In his ninth book detailing the exploits of Emerson Moore, author Bob Adamov turns The Washington Post reporter into a contract killer.
“Missing” refers to the main character’s memory, lost from a head injury during a prison escape by a Detroit mob boss. When the mob boss, Jimmy “Diamonds” Diamonte, discovers this, he retrains Moore, giving him a new name, Manny Elias, and providing a backstory of his days as a hit man — while turning him into a killer.
It’s a jarring change for the character, but, otherwise, for fans of the Moore series, this book is like slipping on a pair of broken-in boat moccasins: Comfortable and familiar. The action proceeds at a breakneck pace (with short chapters to make it feel even faster), starting in Moore’s home base of Put-in-Bay and proceeding to Detroit, the Florida Keys and finally Northeast Ohio for the climax and denouement.
Adamov’s a native of Northeast Ohio and a regular around the Lake Erie shores and islands. This book — like his others — is a love letter to the places he calls home, with references to the Beer Barrel, DeRiviera Park and the Round House Bar at Put-in-Bay and the Olde Jaol Steakhouse and Tavern in Wooster, where Adamov lives now. He even drops in names like Mike “Mad Dog” Adams and Ray Fogg, both entertainers familiar to those who spend time at Put-in-Bay.
Adamov came late to writing novels, publishing his first Moore book in 2002 after he’d turned 50, but he’s making up for lost time. He plans to release another Moore book, “Golden Torpedo,” next year about the wreckage of a U-boat found along the Florida Keys and relates it to a Nazi artifact at Put-in-Bay — and possibly a World War II conspiracy. He says he’s also drumming up plotlines for an 11th and 12th Moore book. “I’ll keep on writing as long as the ideas keep welling up,” he says.
Lessons learned
Patrick T. Perry has offered his nuggets of wisdom for decades in various publications in Northeast Ohio, from The News-Herald to Inside Business magazine.
And for almost as long, people have been telling the human resources and business development executive to compile those columns. “People kept telling me, ‘You really ought to put them in a book,’” Perry says. “It finally sank in that people might be interested.”
The result is “Re-Shape Re-Define Re-Imagine,” a collection of 61 columns that touch on a variety of topics, including pets, dating and sports.
“The focus is to inspire people to self-assess and think differently about how to enhance their personal and professional lives,” he says.
Perry’s fond of relying on Albert Einstein’s old saying that insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results, and he uses it to consider a variety of points. Why don’t we look at a presidential campaign as a job interview and apply the same principles? Should failure be rewarded if it comes from taking risks? What can be done to make work feel less like, you know, work?
But it’s not just a business manual. Perry’s columns are easily accessible with tales of his parents, his dogs and the teams and athletes for whom he roots. And since it’s a collection of short columns, it’s meant to be picked up, read for a few minutes at a time and then put back down if you’re so inclined.
“It’s designed to be disjointed,” he says.
Perry self-published the book in March using PressBooks, and even though he had to hire an editor and a graphic designer, he says, “I found the process to be incredibly simple, even for a novice like me.”
What he did find difficult, he says, was compiling the material he’d already written. The 61 columns included in the book represent about 60 percent of his total output — and they are revised and refined with some new material. “I really underestimated how hard that was,” he says, noting he spent about a year on the project.
Now that he’s written his first book, Perry’s set his sights on another. He plans to release it next March, and it will be more focused on success in the workplace. He hopes it’s a well-received as “Re-Shape Re-Define Re-Imagine.”
“I am humbled by the feedback I’ve gotten,” he says. “I really didn’t expect it.”