Letter from a fellow new writer:Five years ago, shortly after my husband’s sudden accidental death, I alone fulfilled our dream of living a more instinctual life by moving from San Miguel de Allende to a little fishing village on the Pacific coast of Mexico—the site of my story, “The Eleventh Hour,” which was published last week in Chicken Soup for the Soul: Miracles and More. The story is a condensed account of the aftermath of Category 5 Hurricane Patricia, when I met my fairy godmother on the eve of homelessness in late October, 2015.Chicken Soup has an extraordinary publicity program, but I cannot take advantage of it because my village has no reliable mail service, much less a newspaper—which would be written in Spanish, if it existed. I don’t own a cell phone because I can’t receive a signal at home in the tropical forest, and I don’t have a website because I don’t need one. But I do have an email list of people who read, so I’m writing you to recommend this book of uplifting stories, including my tale of “divine intervention.”
The friend in the States who received my ten free copies of the book, for distribution to nursing homes and rehabilitation centers, kindly sent me a photo of the front cover. It is attached, along with the cover photo of The Fourth Moment: Journeys from the Known to the Unknown, by Carole J. Garrison. Carole and I became friends years ago when we served together on the board of Women’s Network in Akron, Ohio. Now that I’m also her editor, having read every word, I can attest to this remarkable collection of true stories; they will make you smile, laugh, cry, and sometimes want to scream at the top of your lungs.
Both books are available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle editions. In this age of Twitter and Instagram, it seems like I’m using the Pony Express to spread the word, but there’s not much more I can do from so far off the grid. (I trust that my expatriated friends will again set foot in the US or Canada, where ordering is easy and bookstores abound.) If you like these stories, please recommend them to your own friends and family. Thanks!
With gratitude from my warm world of words and water,
Lynne
Carole J. Garrison 