When I was a child I saw the world in black and white. There were good people and bad people. Right choices and wrong choices. There wasn’t much room for the in between.
Thinking like that felt safe, it made life an easier maze to navigate. But, of course, the world isn’t that simple. People aren’t that simple. Choices aren’t that simple. Black and white rarely exists. Rather, we’re confronted with a multitude of grays.
Novels are what helped me navigate all these shades I couldn’t quite comprehend. When witnessing a person I’d viewed as good do something ‘good’ people weren’t supposed to do, it was challenging to say the least. The characters in the books I read helped me see and understand the complexity of humans and not be so quick to judge.
If you’re anything like me, despite learning these lessons, there may still be times when you leap to judgment, when you see the world through your perspective, forgetting that there’s always another side to every story, someone who sees the situation through eyes very unlike your own. Someone who might know details you’re not privy to.
This doesn’t mean that people or actions we may perceive as ‘bad’ are actually ‘good’ or acceptable, absolutely not. But it does mean in the majority of situations we may owe it to ourselves, and to the people around us, to consider where our judgments come from, and why.
This can be hard to do, ridiculously hard. But books make it easier. Even though I’m all grown up now, novels still help remind me to at least consider another view or experience, to open my eyes to the gray.
And as a writer, one of my greatest joys is to explore characters who come to these realizations and watch the way it can transform their lives. As a novelist, one of my dreams and goals, both for myself and my readers, is to share stories that reveal our fears and insecurities, that make us contemplate our choices and the choices of those around us, that make us question (and at times make us uncomfortable), all while providing an escape from life for a little while.
To say a book, is ‘good’ is subjective. But to me, a good book is one that enables me to sink into someone else’s story and, when the time is right, resurface again, having learned something or grown.
Even if one sentence in a book I write does that for one person, I’ll feel I’ve done my job.
In early reviews, I’ve already been blessed enough to see that my new book Beneath the Silence is this kind of book for some readers.
Some quotes from early reviews:
“The author delved into this painful darkness with empathy and slowly, delicately replaced that darkness with the light of self-awareness, discovery, hope and most of all forgiveness.”
“It was incredibly upsetting at times, but so gripping I couldn’t put it down.”
“Beneath the Silence is a novel that keeps you thinking, it shows you exactly what real life struggles are all about.”
Beneath the Silence is not a book for everyone. Although not excessively displayed, it deals with themes of abuse that could be upsetting or even triggering for some readers, so if you think that’s you, please, stay away.
But it is a novel that I hope will touch readers and linger in their memories. Another reviewer writes:
“The author did an amazing job of placing us right in the centre of the lives of her characters and making us a part of their lives.”
Beneath the Silence will be free on Amazon August 2 and 3, 2015! If you’d like to get a chance to read it with only the investment of your time, mark your calendars and this link! Beneath the Silence.
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