Posts by Susan Crossman
A Writing Dream Come True
…This post was originally published at my corporate communications site, Crossman Communications… I’m celebrating in Technicolor today as I greet the arrival of my novel, “Shades of Teale” on amazon.ca. I began writing the book in the late 1990s to bring my dream of becoming a published author to life and it never occurred to me that writing one book could take such a long time! Granted it wasn’t my full time gig. During the past 13 years I’ve also worked on business writing projects for Crossman Communications, given birth twice, moved numerous times, walked my terminally ill husband to a painful death by cancer and embarked upon a new uncharted life as the widowed mother of three children, two of whom are still in public school. Signing a publishing contract with Manor House Publishing this past summer catapulted me straight onto Cloud Nine! “Shades of Teale” tells the story of one woman’s journey through marriage to enlightenment in a style Manor House Publisher Michael Davie calls a cross between “Bridget Jones’s Diary” and “The Devil Wears Prada.” It takes a bold look at some of the womanly issues that keep some of us up at night and it pokes a little fun at some of the expectations and misconceptions we ourselves stumble over from time to time. And yes, this is a fictional story. If you’re interested in ordering a copy through amazon.ca please do! Copies will also be available through this site within the next few weeks and the e-book will be coming soon! If you’d like to see the book appear on the shelves of your favorite bookstore, please let them know! The novel is published by Manor House Publishing and distributed through University of Toronto Press (UTP) Distribution. The ISBN number is 978-1-897453-16-2 and it retails for $20. If you’d like to help me promote my novel, please get in touch! You Can Help By… Reviewing the novel either on amazon.ca or for use on my website; Suggesting the names of independent bookstores that might be interested in carrying the book; Providing me with opportunities to give readings and book signings for your club, organization or business; Offering speaking engagements where I can talk about the novel, meet your friends, colleagues and fellow group members, and sell and sign copies of my book Following my character, @TealeCovey, on Twitter so she feels connected to the wider world of keen readers. 😉 My official launch takes place from 1 to 3 pm on Saturday, December 17 at A Different Drummer Books, 513 Locust Street, Burlington, Ontario. Please come and join me there as I celebrate the cheerful arrival of “Shades of Teale” to my writing family! Read Excerpts from...
Read MoreWhy I Wrote Shades of Teale
An Author’s Note I began writing this novel out of a sense of dismay over the many stories I’ve read in the newspaper or heard on the news about another woman found lifeless in her own home. With her partner arrested and imprisoned, the woman’s family – parents, siblings, children and friends – are left with the anguish of re-building lives shattered by the violent end of their loved one’s life. Abuse, death and shattered lives – a disturbing pattern that is more commonplace than we imagine. On researching this topic I came upon recent statistics from the Canadina Women’s Foundation that paint a bleak picture: Every six days on average a woman in Canada is murdered by her intimate partner – nearly 70 deaths a year. On any given day in Canada, more than 3,000 women (and 2,500 children) are living in emergency shelters due to domestic violence incidents, which annually account for over 40,000 arrests and $4.2 billion in social/health/judicial services and lost productivity costs. As someone who has never been in an abusive relationship, I was intrigued by the dynamic of abuse. What would make a woman choose to involve herself with a man who appears to despise her? I began to ask such questions while working for a women’s shelter where I met some amazing women who shared their stories with me. I also read everything I could find on the topic. And I listened. Friends also spoke in strict confidence about difficult circumstances they’d survived. Ladies, I’ll protect you and your identities forever. This has been a sad but enlightening journey. But out of all of those fascinating and heart-breaking pieces of tragedy, I was able to weave together the purely fictional account of Teale’s escape from abuse to freedom. Her abuser, David, is no man I’ve ever met, although I’ve seen glimpses ofhim in the stories other women have told me. It is my hope that this fictional story leads to a deepr understanding of a very real problem that causes untold pain to women every day. Susan Crossman, November 8,...
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