JULY 2nd — This Thursday!!!

Inspirational Authors Facebook Event

This is a blog post by Janet Givens, author of “Stuttering” and “At Home on the Kazakh Steppe”… I am honored to be participating in the Inspirational Authors Event with her on Facebook. I am also grateful to her for putting this information together.

A few weeks ago I was invited to participate in a one-day FB event as an “inspirational author.”

I was curious. What is an inspirational author? I hadn’t thought of myself an inspiration author particularly, but still, I was on this “Just say Yes” kick and so I did.
I said, “yes.”

The Facebook event is scheduled for July 2 and will feature fifteen women from around the world, converging on this Facebook page in three-hour shifts from 5 am to 11 pm Pacific Standard Time. I signed up for the 11 am – 1 pm shift, which is 2 – 5 pm EDT, New York summertime, (I hope).

First, I wanted to know who the members of my cohort were. Many I knew from the FB group We Love Memoirs. Others were new names for me. So, I Googled them all. Here’s what I learned about each of them their book titles are on Amazon and they each have websites, Goodreads, or Amazon Author Pages. They are listed by their shift at the Facebook Event.

FROM 5 – 8 am California Time (8 – 11 am New York Time)
Jacky Donovan‘s life has been filled with twists and turns. She is the author of the memoir, Instant Whips and Dream Toppings: A true-life dom rom com. Her newest book, Simon Ships Out: A Heroic Cat at Sea, takes her in yet another direction: children’s author.

Shannon Hernandez is a former public school teacher, blogger, educator, and author of Breaking the Silence: My Final Forty Days as a Public School Teacher.

Stephanie Collins is the author of With Angels Wings, the story of initiation into “life as a special needs mother.”

FROM 8 – 11 a.m California Time (11 am – 2 pm New York Time)

Anna Whiston-Donaldson opens her website with this, “I wish I had nothing to say on the matter of loss, but I do. Because one day I encouraged my two kids to go out and play in the rain, and only one came home….” That one hooked me; how about you? She is the author of Rare Bird.

Kristin Louise Duncombe is an American writer, psychotherapist, and consultant who has lived in France since 2001. She is the author of Trailing: A Memoir and Five Flights Up, both memoirs that address, among other things, the specific challenges and idiosyncracies of the expat existence.

Sarah Jane Butfield is the author of three travel memoirs set in Australia and France. She also provides support and networking for authors through Rukia Publishing.

Shirley Ledlie is a former columnist for Bella, the UK women’s magazine, and lives in South West France with her family. She’s the author of Naked In the Wind and The Unexpected Pilgrim.

FROM 11 am – 2 pm California Time (2 – 5 pm New York Time)
CeeCee James is the author of the Ghost No More series, her story of childhood abuse.

Fran Macilvey is the author of Trapped: My Life with Cerebral Palsy.

Janet Givens. I am humbled to be included in such a collection. I will just add that I’m the author of At Home on the Kazakh Steppe: A Peace Corp Memoir (2014) and co-author of Stuttering (1997).

FROM 2 – 5 pm California Time (5 – 8 pm New York Time)
Alana Terry bills herself as an “inspirational suspense novelist,” a genre I’d never heard of. She is the author of Slave Again, a Readers’ Favorite gold medal for religious fiction.

Kathleen Pooler is a frequent visitor to this page, a past guest blogger, and I’m pleased to add, a friend in the small F sense of the word. She is the author of Ever Faithful to His Lead: My Journey Away From Emotional Abuse.

Victoria Noe is the author of the Friend Grief series.

From 5 – 8 pm California Time (8 – 11 pm New York Time)
Dana Goodman is the instigator coordinator for this event. I first met her during her phenomenal Sunday Spotlight on the We Love Memoir FB Group. She is the author of In the Cleft Joy Comes in the Mourning: A Story of Hope After Tragedy.

Sandy Oshiro Rosen — “Author, Communicator, Dancer” — is the author of Bare: the misplaced art of grieving and dancing.

From 8 – 11 pm California Time (11 pm – 2 am New York Time)

Shirley Enebrad is an author, speaker, and grief counselor. She is the author of two books: Over the Rainbow Bridge (2009), the story of her young son, Cory, and his inspiring journey as he battled leukemia, and Six Word Lessons on Coping with Grief; 100 Lessons to Help You and Your Loved Ones Deal with Loss (2013).

Now these are inspirational women. Survivors all of them, from domestic abuse, childhood neglect, cancer, and unspeakable grief. We have a woman who recruits us to reform our public education system, another who helps us know what it’s like to be trapped in one’s own body, and another one elevating herself from bondage, albeit a well-paying form of bondage.

There are two novelists and there is me.
I am definitely committed. But who was our audience to be for this one day event? Each of us simply used Facebook’s Invite Your Friends feature to send invites to those we thought might have some interest. Nearly 200 have responded positively, with another 50 “Maybe.”

We’re all offering give-aways too. Our leader, Dana Goodman, directed us to Rafflecopter, where I submitted three prizes: the eBook version of At Home on the Kazakh Steppe and two print versions of My Gutsy Story Vol 2.
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So, huge thanks to Janet Givens for putting this list together. I hope that you will join us on Facebook to see what these remarkably talented inspiring women are up to. I almost forgot that I too am giving away copies of my books.

Be Well.

Shirley