{"id":13788,"date":"2020-07-15T00:37:36","date_gmt":"2020-07-15T06:37:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/?p=13788"},"modified":"2020-07-15T00:37:36","modified_gmt":"2020-07-15T06:37:36","slug":"for-whom-the-book-deal-tolls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/2020\/07\/15\/for-whom-the-book-deal-tolls\/","title":{"rendered":"For Whom The Book Deal Tolls"},"content":{"rendered":"

Publisher launches Hemingway book by local educator<\/b><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

By Eric Valentine<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"
Author, and teacher, Phil Huss. Photo credit: Sun Valley Community School<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cAll you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ernest Hemingway\u2019s famous quote is being put to good use by Phil Huss. In fact, the longtime Sun Valley Community School English teacher and local Hemingway expert has written far more than a sentence; Huss has written a 10-chapter nonfiction book on Idaho\u2019s most famous resident that officially releases July 20.<\/p>\n

How can one immediately know it must contain truth? A good indicator is that the three-page forward for the book was penned by Mariel Hemingway, the granddaughter of the prolific author who in recent years shifted much of her focus to bringing awareness to mental health issues\u2014something Ernest battled especially hard toward the end of his life cut short by suicide and something Huss addresses in \u201cHemingway\u2019s Sun Valley: Local Stories Behind His Code, Characters and Crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI understand why some people dance around it, but I don\u2019t do that in the book,\u201d Huss said in a recent interview with Wood River Weekly.<\/p>\n

Huss doesn\u2019t sensationalize it either, but he notes that Hemingway attempted suicide multiple times and memory loss contributed to the writer\u2019s struggles.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s something that needs to be contextualized,\u201d Huss said.<\/p>\n

Context Is Everything<\/b><\/p>\n

The book has been a labor of love for Huss, who has been writing it off and on for the past five years. Of his 20 years teaching at Sun Valley Community School, he\u2019s spent 15 of them teaching an English elective called \u201cHemingway\u201d for upper division students, a sort of \u201cgreatest hits\u201d review of Hemingway\u2019s short stories and novels, Huss explained.<\/p>\n

One particular unit convinced Huss that all of his research to teach the class was fodder for a book.<\/p>\n

\"\"
The book cover of \u201cHemingway\u2019s Sun Valley: Local Stories Behind His Code, Characters and Crisis.\u201d Image credit: The History Press<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Huss explained that one unit of his course asks students to create a short documentary film on the five different Hemingway sites in the Wood River Valley. The research needed to make these films enhanced the student readers\u2019 understanding of the seminal Hemingway novels Huss was teaching.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s when I saw there was a book in there,\u201d Huss said.<\/p>\n

So Huss started writing. In addition, Huss published articles related to his research in Sun Valley Magazine and BigLife Magazine and became a frequent speaker at the Ernest Hemingway Seminar held each September at The Community Library.<\/span><\/p>\n

And that\u2019s ultimately how Arcadia Publishing saw there was a book in there, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was at the end of one of my lectures that I said I was writing a book on Hemingway in Sun Valley and if anyone knew how to get something published they should let me know,\u201d Huss recounted. \u201cThat\u2019s when John Lundin told me about Arcadia and their interest in local history works.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lundin, a seasonal Valley resident, is a lawyer and historian who authored a number of books. He got Huss in touch with his editor at The History Press, a division of Arcadia Publishing.<\/p>\n

About The Book<\/b><\/p>\n

Readers will get a first-hand look into local stories about Ernest Hemingway in Sun Valley and the surrounding area and how they embody principles of what\u2019s known as his \u201cHeroic Code.\u201d This will help readers understand Hemingway\u2019s most famous texts, including characters in his novels and stories that both exhibit and fail to exhibit the code principles.<\/p>\n

Each chapter is a code principle. Each chapter leads with local Sun Valley stories that develop the code principle, and the second half of the chapter develops how moments from his most famous texts embody the code principle as well. There are also previously unpublished stories about Hemingway obtained from personal interviews with locals and by reviewing archives of interviews at The Community Library.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that\u2019s the contribution this book makes to the Hemingway legacy, the new stories and how I\u2019ve codified the code into distinct chapters.\u201d Huss said.<\/p>\n

Release Info<\/b><\/p>\n

The book will be available online via Amazon, Target, Barnes & Noble, Arcadia Publishing, as well as locally at Chapter One Bookstore, Iconoclast Books & Gifts, Atkinsons\u2019 Markets, Sun Valley Museum of History, Silver Creek Outfitters and Lost River Outfitters.<\/p>\n

Huss will be giving a public talk and signing books at The Community Library in Ketchum from 6\u20137:30 p.m. on Tuesday, July 21.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s also the date of Ernest Hemingway\u2019s birthday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Publisher launches Hemingway book by local educator By Eric Valentine \u201cAll you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.\u201d Ernest Hemingway\u2019s famous quote is being put to good use by Phil Huss. In fact, the longtime Sun Valley Community School English teacher and local Hemingway expert has […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13791,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","_pvb_checkbox_block_on_post":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[74,83,18,36],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-13788","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-education","8":"category-idaho","9":"category-news","10":"category-slider"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13788"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13788\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}