Left Coast Writers® Launch

The compulsion to walk yet another Camino de Santiago trail draws Susan Alcorn to the north coast of Spain. In Healing Miles, her vision is hiking through lively cosmopolitan cities and remote hilltop villages, pausing to sample delectable pintxos in coastal San Sebastian and sip sidra (hard cider) on Oviedo's trendy Calle Gascona. She finds that and more. There is the challenge of walking many miles each day, but there is also time to gaze out upon long stretches of sandy beaches, witness the ocean's moods as it blasts seawater up through blowholes, and look out from mountain paths across valleys blanketed with fog. Layover and shorter days provide opportunities to visit museums, Neolithic cave paintings, and cathedrals.

And throughout, there are rich experiences with others--bonding with new people, sharing news with friends at home, listening to local bands, and happening upon colorful festivals. Yet, she also sees that life goes on--no matter how much you want to do something, your body may protest, and no matter how remote the journey seems, news may arrive from home that a family member needs more care--stressing you to your utmost limits.

At 74, Susan Alcorn sets out to hike across Spain on two lesser-known, and more difficult, Camino de Santiago pilgrimage trails--the Caminos Norte and Primitivo. This is not an easy venture, no matter what your age. Though not everyone has the time or inclination to walk seven-hundred miles across Spain as she and her husband did, all can appreciate the struggles and joys of walking the Camino Norte route along the Bay of Biscay, and of both the Norte and Primitivo Camino routes as they cross the mountains to arrive in Santiago de Compostela.

Those contemplating walking either of these trails will enjoy the substantial section of practical information. They will learn how to plan and pack for such an adventure, the pros and cons of albergue life, and what to expect in the way of weather, terrain, and trail signage.

Throughout Healing Miles you'll find a larger story -- one that's certain to be familiar to many -- aging. The author must confront the issues of her own not-so-young body and her mother's decline. Doing so is not an easy task, but with her own determination and the gifts from others as well as from the trail itself -- she does so.

Donna Fado Ivery is a minister, speaker, writer, and painter dedicated to the art of healing. No longer able to pastor after a disabling brain injury in 1994, for seventeen years she used a wheelchair, cane, and narcotics in order to get around. Now she walks freely without any of these supports. Her poetry—some of which is included in her memoir, Spirit Journey to Healing—traces her journey through brain injury and her reliance on Spirit’s ability to lead and heal. A graduate of the University of California at Davis (Bachelor of Science in the Applied Behavioral Sciences: Organizational and Community Development) and Boston University School of Theology (Masters of Divinity: Biblical and Historical Studies), she has pastored three United Methodist Churches and lectured across the U.S.

Left Coast Writers® Launch Event

In Abandoned Places, twenty-one writers embark on a tour of the lonely, the rejected and the uninhabited. This anthology of short genre fiction co-edited by Chris Cornell features stories of science fiction, fantasy and horror by rising new authors and classic tales by Ray Bradbury, Dashiell Hammett, Edgar Allen Poe and M. R. James.

Left Coast Writers® Salon

Good Luck Life is the first book to explain the meanings of Chinese rituals and to offer advice on when and how to plan for Chinese holidays and special occasions such as Chinese weddings, the Red Egg and Ginger party to welcome a new baby, significant birthdays, and the inevitable funeral. Packed with practical information, Good Luck Life contains an abundance of facts, legends, foods, old-village recipes, and quick planning guides for Chinese New Year, Clear Brightness, Dragon Boat, Mid-Autumn, and many other festivals.

Written with warmth and wit, Good Luck Life is beautifully designed as an easily accessible cultural guide that includes an explanation of the Lunar Calendar, tips on Chinese table etiquette for dining with confidence, and dos and don'ts from wise Auntie Lao, who recounts ancient Chinese beliefs and superstitions. This is your map for celebrating a good luck life.

Rosemary Gong is a third-generation Chinese American. Born and raised in California, she and her family were the only Asians in their Central Valley town, school, and church. A graduate of San Jose State University's School of Journalism and Mass Communications, she moved to San Francisco to join Saatchi and Saatchi Corporate Communications Group. Chinatown was her choice of residence -- just around the corner from her grandparents. There, she developed an affinity for the places and the customs inherent in her culture. Rosemary shamefully admits her Chinese vocabulary totals around twenty-nine words. Thus, she considers one of her greatest achievements to be ordering a plate of noodles in her native Cantonese.

"My father is a federal criminal. My father is a hero," Barbara McVeigh writes in her memoir Redemption: How Ronald Reagan Nearly Ruined My Life.

Reagan fired her father for a union strike in 1981, leading him and 11,500 other families into years of strife. Just eleven years old, she lost her dream to become an oceanographer, and her beloved guitar lessons, as her family struggled emotionally and financially for years. She blamed her father for "following his ego," as her grandfather had termed it, and not placing family first. Reagan's heroic public image soared as America was told how he combated the alleged threats of communism, nuclear war and the Soviet Empire. Thirty years later, Barbara marries and then takes up sailing at her late great uncle's urging, himself a passionate and accomplished sailor, who had been her best friend, where she finds an unexpected connection to the ocean and freedom of the complexities of the modern world.

When hard, bitter truths emerge about the ocean's health and her fourteen-year marriage, Barbara packs her bags and leaves the illusory "good life." She takes the helm of not one, but two film projects, one with the world's paramount oceanographer Dr. Sylvia Earle, and the other with renowned Brazilian guitarist Jose Neto. She does this with no experience and virtually no money, to reclaim her childhood dreams and, in a desperate effort, to remind the world of the awe, beauty, and truth we must always stand for. During her projects she confronts the dark shadows of Reagan's energy, labor, health, media, and environmental policies, revealing horrific truths about America's so-called "Hero of the Republican Party." She discovers that her father was NOT the federal criminal Reagan accused him of being. Instead, her father is a hero today.

Barbara shares her very personal and painful family story of three generations and her search for truth that led her to China, Cuba, the Balkans, across Europe, and ultimately back to her own home, the San Francisco Bay. There she discovers herself, and what it means to be free in America today as our world faces political, social and environmental threats unlike any before. Barbara has a new dream and sees now that the spirits are guiding her, just as they had been, all along.

Barbara McVeigh is a writer, educator, filmmaker, radio host and environmentalist. She's the mother of two children and lives in Northern California. Her one mission: to advocate respect for the natural world as we face political, social and environmental threats unlike ever before.

You are alone. Perhaps in a bar, a museum, a cafe, a grocery store—anywhere. You meet someone. And from the moment of eye contact, a story begins. In The Day You Love Me, you'll travel to six places around the globe and experience six encounters, each fueled by hope and desire, each clouded by uncertainty. Whether in a Japanese village near Mt. Fuji, a small northern California town, an L.A. high school cafeteria, an art gallery in Tahiti, a bar in southern Spain, or in a Paris cafe, the meetings seem similar. The consequences are wildly different.

Jay Humphrey graduated with a degree in English from Stanford, pursuing a varied career in theater and television, law, writing and teaching. The Day You Love Me is his first collection of short stories. This book is fiction, but as Albert Camus noted, fiction is the lie through which we tell the truth. Jay lives with his wife in Northern California.

In Oracle of the Song, determined to save her best friend Sophia, Thaleia—the young Oracle of Delphi—descends into the Underworld, a forbidden land from which none escape.

But does Sophia want to be saved? If so, why does she trick Thaleia to drink from the River of Forgetfulness, so she no longer knows the reason she descended into Hades’ Realm?

Thaleia prays for the gods’ help. Instead of their guidance, she encounters Hades’ rage and Athena’s jealous fury.

Always, the gods defy her.

Beneath fire skies, Thaleia outwits Typhon, a hundred-headed sea monster; challenges the Graeae—three hags who share one eye and one tooth between them and risks being turned to stone with the gaze of Medusa, a snake-haired priestess.

Ultimately, all paths lead to Hades Palace and a box hidden beneath Queen Persephone’s bed. Can Thaleia stop blaming the gods for her friend’s death? Can she let honesty and courage guide her? Can she bring Sophia home?

Gail Strickland translated much of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, Herodotus’ prophecies and The Bacchai by Euripides while studying classics in college. Living on the Greek islands after college, she discovered her love of myth, the wine-dark sea and retsina. The Baltimore Review and Writer's Digest have recognized Gail’s fiction. She published stories and poems in Travelers’ Tales’ anthologies.

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An odd couple patrols a county full of mythological beasts and ornery locals. A familiar youngster from the world of The Last Unicorn is gifted in magic but terrible at spell-casting. A seemingly incorruptible judge meets his match in a mysterious thief who steals his heart. Two old friends discover that the Overneath goes anywhere, including locations better left unvisited.

Lyrical, witty, and insightful, The Overneath is Peter S. Beagle's much-anticipated return to the short form. In these uniquely beautiful and wholly original tales, with new and uncollected work, Beagle once again proves himself a master of the imagination.

Peter S. Beagle is the best-selling author of The Last Unicorn, which has sold a reported five million copies since its initial publication. His other novels include A Fine & Private Place, The Innkeeper’s Song, Tamsin, Summerlong and In Calabria. Beagle's short fiction has been collected in four volumes by Tachyon Publications, including The Rhinoceros Who Quoted Nietzsche, The Line Between, We Never Talk About My Brother, and Sleight of Hand. He has won the Hugo, Nebula, Mythopoeic, and Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire awards and the World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement. Beagle lives in Northern California, where he is working on nearly innumerable projects.

BOOK PASSAGE BOOKSTORE& LEFT COAST WRITERS
present
Javier Zamora reading from his new book
Unaccompanied
and in conversation with his former teacher, Marin County Poet Laureate Rebecca Foust
 
Book Passage Bookstore and Left Coast Writers invite the public to a poetry reading and book release party on Monday December 4, 7 PM – 9 PM at Book Passage Bookstore, at 51 Tamal Vista Blvd., Corte Madera, CA 94925. Bay Area rising star Javier Zamora will read from Unaccompanied, a new collection of poetry that chronicles his migration from El Salvador to the United States following the Salvadoran Civil War. These poems tell the particular story of the U.S.-backed violence that ravaged Central America during the 1980s, but their broader meditations on familial loss at the hands of state violence and forced migration are timely and crucial.

A reading will be followed by a conversation led by Zamora’s former teacher and mentor, Marin County Poet Laureate Rebecca Foust. This event is free and open to the public and refreshments (Salvadoran beer and pupusas!) will be served.

Praise for Unaccompanied (Copper Canyon Press 2017):

A “heartbreaking account” of migrating to “not the promised land but barbwire and barbwire.
—Publisher’s Weekly

“I’ll never be a citizen,” Zamora declares in Unaccompanied’s, opening poem. “I can’t go back and return.” Without the proper papers, you can’t leave the U.S. because you won’t be allowed back in. But the legal bind underlines a deeper question: If you are both profoundly American and inescapably Salvadoran, can you ever feel like you belong fully to either country?
—The New Yorker

“Ezra Pound said poetry is news that stays news. Rarely however, does it begin as actual news, ripped from today's headlines. Despite great grief, this book also dreams of a healed world, and It will stand as a powerful refutation to anyone who claims open borders do not enrich our nation.” —Craig Morgan Teicher, writing for NPR

A resident of San Rafael, Zamora is a 2016-2018 Wallace Stegner Fellow and holds fellowships from CantoMundo, Colgate University, MacDowell, the National Endowment for the Arts, and Yaddo. The recipient of a 2016 Ruth Lilly/Dorothy Sargent Fellowship and the 2016 Barnes and Noble Writer for Writers Award, his poems appear in Granta, Poetry, The Kenyon Review, The New York Times, and elsewhere. For more information, visit http://www.javierzamora.net/

The best writers say their work seems to come from a source beyond the thinking mind. But how do we access that source? "We must first look inside ourselves and be willing to touch that raw emotional core at the heart of a deeper creativity," writes Albert Flynn DeSilver. In Writing as a Path to Awakening, this renowned poet, writer, and teacher shows you how to use meditation to cultivate true depth in your own writing--so your words reveal layers of profound insight that inspire and move your readers.

Constructed as a year-long exploration with a new focus for each month and season, Writing as a Path to Awakening includes: 

- How to approach writing and reading with a greater level of presence and immersion
- Engaging curiosity, playfulness, and spontaneity to keep your regular practice fresh
- Meditating with poetry to deeply embody the power of language
- How you can spark your imagination by connecting to the groundless source of creation
- The meditative approach to storytelling--how not being trapped in your story liberates your capacity to create
- Editing, rewriting, and the path of spiritual transformation

"Writing and meditation practice are a powerful pair, a dynamic duo," Albert Flynn DeSilver teaches. "Together they nourish and push, trigger and define, inform and inspire, enable, and energize. To engage in both practices fully is to activate a more complete, creative, and spiritual self." With a mixture of engaging storytelling and practical exercises, Writing as a Path to Awakening invites you on a yearlong journey of growth and discovery--to enhance your writing through the practice of meditation while using the creative process to accelerate your spiritual evolution.

Albert Flynn DeSilver is an internationally published poet, memoirist, novelist, speaker, and workshop leader. He has published several books of poetry and Beamish Boy, which Kirkus Reviews calls, "A beautifully written memoir of awakening and self-acceptance." He teaches at the Omega Institute, Esalen, Spirit Rock, and writing conferences nationally. He lives in northern California. 

A Sleuth in the Haven follows journalist Gwen Harris through another series of frightening experiences. Bizarre and fatal events threaten the residents of The Haven as Gwen tries to track down the attacker at her aunt's retirement home. Captured by ex-convict Sonny, she is forced to help him plot revenge against his sister, who let him take the fall for a murder during their bootlegging days. Gwen must use her ingenuity and wits to match the tortured and unpredictable demands of her adversary. With unexpected twists, this second in the Gwen Harris series takes the reader back to the days of prohibition, rum running and speakeasies.

Carol Sheldon is an author and playwright. A Sleuth in the Haven is Sheldon's fourth novel. Mother Lode is a best seller, and won an award from Bay Area Independent Publishing Association for Best Fiction. Her numerous plays have won awards across the country, both in professional and community productions. Sheldon lives and teaches writing in Marin County, California.