Ellis Amdur
AUTHOR

Ellis Amdur

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Ellis Amdur has balanced two careers through most of his life, that as a crisis intervention specialist and as a 50+ year practitioner of traditional Japanese martial arts. His writing meets right in the middle. His books are considered unique in that he uses his own experiences, often hair-raising or outrageous, as illustrations of the principles about which he writes, but it is also backed by solid research, and boots-on-the-ground experience. He has published seventeen, profession-specific books on crisis intervention, de-escalation and hostage negotiation. He has also published four books on Japanese martial arts, his most recent being Roots Still Cracking Rock. These books offer an iconoclastic take on these old martial traditions, some of which still exist to this day. Amdur has also published Body and Soul: Toward a Radical Intersubjectivity in Psychotherapy, a combination of a lyrical description of how phenomenology and dialogal philosophy can be applied to psychotherapy, followed by two heart-wrenching accounts showing how these abstract principles are embodied in the real world. He also edited & reworked the book, Final Chapters: A Hospice Social Worker’s Stories of Courage, Heart and Power, written by Evelyn & Shelley Amdur, his mother and sister. His first novel, The Girl with the Face of the Moon, which received both WRITER’S DIGEST's: First Place Award - 11th Annual Self-Published E-Book in Mystery/Thriller Category and READER'S VIEW: First Place Award - 2023/24 Historical Fiction Classics. It is set in Bakumatsu and Meiji Japan, a transitional period in the mid-1800's, when Japan went from Medieval to Modern in only a few years. This, however, is not a book about the privileged few; rather, this is a story of those on the fringes: a blind wandering masseuse, the woman abalone divers, the aboriginal mountain folk, a wild yojimbo (body guard and thug at once), a hunters who worship bears, seeing them as the true power of the mountains, and a woman with no place in any of Japan's societies. Writer’s Digest wrote: "This is a unique and unexpected story. The almost mythological tone . . . elevates it into something more than just a story of violence and revenge." His second novel Lost Boy, is set both in southern Sudan and in the United States. Based on his own career working in child protection, he describes Essam, an orphaned refugee from a hellscape of war who tries to save himself by saving other children. His trajectory towards revenge, towards redemptive violence, towards saving children whom no one else will help, threatens to destroy love, career and life itself. Author Geoff Thompson writes: "This is a beautifully crafted novel, but it is also much more: it is educational, it is revelatory, it is forewarning, and ultimately, it is intercessionary. I believe that these words, this story, this author will land in your life like a bomb or a seed, at the right time, with the right information and guide you towards the right direction.” Ellis’ most recent novel, LIttle Bird & The Tiger, is the winner of WRITER’S DIGEST's, 31st Annual Self-Published Book First Place Award in Mainstream/Literary Fiction. It is is embedded within Japan’s transition to modernity, its outburst into Asia, much like America’s contemporaneous ‘manifest destiny.’ The story shifts between two perspectives, those of Tachibana Hideo and Umezawa Tozaburo. Tachibana, an orphaned young woman who discovers martial arts as a child, wandering from dojo to dojo, both to perfect her art and to secure some food and shelter for the night. Umezawa is one of those tragic young men who march off to serve a cause they do not understand at the behest of men who use that bravery to their own ends. He becomes one of the many Japanese adventurers, known as tairiku ronin, who wandered Northeast Asia, joining local bandit gangs, involving themselves in revolutionary organizations, and most importantly, serving as spies to gather information on the countries that Japan intended to eventually conquer. The only way Tachibana can maintain her integrity is to be inviolate, a woman alone. Umezawa becomes an extravagant man, who rationalizes everything he does with the warrior creed that honor is in service, in his case, to the will of the Emperor. For these people (and many others in the book), violence is a language, a “physical dialogue,” with devastating consequences, win or lose. Within all these themes is interwoven that of love, both redemptive and tragic. Along with authors Neal Stephenson, Charles Mann & Mark Teppo and artists Robert Sammelin and Dean Kotz, Ellis has also released the Jet City Comics graphic novel, the Cimmaronin. He is currently working on a sequel to Little Bird & The Tiger, entitled The Tiger’s Cub.
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Words of Power

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  • Words of Power cover art

    • Words of Power

    • A Guide for Ordinary People to Calm and De-Escalate Aggressive Individuals
    • By: Ellis Amdur
    • Narrated by: Dan Levy
    • Length: 5 hrs and 17 mins
    • Release date: 06-01-2022
    • Language: English
    • 4.0 out of 5 stars 1 rating

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  • Body and Soul cover art

    • Body and Soul

    • Toward a Radical Intersubjectivity in Psychotherapy
    • By: Ellis Amdur
    • Narrated by: QtheDivine
    • Length: 2 hrs and 41 mins
    • Release date: 12-08-2022
    • Language: English
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    $9.99 or free with 30-day trial

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  • Safe Within the Walls cover art

    • Safe Within the Walls

    • Communication, Control, and De-Escalation of Mentally Ill and Aggressive Inmates for Correctional Officers in Prison Facilities
    • By: Ellis Amdur
    • Narrated by: Dan Levy
    • Length: 11 hrs and 13 mins
    • Release date: 18-02-2023
    • Language: English
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    $27.99 or free with 30-day trial

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  • Everything on the Line cover art

    • Everything on the Line

    • Calming & De-escalation of Aggressive & Mentally Ill Individuals on the Phone - A Comprehensive Guidebook for Emergency Dispatch (9-1-1) Centers
    • By: Ellis Amdur
    • Narrated by: Dan Levy
    • Length: 6 hrs and 52 mins
    • Release date: 02-11-2022
    • Language: English
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  • The Coordinator cover art

    • The Coordinator

    • Managing High-Risk, High-Consequence Social Interactions in an Unfamiliar Environment. 2nd Revised & Expanded Edition
    • By: Ellis Amdur, Robert Hubal
    • Narrated by: David Risley
    • Length: 11 hrs and 41 mins
    • Release date: 14-03-2022
    • Language: English
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  • The Accord Agent: Managing Intense, Problematic Social Interactions Within Business Environments cover art

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  • In the Eye of the Hurricane cover art

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