Novacek’s Border Crossings at Great Lakes History Conference
I’m leaving VERY EARLY tomorrow morning for downtown Grand Rapids, Michigan where I will be exhibiting BORDER CROSSINGS: Coming of Age in the Czech Resistance at the 39th Annual Great Lakes History Conference on the GR campus of Grand Valley State University. I’m looking forward to meeting and introducing BC to an audience of teachers of history. The conference is sponsored by the Grand Valley State University History Department, Michigan Council for History Education, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and the Kutsche Office of Local History.
I’ve been told BORDER CROSSINGS would be an excellent choice as a book for supplementary reading at the advanced high school and/or college level. It’s particularly appropriate for those studying Central and Eastern European history, migration, immigration, World War II and the Cold War.
The U.S. Review of Books said, “This book makes an important contribution to the literature of World War II and communism in Eastern Europe.” Christina Vella, writer, historian of
modern Europe, and adjunct professor at Tulane University in New Orleans stated, “BORDER CROSSINGS helps fill the lack of personal accounts of resistance movements amidst a voluminous array of World War II literature. This compelling memoir, written through the eyes of young Charles, shows how circumstances required him to become a shrewd hero. In his opposition first toward Nazism and then Communism, Charles Novacek’s personal story illustrates why people sacrifice themselves and their families for an ideal. Intimate, intense, fascinating.”
BORDER CROSSINGS has also been recognized for its excellence in writing about history. The book has been a finalist and winner of 13 awards for independent publishing among them are the2012 Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPY) – Bronze Medal for World History and the 2013 National Indie Excellence Award – Winner – History
Friday night’s keynote address is open to the public and I’m hoping to attend “Neighborhood History as Activism, ” presented by Professor Melanie Shell-Weiss, Director of the Kutsche Office of Local History, GVSU. This is an important issue in my Detroit neighborhood and was an important issue for both Charles and me.
What are your thoughts about the importance of neighborhood history?
