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Dear Reader,
"My mother, Mildred, was my biggest fan and believed in me as a novelist before anyone else did."
Today's guest columnist, Harry Kraus, is the best-selling author of 19 books, his latest is Lip Reading. He is a Board certified surgeon and lives with his wife of 31 years in Williamsburg, Virginia. Harry's mother passed away two years ago on Mother's Day, and today he shares one of his favorite childhood memories.
Be sure to say hello to Dr. Kraus and welcome him to the book club. When you do, you'll be entered in a drawing for a copy of his latest, Lip Reading. He has five copies for lucky readers. Take it away Harry Kraus...
One day when I was about thirteen, my mother rushed into my bedroom calling my name. "Harry Lee!"
Immediately, I could tell something was wrong. The right side of her normally symmetrical smile had drooped and lay flaccid against her teeth, unable to keep up with her animated expressions.
"I can't whistle," she said, but her speech was slurred so that it came out "whithle." She demonstrated the lost skill by blowing through her mouth but couldn't close her lips into a circle to create a clear note. "Pleeath, pleeth."
I was unsure how to respond.
She continued, "I think I've had a sthroke."
I'd heard of strokes before. They were bad. My grandfather had a stroke and ended up drooling all the time. I imagined my mother with the same fate.
Then, I saw the twinkle in her eye and I realized she'd just yanked my chain. Big time.
"Nahh," she said, "I've just been to the dentisth and my mouth isth sthill numb!"
I still laugh when I think of my mother's love for a good joke.
What was going on, physiologically? The local anesthetic had blocked the nerve impulses between my mother's lips and her brain. When the brain sent out the message, "whistle," her lips didn't get the message.
Novelists, perhaps your brain is sending you the message, "write," but you're behaving as if you've taken some form of writer's local anesthetic and you're not getting the message!
When I think about having writer's block (metaphorically from a local anesthetic) what are the typical things that block the impulse?
For me, it's a hundred other things that I find to do. Check my Facebook status, check my blog for comments, go to my favorite Internet news sites, or even play Ruzzle on my smart phone.
I think the cure for this kind of procrastination is the Nike slogan, "just do it." Discipline to put the butt in chair everyday is one of the novelist's biggest challenges.
My mother read my first novel many years ago and I fed her a chapter at a time. She could hardly wait for the next installment.
What about you, novelists? Your readers are waiting.
Cast off the writing anesthetics that block the impulse to write and "just do it!"
To be entered into a drawing for my latest novel, Lip Reading, just email me at harry@harrykraus.com.
--Harry Kraus
* Start writing. The information about how to enter our 10th Write a Dear Reader Contest will be posted on July 7th in my column.
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
Suzanne@DearReader.com
* This month's Penguin Classics book THE HOUSE OF ULLOA by Emilia Pardo. Start reading now and don't forget to enter the drawing for your chance to win a Penguin Totebag: http://www.supportlibrary.com/bc/v.cfm?L=drclassqqxqQ1AFEF39295A&c=CLASSICS
AUTHORBUZZ: HAMSTER ISLAND (NonFiction) by Joan Heartwell
This is my story of growing up in a poor, super-dysfunctional family that included a kleptomaniac grandmother and two special needs siblings, all of us residing more or less in the middle of a parking lot. There's humor and heartbreak, and anyone who has ever been a caretaker will appreciate the unorthodox measures I took to find the balance between my siblings' needs and my own.
Go to: http://authorbuzz.com/dearreader click on HAMSTER ISLAND to find out more about the book and the author, Joan Heartwell. Send her an email, she'd love to hear from you.
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