Books and Banter: Julian Padowicz ~ an interview and his novel ~ A Menace in Venice

I AM PLEASED TO WELCOME AUTHOR

Julian Padowicz

TITLE: A Menace in Venice

RELEASE DATE: July 2017

AUTHOR: Julian Padowicz

CATEGORIES: Romantic Humor/Adventure/Mystery

PAGE COUNT: 214

ISBN: 978-1974368693

IMPRINT: Black Hawk

BOOK PAGE: http://ravenswoodpublishing.com/bookpages/amenaceinvenice.html

KEYWORDS: Seniors, Sailing, Boat, Unitarian, Universalism, Humor, Domesticity, Former Spouses

ONE LINER:

Kip's abusive ex wife of 30 years ago decides to make up to him for the grief she caused him and virtually destroys his current marriage.

SYNOPSIS:

In an effort to keep her soul from going to hell, Kip's abusive, seventy-year-old former wife, Marsha, comes to visit him and Amanda, so she can make up for the grief she caused him over thirty years ago. In the process, she nearly destroys their life, causing Amanda to almost lose her thumb, Kip's beloved sailboat, Manda, to sail off with no one on board, Amanda to run off, and a variety of small calamities along the way.

AUTHOR BIO:

Julian Padowicz was seven years old, Jewish, and living in Warsaw, Poland, when WWII began. After 6 months under Soviet occupation in southern Poland, he and his mother made a daring trek over the Carpathian Mountains into neutral Hungary. Arriving in America at the age of 9, Julian spent the next 13 years in boarding school and college, where his undiagnosed ADD and Dyslexia caused him considerable grief.

Graduating from Colgate University in 1954 with a BA in English, he was hired by Twentieth-Century Fox studios as editor of their company magazine, “Action.”

From 1955 to 1959 he served in the Air Force as a navigator and intercept instructor.

Following military service, he entered the documentary film profession, first as a writer and eventually as director, cameraman, editor, and producer, garnering numerous awards.

Upon retirement in 2000, Padowicz began writing a 4-part memoir of his WWII experiences. The first book, Mother and Me: Escape from Warsaw 1939 was published in 2006 by Academy Chicago and named “Book of the Year” by ForeWord Magazine. It was followed by A Ship in the Harbor, Loves of Yulian, and When the Diamonds Were Gone. A “young readers’” version of Mother and Me, published by Scholastic Inc. was a best seller in the school field.

Feeling that much of what was interesting in his life was not publishable as memoir, for fear of hurting people still living, Padowicz created the fictional village of Venice on the Massachusetts coast and peopled it with characters based on people he had known, including himself. Applying humor, which he calls his “weapon of choice,” Padowicz has written several novels in which these fictional characters go through many of the experiences he, himself, has gone through. His hero, Kip, is a retired college professor, married to his creative, but accident prone wife, the lovely Amanda, and trying to lead a “normal” life, in a new community, among whacky neighbors and whackier friends from his past.

Padowicz lives in a Hampton, Virginia with his wife, Donna Carter. Their blended family includes 5 children, 9 grandchildren, and 3 great-grands.

BANTER – STUFF ABOUT YOU

Q: Did you like school when you were a child?

A: I hated it. I have ADD, and school was just a distraction from my own agendsa. I considered it my punishment for being a child.

Q: Have you ever been too embarrassed to promote any certain titles to friends or family?
A: I would have had a difficult time promoting one of my memoirs to my ex wife, who is a major character in it.

Q: Dress up or dress down?

A: Both

Q: Dine in or dine out?

A: I really enjoy going to a good restaurant and being waited on. Again, it's not an ego thing but,, probably, a sense of being loved. On the other hand a restaurant where I consider the food to be bad, is a real downer.

Q: How do you feel about exercise?

A: I used to be a runner, till my back began giving me trouble. I used to do six miles a day, and found it to be my most creative time.

Q: Texting, love it or hate it?

A: What's textng?

BOOKS – ABOUT THE CRAFT

Q: When crafting the story do you go from beginning to end, or do you jump around writing the scenes that are pushing themselves forward in your brain?

A: I'm definitely an "immerse yourself in the situation and see what develops" guy.

Q: Do you always know how a story will end when you begin writing it?

A: Almost never. I begin with a problem and hope someone comes up with a solution. If I do it the other way, it feels mechanical.

Q: Have your characters ever taken the story in a different direction than you had originally planned? Do you have a for instance, for us?

A:When I've had an idea as to where I was going, I've usually gotten there. But I mostly write the way I first learned to swim, which was to jump in and thrash around till I start moving in some direction or other.

Q: What geographical locations are your favorite and why?

A: I know the Norteast best, and so I set most of my stories there.

Q: Generally speaking, is your work based on real life experience? If it's not would you want it to be?

A: It usually begins with a life experience, but frequently goes fa afield.

Q: How long does it take you to create a novel?

A: About a year

Q: How does the woman in your life feel about the genre you write? Has he read any of your work?

A: She not only reads my work, but also edits it.

BOOKS - NOW LETS PROMOTE – STRUT YOUR STUFF

Q: Do you have a new book coming out soon? Tell us about it.

A: I have a number of books coming out, A Scandal in Venice, Alexander’s Part-Time Band and a children’s book called Mrs. Parsly 2 – The Cat on the Mantle. All of these book will be featured on this/your blog in the near future.

That’s right! So, I’m inviting everyone to come back and learn more about them.

Q: How can we find you? Do you have a web page, FaceBook page or any buy links?

A: Yes, I do. Here are the links.

EMAIL: julianpadowicz@julianpadowicz.com

BUY LINKS:

AMAZON US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074PP2TNM
AMAZON UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B074PP2TNM
AMAZON CA: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B074PP2TNM
BARNES & NOBLE: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-menace-in-venice-julian-padowicz/1126970792?ean=9781974368693
CREATESPACE: https://www.createspace.com/7443092
PAPERBACK: https://www.amazon.com/Menace-Venice-Julian-Padowicz/dp/1974368696/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1502618305&sr=8-1&keywords=A+Menace+in+Venice+paperback ck