Syndicated Advice Columnist, 'Ask Amy' Launches Her New Website and Invites You to Join Her

Do you know Amy Dickinson, the national syndicated advice columnist and best selling author of The Mighty Queens of Freeville: A Mother, a Daughter and the Town that Raised Them? She likely writes a column in your local paper.

This is what WashingtonPost.com has to say about Amy: "She comes across very much as you'd expect an advice columnist to: smart, humorous, commonsensical, not prone to deep self-analysis and - despite having lived in London and Chicago and worked in New York as a television producer - a passionate proponent of small-town American values."

We featured Amy in our monthly Virtual Book Tour in June, 2009. And you can read the entire interview if you go to 'Archives' to the left of this post, click on June, 2009 and then scroll down to June 11th and 12th. Here's what Amy had to say about why she wrote this book:

I’m a syndicated advice columnist, 'Ask Amy', and by far the most common question I’m asked when people meet me is "How do you know what to say to people?" People are understandably curious about my qualifications to tell others what they should do.

My book is the answer to the question of how I know what I know. It tells the lessons of a life spent watching, doing, and learning from my own mistakes - and I’ve made plenty of those. I didn’t go to school to become an advice columnist (I was an English major), but I have been well-schooled in the fields of relationships, marriage, divorce, and raising my daughter Emily as a single mom. I’ve been in debt and clawed my way out. I’ve picked up and moved households several times. I have been on too many bad blind dates.

Fortunately for me, I haven’t had to take my winding journey alone. Along with my daughter Emily, I am blessed to be from a large family of funny, inspiring, and opinionated women. These are the women Emily christened the "Mighty Queens," and these are the people who helped teach me what I know.

Rather than write an "advicey" book, I decided to tell my own story. In the course of writing the book, I returned to live in my little home town of Freeville, New York. After living in London, New York, Washington DC and then Chicago, coming home to a village of 458 people has been an adjustment and a joy.

This week Amy is celebrating the release of the paperback edition of The Mighty Queens Of FReeville. Over the past few months she has been traveling around, capturing real life stories that highlight Second Chances, a major theme of her book.

From book club parties to libraries, book stores, auditoriums and church basements, women are gathering to draw strength from each other and share their stories.

On Amy's new website, MySecondChanceStories.com, you can join the virtual hometown community, watch inspiring interviews by Amy, browse book club discussion questions, view photos and "bring Amy to your hometown" with live chat, podcasts and book signings. Go check it out - you'll be glad you did.

ReadingGroupGuides.com will be hosting a contest where book club members can tell their 'second chance' story in 100 words or less, and Amy will select readers to win a paperback copy of her book for their group.

If you need some encouragement in order to write your story, join our email list to the left of this post and download your complimentary ebook, Courage and Lessons Learned.