She Wore Emerald Then: Reflections on Motherhood, a book co-authored by Carolyn Howard-Johnson

Mother's Day is nearly upon us. It's time to begin thinking about how you will celebrate your wonderful mother this year. Much of what's in the shops is syrupy, expensive, and full of meaningless sound bites and clichés. This year you can give something different.

Magdalena Ball, May Lattanzio and Carolyn Howard-Johnson teamed up to create a beautiful, full color gift book of poetry specifically on the topic of motherhood. There's nothing overly sugary here!
Their book is entitled "She Wore Emerald Then: Reflections on Motherhood".

You can download it free and print it on linen paper or you can buy it at only $12.50. Either way, it's a gift that’s both frugal and unique — maybe something different than you’ve ever given before. Team it with a small box of chocolates, homemade cookies, or a bunch of flowers (freshly picked from your garden even) for the perfect present. No additional (overpriced) card needed. The complimentary electronic copy is available for you at:
http://issuu.com/compulsivereader/docs/she_wore_emerald_promo

Read the full book online, or download it.

However, if you’d like to support a couple of poets and an artist (and all of them are mothers!), order it on Amazon at:
http://www.amazon.com/She-Wore-Emerald-Then-Reflections/dp/1438263791/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1241294443&sr=1-1

Do it now, and Carolyn will send readers of this blog a signed label for it. Just e-mail Carolyn your address with POETRY BOOK in the subject line at: HoJoNews@aol.com.

The complimentary electronic book is only available until the 10th of May. In any case, please don't forget to tell your mother how important she is to you. And if you're a mother, Happy Mother's Day!

To indicate one reviewer's high regard for this book, please read the following review.

REVIEW of She Wore Emeralds Then written by Kristin J. Johnson:
“What relationship is more complex or more elemental than the mother-child bond? Abraham Lincoln said, 'All that I am or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother.' Toni Morrison wrote, 'Grown don't mean nothing to a mother. A child is a child. They get bigger, older, but grown? What's that suppose to mean? In my heart it don't mean a thing.'
Both of those quotes, as well as one by Honore de Balzac at the beginning of SHE WORE EMERALD THEN, perfectly describe this collection of poems by Carolyn Howard-Johnson and Magdalena Ball---poetry that catches at your soul. Both of them reprise their poems from Ball's QUARK SOUP, Howard-Johnson's TRACINGS, and their joint collection, CHERISHED PULSE. Fans of CHERISHED PULSE will be pleased to learn that the poets continue to write poems that don't sound either like banal Hallmark cards or the bitter-at-dysfunctional-family jeremiads that habitually torture MFA writing workshop participants.
The two poets complement each other (with words accompanied by stunning photography by May Lattanzio). The opus covers both the grand sweep of the birth of all universal life and the private universe populated by only an adult daughter watching her mother struggle to eat dinner and remembering how her mother washed her one slip. While Ball explores the cosmic continuum and traces us all back to the mother spark that set the stars burning, Howard-Johnson concentrates her portraiture on the deeply personal. But Ball also talks about the oxytocin haze of giving birth and her mother vomiting from cancer drugs. To quote the last poem in the collection, 'Hallmark Couldn't Possibly Get This Right.' When you read about the tough love of the universe or Ball's sienna childhood photograph or Howard-Johnson's mother forgetting her name, you want to cry and hug your mother (and your children, if you have them), because they capture the eternal tug of war between joy and sorrow in the mother-child bond."


So, take it from me and go buy a copy of Carolyn’s book for a Mother’s Day gift for your mother, grandmother, favorite aunt, friend, etc. You’ll be glad you did!

I hope you enjoyed reading all about Carolyn Howard-Johnson.



You simply don’t meet a writer as talented as Carolyn very often.

Cheers!

Harry