I have a strong conviction that we should all have a place at this table of life. One of the ways to help that be a reality is through reading. If we read about people who are different from us, there’s a chance we can come to understand them and appreciate them for who they are.
The other side of that coin is reading about people who are just like us, and through their stories, identify with their struggles and come to know we’re not alone after all. People who identify as “disabled” need those stories as much as any of us, and those stories should be as honest as possible.
My grandmother was one of the disabled people in my life, and I drew a lot on her experience while writing this book. I watched her lose her eyesight, fall into depression and despair because she couldn’t read or sew—her two favorite pastimes. Then slowly she rebuilt her life. In the end, she returned to the strong woman she’d always been, and she adapted to a different way of living. I think memories of her journey from sighted to blind might have contributed to the creation of Shattered.
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I’m now at the housecleaning stage of my launch: Sending books to winners of signed paperbacks and eBooks. I’m doing blog tours, sleeping off the effects of publishing, and reading more books. I’m a greedy reader, so when writing and publishing take most of my time, I get a little cranky. I thought I’d share a few of my reads from my Goodreads Challenge of 40 books this year which I completed last month. I think I have to up my challenge next time around.
- Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate
- Dead Wrong by Vannetta Chapman
- Last Girl Ghosted by Lisa Unger
- The Family Upstairs by Lisa Jewell
- Reaching for Family by Jemi Fraser
- The Seventh Tapestry by Beth Camp
- Finding Tessa by Jaime Lynn Hendricks
- The Wife Upstairs by
- Against All Odds by Jacqui Murray
Quote of the Week: “I cannot change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination.” Jimmy Dean