enthusiastic as the 300 or so people who packed Statler Auditorium at Cornell. The film was interrupted frequently by applause - and more than a few gasps.

The film will premiere on HBO July 8. And it's a must-see movie for people already opposed to hydrofracking for natural gas as well as anyone still sitting on the fence. Josh suggested that perhaps some Gasland II parties might be in order when HBO releases the film - parties that would include doubters as well as the faithful.

It would be hard to watch this film - a compendium of images of science, pathos, humanity and corporate greed - and not come away feeling, well, I am still sorting all that out the morning after.

We had hoped to actually meet Josh - and we did, sort of.

Sylvia, Josh Fox and me

At one point he jumped down off the stage and stood for a photo - a photo he was sending to President Barack Obama via Twitter. He is flanked by Admiral Fox and I in the photo.

It's a little grainy, but lately I've noticed I look a lot better in soft focus anyway.

The evening gave me even more encouragement to finish editing The Fracking War. It also gave me several ideas for additions to the book and even some new chapters.

The climate change we are already witnessing is being exacerbated by all the methane gas escaping from  all the gas wells being drilled. It has taken an already nearly out-of-control freight train and added ice to slippery tracks.

If the methane emissions aren't controlled, well-known Cornell Professor Robert Howarth said, it's game over for the planet.

The event was partly to help promote the film and also as a fundraiser for Gas Free Seneca (link to GAS FREE SENECA website), the group fighting to stop the Inergy Corporation from storing propane and natural gas in salt caverns adjacent to - and under - Seneca Lake.

Here's a photo of the crowd last night, sending a message to the president and to NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

Josh Fox with the banjo, Adm. Fox to the left, me on the right

Back in the good old USSA with more sojourns planned

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - Two days back in the USSA and I think I am finally rested enough to write something coherent.

You get to be the judge.

Pool and view from our condo

After Adm. Fox left Mexico in a cloud of dust (quite literally) driving from Puerto Vallarta to Sacramento, I stayed behind, wrote a little but mostly closed up the condo at Bahia del Sol, said goodbye to, well, so many Canadians that I wonder if anyone stays there in the winter.

Adm. Fox's trip went smoothly, with a stop in San Diego before landing here at Dr. Pam and Steve's house where I joined her two days ago. My flights were good, all luggage is accounted for and now civilization is being enjoyed.

You can drink water from the tap! Eat lettuce without soaking it in a disinfecting solution! And the wine not only is drinkable, it's inexpensive. At least the wine I buy and drink.

Rinse before eating, but nothing else

I do miss the sound of the ocean, replaced here by the distant thrum of the freeway. And I miss our Spanish lessons with arguably the best Spanish teacher from whom I have ever taken a class. But it's on to new adventures, including a trip to the Northwest then across the Rockies and back to New York sometime in mid-April.

Before that, I have to finish up the writing on my book The Fracking War and - perhaps equally important - find a camper or camper shell for our newly painted Toyota Tundra to make our expedition more fun.

We had the Tundra painted before Adm. Fox headed north. There were more than a few dings and scrapes from living in the village and some small truck vs. car mishaps. I will miss the cost of Mexican repairs. The body work, repainting and bumper straightening cost $546 U.S.

Time to start checking Craigslist for that camper... like the one shown below...

Looking for this kind of camper...