Pam Withrow was an Indiana farm girl transplanted to Michigan. After a teen marriage and a stint on welfare, she graduated from college and began work with the Michigan Department of Corrections. Within seven years she was named the first woman to head a prison for men in Michigan. She then worked at the Michigan Reformatory in Ionia for 15 years.
Madam Warden takes the reader with Pam as she moves through progressively responsible positions in the Michigan Department of Corrections, introducing you to the people who lived and worked in the institutions she managed. Evidence-based programs and the story of one prisoner who benefitted from cognitive restructuring are featured.
Listen in for a chance to win a signed copy of Madam Warden.
Get into the holiday spirit this Saturday at The Book Nook & Java Shop in cozy Montague with four authors and four spirits.
The special holiday event organized by Written in the Mitten starts with author founder Ingar Rudholm talking about book descriptions, followed by Rudholm on memoirs and short stories, authors H. William Ruback and Marie Lapres.
Moravian Sons Distillery based in Lowell will offer free samples of 100 percent Michigan-made liquors and cocktails, available for purchase at the bar of The Book Nook.
Come and enjoy the spirit of the season on Dec. 16 from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. at 8744 Ferry Street in downtown Montague.
Jan Afman spent 10 years in Taiwan and six years in the Philippines during a difficult time in her life. She managed to write about it in her memoir SariSari many years later after processing her experience.
“It was hard to pry myself out of my comfort zone,” she said. “I had to get over a culture shock.”
However, she encourages people not to avoid difficult experiences since they are opportunities to grow.
“I learned to look for good things each day,” she said. “I learned about growing from not being a happy camper to contentment.”
Listen in for a chance to win a signed copy of SariSari.
Sponsored by Doc Chavent, authors Hilton Everett Moore and Ed Bentley.
Jan Afman spent 10 years in Taiwan and six years in the Philippines during a difficult time in her life. She managed to write about it in her memoir SariSari many years later after processing her experience.
“It was hard to pry myself out of my comfort zone,” she said. “I had to get over a culture shock.”
However, she encourages people not to avoid difficult experiences since they are opportunities to grow.
“I learned to look for good things each day,” she said. “I learned about growing from not being a happy camper to contentment.”
Listen in for a chance to win a signed copy of SariSari.
Sponsored by Doc Chavent, authors Hilton Everett Moore and Ed Bentley.
In her memoir and historical mystery Unto the Daughters, author & former journalist Karen Tintori unveils a family secret set in turn-of-the-century Detroit. The inciting incident to break the silence was an obliterated passport, and then a wedding photo.
“I am Italian, ” she said. “My mother’s side of the family was from southern Sicily. You don’t tell family secrets.”
The story of her great-grandaunt Francesca haunted Tintori’s inquisitive mind for decades. After 12 years, three novels, and advice from the editor, Tintori re-imagined the haunting truth of an honor killing.
Listen in for a chance to win a signed copy of Unto the Daughters.
Sponsored by Doc Chavent and The Lowell Ledger, the hometown newspaper in Lowell, MI
How would you respond if told by your parents you could not marry the love of your life… That special someone you had known since the age of seven?
Fletcher’s book is an autobiography, a memoir, and a biography of her husband Al to whom she was a caregiver for 59 years. This is a journey of two determined people through their garden of stones overcoming hurdles that could have destroyed a marriage, but God was good, always, even performing miracles.
From eloping to living happily ever after with Al, the forbidden love of her life, Fletcher captures significant moments with a dose of nostalgia and a bit of humor.
At the age of 85, Gladys Fletcher published her first book after taking a few memoir writing classes at Calvin University in Grand Rapids.
“At 80, I decided to do something,” she said. “At first I just wanted to leave a legacy for my children, but the instructor encouraged me to write a book.”
“You’ve got more to share than just with your family,” the instructor said.
Fletcher shut the door and meditated while sitting in front of the computer for hours. In two years, she had a book.
“I had to write it chronologically,” she said. “I was honest. It’s all true.”
Listen in to Fletcher’s great feats together with Al who was handicapped with rheumatoid arthritis and graduated from Lowell High School at Mary Free Bed in 1941.
“Some stories need to be told in their original form so history is not forgotten. Those stories are slowly dying…….”
Memoir YourRoots Cast A Shadow is a shocking family history story spanning three generations and several continents from Europe to the Middle East countries of Iraq and Afghanistan.
Canadian author Caroline Topperman was born in Sweden, raised in Canada with a recent stint of living in Poland where she traced her roots and did the research for the memoir.
Listen in to the episode for a chance to win a signed copy of “Tell Me What You See,” an inspirational book of photographs to spark your imagination.”
In her memoir, Caroline tells the story of grandparents Paula and Fryderyck Toperman, Communist Jews, who fled Poland for Uzbekistan, returning to their homeland in 1944 to help rebuild their country. Their story is one that’s seldom told–they survived the Holocaust, and the war, by plunging eastward.
On the other hand, Franciszek and Wanda Wichrzycki were Polish Catholic Communists who had been living and working in Afghanistan. They too returned to Poland.
Their children, Caroline’s parents, fled Poland as political refugees, settling in Toronto by way of Baghdad, Paris, and Sweden. Caroline bailed from Vancouver to move to Poland in 2013, to find a new life. That journey led her to the capitals of Europe and deep into the maze of shocking family history.
The “Blind Date with a Book ” virtual book festival dances into its third week in February as the freezing temperatures plunge below normal and another weather advisory awaits us tonight..
Over the weekend, childrens’ authors read from their books last Saturday followed by the spinning “Wheel of Happiness” for the lucky ones who won some prizes. To soothe the disappointment of those who didn’t win, there is good news; the wheel will spin again tonight with Young Adult genre authors.
You can connect with all the Indie Authors via the festival PopUp Book Shop by clicking on the link below:
However, if you have purchased an Indie Author book from a different sources, it is probably not signed. Check out the shop to request a limited commemorative book plate signed by the author.
“It’s a nice souvenir from the festival,” said organizer Diana Plopa.
I am supposed to consolidate my position and clarify my goals, according to today’s horoscope for the determined Taurus.
I especially like the quote from Bruce Lee: “Absorb what is useful, discard what is useless, and add what is specifically your own.”
That’s a pretty heavy quote that has inspired this entire post. To answer the last part of it; I am refining the content of the Greenwich Meridian memoir about our family immigration saga.
Inspired by Stephen and Owen King’s cooperation on the latest “Sleeping Beauties: A Novel”, I asked my mom Ella to write two chapters for the memoir. I would not be able to write them, because during mom’s second time around in the USA, I wasn’t with her. I was still back in Czechoslovakia.
I wrongfully called Chapter 13, “First years in America.” And surely mom struggled with that, because it was her second time around from 1980 to present. After more than an hour on the phone, we clarified that.
During mom’s writing process, dad discovered a precious document; his bio when he was applying for jobs. It was stored away in old luggage in the basement, where I would have never found it.
This document, probably from the 1970s, and my parents’ involvement will help move the memoir along. For months, I struggled with it. I got stuck halfway through the manuscript.
Lowell, MI- Big birthdays. We all have them. What is a big birthday? Do you remember your big birthdays, what did you do, where, with whom and what happened?
If you can answer the questions above, without looking at photos, it was a big birthday.
Today, on March 1st, our son Jakub Pala is celebrating his 30th birthday with the slogan:
“Got 30, Jake?”
“Yes, beers.”
He was born on a chilly damp Sunday morning in former Gottwaldov, Czechoslovakia in 1987. So, says his birth certificate. Neither the city nor the country exist under those names. They are now, the city of Zlin, Czech Republic, which is part of the European Union.
Doc Emma and Hotshot Jake in Paris, 2009
In 1987, the “Porodnice” or the birthing center was on the cutting edge with the “rooming in” accommodations for the newborns with their mothers. Before that, the babies were separated from their mothers, and the nurses brought out the babies to their mothers only for nursing. The babies were all changed, snug and clean. They were only crying because they were hungry.
Speaking ironically of the “bad communist” healthcare in former Czechoslovakia, we stayed in the hospital for a week, before we were released for home. The staff washed and folded the cloth diapers and newborn shirts in the traditional birthing centers.
I’ve had it both ways; traditional and “rooming-in.” Each was an experience to remember, as any mom can attest to that, in any country, and in any regime.
With the first baby “Doc Emma” born in April 1979, husband and daddy Ludek came to say hi to us under the windows of the “Porodnice” in Gottwaldow surrounded by pine trees.
Daddies and families were not allowed inside. Ludek had to give the flowers to the nurse, who set them in a vase on my bedside stand, along with a novel. I am trying to remember what I was reading back then. I could use it now on the “Goodreads” platform, for a book review. Just, kidding. However, I do think it was in that birthing room in 1979, that I decided I wanted to write for a living, to make other people happy.
I came home with “Doc Emma” on Easter weekend in 1979 to the smell of hot homemade chicken soup with dumplings that I will never forget, after the awful tomato gravies at the hospital.
Mom Ella made the soup, all worried about the new addition to the family house hold. We lived in a four-bedroom flat at the housing mega complex known as “Southern Slopes” or “Jizni Svahy” in Gottwaldov.
The “Southern Slopes” complex still exists and it’s growing. I witnessed that during my most recent visit to Czech Republic in January.
Eight years later, with the second baby, now regional distribution manager “Hotshot Jake,” daddy Ludek and “Doc Emma” came to say hi to the window of the “rooming-in” birthing center on the grounds of the Gottwaldov Hospital, still surrounded by pine trees.
“Oh, mom,” he’s ugly,” said “Doc Emma” throwing her big red hair around.
Doc Em & Hotshot Jake in Caledonia
Yeah, “Hotshot Jake” wasn’t the best looking baby having the newborn jaundice, few hairs sticking out, screaming and kicking like crazy.
“Is he eating and when are you coming home,” Daddy Ludek, always practical, asked.
Ludek was all giddy, that we had a boy. He had visions of paying for a big drinking round at the pub “U Byka” aka “At the Bull” in his hometown of Stipa.
“Hopefully soon,” I answered.
The second delivery at the cutting edge “rooming in” birthing center, still in communist Gottwaldov, wasn’t as convenient as the one with “Doc Emma.”
There were seven mothers with their babies in one big room. That’s 14 bodies; I don’t think anyone had twins. We had the cribs with the infants by our beds. The nurses came in only to assist “as needed.” Whatever that means. In the morning, we all faced together the feared “rounds” known as visitation. In vain, we were hoping we would be released that same day.
If a baby was screaming loud enough that it kept awake the entire building, then the nurse would take the “culprit” with her to the nurses’ quarters somewhere down the hall, where it smelled of disinfectants.
If the babies slept after nursing, we folded the cloth diapers and the tiny shirts for newborns. We ate in the room whatever the hospital cooked for all patients. No, menu style here. I just remember, the horrid tomato soup or gravy, with the soggy dumplings sprawled all over the plate.
With the release from the “Porodnice” after a week-long drill of learning how to take care of the newborn, I breathed with relief stating:
“Never again.”
Today, from a distance of 30 plus years and 6,000 kilometers, I look back at that time in “Porodnice” in communist Gottwaldov, Czechoslovakia, with a smile on my face.
The “babies” have grown up into colorful characters, fashionable, cute “Doc Emma” who resides in France, and handsome “Hotshot Jake.”
They will soon be leaving with their spouses for a big 30th birthday trip, to Bali in Indonesia. The exotic trip comes as a compliment of the ever-generous “Doc Emma.”
In the meantime, we get to watch their extensions for continued joy.
Some of you know them. They bring joy to our lives. Say hi to them when you see them out and about.
Thank you for the beautiful tapestry, called life.
Love always,
Emma
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