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Storyteller for All Occasions.

From Historical to Hysterical.

Always Entertaining.

Speaking Fees Negotiable.*

Call: 352-797-0984 or Email: jdcowling@tampabay.rr.com

 

*In Central Florida

Now available for Kindle and Nook on all online bookstores—including Amazon, Itunes and BookBaby-- is “James Brown’s Favorite Uncle The Hal Neely Story”.

This is the story of the music industry when vinyl was king, the players were wheeler dealers and talented musicians shocked and awed the young people of the world.  Hal Neely emerged from the plains of Nebraska as a gifted trumpet player, learning his craft across Middle America when Depression-era Americans could forget their problems for a night by attending a concert by traveling bands belting out the latest hits of the Big Band Sound.  He soon caught the eye of Lawrence Welk who guided him into show business.  Neely interrupted his rise in the entertainment world when World War II broke out and he enlisted in the military, playing for the troops in the Far East and providing intelligence for the war effort.  After the war he returned to Los Angeles where he had built a name for himself in the best ballrooms up and down the West Coast.  Eventually he found his way into the record production business and met Syd Nathan, the bombastic president of King Records in Cincinnati, joining his company as a producer in the 1950s.  Also he met the man whose records he created and who left him feeling unappreciated—James Brown.

Florida author Jerry Cowling took Neely’s unfinished memoirs and discovered biographical truth to be a complicated creature.  Neely’s account is recounted in his own words.  The author’s research showed something different.  Many of the participants in this musical game are dead; some of the survivors don’t want to play anymore.  What really happened?  The reader decides.
This CD has the storyteller’s spookiest tales, including some favorites from Edgar Allan Poe and Ambrose Bierce. Turn off the lights, light a candle and cuddle up with your family as you hear about ghosts, curses, crows in the cornfield and lost love.

Now your favorite stories you heard at Sweetfields Farms in Mazaryktown, Fl, are available on CD, including Sunflower Maze, The Crows Are Coming and the History of Dogs.  Perfect to play to the children at bedtime or pop into your car CD player when you’re on a road trip with the family.

Christmas will never be the same once your family listens to the storyteller’s tales of the Giggle That Saved Santa Claus, Twas the Night Before Christmas, the First Christmas and many more.  Settle down with the kids and a cup of hot chocolate for an evening of holiday fun.

You Can’t Run Away From Yourself

This is the lesson David Crockett faces in three intertwined stories--young runaway Davy, middle-aged David and a modern-day descendant Dave.  Davy runs away from home to escape a beating.  In his adventures he escapes the clutches of an evil sea captain, finds love with a hat maker’s daughter and is forced into a corner when the sea captain tracks him down.  Middle-aged David loses his re-election to Congress and upon his return home finds himself stifled by the demands of his wife and three teen-aged children.  He wants to heal old wounds with his family, but old urges to run away arise with news from Texas.  Modern Dave tries to create a new life for himself away from his angst-driven family.  The death of his brother causes him to return home to resolve old conflicts.

Your Upbringing Can Be Your Downfall

John Ross, a Cherokee who thinks he’s Moses, escapes from his mental hospital in North Carolina to track down and kill Pharaoh to set his people free.But who are his people? Cherokee, who were robbed of their lands by the federal government in the 1800s?  Hebrews, who were enslaved in ancient Egypt? Jews, who were murdered by Nazis in the 1940s?  Downtrodden people everywhere in modern America?And who is Pharaoh? His own father, who made his childhood a living he? His psychiatrist, who tried to discover the secrets hidden under his calm exterior? A former Nazi, subject of a deportation hearing for war crimes against union leaders in his own country? A television newsman, who first gained John’s trust in an interview but lost it when he reported on the former Nazi’s hearing? Just anyone who gets in his way? With two psychopathic brothers as his accomplices, John creates devastation across the Smoky Mountains in his quest to find redemption in his troubled mind for the sins of his family, and all families that plant seeds of turmoil in their children.

 

Lying….

Spying….

Dying….

Political intrigue, fueled by arrogance and lust for power, propel a Civil War nightmare in which the Lincolns are captive in the White House basement while Secretary of War Stanton pulls the strings of hapless doppelgangers upstairs and destroy the innocence of the Army private ordered to stand guard.  Historical factual reality is twisted into an emotional and dramatic allegory drawn from today’s international headlines.  No one person can control the course of war and anyone who tries condemns those sucked into his scheme to a desperate tragic end.  No reader will finish this novel without forever wondering who actually makes the decisions coming from the White House, the person we call the president or some shadowy figure lurking in the background.