Authors Are People Too!

This week was Emily's and My first week back to school, and it went beautifully. There was no arguing over doing math. There was no complaining about various subjects. There wasn't even a peep when I told her we had to work a half an hour longer per day to get everything accomplished. It was a wonderful, beautiful, miracle!

One of her assignments this week was to write a letter to author Lois Sepahban. Back in April when I attended the Southern Kentucky Book Festival, Emily was told she could purchase one book, and she chose Lois's Paper Wishes. She happily read it over the summer, and wanted to let the author know how much she enjoyed it. I felt this was important for several reasons, one being that authors are people too. And by that, I mean that everyone, no matter who they are, likes to be complimented, likes to be told when they do a good job, and likes to know that what they do matters to some other person in this large and very populated world.
 

Paper Wishes is a historical fiction work that tells the story of ten year old Manami after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Manami and her family, being of Japanese descent, were summarily rousted from their homes and sent to internment camps. Forced to leave behind all that was familiar and all that she held dear including her small dog, Manami tries to make sense of her frightening new world. Emily loved many things about this story but what she loved most was that it was told from Manami's ten year old point of view. Although a horrific part of our American history, this story shares the truly courageous and enduring spirit of a people wrongly accused.

Recently, author Shana Gorian showed me a great kindness by hosting me for a question and answer session on her website. These paying it forward moments, fellow author support, or just plain kindnesses are a huge part in keeping an author on the literary track. You can only imagine how many times an author feels like throwing in the towel. And in honor of the pay it forward spirit, I am happy to be able to do the same for her.

Shana is the author of The Roscoe The Rascal Series, but she recently updated, Rosco the Rascal Visits the Pumpkin Patch, by giving it a fresh and inviting cover. Apparently there are also fresh new illustrations by Josh Addessi as well. Rosco the Rascal series for kids, consist of chapter books in which a sometimes rascally German shepherd uses his true heroic nature to help his pals, James and Mandy, find adventure and overcome obstacles. Although I have not yet read any of Shana's works, they do look and sound appealing!

Shana wanted me to let all my readers know that she is offering a free giveaway of the first two chapters of this book in PDF format to all new subscribers. You can join her at www.shanagorian.com where you can subscribe to her VIP email list. Or if you are a Kindle Unlimited Subscriber, you can download the Kindle version for free or for a mere $1.99 for a regular Kindle copy. It is also available in paperback for those "I love to hold the book" people!

I was interested to learn that Shana grew up in Western Pennsylvania and currently lives in California. The opposite is true for  me. I was born in Oakland, California and now reside in Ohio. It seems she is a jack-of-all trades as well. She has worked as a part-time nanny, a reporter, a camp counselor, a web designer, a waitress, a newspaper and pizza delivery gal, and a mother of two. She has gathered her wealth of material for fun and unusual stories by watching her real life German shepherd, but admits that most of the trouble that Roscoe and his gang get into is entirely fictitious.

Well, that about wraps it up for this week. Join me next week for another exciting episode, same crazy time, same crazy channel. Also be sure to drop by and join the Literacy Musings Monday Blog Hop where you will find other great blogs, or my personal website Fun With Aileen where you will find more on reading, writing, and my very own chapter and picture books. And finally, you can find me on twitter @AileenWStewart if you want an extremely brief glimpse into my days.