When a writer sets out to tell the story of an event or short period of their lives they are not always aware of the inherent dangers of doing so. Celebrities who decide to put pen to paper, for all sorts of motivations, can get away with ‘telling it like it is’ to a greater degree than the rest of us. For me, telling the truth (from my perspective) was always going to be a bit uncomfortable, but I didn’t realise the true dangers until the eleventh hour.

I did not have a title yet when I began assembling ideas for a novel that would eventually be published as THE LITTLE GREEN BOOK OF CHAIRMAN RAHMA. In recent years there had been a great deal of publicity about large-scale environmental abuses to forests, water systems, and wetlands committed by a whole host of careless businesses, including developers, logging companies, and even furniture makers, all going into the woods and taking what they needed or tearing down entire forests, destroying magnificent old-grown trees.

Although there are many great authors today, and the technology of the Internet allows more and more to publish works every day, sometimes I feel nostalgic for books I haven’t read in more than a decade. Such is the case with Stephen King’s Night Shift. I remember reading this novel when I was much younger as my father had a copy from 1979. Currently, its worn pages and creased spine and cover demonstrate the passage of time. Acquiring the Book – During a recent yard sale, my father was trying to sell his collection of Stephen King books. When I saw that a piece of my childhood was on the table, I snatched the book immediately. Since he knew how important it was to me, he let me have the aged novel. As soon as I had a moment to myself that night, I opened the book and began to relive moments of my childhood through reading its pages. Timeless Content – Many of the stories within Night Shift had been published in a variety of magazines in the 1970s. Although the stories were more than 20 years old by the time I first laid eyes on them, the style seemed timeless….

May is short story month, so in honor of the short story let me introduce debut author Laura Newman. PARALLEL TO PARADISE is a collection of fourteen short stories, all stand-alone, and can be read in any order at any time. The writing is descriptive and vivid. Each character is well-crafted. It seems as if I was looking at a snapshot of each person, at times I wondered, were these actual people? I almost thought I was reading fourteen short memoirs. But, that is what we look for when introduced to new characters, as my friend and fellow writer D.L. Whitehead says, “Your characters need to walk, talk, eat, breathe and bleed.” He is a horror writer, so hence the bleed part. Ms. Newman’s characters definitely walk, talk, and breathe off the written page, and sometimes they do indeed bleed. (The Little Beast, Twentieth Century). The common thread running through each storyline is how the protagonists deal with the problems and complications of their lives, which are sometimes messy and not-so-nice. But, cope they must. We are introduced to people with addictions (Needle and Thread), some in abusive relationships, alternative lifestyles (Red Eye), and in another, a young mother copes…

My youngest daughter was born the week after Rosemary and I began the background interviews for the book. So I was squeezing a lot of my work-at-home consulting business and book development activity around taking care of my then-2-year-old and infant daughters. I don’t know that I would have been as effective in telling Rosemary’s story had I not had that small insight into her early parenting world. It gave me empathy and appreciation for what this woman was able to do under extreme circumstances.

Retrieving memories of and writing about your own past can be challenging enough. Recounting someone else’s life history – enabling readers to actually see it unfold through the eyes of your subject and doing so convincingly – can be even more daunting. In writing the memoir Beggars or Angels (August 2013, Oaklight Publishing) for an amazing woman who’s lived through enough drama and hardship to fill two lifetimes, I had two main goals:

“Naïve. Super” is undoubtedly the most famous book by Erlend Loe, a Norwegian writer, film critic and screenwriter. The novel is written on behalf of a young man in his mid-twenties, experiencing “midlife crisis”.

The main character and the narrator is 13-year-old Madison Spenser. Every person can envy her life, her mother is a Hollywood star and father is a film producer. But as it turns out during the narration of dead Madison, who tells her story from Hell, she was very much unhappy and unappreciated child when she was alive.

Writing a book is not what I thought it was going to be. I had seen the growth in authors. The draw it had. Instant success. (Many think.) The numerous attempts at creating worlds, but I never thought I would be drawn in. I am a math teacher. Not a writer. When we make a decision to enter a field of study, we stick with it. We do the same job every day because that is what our parents have done. What their parents have done. And their parents. Stepping out of the norm requires time. Effort. Space. Energy. And know how. I cannot write a book. I told myself that for several years. Why even try? It is not worth the time. Would anyone even read it? There was a fear of rejection. A risk that I was not quite ready to take. Where was the shift? When did I decide to just go for it? It was gradual and in the most unlikely time of my life. Senior year while student teaching. Driving forty minutes one way every morning at six o’clock. Teaching for eight hours. Making the return trip that afternoon. Preparing for the next day. Then…

In fact “Inferno” has gathered all necessary conditions for good edition: cine plot, fashion for medieval, religious theories, Robert Langdon. Filmmakers are going to screen the book and of course it will be interesting to watch. “Inferno” is really interesting, fascinating and worth reading, if you like mysteries, puzzles and unexpected plot twists.