Friday, January 25, 2019

The Devil's Pipeline distributed in the Finger Lakes

   HECTOR, NY - Three locations in the Finger Lakes now have copies of The Devil's Pipeline for sale: the Finger Lakes Times (in Geneva), the Hector Wine Company (in Hector, of course!) and Rasta Ranch Vineyards (also a fine Hector wine stop and cultural experience).
     The three received their first shipments of the novel this week.
     Several other area wineries currently selling The Fracking War and Fracking Justice will likely have copies in coming weeks, too, including Fox Run Vineyards in Penn Yan.
     I'm looking for vendors in Watkins Glen, Rochester and Syracuse. If you know anyone who happens to own a bookstore or shop that might want to carry a few copies of the new novel, please let me know.
     The book is also available via online sources - or directly from me if you want an inscribed copy or to send a gift copy.

Time to write a review of The Devil's Pipeline?

     The early reviews for the novel have been very good and I hope that in the next week or so the compliments I've been getting via email will make their way to be posted on Amazon.com.
      Three local readers in California told me they think this novel is the best of the three and asked if there is a movie in the works.
     Be still my heart! I hope some screenwriter/producer/film mogul picks up a copy of the book and thinks the same thing.
A parrot is always helpful to writers
     If you have finished reading The Devil's Pipeline - and are willing to post a review on Amazon - here is the direct link: AMAZON REVIEW.
     Thank you in advance for taking the time to scribble a few lines.
     And now it's time to get back to the draft of The Wolverine Rebellion.



Wednesday, January 23, 2019

'The Devil's Pipeline' book launch Feb. 11 in SF

   SAN FRANCISCO - The Devil's Pipeline (2018) and its two predecessor novels, The Fracking War (2014) and Fracking Justice (2015) will be featured Monday, Feb. 11 starting at 6 p.m. at Book Passage in San Francisco's Ferry Building.
Michael J. Fitzgerald
      "The event is officially a book launch for The Devil's Pipeline," author Michael J. Fitzgerald said. "But as it completes the trilogy, I'll be talking about how the other two novels uncovered environmental and social horrors, too."
      The event is an official book party of Left Coast Writers and is open to the public.
     All three eco-thriller novels chronicle the work of crusading journalists who battle against powerful energy corporations.
     In The Devil's Pipeline a mega-energy conglomerate collides with a pacifist Iowa farm community housing a family that witnessed the Kent State University massacre in 1970. The company wants to push a pipeline directly through the farm. The community stands firm against it.
     The first set of reviews have given the novel high marks.
Rita Gardner
     "The Devil''s Pipeline is a page-turning eco-thriller," Rita Gardner, author of The Coconut Latitudes said. "It is a cautionary tale about unbridled corporate greed and those who battle against our earth's devastation."
     Labor activist and author Steve Early (Refinery Town and the Remaking of an American City) said the book takes readers to the front lines of environmental action. "Fitzgerald's novel may be fiction, but the conflict between big energy companies and grassroots defenders of land, water and a livable planet is very real," Early said.
     "Fitzgerald's third novel might be his best," writes Elizabeth Claman, author of The Prodigal Wife and other novels.
     The Book Passage event will include a talk by Fitzgerald, a question-and-answer session with the audience and a book signing.
     Copies of The Devil's Pipeline will be available for purchase at the bookstore.
Bill McKibben
     Fitzgerald's first novel, The Fracking War, drew praise from noted environmentalists Bill McKibben and Sandra Steingraber.
     "If you've thought the debate over energy policy was a tad dry, this novel might change your mind," McKibben said. "God hopes it never comes to this!"
     In comments about the novel, Steingraber compared the novel to other novels that influenced public opinion.
     "It was Uncle Tom's Cabin, not economic date, that turned the page on slavery," she said. It was The Grapes of Wrath, not demographic reports that opened the 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 choice and conscience aroused."
     Filmmaker Josh Fox (Gasland & Gasland II) thought Fracking Justice captured the swirling political and social morass created by hydrofracking and its proponents.
     "It may be fiction but it shows how the fossil fuel industry is fracturing not only our land but our communities," Fox said.