Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

I wish all my friends and readers a most happy new year! 
I pray that you all had a wonderful--illness-free--Christmas!

I'm happy to report that Inspector Javert has taken off and fared well (for me) in the book marketplaces.

David Oyewolo... the best Jean Valjean

The best Inspector Javert on film or TV is David Olewoyo (BBC and PBS series). 
About Javert, Oyewolo is quoted by Bridget McManus, in The Sydney (Australia),  Morning News Herald (June 13, 2020): 

"Javert's the antagonist, but he really believe, from a moral perspective, that he'd doing the right thing. His job is to keep order. In his mind, he's doing something incredibly noble and heroic."

#DavidOyewolo #inspectorjavert #lesmiserables #jeanvaljean #victorhugo

#inspectorjavert

#victorhugo

#jeanvaljean

#lesmiserablesmusical

Inspector Javert is here.. and he's looking for you...

My latest book, Inspector Javert: at the Gates of Hell, is available now on Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook formats.

Javert stands atop the parapet staring down at the

River Seine below him. He looks into his future but sees nothing but disgrace--possibly prison--for sparing Jean Valjean's life. So, he steps off and falls into the river. But what happened to him next?

I offer my take on that next? And what might be waiting for each one of us when our time comes.

https://www.amazon.com/Inspector-Javert-Gates-Wisdom-Mis%C3%A9rables-ebook/dp/B09GWFBR2Z/ref=sr_1_1?crid=34B2W1GD23OL4&keywords=inspector+javert&qid=1637612727&sprefix=inspector+j%2Caps%2C215&sr=8-1

#lesmiserables-musical

#inspectorjavert

#victorhugo

#jeanvaljean

#lesmiserablesmusical

The Beliefs of Victor Hugo

 

Bellos, David. The Novel of the Century: The Extraordinary Adventure of Les Misérables (Kindle Location 1667). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

“Les Misérables expresses the beliefs that Hugo held, which were quite particular to him. He was never reluctant to say that he believed in God, but he did not subscribe to any established tradition or cult. Contrary to the impression that Les Misérables may make on some readers, Hugo was not a Catholic. Unlike most French people of his age he had never been baptized or confirmed and had never taken communion; he never attended religious services and never went into church to pray. But pray he did. And he was adamant that Les Misérables was ‘a religious book.’”

#lesmiserables-musical

#inspectorjavert

#victorhugo

#jeanvaljean

#lesmiserablesmusical

 

Go With a Pro
 
Manuscript Evaluations and Editing

Alfred J. Garrotto

Expert and Ethical

Entrust your manuscript to an experienced book reviewer, writing instructor, and manuscript editor, who has authored 16 books (both fiction and nonfiction) on a range of topics and themes. In addition, I offer professional editing for other authors. I have covered all the bases as a writer--commercial publishing and independent publishing. As a veteran of the writing business, I see it from both the publisher’s and author’s viewpoint. 

 

My Editing Philosophy
Your work is sacred and primary. I will respect your original text, while offering positive critical recommendations in the margins or within the text itself when I see the need. I respect the author’s feelings and sense of pride and accomplishment.

Some authors request that I revise/rewrite their text, as needed (fee structure upon request since no two projects are the same). 

Client Testimonials

"Al Garrotto respected my writing and gave me an honest evaluation. In refining my story, he captured the essence of what I had experienced. His enthusiasm, skill, patience, and diligence to detail leaves no doubt that his editorial ability is 'par excellence.' Al also handled all of the nitty-gritty work required for independent publication. He's the BEST!"  Kathryn Davi-Cardinale, Joseph—My Son, My Guide: Communications From the Baby I Lost at Birth

 “Al Garrotto's editing work strikes me as the best available. He gave an amazing smoothness to my book. And what a shock to find his fees are far and away the lowest I've run into.” – Author/Educator Richard C. Brown, Ph.D. (When Ministry is Messy and A Practical Guide for Starting an Adult Faith Formation Program)

“Al has taken the place of a (critique) group, pointing out omissions, clumsy constructions, lack of clarity, illogicalities.” – Aline P’Nina Tayar, Author of How Shall We Sing? Picador Australia

"Thanks so much for your excellent evaluation. Some of your comments I have heard before, but some were new and most appreciated. I'm looking forward to tackling another edit and working on some of the problems presented." 
-- Christine Sunderland, author of the trilogy: Pilgrimage, Inheritance, and Offerings.

Fees
Every project is unique and needs to be discussed before a final fee is set.
The following schedule will help you estimate the cost of evaluating/editing your work.

•  Reading & Evaluation (only)

You'll receive an honest, objective, written evaluation of your work. 
(1-5 pages) 

Initial reading and evaluation: US$30.00 per 100 ms. Pages.
Return postage required, if you wish your submission to be returned. 
Partial ms. and first drafts accepted. 
A ms. page is 25 lines, double-spaced. (Single-spaced pages count as 2 pages.)

•  Line Editing

My current fee for line-editing a manuscript is US$1.75 per ms. page (25 lines, double-spaced).

alfredjgarrotto@gmail.com

All inquiries are welcome. Free consultation.

Inspector Javert is Coming . . . Soon and Very Soon

 

I’m delighted to announce a mid-November rollout for new my novel, Inspector Javert: at the Gates of Hell. Victor Hugo’s most despised antihero stands on the parapet where the swirling River Seine beckons to him. He hesitates . . . then steps forward. 

Readers wonder, “What happened next?” Did Javert cease to exist? Is there life on the other side of life as we know it here on Earth? If there is, what kind of existence awaits  Javert—and each of us—on that “other side”? I offer readers my own version of what came next for Javert . . . and might for us.   #lesmismusical   

                              

    

#lesmiserables-musical

#inspectorjavert

#victorhugo

#jeanvaljean

#lesmiserablesmusical

 

 

Inspector Javert is Coming for You

Here's the front cover for my new novel, Inspector Javert: at the Gates of Hell in both paperback and e-book formats.

Design by Andrew Benzie, https://www.andrewbenziebooks.com/  

Publication in early October and available on Amazon and through local bookstores and your favorite ebook seller.

Writing Javert took about 14 months and ever two dozen drafts. The writing came as both a pleasure and a challenge. Javert and I share nothing in common other than our humanness.  He's the "anti-me." Climbing inside the head of Victor Hugo's antihero took great emotional energy, but in the process, I got to know him better and understand what made him...Javert.

I can't wait to put it in the hands of readers. Let me know what you think. Thumbs up/down/sideways.

Victor Hugo's Testament of Life

 “You say the soul is nothing but simply the result of bodily powers that begin to ail. In my heart, Winter gives way to eternal Spring. I breathe the fragrance of lilacs, violets, and roses. The nearer I approach to my eternal home, the plainer I hear around me the crescendo of a universe of endless symphonies.

“Yet, the marvelous simplicity of ensemble washes over me like a warm summer shower. I feel like the charming prince in a children’s fairy tale. For half a century I have been writing my thoughts in prose, verse, history, philosophy, drama, romance, tradition, satire, ode, song. I have tried all. But I feel that I have not said the thousandth part of what is in me.

“When I go down to the grave I can say, like so many others, ‘I have finished my day’s work,’ but I cannot say, ‘I have finished my life.’ My day’s work will begin again the next morning. The tomb is not a blind alley; it is a thoroughfare. It closes in the twilight to open with the dawn.

“I improve every hour, because I love this world as my fatherland, because the truth compels me, as it compelled Voltaire, that human divinity. My work is only a beginning. My monument is hardly above its foundation. I would be glad to see it mounting and mounting forever. The thirst for the infinite proves infinity.”

Victor Hugo

Image: Rodin's "Bust of Victor Hugo"

Original Source: Sacramento Daily Union, March 16, 1882 (twenty years after publication of Les Miserables and three years before the great man’s death)

Javert's flaw in "Les Misérables"

 

“Few characters are scarier than the villain who thinks he is the hero. That is the case for Inspector Javert, the pitiless cop who vows not to rest until he sees our fugitive hero, Jean Valjean, safely behind bars. Is there no room for redemption in his book – even for himself? The Terminator in a frock coat, Javert makes this list through sheer tenacity.”

From “The six baddest Broadway villains”

in “What’s Onstage”
Zachary Stewart, New York, NY
16 September 2020

Bishop Myriel: In His Own Words -- Chapter 1, The Beauty of Goodness

I have been invited by Art Embraces Words to do a virtual reading this month (August) of a chapter from my latest (2020) novel, Bishop Myriel: In His Own Words. A firm date has not been set, but I will keep my readers informed through all my online social media sources.

Below, is that same first chapter. Enjoy this "sneak preview."

The Beauty of Goodness

 

[Myriel’s sister, Baptistine] had never been pretty; her whole life, which had been a succession of pious works, had produced upon her a kind of transparent whiteness, and in growing old she had acquired what may be called the beauty of goodness.

-- Fantine,  Book the First, Chapter I, M. Myriel: An Upright Man
 
 
     I am compelled by grace to explore a phenomenon I have observed with awe over the course of my lifetime. We Frenchmen are obsessed with beauty. The ancient Greeks were as appearance-consumed as upper class culture is today. Yet, they had the insight to peg the root of beauty to the word, ὥρα (in Koine, their common dialect). It meant “being one’s hour,” an interesting linkage to be sure. Beauty, then, knows “what time it is” or better perhaps “knowing who I am and who I am not.” My personal mandate as a human, then, is to know my true relationship with every person I encounter, at each stage of my journey and all the individual days that comprise that journey.

     I offer my dear sister Baptistine as a model of virtuous living. The call to recognize the “beauty of goodness,” however, applies not only to those having a lifelong resume of virtue. I have witnessed beauty’s goodness at life’s earliest stages. A toddler knows no other way of being than “in the moment,” even as the child grows and changes from week to week. A mother holding her child in her arms, searches beyond that moment for hints of the emerging man or woman in their maturity. I suspect that, within every parent there resides an unspoken awareness that they may not live to see their children fulfill their God-given destiny.

I have witnessed the beauty of goodness in teenage years, when it easily suffers displacement along the meandering path to maturity. I pay attention when I hear of any child, teenager, or young adult taken too soon by illness or tragedy. Also, when I hear of young soldiers sacrificing their precious lives on the desecrated altars of their elders’ self-serving wars. Parents and friends remark, “He was such a fine young man, always ready to assist someone,”  or “He was too good  for  this world.”  My heart cries,  “No!  The world  needs such young, idealistic men to stay alive, to make their mark upon our shattered society!” Some of us live our way into beauty. Others suffer their way to it. I think of patients I have known in our neighboring hospital whose clear eyes glow with inner light.
 
The beauty of goodness is like that hidden treasure Jesus spoke of in Matthew 13:44:
"The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure, hidden in a field. The one who finds it, buries it again; and so happy is he, that he goes and sells everything he has, in order to buy that field."
 
     When I discover goodness, be it for a moment or longer, I rejoice in its native beauty and bask in its bright light. So inspired, I take quill pen in hand. I lay no claim, on earth or before God, to poetic aptitude. At those times when I hear the call—I should say “challenge”—of the muse, I dare to express my heart in the fewest possible syllables. In doing so, I take comfort in knowing that no other eyes will see—and, God forbid, judge--my verse.

  

The Beauty of Goodness

i see goodness

in a mother’s smile

a helping hand

a loving heart

 

i find goodness

in a kind word

a silent shrine

sunrise aglow

 

chancing upon the

beauty of goodness

i catch my breath

stand in awe

Bishop Myriel: In His Own Words is available through your local bookstores or through Amazon and other online book sellers. Paperback list price: $17.99, ebook $3.99.