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 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.

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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.

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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

Because of A Book with Joanne Kennedy

Today I am pleased to welcome author, Joanne Kennedy to the blog.

Joanne Kennedy has worked in bookstores all her life in positions from bookseller to buyer. A member of Romance Writers of America and Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, she won first place in the Colorado Gold Writing Contest and second in the Heart of the Rockies contest. Joanne lives in Cheyenne, Wyoming. For more information, please visit http://joannekennedybooks.com/.

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Joanne Kennedy Guest Blog, Author of One Fine Cowboy

Write for a Reader Because of a Book Feature

As a child, I loved to go to my grandparent’s farm and read the books my mother read as a child. The most battered and beloved of these were two books by Gene Stratton-Porter: Freckles and A Girl of the Limberlost.

Gene Stratton-Porter is a perfect example of the ephemeral nature of fame. Her books were enormous bestsellers in her day, with over 50 million readers—and this was in the nineteen-teens and twenties. Today, I wonder how many readers have even heard of her.

Ms. Stratton-Porter was a naturalist, novelist, photographer, conservationist, and one of the first women to start a film studio. She accomplished all these things around the turn of the century, when women didn’t necessarily have careers.

And she did it to save a swamp.

When she moved to the 13,000-acre Limberlost Swamp in Indiana, it was 1888 and the wetlands were in the process of being drained and logged. An oil and gas boom sparked drilling and more draining. This all sounds very familiar and modern, but it was 1913 when Stratton-Porter finally was forced to move away. She continued to sing the praises of the Limberlost in her bestselling novels, and her cabin there is now a state historic site.

After almost a century, her books have faded into obscurity. I’ve worked in bookselling for twenty years, and for a while I owned a used and rare bookstore. Stratton-Porter’s books turned up often, but except for her rare nature books, nobody seemed to be interested. It’s incredible how the bestselling authors of one era can be totally unknown to readers of another.

But discovering these books when I was a child changed me, sparking my interest in birds and butterflies and my belief that nature feeds the mind and restores the soul. They also introduced me to some strong and stalwart heroines that inspired the heroines of my own books. Stratton-Porter’s women have little in the way of creature comforts in their woodland cabins, but their appreciation of the natural world and their dogged determination to better themselves makes them compelling characters.

I read her books over and over. When I was ten, I was the “Girl of the Limberlost.” I’d never been to Indiana, but my childhood home boasted a brook and an actual, no-kiddin’, mushy, gushy swamp populated with all kinds of birds and frogs and slimy salamanders.

The swamp must have been a pond at one time, because the remnants of an old stone dam stood on one side. I’d sit up on the tumbled rocks and watch the birds, scribbling descriptions and renditions of birdsong in a tattered notebook just like my favorite author. I rarely went home without gathering some sort of “specimen”—a bucket of polliwogs, a caterpillar on its host plant, or a tiny red newt. Thank goodness my mother had read those Limberlost books and understood why I felt compelled to bring the outdoors in.

And thank goodness she introduced them to me. Thanks to the long-reaching influence of this turn-of-the-century writer, I can still have my day brightened and my heart lightened just by the song of a sparrow.

The publisher has offered 2 copies of One Fine Cowboy, for giveaway to 2 of my readers.  Please just leave a comment on this post if you'd like to be entered.  Entries will be taken until Tuesday, Oct. 5th at midnight.

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About A Girl of the Limberlost - Set amid Indiana's Limberlost Swamp, this classic mixes astute observations on nature with the struggles of growing up in the early 20th century and the discoveries of independence and romance.

Buy it at Indiebound

About One Fine Cowboy - He’s got a way with horses…and with women...

Nate Shawcross is perfectly content to spend his days training wild horses. So when a beautiful greenhorn unexpectedly shows up for a seminar from the famous “Horse Whisperer” of Wyoming, all Nate wants to do is send her packing…

The last thing she expects is a lesson in romance…

Graduate student Charlie Banks came to the ranch to learn about horse communication, but when she meets the ruggedly handsome cowboy, she starts to fantasize about another connection entirely…

Nate needs to stay focused if he’s going to save his ranch from foreclosure, but he can’t help being distracted by the brainy and breathtakingly sexy Charlie. Could it be that after all this time Nate has finally found the one woman who can tame his wild heart?

Buy it at Indiebound

Because of A Book with Anne McCrady

Today, thanks to a post on Blogger Link Up, I have writer, Anne McCrady on the blog.  Here is a little about Anne to get you started.

Anne McCrady is a writer and inspirational speaker who lives in East Texas. Her award-winning poetry collections are Along Greathouse Road and Under a Blameless Moon. Anne's poetry and creative nonfiction have been published in literary journals, magazines, anthologies and online. She is a frequent speaker at conferences, civic groups, festivals, churches and schools, as well as the founder and principal of InSpiritry, an endeavor to Put Words to Work for the Greater Good. She welcomes readers to her blog and website at www.InSpiritry.com.

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Red Tag Comes Back

When I think about my childhood, it seems I was always a reader, always a writer and always a scientist. In my bedroom, paper, pencils and books shared space with stuffed animals and other toys. Often home sick with asthma, I let my mind live in a wider world and it took my heart with it!

While I had many favorite books, one that remains on my shelf between newer authors, is a simple story that captured my imagination in ways I only realized recently. The book was Red Tag Comes Back. It was written by Fred Phleger with line drawings by Arnold Lobel, and was a Science – I Can Read book published by Harper & Row in 1960.

The story is a factually based account of a salmon from its young life in a Northwest American river to its trip out to sea and its eventual return years later to lay its eggs and die. The salmon’s endeavors are witnessed by two Native American children, Aku and his sister, who understand and honor the cycle of its life.

From the first page, I wanted to join those two children, whose days included exploration in the woods beside a quiet river. I wondered about the difference in their lives and mine. I wanted to be the scientist who tagged the baby salmon. I wanted to follow it on its adventure down the river and beyond. I feared for its life among the bigger fish, ached for it in the struggle to return home, dreaded its death and rejoiced in the triumph of knowing it had spawned a new generation.

When my childhood books were packed away, Red Tag wasn’t forgotten. I survived my asthma, grew up enjoying walks in the woods alone, went on to college where I studied Chemistry and Biology and became a storyteller and writer. I developed a deep reverence for Nature and kept my curiosity about the diversity of people and places and things. I now live on five tree shaded acres that I share with fish and woodpeckers and raccoons and squirrels. As a mother, I read Red Tag with my children and have my original copy to show my grandchildren.

Recently while reading online, I discovered that Fred Phleger was a scientist of great renown as well as a writer. Knowing that, I realize he gave me more than just a favorite book. He helped lead me to pursue a life centered on the great mystery of “how things are.” Each day as I write a poem about the play of shadow or tell a story about children who are inquisitive or publish an essay about the Greater Good, I am paying homage to Fred Phleger for his inspiration.

Best of all, just last month, I  finally traveled from my home in Texas to Seattle to view the arduous journey of the salmon, to see for myself how Red Tag Comes Back!

More about Phleger and his wife can be found at this Vintage Kids’ Books post:
http://www.vintagechildrensbooksmykidloves.com/2007/09/red-tag-comes-back.html

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Red Tag Comes Back - buy it at Amazon

About Along Greathouse Road - This reading offers new work as well as selections from Anne’s first poetry collection, Along Greathouse Road, which won the 2003 Edwin M. Eakin Book Publication Award offered by the Poetry Society of Texas. With unforgettable characters, picturesque settings and Anne’s distinctive reading voice, this program takes audiences "back home" for a while. 

Buy it at Amazon

Because of A Book with Maya Jax

There are times that I love Blogger, and then other times that I do not.  When my scheduled posts do not get posted, that is one time I do not like Blogger.  With the start of school this week, I knew my life would be hectic and non-stop, so I tried to prepare for that by scheduling posts.  Well, as they say, "the best laid plans of mice and men..."

I'd like to thank Dorothy Thompson and Pump Up Your Book Promotion for allowing me to participate in Maya Jax's blog tour.  Let me first introduce you to Maya.

Loving John Grisham and Janet Evanovich novels, Maya Jax entertained the idea of being a lawyer or a spy and started working at an embassy in Australia while doing her master’s in international relations. During this time, she finished her first screenplay, an action/thriller about spies and nuclear weapons. She pitched it to a friend in Hollywood, who told her she had talent, but to never show the screenplay to anyone again — ever. Realizing her love for writing was stronger than her desire to spy and fight crime, she attempted a second screenplay focusing on what she knew best — trying to make it as a writer. The screenplay turned into a novel and the result was Escapades of Romantically Challenged Me.

You can find Maya at her website, Maya Jax.

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Writer for a Reader – Books that Impacted Me As a Child

How Nancy Drew Saved Me From Suburbia by Maya Jax

I have always wanted to be a secret agent – always. When I was in grade school, I had a pair of binoculars covered in hockey stickers, and everyday I would spy on the neighbor’s car across the street because I thought it was suspicious. I would hunker down on the couch, peer out the window and write down everything about the car. Tuesday: It’s parked on the left side of the driveway. Wednesday: It’s parked on the right. Thursday: They’ve moved the car onto the street. There is now an orange air freshener hanging from the rear view mirror. Interesting… But nothing ever came of my neighbor’s car. They were actually an older couple with a little dog and not much excitement outside of take-out Chinese food every Friday. To a wannabe spy the suburbs were torture. I wanted great adventure and riding my bike around the block just wasn’t cutting it.

And then I read Nancy Drew. A detective. A girl detective. I knew of the Hardy Boys, and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (and I adored them all!), but Nancy Drew was the first heroine I ever read about that did things I wanted to do. I loved those books. In sixth grade very single book report I did was one of hers. By June everyone was rolling their eyes when I came up to the front of the class. I remember the very last one I did. The story involved a shark at the beach and after I was finished, my teacher called me over to her desk and suggested I start reading something else.

But I didn’t. Instead I expanded my spy kit from binoculars to invisible ink, secret codes and a magnifying glass. I also started a mystery club and forced my two best friends to join. (Ghostbusters had just been released, so I hooked them in by saying we could solve mysteries involving ghosts just like Peter, Ray, Egon and Winston). We spent HOURS going through old photos looking for ghost clues and running tests on Silly Putty with my chemistry set. After a few months of meetings, my friends became very ‘busy’ on our club nights, so I was left to my own devices again and went back to Nancy Drew.

She opened so many doors in my mind. All the adventure I wanted was right there on the page, and unlike TV or movies, I could spend hours in just one story, investing so much into the character. Actually, until now I didn’t realize how much Nancy Drew acted as a foundation for what I read and write now. I love spy and mystery novels, Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum books are some of my most favorite. The best part about reading is the escape, and for me, Nancy Drew introduced me to the grand world outside my own and laid a foundation for a future love of espionage, travel and just being a girl.

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About Nancy Drew - Nancy Drew, the classic mystery-solving heroine, returns in these special-issue omnibus editions. Each collection features three bestselling, classic Nancy Drew mysteries.

The Best of Nancy Drew Classic Collection Volume 1

#1 The Secret of the Old Clock: Nancy Drew's keen mind is tested when she searches for a missing will in this mystery that started them all.

#3 The Bungalow Mystery: When one of Nancy's closest friends suspects her guardians of trying to steal her inheritance, Nancy's search for clues leads her to an old, abandoned bungalow.

#43 The Mystery of the 99 Steps: Despite warnings from a stranger, Nancy sets out for France to search for a flight of 99 steps that may help solve the mystery of a weird dream and a possible case of blackmail.

Buy it at IndieBound

About Escapades of Romantically Challenged Me - Lelaina is trying to make it in LA, but first she has to make it through her trip home... Aspiring screenwriter Lelaina Zane finally lands a Hollywood break, but it's cut short when her dad has a heart attack and she has to return to her home town. Leaving LA for the first time in three years, she returns home to be with her family. And now that she's back, her parents want her to stay and join the family law firm. After three years of unsuccessfully trying to 'make it' in Hollywood, she thinks they might be right. But soon after settling into her new life, Hollywood calls with a potential offer. Lelaina has to decide if she'll stay for her ailing father and the promise of a successful life, or return to LA to pursue what she's always wanted. Torn between her two choices, the decision becomes even harder when her cheating ex -- her first love, first kiss and first... you know -- reappears with apologies and a proposition.

Buy it at Amazon

Because of A Book with Diana Raab

Today has been a crazy day with rescheduled blog tours and overbooked Because of A Book features. I apparently had 2 different authors scheduled for today due to a reschedule from last week.  Enjoy today's WOW author and look for another one to come in the weeks ahead.

Today I am pleased to have WOW author, Diana Raab joining me.

Diana M. Raab, MFA, RN was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1954 and received her undergraduate degree in Health Administration and Journalism in 1976. A few years later she received her RN degree. After 25 years as a medical and self-help writer, she’s directed her creative energy towards nonfiction and memoir writing. In 2003 she earned her MFA in Writing from Spalding University’s low-residency program.

She is the author of eight books. Her most recent release, Healing With Words: A Writer’s Cancer Journey (2010) is a memoir/self-help book which includes reflections, experiences, journal entries and poems all emphasizing the healing power of writing. In addition to extensive appendices, each chapter finishes with blank pages and journaling prompts for the reader to write about their own experiences.

Her first memoir, Regina's Closet: Finding My Grandmother's Secret Journal (2007) is the recipient of the 2009 Mom’s Choice Award for Adult Non-Fiction, and the 2009 National Indie Award for Excellence in Memoir.

Diana’s has been writing since a very young age. Currently, she teaches creative journaling and memoir in UCLA Extension Writers’ Program. She facilitates workshops in journaling and writing for healing around the country. She is a frequent moderator for panels on writing.

She's editor of the anthology, Writers and Their Notebooks (USC Press 2010), a collection of essays written by distinguished writers who journal, including Sue Grafton, Kim Stafford, Dorianne Laux, John DuFresne, James Brown and Michael Steinberg, to name a few. The foreword is written by world-renowned personal essayist, Phillip Lopate.

After experiencing three successful, but high-risk pregnancies, she wrote a comprehensive guide for other women. The award-winning Getting Pregnant and Staying Pregnant (1989) which was recently updated and revised in collaboration with Dr. Errol Norwitz of Yale School of Medicine under the new title, Your High Risk Pregnancy: A Practical and Supportive Guide (2009).

Raab's award-winning work has been published in numerous literary magazines and is widely anthologized. She has one poetry chapbook, My Muse Undresses Me and two poetry collections, Dear Anais: My Life in Poems For You winner of the 2009 Next Generation Indie Award for Poetry and the newly released The Guilt Gene.

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How Writing Can Help Us Heal

by

Diana M. Raab

At the age of ten, I made my first journal entry. My grandmother had just committed suicide by taking an overdose of sleeping pills in her room next to mine. It was Labor Day Weekend, 1964, and my parents were both at work. I cracked open her bedroom door and grandma lay in bed completely still with a Graham Greene book and a pair of glasses resting on her chest. The sheer curtains swayed in the breeze as if waving good-bye.

After the commotion of ambulances, paramedics, and my parents frantically rushing about, the grief of this loss penetrated like a deep-seated bullet. But, healing only began days later, when my mother handed me my first journal. I poured my grief onto its pages. Little did my mother know that her seemingly benign gesture set the platform for my life as a writer.

In fact, over the years, I’ve learned that when in distress, many writers do turn to writing because it is a form of catharsis and/or therapy. We can say that when life takes an unexpected turn, journals can become our best friends. Poet Langston Hughes said, “When I feel bad, I write in order to keep from feeling worse.” Writing to feel better is probably the most common reason people crack open their journals. Therapists often suggest journaling as a part of the healing process to help channel problems. Poet Kim Stafford says that the journal lets him wallow, if that’s what he needs. “But,” he says, “the act of writing lifts me out.”

The challenges surrounding illness can also become a catalyst for journaling.  “When it hurts write harder,” one colleague tells me. During the my breast cancer journey, my journal became the forum for venting my fears and frustrations. Eventually parts of my journal entries ended up in my recently released self-help memoir, Healing With Words: A Writer’s Cancer Journey.

Over the years, journaling has been a healthy habit like brushing my teeth. It’s such a powerful tool for our fast-paced and hi-tech existence where TVs, radios, and cell phones clog up our auditory receptors. Some argue that journaling on a computer provides quicker results, but I’m really against it. Not only does the act of using a pen and paper slow us down, but recent studies have shown that we dig deeper into our psyches with a pen in hand.

For the writer, the journal or notebook is not only to a place to play around with words and voice, but it is a place to foster a more intimate relationship with who we are. The journal is also be a place to gather momentum and excitement about writing, akin to the artist’s sketchbook. Many writers, including myself, use their journals as catch-alls for personal experiences, observations and seeds for future works.

Writers such as James Brown says that his journals serve as tools for their creative work: “For me, the journal is a kind of stepping stone to a larger, more refined work. That could be a memoir, a novel, a short story, the personal essay or a script.”

Don’t laugh but it’s important to secure the proper tools for journaling, which include having a seductive and readily available notebook and pen. A few years ago while on vacation with my husband in Hawaii, I was caught without my tools. We’d gotten up early for a drive in the country. Moments after we climbed into our rental car and had already driven a mile up the road, I realized that I’d forgotten my notebook. In a literary panic, I asked my husband to stop at a remote gas station, but, much to my dismay, they had nothing that resembled a writing pad. A few miles later, standing on its own, was a general store, glowing with promise. I entered like a child searching for candy, only to learn that they also had no pads. Head hanging low once again, I walked back to the car, but before pulling the door open, I made an abrupt about-face.

I returned to the cashier and asked for the key to the ladies’ room. From the roll on the wall, I yanked out a stack of paper towels, a suitable, but fragile substitute for a journal. I pondered about what a desperate writer would do for something to scribble on. I was now set to continue my private internal dialogue and ready to plant the seeds which might one day blossom into fine verse. And this is one of the greatest joys of being a writer!

Graciously, the author has offered a copy of this book to one of my readers.  Please comment below and you are entered.  Contest is open to US/Canada residents and ends Tuesday, Aug. 17th at midnight.  Winner will be chosen at random and posted on the 18th.  Good luck...spread the word!

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About Healing With Words:  Healing With Words: A Writer's Cancer Journey is a compassionate and wry self-help memoir written by an award-winning prolific author, nurse and poet, who at the age of forty-seven found her life shattered first by a DCIS (early breast cancer) diagnosis and five years later by another, seemingly unrelated and incurable cancer--multiple myeloma. The book includes the author's experiences, reflections, poetry and journal entries, in addition to writing prompts for readers to express their own personal story. Raab's journals have provided a safe haven and platform to validate and express her feelings. Raab views journaling to be like a daily vitamin--in that it heals, detoxifies and is essential for optimal health.

Readers will learn to:

Understand the importance of early cancer detection and how to take control of their own health

Discover the power of writing to release bottled-up emotions

Learn how the process of journaling can facilitate healing

See how a cancer diagnosis can be a riveting event which can renew and change a person in a unique way

Buy it at Amazon

Because of A Book with Melissa Sarno

This week I am pleased to have Melissa Sarno joining me on the blog.  Here is a little about her...

Melissa Sarno is a writer and producer living in Brooklyn, NY. After working in television production for several years, on the sets of live televised events, promos, commercials, and reality tv, she made the switch to children’s media. She now writes and produces content for toys and interactive games. When she’s not writing elegant prose for preschoolers, she writes for an adult audience and most recently finished her first novel, Spared. Now she begins the exciting journey to get it published. Read more about Melissa on her blog, This Too (http://www.melissasarno.com)

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     I can think of many things that have happened to me because of a book. As a child, I definitely had an overly romantic and idealistic view of the world. I thought that things would be much more exciting if I could live on a farm with talking pigs like in Charlotte’s Web or prance around, following a red robin to an enormous secret garden. I wanted to be the fifth March sister in Little Women and I had lots of other nonsensical ideas that might have gotten me funny looks on the playground. Of course, I now believe that a healthy imagination led me to write the stories I write today. The fact that I knew stories existed at all must have led to my belief that I could create them too.
      I wrote stories from the time my Dad brought home a strange Apple computer when I was 7 years old. Pac Man got boring after a while and the only other thing to ‘play with’ on the strange contraption was a word processing program. I wrote all kinds of silly little things I wish I could read now. And if you had a computer that still read a floppy disk, maybe I could!  I also told people I wanted to be an ‘author’ like Ann M. Martin, creator of the beloved Babysitter’s Club series.
      Despite the fact that I was so invested in the idea of becoming a ‘writer’ and that I had become so wrapped up in stories other people wrote as well as absorbed in the words I was putting on paper, it did not hit me that stories and words were powerful things until I read The Diary of Anne Frank. The fact that she sat down to write in her journal every day. That she told her story despite unimaginable human suffering. That she was just a young girl and she had a voice was remarkable to me. Of course we know her as a symbol of so much more. I mean the praise for this book is epic; her wisdom at such a young age, her faith in the human spirit, her haunting prose, all about a life cut tragically short. But for me, it was all about this idea of being 15 years old and writing out your thoughts even when no one cares and no one is listening. And then knowing that those words could become what they became. That it was just a paper and a pen that could make the whole world turn their heads and listen.
      Of course, there are many books that shaped me as a writer. But it was her diary that told me if you sit down and write what you think, it could mean something to someone. And at 15 years old myself, I thought, Well, this makes a lot of sense to me. This is pretty cool. You never know who will hear your stories. You never know who will relate to them. You just sit down and tell your story the best you can with the knowledge that someday it could mean something to someone.

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About The Diary of Anne Frank - Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl is among the most enduring documents of the twentieth century. Since its publication in 1947, it has been read by tens of millions of people all over the world. It remains a beloved and deeply admired testament to the indestructible nature of the human spirit. Restored in this Definitive Edition are diary entries that were omitted from the original edition. These passages, which constitute 30 percent more material, reinforce the fact that Anne was first and foremost a teenage girl, not a remote and flawless symbol. She fretted about and tried to cope with her own sexuality. Like many young girls, she often found herself in disagreements with her mother. And like any teenager, she veered between the carefree nature of a child and the full-fledged sorrow of an adult. Anne emerges more human, more vulnerable and more vital than ever.

Anne Frank and her family, fleeing the horrors of Nazi occupation, hid in the back of an Amsterdam warehouse for two years. She was thirteen when she went into the Secret Annex with her family.

Buy it at IndieBound