February/March: Book Club Announcement and Giveaway

Today, I would like to announce our Feb/March book and give everyone an opportunity to win a copy of it. Our next book is called The Things That Keep Us Here by Carla Buckley. It is in bookstores starting today. This book has received alot of advanced praise and we are delighted to have Carla join us on the blog next month to discuss it. So, grab a copy of this book and start reading! MARK YOUR CALENDARS! We will be discussing The Things That Keep Us Here with the author on March 17th.

To enter the giveaway:
1) You must be a subscriber, fan, or follower of Author Exposure

2) Leave your email in case you win

NOTE: Please, only enter the giveaway if you are interested in participating in our discussion on March 17th.

**This giveaway ends Thursday (2/11) at midnight**

Back Cover Blurb:
A year ago, Ann and Peter Brooks were just another unhappily married couple trying—and failing—to keep their relationship together while they raised two young daughters. Now the world around them is about to be shaken again, when Peter, a university researcher, comes to a startling realization: a virulent pandemic has made the terrible leap across the ocean to America's heartland.

And it is killing fifty out of every hundred people it touches.

As her town goes into lockdown, Peter is forced to return home—with his beautiful graduate assistant. But their safe suburban world is no longer the refuge it once was. Food grows scarce. Neighbor turns against neighbor in grocery stores and at gas pumps. And then a winter storm strikes, and they are left huddling in the dark.

Trapped inside the house she once called home, Ann Brooks must make life-or-death decisions in an environment where opening a door to a neighbor could threaten all the things she holds dear.

Carla Buckley's poignant debut raises important questions to which there are no easy answers, in an emotionally riveting tale of one family facing unimaginable horror.

For more information, please visit the author's website.
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REMINDER:
I hope everyone is enjoying our Jan/Feb book club selection, The Murderer's Daughters. I sure am! Remember, Randy Susan Meyers will be joining us on the blog for a LIVE book club discussion on February 18th at 9 AM (EST). If you haven't done so already, please mark your calendars! We are looking forward to discussing this excellent book with her.

Short Story Buzz: "Forgetting English" by Midge Raymond

Short stories received numerous awards and accolades in 2009. It seems everyone was reading them, except me. I prefer novels over short stories mainly because novels tend to have greater character development and, overall, more satisfying resolutions. However, when Eastern Washington University Press contacted me to review an award-winning short story collection, I thought it would be a great opportunity to see for myself what the buzz over short stories was all about.

Forgetting English by Midge Raymond is a collection of eight, unrelated short stories united by a common theme—self-discovery. Each main character is a woman, at a crossroad in her life, who has chosen to leave home. The stories focus on the motives behind why these ordinary Americans decide to travel to foreign lands (including Tonga, Japan, and Antarctica) and the consequential changes that occur due to their extra-ordinary environment. Why is it, that once outside our comfort zones, we are able to make discoveries about ourselves?

Forgetting English is an entertaining collection of remarkably insightful stories. It was unlike any other volume I’ve read before. The characters were well-developed and memorable. The endings were both satisfying and thought-provoking. After finishing this short story collection, I wanted to read more like it. I would recommend this book to all readers—even those who say they don’t like short stories.

An excerpt from my favorite story, The Ecstatic Cry, was read by the author on Writers Out Loud: Literature for the Ear. To listen, click here.

Sunday Synopsis: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same land as her slave ancestors, yet her cells—taken without her knowledge—became one of the most important tools in medicine. The first “immortal” human cells grown in culture, they are still alive today, though she has been dead for more than sixty years. If you could pile all HeLa cells ever grown onto a scale, they’d weigh more than 50 million metric tons—as much as a hundred Empire State Buildings. HeLa cells were vital for developing the polio vaccine; uncovered secrets of cancer, viruses, and the effects of the atom bomb; helped lead to important advances like in vitro fertilization, cloning, and gene mapping; and have been bought and sold by the billions.

Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked grave.

Now Rebecca Skloot takes us on an extraordinary journey, from the “colored” ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells; from Henrietta’s small, dying hometown of Clover, Virginia—a land of wooden slave quarters, faith healings, and voodoo—to East Baltimore today, where her children and grandchildren live, and struggle with the legacy of her cells.

Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality” until more than twenty years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in research without informed consent. And though the cells had launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family—past and present—is inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we are made of. Over the decade it took to uncover this story, Rebecca became enmeshed in the lives of the Lacks family—especially Henrietta’s daughter Deborah, who was devastated to learn about her mother’s cells. She was consumed with questions: Had scientists cloned her mother? Did it hurt her when researchers infected her cells with viruses and shot them into space? What happened to her sister, Elsie, who died in a mental institution at the age of fifteen? And if her mother was so important to medicine, why couldn’t her children afford health insurance?

Check out this article in Popular Science magazine "Five Reasons Henrietta Lacks is the Most Important Woman in Medical History"

Belong to a book club? 

There's plenty to talk about with this book! Morality is never clean cut. It's complicated. 

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"Sunday Synopsis" is a new feature for 2010. Every Sunday, we will post the synopsis of an upcoming book that we think deserves your attention. Think of it as a mini e-paper. It'll be there in the morning when you wake up for your coffee.

A Pink Blog and Alice Walker's Voice in One Place?

Earlier this year, a publicist sent me a message that said, "you have a pink blog?!"  I must admit that I loved the color scheme and never really paid attention to the fact that it was pink. I never paid attention to the default meaning of pink. Pink. Female. Girl. Woman.

February is National Black History Month. You will see themes off and on this blog in celebration of this month. Today, I celebrate this history with my pink blog. This humorous, yet meaningful clip is of Alice Walker reading "Sojourner Truth" from Voices of People's History of the United States, edited by Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove.

Women have come a long way and are much stronger than anyone will ever know.

What stands out to you in these words? Leave a comment below

Beth Hoffman: LIVE Chat and Giveaway

Today we welcome author Beth Hoffman to Author Exposure! She will be available all day (starting at 9 AM) to answer your questions, so please post them in the comment section. Beth is offering a SIGNED copy of her debut novel, Saving CeeCee Honeycutt, to one lucky winner! Have a question or comment for our guest? Chime into the discussion and you will be entered in the drawing. Be sure to include your email address so we can contact you if you win. Good luck and enjoy!

Review: "Saving CeeCee Honeycutt" by Beth Hoffman

Saving CeeCee Honeycutt is a delightful coming-of-age Southern story about a young girl who learns about love and friendship during a summer in Savannah, GA. The novel opens with the title character, CeeCee Honeycutt, living in Ohio with her mentally ill mother and absentee father. Her mother’s psychosis is no secret to the townspeople and, unfortunately, CeeCee bears the brunt of their jokes. Tragedy strikes when her mother is killed in an accident and everything changes for CeeCee. Unable to raise his daughter, CeeCee’s father decides she must move to Georgia and live with her Great-aunt Tallulah (“Tootie”). Once in Savannah, CeeCee meets a group of incredible, eccentric women who help inspire her to believe in herself.

The Savannah ladies in this book are absolute Southern gems! I enjoyed experiencing their world along with CeeCee. The author did a great job bringing both the characters and setting to life. I felt as though I was right there, in Savannah during the 1960s.

I absolutely loved this book. That said, my only criticism has to do with the editing, namely the lack of transitional end marks. At times scenes ran together without much in the way of transition, producing a jarring effect.

This structural issue was a minor distraction and did not undermine my enjoyment of the book. Overall, I would highly recommend Saving CeeCee Honeycutt. It is a wonderful story about hope and what it means to be a survivor.

I received this book from the publisher.

Literary Fiction Novel Commemorates Nigeria's Independence Day and Black History Month

An inspirational albeit heart-wrenching literary fiction novel which chronicles Nigeria’s turbulent history and Independence from British rule has been published in commemoration of Nigeria’s 49th Independence Day Anniversary and Black History Month 2009 and it's still relevant for 2010.

Despite the diversity and dynamism of African literature, there has been a need for a literary novel that would commemorate the love, courage, creativity and entrepreneurial instincts of the African woman while celebrating the hope, culture and tenacity that people of all races have in common. Egg-Larva-Pupa-Woman is that novel. Rather than merely showcasing chaos and leaving its readers wondering what to make of it, this ambitious debut novel, in a style and language that is universally accessible, tells the story of two remarkable personalities who vivaciously defy the odds:

Nkiru: a privileged young girl forced to learn the art of survival after mysterious circumstances befall her family…
Nigeria: Africa’s most populous and controversial country – starting from its pre-infancy days to its present state of flux.


Set in the politically charged colonial and post-independence Nigeria (as well as the vibrant capitals of Uganda, Sierra Leone and Britain), Egg-Larva-Pupa-Woman is a novel that fearlessly chronicles the history of Africa’s most populous and complex country whilst tackling big themes such as ethnic identity, racial discrimination, domestic violence, gender equality, endemic corruption, entrepreneurship and self actualisation, as well as universal themes such as love, mother-daughter relationships, betrayal and forgiveness.

Through a language of passion, poetry and deceptive simplicity, we see sisters and daughters, mothers and wives who metamorphose over time, juxtaposed with a nation’s fight for freedom, fall from grace and pursuit of an elusive destiny.

********************Ogo answers some key questions *******************

How did you come up with the amazing title?
I’ve wanted to write a novel titled Egg-Larva-Pupa-Woman for donkey years, to be honest. I have always been very intrigued by the metamorphosis process butterflies undergo, so my curious observations inspired the title which then slowly, slowly, birthed the story – perhaps subconsciously over a number of years.

What excites you most about your book’s topic? Why did you choose it?
The theme of this story is very exciting to me. Egg-Larva-Pupa-Woman is an inspirational, albeit heart-wrenching tale, of a remarkable young woman who dares to defy the odds (economically, emotionally and socially) in order to become who she is destined to be, juxtaposed with the struggles of her motherland – Nigeria/Africa (also striving to rise above her past and achieve greatness). Do they have what it takes to succeed? Well, you’ll have to read the book to find out. I love stories about strong characters who are hungry to achieve and this book has that in abundance. The ‘survival’ theme is a topical choice because we live in challenging times and people want to be inspired and empowered to achieve their goals no matter the odds.

What do you hope your readers will gain from reading?
I hope my readers will be inspired to defy the odds in their own lives – economically, emotionally and socially. Although the essential theme that cuts through the story is ‘defying all odds’ several topical issues are explored in Egg-Larva-Pupa-Woman: love and loss, mother-daughter relationships, sister-sister conflict, domestic violence, child labor, gender equality, political corruption and entrepreneurship. So I believe that people from all strata of society will find a topic or two that will resonate with them and be inspired to create the change they want to see.