Thursday, January 31, 2013

THE YELLOW CAR



Just saw MIDNIGHT IN PARIS for the third time and couldn’t help marveling at the ingenuity of Woody Allen in keeping things simple while bringing us face-to-face with that whole magilla of authors and artist expatriates from the 1920s.
             
             It’s midnight in the Paris of today. An aspiring author played by Owen Wilson sees a mysterious yellow car approaching from out of the mist. Filled with rowdies looking for a good time, the car stops in front of him.  He decides to get in. It takes him to a Parisian bar and he goes inside.  
              
             WHAMMO—suddenly Wilson is drinking and rubbing elbows with Hemingway and Fitzgerald, Zelda, Alice B. Toklas, Gertrude Stein, and cozying up to the mistress of Picasso. Later he meets Salvadore Dali, Bunuel, Man Ray, T.S. Elliot.
             
             While we struggle with magical devices like time machines and space ships and complicated portals and flashbacks and flash forwards, Woody Allen chose the everyday simplicity of a car to move us backward almost a century in time. Sure it was exotic—that strikingly yellow 1925 Peugeot Type 176 sedan.
              
             But that yellow car got us to where Woody Allen wanted us to go. No long, perilous journey through space. No feeling we didn’t belong. Just as natural as stepping into a hybrid for a trip to the office or the Mall.  Absolutely brilliant.

Sunday, January 27, 2013

WELCOME BACK, KATE CONWAY



My favorite female protagonist is back in action. Flame-haired investigative reporter Kate Conway returns in THE DEADLY BUDDHA. And my readers have fallen for her, head over Kindles.   

“Talk about new age heroines,” wrote one reviewer. “Kate is a natural blend of intellect, power, determination and, by the way, beauty and a real healthy sexuality. She represents the young women of today who are different, bright, well-educated and focused on following their dream, which isn't having babies, playing bridge with the girls and joining the right country club. I want to see more of Kate Conway as Mr. Ong develops her character and her next adventure.”

In THE DEADLY BUDDHA Kate gets trapped into writing the life-story of an Oscar-winning Welsh heart-throb. As much as she hates the Hollywood scene, she can’t avoid falling in love with the guy—despite discovering the ghastly truth about his conniving mother and her diabolical lover in their search for The Golden Buddha of Anyang.

This second volume in the Kate Conway trilogy features museums filled with intrigue, swimming pools filled with temptation, a Welsh city filled with witnesses that keep disappearing, helicopter rides that discharge passengers prematurely—and a 16-year-old Chinese charmer named Zookie, whose sensual body holds the secret of where the billion-dollar Buddha is buried.

But above all THE DEADLY BUDDHA features a female protagonist who makes her readers sit up and take notice while making her author proud—proud of having created a character that is right for the times.