Join Our Virtual Book Tour Wednesday

Looking for a great summer beach read? Don't miss our monthly Virtual Book Tour tomorrow, July 25. Log on and meet author Kathleen Toomey Jabs who will join us for a Q & A about her book, Black Wings. Her novel invites us into a world of secret societies, military tradition, and deception as Lt. Bridget Donovan unofficially investigates the crash of one of the Navy's first female fighter pilots, who also happens to have been her former roommate when both attended the U.S. Naval Academy.

Kathleen, a graduate of the Naval Academy herself, has created a mystery praised as "a chilling, fact-paced and intelligent story, wonderfully written."  You'll be drawn in by her engaging book and enjoy the ride.

Come by tomorrow, explore our Q & A and ask Kathleen more questions about how to tell your own story. 

Wrap up of Lucy Adam's Virtual Book Tour

If you missed our Virtual Book Tour yesterday, scroll down to read about Lucy Adams and her book, "If Mama Don't Laugh It Ain't Funny." Below are some of Lucy's answers to our readers' questions:

Were you always funny or did you cultivate your sense of humor? I admire your skill and, although I see the humor in stuff, I don't seem to be able to convey it to others.

I think a good sense of humor runs in my family. My best memories of my great-grandmother and grandmother are of them laughing, and mostly at themselves; my mother, likewise. I learned from them to note the details in life, to find humor even in unlikely places, and how to tell a story. So, I owe them for my gift of humor . . . and for many wonderful memories.

With raising a family, writing and working, how do you ever find any time for yourself?

How do I find time for myself? Funny you should ask that. I just finished writing an article (for a parenting magazine) about moms making time to pursue their own interests.

Writing is my THING, my personal interest, and I tend to squeeze it in where ever I can. I always have a pen and paper with me, I've been known to take out a pen light in a movie theater and jot down an idea that suddenly comes to me. I wrote an entire story one time in a fitting room, sans children of course, in the women's department of Macy's.

I don't watch television, don't carry on long conversations over the phone, try not to get bogged down in e-mails, don't spend long hours on facebook. I find those things steal my time.

But most of all, I guess I've made time for myself to write because it is very important to me.

You say you have 4 children and seem to be pretty intuitive - any insights about birth order?

Aaah, birth order. Well, first of all, I suppose I should confess that there are two babies of my family. And, no, they are not twins. My oldest three children are boys and my youngest is a girl, the natural baby of the family. My youngest boy is the baby of the boys. It really complicates things.

One of the stories in If Mama Don't Laugh capitalizes on the whole birth order idea, when I refer to my children as Say Some Evil (the go-getter oldest), See Some Evil (the observant, quiet middle boy), Do Some Evil (the attention grabbing youngest boy).

You're able to look at your life and find the humor in it - I've never been able to do that. I wonder if that's in the DNA or I can learn to see the world through a softer lens. What do you think, Lucy?

I think all the little annoyances of the day - trying to get four kids to six different activities while also getting myself to my own obligation, dinner burned, no milk for breakfast, an unexpected meeting at work, car battery dies -while on the surface very managable, start to pile up until my jaw is clenched and my heart is racing and all I want to do is go back home and get back in bed. I think everyone has days like this, weeks like this, or even lives like this.

But in the big scheme of things, these little annoynaces are barely blips on the radar. And it's important to keep them in perspective. I don't want my life to boil down to one frenetic day after another, without happiness or joy. I don't want my children to remember me as a stressed out shrew who only said, "Hurry up." When they see my face in their mind's eye, I hope they picture me smiling and laughing.

I believe it is a personal decision to find the meaning, the lessons, the laughter in the very chaos of life. If I can't do that, then I have nothing but chaos, and I cannot live that way.

I loved If Mama. Living in the south and having a gaggle of kids may help, but there was so much I could relate to. The title of your new book makes me wonder what it's about.

My upcoming book, Tuck Your Skirt in Your Panties and Run, due out late spring 2010, is about life's embarrassing, uncomfortable moments, both mine and those of other people. The first chapter highlights some of my own flubs and foibles, then I go on in subsequent chapters to share about my husband and children, my extended family, my friends, and finally observations of total strangers.

The book and title were inspired by an actual incident in which I walked out of the bathroom and down the hallway at work, past several coworkers, with my skirt tucked into my panties. I dedicated Tuck Your skirt to the author of a scathing letter in regard to one of my columns published in the newspaper. Her letter and my response are both included in the introduction.

Thanks, Lucy! We all appreciate your honest, thoughtful and funny responses.

Wow, everyone asked such great questions. This has been a wonderful Virtual Book Tour stop. Please go out and purchase your very own copy of If Mama Don't Laugh, It Ain't Funny. Ask your local bookstore to order it for you, or order it on-line at all major bookstores - Barnes & Noble, Borders, Amazon, Books-a-Million, etc. Hint: It makes a great Christmas gift! And please keep your eye out for Tuck Your Skirt in Your Panties and Run in the Spring of 2010.

Virtual Book Tour: "If Mama Don't Laugh, It Ain't Funny"

Today we are delighted to welcome Lucy Adams to our blog’s Virtual Book Tour. Lucy is the author of “If Mama Don't Laugh, It Ain't Funny.” Her first book celebrates family and the struggle to balance life while maintaining a sound mind and body. Readers get lost in her stories of family antics which somehow always seem to explore and further her own personal growth through insight and a healthy portion of humor. Now see for yourself:

Nourishing Relationships: What inspired you to write this book?

Lucy Adams: So many things inspired me to write If Mama Don't Laugh, It Ain't Funny. My husband stayed after me about doing it. Readers of my weekly newspaper column frequently asked me when I planned to write a book.

The turning point came when a publisher called and asked if I was interested in writing a how-to book on parenting. Wow! I was flattered. But when I finally got my puffed up ego to sit down and be quiet, the reasonable, logical side of me said that it was dangerous territory to tread. After all, my own children aren't fully cooked. I've yet to see the end product of my own parenting. Who am I to tell someone else how to do it? I had to call the publisher and decline the invitation. While on the phone, however, with newfound confidence clutched in my sweaty palms, I pitched the idea for If Mama. He liked it.

If Mama Don't Laugh, It Ain't Funny was also inspired by my need to prove that life is more than a collection of chaos book-ended by rare moments of calm. Every moment counts. Every minute of every day has a purpose. I have found that by learning to live in the little moments, I open myself to the biggest lessons and the best rewards. And, of course, humor. The smallest sliver of a second contains a complete journey. So much more happens between loads of laundry than wiping noses, folding shirts, and scrubbing the kitchen floor. In fact, most of life happens at the same time that I’m driving carpool, cleaning toilets, and scorching spaghetti.

N R: How did you decide on the title, "If Mama Don't Laugh, it Aint Funny"?

L A: My husband actually inadvertently coined the title. One evening at dinner, several years ago, one of my sons asked my husband to pass the rolls. Instead of passing the plate, the man tossed a roll to the child who bobbled it. Buttery bread left a long grease streak down the front of my child.

I was irritated at the poor display of table manners and at the challenge of getting butter stains out of navy blue pants. My husband could see it on my face, so he said, “Uh oh, y’all. Mama isn’t laughing. If Mama doesn’t laugh, it isn’t funny.”

The title (and ghastly grammar) evolved from there.

N R: Do you have a favorite story from the book?

L A: My favorite story is "I Hope I'm Getting Smaller." It tells of a brief but poignant interaction with my then 4 year-old daughter. She questioned me about loving "bad guys" and what God would want us to do. We shared an amazing moment when I had a revelation about my relationship with my daughter, as well as about how she and I both understand God. It was such a profound experience; tears fill my eyes every time I read that story.

Another of my favorites is about Noah, the three legged pig. But that story is best consumed a little bit at a time, so I won’t go into detail here.

N R: Did all of the stories in If Mama Don’t Laugh, It Ain’t Funny really happen?

L A: All the stories but one are true. There is a clue embedded in the book. Can you find it? Do you know which story isn’t true?

N R: How do your family and friends feel about their lives being published?

L A: I have to admit, there’ve been a couple of pieces I published that sent my husband over the edge. He has actually given me a list of things I can’t print about him in the newspaper. For example, I can never write that he “squealed like a school girl.”

And every now and then my parents will question something I put in print. My parents are very thrifty and I once used a metaphor of gnomes burying their gold under toadstools to describe my mom and dad. There was no end to the grief they caught for that. I’m fortunate that they have a good sense of humor.

My friends laughingly say things like, “Uh oh, you’re not going to put that in the paper are you?”

But my children seem to go out of their way to supply me with topics. I even find myself lecturing them on not doing brainless things just to see if I’ll write about them.

Unfortunately, we usually don’t realize how entertaining the chaos is until the crisis du jour has passed. In the moment, I’m like every person – I’m surviving. I hope that in all the minutes that come between racing time to the grave, ha, ha, I’m teaching my children to laugh at themselves and take life’s ups and downs lightly.

N R: What is your favorite thing about being an author?

L A: Let’s see. Perhaps that total strangers write me and e-mail me to say they love If Mama Don’t Laugh, It Ain’t Funny and that they’ve put it in the basket of reading materials in their bathrooms. On a home tour last Christmas, one man actually walked me into his bathroom to point out my book, which he keeps on the back of his commode.

Making people laugh; making an emotional connection.

I also enjoy the idea that something of my creation with my name on it is recorded in perpetuity in the Library of Congress. I'm a permanent, though tiny, piece of the fabric of America. It's a record of my existence and my contribution. Hmmm. That sounds so silly and neurotic when I say it out loud.

N R: How did you get started writing?

L A: My original plan, when I was 5, was to be an artist and live in my parents’ garage and take care of them in their old age. Despite my father nursing that ambition, I ended up being a writer and living down the rod from my parents. An arrangement that pleases my mother very much, since she and my dad haven’t decided to get old yet.

My high school friends would tell you that they always knew I would be a writer. My college friends would tell you they were all surprised. My husband says I’m not the same woman he married; that it’s like my alien inside took over.

I always wanted to write. I sort of gave up on it, though, after high school, seeking to do more practical things with my education and my life. It wasn’t until I was 34, with four children ages 6 and under and a husband who said we needed extra income, that I got up the courage to act on it.

I typed up sample columns and went to my local newspaper and asked if I could write for them. Then I called back the editor again, and again, and again, until he said, “Yes, if you’ll quit bothering me. I’ve got work to do.”

Now, in my 40’s, going a day without writing is like going a day without oxygen.

N R: Do you have any advice for other people who would like to get into writing?

L A: It’s NEVER too late to start. But, if you’re serious about it, you have to truly commit to seizing every moment. Working full-time and managing a family can pose barriers to a writing career.

I write in every sliver of time I can find. I try keep a notebook and a pen with me at all times, everywhere I go. Ideas suddenly come to me and I have to write them down or I’ll never remember them. Sometimes I don’t have my notebook handy when I get inspired on aisle 9 of the grocery store. I’ve written entire stories on the back of my grocery list. I’ve also been known to scribble notes on the backs of soup labels, on napkins, and flattened straw wrappers. Sometimes I dictate to my 14 year-old son when ideas come to me while I’m driving (deciphering his handwriting, however, is whole other challenge in and of itself). I jot things down while in waiting rooms, dressing rooms, and bathrooms. I have lots of scraps of paper stashed here, there, and everywhere with various notes. Often, writing a story is like piecing a puzzle together, literally.

The first step, however, is just starting. Commit to writing a certain number of words a day. My number is 250. It’s manageable. You’ll find that once you start, it’s very, very hard to stop. I know I do. I’ve burned countless meals because I couldn’t put my pen down.

N R: What's in the future for Lucy Adams - another book?

L A: My second book of humor, Tuck Your Skirt in Your Panties and Run, chronicling embarrassing moments in life, is due out in late spring 2010.

I also continue to blog at www.IfMama.com, to write freelance articles, and to publish my syndicated humor column.

N R: If your readers only got one thing from If Mama Don’t Laugh, It Ain’t Funny, what would you want that to be?

L A: That life is short, without a lot of big moments outside of marriage proposals, weddings, and children’s births. So it’s important to live it all in the everyday small moments. That’s where the marrow of our existence is. Fill those moments with laughter, and appreciate the lessons they hold.

Thanks, Lucy, for a delightful interview. Now, Readers, it's your turn. Ask Lucy questions, share your thoughts, you can even show us how funny you are. Just click on 'Comments' at the bottom of this post and follow the prompts.

We want to welcome Carolyn Howard-Johnson to our blog today. She is the author of a novel, "This is the Place" and a collection of poetry, "Tracings." Her series of nitty, gritty how-to books include "The Frugal Book Promoter" and "the Frugal Book Editor."

Q: Carolyn, we understand that your writing career didn't begin until mid-life. Looking back, what was it like for women in the 1950's and '60s?

A: Sometimes the big barriers in life aren’t abject poverty, dreaded disease or death. Sometimes it’s the subtle ones set upon us by time and place. The ones that creep up silently on padded feet and, if we sense them at all, we choose not to turn and face them. The decade of the 50s was a time when these kinds of barriers faced those with dark skin, those who lived in closed religious communities, and those who were female.

Living in Utah, I knew that women in that time and place had a notion of who they should be, could be and, mostly, they got it from those around them because many of them couldn’t see the difference from society’s expectations and their own.

“You can’t be a nurse,” my mother said. “Your ankles aren’t sturdy enough.” I also was told I couldn’t be a doctor because that wasn’t a woman’s vocation. The choice left to me was to be a teacher. My dream to write became a victim of the status quo.

When I applied for a job as a writer at Hearst Corporation in New York in 1961 I was required to take a typing test. I was piqued because I wasn’t applying for the typing-pool, I was applying for a post as an editorial assistant.

I was told, "No typing test, no interview." I took the test and was offered a job in the ranks of those who could do 70 in a minute. I had to insist upon the interview I had been promised. I was only twenty and had no real skills in assertiveness. I am amazed I had the wherewithal to do that.

Something similar was at work when I married and had children. I happily left my writing to accommodate my husband’s career and the life the winds of the times presented to me. That there was a time when we didn’t know we had choices is not fiction.

I had always wanted to write the next “Gone with the Wind” only about Utah instead of about the South. I had a plan that was, itself, gone with the wind.

Instead of following my star I searched for replacements. My husband and I built a business. For forty years I didn’t write and, during that time women became more aware. The equipment, gears and pulleys were in place for a different view on life.

Q: Can you tell us about how you dramatically changed directions in the second half of your life in a desire to fulfill your dreams?

A: In midlife I became aware that there was an empty hole where my children had been but also that the hole was vaster than the space vacated by them. I knew I not only would be able to write, I would need to write.

Then I read that, if those who live until they are fifty in these times may very likely see their hundredth year. That meant that I might have another entire lifetime before me--plenty of time to do whatever I wanted. In fact, it’s my belief that women in their 50s might have more time for their second life because they won’t have to spend the first twenty years preparing for adulthood.

That was it. I started writing "This is the Place." I had to relearn old skills and brush up on new, and I am proud that I did it. I’m glad that I waited until I was sixty. Forty years of experience gave it a dimension it would not have had if I had written it when I was young. That first novel has expanded into four books including a new book of poetry, "Tracings" and I am now working on one called "Best Book Forward: How to Edit for a Spotless First Impression." I like that I am doing something for other women and for other writers.

I also like being proof that a new life can start late - or that it is never too late to revive a dream.

Thanks for sharing your story, Carolyn. Although we are new friends, we can see already that you are as generous with your experiences as you are with your wisdom and excellent ideas. What you say resonates for us and we're sure it will for other women as well.

Readers, here's your chance to fire away. You may have questions about Carolyn's mid-life transformation and how you can begin your own process. Or maybe you have a book percolating and want some direction about how to serve it up. All you have to do is click on "comment" at the bottom of this post, type in what you have to say and then follow the simple directions. You do not have to join anything in order to make a comment. We look forward to hearing from you.