In an alternate universe, I also write women's fiction under the pen name Star Ferris. My book, Mending Fences, is FREE in the Amazon Kindle store this weekend. As an aside, the cover is a temporary one. I'm designing a new one...but for now, the one up there is a placeholder of sorts.
Please go download a copy here: http://tinyurl.com/mendingfences
It's currently ranked #12 under Genre Fiction>>Romance>>Western
The story takes place in Oklahoma. Freaky coincidence with this book is that I wrote it years before I became a widow with young children, and the heroine of the book, Jennifer Marless, is a widow with a young son. Talk about fiction imitating what happens later in real life! I think you'll like the sexy hero, too. His name is Jace Thompson and he has a secret past. Grab a FREE copy to find out more. ;-) http://tinyurl.com/mendingfences
Here's a review of Mending Fences:
A Fallen Angels Recommended Read
Mending Fences
Jennifer Marless needs help in a big way but is reluctant to ask for it thinking anyone who helps her will feel just pity. On a whim right after her husband Reece died she participates in a contest to win her own ranch. What she didn’t expect was to actually win the ranch and the foreman Jace Thompson. So against her own wishes she takes her son, Aaron and herself for a week to Split Rail Ranch hoping to convince the foreman to selling the ranch. However, upon going she didn’t expect to see a dump and dilapidated ranch so in need of modern luxuries like plumbing. Jace is always there constantly reminding her of a snob she has become. Who can blame her, Reece was a big upstanding businessman and she had to make a good appearance? She knows that Jace is a good man but the ranch definitely needs a jump start of modernization. How can she just leave the ranch now in despair when her son becomes great friends with Jace and have his little heart broken. More than that will her heart stay intact from the love and passion that Jace is offering to give her?
Jace Thompson has lived for the past ten years on Split Rail Ranch making it his home and a city girl with a 13 year old teenager is not what he needs right now. Jace has his own secrets and past demons that he has been hiding from the past couple of years. Having Jennifer around has made him realize how long he’s been without a woman’s love but more importantly a son like Aaron. Even though he constantly riles Jennifer up he falls more in love with her each day. Can he make her see that not only the ranch needs her but he needs her to complete his life?
Among the wild Oklahoma terrain with its starry nights, love blooms with surprises in the air and passionate kisses bringing two lost souls to one another. I fell in love with Jennifer’s reluctance in seeing how beautiful the ranch really is and with the temptation of succumbing to Jace’s kisses. Man this man sure knows how to distract yet his past interferes with his relationship towards her. I especially loved Aaron also for this teenager sure has grown up so fast since his father passed away. This is a great contemporary romance filled with a gorgeous real life cowboy that will make any woman tingle with his seduction and Jennifer’s determination to make it on her own. Star Ferris did a great job with Mending Fences being her first book and will surely go far with her imagination and talent in creating such a beautiful story come to life with memorable characters.
Reviewed by: Lena C.
Saturday, March 30, 2013
Depression, life narratives, walking one's own path
This is an excerpt from a comment thread on my Facebook page. I'd posted an article about writers and depression -- specifically about writers using depression meds. My friend, Anli, posted a comment that she was on meds, but eventually went off of them after therapy when she realized that we like to tell ourselves stories which can result in distortions that affect our thinking. We then carry them around like a book instead of dropping them and getting on with our lives.
That's a summary...but you get the idea. I love when people share their perspectives (in a respectful way, of course), because it gives me a chance to sit with my own and either remain with those stances or reconsider and change them. Discourse is the best when it provokes deeper thought and examination.
Here was my response (and a bit more besides):
Anli -- I understand and appreciate you sharing your story. All sharing is helpful in this regard.
My stories aren't stories I made up, though. I didn't make up that my first husband accidentally killed himself one day and I ended up a widow with two young kids in May 2001. I didn't make up stories that my ex-stepfather abused me and was violent with my family, threatening to burn down our house with us in it and stepping in front of our car with a gun pointed at us to keep us from leaving in the car. I didn't make up stories that I was nearly sexually assaulted in front of an entire college baseball team at Phillips University in Oklahoma back in 1984. I didn't make up stories that a good friend of my parents -- and a neighbor -- used to grab me inappropriately in the stairwell of our apartment building when I was 12 years old. These are not stories I made up; they were very real and don't even cover all the stuff I endured throughout my life. However, the past does not equal the future, and I choose to cope in whatever way I can.
My psychiatrist told me he was amazed I wasn't an alcoholic or a drug addict, considering all the messed-up shit that's happened in my life. However, it's all been a strange blessing in that it's made me stronger, more tenacious, more determined to succeed. If it hadn't been for those horrible circumstances, I may not have been such a good student; I may not have been published before the age of 18; I may not have published six books with more on the way; I may not have had the gumption to be a full-time freelancer (scary!) the past 16 years; I may not have had the strength or will to raise my kids by myself after Gary's death; I may not have had what it took to do countless things in my life. And yet, I have.
My past doesn't define me, but it does affect who I am today. I did go without meds for a very long time -- for six years, in fact. However, in 2012 my life became so difficult and stressful that I ended up in the emergency room and was told either I get things under control or risk a brain aneurysm from all of it. Well, needless to say, I chose not to die.
I can't say how long I'll stay on Celexa, but I will stay on it as long as I feel it's beneficial. We all walk our own paths. It's important to remember that your own path is unique and you can't compare it to anyone else's. It's the whole "walking in their shoes" thing. Each day, I continue on with life and get the fuck on with it; however, if we do not learn from the past and those experiences, we are often destined to repeat them in the future. I won't forget where I came from or how I got here. I won't let it hold me back, but I also won't forget the lessons I learned, either. They were often brutal and cruel, but they made me who I am.
I'm going to repost this as my status, since it's really something I've been meaning to say for a while just to get it off my chest. People think they know other people...but in truth, they usually don't know the half of it -- which is certainly the case for me.
I will also not hide or feel ashamed for what happened to me. Other people with twisted agendas and/or mental issues facilitated these messed-up events, not me. I will not take on the mantle of victim shame; sexual assault and abuse is NOT the victim's fault in any way, shape or form.
Anyway -- there you go. A rambling response that just sort of came out as a result of the comment thread. I'm glad it did, and if it makes anyone uncomfortable, that's too bad. It's my narrative and what happened can't be changed. It can only be used as fodder for addressing and assessing the present and the future.
So, remember this: when I react a certain way on Facebook or respond in a particular way about a subject, chances are my past has colored how I react.
One thing I do know is this: I am a survivor. I will find a way to survive, no matter what. Once you've been through hell, you get used to the flames. I am woman, I am warrior. I will do whatever is necessary to survive, with or without anyone's approval.
In the end, you come into this world with yourself and you leave with only yourself. Enjoy the ride, and if Celexa (or Paxil, Prozac, etc.) helps you hold onto the straps for a while longer, so be it! Do what works for you, and you alone. Our path is inevitably our own, and nobody else's.
That's a summary...but you get the idea. I love when people share their perspectives (in a respectful way, of course), because it gives me a chance to sit with my own and either remain with those stances or reconsider and change them. Discourse is the best when it provokes deeper thought and examination.
Here was my response (and a bit more besides):
Anli -- I understand and appreciate you sharing your story. All sharing is helpful in this regard.
My stories aren't stories I made up, though. I didn't make up that my first husband accidentally killed himself one day and I ended up a widow with two young kids in May 2001. I didn't make up stories that my ex-stepfather abused me and was violent with my family, threatening to burn down our house with us in it and stepping in front of our car with a gun pointed at us to keep us from leaving in the car. I didn't make up stories that I was nearly sexually assaulted in front of an entire college baseball team at Phillips University in Oklahoma back in 1984. I didn't make up stories that a good friend of my parents -- and a neighbor -- used to grab me inappropriately in the stairwell of our apartment building when I was 12 years old. These are not stories I made up; they were very real and don't even cover all the stuff I endured throughout my life. However, the past does not equal the future, and I choose to cope in whatever way I can.
My psychiatrist told me he was amazed I wasn't an alcoholic or a drug addict, considering all the messed-up shit that's happened in my life. However, it's all been a strange blessing in that it's made me stronger, more tenacious, more determined to succeed. If it hadn't been for those horrible circumstances, I may not have been such a good student; I may not have been published before the age of 18; I may not have published six books with more on the way; I may not have had the gumption to be a full-time freelancer (scary!) the past 16 years; I may not have had the strength or will to raise my kids by myself after Gary's death; I may not have had what it took to do countless things in my life. And yet, I have.
My past doesn't define me, but it does affect who I am today. I did go without meds for a very long time -- for six years, in fact. However, in 2012 my life became so difficult and stressful that I ended up in the emergency room and was told either I get things under control or risk a brain aneurysm from all of it. Well, needless to say, I chose not to die.
I can't say how long I'll stay on Celexa, but I will stay on it as long as I feel it's beneficial. We all walk our own paths. It's important to remember that your own path is unique and you can't compare it to anyone else's. It's the whole "walking in their shoes" thing. Each day, I continue on with life and get the fuck on with it; however, if we do not learn from the past and those experiences, we are often destined to repeat them in the future. I won't forget where I came from or how I got here. I won't let it hold me back, but I also won't forget the lessons I learned, either. They were often brutal and cruel, but they made me who I am.
I'm going to repost this as my status, since it's really something I've been meaning to say for a while just to get it off my chest. People think they know other people...but in truth, they usually don't know the half of it -- which is certainly the case for me.
I will also not hide or feel ashamed for what happened to me. Other people with twisted agendas and/or mental issues facilitated these messed-up events, not me. I will not take on the mantle of victim shame; sexual assault and abuse is NOT the victim's fault in any way, shape or form.
Anyway -- there you go. A rambling response that just sort of came out as a result of the comment thread. I'm glad it did, and if it makes anyone uncomfortable, that's too bad. It's my narrative and what happened can't be changed. It can only be used as fodder for addressing and assessing the present and the future.
So, remember this: when I react a certain way on Facebook or respond in a particular way about a subject, chances are my past has colored how I react.
One thing I do know is this: I am a survivor. I will find a way to survive, no matter what. Once you've been through hell, you get used to the flames. I am woman, I am warrior. I will do whatever is necessary to survive, with or without anyone's approval.
In the end, you come into this world with yourself and you leave with only yourself. Enjoy the ride, and if Celexa (or Paxil, Prozac, etc.) helps you hold onto the straps for a while longer, so be it! Do what works for you, and you alone. Our path is inevitably our own, and nobody else's.
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