Because of A Book with Stuart Lutz

This week I have Stuart Lutz on the blog talking about the most influential book that he has read.

Stuart Lutz has always been fascinated by the stories told by older people. Perhaps it started when he was a boy and heard his great-grandparents recount their immigrant voyage to America, their first airplane sighting, and the first time his great-grandmother could legally vote (even though she had been married four years). Also, when he was young, he was intrigued during a family trip to Charleston, South Carolina, when the tour guide pointed out the building that still housed some Confederate widows, even though the Civil War had been over for 125 years. He could not understand how that could be, until the guide explained that some young ladies married much older men who had fought in the Civil War.

Lutz’s interests in history and writing come together in The Last Leaf, an oral history book featuring the stories of almost forty survivors and eyewitnesses to historically important events. Lutz is the only person to have interviewed the last three Civil War widows (the last one died in 2008), but The Last Leaf also features the last American World War I soldier, the final living person to have flown with Amelia Earhart, the final pitcher to give up a home run to Babe Ruth in his historic 1927 season (when Ruth hit sixty home runs), the last suffragette, the final Medal of Honor winner for heroism on Pearl Harbor Day, the last person to have made design contributions to the ENIAC (the first electronic, programmable computer), the final Iwo Jima flag raiser, the last survivor of the sunken Lusitania, the final Harry Houdini stage hand, and the last employees of Thomas Edison and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Each chapter blends the narrative of the “Last Leaves” with historical background so readers can understand what occurred and the long-term importance of each event.

Lutz owns Stuart Lutz Historic Documents, Inc., a firm that sells rare letters and manuscripts (www.HistoryDocs.com). He has written for American Heritage and Civil War Times Illustrated, and appeared on National Public Radio. He has a B.A. in American History from Johns Hopkins.

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My Most Influential Book

By Stuart Lutz

About fifteen years ago, I lived in Fairfield County, Connecticut. Not only is it one of the country’s wealthiest counties, it is one of the showiest too. Everyone, it seemed to me, owned a luxury car, took exotic vacations, and shopped at the local boutiques. And frugal me was driving an old Mitsubishi Colt with 140,000 miles that required bi-monthly repairs, and living in a small apartment in a woman’s subdivided house. It was easy to wonder what I was doing wrong.
I mentioned this conundrum to my uncle, who was then a top executive for one of the country’s most prestigious financial firms. “Most Americans,” he explained to me, “are so far in credit card debt that they will never get out, or they two weeks away from living on the street [his forecast is being proven by today’s foreclosure crisis].” I was momentarily puzzled by what he said, and I responded with, “Perhaps for the little guy, but these people who drive Mercedes, they can’t be two weeks away from foreclosure.” “They frequently are,” he replied. “People who make big money usually spend big money. Or they skip contributing to their retirement funds so that they have no accumulated wealth. I read recently that the average luxury car buyer only makes something like forty or fifty thousand dollars a year. It’s hard to get ahead financially when the price of your car equals your annual salary.”
Soon thereafter, I received a package from my uncle containing The Millionaire Next Door by Thomas Stanley and William D. Danko. The book is an academic, yet easily readable, study of people who have at least a million dollars in wealth, excluding the value of their homes. The people profiled include business owners worth seven figures, or others who have frugally saved over a million dollars in their retirement accounts. Stanley and Danko emphasize several characteristics the millionaires generally share, including frugality, a desire for financial independence, self-employment, and an emphasis on saving, investing, and budgeting. The authors define “underaccumulators of wealth” and “prodigious accumulators of wealth,” and introduced me to one of my favorite phrases, “big hat, no cattle.”
The Millionaire Next Door is the most influential book I have read in the past two decades for a few reasons. First, it is my desire to be financially independent. Recent news stories state that the Social Security trust will be exhausted in 2037, about the time I can first collect. If there is not going to be Social Security, then I need to be a “prodigious accumulator of wealth” to retire.
Second, the book showed that the frugality that I learned from my parents is the lifestyle that I want to have. I am just not a Mercedes or BMW person. Instead, I am delighted to drive my seven-year old Toyota with 146,000 miles or my fifteen year old Acura with 206,000 clicks; I prefer them to the slavery of new car payments or a lease. Yet my frugality does not mean all self-denial; my wife and I have twice traveled to Hawaii and Ireland; we just do it in the off-season when rates are cheaper.
I re-read The Millionaire Next Door at least once a year for continued inspiration. But my page-flipping is only the theoretical. As for the actual practice of becoming financially independent, I think of the book once a month when I deposit my hard-earned, hard-saved check into my retirement accounts.
To conclude, I own a business that buys and sells historic documents and letters. I have a client who made a fortune on Wall Street and collects papers related to early financial history. About fifteen years ago, he bought at auction one of the first known American stock certificates for almost $40,000. Subsequently, I bought the letter that should accompany the aforementioned stock, and I sold it to him for nearly $10,000. I met this gentleman at a New England hotel to show him the letter. When we finished our business, we walked out to the parking lot, and he got into a beat-up Buick that looked like it belonged in the local demolition derby. Yet he had spent nearly $50,000 on two sheets of paper. He was living proof of the millionaire next door.

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About The Millionaire Next Door:  The bestselling The Millionaire Next Door identifies seven common traits that show up again and again among those who have accumulated wealth. Most of the truly wealthy in this country don't live in Beverly Hills or on Park Avenue-they live next door. This new edition, the first since 1998, includes a new foreword for the twenty-first century by Dr. Thomas J. Stanley.



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About The Last Leaf:  When we read about famous historical events, we may wonder about the firsthand experiences of the people directly involved. What insights could be gained if we could talk to someone who remembered the Civil War, or the battle to win the vote for women, or Thomas Edison's struggles to create the first electric light bulb? Amazingly, many of these experiences are still preserved in living memory by the final survivors of important, world-changing events.
In this unique oral history book, author and historic document specialist Stuart Lutz records the stories told to him personally by people who witnessed many of history's most famous events. Among many others, Lutz interviewed:

-the final three Civil War widows (one Union and two Confederate)
-the final pitcher to surrender a home run to Babe Ruth
-the last suffragette
-the last living person to fly with Amelia Earhart
-the final American World War I soldier
-the last surviving employees of Thomas Edison, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Harry Houdini.

The wide-ranging stories involve humor (the 1920 Olympic medalist who stole the original Olympic flag), tragedy (the last survivor of the 1915 Lusitania sinking), heroism (the final Medal of Honor recipient for actions on Pearl Harbor Day), and eyewitnesses to great events (one of the last scientists at the first nuclear chain reaction, and the final Iwo Jima flag raiser).
In more than three-dozen chapters, Lutz blends background information in a lively narrative with the words of the interviewees, so that readers not familiar with the historical episodes described can understand what occurred and the long-term significance of the events.

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Because of A Book with Lisa Lickel

A graduate of the Christian Writer’s Guild’s Apprentice Course, Lisa Lickel was a top ten finisher in the first Operation: First Novel contest. She has written and produced for radio theater and performed live. Her works have been released in national syndication on FreeQuincy.podcast. She freelances for local newspapers and writes short stories, book reviews, devotionals and magazine articles which have appeared in Writer’s Digest, You Can Write for Children, and Harpstring. She holds a bachelors of science in history and RECES.

Lickel’s novels include The Gold Standard, Healing Grace, and Meander Scar.

She enjoys membership in local book clubs and writing groups, as well as American Christian Fiction Writers, and Wisconsin Regional Writers where she is editor-in-chief of Creative Wisconsin Magazine. She lives in a hundred and fifty-year old house and is active in local historical societies. Married to a high school biology teacher, she enjoys travel, books and collecting dragons. Visit her on the web at http://lisalickel.com/.

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Both of my parents taught English at one point; my mother was also a librarian and their house is filled with books. When I was young, we visited my grandparents frequently: a two-hour drive north or a five-hour drive west. My favorite memory of those visits is the book shelf. The Pokey Little Puppy was a staple at Grandma Dhein's. The story was a treat I read at their city house. Another influential book in my life was an early Whitman Publishing book called The Star Fairies. Ethereal, fantastic, frightening, I realized later the wonder of capturing allegory.

My parents enrolled my brother and me in a children's book club. The delight of receiving three books a month, like Dr. Suess stories, and A Visit to the Zoo, and so many others is the fondest of memories. They taught me about creating rhythm and word pictures. We were also given free range when choosing from the Scholastic catalog in elementary school. The Witch of Blackbird Pond fueled my love of history and attention to detail.

When I was older, I reached for the western sagas of Zane Grey on my grandfather Duvel's shelf. He never went to high school, but kept a stock of novels and books and crossword puzzles in their farmhouse to satisfy his love of learning. My favorite, Under The Tonto Rim, is a book I kept and read often. It's a tangible family tie I hope my children will appreciate.

I began to read book reviews when I reached high school. Those reviews influenced my reading and buying choices. I discovered Anne McCaffrey, and my love of dragons, inspired first by the frontpiece of Thomas Costain's books, took shape as I started a dragon collection. Robert Heinlein, CS Lewis, and Mark Twain showed me how to create worlds, remember life, and portray characters.

When I read to my children, I saw the delight on their faces, which books were their favorites and why. My reaction, and theirs, taught me the passion of storytelling.

I didn't realize until adulthood that I'd been laying the foundation of an author's toolbox. When I took a writer's course and began selling my articles and stories, then delving into the world of novels, I paid tribute to the love of books I've been privileged to know since childhood.

My work now, mystery and adventure and romance, reflects those early stories.

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About The Poky Little Puppy
One of the original 12 Little Golden Books, The Poky Little Puppy has sold nearly 15 million copies since 1942, making it one of the most popular children’s books of all time. Now this curious little puppy is ready to win the hearts and minds of a new generation of kids.


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About Meander Scar

Love can heal even the deepest scars ... After seven years with no clue as to the whereabouts of Ann Ballard's missing husband, nearly everyone presumes him dead. Now forty-something, Ann is ready for her stagnant life to flow again. Then one day, a dark-haired younger man from her past shows up on her doorstep offering a river of hope in place of tears. Former neighbor Mark Roth has secretly loved Ann for years. A respected attorney, he's returned home to help Ann face down disapproving family members and the legal maneuvering of her likely deceased husband's family-while quietly winning her heart. When the hidden truth of Ann's situation turns their lives on end and another tragedy strikes, the two must come to terms with family, faith and the depths to which true love can run.

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Because of A Book with Dorien Grey

Dorien Grey started out as a pen-name, nothing more, for a lifelong book and magazine editor who wanted to write a mystery novel with a gay detective. However, because he was living in a remote and time-warped area of the upper mid-west where gays still feel it necessary to keep a very low profile, he did not feel comfortable using his own name--a sad commentary on our society, he admits.

But as the first book led to the second and then the third, he found Dorien slowly became much more than a pseudonym, evolving into an alter ego. "It's reached the point," he says, "where all I have to do is sit down at the computer and let Dorien tell the story."

As for the Dorien's "real person," he's had a not uninteresting life. Two years into college, he left to join the Naval Aviation Cadet program: he washed out and spent the rest of his brief military career on an aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean. The journal he kept of his time in the military, in the form of letters home, honed his writing skills and provided him with a wealth of experiences to draw from in his future writing.

Returning to college after service, he graduated with a B.A. in English, and embarked on a series of jobs which worked him into the editing field. While working for a Los Angeles publishing house, he was instrumental in establishing a division exclusively for the publication of gay paperbacks and magazines, of which he became editor. He moved on to edit a leading L.A. based international gay men's magazine.

Tiring of earthquakes, brush fires, mudslides, and riots, he returned to the midwest, where Dorien emerged, full-blown, like Venus from the sea.

He . . . and Dorien . . . of course, moved to Chicago a few years ago, and now devote "their" energies to writing. After having completed thirteen books in the popular Dick Hardesty Mystery series--the fourteenth to come later this year, and a western/romance/adventure novel, Calico--"they" have embarked on a new mystery series with a new protagonist: the Elliott Smith Mysteries, which will alternate with the Dick Hardesty Series; three books in this series have been released: His Name is John, Aaron's Wait, and Caesar's Fall.

You can visit Dorien at his website or blog.

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Frank L. Baum & the Oz books

I am eternally grateful to my mother for giving me a fascination with and love for words. It was she, by reading me stories even before I was able to understand many of the words--though I loved the sounds--, who opened the doors of wonder contained in those words.

From the time I learned to read, the library was a very special place. I got some sort of award while in first grade for having signed out more books than anyone in my class. Most of them were pretty elementary stuff, but among the first "real" books I remember were the Oz series, by Frank L. Baum. The most famous of which, of course, is "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz", from which the classic movie was made. I saw it when it was released in 1938 and though I was not yet five years old, it enthralled me then, and it enthralls me now.

Once I discovered that there was an entire series of Oz books--fifteen in all--I'm quite sure I read most of them if not all. I can still close my eyes and see them...outsized, as I recall, with thick cardboard covers with wonderful illustrations. To open them was to open the door to the imagination and all the wonders therein.

The fifteen books, should you be curious, were The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Marvelous Land of Oz, Ozma of Oz, Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, The Road to Oz, The Emerald City of Oz, The Patchwork Girl Of Oz, Little Wizard Stories of Oz, Tik-Tok of Oz, The Scarecrow Of Oz, Rinkitink In Oz, The Lost Princess Of Oz, The Tin Woodman Of Oz, The Magic of Oz, and Glinda Of Oz.

The books' concept that there was a special place, somewhere "over the rainbow" with enchanted creatures and wondrous fields and forests and cities where anything was possible, acted like a magnet for my own imagination, and taught me that if I was not happy with the world in which I lived, I was free to create my own.

One of my favorite characters in the Oz series was a little boy named "Button-Bright," about my own age, who appears in several of the books. He got his name from his parents, who thought he was "bright as a button." I'm sure I strongly identified with him. As I recall, he was constantly getting lost, then being found, then getting lost again. Eventually, he moved to Oz permanently. I take particular delight, on looking back, to realize that he was a friend of Dorothy's, because a long-time code between gay men was to ask "Oh, are you a friend of Dorothy?" I certainly was, and am.

The Oz books contain all the ingredients required to nourish and enrich any child's imagination, as it did mine. They teach the child that the mind--the imagination--is not tied to the body; that it can go anywhere, do anything; that it can provide a refuge, a haven, when the real world is harsh and cruel. It teaches that there are other places, other worlds. Every book is an arrow, a path, a guide to where the imagination can take us.

In an inscription to his sister in one of his books, Baum wrote: "I have learned to regard fame as a will-o-the-wisp, which when caught, is not worth the possession; but to please a child is a sweet and lovely thing that warms one's heart and brings its own reward."

I'd take that one step further and point out that an adult with an imagination is still a child, and it is to the adult child that I have dedicated my own books. And so I embarked on a life-long journey to create my own arrows, my own paths, my own guides for others. It's been a wonderful journey, and I hope that when it is over I, like Button-Bright, often lost and often found, may move permanently to Oz.

My thanks to Shelly for giving me the opportunity to share my thoughts with you here.

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About The Wizard of Oz
The Complete Wizard of Oz Collection, All 15 Books, including The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Ozma of Oz, The Emerald City of Oz, and MORE plus Active Table Of Contents and Original Cover Illustrations.

We all know that The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is a children's novel written by L. Frank Baum, but did you know he published many more and all were beautifully illustrated by W.W. Denslow. It was originally published by the George M. Hill Company in Chicago on May 17, 1900, and has since been reprinted countless times, most often under the name The Wizard of Oz, which is the name of both the 1902 stage play and the extremely popular, highly acclaimed 1939 film version. The story chronicles the adventures of a girl named Dorothy in the Land of Oz. Thanks in part to the 1939 MGM movie, it is one of the best-known stories in American popular culture and has been widely translated. Its initial success, and the success of the popular 1902 Broadway musical Baum adapted from his story, led to Baum writing thirteen more Oz books.

Here now you can read every one of his other stories which few know exist but indeed they do and together with the delightful illustrations and active table of contents this is surely a joy to read. Rare stories that indeed make up a whole world of Oz, are now all here at your fingertips.

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About His Name is John

Elliott Smith wakes up in the hospital with a head injury...and an invisible companion. At first, he's convinced "John" is just a figment of a damaged brain, but when he's fully recovered John is still around; and desperate to find out who he is. Reluctantly, Elliott agrees to help, and discovers Chicago PD has a John Doe on their hands with six bullets in him?who died in the ER at the same time Elliott was there.
As Elliott digs deeper into the mystery of John, he stumbles on a body hidden behind a wall for 80 years, meets a sexy artist who could become more than just a one-night stand, and uncovers a deadly secret that has haunted a nun for two decades.

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Because of A Book with Sylvia LaFair

Joining me on the blog today is author, Sylvia LaFair.  Many thanks to her for stopping by and sharing thoughts on leadership through Mrs. Piggle Wiggle.

Sylvia Lafair, PhD, is a business leadership expert, President of CEO – Creative Energy Options, Inc., a global consulting company focused on optimizing workplace relationships and author of the award winning book, “Don’t Bring It to Work”.

She has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes.com, USA Today, Time, New York Times, many radio, and TV programs.

As an executive coach and leadership educator, she has more than 30 years of experience with all levels of management.

Her quick-witted humor, charisma, and energy are infectious and her knowledge gives substance and depth to all presentations.

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Because of a Book

By: SYLVIA LAFAIR, PhD

It’s amazing how a pudgy lady who lived in an upside down house, baked amazing cookies, and was married to a pirate can help point you in the direction of a future career.
This woman, a combination of Antie Mame, Mary Poppins, and Maria from the Sound of Music was a major influence for me to choose psychology as a major in college. I remember when my third grade teacher introduced us to Mrs. Piggle Wiggle. She told us the book was a classic. I had no idea what that meant, it just sounded important.
So we gathered on the floor and entered the fantastic world where kids learned about life without being yelled out, where they became accountable for their own behavior by experiencing what matters and what doesn’t.
The “cures” this jolly lady had for bad behavior always made sense to me. There was no lecturing, no finger pointing, and no time outs on stools in corners. Like the boy who had tons of toys and never wanted to pick them up; he didn’t have to. Sounded good to me. It also made sense that he soon had blocked his way out of his room and eventually learned, in his own time about consequences of behavior.
She took the plaintive cry of the “waddle-I-doers” and made an indoor treasure hunt the action of the afternoon. What fun! And the “don’t-want-to-go-to bedders” learned about the importance of sleep by staying up late, later and very late.
Somehow, the behavior modification and reinforcement for positive ways of responding made sense to my nine year old brain.
Here is where it gets really interesting. I have morphed my career from family therapist to leadership development expert. I now teach people that the behavior patterns they learned in their original organization, the family, are what they bring into their present work organization.
I started to relook at Mrs. Piggle Wiggle and see that she also had great lessons for high potential and emerging leaders in all types of work settings. It’s about accountability, learning to understand your own boundaries and how to be good and kind to others. And so much can be learned about solving problems as you taste the cookies that are always a part of the reward for choosing wisely and treating others with respect. That’s core to leadership, isn’t it?
I am now a grandmother and when my daughter feels like tearing out her hair when her three year old sets sassy or her five year old gets bored she has an old friend of mine to rely on.
Books that touch the human universals in all of us are truly classics. When I wrote “Don’t Bring It to Work: Breaking the Family Patterns that Limit Success”, I reread the stories from my old friend to help me stay true to what I wanted to say.
So, thank you Betty MacDonald for conjuring up Mrs. Piggle Wiggle. And thank you for all the wise “cures” that everyone on the planet can relate to.

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About Mrs. Piggle Wiggle's Farm

Ms. Piggle-Wiggle's left her upside-down town house and has moved to a farm in the country. With the help of her cows and pigs and horses, she's still curing girls and boys of their bad habits. So whatever the problem-from pet forgetter-itis to fraidycat-ness-the parents all exclaim, "Better call Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle!"

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About Don't Bring It to Work

How can you get to the bottom of workplace behaviors that simply don't work for you or your organization?
Don't Bring It to Work explores what happens when patterns originally created to cope with family conflicts are unleashed in the workplace.?This groundbreaking book draws on the success of Sylvia Lafair's PatternAware program Total Leadership Connections. Throughout the book she shows how to break the cycle of pattern repetition and offers the tools that can turn unhealthy family baggage into creative energy that will foster better workplace associations and career success.
Lafair identifies the thirteen most common patterns that correspond to characters familiar to anyone who has ever worked in an office: Super Achiever, Rebel, Persecutor, Victim, Rescuer, Clown, Martyr, Splitter, Procrastinator, Drama Queen or King, Pleaser, Denier, and Avoider. To help overcome destructive behavior problems, she maps out the three main steps for becoming aware of patterns and finding the way OUT:

• Observe your behavior to discern underlying patterns
• Understand and probe deeper to discover the origins of these patterns
• Transform your behavior by taking action to change

The book includes a wealth of real-life anecdotes and practical, workbook-style exercises that clearly show how anyone can get beyond old, outmoded attempts at conflict resolution and empower themselves to make profound differences both at work and in their personal lives.

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Because of A Book with Elizabeth Harper

 This week's guest is Elizabeth Harper, whom I met through my BLU post looking for guests for this feature.  If you are ever looking for guest posts or want to see what kind of guest posts other bloggers are looking for, check out BloggerLinkUp.  Please make Elizabeth feel at home.

Elizabeth Harper is an internationally acclaimed color intuitive, psychic artist, spiritual guide, healer and teacher. She is a faculty member of the Omega Institute, teaches workshops at the Open Center and Lily Dale Assembly and is co-founder of Spiritual Living, an online education & wellness center. Her pioneering work with color inspired her Sealed With Love jewelry, Powersilks, and the intuitively revealing ColorScope. Her work and life have been featured in popular national magazines including Woman's World, Redbook, Prevention and Health. She is a magazine columnist and regular contributor to radio and television in the US and Australia, and she is the award-winning author of "Wishing: How to Fulfill Your Heart's Desires" (Beyond Words/Atria/Simon & Schuster 2008).
Find out more about her work on her website: www.sealedwithlove.com

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Because of A Book

My brother Phillip died in a car accident when I was ten years old. Shortly after his death he began to visit me in my dreams. I had always been sensitive to energies. I saw auras, knew more about people than I should, and I could accurately predict the future for friends and family. After my brother’s passing my psychic skills seemed to intensify. It was around this time that my mother, no doubt realizing that I felt “different,” chose to give me a book that helped me to understand what I was experiencing. Its title encapsulates its contents – The Boy Who Saw True. The book, however, does not reveal the name of its’ author, only that he lived in the north of England at the turn of the twentieth century.

The Boy Who Saw True is a compilation of a set of diaries started when the “boy” was young and culminating in correspondence with his second wife while on his travels. He humorously details his clairvoyant observances and the shameful scolding he was exposed to by members of his immediate family for what they considered to be bad behavior. Their ignorance was understandable. He was, in short, extremely mediumistic, meaning he could see and converse with the spirits of dead people to such an extent that you would think he was speaking with a living embodied being.

The book fascinated as much as it comforted me. My mother very cleverly waited until I could appreciate its worth. In the early part of the book the innocence and naivety of the boy is apparent, but this is what makes him so endearing. Some of the language is funny and very “British” and the compiler of the works thought to leave a number of the boy’s spelling mistakes, making it all the more heart warming.

From an early age I was an avid absorber of all paranormal books. I had virtually exhausted every library within a fifty radius. We are talking about the available tomes of forty years ago; new age literature was not as common then as it is now. My mother, one of the pioneers of yoga in Britain, thought to subscribe to the Psychic News magazine and would make a point of ordering books they had reviewed. The Boy Who Saw True was one of these books. It came at the perfect time in my life when I needed support and guidance for my burgeoning psychic skills. It imprinted my soul with the understanding that not everyone is accepting of this gift, but nonetheless it is a gift to be nurtured and cared for.

I recommend this book to all of my psychic development students and to anyone curious about the unseen world. It offers insight into the life of a psychic and makes this skill palatable, amusing and above all - normal! It is a little piece of light that brings joy to my heart every time I read it. I no longer have the original copy. Whenever I buy it I am inspired to give it away, a gift to be shared. I am after all my mother’s daughter!

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About The Boy Who Saw True - Based on the diary entries of a young Victorian with extraordinary supernatural talent, this is a naïve, insightful, funny, and moving account of a precocious young clairvoyant. Born with incredible powers, the anonymous author could see auras and spirits, yet failed to realise that other people were not similarly gifted. This remarkable book has become a paranormal classic.

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About Wishing: How to Fulfill Your Heart's Desires - In Wishing, author Elizabeth Harper provides the tools and wisdom necessary to manifest each and every wish made. Using the basic concepts of the law of attraction, a step-by-step wish process outlines how wishes manifest, why some go unfulfilled, and how you can best realize your wishing potential in all aspects of your life. From wishing the train would come on time to yearning for those six precious little numbers in the lottery that will irrevocably change your life, we all make multiple wishes during the day with the hope some will come true. Wishing's "wish sense" is a time-tested, magical formula for successfully manifesting your heart's desires and a proven way to get the results everyone wants. 

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Because of A Book with Hannah Daniel

Today's Because of A Book guest is a blogger.  Please help me welcome Hannah Daniel to the blog!  Here is a little about her:

Hannah Daniel read everything she could get her hands on as soon as she learned how at age five, and she hasn’t stopped since. She continued her love of reading and writing with a journalism degree from The University of Texas. Now she writes for a company that helps people find an affordable dental insurance alternative and manages the 1Dental blog.

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One of my favorite books growing up was “The Phantom Tollbooth,” by Norton Juster, published in 1961. It’s a fairy tale of the most peculiar kind, beginning when a little boy named Milo is bored and comes home from school to find a large package addressed to him. It contains a magical tollbooth, and as soon as he drives through it in his toy car, he’s off on an adventure.

Rather than running into your average dragon or evil stepmother, he faces foes like the Senses Taker and the very short Officer Shrift. His faithful companion is a “watchdog” named Tock with a large timepiece in his side. He must travel from Dictionopolis to Digitopolis and rescue the princesses Rhyme and Reason before discord and disharmony take over the Kingdom of Wisdom.

They run into many unusual characters along the way like the Dodecahedron, who has 12 faces, each with a different emotion. Many of his situations come from taking English idioms literally. For example, when he makes an assumption early in the trip, he is whisked over to the Island of Conclusions. He learns why it’s important not to jump there again, because it can get you into trouble.

The play on words is even more brilliant for adults than it is for children, who may just find it an interesting adventure story. I loved to read as a child, and my mother took the time to explain the plays on words to me. I reread it several times and got something new out of it every time. To this day, I love all the intricacies and idiosyncrasies of the English language. I owe that love largely to this book.

I love words, and I really enjoy writing – it’s part of my profession. The Phantom Tollbooth introduced me to the vast world of language, and how it is much bigger than it seems at first glance.

The pictures are some of the most charming I’ve ever seen, but this is no mere picture book. If you have any love whatsoever for letters or numbers and their nuances, the small novel will enchant you from page one.

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About The Phantom Tollbooth:  This ingenious fantasy centeres around Milo, a bored ten-year-old who comes home to find a large toy tollbooth sitting in his room. Joining forces with a watchdog named Tock, Milo drives through the tollbooth's gates and begins a memorable journey. He meets such characters as the foolish, yet lovable Humbug, the Mathemagician, and the not-so-wicked "Which," Faintly Macabre, who gives Milo the "impossible" mission of returning two princesses to the Kingdom of Wisdom... 

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Because of A Book with Suzi Katz

I am so glad to be bringing back my Because of A Book feature this year.  I love this feature because I get to meet so many wonderful people and find out what their bookish influences were as a child.  This week's guest has been on the blog before.  Please help me welcome back Suzi Katz!

As a working mother, volunteer and passionate youth advocate, Suzi Katz focuses her energy on teens and helping them build positive futures. Her commitment to young people drives her personal and professional lives, and her latest venture as an author is no exception.
With the release of her debut novel A Life Revealed, Suzi Katz launches Suzi Katz Books, a publishing house dedicated to exploring the lives of young adults and the complicated choices they face each day. Following her support of children’s causes, a portion of the proceeds from the sales of A Life Revealed will be donated to the International Child Art Foundation, a non-profit organization that integrates arts with science, sport and technology for the development of children’s creativity and empathy.
Katz earned a Masters of Science in Sports Management from Northeastern University in 1995 and a Bachelor of Science in Communications/Media from Fitchburg State College in 1992. Originally from Boston, Katz resides in Orlando, Florida with her husband Jay Slowinski and their daughter Maia.

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One book was all it took. When I was a kid, I read assignments for school because I had to. But it wasn’t until I read, Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret, that my love for reading and writing blossomed. Like so many other writers, Judy Blume inspired me to do both. I loved her characters, the lessons they learned and the fun they had. I can still picture Margaret raising her eyebrow, Deenie finding out she had scoliosis, and the day that Blubber became the name of a fifth grade student, bullied by her classmates. I could see myself running away from egging a home on Halloween, to raking fall leaves with blisters on my hands. Those books have lived inside of me for years.

How do I know I love a book? When I open the cover, I feel like I am walking through a door to each character’s world. I love feeling like I’m a part of their world and what they’re doing.

Along the way, I discovered so many other great authors like Dr. Seuss, Maurice Sendak, Julie Reece Deaver, Shel Silverstein, Elie Wiesel, F. Scott Fitzgerald and many more. In school, one of my favorite things to do was sit on the carpeted rug outside my classroom and listen to my teacher read to us.

When I’m writing, I try to be as real as possible. Not every character is perfect, they don’t always make the choices I would, or speak perfectly. They are themselves and develop into people who carry the story from beginning to end. It’s what makes the story move along.

Growing up, my bedroom was filled with the little blue notebooks. The books we used in school to write our test answers in. I used each and every one to create a new story. I wish I knew what happened to them over the years. It would be interesting to read them now. While most of my books have disappeared over the years, the stories have not been forgotten.

One of the most important things I do in my life is helping in my community. It has always been a rewarding experience for me. Now it is even more rewarding, as my daughter, who is almost 8, is really involved with the work I do. I now consider it, the work we do.

While we volunteer at a women and children’s living center and can offer toys, clothes and those things needed on a daily basis, one of the most important things I can offer them are brand new books. Books, with stories that will hopefully last a lifetime in their hearts. Books that might make them love reading, or inspire them to become writers.

I feel like I’m starting over again reading for my daughter. While she is becoming a reader herself, I love reading to her, using a different voice for each character in each story. I can’t wait to introduce her to the books I loved during my childhood, and to the incredible new writers who have added to the great books since that time.

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About Are You There God It's Me Margaret by Judy Blume:
No one ever told Margaret Simon that eleven-going-on- twelve would be such a hard age. When her family moves to New Jersey, she has to adjust to life in the suburbs, a different school, and a whole new group of friends. Margaret knows she needs someone to talk to about growing up-and it's not long before she's found a solution.
Are you there God? It's me, Margaret. I can't wait until two o'clock God. That's when our dance starts. Do you think I'll get Philip Leroy for a partner? It's not so much that I like him as a person God, but as a boy he's very handsome. And I'd love to dance with him... just once or twice. Thank you God.

Buy it at Amazon
Buy it at Powells
Buy it at IndieBound

About A Life Revealed by Suzi Katz:Tragedy can strike in a split second. But what if that tragedy brings with it both heartache and mystery? After her parents are killed, seventeen-year-old Chloe Jacobs discovers that she's been part of the Witness Security Program her entire life. While enduring twenty-four hour protection from U.S. Marshals, Chloe secretly searches through her tangled family history...and realizes that in order to find the truth, she'll have to fight for her safety, dreams, love...and ultimately her life.

Buy it at Amazon
Buy it at Powells

About Hiding in the Open by Suzi Katz:  coming out soon!
The long-awaited sequel to a life revealed

When Chloe Jacobs became Caiden James, life was supposed to be perfect. However, life doesn't always go as planned...especially when it is in a directions you shouldn't be heading. How will Caiden handle the real truth, about herself and her family? And how can she keep her past from the one she loves...and keep her worst enemy from taking it all away