First Look

A book cover!  Can it be ours?

Panic, Pray and Publish

I've looked on the back of book jackets for years, thinking how cool
it would be to be a real author with my picture gracing that page.
Of course, I'd want to look like Jan Karon and I don't. I'd picture
myself at book signings, seated behind a table with my books piled
high and lines of people wanting me to sign their book. I'd smile and
be gracious and charming, a perfectly coiffed blonde with red
manicured nails and ivory hands without one age spot. My clothes
would be from Chico's, my heels high and stylish and Chanel No. 5
would waft from my presence. That, of course, is all a dream, so I
guess you'll have to buy the book to see what we really look like.

But the dream of having a book with Julie's and my name on it is
actually coming to pass! What a gift. Now we're going to be thinking
about publicity, posters, pushcards, press releases, and promotional
items. Now we must have persistence as we panic and pray and
publish. Now we must just be who we are...unpretentious, late, late
middle aged (I can't say old!) women with a story to tell. We hope
you'll share your thoughts with us on the blog.

Journey of a Journey

I have to pinch myself; I think our book will actually happen.  Last week the layout people started working on fonts and appearance of our text. Yesterday Judy and I approved the cover.  Late yesterday afternoon our marketing director emailed us throwing words around like bookmarks, niche for sales, press releases.  And underneath somewhere are the words "book signings."  Ha, we thought when we finished writing we were actually finished.

I might lose heart, but Judy is giving me courage.  We are in this steep learning curve for experience, though wouldn't it be fun if we had a New York Times best seller.  In your dreams!  So if you happen to see an errant flyer with A JOURNEY OF LETTERS printed on it in big bold letters, you can empathize with our angst, shake your head over our folly, or if you've a mind to, give us an encouraging pat on the shoulder.  And if you want to write a book,  you could try pen on paper and then simply pass it around to your friends.

Don't Forget to Live

As our book dreams grow into reality, I was reminded last week of the
importance of enjoying our lives with purpose. Helping a friend clean
out the apartment of a 90 year old woman who had fallen and been
hospitalized for a month, never again to return to her home, I was
struck by how like that woman I am. She made lists and saved
clippings and gathered new recipes, as do I. She had a closet too
full of clothes, with too many shoes, and too many linens, as do I.
She collected cookbooks and watercolor paints, dishes and glasses and
pots and pans, cards to send on appropriate occasions, innumerable
pens and pencils and paper, and creams and lotions to keep her spot-
less and wrinkle-less, as do I.

So yesterday I spent cleaning out my own drawers and closets and
cupboards, desperate to keep things neat and at a minimum, lest my
children have to do this for me some day in the future. But the
future is today. We never know when the unexpected expected will
occur. It could be now or 20 years from now. February is a good time
to begin my New Year's Resolutions, though, don't you think? My
desire is to stop spending unnecessarily, to give generously and to
live passionately.

Our book, A Journey of Letters, (due out in the spring) will perhaps
encourage you to begin writing down your own story, a legacy aside
from 'stuff' you can leave your children. Let's all learn to live
now, for tomorrow could be too late.

A Tuesday List

A thankful list for a Tuesday:

Down-soft snow blanket when drought looms large.
Warm house when many Syrians have not a cold one.
Shelves full of books when some cannot read.
A friend to laugh with when many are lonely.
Language to think our souls when some are mute.
And last, a fresh new book acquires a cover.
Oh for courage to say, "This book is ours."
                                               Julie

Christmas is Coming fast!

Hello, faithful followers of our blog, if there be any followers at
all. Is your Christmas shopping done? Have you baked cookies and
made fudge or divinity? Does anyone make divinity any more? I used
to love that heavenly melt-in-your-mouth flavor of...sugar. Now I'm
trying to be gluten free, sugar free, carb free, lactose free and fat
free. It's not working out very well. What IS working out, is the
third and final edit on our book. What a gift it will be if we can
turn it in before the beginning of 2013! And so none of us forget the
real GIFT of Christmas, I'll share a poem I wrote for our church
Advent booklet of meditations.

The Buoyancy of Grace

Come again to us this Advent
As You did so long ago
In Your river of forgiveness
Let Your ocean ever flow.

For in these rubber tubes we float
Held up so we don't sink
Your lavish love surrounding us
Grace enough to drink.

With never a fear of drowning
Surrounded by this ring
Protected for all Eternity
Privileged children of The King.

Blessed Christmas to you all.

Perfection

It feels good to have the second edit sent off!  Only one more to go, we trust.  Is a book ever finished?  Can it be perfect with no mistakes?  Will it offend anyone?  Inspire anyone?  Exclude anyone?  I read this quote by Oscar Wilde the other day:  "I have been correcting the proofs of my poems.  In the morning, after hard work, I took a comma out of one sentence.  In the afternoon I put it back again."   Does this sound like us, or what?

Remember I asked you for a suggestion of a book to read?   (I'd run out of good ones for a month or so.)  And you asked if I'd read 84 Charing Cross Road.  I asked if it was true.  I hate true, I'd rather read fiction...makes life seem not so real.   I started reading it anyway, and I love it!  Here's an entry from Helene Hanff, February 9, 1952:  I never can get interested in things that didn't happen to people who never lived.  

So, I guess lots of people will like our book, right?  And I may learn to love non-fiction after all.   Judy