Developing Minds: An American Ghost Story
About this ebook
-Bronze medal winner of 2016 FAPA President's Awards (Adult eBook category)
-Recommended by Kirkus Reviews
Developing Minds: An American Ghost Story follows a group of recent college graduates who struggle with feelings of alienation and their addictions as they try to survive a year of teaching at two dysfunctional Miami public schools.
A poetic and insightful coming-of-age novel, Developing Minds is centered on 24-year-old Luke Entelechy, an aspiring writer who sees his creative output suffer when he begins teaching at one of Miami's most challenging middle schools. As the year progresses, however, Luke begins to relate to the neglect and abuse his students suffer, and is faced with a "haunting" decision: continue to let his dark past destroy him, or rise above the struggle to realize his potential as an artist and a "real" human being.
Equal parts disturbing and humorous, Developing Minds offers a brutally honest look at the American public school system and the extreme measures many teachers take to cope with working in it.
*Developing Minds: An American Ghost Story is the fourth book in a loosely-linked series, with Hammond, The Summer of Crud, and Understanding the Alacrán as books one-three, and The Soul City Salvation as book five. Each novel can be read independently of the others.
About the author
Jonathan LaPoma is an award-winning novelist, screenwriter, songwriter, and poet from Buffalo, NY. In 2005, he received a BA in history and a secondary education credential from the State University of New York at Geneseo, and he traveled extensively throughout the United States and Mexico after graduating. These experiences have become the inspiration for much of his writing, which often explores themes of alienation and misery as human constructions that can be overcome through self-understanding and the acceptance of suffering.
LaPoma has written five novels, thirteen screenplays, and hundreds of songs and poems. His screenplays have won over 160 awards/honors at various international screenwriting competitions, and his black comedy script Harm for the Holidays was optioned by Warren Zide along with Wexlfish Pictures (American Pie, Final Destination, The Big Hit) in July 2017.
LaPoma’s novels have been recommended by Kirkus Reviews and Barnes and Noble (B&N Press Presents list), have hit the #1 Amazon Bestseller lists in the “Satire,” “Urban Life,” “Metaphysical,” “Metaphysical & Visionary,” and “Religious & Inspirational” Kindle categories (USA, Canada, and Australia), and have won awards/honors in the 2018 Eric Hoffer Book Award, the 2016 and 2017 Florida Authors and Publishers Association President’s Awards, and the 2015 Stargazer Literary Prizes. He lives in Mexico City.
