Thursday, November 26, 2015

Book Beginning: Ancient Places by Jack Nisbet



THANKS FOR JOINING ME ON FRIDAYS FOR BOOK BEGINNING FUN!

Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author’s name.

EARLY BIRDS & SLOWPOKES: This weekly post goes up Thursday evening for those who like to get their posts up and linked early on. But feel free to add a link all week.

FACEBOOK: Rose City Reader has a Facebook page where I post about new and favorite books, book events, and other bookish tidbits, as well as link to blog posts. I'd love a "Like" on the page! You can go to the page here to Like it. I am happy to Like you back if you have a blog or professional Facebook page, so please leave a comment with a link and I will find you.

TWITTER, ETC: If you are on Twitter, Google+, or other social media, please post using the hash tag #BookBeginnings. I try to follow all Book  Beginnings participants on whatever interweb sites you are on, so please let me know if I have missed any and I will catch up.

TIE IN: The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice is a natural tie in with this event and there is a lot of cross over, so many people combine the two. The idea is to post a teaser from page 56 of the book you are reading and share a link to your post. Find details and the Linky for your Friday 56 post on Freda’s Voice.

YOUR BOOK BEGINNING



MY BOOK BEGINNING



In early November 1792, Hudson's Bay Company fur agent David Thompson led a crew of hungry men through the wilderness of lakes that exteded north and west of their York Factory headquarters on the bay.

-- Ancient Places: People and Landscape in the Emerging Northwest by Jack Nisbet, published by my favorite Sasquatch Books.

This collection of nonfiction stories explores the connection between human history and natural history in the region that is now Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. Ancient Places would make a great choice for the history or nature lover on your holiday shopping list!

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Author Interview: Carolee Horning


Carolee Horning is an inspirational and now-fearless woman who broke decades of silence about how her Catholic priest seduced and sexually molested her when she was an immature teenager. When she was 40, she came forward to bring a claim against the Portland Archdiocese and tell the world about her experience.



The Journal of my Broken Life is Carolee's first-person account of her abuse, her lawsuit, and her path from victim to survivor. It is an honest, straight-from-the-heart, and ultimately uplifting story that deserves a wide audience.

Carolee recently answered questions for Rose City Reader:

How did you come to write The Journal of My Broken Life?

I was preparing for my deposition in my case against the Archdiocese of Portland and was struggling with memories, dates, and sequences of events. I had always kept a journal, and my therapist recommended writing and going through my past entries to help me center myself and anticipate questions and answers for my part of the deposition. Once I completed the deposition, I found myself still writing and journaling. My therapist commented that it could be very healing for not only myself but for others if I made it into a book. And so, I did!

Your memoir is an intensely personal account of being abused by your Catholic priest. Was it difficult to tell such an intimate story?

In some ways it was difficult, but in other ways it was freeing. It was healing. As the words hit the page, the burden of carrying all that pain for so long seemed to ease. I had been keeping secrets my entire life up to that point, so it felt liberating to share it all - the light and the dark, the painful and the intimate.

Who is your intended audience and what do you hope your readers will gain from your book?

My intended audience is fellow survivors of childhood sexual abuse, as well as parents and the general public. One out of three girls and one out of five boys will suffer from childhood sexual abuse. I’m hoping that my book will help shed light on this epidemic, enlighten people regarding prevention measures, and that fellow victims and survivors will learn and understand what happened to them was not their fault, and that they are not alone. Parents will be aware of the grooming techniques that predators use, and learn to NEVER leave their child alone with another adult, even if it is one they think they can trust.

You were one of the cast in the play Telling. Explain a little about that project and what it was like to be involved in it.

Telling is a play written by Margie Boule. Over several months time she interviewed seven survivors of childhood sexual abuse, me included. She then took our true accounts and wove them into a beautiful tapestry, along with personal images, songs, and other artistic pieces that resulted in the play, Telling, Adult Survivors Step Into The Light.

Being in this play changed my life. It inspired me to change my profession and I am now in graduate school to become a licensed therapist. The cast mates are more than my friends -- they are my brothers and sisters. The unconditional love I have received and given to them feels like what heaven must be like. We completely understand one another, love each other, comfort one another, and make each other stronger. And we have been able to reach out to other victims and survivors to inspire them and show them that they are not alone. Our play also helped to educate the audience on what the face of a survivor looks like, what a predator looks like, and how this epidemic persists. We shine light into the dark places of abuse! I can only hope that we are able to present Telling to more and more audiences because I think it’s a wonderful tool of love, encouragement, and education.

Can you recommend any other books about healing after child sexual abuse? Are any of them personal account like yours?

I was in Telling with Digene Farrar and she has written her personal account of sexual abuse entitled, Not My Secret To Keep.  She is a real survivor, and an inspiration!

What can friends and family of abuse victims do to support them?

I would not be as healed as I am today without the loving support of my family. They have been unconditional when it has come to my journey, letting me heal the way I needed to heal. I’m sure parts of my book were hurtful for them, but they did nothing but encourage me. They are proud of me. When I first told my family, they were accepting. We’ve always been close, but I had put up walls. Now, all that made sense to them. I would say the most important thing you can do for your loved one when they tell you they’ve been abused is to listen to them with an open mind and an open heart, look deep inside yourself and you will know you are hearing the truth, love them unconditionally, and do whatever it is THEY need to heal. It’s not about you, at that point. It’s about the victim. It’s not about pride or shame or guilt. It’s just about healing.

What’s next? What are you working on now?

As I mentioned earlier, I changed my entire world around and am now in the Mental Health Counseling Graduate Program at Northwest Christian University in Eugene, Oregon. When performing in Telling, I learned how much good therapists are needed. Unfortunately, there are a lot of “technicians,” out there, and they are not necessarily “healers.” I want to be a healer, like my therapist was for me. I want to work with other adults that suffered abuse as a child. I want to give purpose and meaning to my own story by helping someone else along their healing journey.

THANKS, CAROLEE! AND GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR STUDIES!

THE JOURNAL OF MY BROKEN LIFE IS AVAILABLE IN PAPERBACK OR KINDLE.

AND YOU CAN FOLLOW CAROLEE'S BLOG ON GOODREADS.

Monday, November 23, 2015

Mailbox Monday: Numbers and Nerves



Thanks for joining me for Mailbox Monday! MM was created by Marcia, who graciously hosted it for a long, long time, before turning it into a touring event. Mailbox Monday has now returned to its permanent home where you can link to your MM post.

I got one book last week, and it has me intrigued:



Numbers and Nerves: Information, Emotion, and Meaning in a World of Data, edited by Scott Slovic and Paul Slovic, published by OSU Press. This is a collection of essays and interviews that examines how we are deluged with facts, statistics, models, and projections to the point of desensitization to information presented in the form of numbers.

The journalists, literary critics, psychologists, naturalists, activists, and others who contributed to the book explore this quandary and offer strategies for overcoming the insensitivity.

OK, I'll admit it sounds pretty abstract and not what I'd pick up after a long day at work. But when I think about it, it does sound very interesting and I'd like to learn more. And it includes an essay by Annie Dillard!

Friday, November 20, 2015

Book Beginning: Certainty by Victor Bevine



THANKS FOR JOINING ME ON FRIDAYS FOR BOOK BEGINNING FUN!

SORRY FOR THE LATE POSTING!

We had two briefs to file in court yesterday and I forgot to post this post. It sat here in draft form. APOLOGIES!


Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author’s name.

EARLY BIRDS & SLOWPOKES: This weekly post goes up Thursday evening for those who like to get their posts up and linked early on. But feel free to add a link all week.

FACEBOOK: Rose City Reader has a Facebook page where I post about new and favorite books, book events, and other bookish tidbits, as well as link to blog posts. I'd love a "Like" on the page! You can go to the page here to Like it. I am happy to Like you back if you have a blog or professional Facebook page, so please leave a comment with a link and I will find you.

TWITTER, ETC: If you are on Twitter, Google+, or other social media, please post using the hash tag #BookBeginnings. I try to follow all Book  Beginnings participants on whatever interweb sites you are on, so please let me know if I have missed any and I will catch up.

TIE IN: The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice is a natural tie in with this event and there is a lot of cross over, so many people combine the two. The idea is to post a teaser from page 56 of the book you are reading and share a link to your post. Find details and the Linky for your Friday 56 post on Freda’s Voice.

YOUR BOOK BEGINNING



MY BOOK BEGINNING



William Bartlett had visited at the Newport City Jail only once before, on his ninth birthday, when he’d been treated to a tour of the facility by the police commissioner himself, a longtime acquaintance of his father.

Certainty by Victor Bevine. This historical novel is inspired by a true scandal in Newport, Rhode Island near the end of World War I, when a local Episcopal priest was accused of sexual impropriety with Navy sailors.

Certainty would make a great pairing with the new Spotlight movie about the Catholic sex abuse scandal in Boston. I saw the movie last week and it is lights out good. Now I want to read Certainty to get a perspective on how similar scandals were treated in earlier decades. Not much differently, I would imagine -- wrong is wrong.

Wednesday, November 18, 2015

Author Interview: Judith Hooper


Judith Hooper the author of the new novel, Alice in Bed.

Alice James was the sister of novelist Henry James and philosopher William James. Hooper's historical novel tells the story of Alice's life, mostly through letters with her famous brothers, because Alice has taken to bed with a mysterious illness.



Judy recently answered some questions for Rose City Reader:

How did you come to write Alice in Bed?

It grew out of a nonfiction book about a preFreudian psychology that sprang up in 19th century Boston. William James was part of it, along with many interesting Boston characters including psychics. When this research did not pan out, I decided to write a novel about William’s “hysterical” sister instead. By then I’d got to know the Jameses and the social and intellectual atmosphere of Boston and Harvard College in the latter half of the 19th century. At first it seemed wasteful to have done extensive research for a book I never wrote, but it ended up being useful background knowledge for Alice in Bed.

How much of your novel is based on true, historical events?

Maybe 75 percent is factual and the rest I like to think is plausible. The Jameses (especially Henry) burned the letters they did not want posterity to see. I imagined that when I filled in the blanks I was channeling the letters that went up in smoke. And many of the things Alice says in the novel are drawn straight from her letters and her diary. She was hilariously funny and curiously modern, with the Jamesian flair for highly original utterances.

How did you research the historical information and detail found in your book? Did you have access to primary source materials? People to interview?

The James family had its own peculiar culture. Their father, Henry James Sr. was a Swedenborgian mystic who considered colleges and schools to be “hotbeds of courruption” and educated his children privately, partly in Europe. Thus the five siblings—William, Henry, Wilky, Bob, and Alice—grew up like an isolated tribe on an island, with their own language and customs. To capture the flavor of the family culture, thus, I read thousands of James family letters. diaries, notebooks, William’s scientific and philosophical writing, Henry’s autobiographical and travel writing. I also read histories of Harvard College, memoirs and diaries of other 19th century Bostonians. magazines like Godey’s Lady’s Book, as I wanted to know how people talked and thought, what they wore, what life was like for a woman in those days. (Very arduous!)

Can you recommend any other books or resources about Alice James?

There is a good 1880 biography by Jean Strouse, and Alice’s diary has been published. There are several biographies about the entire James family including Alice. Some of Alice’s letters have been published and others are available on the internet. Colm Toibin’s The Master is one of my favorite novels and his Henry James is the genuine Henry James as far as I am concerned.

What did you learn from writing your book – either about the subject of the book or the writing process – that most surprised you?

My background is in nonfiction. I was surprised by the way a novel takes you over and writes itself through you. There is surrender involved. You don’t know where you’re going exactly, your characters have their own life, and you don’t know how many years it will take. But that is the joy of it. You have to let go and trust in something deeper inside you.

Who are your three (or four or five) favorite authors? Is your own writing influenced by who you read?

When I was in my 20s I loved great stylists like Nabokov, Proust, Virginia Woolf. I still worship every single world-weary, beautiful sentence in Graham Greene. There are scenes in Tolstoy I would give my soul to have written. More recently, Anne Enright’s The Green Road strikes me as a near-perfect novel—along with Colm Toibin’s The Master and Hilary Mantel’s Henry VIII novels. There are too many to mention.

I don’t think there were ever more great novels than there are today (by writers from all parts of the world). At the same time, it has probably never been harder to make a living by writing them.

Have you been influenced by other writers? 

All the time, but I learn best from those with a sensibility like my own. For example, The Orphan Master’s Son is an amazing novel but foreign to me, whereas Jonathan Franzen feels like family (literally speaking) and I get a lot from studying his scenes, taking them apart and putting them together again.

What kind of books do you like to read?

Right now literary fiction and the occasional good spy novel. I go through phases. There was a period when I devoured survival memoirs—doomed mountaineering expeditions, stranded arctic explorers, shipwreck survivors adrift on rafts. I had a life-threatening illness and I guess I was working something out for myself.

What are you reading now? 

Risk Hallberg’s wonderful City on Fire. (I moved to New York City in 1976, so his New York is also the one I got to know.) At the same time I’m reading & Sons by David Gilbert and loving that. I confess I sometimes confuse the two.

What do you do to promote your books? Do you use social networking sites or other internet resources? 

I have an author website with a page for book groups and instructions on how to contact me. I am on Facebook (but don’t have an author page there) and I tweet now and then as @JudyHooper2. I am not sure if the latter has been helpful.

Do you have any events coming up to promote your book?

Just finished a modest book tour in my neighborhood (western Massachusetts) and one in the San Francisco Bay Area, where I grew up. There may be more events in New York City and elsewhere in January.

What is the most valuable advice you’ve been given as an author?

Write all the time, when you feel inspired and when you don’t. And be very, very patient! I wish someone had told me years ago that the writers I admired probably didn’t have the entire novel worked out in their minds from beginning to end, as if they were just taking dictation from God. I had no idea of the process and concluded I lacked imagination.

What’s next? Are you working on your next book?

I’m working on a novel tentatively entitled How to Disappear and Never be Found. Although the main characters are three teenage girls who make a tragic mistake it is not a YA novel.

THANKS, JUDY!

ALICE IN BED IS AVAILABLE ON LINE FROM POWELL'S, AMAZON, OR OTHER ON-LINE STORES, OR ASK YOUR LOCAL BOOKSTORE TO ORDER IT!

Monday, November 16, 2015

Mailbox Monday: Buffalo Noir



Thanks for joining me for Mailbox Monday! MM was created by Marcia, who graciously hosted it for a long, long time, before turning it into a touring event. Mailbox Monday has now returned to its permanent home where you can link to your MM post.

I got one book last week, from the LibraryThing Early Reviewer program:



Buffalo Noir, edited by Ed Park and Brigid Hughes.

This collection of "Ice-Cold Stories" is another terrific anthology in Akashic Books' Noir Series.  The headliners in this collection are Joyce Carol Oates and Lawrence Block, but the real star of the Buffalo Noir show is New York's second largest city, or at least its dark side.

Thursday, November 12, 2015

Book Beginning: The 52 Lists Project



THANKS FOR JOINING ME ON FRIDAYS FOR BOOK BEGINNING FUN!

Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author’s name.

EARLY BIRDS & SLOWPOKES: This weekly post goes up Thursday evening for those who like to get their posts up and linked early on. But feel free to add a link all week.

FACEBOOK: Rose City Reader has a Facebook page where I post about new and favorite books, book events, and other bookish tidbits, as well as link to blog posts. I'd love a "Like" on the page! You can go to the page here to Like it. I am happy to Like you back if you have a blog or professional Facebook page, so please leave a comment with a link and I will find you.

TWITTER, ETC: If you are on Twitter, Google+, or other social media, please post using the hash tag #BookBeginnings. I try to follow all Book  Beginnings participants on whatever interweb sites you are on, so please let me know if I have missed any and I will catch up.

TIE IN: The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice is a natural tie in with this event and there is a lot of cross over, so many people combine the two. The idea is to post a teaser from page 56 of the book you are reading and share a link to your post. Find details and the Linky for your Friday 56 post on Freda’s Voice.

YOUR BOOK BEGINNING



MY BOOK BEGINNING



The act of list making is such an essential part of our everyday lives, whether we jot down those lists on paper or create plans in our minds.

-- The 52 Lists Project: A Year of Weekly Journaling Inspiration by Moorea Seal, coincidentally published by Sasquatch Books.

The 52 List Project isn't a book to read, it is a journal to keep, with beautiful pictures and prompts to inspire 52 weeks of journal writing. I can't resist a list, so I just love this. And based on it's universal appeal with every woman who has seen it sitting on my desk, I've decided to make it my default Christmas gift this year.

Wednesday, November 11, 2015

Veterans' Day & Anniversay

Thank you veterans, for your service! 


And Happy 15th Anniversary to my terrific husband!


Tuesday, November 10, 2015

Teaser Tuesday: Honey in the Horn



When Clay got to camp, Luce had the wagon-seat dismounted and breakfast spread on it. To his relief, she took the news of the killing very calmly.

-- Honey in the Horn by H. L. Davis. Wow! Those pioneer women were tough!

Honey in the Horn won the 1936 Pulitzer Prize -- the only Pulitzer for an Oregon novel. It is a classic coming of age novel about Oregon  homesteaders in the early 1900s.

This reprint edition from OSU Press features a new introduction by Richard W. Etulain.


Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by Jenn at A Daily Rhythm, where you can find the official rules for this weekly event.


Monday, November 9, 2015

Mailbox Monday: The Lightening Round



Thanks for joining me for Mailbox Monday! MM was created by Marcia, who graciously hosted it for a long, long time, before turning it into a touring event. Mailbox Monday has now returned to its permanent home where you can link to your MM post.

I got one book last week, and if looks like fun:



The Lighening Round by Bruce Stewart. Its a Rom Com set in San Francisco with the two protagonists competitors in a fitness challenge at a local gym.

This might not be the sort of thing I usually pick up, but it sounds perfect right now because I am super busy at work and need something funny and light to take to the gym with me!

Thursday, November 5, 2015

Book Beginning: Honey in the Horn



THANKS FOR JOINING ME ON FRIDAYS FOR BOOK BEGINNING FUN!

Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author’s name.

EARLY BIRDS & SLOWPOKES: This weekly post goes up Thursday evening for those who like to get their posts up and linked early on. But feel free to add a link all week.

FACEBOOK: Rose City Reader has a Facebook page where I post about new and favorite books, book events, and other bookish tidbits, as well as link to blog posts. I'd love a "Like" on the page! You can go to the page here to Like it. I am happy to Like you back if you have a blog or professional Facebook page, so please leave a comment with a link and I will find you.

TWITTER, ETC: If you are on Twitter, Google+, or other social media, please post using the hash tag #BookBeginnings. I try to follow all Book  Beginnings participants on whatever interweb sites you are on, so please let me know if I have missed any and I will catch up.

TIE IN: The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice is a natural tie in with this event and there is a lot of cross over, so many people combine the two. The idea is to post a teaser from page 56 of the book you are reading and share a link to your post. Find details and the Linky for your Friday 56 post on Freda’s Voice.

YOUR BOOK BEGINNING



MY BOOK BEGINNING



There was a run-down old tollbridge station in the Shoestring Valley of Southern Oregon where Uncle Preston Shiveley had lived for fifty years, outlasting a wife, two sons, several plagues of grasshoppers, wheat-rust and caterpillars, a couple or three invasions of land-hunting settlers and real-estate speculators, and everybody else except the scattering of old pioneers who had cockleburred themselves onto the country at about the same time he did.

-- Honey in the Horn by H. L. Davis. I'm a sucker for shaggy opening sentences like this that set the stage and give a whole backstory in one go.

Honey in the Horn, Davis's 1936 Pulitzer Prize winner, is a classic coming of age novel set in Oregon in the early 1900s. This reprint edition from OSU Press features a new introduction by Richard W. Etulain.

Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Author Interview: Ellyn Bell and Stacey Bell


Ellyn Bell and Stacey Bell are co-authors of a new book, Singing with the Sirens: Overcoming the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Sexual Exploitation. The women drew on their own experiences and years of working with domestic and sexual abuse survivors to address the long term complex trauma that results from the sexual abuse and exploitation of girls and young women.

They recently answered interview questions for Rose City Reader.


How did you come to write Singing with the Sirens?

We decided to write this book after concluding our first round of 12 week process group sessions with girls in detention. We realized the commonality of their challenges and stories, and we recognized how our own troubled pasts had led us to challenges, unfortunate relationships, and feelings of defeat. We knew firsthand what a difficult and tumultuous journey it is to become whole and emotionally healthy. We wanted to provide hope to other women on the journey and to girls and young women. We were attempting to create solidarity through the common threads that bind us.

All that said, we began writing in the fall of 2011— and the way just gently unfolded to us through conversation and dreams. We decided to write from a practical standpoint, but with a poetic quality that infuses both of our writing styles. It is the power of myth and poetry that truly spoke to us and informed the book.

What is your work background and how did it lead to writing this book?

We have both worked with youth throughout our careers in the fields of social services and education. We have both been especially fortunate to work with young people who have learned to use resilience and strength to overcome substantial challenges, or to learn to cope with difficulties as they present themselves.

Both of us have worked in and out of the classroom with youth, counseled youth and adults, and been involved in the administration of programs that assist youth and adults who have suffered abuse, neglect, homelessness and violence.

Your book is about the complex trauma early abuse in girls’ lives, but you include much about your personal stories. Did you have any qualms about sharing so much?

We were both very clear from the beginning that we were not setting out to write a memoir. There are numerous memoirs on exploitation and abuse that are available, and that was never our goal. However, we did recognize that story is an effective means of conveying concepts that are relatable to people and yet not completely personal. So we decided to use anonymous stories from the outset, and although many of them are our own, we tried to make them relatable to the experiences of others through the emotional tenor of the story telling. We both have found much healing in our own lives through the writing of story, and use of theater, art, and poetry.

So in some way, I think we felt vulnerable to a degree, as we are both introverted people. But that experience of vulnerability was mitigated by turning the realities of lived life to story and using myth, dreamlike creatures, and the beauty of transformation to counter the harshness of the topic and promote a feeling of strength from within — which we wanted to do for ourselves and our readers.

Who is your intended audience and what do you hope your readers will gain from your book?

We wrote this book for women of all ages and backgrounds who have experienced sexual trauma as children or youth, and for women who consider themselves “survivors” of sexual abuse or exploitation. We also wrote it for students of social work, women’s studies, and social sciences, as well as practitioners of social work, child welfare, public health, education, and psychology. We think it could be beneficial to both those who have experienced sexual abuse and trauma and those who work with survivors of sexual abuse and trauma. There is such a common thread that runs through stories of sexual and emotional trauma in women's lives, and we wanted to help people find that link and not feel alone.

Since writing this book, we have been approached by a number of men who have identified with information in the book as well as men who want to understand and stand with women that they love.

One common theme is “how do we become the heroines of our own lives?” and that theme is important for all women in our world. It is the learning to live in our own power and not in the definitions of a culture or a time that defines us.

Can you recommend any other books about healing after child abuse?

We both love the work of Judith Herman and Peter Levine for understanding and dealing with trauma. Iyanla Vanzant and Clarissa Pinkola Estes, as well as the stories and poetry of Adrienne Rich and Alice Walker were particularly useful to us in finding a healing process.

There are several good books that address healing from abuse; however, we thought it important to address the outcomes on adult women’s lives and how we find or lose our power in our chosen work, relationships, family, etc. And how this repeats itself in cycles until we can gain understanding in the imprinted patterns of our lives.

What did you learn from writing your book – either about the subject of the book or the writing process – that most surprised you?

I think we both learned far more that we are even aware of at present. So much material came to us through our dreams and our discussions with each other. But we kind of lived the journey as we went a through the writing. Sometimes we would say to each other things like, “ooo, I’m in the hunger now. I’m really feeling it and it is out of control!” or “Well, I’m definitely putting up a fortress now and it is no longer helpful!”

We lived the concepts of each chapter and we re-lived them in new ways as we wrote the book. Finally saying to ourselves — well let’s finish this book and move on with our lives and stop re-living these old traumas!

What has most surprised us in general is that after completely being in the thick of it and exploring it; we have both been able to get a very new perspective on living with strength and grace despite everything.

You are named as co-authors. Can you describe your process of writing the book together?

We had a unique writing process that worked for us. In the beginning, I think we both lacked the confidence that we could write a book, but the process of writing together was a kind of encouragement and a commitment at the same time. In the beginning, we outlined the chapters and the concepts that we wanted to discuss. Then we took turns writing and contributing to each chapter — such as Ellyn started the first chapter and Stacey the second and after 2 weeks we switched and Ellyn worked on chapter two and Stacey on first chapter. We did this throughout fourteen chapters and then wrote the last chapter in three days together lounging around on the floor of Ellyn’s apartment. We traded our computers back and forth and added to each other’s work. We were so surprised to see how on the same page we were in terms of content and thought! Eventually, we edited and consolidated information and story.

What resources would you recommend for survivors of child sexual abuse? How about for their loved ones and supporters?

It’s a somewhat complex question to answer as there are many additional issues that survivors face in adulthood. They may not be able to comprehend or deal with the abuse they suffered as children that may be the root causes of other disturbances that are more predominant in their adult lives. Such as for some it may be addictions or anxiety or depression, and for others it may be an emotionally or physically abusive partner or relationship, an eating disorder or challenges with their own children. It’s important to deal with the presenting issue at hand and then address the underlying causes. There are numerous resources for addressing old trauma; many of which we discuss in the book. Sometimes once the connection is made, then the issues can be dealt with simultaneously.

What can friends and family of abuse victims do to support them?

They can read and study information on trauma and trauma bonds, and try to gain understanding on the issues that face their loved one. They can come to see the linkages of the challenges faced by their friend or family member by gaining an understanding of the issue.

They can also support them in finding healing groups or resources.

What is the most valuable advice you’ve been given as someone working to help abuse survivors?

Listen to them. Believe them.

Do you have any events coming up to promote your book?

We’ve had a few since the book was published in May, but expect there to be more as time goes on and the book gains more momentum.

What’s next? Are you working on new projects?

Yes, Stacey is working on her PhD. And all that is required of her.

Ellyn is working on some articles, wrote a speech for a “take back the night” rally for a friend, and is looking at doing some additional writing projects.

THANKS ELLYN & STACEY!

SINGING WITH THE SIRENS IS PUBLISHED BY SHE WRITES PRESS AND IS AVAILABLE ONLINE FROM POWELL'S OR AMAZON, OR ASK YOUR LOCAL BOOKSTORE TO ORDER IT!

Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Teaser Tuesday: Alice in Bed by Judith Hooper



From Italy, in his wretched, homesick state, William had written me the tenderest, most fraternal of letters of which I could recall whole passages by heart. Thou seemest to me so beautiful from her, so intelligent, etc.

-- Alice in Bed by Judith Hooper. This is a historical novel about Alice James, so the William referred to above is her philosopher brother, William James. Much of this story of Alice's life is told through letters between Alice, William, and her other brother, novelist Henry James, because the "present day" action takes place after Alice has taken to bed with a mysterious illness.

Alice in Bed is generating a lot of attention. If you are in the Bay Area this week, there are several author reading and book signing events coming up in Berkeley, Larkspur, and San Francisco. See here for details.


Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by Jenn at A Daily Rhythm, where you can find the official rules for this weekly event.

Monday, November 2, 2015

Mailbox Monday



Thanks for joining me for Mailbox Monday! MM was created by Marcia, who graciously hosted it for a long, long time, before turning it into a touring event. Mailbox Monday has now returned to its permanent home where you can link to your MM post.

Two books came into my house last week and they both look great:



Certainty by Victor Bevine. This historical novel is inspired by a true scandal in Newport, Rhode Island near the end of World War I, when a local Episcopal priest was accused of sexual impropriety with Navy sailors.



Ancient Places: People and Landscape in the Emerging Northwest by Jack Nisbet, published by my favorite Sasquatch Books. This is a collection of nonfiction stories about the connection between human history and natural history.

Jack Nisbet will be reading and signing Ancient Places at Powell's Books in Portland on November 19, 2015 at 7:30 pm.