The Lasting Perks of Being a Foreign Exchange Student – 39 Years Later

Next year, it will be 40 years since I first laid eyes on foreign soil. I left my hometown in May of 1974 to make the long flight to Cali, Colombia to be a foreign exchange student. I was only there about four months, but the experience changed me – I think for the better – and taught me lessons I would never have learned at home.

Even after all this time, I find myself thinking of Cali often. I have lost contact with the friends I made there, and even the family I lived with. Yet, those people helped to shape my personality and my world view. It was such an overwhelmingly positive experience. Sure, there were a few tense moments and a very few people that weren’t especially nice to me, but all in all, it was a journey I will never regret.

One thing I quickly learned is that people from the home country quickly become friends when they find themselves on their own in a strange place. Of course, going to Spanish classes at the Centro Colombo Americano together gave us an opportunity to get to know each other in the first place. After that, we spent many pleasant hours together, exploring the city, going to parties, or simply chatting about our lives in America.

Remembering this, I have been looking up hometown friends in the past month. Before I became an author, I used Facebook very little. My blog tour manager encouraged me to get involved in social media so I could familiarize readers with my book. The transition has made me more outgoing – both on the Internet and off. I once was afraid to contact old friends from the past, thinking that I left in too big a hurry and didn’t even get to say goodbye to many of them. But, with the help of Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads, I have been able to reconnect with my hometown, just as I reconnected with my home country while in Cali.

It’s funny, but when I was that frightened and naïve young girl that got off the plane in a foreign land, I imagined that people in this strange country would be quite different from me. After the first night, I had already realized that people are people wherever you go. They may speak a different language and have different customs, but they have problems to overcome, family members to deal with, challenges to meet, things to laugh about, and most of all, human emotions just like people at home.

The biggest thing the trip taught me was courage. I learned not to be afraid of people because they seem different. I tasted new foods I had never heard of and even got a taste of Aguardiente, an anise-flavored liquor made in Colombia. My mother would have been appalled if she had known, but probably not surprised. The experience taught me how to meet new people and enjoy doing it. And I finally understood the importance of being positive in difficult situations.

Beyond the educational value of the trip, there have been many perks in the years since. For one thing, I have many photos of myself as a teenager that I wouldn’t have had if I had stayed home. This was before phones had cameras and back when the only way to see your picture was to have film developed, which would have been costly had Strade Studios not provided that service for me.

Most of all, I made memories that I would not have made at home. I have never exactly used those memories when writing fiction, but the emotions I felt during those times often come out in the stories I write. And, if I ever choose to write a story that takes place outside the U.S., I will have a better understanding of what to look for when I do my research.

Plus, don’t forget that I get to be someone who has done something unusual that few people get the opportunity to do. It is a great conversation starter with people who are unfamiliar with the country or with exchange programs. It helps this shy small town girl feel a part of the larger world, just as music did for my character Cheryl from “Loving the Missing Link.”

I can’t thank the Hamilton Rotary Club enough for sponsoring me on the trip, providing a scholarship to help pay my way. I am also indebted to Mr. Blakely, my high school Spanish teacher, who taught me so much that I could communicate adequately with my Colombian host parents and the other people I met there. My parents were the final piece of the puzzle. My mother has said often that she was afraid for me, so it was a great sacrifice for her to allow me to go. And my father was so happy when I asked to go that what started out as a pipe dream for me became a reality that altered my existence forever.

Check out Loving the Missing Link at Amazon http://ow.ly/oxCUt

Why Author Giveaways Are Great for Writers and Readers Alike

I am so happy! I have won five books this month from author giveaways. The good news is that I’ve got lots of great reading ahead. And I will do a review for each one on this blog and on other sites as well, along with a review of A Luminous Future by Teodor Flonta (which I didn’t win). Watch to find out what I say about each one, and if you would like me to do a review of your book, post a comment here or on one of the review posts. I will be honest, but know that I am a generally positive person and I only offer constructive criticism if any.

At first, giving away my book for free seemed counterproductive. Then, I remembered why I wrote it. I had an important and interesting story to tell, and I wanted others to read it. It is exciting when my friends and family read the book. So far, they have all been very enthusiastic about it. And let me tell you, this is not an enthusiastic bunch on most days.

It is fun to hear them telling me the story as if I don’t know what’s in it. They tell me what they thought and felt when they were reading the book, and they seem quite fascinated and moved. Just what I wanted! It builds my confidence more than ever.

I have also done other giveaways as well. All but one person has reviewed it. The ones who posted on Amazon gave me five stars, seemed very happy to have read it and excited to tell other people about it. That’s not just good publicity, but it is also good will. Now, they are looking forward to my next book. I can’t wait to finish it and make it available for them to read.

I got two reviews on GoodReads as well. Both readers only gave me three out of five stars. But, face it: GoodReads members tend to be tough. Most of them have read many, many books, and are sometimes comparing my books to the greats of literature. Well, this is my first book, after all, and I don’t expect to measure up to those standards.

Even though the two GoodReads author giveaway winners didn’t give me five stars, they were very positive in their reviews. In addition, they pointed out a few things that they would have liked to see more of in the book. Their advice was very helpful for the most part. And in the end, both of them recommended my book.

If you are a first time author, I would suggest that you do author giveaways too. You don’t have to give a signed print copy, either. All of the books I won were either PDF files or Kindle downloads. So, it doesn’t have to be any great cost for you, if any at all.

Giving away your book to just a few readers is a great way to connect with your audience and get people reading and talking about your book. I give author giveaways five stars, and I would recommend them to authors and readers alike!

I am doing several giveaways in September as a part of my blog tour. I will add a post with all my blog dates and URL’s so you can enter if you wish. Each winner will get a signed copy of my first novel, Loving the Missing Link.

In the meantime, check out this great giveaway by another author. She is giving away several Kindle Fire ereaders. That’s right, I said Kindle Fire! What a great way to thank readers and expose her work to people on social media. Here’s the Link: http://bit.ly/17aF9ji

Best of Luck on all your giveaways, both the ones you enter and the ones you sponsor.

And, as always, happy reading to all of you!

Oh, Those Moody, Moody Writers!

Authors have a reputation for being moody. In fact, all artists are seen as very emotional humans. Certainly, writers – at least writers of fiction – need to be in touch with their emotions to create real, believable characters.

What is sad is when authors allow their emotions to overcome their productivity. It is one thing to be emotional, and quite another when they are so far gone they can’t write.

I have just recovered from a bout of depression. Many writers face the same thing. For one thing, many writers are not social creatures by nature. This makes it hard for these writers to be around the very people who would love them, support them and make them smile.

Of course, there are great numbers of writers who never face this problem. Unfortunately, I am not one of them.

I want to be productive as much as possible, so I will share with you my techniques for breaking the depression and getting back to writing.

Stick With Positive People

No matter how difficult it may seem when I am in the throes of melancholy, I make the effort to spend time with friends and family who are positive and supportive. If not all of the time, at least as much as I can. It seems obvious that negative people will bring me down further into sadness. Yet, when it is going on, sometimes, I just want to wallow in it. There it is. I admit it. But, I make an intellectual choice to ignore this desire and do the things that will help me get back to my computer to write.

Fake It

In Loving the Missing Link, there is a strong character who tells my protagonist, “Laugh.”
Cheryl says, “I can’t laugh. That’s ridiculous. Laughing happens when it happens, you can’t force it.”
I’m here to tell you that you certainly can laugh, smile, and talk and think about positive things even when you are feeling down. If you are feeling this way, try it. Have you ever gone to a party you didn’t want to go to because you were too upset? This is what happens to me sometimes: To be polite, I join in the conversations and try not to bring anybody down. I laugh when someone tells a joke I know is funny and I smile graciously to let people know I appreciate being included. As the party goes on, I begin to start enjoying myself. It seems like an absolute miracle!

Think About the Good Things in My Life

This time it was easier. I knew I had done a great job on my first book, and was getting a lot of encouraging feedback about it. A journalist from my hometown paper had done me the honor of requesting a copy of my book, my bio, and my picture for a feature in their local paper. Positive things were happening, and, although my mood was low, I couldn’t help recognizing that things were really going well, even if I didn’t feel that way. I have to be patient, because sometimes it takes awhile before I start feeling the change, but slowly, it did happen.

When All Else Fails, Seek Help

Many people, writers included, feel that taking an antidepressant or visiting a counselor will stifle their creativity. But let me ask you one thing: If you are so depressed that you can’t get out of bed, are you going to be creative? Productive? Probably not. So, I do what I have to do until we break the back of the depression. This time, it only took three weeks. I think it was mainly because I saw my productivity and the quality of my work slipping away, and I went to my doctor as quickly as possible. That was what finally banished my depression completely. If I had it to do over, I would do it in a heartbeat.

For me, it is much too easy to tell myself it’s OK to be moody. There have been so many great artists who have struggled with this problem. And I do believe most of them fought the good fight as well as they could. After all, if they had been too deeply depressed to produce, they would have been devastated. And most writers I know can’t abide not writing for long.

So, if your emotions have gotten the better of you, make a plan. Then, have the discipline to carry it out. You can do it. I know you can.

I Finally Found My Genre!

Not being up on all the latest publishing trends, I struggled to categorize my novel, Loving the Missing Link. I did want to put it into a category so people would have some idea of what they were getting. Yet, it seemed to be its own unique entity – I had never read a book quite like it. When I wrote it, I wasn’t thinking about these things. I was only writing what was in my mind and in my heart. Here’s why it didn’t seem to fit into the old categories.

Young Adult (YA)

It dealt with issues that young adults are not ready to tackle. Like leaving home, exploring sexuality, struggling with career choices, making your own home. By putting the label of YA on it, I would be telling the world that children could read it. Certainly, some midgrade and teens would be able to get it, but I think the parents would need to be involved to make that call. It is not an obscene book, but it does imply sex and sometimes puts a positive spin on things parents might want to talk to their child about – like teen marriage and infidelity. So, YA didn’t seem quite right.

Coming of Age

It is a coming of age story, but it is about the coming of age that happens not only in your teens, but also in your 20’s. It is sort of a crossbreed. By saying it’s a coming of age novel, I would imply that it is about the teen years. Cheryl, my protagonist goes through a coming of age gone wrong in her teen years. It is only in her 20’s that she finds herself, as well as exploring all those grownup issues. I listed it as coming of age on Amazon simply because I didn’t see a category that fit better. Yet, that wasn’t quite right either.

Literary

I was told by a writer who has been published multiple times by traditional publishers that it should be in the literary genre. However, I felt that my story was too simple for that. I have taken as many college classes as I could squeeze into my life – figuring out to be about midway through the Junior year of college. But I don’t want to give readers the wrong idea. I don’t want to claim to be a master of fiction, but that is what I think the literary genre implies. I am still learning, and have a lot more to learn. I think my story is a good one, and every reader who has reviewed it or contacted me has recommended it to others. I would love to think it is high art, but I feel presumptuous making that claim.

Finally Found It!

Just this month, I discovered the New Adult category. It is not listed on CreateSpace as a category yet, so I couldn’t label it as such there. But, the gist of it is that a New Adult book is supposed to cover issues like…leaving home, exploring sexuality and making career choices. Sound familiar? It did to me too.

Many people have maligned this new category. Some see it as a marketing scheme, but don’t all writers need to market their books? Anyway, I didn’t write it with marketing in mind. I just realized after it was written that it needed to be set apart in some way so readers would immediately say, “Oh, that’s what it is!” I understand that not everyone is familiar with the new genre of New Adult. After all, I just found out about it this month myself. But as the genre gains momentum, my book will already be on the shelves, one of the trailblazers that helped define the genre.

If you don’t know much about the New Adult category, just do a Google search. There is lots of information about it. Some of it is negative and other articles and blogs are positive about it. I encourage you to learn about both sides of the issue.

And read my previous blog post called “Coming of Age – What Is It, Really?” You’ll know why it makes sense to me to call Loving the Missing Link a New Adult novel.

Coming of Age – What Is It, Really?

My only somewhat negative review so far mentions the fact that Loving the Missing Link comes across as a coming of age story but that the protagonist is the wrong age for this type of story. This begs the question: What is coming of age, really?

Most people think of a coming of age story as one that moves the protagonist from childhood to adulthood. Within the short time usually covered in such stories, the main character goes from innocence to experience, from idealism to realism, and from immaturity to maturity. I think this is a narrow view. Unless you become an adult in one swift move and never mature any more, there is more to coming of age than this brief period. If we keep changing over the courses of our lives, we continue to come of age over and over again.

What is more, in modern American society, many young people do not get their first glimpse at adulthood until they are well into their twenties or even thirties. There are several advantages for both young people and their parents when all live in a multi-generational home. The family members can help each other through the hard times and develop closer bonds. Yet, it is all too easy in this situation to delay growing up and taking responsibility for yourself. It is often difficult to explore your own personality while surrounded by the people who you have known all your life. It works for some people, but honestly, I think they are in the minority.

And I do not believe that broadening the definition pollutes the concept of coming of age. It merely amplifies it and makes it more relevant to all of us. When you read my story, you needn’t think, “Well that’s all in my past.” Instead, think about where you are now on your road to maturity and where it will take you next.

So, when you read Loving the Missing Link, do not consider whether it fits neatly into a certain literary mold. Instead, think about what is happening in the story and why it takes the protagonist so long to find herself. If you do, you will find a more realistic vision of coming of age in America.

Excerpt from Loving the Missing Link – Cheryl Begins Her Story

Loving the Missing Link is now available on Amazon, both as a print book and a Kindle edition. You can read more on the “Look Inside” feature, but here is a little taste of what I have in store for you:

“I never intended to be a bassoon player in the first place. I just wanted to be in the band. I’d heard the kids talking about their trips-like staying at the Ramada Inn for band contests. Orgies in someone’s hotel room. Not that I knew exactly what they meant by that, but I vaguely connected it with sophistication. I imagined it was what kids from New York did on a regular basis-the real New York, that is. Not the New York I grew up in, a hick town in Missouri.

It had always been my private fantasy that some guy from New York City brought his poor relation out to Missouri so he wouldn’t clutter up his swanky uptown apartment. Dumped him in the middle of nowhere like people dump a mutt that won’t be housetrained. Given him his own little town.

Of course, the poor relation had to go and name the town New York. And his cousin-third cousin twice removed-never spoke to him again.
Well, that’s the explanation I came up with for why our town was named New York. And for why nothing ever happened there.

But the band offered a link to the outside…”

Check me out on Amazon.

Cheryl’s Friends and Mine

Friendship is a funny thing. When I wrote the first two chapters of Loving the Missing Link, back in 1985, I could never have created the characters of Sid and Fredericks. As Cheryl’s dearest friends (Cheryl is my protagonist), these two people provide love, support and a certain amount of guidance. They are the epitome of mature friends. And now, after all these years, I understand how valuable friends like that are.

When I was younger, I didn’t have any friends like Sid or Fredericks. I had fun friends to go out with, which was great at the time. I had sort-of friends I worked or went to school with. Actually, they weren’t real friends at all. We had some sort of relationship, but it was not as close as real friends.

My best and most beloved friend was and is my husband. But spouses don’t work well as only friends. Because you don’t want to make them feel bad about things they can’t change, you can’t ask them to listen to your anguish. Because they know you so well, there are fewer new things to talk about. Husbands as friends can be kind or helpful, but what they can never be is objective.

By the time you reach my age (not that I’m ancient or anything), the value of a reliable, intelligent and reasonable friend becomes increasingly evident. Luckily, Cheryl didn’t have to wait until her 50’s to find friends who had her best interests at heart.

I have been considering abandoning my current project for the time being to write a sequel to Loving the Missing Link. My readers want more out of Cheryl, and I did enjoy writing that book. If I do write it, Sid and Fredericks will play a large part. Considering what I have planned for her, she will need them more than ever.

Why I’m Not Celie J. Halsewell

As I neared the beginning of publishing Loving the Missing Link, I began to think about my name. Julia Thomas. Boring, ordinary, unmemorable. I thought it would be as bad as publishing under the name of Jane Doe. Somehow, I wanted people to know that I was a real, live, individual person. So, I thought about publishing under a pen name.

To devise my pen name, I took the first and middle initials of all my grandchildren and began to manipulate the letters to create a sort of anagram. Somewhere during the process, I looked up my maiden name and found that Halsewell was a related name. It made sense because it had a similar sound. Asel, Halsewell. Sounded good to me. Plus, it fit into the theme of using my grandchildren’s initials.

I began to love the name Celie J. Halsewell. I imagined that I was an intriguing person with loads of personality. I thought that no one would ever mix up Celie’s work with that of anyone else. It all seemed so ideal.

Then, I began to think about marketing. Throughout the marketing process, I would have to pose as Celie J. Halsewell for interviews, blog posts and comments, and any other person-to-person interaction. Heaven forbid that my book would become so popular that I would have to make personal, face-to-face appearances. Suddenly, I saw my proposed pen name as a commitment to lie. Sorry, but that’s just not me.

I settled for adding my unusual maiden name in between my ordinary first name and my boring last name. I did drop an “s” from my maiden name, but that was a practical consideration designed to prevent unfortunate mispronunciations. It all seemed like a good compromise, and I loved the idea of being me rather than trying to be someone else.

So, look for my work under the name of Julia Asel Thomas. It’s a good name, it’s a solid name, and it’s the name I can honestly call my own.

Multitasking – Is It Great for Everybody?

I’ve been hearing about multitasking for many years now. The interest in the term started around the time computers came into our lives and workplaces. The general consensus was that, not only was more efficient to multitask, but it was also really cool to be able to do several things at the same time.

It turns out that there are some problems with multitasking. The constant shifting from one point of attention to another seems to lead to more mistakes than concentrating fully on each task individually. At least, it does for people who are not gifted at it.

At the same time, the younger you are, the better you are likely to be at multitasking. Take my grandson, for example. Since he’s been staying with us, we have noticed that he cannot seem to accomplish anything one task at a time. He plays videos, watches Youtube, and works on his homework all at the same time. We might complain if he didn’t maintain his 4.0 GPA. As it is, how can we say anything? It seems to work for him.

As for me, the closest thing to multitasking in my life as a teenager was listening to music while I did my homework. I loved to do it, but even that was difficult for me and I had to focus and concentrate on the work so much I barely heard the music. Usually, I ended up turning it off before long so I could get my homework done faster and start grooving with my tunes.

Even as I’m writing this, the house is quiet and the only sounds I hear are the tap-tap-tapping of my fingers on the keyboard and a slight whishing from a table fan. I want to be a kid or at least one of those special adults my age who have taken to this trend of multitasking. I want to, but I cannot be what I am not.

So I say: Hooray for those of you who can do it! In the meantime, I will be writing my blog posts, novels and anything else I write in the quietest environment I can find. Thank goodness my chosen profession gives me that option.

So, is multi-tasking great for everybody? I think I can say with certainty that there is at least one 50-something woman out here who is better off doing one thing at a time. Oh well, you can’t be great at everything!

A Dream to Ponder

A Dream to Ponder

The other night, I had the most amazing dream. Perhaps significantly or perhaps not, it came to me on the night Loving the Missing Link, my first book, went live on Amazon. I don’t want to break its beautiful spell by tearing it apart. But I would be interested in what you think it might mean.
The Dream:

I am sitting, cross-legged on the most beautiful hardwood floor I have ever seen. It is made of a rich, golden oak and polished to a brilliant shine. The floor stretches out in all directions so far that I can’t see the end of it.

But, I am not so much sitting on the floor as I am hovering about a inch or two above it. I am looking at the beauty of the floor and enjoying the gentle sounds of music playing from somewhere far away. I am at perfect peace.

Suddenly, my vision begins to fade, and then I become blind. My hearing begins to fail, and I become deaf. My arms and legs begin to go numb, and then I can’t feel anything. Yet, I am not afraid.

The only thing left to my awareness is what is going on in my mind. In the dream, I am asking myself, “Am I dead? Is this what death feels like?” And yet, I am still not afraid or panicked. I feel wonderful.

So, that’s the end of the dream.

I told my son about the dream, and he had an answer for me. He said, “Mom, you weren’t dead.”

I asked, “How do you know?”

He said, “You thought, therefore you were.”

Well, I guess that’s as good an answer to that question as any, but I still don’t know what that dream meant or where it came from. I only know that I woke up feeling happy. Isn’t that odd?

So, if you have any insight into the meaning of this incredible dream, share it with me. I don’t want to dissect it myself, but I am interested in your impressions about it. Give it your best shot. I’ll be anxiously awaiting any input you might have. So, comment away. Your opinions matter to me and as always, they matter to the world.