Cha-Ching!

The only thing I like about crafts fairs is attending them, because the first and last one I displayed at over 25 years ago left me deeply scarred, rejection gashed into my self esteem.  All day long people walked right past my display of original oil paintings, a gem of a display, within the jungle of bobbles tuned out in neighboring booths.  The cha-ching of sales rung up by hawkers of pot holders and beach glass earrings –only empty sighs registered from my booth

When I was invited to sell my books at a large and well know crafts fair this weekend my immediate reaction was No Way, will I ever again subject myself to such humiliations. Besides, serious things like books aren’t what people are looking for among the knitted hats, jars of pickled garlic, turned bowls, hammered copper salmon, and goat soap.  I accepted the invitation because it came from a good friend and great humanitarian who originated and still manages this fair 25 years later.  

I packed along 15 books thinking I might be lucky to sell two.  I sold out long before the fair closed for the day and went home buoyed by this little success and the connections made with the people who bought my book.

Later, in my office littered with a new mess of checks and cash, I found my email contained greater richness.  The subject was Oh… from a Susan Gilman.

Ms. Wakefield,

You owe me two night's sleep.

Why? Because I received your glorious book on Thursday and I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN.  I LOVED it.  I stayed up until 2 a.m. this morning finishing it, and then I actually dreamed about it, too.  It's a TERRIFIC read, and please know that I don't say that lightly.

I have praises to heap and questions to ask.  That said, since I live my life in front of a damn computer writing all day, I prefer real human voices to email correspondence. And so, be forewarned. I may try to call you this weekend, the 9-hour time difference between us notwithstanding.

If I can't reach you, you'll get the bombardment electronically. But know that your book -- and your story -- are remarkable.

Thank you for including my own work in yours.

With effusiveness & admiration,
Susan Jane Gilman

What?   You do not know about Susan Jane Gilman, this smack in-your-face-wit of a crafty writer?  Blog on…

First Christmas in Kuwait

After a lot of stumbling blindly about and choppy surfing, I discovered several blogs on women expatriates.  One in particular runs regular first person accounts on living abroad.

Expatwomen, accepted an excerpt from Suitcase Filled with Nails.  I simply cut out a relevant chunk from the book, titled it My First Christmas in Kuwait, and within 24 hours the excerpt was approved and posted on this blog below…….

http://www.expatwomen.com/expat-women-your-stories.php

The Rape of Kuwait

This is Ripe!

On page 8 of Suitcase Filled with Nails, I mention the only book I could find on Kuwait, prior to moving there was The Rape of Kuwait, written by Jean Sasson.  It was written and published in 1990 just as Iraq invaded Kuwait. During my stint there, I heard rumors that The Rape of Kuwait was commissioned and paid for by the Kuwaiti government as part of a marketing plan to publicize their plight.  Those rumors appear to be substantiated in a few paragraphs of the article below.

Arthur E. Rowse, Progressive; May91, FLACKING FOR THE EMIR Vol. 55

Issue 5, p20, 3p

Another major success racked up by Citizens for a Free Kuwait was The Rape of Kuwait, a quickie 154-page paperback by Jean Sasson about Iraqi atrocities. The publisher, Knightsbridge Publishing Company, a small firm in New York City, hit the stands with a first printing of 1.2 million shortly before the war began, advertising the book heavily on television and in newspapers.

Knightsbridge representatives firmly deny that the book was subsidized, and Mankiewicz says H&K {publicists} "had nothing to do with it." But the Kuwaiti embassy acknowledges that it purchased 20,000 copies of the book to send to American troops, and Citizens for a Free Kuwait somehow obtained enough copies to include it in thousands of information kits prepared by Hill & Knowlton for public distribution.

Though quickie paperbacks rarely receive such treatment, The Rape of Kuwait was featured in serious discussions on morning TV talk shows and received respectful reviews in such outlets as The Wall Street Journal. As a result, the book soon made its way onto best-seller lists and into a second printing.

The tattered copy I checked out of the local library in 2003, to prep me for my trip to Kuwait, was riddled with typos.  Maybe this was the first printing, dashed out on command. Doesn’t this take self-publishing to a new level?  

This is the picture Lois took of me at her Gallery, Wynwoods.  I am showing off her marvelous crystal bead necklace

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Wynnwoods Gallery Book Signing

Lois Venarchick owner of Wynnwoods Gallery took this photo

Book Signings/Readings

Started the weekend signing books at Wynwoods Gallery.  Friends, some long lost, stopped by my little table in front of the shop.  The next day, I read and signed copies at Max Grover Gallery.  It was my first public reading and I appropriately started with the church scene. Even though no one in the audience was even a lapsed Catholic, they all knew where the church I wrote about stands.

Cat Got My Tongue

I gave a live radio interview this afternoon on Suitcase Filled with Nails.  Like many interviews of past, on my Kuwait experience, I found myself on the defense and with my tongue caught by some mental cat clawing at my ability to speak concisely and intelligently.

During this interview, like many involving Kuwait, I am asked questions about a culture, politics and religion in which I lived, tried to abide by and out of respect, respect.  Normally, I never speak with suave, detached intelligence, because I am not a diplomat or a politician.   I’m really kind of an off-the-cuff, over-the-shoulder, thin-skinned, blabber mouth.  So, lobbying words put into my mouth during a blind interview only makes that cat curl tighter around my tongue.

I’ve either got to put a leash on my tongue or unleash the cat.