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A Car Crash of Sorts
 
 

A Car Crash of Sorts [Kindle Edition]

Frank Marcopolos
4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)

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Book Description

March 21, 2011
The only soldier in the history of the Army to bring both MACBETH and DUINO ELEGIES to boot camp, Dante Kronos recruits his best buddies to establish "The Reading Maniacs Reading Group" on Fort Bragg. When a barracks brothel-ring threatens to annihilate his team, can Dante destroy the threat and save the brotherhood?

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This is a short story of 5,443 words.

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Frank Marcopolos began writing as a kid in the evenings after summer days of competing--always unsuccessfully--against the older neighborhood kids (the evil "teenagers") in the P.S. 207 schoolyard. After long, hot days of sporting failures, he discovered that by writing stories, his fictional heroes (almost always coincidentally named "Frank") could always end up saving the day from the taller, menacing forces arrayed against them. He usually composed these stories by flashlight as he wrote in a black-and-white Mead notebook while seated on a shelf in his bedroom closet.

For some reason, this love of creating alternative--glory-promising--realities never died within him, and continues to this day. (Thankfully, his boyhood habit of naming all of his main characters "Frank" HAS died, however.)

Frank still lives in Brooklyn, NY, not far from that very schoolyard, among others where he also spent portions of his youth failing at various sports. He notes with sadness that the current trend in public education is to chain up all schoolyards during the summer, presumably so that the painted-on-cement bases can't be stolen.

Frank rocks a cable-free lifestyle, and ALWAYS knows where his towel is.

Product Details

  • File Size: 466 KB
  • Print Length: 23 pages
  • Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited
  • Publisher: Whirligig Media (March 21, 2011)
  • Sold by: Amazon Digital Services
  • Language: English
  • ASIN: B004TAE9ZE
  • Text-to-Speech: Enabled
  • Lending: Enabled
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #698,656 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Amazon Verified Purchase
Dante Kronos, a paratrooper assigned to Fort Bragg, comes off a week in the field. He's expecting a weekend of drinking, reading, and hot dogs with a quirky group of disciples. But his posse abandons him and he looks to fill the gap. But fill it with what?

Marcopolos takes us from the barracks to the couch of a Delta Force captain - not at home - whose wife Dante met "through the plausible guise of Amway." There's Dante's attempt to connect with another soldier jumping from a C-130. Also a drunken drive down the North Carolina backroads.

Through It all, Dante struggles against the feeling that he is under bombardment and it's "only a matter of time before they [get] the coordinates right and [nail him] with a direct hit." He needs to move. He craves action, but he's leery when it comes.

Marcopolos riffs on the rhythms of real guy speech. He punctuates his straight-up style with the occasional over-the-top phrase or reference. His soldiers' voices are right on. He shows us military life as only an insider can. And he makes us feel for this soldier who struggles to leave his demons and his isolation behind.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By litlife
Amazon Verified Purchase
This short story is packed with action, intrigue, and events that really make you stop and think. It is really refreshing to read about a military man and not have him be a chest-thumping neanderthal. Dante has a heart and a soul and a conscience. I found I was really pulling for him. If only I could find more authors who could draw me into the story like Frank Marcopolos can. I look forward to any future work, because I know I'm in for a wild emotional ride!
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Good story overall November 18, 2011
"A Car Crash of Sorts" is a case of surprisingly rich plot and depth that is somewhat marred by a disjointed writing style. My biggest beef was with the general "flow" of the plot. The author would only sometimes add asterisk to mark large changes in time or point of view.

The rest of the time there would be scenes where, for example, one paragraph would be describing Dante going over to his girlfriend's house. There would be a paragraph break and then the next line would be the same set of characters only an hour later. I found this to be distracting as I was frequently pulled out of the story trying to figure out what was going on. It's the kind of thing that could have so easily been avoided with a "Dante sat there talking to her for an hour."

In retrospect, the story concept as a whole is very good. The ending (which I won't spoil) is really what takes the entire plot to the next level. Once my brain had time to fill in all the gaps, I would say that Marcopolos can certainly weave a tale.

In this story's case, the end justifies the means. Yes, the process of figuring out what was going on made for a rough read. But after everything ties together you can't help but think that it was a really good story.
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