Sunday, November 26, 2017

Southern Comfort

I've always felt a little sorry for friends who grew up as an only child. Raised in a large family, I was rarely more than an arm's length from my nearest sibling. I also enjoyed a built-in gaggle of playmates through my dad's church. But what I didn't have, and envied in others, were close aunts and uncles. My mother had one sister who we saw on rare occasions. My dad's family lived in Missouri.

I remember the first time I met my Aunt Ruth, who came to visit when my mom was pregnant with my brother. She smiled a lot and spoke real slow in her honey-like southern accent. When she called me sweet pea, I thought I'd melt on the spot. Aunt Ruth was married to my Uncle Cecil,  a petite, white-haired man who played the harmonica and guitar at the same time. They were devoutly religious yet loving and playful. When Aunt Ruth hugged you, it was like her heart soaked up all your troubles and replaced them with giggles. My Midwestern people are known for being kind. But there's a deep-down warmth to Southern women that feels rooted in utter affection.

I'll admit to channeling a bit of my Aunt Ruth when I drew my protagonist's beloved Aunt Pearl. Young Grace's family is in turmoil when Rev. Carter's sister travels from Mississippi to lend a hand. From the moment Aunt Pearl steps off the bus in her flowered slippers, Grace finally feels as though she has a confidant, an adult who is on her side for once.

Aunt Pearl is round like Daddy but not much taller than me. She rocks back and forth when she walks, which makes her slippers lean to the outside. She takes the black rubbered stairs one at a time, saying, “Lordy, Lordy,” as if it’ll take a miracle to get to the bottom step. As soon as she hits the sidewalk she looks at me and grins, her front gold tooth sparkling like a little star. 

“Come here, shoog,” she says, and opens her arms. 


What about you? Did you have a favorite aunt or uncle, a mentor who stood up for you and who honored your individuality? Drop your answer in the comments or just to say hi. :)


~~~~~


My debut novel, THIS I KNOW, releases April 24, 2018. Follow me on Good Reads to be updated about future giveaways and blog posts. You can also pre-order my book on Amazon or from you local bookstore.



"A heartfelt and beautifully crafted debut about an eleven-year-old girl struggling to find her place in the world. THIS I KNOW shines, thanks to narrator Grace, one of the most authentic child characters I've come across in a long time. Don't miss this one."  Lesley Kagen, New York Times bestselling author of THE MUTUAL ADMIRATION SOCIETY.

Sunday, November 19, 2017

A Room of One's Own

I live in a tiny cottage with my beau but thankfully it came with an extra bathroom. Okay, bathroom is a generous term for the toilet that sits in the basement laundry area with no door, completely exposed. Even so, anyone who grew up in a large family with a single bathroom will relate to the benefit of having more than one commode.

Such was the case for the first twelve years of my life, when my family lived in a two-story parsonage. The house boasted five bedrooms, perhaps because preachers tend to fill a couple pews with their own children. Yet unbelievably, there was just a single bathroom to share between seven kids and two adults. Think about that for a minute. Nine people, one bathroom. I understand this is  not uncommon in third-world countries but this was America. Rural America, but still...

So you can imagine how convenient it must have been to live across the street from our little church, one whose doors were never locked and that contained a bathroom with not one, but TWO stalls. My five sisters and I often pee-pee danced across the street when the bathroom was in use by one of our siblings or, God forbid, my dad. To him, it was not just a bathroom; it was his study, his escape from seven females and our baby brother. When nature called my dad, it was as if God himself had called him to the ministry of elimination. He'd spend hours in there "studying," his claim backed up by the stacks of reference books, concordance, and a several versions of the Bible. And yes, some of them had toilet paper squares marking the pages. 

People often ask if THIS I KNOW is autobiographical. The answer is yes and no. The story is fiction, but did I harvest snippets from my fertile childhood growing up as a preacher's kid? Absolutely. Including this little gem:

By the time I get back from town, Daddy’s in the bathroom doing some last-minute cramming for his sermon tomorrow. It’s one of his favorite places to think. Unfortunately, if one of us needs to pee we have to walk over to the church because he’s not coming out anytime soon. Even if he did, nobody would want to go in right after Daddy’s been in there. I fast-walk across the street, rushing past the church janitor and into the girls’ bathroom. Somebody has scratched "Jesus Loves You" into the back of the bathroom door. I wonder if whoever wrote it considered whether Jesus would like her vandalizing His holy house.

 Sorry, Dad, but that was too good not to steal. 

~~~~~~~
If you're reading this on Sunday morning (12-19-17) there's still time to enter a giveaway for a $20 Target Gift Card just by dropping a comment on the thread below this photo on my Facebook Author Page:


Sunday, November 12, 2017

When Things Fall Apart


"I am terrified by this dark thing that sleeps inside me." --Sylvia Plath

We've all done it; pasted on a happy face to cover our fear, our sadness, our fragility. Nobody wants to be a Debbie Downer and drag others down with them, right? So we stuff our vulnerable selves deep into our core and pull out a mask bearing an appropriately put-together shell. One that appears happy and confident. But on the inside, things are still falling apart.

Growing up in the Midwest I learned from an early age that you need to "buck up" or " "grin and bear it" when times get tough. We were taught to smile through our pain or discomfort because appearances mattered more than feelings. I was a sensitive child and cried easily so I heard it a lot. Of course, I carried this idea of stuffing your feelings well into my adulthood, until that point when I realized that a river of repressed emotions will eventually breach the damn. This flood of truth might manifest as anger or addiction or even suicide if not treated.  

Such is the case for Isabelle Carter, wife of the Rev. Henry Carter, who suffers from a combination of postpartum depression and unfulfilled desires. She wanted to be a famous gospel singer. What she got instead was life as a rural minister's wife and mother to five daughters, one of whom reminds her of long-forgotten self.

Daddy brought Mama back home two days ago. She doesn’t seem very rested if you ask me. She still naps a lot and when she is up and around she bumps into the walls. Joy won’t let Mama hold the baby unless she’s sitting down. Mama reminds me of a Dilly Bar from the Dairy Queen, like there’s only a thin shell covering what’s melting inside.

In this scene from THIS I KNOW, Mama has just come from a place where she was sent to "rest" but returns home looking anything but recovered. I wanted to underscore the disconnect that people (mostly women) from that era suffered. Faces disguised with pleasant, Stepford-like eeriness. These women were often over-prescribed "nerve pills" to calm them or "diet pills" to give them energy. Many self-medicated with alcohol and other forms of escapism. Or as in Mrs. Carter's case, told to pray away the malaise when what she most needed was simply to be allowed to feel what she was feeling. In retrospect, it's no wonder we're currently struggling with an opioid addiction epidemic crisis. People want to feel good and will do anything to make the pain go away.

I enjoy what most friends and acquaintances would describe as a happy disposition. But where there is light, there is shadow. For several years I endured depression that might have been postpartum or might have been circumstantial due to life events. Or maybe it was just good old-fashioned clinical depression. What I remember most was feeling terribly ashamed, that old tape of "get over yourself" looping endlessly in my head. Eventually I sought help, got counseling, and was able to talk openly about my feelings as I surfed the waves of melancholy and despair. 

During that time I learned that what depressed people most need is acceptance and support. Things young Grace strives to give her mama as the reverend's wife struggles to find her way back to happiness  and contentment. In THIS I KNOW, Grace's way of helping happens to involve using her uncanny abilities to break through the membrane of consciousness to reach her sullen mother. Because sometimes a little magic is the best medicine.

~~~~~


Someone, maybe you, is reading these words and recognizes yourself in them. Talk to somebody

~~~



My debut novel, THIS I KNOW, releases April 24 2018. I'd be honored if you'd add it to your wish-list on Good Reads. and thrilled if you recommend it to your friends. You can also pre-order the book on Amazon or from you local bookstore.




In this outstanding debut, Eldonna Edwards has created an enchanting, loveable narrator by the name Grace Carter, who shares all she sees about her world and beyond.  Rendered in a voice at once singular and exquisite and with an old soul sense of wisdom, I was captivated by this story of a girl and her unique gift, her love of family, the pain of loss, the sting of indifference, and the simple joy of acceptance, but most of all by Grace, and her purity of heart. --Donna Everhart, best-selling author of THE EDUCATION OF DIXIE DUPREE and  THE ROAD TO BITTERSWEET.

Sunday, November 5, 2017

Big Daddy

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons
Remember when you were a kid and adults seemed so big, so powerful, so impossibly in charge of EVERYTHING? They controlled what you ate, when you went to bed and the consequences of any misdeeds. It was frustrating wasn't it? Especially when you were innocent but got blamed because more often than not, you were the mischievous kid at the center of those misdeeds. 

My father was loving but strict. As a preacher, he held a higher position than most of my friends' dads. We might have been on the low end of the economic barometer, but we had righteousness on our side and that allowed us other benefits. Clergy discounts. Chore-free Sundays. Memorized Scripture to back-up and win most arguments. Because really, who wants to take a side against the Almighty?

In writing THIS I KNOW I tried to convey that sense of impotence in children compared to powerful adults, especially parents. In the following scene, Grace nervously waits while her mama explains a situation that could make her either a hero or a villain in her father's eyes:

"Daddy spends a long time in the bedroom with Mama before supper. I picture him sitting on the bed, the way it sinks when he lowers himself onto it. Daddy tends to leave a dent in soft things. Not just because he’s big, but because he means to. Everything about him is heavy, from his voice to the way his foot lands on the floor. Sometimes just in the way he looks at you."

As a child, that's pretty much how I viewed my dad. He was the boss. And he was the pastor. Who was I to challenge him?

And then one day, tragedy struck and for the first time in my life, I saw him crying. Dad's don't cry, I thought. Kids cry. Sometimes mothers. But not your dad. And especially not Pastor Edwards. Until he does. He appeared disheveled that day, like someone who'd slept several nights in their clothes. It was the first time I recognized that he wasn't merely those roles of father and minister, he was a human being who, in that moment, felt helpless and not in control of anyone or anything.

It was a rare moment, but one I never forgot. So in creating the fictional Reverend Carter, I made the character big--much bigger physically than my own dad. I made him insufferably controlling and close-minded. But somewhere deep inside I managed to insert a tiny wedge of vulnerability: a woman that he adores and without whom he feels unlovable. And then I wrenched her from his assured grasp. I'd like to say I did it to expose his true self, letting his house of cards crumble around him so that he's faced with difficult choices. But the truth is, I'm still that same mischievous kid who enjoys stirring up shit when she gets the chance. Fortunately as a writer, I get lots of chances.

~~~~~

My debut novel, THIS I KNOW, releases April 24 2018. I'd be honored if you added it to your wish-list on Good Reads. You can also pre-order the book on Amazon or from you local bookstore.






In this outstanding debut, Eldonna Edwards has created an enchanting, loveable narrator by the name Grace Carter, who shares all she sees about her world and beyond.  Rendered in a voice at once singular and exquisite and with an old soul sense of wisdom, I was captivated by this story of a girl and her unique gift, her love of family, the pain of loss, the sting of indifference, and the simple joy of acceptance, but most of all by Grace, and her purity of heart. --Donna Everhart, best-selling author of THE EDUCATION OF DIXIE DUPREE and  THE ROAD TO BITTERSWEET.