Middle East | Middle East
Feb.06.2012
As I read about the ancient kingdoms of Sumer, Ur, Babylon, Akkad, etc, it's amazing how world politics don't seem to have changed. Kingdoms that grew strong enough to overpower a larger kingdom did so. Babylon, which was once a glorious kingdom was eventually laid to waste as a "backwater of...
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Jan.30.2012
A couple thousand years ago there was a "country" called Aram. It was part of Syria. The people who dwelt there were Semitic and called Aramaeans. Their language was Aramaic, which Jesus spoke. But the term Aramaean later came to denote those who were Pagan; the Christians took the title of Syrians...
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Jan.23.2012
The word is Greek and means, "land between the rivers." You are probably confused by what it means because it is often used to designate a country or ethnicity, which it is not. It is an ancient melting pot for many nations and tribes. Mesopotamia includes most of the valley between the Euphrates...
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Jan.16.2012
Asia Minor and Anatolia are the same designation. It is the peninsula between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean and comprises the largest part of Turkey. Scholars believe Ancient Germans migrated from Northern Europe to Anatolia, assimilated with pre-Hittite tribes then later fought for...
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Oct.26.2011
Sometimes they were the persecutors and at other times, they were persecuted. During their persecuted years, they were constantly being driven out of or migrating away from their homes. Early on, they went to eastern countries near their original homeland but some reports have the Jews going up to...
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Oct.24.2011
No doubt Muslims and Jews fell in love and intermarried, especially during the Middle Ages when in Spain the Arabs and Jews shared their love of exploring science, math, philosophy, religion, architecture and life’s deep questions. When you look at lists of Jewish surnames, you will see names with...
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Sep.10.2011
http://www.fictionstudiobooks.com/Fiction_Studio_Books/Our_Blog/Our_Blog...
When I began to think seriously of writing, it was always the most intricate, internal dynamics of characters that kept me coming back to create my fiction, even when I faced having to describe actual geography, and...
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Aug.19.2011
At the start of each decade of my adult life, I've had a moment when everything changed.
Of course, I can identify these moments only in retrospect. Usually, they involve a combination of choice and serendipity.
At twenty, I accepted a college friend's offer of...
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Jul.28.2011
For some writers this is no big deal. But for me, a first-class techniphobe, this is a big step. My hope is that my Redroom blogs, infrequent as they are, will now appear on my Amazon.com author's page. So I will keep this entry short and to the point. With a new book coming out this fall, THE...
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Jul.21.2011
I’ve tried to do everything the characters in my books do. I’ve roamed the alleys of Bethlehem’s refugee camps. I’ve had clandestine meetings with gunrunners in Gaza. I’ve risked diabetes to eat syrupy Palestinian desserts and made them key to the plot of “The Samaritan’s Secret.” I learned piano...
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