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The Big Belly Flop | 
 enlarge | Author: Kent Whitaker
Publisher: Amazon
Category: Book
Buy New: $0.49
Avg. Customer Rating:  1 reviews
Sales Rank: 1310651
Media: Digital
Pages: 17
ASIN: B000R4F9RS
Publication Date: May 7, 2007
Availability: Available for download now
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Everyone has a fun story, an accomplishment or achievement that helps define who they are. Many of these events happened to me when I was a child growing up with two older brothers. As a father and uncle I am often requested to tell the stories about growing up with my brothers. My kids, nieces and nephews love hearing about our adventures. I have noticed my brother's wives love hearing them too. Nothing beats a good memory.
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| Customer Reviews:
Take a universal drudgery-dip, dunk it a few depths to the Nth of writing talent, then surface with a reader appreciation splash June 20, 2007
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
I swear the Golden Retriever in the photo on this Amazon Short possesses charismatic conjuring qualities. One look at him sitting on the list of Hot New Releases on the Amazon Shorts page, and I clicked on the cover of "THE BIG BELLY FLOP" to go to the buying page and see what that dog and man were about. The "author speaks about" the story was also warmly inviting, describing Whitaker's family taking time to listen to stories about each other. The blurb's closing line snipped the last straw for the click on 49 cents. That line read:
"Nothing beats a good memory."
Also noticing from the materials on this Shorts' buying page that Kent is a barbeque master with a few cookbooks under his belt and a new one coming out in August 2007, I was ready to believe one of Whitaker's recipes might include memory retention seasonings as well as flavor sensations. I believe in the healing power of food (the good stuff, not the shredded cardboard put out by health gurus).
Here's a sample of how Whitaker adds word spice to his backyard barbeque scene. Note the way the gesture was composed with only a few words which gave characterization value, slid the reader into the action, rang true in dialogue, and blurted out a snip of well-humored, social wisdom:
>> "The real issue is liability! Insurance my friend, insurance is your problem." Paul stated with a slight gesture of his beer hand. "I didn't think about that." John said. [Paul continued]: "Liability is the issue. Society is based on who you can sue and who will sue you." <<
Then double drool detail was set: >> While we were talking about liability and Paul's belief on how everyone is out to get you I began to place the evenings select dish on the grill. Tonight we were having Kent's Root Beer Grilled Chicken. << (That flavor burst recipe was included at the end of the Short.)
And, just wait till you read what followed that quote!
Then Kent dropped into an even truer storyteller mode and regressed in his mind about a dark (sort of) daydream. Admired the way he wrote that situation as it evolved over a few years of his youth. Especially given that one of the barbeque conversations was about liabilities of swimming pool ownership, this segment was artful with pass-through imagery: >> It was a fearful daydream type of event that still lingered in my preteen memories. It was a scary childhood fear that came flowing back into the shallow end of my mind. <<
As the story continued Kent accomplished the writer's sleight of words in dramatizing a childhood fear with realism, warmth, humor, and the right abundance of well-chosen words. When I realized I was itching to quote and clamor over nearly every line; I sluiced the itch to avoid republishing THE BIG BELLY FLOP into a review.
Great memoir style. Kent Whitaker might be notching a viable niche here. He's already come a long way with his culinary showmanship.
After digesting this one, if you're in the mood for another culinary memoir, Coal & Coca-Cola
Linda Shelnutt
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