Books

The First Tale:

LINDA PLAYS HOOKY

1963 was a pivotal year still immersed in all the values and manners of the 1950s, but as Bob Dylan aptly penned “The Times They are a-Changin,” a new collective consciousness was taking hold. The Civil Rights movement was coming to light and protests against the Vietnam War were becoming more urgent and strident. President Kennedy was assassinated in November and the following year the Beatles came to the U.S., which kicked off the British Invasion of the American music scene.

Against this wavering backdrop, Linda Upright is a bored sixteen-year-old junior in high school, struggling with typical teenage issues. Female breasts were on her mind almost as much as on the minds of the teenage boys who surrounded her. She discovers Paul McCartney and develops a painful obsession with him—her first celebrity love. Well, her first love of any kind.

Stuck at home with a mother also suffering from apathy and a father with Neanderthal attitudes toward women and society, Linda makes a decision that makes this nuclear family explode.

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The Second Tale:

LINDA GETS A HICKEY

It is 1964 and the country is stunned by the Kennedy assassination. Linda is now seventeen-years-old and trying to cope with the trauma of uncovering her mother’s illicit affair with their next-door neighbor, and with the new and unsettling direction of her parent’s marriage. On top of all this, she is trying to get her driver’s license and figure out where she will go to college next year. 

Her biggest challenge is how she will get to The Ed Sullivan Show to see her true love Paul McCartney when the Beatles come to America. As Ed always said, “It’s a really big shoe (sic) tonight,” and this was the biggest of them all!

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The Third Tale:

LINDA GOES TO THE WORLD'S FAIR

New York City played host to the 1964/65 World’s Fair, a showcase of mid-century advances in technology and commerce. As far as Linda’s boyfriend Dusty was concerned, the real lure to the fair was the unveiling of the 1965 Mustang, which proved to be Linda’s improbable rival.

Linda and Dusty explore exhibits such as the notorious Louisiana Pavilion where the food is not the only spicy thing going on at the fair! They interact with computer technology for the first time and are thrust into a grand display of consumerism that whetted the Baby Boomers’ appetite for convenience and instant gratification.  

The theme of the fair was “Peace through Understanding,” a fleeting sentiment before all hell broke loose in Vietnam, on the streets of Selma, Montgomery, and throughout America. The question is, will Linda retain her innocence, and for how long?

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The Fourth Tale:

LINDA GETS HAZED

In 1965 Linda finally leaves home for the first time and is totally overwhelmed. She is faced with a fashion revolution when confronted by all those Long Island girls in their miniskirts and bellbottoms and gets rushed by the upperclassmen who pounce on the incoming pretty freshmen girls. Trails of reefer smoke are everywhere along with many other street drugs like the famous and ill-fated Quaaludes, or Ludes, as they were affectionately called.

There was so much going on, on campus and off.  Fraternities and sororities competed over the newcomers. This was the year of the New York World’s Fair and the Beatles playing Shea Stadium—the first stadium concert ever. Many serious events transpired, including escalation of the Vietnam War and Bloody Sunday in Selma, AL. 

Real live men began to steal Linda’s focus on rock idols and her grades were showing the stress. But let’s face it, her parents sent her to college to get an MRS, and Linda has to find out if she’s cut out for the job. 

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