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Dear Reader,
When I was ten years old I spent hours riding my bike in the vacant parking lot next to our house, pretending to be a secret agent (my favorite show was The Man From Uncle.) At the age when I was playing super spy, today's guest author, Kim Fay, had already begun her writing career.
Guest author Kim Fay The Map of Lost Memories invites you to send her an email today. She absolutely loves to hear from readers and she replies to each and every email she receives. It was a delight to read her guest column, and you'll be delighted meeting her via email. And of course, Kim has goodies. Five copies of her book, The Map of Lost Memories. Send your email to: [email protected]
Writers spend a lot of time alone. And when I say a lot, I mean a lot. For the majority of us, the ability (desire) to be by ourselves is simply part of our genetic makeup. I started writing fiction when I was ten, and unlike most kids my age, I could spend hours holed up in my closet-turned-office, pounding away on the manual Smith-Corona my dad passed on to me from his college years.
Give me a week to myself to write, and I'm a happy camper. At the same time, I also write because of the many ways it allows me to socialize out in the world. I love my writing critique group, book festivals and Twitter, not just because I get to blather on about my writing, but because I get to discuss the ideas in my writing--ideas so near and dear to me that I felt compelled to write entire books about them. The recent discovery of an ancient Khmer city in Cambodia thrilled me because such a discovery is the foundation for my debut historical novel, and it gives me yet one more way to continue the conversation about the controversies of art ownership, cultural appropriation, colonialism and personal obsessions that I started with the novel.
My attraction to the social side of writing came to me early. Around the same time that I discovered the magic of storytelling I also discovered the magic of bookstores. I can still picture every bookstore that captured my heart, beginning with the little independent shop in Pioneer Square in Seattle where my dad would take me before Seahawks games in the late 1970s.
The world embraced by that indie bookshop captivated me so much, in fact, that a decade later, right out of college, I found myself working there. By that time, the Elliott Bay Book Company was one of the most respected bookstores in the nation. And it was in that hallowed place that I realized I write for more than one reason. Yes, I write because I must. A day without writing is a day without happiness for me. But I also write because of the people and places it connects me to.
The Elliott Bay Book Company just turned forty, and I flew up from L.A. to attend the anniversary party. I "graduated" from Elliott Bay almost twenty years ago, but as I mingled with former co-workers, I remembered in detail the early morning coffee, late night wine and always, always!, talk about writing and books. Those conversations were the basis for enduring friendships, and as a writer, I can imagine nothing more satisfying than continuing to be a part of those discussions, literally, and also in absentia as readers begin to form their own lifelong bonds with coffee and a chat about one of my books.
To say hello and to enter the book drawing, send your email to Kim at: [email protected]
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
[email protected]
* This month's Penguin Classics book is DEATH OF A HERO by Richard Aldington. Start reading now and enter to win a Penguin totebag. Go to: http://tinyurl.com/July13Classics
AUTHORBUZZ: DONNY AND URSULA SAVE THE WORLD (Fiction) by Sharon Weil
A plot by an agribusiness giant threatens the world's food supply and Mother Earth herself--and all because Ursula had her first orgasm! The funniest wild-romp, romantic mishap-adventure about love, sex, courage, and GMOs.
Go to: http://authorbuzz.com/dearreader click on DONNY AND URSULA SAVE THE WORLD to read more and to email author Sharon Weil, you'll get a reply.
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