It all starts with a place.
Where I’ve been is what I
write about.
Anyone who knows me, or my work, is well aware that what I write is based on my experience of a place, its history, character, and story-telling possibilities. My first novel, The Day That I Die, and a more recent one, The Master Blaster, are set on my frequently-revisited Peace Corps island of Saipan. The Philippines and my home state of New Jersey have engendered books. So have Gambier, Ohio and Kenyon College. I'm utterly familiar with the place I call home and sometimes wonder if — congenial as it usually is — it has lost its ability to surprise me.
That, it turns out, is a mistake. July 4, 2015 startled me. Fresh from yard work, unshaven and unkempt, I made my way into the village, looking forward to chatting with friends and neighbors, listening to speeches, watching a notoriously quaint Independence Day parade. The usual stuff. But I was ambushed — pole-axed — when I saw my Kenyon classmate (1964) and lifelong friend, Perry Lentz at the podium, announcing the 2015 Gambier Citizen of the Year. Me. The applause, the plaque, the bouquet of roses — which I couldn't quite figure out how to hold with real dignity — were unforgettable. So were the things Perry Lentz said about me. This picture is worth a thousand words.
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Kirkus Reviews is applauding P.F. Kluge's A Call From Jersey
as ”heartfelt, funny and poignant.”
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WORDMAN
This is the name of a character in Eddie and the Cruisers. But, it is also my nickname. And it seemed a fitting title for a book about writing, being a writer, about accidents and opportunities, about people and places.