TRUDY KNOWLES
Author, Progressive Educator, Public Speaker, Workshop Facilitator
LARONE FAMILY PRESS BOOKS
RADISHES AND RED BANDANAS by Trudy Knowles
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​When Becky Jamison finds herself in a courtroom with her son, who was arrested during an Occupy Wall Street protest in 2011, it takes her back to another time. It’s 1967 and widespread resistance against the Vietnam War has rocked college campuses. Eighteen-year old preacher’s daughter Becky abandons the idealism and safety of small town Kentucky to spend the next four years at Lake Forest College north of Chicago. When Becky meets Marty, the leader of the school’s anti-war organization, she is thrust into the political and cultural turmoil of the times; the protests, demonstrations, occupations, riots, assassinations. Becky becomes immersed in a chaotic world of drugs, free love, and changing ideals.
As the body count in Vietnam climbs, the draft lottery targets the men in Becky’s life. One by one her friends and lovers are ripped away, leaving Becky behind. With Vietnam coming closer to home, every moment counts. Becky becomes the voice of the anti-war movement on campus. She must find the strength to hold on to a world she has no control over—before she loses everyone she loves including herself.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BF724G82
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CONFESSIONS OF A CONFIRMED NONCONFORMIST: SNIPPETS OF A LIFE WELL LIVED by Trudy Knowles
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Born in Lincoln, Nebraska, on November 3, 1949, Trudy Knowles has led a life filled with family, tacos, travel, children, grandchildren, laughter, and exciting adventures. When she retired from a quarter century of college teaching, she had a five-point plan: write more, make more music, dance more, play with her grandkids, and do more social justice work. Since her retirement she has done all that and more.
This book is a halfway chronological look at her life and contains essays she wrote primarily from prompts from various writing groups. These writings give you a look at a person that one of her graduate professors called “a confirmed non-conformist.”
Trudy lives in Western Massachusetts with her husband. She has five children and four grandchildren. One of her life’s mottos is “Dance with Reckless Abandon.”
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FDX1DL1Z/
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BRINGING UP SARGE by Trudy Knowles
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In 1916, after riding the rails for two years, Oscar “the Whiz” Walker lands in Albany, New York, where he becomes a pitcher for the Albany Senators, dances at the local theater, and marries Rosalina Romano. Oscar, Rose, their three children, and Sarge, a bulldog with big jowls and front legs shorter than his back, live through the cultural and political events of the early 1900s: World War I, the Spanish flu epidemic, Prohibition, women’s suffrage, the Wall Street crash, and the depression. Although Oscar is a star baseball player, a talented tap dancer, and a loving husband and father, he lives with an inner demon that eventually destroys him.
Beneath the visible story of Oscar’s life is a deeper story. Discovering the truth of that story sets his children free from years of wondering, searching, anger, and resentment. Bringing Up Sarge is a story about love, family, and forgiveness.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
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ME, MY GUITAR, AND ELVIS by Trudy Knowles
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Wendy Jackson is in love with three things that helped her survive growing up unwanted in an abusive, alcoholic family: a Gibson Sunburst guitar, Elvis Presley, and her boyfriend Scott. After high school, Wendy moves to New York City to launch her music career and the unthinkable happens. Wendy’s guitar is stolen. She loses her sense of self and her will to live, falling into the self-destructive behaviors that are familiar from her childhood. Wendy turns to Scott for help. She asks him to stay with her and to find her guitar. Scott is not sure he can do either.
Me, My Guitar, and Elvis is a story of love, survival, resilience, and one woman’s ability to persevere in the face of abuse and loss.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
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40,000 MILES ON THE ROAD: My trip around the world—March 1970-July 1972 by Trudy Knowles
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In March 1970, I went to Europe for a spring term in Athens. I planned to travel through Europe during the summer and return home for my senior year. In an unanticipated twist of event, I left from Istanbul, Turkey, in a VW van and headed east through Asia. More than 40,000 miles and two years later, I returned home. This is that story.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
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FROM LOCKDOWN TO VACCINATIONS—My journey through the pandemic of 2020 by Trudy Knowles
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In the spring of 2020, the world was thrown into turmoil when a small virus disrupted our lives. Known as COVID-19, it quickly began to zigzag its way across the planet. People went into lockdown to protect their lives and the lives of people around them. This story is my journey through the pandemic of 2020.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
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51 SHORT STORIES, 14 ESSAYS, AND 5 POEMS OF MEDIOCRE QUALITY WRITTEN DURING THE LOCKDOWN OF 2020
by Trudy Knowles
What did you do during the coronavirus lockdown? Clean your attic? Organize your photos? Watch bad TV? Put together a puzzle? Eat Pop Tarts? Take long walks? I did all that and participated in four writing groups via Zoom. These stories, essays, and poems were written in twenty to thirty minutes from prompts in those groups.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
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CELEBRATING THE GIFT OF YEARS by Nancy Knowles Lund
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We all have stories to tell. "Celebrating the Gift of Years" is Nancy Lund’s story. She began writing it in her late 70s. In addition to her story of struggles, loss of hope, and grief is a story of love, laughter, and family. Through the years Nancy learned she was resilient. She believed in her core that despair would not win. Nancy lived with a deep reservoir of hope, optimism, and joy. She was grateful for the gift of years. Nancy is one woman, quite ordinary, but ordinary in her own unique way. This is her story, and she shares it with you now.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
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THE KNOCKLEPOCKLES by Anne Knowles
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The Knocklepockles is a middle grade novel that tells the story of Riley, age 11, who is scarred by the same fire that killed her family. Riley discovers a way to live again when she is befriended by the four Knocklepockles: Olivia, Charlie, Jane, and Elmer Wallace. The Knocklepockles have been adopted by many aunts, great aunts, and Great Great Aunt Pearl. They live in a home that celebrates eccentricity and differences. The children form a bond with Riley allowing her to accept herself and to courageously return to public school.
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The Knocklepockles focuses on the themes of bullying, diversity, acceptance, resilience, and friendship.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
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A BOOK CAME KNOCKING by Anne Knowles
A book starts with empty pages. One day someone puts words on one of the pages and a poem slowly comes alive. In A Book Come Knocking, Anne Knowles has brought the pages alive with funny, thought-provoking, and inspirational words. Her poems touch on everything from the wonder of the outdoors to the deep feelings inside the hearts of children.
The book is illustrated by children and adults from age three months to 77 years. A beautiful book to share with all children.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
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IT'S BEEN A GOOD LIFE: THE LOVE STORY OF REX AND JESSIE KNOWLES by Trudy Knowles
Jessie and Rex met in 1934 as teenagers at Camp Townsend, a Presbyterian church camp near Liberty, New York. For the next nine years, they wrote letters. Through high school (Elmira, NY and Little Falls, NY), through college (Elmira College and Wesleyan University), through graduate school (Hartford Theological Seminary and Yale Divinity School) and when Jessie moved to Wilmington, Delaware while Rex finished his degree at Yale. In 1943 they married and stay married and in love for fifty years. This book was written as a tribute to their extraordinary lives for their five children, eleven grandchildren and thirteen great-grandchildren. It is their love story told through prose, autobiographical information, letters, photographs and historical research.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0863TPYV1
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THE LOVE STORY OF REX AND JESSIE KNOWLES VOL. 2 by Trudy Knowles
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It's Been a Good Life" was published in April of 2020. This volume of the love story contains documents, letters, articles, photos, and personal accounts that deepen the story of Rex and Jessie Knowles.
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AVAILABLE ON AMAZON