Project and content management for Contemporary Authors volumes
WORK TITLE: American Vineyard
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://vincentlowry.zenfolio.com/
CITY:
STATE: CA
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
Has one son.
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Children: a son.
EDUCATION:Attended Tulane University.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Author, environmentalist, financial manager, and photographer.
AWARDS:New Mexico-Arizona Book Awards finalist, 2017, for American Vineyard.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Vincent Lowry’s varied works include poetry (Surfing the Seconds), short stories (Dreams Reign Supreme) and a number of novels: Constellation Chronicles: The Lost Civilization of Aries, #LucysLetter: The Children of the Greenhouse Age, and American Vineyard.
Constellation Chronicles
Constellation Chronicles is set in the American southwest and is an alien-contact story with elements reminiscent of E.T. and Star Wars. “Glenn Sawyer is a teenager living in Rigel, New Mexico,” stated Chris Gerrib in POD People. “Glenn’s a geek–interested in alien civilizations and flying saucers. Then one stormy night, something crashes in the desert outside town. Glenn, who happens to be driving by with his grade-school-aged sister, stops and investigates.” The object proves to be a huge alien spacecraft, which Glenn and his sister Crissy immediately decide to investigate. Glenn decides that such an important find demands documentation and heads home, with Crissy in tow. Crissy points out that something has followed them from the crash site: a small monkey-like alien named Paako, who proves to be quite friendly.
“But Paako and her kind are not the builders and pilots of the crashed spacecraft,” declared Thomas Drinkard in Bookpleasures. “When Glenn, without Crissy, takes Paako back to the crashed vessel, she leads him into the depths of the gigantic ship. There he finds … the builders and pilots of the craft.” These creatures, the Povars, enlist Glenn as their savior in their struggle with their enemies, who were responsible for the spaceship’s crash. Constellation Chronicles reaches its climax as Glenn and the Povars engage in a frantic space battle, fighting for their very existence.
#LucysLetter and American Vineyard
#LucysLetter is an environmental novel about the problems of global warming. It features a little girl named Lucy Gold whose planet has been devastated by years of greenhouse gas emissions that have gone unchecked. In addition, Lucy has to deal with the unexplained absence of her father and the suspicion that her mother may in fact be a murderer.
American Vineyard is described as a coming-of-age novel in which an adult man looks back on his youth. “Narrator Davy Blake,” explained a Publishers Weekly reviewer, “alludes to a trauma that occurred in 1982, when he was 13.” Davy and five of his closest friends were rebuilding a fence at a ranch to repay damages for which they were responsible when an event occurred that resulted in a death. As an adult, Davy begins reflecting on his past in an attempt to come to terms with it. “I hope the story sweeps [readers] away on an unexpected journey,” Lowry wrote on the E-author Resources website, “and brings them back with a vision of the world that’s a little brighter.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Publishers Weekly, October 9, 2017, review of American Vineyard, p. 48.
ONLINE
Bookpleasures, http://www.bookpleasures.com/ (July 26, 2009), Thomas Drinkard, review of Constellation Chronicles: The Lost Civilization of Aries.
E-author Resources, https://eauthorresource.wordpress.com/ (January 12, 2017), Vincent Lowry, author profile.
POD People, http://podpeep.blogspot.com/ (July 12, 2009), Chris Gerrib, review of Constellation Chronicles.
Vincent Lowry Website, http://vincentlowry.zenfolio.com (March 28, 2018).
No bio.
American Vineyard
Publishers Weekly. 264.41 (Oct. 9, 2017): p48.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
American Vineyard
Vincent Lowry. Sandhill Crane, $17.99 trade
paper (628p) ISBN 978-0-692-84584-4
Lowry, author of the SF novel Constellation Chronicles: The Lost Civilization of Ares, demonstrates his versatility with this memorable coming-ofage narrative. The prologue provides the dramatic context for what is to follow, as narrator Davy Blake alludes to a trauma that occurred in 1982, when he was 13 years old and living in Huckleberry, N.Mex. He had five close friends at the time and thought that they would remain connected forever, until "the lightning split the sky and flooded the desert mesa" and an unexpected evil that "had been lurking at the edge of the horizon" struck, violently claiming a life. Lowry then alternates between 1982 and 2001, when an adult Davy, who still suffers from nightmares, learns of the death of the father of one of his clique. That news prompts him to begin writing a journal about the events leading up to the murder of his unnamed friend; the delayed reveal of whom he lost is an effective hook that sustains engagement. (BookLife)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"American Vineyard." Publishers Weekly, 9 Oct. 2017, p. 48. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A511293321/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=d45e2f09. Accessed 16 Feb. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A511293321
Sunday, July 12, 2009
REVIEW: Constellation Chronicles: The Lost Civilization of Aries
Title: Constellation Chronicles: The Lost Civilization of Aries
Author: Vincent Lowry
Genre: science fiction
Price: $14.95
Publisher: Mill City Press
ISBN: 978-1-934937-35-8
Point of Sale: Author’s site Amazon.com
Reviewed by: Chris Gerrib
I recently received Vincent Lowry’s first novel, Constellation Chronicles: The Lost Civilization of Aries. It’s an interesting book, and one that I am finding difficult to review. From a technical point of view, the only flaw I see is a tendency to italicize brand names. Otherwise, the writing is clear and entertaining. Yet I still am a bit ambivalent about the book. I think part of my difficulty is that the book is really a novelization of Lowry’s so-far unproduced screenplay.
The plot of the book is simple enough. Glenn Sawyer is a teenager living in Rigel, New Mexico. Glenn’s a geek – interested in alien civilizations and flying saucers. Then one stormy night, something crashes in the desert outside town. Glenn, who happens to be driving by with his grade-school-aged sister, stops and investigates. The object proves to be some kind of spacecraft, and one of its occupants, a small furry biped, tags along for the ride back to Glenn’s house for dad’s digital camera. Due to various issues at the Sawyer house, Glenn returns alone to the spaceship, and meets the crew, who are giant creatures resembling polar bears.
This is the point where the plot and I part company. We are told that Glenn’s visit to the spaceship is no accident, and that the aliens are the survivors of a civilization destroyed in a war, a war which is on its way to Earth. Glenn’s help is required to save Earth from this threat.
Now, here’s where I’m having difficulties. If your exposure to science fiction is limited to movies and TV, this plot is believable, if a bit overdone (how many “Chosen Ones” are there, anyway?) If you get your science fiction from reading, the plot doesn’t work – at least not on paper. Whisk me along on an epic voyage, show me some pretty pictures and blow stuff up real good on screen, and I’d probably consider it okay.
Here are just a few of the TV tropes that I found irritating in the book:
* Crew of starship is in suspended animation, but they don’t wake up until after the ship has crashed. (Shouldn’t they wake up well before the ship approaches the planet?)
* Instant and fluent command of English by aliens.
* Space dogfights at extreme close range.
* Super-thick asteroid belts, or in this case, Kuiper belt.
* Captains of ships representing two warring alien races know each other’s name, and routinely communicate with each other during battle.
On the other hand, while not super believable, the book tells an entertaining tale. Lowry is a good writer, and Glenn seems to be a believable teen. Compared to, say, the latest Transformers movie, the plot is a marvel of believability and comprehension.
RATING 7/10
Posted by Chris Gerrib at 12:04 PM
Labels: 7/10, Chris Gerrib, review
Constellation Chronicles, The Lost Civilization of Aries Reviewed By Thomas Drinkard Of Bookpleasures.com
By Thomas Drinkard Published July 26, 2009 Science Fiction
Thomas Drinkard
View all articles by Thomas Drinkard
Author: Vincent Lowry
ISBN: 978-1-934937-35-8: ISBN- 978-934937-35-5
Publisher: Mill City Press
Click Here To Purchase Constellation Chronicles: The Lost Civilization of Aries
This book is a quick, fun summer read. It is more space/fantasy than hard science fiction and appears to be aimed at the teen audience—although this reviewer, far from his teen years—thank goodness, enjoyed it.
An eighteen year-old young man, Glenn Sawyer, is broke and harassed both at school and at home. When he and his somewhat brattish sister, Crissy, are on their way to get dinner, they see a fiery object whiz by, close overhead, and crash in an open field.
When they investigate the crash site, they find a huge crater. In the crater, “… jutting out about twenty feet like the nose of a submarine…” is an alien spacecraft. When he, accompanied by Crissy, crawl inside a hole in the craft, they find that the vessel is immense and obviously not of this Earth.
While inside the craft, Glenn—who is a science and science fiction fan—is amazed and plans to go back home and get his camcorder and come back to record what he has seen. As he and Crissy work their way back to the hole, Crissy keeps insisting that there is something following them. And there was.
A monkeylike little creature, who we later find is named Paako, has large, silver eyes; four webbed paws; a belly pouch like a kangaroo and a fuzzy tail split into five parts at the tip. Paako is a chameleon-like creature. Her fur changes from white, to pink, to red and to black, indicating her emotions. She loves popcorn.
But Paako and her kind are not the builders and pilots of the crashed spacecraft. When Glenn, without Crissy, takes Paako back to the crashed vessel, she leads him into the depths of the gigantic ship. There he finds, past an entrance door that he estimates at ten feet high, the builders and pilots of the craft. They are in immense, liquid-filled hibernation tanks and remind Glenn of polar bears without muzzles, but with gigantic humanoid hands and feet.
When they awaken, the first is the captain of the ship: Rumaas. The others soon join him and before the night is over, they identify Glenn as their Quda—a mystical seer who will be the “chosen prodigy” to guide them, the Povars. Their first Quda, Ramesh, also from Earth had said that:
The great prophet will unearth the fractured hearts of a lost people. He shall rise from obscurity to heal and mend.
Glenn is astounded and disbelieving, but eventually is persuaded to join Povars as a fighter pilot in a wild battle against the forces that have caused the crash of the ship. The battle scenes are reminiscent of the space battles in “Star Wars,” against a foe that intends to totally destroy the few remaining Povars.
The author obviously means to work his way through other constellations in sequels. Science fiction fans that enjoy the genre and don’t demand deep science explanations—but love fantasy and action—will find an enjoyable read in this book.
Click Here To Purchase Constellation Chronicles: The Lost Civilization of Aries
#LucysLetter: The Children of the Greenhouse Age Paperback – December 1, 2015
by Vincent Lowry (Author)
A dark family secret haunts a young Lucy Gold as she struggles to survive in a world ravaged by the effects of climate change. Her mother is a suspected murderer, her father has been absent since her birth, and her planet—after generations of careless greenhouse gas emissions—is a nightmare of droughts, fires, and violent storms. As Lucy grows older and unravels the closely guarded mystery surrounding her past, she discovers an opportunity to redefine her life and alter the fate of children in the path of unfathomable environmental hazards.
January 12, 2017
My 2017 blog entries so far have focused mostly on photography, so I think it’s about time I wrote one about the second goal of my creative dream: becoming a full-time writer. I’ve been creating stories ever since I moved out to California, about seventeen years now, and I’m currently editing my newest fiction novel American Vineyard. It’s a coming-of-age mystery about friendship, bullies, and growing up in the 80s. I wrote the book fifteen years ago. I have no idea why I decided to wait so long to finally publish it (it must have been God’s design), but I’m pleased I’m finally taking this crucial step to now see it in print. The story is probably the best piece of art that I’ve ever created. I suppose my critics will say that statement doesn’t mean much, but I’ll just tune them out like I’ve always done through the years (with both writing and photography). I’m proud of this novel. Really, really proud. I reminds me what it was like to be a kid, the beautiful and awkward moments alike, and it teaches me something new no matter how many times I’ve read it.
It’s my hope American Vineyard does the same for others when they read it. I hope the story sweeps them away on an unexpected journey, and brings them back with a vision of the world that’s a little brighter than the one they’d had before opening the book. And maybe they’ll turn to the first chapter again after finishing it, and take the journey one more time.
And become a kid again.
(Vincent Lowry – Author of American Vineyard and #LucysLetter)