Emigrant Online Posts Review of Lizzy Shannon's A Celtic Yearbook

Orgeon author pens a year’s worth of Irish traditions

Lizzy Shannon.

Oregon resident Lizzy Shannon is celebrating her Irish heritage in style by releasing A Celtic Yearbook, a guide for everything Irish divided into thirteen chapters corresponding to the thirteen Druidic months.

Shannon’s varied works span live stage plays, science fiction novels, short stories and a children's Japanese picture book to name but a few genres. Within the pages of A Celtic Yearbook, readers can enjoy her unique take on Irish festivals, folklore, recipes, superstitions, traditional remedies and much more.

Born in Belfast but now celebrating her ninth year as a US citizen, in Northern Ireland she learned mostly British history in her early studies and did not initially realize the rich Irish heritage from which she had come.

“It wasn’t until I emigrated to the United States that I found out people loved Ireland,” she told the Sherwood Gazette recently. “I said, ‘why can’t you be Irish and British’? And I am.”

Her own family research has revealed many things; one eureka moment being the discovery that her father’s uncle was a man named Ernest Blythe, a member of the Irish Republican Army who worked closely with Eamon de Valera.

Other parts of her heritage which have made it into the book are diary entries from her late mother, Maureen, including a passage detailing how to properly clean a house, Irish style. There are also home-made how-to-dos, covering pomanders to potato bread to soap-making. On top of all that, the new title contains plenty of folklore tales which have enthralled Shannon down the years, including stories about fairies, leprechauns and the dreaded banshees.

A Celtic Yearbook is released on November 10 and can be purchased on Amazon.com for under $10. For more information visit LizzyShannon.com.

Ladder Memory, by Mark Ellis, Published

Ladder Memory: Stories from the Painting Trade

by Mark Ellis

(Mark was a student of mine, and it was my pleasure to read the stories collected here).

In Ladder Memory, Stories from the Painting Trade, freelance journalist and writer Mark Ellis recalls his 30 year journey from apprentice painter to successful painting contractor. A memoir that will resonate for painters, those in the paint retail marketplace, trade contractors and for anyone who has ever hired a painter or picked up a brush.


In “Mrs. Peltzer’s Husband” a floor epoxy job becomes a look into the life of a woman suffering from emotional abuse. “The Stairwell” takes readers through the hellish painting of a seven-story industrial stairwell with a certifiably motley crew. “Plants I Have Known” humorously catalogues the obstacles to a good paint job created by bushes and trees. “Sam Drucker and the Frogs” recounts the story of a celebrity client and a controversial neighborhood frog abatement project. A useful appendix offers proven painting tips.


These stories scrape the knuckles and get under the fingernails. Ellis brings authenticity and discovery to his exploration of the experiences of a housepainter, and the entrapments, frailties, and indomitable spirits of those living and working in the structures he paints.


This title is also available through Amazon.com at http://www.amazon.com/dp/159299668X?tag=inkwaterpre07-20.

Authors Road Interview Features Tom Robbins

Friends and Fellow Authors Road Passengers,

We are very pleased and proud to present our latest video and audio interview with one of our favorite writers, Tom Robbins. At 36 minutes it is longer than our usual 20 minute goal, but we just couldn't help ourselves.

Since early childhood Robbins has been in love with writing, and he has devoted his life to this art with his publication of some of the most well-known, well-loved books of all time. It’s no surprise that he was named as one of the 100 Best Writers of the 20th Century by Writer’s Digest Magazine. We found him to be an intensely intelligent and generous man – and the funny, charming, slightly off-kilter writer we know from his books.

We hope you enjoy watching or listening to this interview as much as we did making it.

George & Salli
The Authors Road

Todd Williams Rescue the Problem Project

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Todd Williams speaks about his book, Rescue the Problem Project. Todd speaks at business conferences around the US about how companies can rescue a failing project.

I shot this video at the new Willamette Writers house in West Linn, Oregon.

Meditation Anecdotes

by Bill Johnson

(I practice yoga meditation as taught by Paramahansa Yogananda. The following are short pieces I've written about the meditation group I've attended).


A Meditation on Pine Sol

Paramahansa Yogananda relates the story of the businessman in India who had to travel to England to attend to business interests. He approached a great yogi to ask for a technique that would allow him to travel to England by a yogic method and avoid paying the cost to travel by boat. The great yogi taught the worldly businessman a technique that he could use to transport himself to England and back, but mentioned as the businessman was leaving that he should not think about monkeys while he practiced the technique.

All the man could meditate on was monkeys. Dozens of monkeys. Thousands of monkeys. Monkeys were all he could think about.

When our meditation group moved into its chapel on 32nd and NE Broadway, the group rented its space from a Foos Ball company on the first floor of the building. A devotee cleaning the chapel on the day of the first service thought that if a little Pine Sol cleaned things well, a lot of Pine Sol would do an even better job.

That first service reeked of Pine Sol. Anyone who didn't wear a Hazmat suit to the meditation service surely found themselves thinking about Pine Sol.

The devotee who learned something about Pine Sol that night could think of nothing else. Not even a monkey could have made it through his inner mental chambers, unless the monkey was carrying a mop soaked in Pine Sol.


The Most Catholic Receptionist

When our meditation group moved in to our new chapel on 32nd and Broadway, the street front of the building was a company that sold Foos Ball equipment and a small space directly under our chapel was a doctor's office. The doctor's receptionist was an 80 year old lady.

Because the circuit breakers for the building were at the foot of the stairwell, if a circuit breaker was tripped, she needed access to the panel, so she would speak with the usher a few times a month. It came out that this lady very much enjoyed looking up the stairwell at Master's picture.

It came out that she'd been raised as a traditional catholic, which meant that if she ever did have a question about religion, a priest had the answer, and that was that. No meditation, no reflection.

She insisted she'd never had a spiritual experience in her life, but it came out that was being woken at night by a strange sound, which the usher informed her was probably an astral sound. He told her about the energy body and the astral currents in the spine. She was skeptical, but a few nights later she woke up and experienced her energy body instead of her physical body.

A few days after that, on the way to work and listening to her car radio, the music faded into the background and she heard a symphony of astral sounds.

Which she didn't like at all, and prayed that it be taken away.

The usher realized that, as Paramahansa Yogananda has said, only a master can really tell why someone is on a particular path in this life and what kind of spiritual awareness someone has. In the case of our most catholic receptionist, in this life looking up the stairwell at Master's picture with adoring eyes was enough of the spiritual life for her.

Is It Smart To Make Yourself The Main Character in Your Fiction Novel?

When you are beginning to write your fiction novel, character development is key. As many authors know, lines often become blurry, and main characters can easily resemble yourself. However, how far should you take it, and is it effective to have yourself as the main character in your fiction novel?

This many times can stem from unresolved issues that you would like to express within your fictional story. This can be a good and a bad thing. If you have had a very emotional experience in your life, then you can use yourself as your fictional main character to give an outside point of view to specific events that have occurred. Many people would call a story about character based on themselves a memoir, but what if you wanted to put that main character within fictional events that weren't true to your life? That is the beauty of being a writer because you have the opportunity to blur truth with reality, and you can use yourself as your main character within the story that you are creating.

Many people may feel that it is more effective to make themselves the main character in their fiction novel because it gives them a better voice and tone to their writing. Again, since it is a fiction novel, many of the events will be fabricated within the storyline, but you will still be using yourself as the main character to tell the story. This can often give you the opportunity to express something in your life that you did not get the chance to express before. Now you are in control, and you can write your story however you would like with yourself as the main character.

This does have a good and a bad side because many people may do this with suppressed motives of anger or sadness regarding true events that have happened to them. They may want to write themselves as the main character to be able to rewrite the past and work through some of their issues.

Regardless, your choice in using yourself as the main character is up to you if you are still staying true to the theme of your novel. For some people, this may be an interesting avenue to provide first-hand insight of events that will make the story one-of-a-kind.

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Chuggin McCoffee is a coffee fanatic that has spent the entirety of his career cultivating and studying all of the best uses and brewing styles for optimal coffee and espresso flavor. His specialty site for all coffee needs, supplies, and Automatic Drip Coffee Makers can be found at The Coffee Bump.com.

Hats for Sale, by Nancy Hill

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Hats for Sale is a video written and created by Nancy Hill, a photographer and writer who lives in Portland, Oregon. The video can be viewed at http://storyispromise.blip.tv/

Nancy is the photographer and writer of the The Dolltender, also available for viewing on Blip.tv.

To view more of Nancy's work, visit http://www.nancyhillphotography.com/default4.asp

Hats for Sale is a retelling of Slobodkina's Caps for Sale.