Tag Archives: non-fiction

Author Janice Afman pens memoir SariSari

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-t6q54-14cb2ec

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.

Author Janice Afman pens memoir SariSari

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-t6q54-14cb2ec

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.

Author Rich Nelson pens This Tender Man – My Father’s Story

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-a7vyq-14b131a

In his memoir, This Tender Man-My Father’s Story Nelson explores the journey of an ordinary man caught up in the extraordinary circumstances of war. “My father nearly died of malaria in the jungles of WWII New Guinea” is the opening line of the book.

 

Woodrow F. Nelson served in the U.S. Army’s 1462nd Engineer Maintenance Company in the tropical Pacific during WWII, coming home damaged by war but committed to leaving the war behind and going back to work, starting a family, and serving his community. 

However, like many veterans, he never shared any of the war stories with his son. Author Rich Nelson embarked on a journey to find out about his father’s experience.

The book also delves into Muskegon’s colorful historical and cultural tapestry.

 

Listen in for a chance to win a signed copy of This Tender Man-My Father’s Story.

 

Sponsored by Doc Chavent, The Lowell Ledger, and UP author Hilton Everett Moore

 

Pearls of My Mind journeys into self-discovery

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-rajxi-13d9547

In Pearls of My Mind, author Preethi Saravanakumar, a software developer and an award-winning poet, takes you on a journey into self-discovery using the symbolism of pearls.

 

Are you a Spiritual Newbie? Are you a Seeker? Or are you a Sage today? Let’s find out as we go on a self-reflective journey of pearl harvesting. Pearls Of My Mind is a book that houses my rainbow thoughts. As each of the seven colored pearls brings simple wisdom, dazzling jewelry is cautiously strung. 

This book deals with the connection between colors and emotions and their relationship to the Chakras. Pearls are rightly synonymous with purity, clarity, and longevity. They are wisdom in the true sense! Oh, Rainbow Pearls! Thy vivid prismatic hues, Thy pure poised wisdom, Thy bold mighty endurance, I majestically manifest thy cues! I majestically manifest thy cues!

Listen in for a chance to win a signed copy of Pearls of My Mind.

Sponsored by Doc Chavent and The Lowell Ledger

Author- photographer portrays Detroit’s hidden gems, obscure sites

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-5p3hy-13756ff

In her Detroit Revealed: A Different View of the Motor City, author-photographer Leslie Cieplechowicz highlights the obscure and amazing hidden gems of the city which is sometimes portrayed as unapproachable. The imagery highlights places only seen by local people who have created a rich culture and scenery that is veiled from the public eye.

“I wanted to share my view of the city,” she said.

Cieplechowicz worked as an EMS paramedic for the Detroit Fire Department. She returned to the sites of former EMS encounters to capture the images, all 4,000 of them. 150 best pictures made it into the book.

“I captured the heart of the city and the people,” she said. “I put a positive spin on a city that gets a negative reputation.”

The book serves as a city guide for both locals and visitors with its stunning imagery, history of the sites, and addresses.

“You can visit all the places,” she said.

Walk along the radiant blue riverfront of the Detroit River and view the beautiful structures glittering in the sunlight. Hang out at the hole-in-the-wall local bar and absorb the glow from the antique fixture that bathes the vintage decor in a warm light.

Head to the streets in a snowstorm, and peer through a broken window down Jefferson Avenue at a city shrouded in swirling white flakes. Or check out an old, dimly lit industrial center that has been turned into an enclave for local singers and artists to hone their talent, whose studios are a splash of faded records, flashing neon lights, and vibrant flags.

 

Listen in for a chance to win a signed copy of this book.

 

Sponsored by Doc Chavent and The Lowell Ledger

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Author Janet Vormittag pens Cat Women of West Michigan

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-dd3zd-133e894

Janet Vormittag of West Michigan calls herself ‘A Crazy Cat Lady,’ and thus the name of her book series with the newest book out just in time for the holidays. Cat Women of West Michigan tells 30 compelling stories of passionate women who do cat rescue in many different forms from the actual rescue to Cat Cafe in Grand Rapids.

Vormittag became the self-proclaimed  ‘A Crazy Cat Lady’ in the mid-80s with the rescue of an injured kitten Lucy in Saugatuck that lived 10 years.

“They’re not crazy cat ladies,” she said. “Just compassionate women.”

She connected with these women through her quarterly magazine Cats and Dogs.

“I was struck by women rescuing cats,” she said.

And the number of euthanized cats went down from 8,000 to 189 over the last 15 years since the publication started.

“It’s a community problem,” she said.

Listen in for a chance to win a signed copy of Vormittag’s Cat Women of West Michigan.

Sponsored by Doc Chavent and The Lowell Ledger.

Lowell author Gladys Fletcher pens memoir My Garden of Stones

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-h7dfb-12bc76f

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.

Sponsored by Doc Chavent and The Lowell Ledger

Author Deborah Frontiera pens Superior Tapestry

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-xyb6s-1256ccd

In Superior Tapestry, author Deborah Frontiera combines fiction with non-fiction to create a fun fact read for adults and children. Frontiera picked 27 artifacts from UP history and gave them personality.

“The stories are told from the point of view of objects,” she said. “I had a lot of fun with it.”

In the first story Birch Bark (B. B.) Canoe, Frontiera portrays the canoe as a female traveling from St. Ignace across Soo to Duluth. The objective was to show how native Americans used a canoe for travel. 

Frontiera aimed to strike a balance between the genders of the objects in her personification of artifacts such as the cliffs and the stone in Portrait of Pictured Rocks.

Superior Tapestry

Bishop Baraga appears in several different stories thus weaving a tapestry throughout the book. The idea for personification of objects occurred to Frontiera while writing the article Estabad Pines from the POV of a pine tree.

For details of the book giveaway visit Frontiera’s website http://www.SuperiorTapestry.com http://www.SuperiorTapestry.com

Author Jon Stott pens Summers at the Lake

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-vt9hs-123fba4

Summers at the Lake is a delightful collection of essays centered around the author’s beloved “Little cabin in the Big Woods” beside Crooked Lake in the Upper Peninsula.

Summers at the Lake

The humorous and meditative essays, that read like prose poetry, track the progression of the seasons. Stott aims to evoke for readers memories of similar incidents and feelings at other lakes and at other times.

Stott, a part-time Yooper, spends extended summers in the solitude of the northern woods where the closest community of Munising is 27 miles away from his cabin.

“I am the old hermit of the woods,” he said in the podcast interview speaking directly from the Munising School Public library, 500 feet from Lake Superior.

In chapter 6 “Day Tripper”, Stott takes us on a trip to Grand Marais which looks like a New England seaside village with a year-round population of 300.

Stott acts as a knowledgeable and funny tour guide as he writes about “Life in a Pickle Barrel” about the history of the Pickle Barrel House. 

Email Stott for a chance to win a signed copy of his new book at jstottuaalberta.ca

Special thanks to the Munising School Public Library.

Sponsored by Doc Chavent, the Lowell Ledger, Modern History Press

In Healing Childhood Trauma author Robin Marvel offers tools to heal

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-a4ecz-1221e63

Author Robin Marvel of Hersey, MI is that girl who has survived mental, domestic, and drug abuse; homelessness, and kidnappings throughout her childhood. Being addicted to alcohol and partying at age 15 resulted in a sexual assault, and later she became a teen mother at age 16.

Since May is mental health awareness month, Marvel opened up to talk about her story captured in her book “Healing Childhood Trauma” from a PTSD standpoint of view.

“I didn’t want to repeat the cycle, and I started working on myself,” she said. “I realized I was in control of what happened to me.”

As a motivational speaker, Marvel talks about self-respect and determination. She strives to be a role model for her five daughters. She chose to grow through the trauma she had endured as a child.

“I didn’t have any role models,” she said witnessing how her mother was abused by her father with subsequent kidnappings of her.

“It was always the same,” she said. “He took me to his mother to get supplies and we slept in a car. I grabbed my blanket.”

But facing all these hardships, Marvel found the strength to overcome being a victim of circumstance.

“It doesn’t happen at the flip of a switch,” she said. “I had to work on myself.”

Listen in for a chance to win a signed copy of Marvel’s life-changing book.