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SSWW Welcomes Dr. Connie Mariano My Patients were Presidents

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SCOTTSDALE SOCIETY OF WOMEN WRITERS

Welcomes Dr. Connie Mariano
The White House Doctor: My Patients were Presidents

www.drcmariano.com

WHAT: Monthly Speaker/Dinner Meeting

WHEN: WED June 27th, 2018 5:30 -7:30 pm

See PayPal info below*

WHERE: Starfire Golf Club
11500 N. Hayden Rd., Scottsdale, AZ 85260

WHY: Mission: The Scottsdale Society of Women Writers gives members access to events of interest, a format for exchanging ideas, an opportunity to network with other women writers and authors, an alliance with professionals relating to writing, publishing, and marketing of books, and camaraderie and support.

SPEAKER 6:45: Dr Connie Mariano is a board-certified internal medicine physician in private practice in N. Scottsdale. She has broken many barriers with an impressive list of “firsts”: First military woman to become the White House Physician to the President of the United States, first woman Director of the White House Medical Unit, and first Filipino American in U. S. history to become a Navy Rear Admiral.

“Dr Connie,” as she is known to former presidents and the media, wrote her memoir, “The White House Doctor: My Patients were Presidents” in 2010, published by St. Martin’s Press. At today’s meeting, she will share her journey to writing her memoir and lessons she’s learned about publishing and media along the way.

www.drcmariano.com

PRICING: $30 for members and guests. See PayPal Below. We are no longer taking checks or cash at the door, except for payment of Annual Dues. This is a workable and good system for all of us. Thank you for moving forward with SSWW.

*Please PAY IN ADVANCE with PAYPAL on this website only – see home page www.brooksgoldmannpublishing.com
NOTE upper right corner for the link on this website. Please fill out the form and pay with your credit card before NOON FRIDAY! Thank you!

RSVP before 10:30am the Friday morning before the meeting. The Starfire Golf Club needs to order food, and I must give a guarantee to them at that time. That is the confirmed deadline for an RSVP! Please do not use the PayPal after that time. Thank you for appreciating our contract with the Starfire Golf Club.

CHECK-IN: Please check-in between 5:15 and 5:45 to begin the buffet that is available by 5:45 The meeting starts promptly at 6:00.

All those attending the meeting must pay for the dinner/room/speaker. The cost is noted above. Pick up your name badge at the front table and ENJOY a wonderful night!
Guests pick up a brochure and a membership signup sheet too.

AGENDA: The agendas will be on the dinner table with a lot of wonderful announcements for you, including the schedule of upcoming meeting speakers. Remember, the announcements are reviewed at 6:00 with dinner. The member introductions are 30 seconds. They follow the announcements.

DIRECTIONS: From the 101 Freeway, exit Shea Blvd and go West to Hayden Road and then North a quarter mile, the club is on the West side (Left) of the street. From the South, cross Shea Blvd going north on Hayden Road, again, it is on the West side (Left) of the street. 11500 North Hayden Road, Scottsdale.

Goals of the Group

• Value all the professional women writers seeking to share their expertise
• Honor all genres and all forms of professional writing
• Attend monthly meetings to move the group and its members forward
• Learn and share in the experiences of monthly professional speakers
• Grow the group to a membership of active and contributing women
• Encourage participation by members as mentors, and volunteers
• Support and challenge each other to always be writing
• Help members to stretch as writers and reach lofty personal goals
• Have fun, meet trustworthy women writers, share dreams

ONCE UPON A TIME THERE WAS A LOST, GAY LITTLE BOY

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In her biographical debut, Once Upon a Time There was a Lost, Gay Little Boy, Jo Gabriel warns us that this writer is vulnerable, open to attack, and easily smeared repeatedly. She has written this story from everywhere, but maybe in your world, nowhere. The story begins with a chaotic childhood, followed by an unhappy home-life with husbands she believes taught her hard lessons. Eventually escaping to a new country, Gabriel’s captivating biography confirms she’s far more invincible, not a heroine or a hero, but a sympathetic figure.

Jo was born into a bi-racial family in Europe to an American white man, who stayed there after military duty, and a Spanish woman born in Spain. She demonstrates early her misfit position in that family by not following the footsteps of her taller and prettier sister. She overcomes a horrific childhood of abuse at both the hands of her father and her mother as neither tries to protect her from the other, or from other family members.

Living abroad for many of us would be exciting, but for one who has memories of abuse, assault and cruelty on several levels, it’s far from it. And that is the gist of this story.

Despite her rising above adversity, she’s self-destructive. She moves many times during her younger life due to her father’s decisions, drugs and prostitution, and life on the street. Her relationships are uneasy with her peers in her early years, but she perseveres and begins to find herself. Educating herself as a tool to make her life better.

In her story telling, Jo in no way romanticizes her life. There is no moral redemption in her transformation to a ‘religious person,’ a wife or a mother. She has a lot of trauma to work through that amplified her initial suffering at the hands of her parents. She begins to conceal her desires for same-sex relationships, and more importantly, to be a boy, while moving forward in life as a wife and mother.

Jo has much psychological torment from her past, but even more with her self-identity in the present moment. Her career paths and her drive for an education establish her as a full-fledged success in her field of choice, education.

Several intimate partnerships are revealed to give the reader insight into her life beyond her work as a dedicated, hardworking professional. Jo’s life continues to be replete with episodes of abuse and misbehavior almost to the point of frustrating the reader, yet being so necessary to tell the story.

Haunted by her past, her mistakes and failures, she leaves Spain with her four children and vows to never return. Her words mirror her shrewd cynicism about relationships and family. She spells tragedy on the page as a catharsis, not to entertain us. It’s a raw account of a life, not necessarily optimistic, but certainly realistic. She takes the plunge to move to the United States, and leave her heartache and homeland behind in a quest to find who she is and what she will become.

This author is an inspiration to victims. This biography does not suffer with its structure of vignettes and honest presentation. The reader will learn about an unfamiliar life.

Jo has many stories to tell that rumble around in her head, but life with four children and a heart that says, “I’m living in somebody else’s body” make that complicated. She takes the plunge with love and experiments after two failed marriages. The virgin love relationship she seeks is with a lesbian. Her hope is to feel free at last and truly discover who she is, but it’s not that easy.

She tries a change of scenery with various moves, from the energy of a bustling city to the countryside, but still feels unsatisfied within herself. She tries to take advantage of her free time, as her children get older and she matures, to pick the perfect wife for her. The change of scenery often provides a new perspective for a while, but it’s not the answer. She still feels a need to escape the life most women know. Even though she loves motherhood and works hard to be there for her children, she’s out of touch.

Feeling overwhelmed and lonely, after many years with husbands who were abusive or not right for her, she looks at her sexuality from another angle, that of a boy not a girl. Although she had no specific plan, she began researching sex change and all it entailed. She was directed by a medical professional on where to go and what to do. She found many road blocks, including her own physical and mental condition.

Having always been frugal, especially after living in the street, she began to plan financially how to handle transformation and how that would take place. She always believed being frugal was a way to her longevity, her survival, often living below her means. She had a good hard-earned education, and worked diligently to maintain her professional career that had not come easily.

Her ‘good’ life did not happen overnight. Though she had known career success, and had been a good provider for her children, she emphasizes the trial and error involved in getting there. The sacrifice, the disappointments. Her life had not been easy, in fact it was quite difficult. This transformation process was going to be extremely difficult with a lot of new challenges, but it was what she desperately wanted.

She became conscientious of the life as a trans-person, feeling an obligation to learn as much as she could about what her new life would entail. She vowed to be sensitive to those who came before her. She attempted to forge some connections in the trans-gender world while still maintaining an on again-off again relationship with a lesbian. She didn’t seek much advice from others who had been in her shoes, and thus she fell into some harrowing situations.

With surviving child abuse by a relative in her early life, an eating disorder for decades, and being abused by her husband, Jo developed her own ways to counteract the abuse in her lesbian relationship that was also an isolated life. She too often saw her life as normal even though the underpinning of normalcy and routine were far from the door.

As you read this courageous portrayal of a fragile child maturing too quickly, you ask yourself what stops people from taking a suicidal leap in these situations. Or what stops them from quitting on everyone they know or from giving up and going to the streets to hide? We know you can rarely go back, undo, rework, and that we must progress and grow, mature and find answers. This book shows us that fortitude.

A Change of Habit – by Patty Kogutek (Sister Mary Kateri)

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Screen Shot 2013-03-10 at 11 29 33 AMA Change of Habit Patty Kogutek, author  www.pattykogutek.com

Book Reviewer:   Patricia L. Brooks www.plbrooks.com

Author Patty Kogutek is torn between her life in marriage to God, and being away from her family.  She’s lonely and often questions her decision.  At times the story is funny, other times it skates close to stereotypical, but it is never dry or boring. Even while allowed to teach young children at a school near the convent, Sister Mary Kateri finds a lack of intimacy in her life.  She seeks God, the church and others in the convent again and again for answers. Patty shows us well the struggles and frustrations of all she’s asked to endure and accept, as if a caged dove.  We walk with her in those dark moments of yearning for peace in her new life to those special moments of commitment to the convent. The habit in this memoir’s title is a symbol of the personal guilt and grief endured by Patty during her impressionable years.  It is both the black wool habit a young teenage nun wears in the 1960’s that evolves to the less confining habit after a Vatican II upheaval in the Catholic Church of the 1970’s. This piece of clothing that adorns her in the convent is fraught with pain and loss.  It comes to symbolize all she has hoped to leave behind in the secular world.  It makes itself almost unfit for a dynamic young woman’s naïve and humble beginnings before God. Does she want it any other way?  Is it too late for her to change her mind and go back to her other life?  Can she even make that decision without being engulfed in guilt? Her convent life is an interesting backstory to her change of habits and interests, and yet the story is so much more.  The Change of Habit is almost beside the point as we witness this metaphor unfold in her tremendous drive and determination to heal and grow into the person she was meant to be. Her fans will support her and she will endear her fans to her.  Her lack of true intimacy in the past is addressed for the reader.  Her mindless devotion to the church and all its rules and need for control are offered but not hammered relentlessly.  She explores alternatives for her life and shares them with us. Her important insights will influence even the staunchest Catholics.  This book is thought provoking and at times fun to read.  The details are delightful; the emotional rollercoaster is worth the ride.  Some readers may yearn for a little less naivety and a little more depth, but Patty will not disappoint them as she takes them on her journey of hope. This reader found the story respectful of the women who serve God as a nun.  You be the judge as God is their judge. Respectfully submitted,   Patricia L. Brooks, author, publishing consultant www.brooksgoldmannpublishing.com

AZ Authors Associ Writers Circle welcomes Patricia L. Brooks to speak on The Art of Writing Memoir

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WRITERS FAIRE 2012 011

 

The Art of Writing Memoir

AZ Authors Association – Writers Circle

 

  North Mountain Visitor’s Center

12950 North 7th St., Phoenix, AZ 85022

 

RSVP/register info@azauthors.com

Limited Seating

 

 Patricia L. Brooks, speaker, author, consultant patricia@plbrooks.com

 

 www.blog.brooksgoldmannpublishing.com

for details 480- 250-5556

In this workshop you will immerse yourself in the art of powerful storytelling and take an unflinching look at your own stories.

You will learn to incorporate fictional techniques into your memoir writing to enhance your effort to share galvanizing events.

 

Objectives of this Workshop

ü Learn to help your reader see and feel what you saw and felt.

ü Understand the process and structure of memoir writing as a learned craft that will enhance your art.

ü Appreciate the power of storytelling by being loyal to your truth.

ü Further empower yourself to tell the truth.

ü Take an unflinching look at your stories and share your galvanizing events.

ü Bring your memoir writing to a new level with fictional techniques.

 

 

 

The Art of Writing Memoir – Desert Foothills Library welcomes Patricia L. Brooks

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WRITERS FAIRE 2012 014The Art of Writing Memoir

 

Desert Foothills Library – Writers Connection

 

Fri. May 3, 2013

1:00-3:00 p.m.

Cave Creek, AZ

 

 Patricia L. Brooks, speaker, author, consultant patricia@plbrooks.com

 www.blog.brooksgoldmannpublishing.com

for details 480- 250-5556

In this workshop you will immerse yourself in the art of powerful storytelling and take an unflinching look at your own stories.

You will learn to incorporate fictional techniques into your memoir writing to enhance your effort to share galvanizing events.

Objectives of this Workshop ü Learn to help your reader see and feel what you saw and felt. ü Understand the process and structure of memoir writing as a learned craft that will enhance your art. ü Appreciate the power of storytelling by being loyal to your truth. ü Further empower yourself to tell the truth. ü Take an unflinching look at your stories and share your galvanizing events. ü Bring your memoir writing to a new level with fictional techniques.

Some of What I Learned at the Desert Nights Rising Stars Conference – Seven Secrets to Writing Memoir – and more

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Seven Secrets to a Successful Memoir – and more

My thoughts – Desert Nights Rising Stars Writers Conference

Arizona State University – Spring 2013

 

Timing is everything, as they say and the timing at Desert Nights Rising Stars could not have been better for me.  By sheer coincidence the DNRS move this year to more memoir and creative non-fiction arrived in the wake of my second memoir.  Here are Seven Secrets to this genre I discovered at the conference, and a few more tips – including some of my own.

Have you ever wondered what happens at DNRS conference weekend behind the vastness of Old Main?  The answer is simple:  invaluable guidelines on writing prose, demonstrations on how to write memorable dialog, lists of quality books to read, demonstrations on editing, thoughts on seeing images clearly to enhance descriptions, encouragement about being critiqued, and so much more.  I learned too that I must show immersion in my memoir and fine tune my writing with some fictional techniques.

The positive and upbeat attitude of the faculty reinforced for me that there is a place for all writers in this writing life.  Here is an elaboration of my notes on memoir from that weekend.

 

Be Open to New Ideas

The most important thing you can capture in your research is how to process your memoir.  Start with little chunks.  Write from memory, from interviews, from reflections on old photos and revisited conversations.  I write with fierce abandon initially and use these prompting methods.  This plan allows me to enjoy building my story.  Start with rhetorical questions you can come back to periodically.  With a journal I find “morning pages” helpful.  Try these:

  • What am I willing to share?
  • What if?
  • Who will I tell?
  • How will I tell it?
  • How will I get to the truth?
  • Who tells me not to share my story?
  • Do I own it?
  • Is my story too dangerous to tell now?
  • Am I willing to journal first and then share?

 

Live the Whole Truth

Remember this is your version of the truth.  Write for a sense of discovery too.  You do not need a timeline and are not limited to just what happened.  Your philosophy about these experiences, and your lessons learned, are valuable parts of your memoir.  You are the expert and have wisdom and knowledge in many areas.

Do not be afraid of your truth and lose your power.  Do not change your story.  Remember your truth is stronger than fiction.  There is power in your honesty.  Take an unflinching look at your life and your experiences to catapult your work to a new level.  Do not be afraid to step out of memoir to fiction if you want to experiment with your stories, but be sure you do not lose what you want to say.

I feel freer in my second memoir than with the first.  It is an unbelievable experience for me to tell my truth about the violence and trauma in my story and have the encouragement I have received from my critique group.

 

The Seven Secrets

  1. When you tell
    1. Take time to contemplate that decision and be sure you are ready.
    2. Allow the distance you need from a traumatic event or the insight required for a galvanizing experience.  Do not portray yourself as the victim.   I waited five years with my first memoir due to grief and loss and 10 years with the second one due to post-traumatic stress recovery from violence.
    3. Step back and give the story and experience time to blossom into something that is worth sharing.
  2. How you tell
    1. Be sure the voice you choose is the best voice for the story.
    2. Consider your voice as a child or that of another family member or as the narrator.  I prefer first person as I feel that is my strongest voice and critical to my success.
  3. What sequence you use
    1. Look at the big picture and analyze your stories thoroughly.  A chronological format is not the best way to go with your memoir.  You need a hook in the beginning and an arc where the change takes place.
    2. Get the reader in quickly to the intensity of the prose.  My assault story leads in detail to my second memoir to advocate for women who have experienced violence.
  4. Where you end the breadth and span of time
    1. Remember a memoir is about a particular event or time in your life.  We can write many memoirs.  I am writing a second one now.  When asked what genre I write I respond with memoir and non-fiction.
    2. Memoir is not a life history or biography in chronological order.
  5. What amount of backstory you need to use
    1. Avoid the pitfall of being too close to the material and not seeing the flaws in your thinking or the unimportant items in your stories.
    2. Consider the areas of your past that are lessons learned.  Use events that have shaped who you are and what you are about to complement the points you are making with your memoir.
    3. Intersperse them in your main theme as threads.  I have used my past trauma and violence survival to show patterns, and my walk through recovery to show hope.  I view my life from many angles.
  6. Who is involved in your storyline
    1.  Acknowledge you understand others can help bind the work.
    2. Be able to forgive and look at the lessons learned.  With my second book on assault and survival with violent crime, I had a lot to forgive.  I address forgiveness in my spiritual journey chapter.
  7. Why you select a particular structure
    1. Write your memoir/ non-fiction in your unique way.  Invite your readers inside the story with a gripping theme to help move it along.
    2. Consider using quotes and other materials.  We have the experience in these incidents and we are the expert on the topic.  We have a right to tell our stories and see ourselves in our own light.
    3. Take your theme throughout the book and thread your ideas to keep it a page turner.  In my second book it is the PTS issue from violence and my spiritual transformation in recovery from PTS that sets it apart.

 

When Family is Involved

It is important to note that everyone reacts differently to physical descriptions of themselves.  So many of us fear the secrets that we know exist in our families and in our lives.  I know I did, but I also knew that the truth would set me free. I had to describe the enemy the way he was and not fear retaliation.  I had to tell my truth about love addiction and abuse.

Often, on so many levels, we are in denial of what happened in our lives.  Sibling rivalry does exist.  It is usually not seen because we are in the middle of the competition and it is all that we know.  This can be good fodder for a memoir.  Most family members want to be portrayed as a hero.  This writing at times is going to be difficult, so just do your best.

Your imagination can fail you, so tell your story true to you.  Do not be concerned about bitterness and anger, just confess what you know and forgive yourself and others along the way.  There will be a moral imperative – somebody was deeply wronged somewhere in your family history.  That may be the story to tell.  Give yourself permission to tell it from your perspective.

Inciting events need to be in your story.  Consider fictional techniques such as scene and dialogue, plot and setting descriptions to enhance your work.  Go deep to bring them to us in memoir form.  Have empathy for all the characters and add some humor in there too.  Remember, you are not the victim of your story.

Now that you have moved away to write and given yourself some space and permission, tell the story and share the experiences the way you want to give us your work.  Be the heroine or hero in your pain or joy and triumph in the end.  Write with your mind and your heart.  Ask yourself what voice leads your truth.  Good luck and happy writing.

It is with much gratitude I say thank you to both Marylee MacDonald (http://members.authorsguild.net/mlmacdonald/index.htm ) and Bhira Blackhaus (www.underthelemontrees.com) for their generosity as speakers at this conference.  I have shared some of their ideas in this piece.  I appreciate the insights they gave and the opportunities they offered us.  We learned from them.

 

Patricia L. Brooks, author, speaker, consultant, educator

patricia@plbrooks.com 480-250-5556

www.blog.brooksgoldmannpublishing.com

 

BOOK REVIEW The Slumber Party from Hell – author, Sue Ellen Allen and reviewer Patricia L. Brooks

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The Slumber Party from Hell, the book Sue Ellen Allen published in 2011, seems like an intimate chat with an old chum.  It’s a book that is more like an overheard
conversation.  You feel you’re intruding but you can’t stop listening.

In this well written work, The Slumber Party from Hell puts the spotlight on the Arizona prison system that is penalizing, but not rehabilitating its inmates.

Allen says it took her seven years in prison to realize the Arizona prisons are part of the problem as they focus narrowly on penalizing and punishing our prison population.  She believes her life has changed completely from this experience of dealing with breast cancer as a prisoner, as well as the unnecessary death of her friend and roommate Gina to cancer while she too was in prison.

Allen knew it was the end of the world as she had known it once she stepped in to that life and she was determined to make the best of it.

Allen puts some of her self-made power to work by being a leader and role model while behind bars by volunteering her expertise and ideas learned on the outside as a professional woman and community leader.  She helps many of the younger women who are struggling develop themselves within the confines of an unfair and unjust prison system.

She also attempts to shrink the negative impact of prison for herself and her fellow inmates by starting programs positive in nature.  This is no easy feat because most of the rules are unrealistic and frustrating at best.

Although often her writing leaves you wishing things were not as she describes them, you find joy and humor in the small things she celebrates during those seven years of incarceration.

You are able to decipher what is really going on in some of the chaos and craziness to make a little sense of the journey, but in most areas to no avail.  It is what it is and the few gems in the story are Sue Ellen herself, along with a couple of her friends – inside and out.

This is a story of a few founders of the truth in a world where innocence and beauty do not exist.  Some readers will be engaged by Allen’s fierce convictions and continuous mentions of hope and gratitude for the lessons she is learning and the person she is becoming.

Others will be turned off by the blatant honesty of life in the Arizona prison system and the horrors she witnessed.  But throughout it all, you will find humor and humanness to admire just as I did.  You will find respect for her in your own way and you will surely be grateful for your life just the way it is today.

This week she is celebrating three years since her release March 18, 2009.  She celebrated 10 years cancer free on Valentine’s Day, Feb 14, 2012.

Book Reviewer:

Patricia L. Brooks patricia@pplbrooks.com
480-250-5556

President/Founder – Scottsdale Society of Women Writers

President/Owner – Brooks Goldmann Publishing, LLC

www.blog.brooksgoldmannpublishing.com

Author – Gifts of Sisterhood www.amzn.com/B006MLA91Q

Celebrate My Sister’s Birthday – FREE EBOOK Gifts of Sisterhood-journey from grief to gratitude

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Title:    Gifts of Sisterhood-journey from grief to gratitude

Publication:    December, 2011

Contact:          Patricia L. Brooks, author

Address:          7970 E. Camelback Rd., 710, Scottsdale, AZ  85251

Cell                 (480-250-5556)

Email:             patricia@plbrooks.com

Publisher:       Brooks Goldmann Publishing, LLC

www.brooksgoldmannpublishing.com

Scottsdale Author/Publishing Consultant
Launches FREE EBOOK to Celebrate Sister’s Birthday Jan 14-16! Gifts of Sisterhood – the gifts that keep on giving!

SCOTTSDALE, Arizona, January 11, 2012 – To find hope in her
grief and to celebrate her sister’s life is God’s plan for this author. This past
month, Scottsdale author Patricia L. Brooks www.amazon.com/author/patricialbrooks
as Brooks Goldmann Publishing Company, LLC of Scottsdale, AZ enhanced her book Gifts of Sisterhood with updates in an Ebook now available to you
FREE for three days – Jan. 14-16 in celebration of her sister’s birthday.  This new Ebook supports the importance of family relationships and the journey of grief when a loved one is lost. www.amazon.com/giftsofsisterhood.

In today’s firestorm of spiritual doubt, this book is a collection of heartwarming stories that should not be overlooked.   Brooks gathered the stories from true
accounts of her relationship with her sister and their growing up in the upper
peninsula of Michigan.  They experienced the unusual, the synchronistic, the amazing.

She tells them in her own words with her sister’s permission.  Each one is a small miracle, often a life-changing experience that will touch your heart.

In addition to reducing the mystery of life, death and grief in her book, Gifts of Sisterhood, Brooks asserts life’s challenges occur all the time and change our lives forever; many times for the better.

Brooks, who represents not only her writing but her spirituality here, serves the community in many ways.  She teaches and works within natural
approaches to the grief journey and offers her workshop outline in this revised
Ebook.  Readers who sample this beautiful Ebook will become open to the possibility of achieving greater well-being and peace with life’s many challenges.  Her Stop Smoking Sister campaign is introduced as well.

Patricia is the president/founder of the Scottsdale Society of Women Writers; building the group to 60 members since 2007 with monthly speaker/dinner meetings, critique groups and other outside book event activities.

The Brooks Goldmann Publishing, LLC website www.brooksgoldmannpublishing.com
provides information on their publishing services.    As a published author and Scottsdale business woman, Patricia L. Brooks performs the duties of publishing consultant/book shepherd for the independent writer/author seeking information in the self-publishing maze.  Patricia confirms her new Ebook is thought provoking and genuine and fits the other authors she has helped in the memoir, self-help and non-fiction arena.
Patricia can help you travel the writing and publishing maze.  Feel free to visit her many posts on writing and publishing on their blog http://brooksgoldmannpublishing.com

We give and receive gifts, but the gifts that keep on giving – Faith, Courage, Love, Friendship, Happiness and Acceptance – are the gifts her youngest sister gave so freely.  Too often it takes a life changing experience to recognize what we already have, affirm what we already know, welcome what is given to us and share it with others.

Patricia is a “sibling survivor” of the #2 killer of women today.  While rejoicing in her sister’s memory she preserves her story and important legacy.  Through emotional healing Patricia takes you on a journey of love and friendship, grief and acceptance as she gives her sister’s spirit back to their “roots” in County Tipperary, Ireland.

You will learn to awaken the compassion within you, forgive yourself when facing life’s challenges, find the hidden gift of hope in your life and have faith that nothing happens in God’s world by mistake.

Patricia reveals her upbeat and insightful personal story of the relationship she had with her youngest sister – her friend, her confidante, her soul mate.  Their lives constantly intertwined, both growing up in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and living 2,500 miles apart as adults.

Now God takes you on the Journey from Grief to Gratitude to a place of inspiration and acceptance.  The faith Patricia has her sister’s life was not in vain calls her to share her gifts with you.  By embracing her sister’s wit,
charm and beauty she weaves together a meaningful story of love and courage you can reflect upon as you travel your own life’s path.

A portion of the proceeds of this book goes to the Vital Care Hospice of the Straits of Mackinac County Michigan in memory of my sister. Thank you.

 

Scottsdale Society of Women Writers welcomes Lisa Farringer Parker – memoir author, professor of writing, AZ Republic columnist

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SCOTTSDALE SOCIETY OF WOMEN WRITERS

Welcomes memoir writing expert – professor of writing and newspapercolumnit to speak at monthly dinner meeting!

LISA FARRINGER PARKER

Speaker Scottsdale Society of Women Writers

WHO: Scottsdale Society of Women Writers

WHAT: Monthly Speaker/Dinner Meeting – celebrate writing

WHERE: Chaparral Suites Resort, 5001 N, Scottsdale Rd. at Chaparral Rd light, NE corner – Enter off Chaparral Rd – 4th Floor Grill entrance, take elevator, exit 4th floor, left to the Cactus Room

WHEN:          NOV30th Wed 5:30-7:30 – Celebrate Fall with us!

WHY: The Scottsdale Society of Women Writers gives members access to events of interest, a format for exchanging ideas, an opportunity to network with other women writers and authors, an alliance with businesses relating to writing and publishing, and camaraderie and support.

HOW:             PLEASE – RSVP now to Patricia L. Brooks, president/founder

Cell 480-250-5556 or patricia@plbrooks.com SEE DETAILS BELOW

SPEAKER: Lisa Farringer Parker – Memoir Author, Professor of  Writing and Columnist

Angels in the Darkness

Historical/Memoir

Publication Date: April 2011

Author: Lisa Farringer Parker

ISBN: 978-1-60494-438-9

A Family’s Triumph
over Hitler and World War II Berlin: 1935–1949

THE BOOK

It is 1936 and Jesse Owens is poised for victory. Berlin is on full display. Hitler is firmly in control.  Six-year-old Jutta Bolle relishes Owens’s victory and the excitement of the Olympics. But the darkness is already engulfing Jutta’s world as her family confronts the evil of Hitler. Each year brings more unimagined hardships and heartbreaks until finally, in 1945, bombs destroy what remains of Berlin and fifteen-year-old Jutta and her father run for their lives. The Russians are coming. In a matter of days Berlin will be surrounded, unleashing a new round of misery.  Though written like a novel, Angels in the Darkness tells the dramatic true story of the Bolles’ struggle to survive the tyranny of Hitler’s government, a war they did not believe in, and the subsequent brutal occupation of their home and city by the Russians.

THE AUTHOR – Lisa Farringer Parker

www.lisafarringerparker.com

Lisa Farringer Parker is a successful attorney and author. A former professor of writing at Arizona State University, she has appeared on CNN and is a regular contributor to the Arizona Republic. She lives in Paradise
Valley, Arizona, with her husband, Vernon B. Parker, the former mayor, and her two children. Jutta Bolle is her mother.

See notes below for dinner fees, new format and new location, thank you.

MENU:  Salad, dessert, beverage and roll or a sandwich/soup, dessert, beverage and roll – both with tax and gratuity included – make a CHOICE the night of the meeting.

COST: $22.00 for members – $25.00 for guests (able to visit twice before joining)

CHECKS:  Please make your check payable to Scottsdale
Society of Women Writers PRIOR to coming to the meeting to save time at the check-in table.  Thank you.

CHECK-IN:  Please check-in between 5:00 and 5:45 at the table at the door so we can start the meeting promptly at 6:00 – thank you.

(1) Leave your check made payable to SSWW

(2) All those attending the meeting must pay for the
dinner/room/speaker

(3) Have your name checked off the RSVP list

(3) Pick-up your name badge – your receipt for the food
server

AGENDA:  The agendas will be on the dinner table and
the format remains the same.

DIRECTIONS: Chaparral Suites is in Scottsdale at Chaparral Rd just north of Fashion Square Mall – Chaparral Rd has a light.  Parking is in the rear – two large parking lots Note: best to enter from the middle elevator for the 4th Floor Grille.

From the 101 freeway exit Chaparral Rd and go west.  Just prior to Scottsdale Rd enter the side drive at 4th Floor Grille and come up that elevator – it is in the center of the hotel complex.  There is an awning marked 4th Floor Grille.  This is the easiest way in – not through the lobby.  The parking lots are in the back of the complex.

Goals of the Group

Value all the professional women writers seeking to
share their expertise

Honor all genres and all forms of professional
writing

Attend monthly meetings  to move the group and its members
forward

Learn and share in the experiences of monthly
professional speakers

Grow the group to a membership of active and
contributing women

Encourage participation by members as presenters,
mentors, judges and volunteers

Support and challenge each other to always be
writing

Help members to stretch as writers and reach lofty
personal goals

Have fun,
meet trustworthy women writers, share dreams

BOOK REVIEW Paper Children – an immigrant’s legacy

by

 

Marcia Fine likes to show-off her charming wit and skill at satire in her books about Scottsdale, but her narrative fiction based on her grandmother’s immigration to the United States prior to WWII is in my opinion her life’s work.

Such is this author celebrated for her award winning novel Paper Children: an
immigrant’s legacy claiming the Best Books Finalist Award, USA Book News; the Foreword Finalist Book of the Year award and the Eric Hoffer Independent Publishing competition finalist status.

The book is about a young aristocratic Jewish woman growing up in Poland in the early 20th century in a sheltered and refined environment.
She lives within the walls of Jewish aristocrats in Warsaw oblivious to
the ominous changes going on in Warsaw with the beginnings of the Nazi invasion.  The story continues its eventful trek with second and third generations.

Grandmother Paulina’s “matchmaker” marriage is one we all think we know from the little knowledge we gentiles have of Jewry.  The story of the grandmother and the man of “her match” intersect through her father’s successful business.  Although neatly arranged, the story winds
around years of an organized attempt on Paulina’s part to not go to America
with her new husband.

The bond of the Jewish family is beautifully illustrated, showing us both love and loss throughout the book.

Even when the gypsies predict she will marry an older man and go to America she questions why she would want to make the journey.  But the day finally comes when immigration is eminent and the story moves to New York – not through Ellis Island but by cruise ship known only to the European aristocracy.

At 250 pages her novel is broken up into three books.  First, is the Grandmother Paulina’s story, the aristocrat who learns the hard facts of Jewish life.  Second, is the mother, Rachel, the rebellious
one who takes her own path to learn about her family heritage that she later comes to appreciate.  And third is Mimi’s story that gives us the Jewish girl raised by two women caught in the middle of the old and new worlds of Jewry.

Being Jewish in America can be cultural or religious or both.  Fine keeps
us fascinated with how old world religion can dissipate as the immigrant becomes more Americanized. It was exciting reading to learn how this happens and why it can happen.

Fine’s research into her culture, as well as her religioin and the Hebrew language, is a gift to the reader.  She visited not only New York and Miami, but Warsaw, Poland where it all began.

Letters written on onion skin that belonged to her grandmother are beautifully constructed into the crux of the story.  They’re from her great-grandparents
who wrote them in Polish and Yiddish in a loving and naive way as they
witnessed the Nazi takeover.  Fine found the perfect person to translate the letters. They add much to the authenticity of the story.

Fine’s book is good enough to inspire a movie or a Lifetime TV show.  Her
attention to detail is incredible and her use of dialogue and storytelling hit
the mark for this reader.  She could easily weave the three women’s stories together even more and make a documentary about Jewish aristocracy that so many Americans may not know existed prior to WWII.

There are many visuals of the horrors of war and the beauty of wealth in this family’s dynamics portrayed in the book. They could be readily transferred to the big or small screen because of Fine’s quality descriptions of the characters, events and scenery of the time.

The title becomes clear as we learn of her letters and the importance of their communication to the story.  Beautifully written by the great-great
grandparents back in the old country of Poland, and later analyzed by Fine, they’re a cornerstone to the story and differentiate it from the others out there today.

There’s no e-book, this book exists as a solid object; the physical turning of the pages reflect the passing of time, the generations living through decades of their lives. The weight of the book and the paper in your hands is a critical part of the understanding of the strength of the story that needed to be told properly and correctly.

Fine has captured her history and the cultural and religious aspects of her heritage and should be commended even further for her efforts.

 

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