Selected Events 2005

Meet American Writers at the U.S. Embassy Stand

As in previous years, the U.S. Embassy in Germany participates in the Frankfurt International Bookfair. We highlight publications and products for schools and libraries as well as specialized services for information professionals and academics.

This year, you also have the opportunity to meet and chat with American authors at our booth. Please check out the schedule below and join us for interesting discussions and some fun with David Gilbert, Todd Strasser (aka Morton Rhue), U.S. Business Expert John Caslione, and Korean-American writer Leonard Chang!

October 19, 12:00
Meet David Gilbert who just introduced his latest book "The Normals"
David Gilbert was born in Paris in 1967. In 1969 the familiy moved to New York City. David Gilbert is a regular contributor (short stories and other material) to The New Yorker, G.Q. and Harper´s Bazaar. He has just finished the screenplay for Don DeLillo’s Endzone. In 1998 his short stories were published by Scribner as Remote Feed. The Normals was published in 2004 by Bloomsbury, USA. David Gilbert lives in New York City with is wife and two children.

October 20, 15:00
Frankfurt Students chat with Popular American Author at U.S. Embassy Booth
Consul General Peter Bodde joined Frankfurt students for a web chat with U.S. author Todd Strasser (popularly known in Germany by his pen name, Morton Rhue) on October 20. Todd took questions and comments from students and teachers on the impact of his books and their powerful themes during a live Internet chat to celebrate the Frankfurt Book Fair. Students from around Germany participated in the chat from their computers at home. Rhue’s books "Die Welle", "Asphalt Tribe" and "Ich knall euch ab!" are popular reading in schools throughout Germany. Photos | Report from Washington | Transcript

In the book, the powerful forces of group pressure that pervaded many historic movements such as Nazism are recreated in the classroom when history teacher Burt Ross introduces a "new" system to his students. And before long this system, with its rules of "strength through discipline, community, and action," sweeps from the classroom through the entire school. And as most of the students join the movement, the characters Laurie Saunders and David Collins, recognize the frightening momentum of "The Wave" and realize they must stop it before it is too late.

October 21, 16:00
Reading and Book Signing with U.S. Business Expert John Caslione
Mr. John A. Caslione is founder and President & CEO of Andrew-Ward International, Inc. (1991), a global marketing and sales firm with offices in Chicago (US) and in Frankfurt (Germany). AWI assists companies to develop and implement global marketing, global business development and global alliance strategies including a special focus on how to globalize with China. Mr. Caslione is a successful global businessman highly sought-after for his expertise and experience in globalization, developing global marketing and global distribution strategies for companies of all sizes.

His latest best-selling book, "Global Manifest Destiny: Growing Your Business in a Borderless Economy," has been chosen once again as one of Harvard Business School's "HBS Working Knowledge" top business book picks for four consecutive years!

October 22, 11:00
Consul General Peter Bodde welcomed our Guest of Honor:
Korean-American writer Leonard Chang
Leonard Chang was born in New York City, and grew up on Long Island, where he attended the public schools in Merrick. After high school, Leonard studied at Dartmouth College, but took time off after his sophomore year to intern briefly with the Peace Corps in Kingston, Jamaica. He soon returned to the United States, where he continued his studies in Philosophy at Harvard University, and graduated with honors. From there, he attended the Master's of Fine Arts program at the University of California at Irvine, and received his M.F.A. in 1994.

His first novel, entitled The Fruit 'N Food, was published in 1996 and won the Black Heron Press Award for Social Fiction that year, and is now taught at colleges around the country. His second novel, Dispatches from the Cold (Black Heron, 1998) won a San Francisco Bay Guardian Goldie Award for Literature. Over the Shoulder (Ecco/HarperCollins, 2001), his third, appeared to wide acclaim, and introduced the character Allen Choice, who is also the focus of Underkill (St. Martin's Minotaur/Dunne, 2003). Allen Choice returns in the new Fade to Clear (St. Martin's, 2004), which is garnering some of the strongest reviews of Leonard's career.

Interviews, Essays and Literary Criticism (including German PhD Dissertation on Asian American Literature (See Chapter Five, p. 150ff.)