Latest news with #SamanthaHarvey
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Loved ones advocate and raise awareness to battle opioid crisis
NEW PORT RICHEY, Fla. (WFLA) — On Saturday, mothers, fathers and other loved ones gathered to spread awareness about fentanyl overdoses in Tampa Bay. They handed out free Naloxone, which can reverse opioid overdoses, made signs, put up billboards, and shared their stories. Each sign you see with a picture and a name along US-19 is someone's child and loved one who was killed by fentanyl. Samantha Harvey lost her son, Joseph, in February of 2024. 'Joey was a great kid, he was getting ready to have a baby. He's forever 24,' Harvey said. She said having support from other parents is what helps her cope. 'It's a great support system. It's been a great experience in such a tragic time. If it wasn't for these moms, I don't know where I would be,' Harvey said. 'I'm new with this, I'm fresh, I'm only 15 months in. They're all really strong.' Tammy Plakstis created Dylan's Warriors in honor of her son, Dylan, who died in 2020. 'I felt like Dylan was always a special person, so it helps me cope to think, you know what, I'm going to help save lives through him,' she said. Plakstis is always passing out Narcan, a brand of Naloxone, and teaching others how to use it. She said before she lost her son, she had no idea about fentanyl and Naloxone. 'Keep it in your car, keep it in your pocketbook, you never know where there can be a situation where somebody may have unfortunately been exposed to fentanyl,' she said. She hosts several gatherings in front of the billboards she puts up. 'It doesn't discriminate, it happens to anyone, and you don't necessarily have to be an addict for this to affect you. It's hurt a lot of families here in the United States,' Plakstis said. These mothers come together to grieve, advocate, and try to prevent other parents from having to experience their pain. 'Some people say, 'Well, how can you, how do you go on,' and I was one of those people that said if anything were to happen to my kids, I would've thought I was going to die,' Plakstis said. 'I know my son died for a purpose and the purpose is to save other lives.' 'I couldn't save my son, but the awareness can save lots of other daughters and sons. Our kids' lives mattered,' Harvey said. These mothers want people to know that they are not alone. Below are resources available across Tampa Bay. Hernando Community Coalition Fentanyl Awareness Coalition Behavioral Health Centers Baycare Haven Health They said they will continue to fight to give their children, and others, a voice. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Daily Mail
15-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Which book makes Quentin Letts cry every time?
What Book... ...are you reading now? Having just chewed through Samantha Harvey 's Booker prize-winner, Orbital, I fancied another voyage story, this time more dangerous. Joseph Conrad's 1897 novella about the merchant ship Narcissus, sometimes titled The Children Of The Sea, is certainly that: surging, salt pages of muscular peril. My criticism of Orbital, though I admired its idea, its dreamy prose and brevity, is that little happens in space. Astronauts are quite boring. Conrad's 'immortal sea' is a constant threat, as are his gnarled, desperate characters – though he was terrible at dialogue. Halfway through the excellent Penguin Classics edition, I have a suspicion Narcissus and her crew may meet a pitchy end. ...would you take to a desert island? Anthony Trollope's The Way We Live Now. It describes, with dry humour, an opulent conman who fools 19th century London. The Victorian House of Commons leaps to life. David Suchet was perfect in the BBC 's 2001 adaptation. Trollope is good at depicting women, and in my 20s I fell in love with Madame Max Goesler, a 30-something Viennese widow in several of his novels. ...first gave you the reading bug? My father was a schoolmaster. Books were everywhere: GA Henty's imperial adventure yarns, PG Wodehouse's surreal souffles, RJ Unstead's history stories and H Rider Haggard's sultry King Solomon's Mines. Quite sexy, though as a ten-year-old I didn't realise that. I was gripped, too, by Rosemary Sutcliff's more prim The Eagle Of The Ninth and I gurgled at Gerald Durrell's animal-packed comic memoirs. We had a children's edition of The Odyssey. Disguised Odysseus returns home to Ithaca after 20 years. The only being to recognise him is his dog, Argos, who has waited for his master's return. Faithful Argos is in a bad state. He wags his tail, sighs, dies. Made me cry every time. ...left you cold? St Paul's letters in the New Testament. Too intellectual for me. I can never work out what he is saying. And I have tried, four times, Anthony Powell's A Dance To The Music Of Time. One day I'll crack it.
The Age
13-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
An election and wild weather couldn't stop our most isolated writers festival
When Marcus Zusak came to Margaret River in 2000 to do a library reading from his first novel, nobody turned up. The librarian made him do the reading anyway. Twenty-five years later, when The Book Thief author returned, he was in a big theatre full of readers. 'It's amazing to us that you're still out there,' he said to his audience. 'It gives me hope. I feel like I'm looking at the last bastion of civilisation.' These last bastions crop up everywhere. In May alone we've seen events such as the Margaret River Readers & Writers Festival, the Melbourne Writers Festival, the Stratford Shakespeare Festival, the Penola Coonawarra Arts Festival and the Sunshine Coast Hinterland Writers Festival, with the Sydney Writers Festival due to start on Monday. I attended the 17th Margaret River festival, in the southwestern corner of Australia, possibly the most isolated literary gathering in the world. That isolation, plus a federal election and wild weather, failed to stop a record crowd of more than 7000 watching more than 50 writers, including Booker Prize winner Samantha Harvey, Booker finalist Charlotte Wood, feminist icon turned crime writer Jane Caro and bestselling Irish novelist Marian Keyes. The theme of the festival was 'the universe is made not of atoms but of stories'. Nobody actually agreed with this – of course the universe is made of atoms! – but Samantha Harvey put us in a humble cosmic mood with a reading from her novel Orbital evoking the vision of the universe as a calendar year, where humankind emerges in the last blink before midnight on New Year's Eve. British philosopher A. C. Grayling, billed as 'the rock star professor', said he went to bed with Jane Austen every Easter, and went on to analyse the philosophy of Pride and Prejudice. He wanted us to rescue the much-derided term 'woke' and wear it with pride. But he wasn't quite so keen on cancel culture: 'You should hear what they have to say, so you can challenge it.' And he revealed he'd been banned from Twitter 'by that defender of freedom of expression, Elon Musk'. Hannah Kent told us about her tough time as an exchange student in Iceland, the inspiration for her novel Burial Rites. She was brave enough to try the disgusting local delicacy, rotten shark meat. Another time she found herself in a mysterious meeting of Icelanders who decided she could be their slave and sweep up the blood. Fortunately, the blood was fake: they were actors in a play. Peter Godwin's memoir was full of distress, secrets and surprising humour. At the age of 90, his mother took to her bed for no apparent medical reason and began to let loose with uninhibited jibes, all spoken in a brand new frightfully posh voice.
Sydney Morning Herald
13-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
An election and wild weather couldn't stop our most isolated writers festival
When Marcus Zusak came to Margaret River in 2000 to do a library reading from his first novel, nobody turned up. The librarian made him do the reading anyway. Twenty-five years later, when The Book Thief author returned, he was in a big theatre full of readers. 'It's amazing to us that you're still out there,' he said to his audience. 'It gives me hope. I feel like I'm looking at the last bastion of civilisation.' These last bastions crop up everywhere. In May alone we've seen events such as the Margaret River Readers & Writers Festival, the Melbourne Writers Festival, the Stratford Shakespeare Festival, the Penola Coonawarra Arts Festival and the Sunshine Coast Hinterland Writers Festival, with the Sydney Writers Festival due to start on Monday. I attended the 17th Margaret River festival, in the southwestern corner of Australia, possibly the most isolated literary gathering in the world. That isolation, plus a federal election and wild weather, failed to stop a record crowd of more than 7000 watching more than 50 writers, including Booker Prize winner Samantha Harvey, Booker finalist Charlotte Wood, feminist icon turned crime writer Jane Caro and bestselling Irish novelist Marian Keyes. The theme of the festival was 'the universe is made not of atoms but of stories'. Nobody actually agreed with this – of course the universe is made of atoms! – but Samantha Harvey put us in a humble cosmic mood with a reading from her novel Orbital evoking the vision of the universe as a calendar year, where humankind emerges in the last blink before midnight on New Year's Eve. British philosopher A. C. Grayling, billed as 'the rock star professor', said he went to bed with Jane Austen every Easter, and went on to analyse the philosophy of Pride and Prejudice. He wanted us to rescue the much-derided term 'woke' and wear it with pride. But he wasn't quite so keen on cancel culture: 'You should hear what they have to say, so you can challenge it.' And he revealed he'd been banned from Twitter 'by that defender of freedom of expression, Elon Musk'. Hannah Kent told us about her tough time as an exchange student in Iceland, the inspiration for her novel Burial Rites. She was brave enough to try the disgusting local delicacy, rotten shark meat. Another time she found herself in a mysterious meeting of Icelanders who decided she could be their slave and sweep up the blood. Fortunately, the blood was fake: they were actors in a play. Peter Godwin's memoir was full of distress, secrets and surprising humour. At the age of 90, his mother took to her bed for no apparent medical reason and began to let loose with uninhibited jibes, all spoken in a brand new frightfully posh voice.
Telegraph
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
So Oscar voters must now watch every film? About time
The art of judging a prize is a strange process. From my experience – judging radio dramas and TV shows – it is quite a lonely process that involves a lot of slog. To the outside world, I am sure that this sounds irritating: that, in the public imagination, judging panels consist of urbane types sitting around stroking their chins and offering recondite thoughts that are of interest to nobody but themselves. I admit there is a bit of that – a bit of point scoring and old enmities rising to the surface. I know people who are compulsive judgers which often makes me wonder – why are you so desperate for your voice to be heard? Are you on an ego trip, or are you compensating for something that is lacking in your life? But I would also defend the need for prizes which are judged by experts – they are a necessary part of the cultural ecosystem. These days, so much good art (be that books, films, visual art or theatre) goes unnoticed as the algorithm demands that we all watch or read or listen to the same thing. A prize like the Booker is very valuable in bringing unknown writers to the fore, which is exactly what happened last year when Samantha Harvey won for Orbital, and was deservedly propelled into a different league as sales rocketed. However, I have caveats about prizes and panels and that is over degrees of scrupulousness. This is in my mind because it has just been announced that Oscars voters must now watch every film in a category in order to cast their vote. Seriously? I had always assumed that that was the case, and certainly Bafta instigated this rule several years ago. To cast your vote on a film that you have not actually seen seems to be both a dereliction of duty and a little bit corrupt. Mind you, the new stipulations – which were instigated following criticism of those who admitted they had not seen The Brutalist or other nominees and involve the Academy tracking viewership through a members-only streaming platform – veer towards the Orwellian. I admit that I am a bit of a swot. In the past, I have not only watched or listened to all entries more than once, but I have also made copious notes. This might seem a little extreme, but I think that such things should be taken seriously. Apart from anything else, there is a need to counter the whiff of behind-the-scenes skulduggery that has emerged in the past. Remember the storm when several critics resigned from the Evening Standard Theatre Awards (including our own Charles Spencer) following a dispute over the judging process which was reported to have involved a secret ballot? Meanwhile the Booker has suffered from all sorts of controversies over the years – most recently when a tie between Margaret Atwood's The Testaments and Bernardine Evaristo's Girl, Woman, Other, was seen as a fudge on the part of the judges. But there is also the question of whether book prize judges read everything – including that onerous Booker pre-longlist which can consist of over 160 titles. In the past, actor and comedian Robert Webb caused minor outrage when he said that it was impossible to read them all in the allotted seven months. He had a point, but surely you don't take on the challenge unless you are willing to wholeheartedly commit. Oscars voters, in comparison, have it easy. OK, The Brutalist is over three hours long, but that's nothing compared to Eleanor Catton's 263,000 word doorstopper The Luminaries. Of course, it's about time that the Oscars got their act together. Variety's recent report on anonymous ballots highlighted a hilarious ineptitude – this year, for example, there was a mistaken belief that Ralph Fiennes (star of Conclave) had won before. Thus, the Academy's doubling down is to be welcomed. In an era where everyone is a critic, where the public are increasingly suspicious of exclusive cliques making decisions, judges and voters need to prove their integrity. After all, the only thing worse than an urbane chinstroker is a lazy urbane chinstroker.
