Archive for March, 2009
A Border Mystery from Paul Levine
Paul Levine ’69 Com has a nice behind-the-scenes piece on live.psu.edu about his latest novel, Illegal. In his posting, he tells how the novel found its center of gravity after he had a chance meeting with a mother and son trying to make it across the border from Mexico.
The blurb on Levine’s Web site describes the book this way:
“Say hello to Jimmy (Royal) Payne, the trouble-prone hero of ILLEGAL. Did I say ‘hero?’ He’s a lawyer who skims money from a bribery sting, punches out cops, and skips town when he’s jailed for contempt. And yet the plight of a twelve-year old Mexican boy touches Payne’s cynical heart. The boy’s mother disappeared when a border crossing went to hell, and Payne hits the road to track her down.”
Levine, who was named a Distinguished Alumnus in 2003, has been writing legal thrillers for about 20 years now, including the Solomon vs. Lord novels and the Jake Lassiter series (featuring a Penn State football player-turned-lawyer). He also wrote episodes for TV’s JAG.
Illegal, published by Bantam, came out yesterday.
Chas Brua, contributing editor
Rambo Onstage, Sort Of
Yesterday’s New York Times theatre section reviewed a show called Rambo Solo, a send-up of an obsessed fan of the novel First Blood. That book, which eventually led to Sylvester Stallone’s Rambo movies, was written by David Morrell ’67 MA, ’70 PhD Lib.
The review is generally favorable about the show, staged by Nature Theater of Oklahoma, although a bit snarky about Morrell’s novel.
Chas Brua, contributing editor
A Powerhouse on West Campus
On Saturday, I went to see the women’s rugby team in action. I don’t know much about the sport, but I do know that the Lady Ruggers are one of the best club programs in the nation; plus, I felt I owed it to myself to catch a game after profiling All-American Kate Daley in the magazine’s Jan/Feb ’09 issue. So it was fitting that on Saturday, Daley seemed to score every time she touched the ball. Even with a “split” squad that saw the Lady Ruggers divvy up their best players into two teams, Penn State trounced Princeton and Pitt by a combined 172-5.
In the second half against Princeton — by which time the score was something like 62-5 — I snapped a photo of a Penn State player getting up after scoring a try. Lying on her back, she was using her momentum to swing herself back onto her feet — and I guess she didn’t notice the Princeton player lying face-down in front of her. Point being, it only looks like the Penn State player (who might be Lauren Rosso, Meghan Byrnes, or Annie “Meatsticks” Zeigler — ladies, feel free to leave a comment and let me know) is adding insult to injury by bashing her vanquished foe on the noggin.
Click to enlarge... though the Princeton player would probably rather you didn't.
Either way, it was that sort of day for the Tigers. Maybe if they’d seen this video from two years ago — back when the team played on the IM fields near Beaver Stadium — of the Lady Ruggers picking up and moving a truck some unfortunate tailgater had left the day before, they’d have known better than to show up at all.
Ryan Jones, senior editor
The Champs Are Here
The men did their part on Thursday and Friday. The Penn State women finished the job over the weekend, winning two of three individual titles to give the combined Nittany Lion fencing team its 11th national championship. Penn State finished the NCAA meet with 195 points, 13 ahead of runner-up Notre Dame. Big Ten rivals Ohio State finished third.
Sophomore Doris Willette (who we featured in the Jan/Feb ’08 issue of The Penn Stater) twice defeated Harvard’s Olympian Emily Cross en route to the foil title, doubling up on the individual championship she won as a freshman in 2007 (Willette redshirted last year). And junior Anastasia Ferdman, already a two-time All-American in epee, won her first national title.
Ryan Jones, senior editor
No, I Don’t Have Any Antlers to Check, Thank You
I was just checking in online for my flight to San Francisco tomorrow for the aforementioned editors’ conference and was pleasantly surprised to see that the airline lets you pay the not-so-pleasant checked-bag fee ahead of time, online. One fewer thing to do at the airport. And I was amused at the pop-up list of items that you can’t check ahead of time:
Do they get a lot of passengers bringing Christmas trees on board? How much extra would it cost to check a vaulting pole, I wonder? (And where exactly would they stow it?)
Tina Hay, editor
Ah, We Knew Her When
Former Penn Stater senior editor Vicki Glembocki ’93, ’02g is really seeing her freelance-writing career take off. In addition to the book she released last year and the stories she does for Philadelphia Magazine (and The Penn Stater), she’s got two new articles in major magazines this month.
The April 2009 issue of Reader’s Digest includes a story by Vicki called “You Be the Judge: Should This Soccer Mom Go to Jail?” The subtitle reads: “A woman escaped from prison at 20 and led a law-abiding life for the next 32 years. Should she be required to serve out her sentence?” Vicki tells me that “You Be the Judge” will be a regular feature in the magazine, in which she finds court cases that could go either way, and then present them without bias, letting readers “be the judge.”
Vicki also has an article in the new issue of Parents magazine, called “Should We Have One More?”
Oh, and she’ll be on the Oprah show on April 6! More on that when we get more details.
Tina Hay, editor
Off to California (Soon, Anyway)
This weekend I’ve been finishing up a presentation on sports coverage that I’ll be making at our national editors’ conference next week in San Francisco. Alumni magazine editors gather once a year to talk about their craft, and while the tough economy means that a lot of editors won’t be able to attend this year, we still should have more than 200 in attendance.
The description of the sports panel mentions that “Our team of experts consists of a sports nut at a sports nutty school, a self-avowed sports novice who nonetheless has published a memorable athletics cover story, and one of Sports Illustrated’s finest practitioners of literary journalism.” Apparently the sports nut at the sports nutty school is me.
It’s true that I’ve been paying attention to sports since I was a kid. As evidence of that, I plan to show attendees this gem from a scrapbook I kept when I was about 11: an autographed photo of Roman Gabriel. I had quite the crush on Roman Gabriel. If you look closely, you can see that he wrote: “To Tina – Always a 110% – Roman Gabriel.”
I also read all of the books in the Chip Hilton sports series (anyone else remember those?), went to Pirate baseball games at Forbes Field, the whole bit.
And, as evidence that I work at a sports-nutty school, I’ll show them this information from our reader surveys:
A lot of alumni magazines don’t even have a sports section, but at The Penn Stater, it’s readers’ second-most popular section. I know that a lot of editors in the audience work at schools where sports isn’t quite as dominant as it is at Penn State, so my challenge will be to offer advice that’s useful to them as well.
Tina Hay, editor
Serious Swordplay
I spent Friday morning at the Multi-Sport Facility here at University Park, checking out the mid-to-late rounds of the men’s NCAA Fencing Championships. Penn State finished the day in terrific shape, leading the overall team race and winning individual national championships in two of three weapons. (The women fence this weekend, with preliminary rounds on Saturday and the late rounds and finals on Sunday. You can see the full schedule here.)
I had a blast showing my four-year-old these “real” sword-fighters, though I found it difficult to explain how two Penn State fencers could face each other (as happened when Daniel Bak faced teammate Aleksander Ochocki in the semifinals of saber). “But which one’s the stinky team, Daddy?” he asked. As my son understands it, sports involve a good team (usually Penn State) playing a “stinky” team (often Michigan or Ohio State). I tried to explain how fencing is an individual sport, and that two athletes from the same team occasionally have to compete against each other.
He wasn’t buying it.
Anyway, I put my very limited camera skills to work, borrowing the office Nikon to shoot what I could. Thankfully a few shots turned out semi-respectably (all of which you can see much bigger by clicking on the images below). Enjoy.
Senior James Moody (right) advances against his opponent. Moody finished 6th in epee.
A tournament official checks the electronic wiring that registers touches on fencers' suits. Scoring bouts can be pretty complicated: Different parts of the body are fair game depending on the weapon, and officials can overrule the electronics — which, did I mention, don't always work?
Penn State junior Nick Chinman (right) lost this bout, but he rebounded to win gold in foil.
Chinman's blue Nikes. Fencing shoes are pretty cool.
Legendary Penn State coach Emmanuil Kaidanov watches a bout.
Miles Chamley-Watson (center), a Penn State freshman, listens as an NCAA official explains a contested point in an early bout. Chamley-Watson eventually lost to teammate Nick Chinman in the foil semifinals and finished tied for third.
Penn State teammates Daniel Bak (left) and Aleksander Ochocki face off in the saber semis.
Ochocki takes a breather during his semifinal bout with Bak.
Ochocki celebrates his 15-13 victory over Bak. The Penn State freshman went on to beat Daryl Homer of St. John's for the NCAA saber title.
Ryan Jones, senior editor
Clearly I Need to Get Out More
Somehow I managed to miss the fact that Penn State Berks has a labyrinth! I visited the campus some years back, but this is a more recent addition—completed in 2004.
I mention this because my colleague and Facebook buddy Lisa Weidman, director of university relations at Berks, mentions on her Facebook status update today that they’re having a spring equinox festival at the labyrinth garden tonight from 7 to 9 p.m. The event will include everything from an astronomy lesson to a discussion of “greenman folklore” to bulb plantings.
Hey Lisa, I hope you’ve got a photographer at the event….
Tina Hay, editor
An Amazing Video
Yesterday a Penn State student by the name of Maxwell Kruger sent us some photos he took at THON last month, along with links to several videos he produced. He got access to the catwalks above the Jordan Center and filmed some time-lapse videos from above. The one here shows THON in its entirety, from setup to tear down, in time-lapse video. You can see them taking apart the basketball court, laying down a different floor for THON, the whole bit. Just very, very cool.
Kruger also has a blog where he shows what he’s doing in photography—and he is definitely doing some interesting stuff.
Tina Hay, editor
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