Day: September 23, 2020

Book release: ‘The Resurrection of Fulgencio Ramirez’ by Rudy Ruiz

‘The Resurrection of Fulgencio Ramirez’ is the new release from Rudy Ruiz. Photo: google

Rudy Ruiz is a writer, advocate and social entrepreneur.  The award-winning author’s short fiction has received several awards,  including four International Latino Book Awards for his short-story collection “Seven for the Revolution” and the 2017 Gulf Coast Prize in Fiction. His stories have been published in the Notre Dame Review, Ninth Letter, Gulf Coast and New Texas. A native of the US-Mexico border, he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Harvard, and now resides in San Antonio with his wife and children. Ruiz is also a regular special contributor to CNN and co-founder of Interlex, an advertising and marketing agency. His new book “The Resurrection of Fulgencio Ramirez” weaves together the past and present as Fulgencio strives to succeed in America, break a mystical family curse, and win back Carolina’s love after their doomed youthful romance. It was just released this week.

Set in the 1950, in “The Resurrection of Fulgencio Ramirez,” tensions remain high in the border town of La Frontera, Texas.  Yet amidst the discord, young love blooms at first sight between Fulgencio Ramirez, the son of impoverished immigrants and Carolina Mendelssohn, the local pharmacist’s daughter. But their bonds will be undone by a force more powerful than they could have known. Thirty years after their first fateful encounter, Fulgencio Ramirez, RPh, is conducting his daily ritual of reading the local obituaries in his cramped pharmacy office. After nearly a quarter of a century of waiting, Fulgencio sees the news he has been hoping for: his nemesis, the husband of Carolina Mendelssohn, has died. “The Resurrection of Fulgencio Ramirez” offers a vision of how the past has divided us and how the future could unite us.

Book review: ‘How to Write Anything: A Complete Guide’ by Laura Brown

‘How to Write Anything’ by Laura Brown

Laura Brown, has taught writing to everyone from corporate executives to high school students. Her expertise includes instructor-led training, individual coaching, classroom teaching and e-learning development. She has more than twenty-five years of experience providing training and coaching in business writing and she has also taught composition and literature at Columbia University. Her book “How to Write Anything: A Complete Guide” is a practical guide to writing at work, home or at school.

“How to Write Anything” begins with an Introduction by the author where she explains that in all her years of helping people to write, she has never met anyone who “can’t write.” In reality, everyone can write, they just need to understand the process of writing and the exact situation they are writing about. This is where she comes in. The book is divided into three sections: Section I gives guidance about the writing process and techniques to use based on the writing task, Section II is devoted to “e-writing,” writing done on a computer, a smartphone, an iPad or any other device connected to the Internet and Section III is an encyclopedia of nearly two thousand different writing tasks and how to write for each. The Table of Contents divides the writing tasks according to topics to make them easy to find.

Even though writing has evolved from exclusively pen and paper to e-writing, it is still necessary to know how to properly express an idea or thought.  “How to Write Anything” is Internet-savvy for the modern age and has helpful advice on a wide range of topics from writing for personal life (holiday family newsletter, birth announcement) to writing at work (business letter, termination letter). The language is easy to understand and the writing advice is effective regardless of topic.  Each section begins with a background of the task, has a list of Dos and Don’ts to summarize the guidelines and the ‘Not Like This…’ ‘…..Like This’ sections give appropriate writing examples.  It covers a wide range of writing tasks, making it an essential guide for the whole family, particularly the sections on Social Media, page 210 – 219 and The Job Search and Human Resources, page 442-494. The helpful Index makes it even easy to look up a writing task. Overall, “How to Write Anything” is a how-to, a reference book and an essential writing resource that anyone can use.

*The author received a copy of this book for an honest review. The views and opinions expressed here belong solely to her.