Life

I've figured it out, why I write.

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I haven't been writing in the days since my dad died. Or in the days, weeks, before that even, because he was sick and I couldn't pull myself from knowing it would be quick. I had emotion weighing down each moment, and had those things, life-or-death kinds of things, to tend to. You know?

I spent a lot of time with my parents and sister; time helping, time loving. And I was okay putting my writing aside for a while. This blog took on a sort of lesser quality. From what I thought was my standard, anyway. And my fiction was tucked away, saved, ready for later. Whenever.

But then my everyday real-and-in-person life flagged, too.

I started suspecting the cause was more than losing my father. Because hard as that has been, and continues to be, would it overlap into everything else, the minutiae of daily life as a wife, mother, homemaker? Force my patience and determination to wear, not just thin but through? I've been apathetic. I've been moody. Horrible.

I told my husband something is wrong. That everything--people, my responsibilities, all of it--overwhelms me.

Then last night I had one of those half-lucid brainstorms. The first scene of A Gradual Goodbye, the novel I'm rewriting, floated around in my dreams, delivering me back to the story. The creative coals kindled.

When I woke this morning I headed straight for the computer. Pulled the book up. Worked for a couple hours, felt it for the first time in a long while. Inner peace. And it clicked. The piece I hadn't been able to fit, let alone identify, slid right in its place. I don't know why I didn't realize it before.

It's the writing. Such a defining outlet for me. That creativity, huge. It balances my world, and my mental health.

It makes me happy. That's why I write.

I Am Grieving and I Am Mourning

There's no easy way to say, we lost my dad this morning. We are heavy with sadness but thankful for his release.

I heard today, grieving happens on the inside, mourning on the outside.

I'll be doing both for a time.

Random Question #6

Here's something you don't think about when it comes to internet friends:

How tall are you?



I'm 5' 6.5".

You Won't Regret It

Beginning today, treat everyone you meet as if they were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness, and understanding you can muster, and do it with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again.

Og Mandino

Giveaway winners... in poetry!

I'm away from home,
didn't expect to be.
But still, I've got the winners
of the books I listed--all three!

Instead of Giveaway Guy's help,
because he's not with me,
I've put to the task my mom--
We'll call her Giveaway Grandy.

And so now I've got
everyone's names in the pot(s).

Let's draw, Giveaway Grandy.
(I have no pictures. Sorry!)

Up first, Willow Run.
And our winner is...
Angie Muresan!

And next, for Midnight Pearls:
pull our name, Giveaway Grandy...
Lisa Dovichi!

Last is for Flirting With Pete...
Wendy Paine Miller!

Congratulations to the winners! If you could each send your mailing addresses to jannawritesATyahooDOTcom, I'll send the books out just as soon as I can.

Thanks, everyone, for participating! And congrats again, ladies.

While We Wait

There's always something for which to wait. In fact, I'm waiting right now.
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Have a seat. You take the left, I'll sit at the right, and we'll talk. Pass the time. Wait together.

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If you were sitting here with me, what would we talk about?

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**Make sure to visit this post and enter for my book giveaway. Winners TBA Wednesday.

Book Giveaway: Two Young Adult, One Women's Fiction

The notion has hit me, and I can't ignore it. Time for another giveaway!

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Many of my followers read and/or write YA fiction, and I know some of you have kids who'd enjoy these titles. Check 'em out!
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Willow Run

by Patricia Reilly Giff

new paperback, Yearling

this may actually be Middle Grade?

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Back cover copy:

Margaret "Meggie" Dillon's life in Rockaway, New York, has been turned upside down by World War II. Her older brother, Eddie, is fighting in Europe. And she's heard that anywhere but Rockaway, her grandpa would be turned in because he's German and might be a spy. But Grandpa became a loyal American citizen long ago. Could he be taken away?

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Meanwhile, Meggie's father has announced that they must help the war effort and move to Willow Run, Michigan, where he'll work in a factory, building planes. Meggie is sad about leaving Grandpa and her best friend, Lily, but she tells herself that Willow Run will be an adventure.

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There Meggie meets Patches and Harlan, other kids from far-off places whose parents have come to do their part in the war. And she faces questions about courage, and what it takes to go into battle--like Eddie--and to keep hope alive on the home front.

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Once Upon a Time: Midnight Pearls

(A Retelling of The Little Mermaid)

by Debbie Viguie

new paperback, Simon Pulse
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Back cover copy:

In a quiet fishing village seventeen years ago, one lone fisherman rescued a child from the sea. He and his wife raised the girl, Pearl, as their own daughter, never allowing themselves to wonder long about where she came from--or notice her silver hair, unusually pale skin, and wide, dark blue eyes.

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Pearl grows from a mysterious child into an unusual young woman, not always welcomed in the village. As all the other girls her age find husbands, she has only one friend to ease her loneliness. One very special, secret companion: Prince James.

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But their friendship is shaken when trouble erupts in the kingdom--a conspiracy against the royal family combines with an evil enchantment from beneath the sea. Now, just when Pearl and James need each other most, bewitching magic and hints about Pearl's past threaten to tear them apart... forever.

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And now, because YA isn't my niche but women's fiction is, here's a third title!

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Flirting With Pete

by Barbara Delinsky

like-new (read by me) hardcover, Scribner

Janna's dust, no extra charge!
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Barbara Delinsky has written many bestselling novels over the past two decades, including Searching for Peyton Place, An Accidental Woman, The Woman Next Door, and Coast Road.

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For this book's summary (which is too expansive for this already-long post), see here.
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To be entered for this giveaway, leave a comment with your title preference. If you're interested in more than one, just say so (you can only win one, though). At contest's end--next Tuesday, May 11th, 8pm CST--I'll categorize names and hold three separate drawings. Giveaway Guy (my hubs) will draw our winning names, which will be announced in Wednesday's post.

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Good luck! And have a lovely weekend. :)

Random Question #5

Who's your living hero, and why?

Janna Touts Joanna -- Spreading the Awesome

What caught my eye that day, poking through antiques, was a small collection of novels. I can never turn away, you know.
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I liked the one book's blue spine. (Ask my best friend; she'll tell you I'm drawn to blue. In clothes, furniture, trinkets. Always blue.) I lifted it from the others; its trade paperback size perfect in my hands. And from the back cover blurb to the front cover endorsement, it smacked of women's fiction. So it had me, see.
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When I got to the front register, the shopkeeper said it had been her copy. "Joanna Trollope, she's one of my favorites. I'm glad to see the book find someone new."
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Second Honeymoon is a tale of family and of change, wrapped in the tenderness and fragility of motherhood.
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Edie Boyd's children have all grown and moved out, leaving both the nest and her heart empty. Her sense of purpose, gone. Her life's work, unraveled. She has no choice but to scrabble through, and revive her marriage to Russell, try to resuscitate an acting career she'd once set aside.
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Until, that is, one circumstance after another leads each of the kids home again, and Edie has the option of reclaiming her role of a lifetime: motherhood. But is anything as good the second time around?
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Trollope's writing is beautiful, full of heart and depth. Her insights into life, into the emotions of a woman, wife and mother, build a story of truth and relatability. It's women's fiction, perfected.
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This post is part of Spreading the Awesome, an event created and hosted by Elana Johnson. Today you'll find bloggers, all over the internet, sharing details about the books they most love, and the incredible authors behind them.
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I'll refer you now to Gretchen McNeil. She'll be sharing her own review and the link for another blog and review, and so on, in our round-robin way of connecting one to the next and (eventually) back again.
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For Elana's all-inclusive list of bloggers and the links to their awesome, visit her page of recommended reads.
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So Joanna Trollope, she's one of my favorites. And this is my way of helping her books find someone new.