Category Archives: Media

August 3, 2024 · 4:10 pm

The emperor and the interpreter

In May 2023, Nonna and I jetted to Hong Kong as guests of a storied auction house founded in 1796. Phillips had invited us for an event we never imagined participating in: the auction of a priceless watch that had belonged to Aisin-Gioro Puyi, the last emperor of China.

We had spent nearly a year working on contract for Phillips, helping verify the watch and writing a catalogue the size of a coffee table book. And suddenly we found ourselves schmoozing with the kind of people who could casually spend a fortune on a watch. The timepiece eventually sold for $6.2 million.

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Filed under Media, Puyi, Uncategorized, Watches

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June 11, 2024 · 2:34 pm

Dangerous new satire launches

Fiction! Disinformation! Run and hide, while there’s still time!

They told my agent my new novel could not be published. Too dangerous! You’re not allowed to question the Jan. 6 narrative, they said. It was the worst crisis since the Civil War, since the Visigoths sacked Rome. Delete your account.

He tried valiantly, but there were no takers, and we parted ways amicably. So I am publishing The Insurrectionist myself. And today the novel launches, in both paperback and ebook formats.

What’s it about?

Denied a promised posting in Paris, Ian Landquart, a reporter with the storied Chicago Bullet newspaper, is shunted off to a suburban bureau and assigned to redact racist language from the historical archives.

To salvage his career, he investigates an elephant-owning farmer who protested nonviolently on Capitol Hill on January 6, 2021. But as Ian gins up an FBI probe, he learns that his progressive teenage daughter is dating the farmer’s conservative, gun-owning son—ensnaring the teens in the case.

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Filed under Books, Fiction, Free speech, Media, novel, Russell Working

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