Motown Burning - Softcover

Jeffire, John J.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0615317235 ISBN 13: 9780615317236

Publisher: WriteOnDetroit, 2014

Synopsis

Late July of 1967, and Detroit boils over. For Aram Pehlivanian, aka Motown, the Grande Ballroom and the music of the MC5 and Iggy Pop and The Temptations no longer provide a haven as destruction engulfs his city.  However, escaping death in the streets during the '67 Detroit Riots only leads him to the jungles of Vietnam and away from Katie, the girl who might be his salvation. Beaten on the streets of Detroit, hunted in the jungles of Vietnam, and fueled to survive by the music of the Motor City, Aram burns with one goal...to see Katie again. Winner of the 2005 Mount Arrowsmith Novel Competition and the 2007 Independent Publishing Gold Medal for Regional Fiction.

About this title

About the Author

John Jeffire was born in Detroit.  In 2005, his novel Motown Burning was named Grand Prize Winner in the Mount Arrowsmith Novel Competition and in 2007 it won a Gold Medal for Regional Fiction in the Independent Publishing Awards.  Speaking of Motown Burning, former chair of the Pulitzer Jury Philip F. O'Connor said, "It works. I don't often say that, but it has a drive and integrity that gives it credible life....I find a novel with heart." In 2009, Andra Milacca included Motown Burning in her list of "Six Savory Novels Set in Detroit" along with works by Elmore Leonard, Joyce Carol Oates, and Jeffrey Eugenides.  His first book of poetry, Stone + Fist + Brick + Bone, was nominated for a Michigan Notable Book Award in 2009.  Former U.S. Poet Laureate Philip Levine calls the book "a terrific one for our city."  

Review

"John Jeffire's novel Motown Burning breathes life into an all too familiar battered and bruised Detroit, reminding me of John Dos Passos's Manhattan Transfer, how 200-plus characters as a collective group define New York City, where the setting 'becomes' the main character with a steady flow of immigrants coming and going, searching for opportunity, for a place to call home."
            --James Tomlinson, winner of the Judith Siegel Pearson Prize
 

"It works. I don't often say that, but it has a drive and integrity that gives it credible life....I find a novel with heart."
--Philip F. O'Connor, former chair of the Pulitzer jury
           

"Motown Burning is raw, the emotions, powerful, and the images, brutal. The dialogue is coarse and gritty and paints an uncompromising portrait of war. It is through this language and Jeffire's rich imagination that history comes to life."
--Holly Smith, thedetroiter.com

About this edition

• Publisher: WriteOnDetroit
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 0615317235
• ISBN 13: 9780615317236
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 218