Author Spotlight: Marilyn Morris and Forces of Nature

About Forces of Nature:

What would happen when a bomber from the nearby Air Force base is flung by a fierce tornado into the county’s largest shopping mall? Begin the day with the mall manager, his assistant, the security officer and Howard the Weatherman, whose predictions are always uncannily accurate, and in this case, deadly.

Read an Excerpt:

It was going to be a two-shoe day.

Howard the Weatherman woke with what he referred to as That Certain Dread and a bad taste in his mouth, to boot. The birthday party for his youngest granddaughter the previous evening was the cause, even though it was just ice cream and cake and no booze, befitting his solid Southern Baptist background.

The feeling lingered on the fringes of consciousness until he was fully awake.
Glancing over at his sleeping wife of forty years, he considered waking her and telling her about his dream. No, he would prepare for work first, and let Neva sleep a while longer.

He eased out of bed and padded into the adjoining bathroom. He allowed the shower head to spray stinging hot water over his face and body, all the while he was reciting his usual morning prayers: “Father, I thank thee for this day that thou hast made. I will rejoice and be thankful in it.”

He continued with his intercessory prayers for his family and friends, and for the nation as a whole. “And so I beseech thee, Dear Lord, heed my prayers. I pray in the name of my savior, Jesus Christ.” Normally, his prayers would have ended at this point with a heart-felt “Amen”, but this morning he added softly, “And Lord, if it be thy will, spare us the agony of this day, and keep us safe from harm. Amen.”

About the author:

Marilyn Celeste Morris, multipublished author of Forces of Nature, The Women of Camp Sobingo, and coming soon from Vanilla Heart Publishing, Sabbath’s House, has also published Sabbath’s Room, a supernatural mystery, and Once a Brat, part travelogue, part therapy session about her world-wide travels with her army officer father from her birth in 1938 to his (their) retirement in 1958. Her Diagnosis: Lupus, The Intimate Journal of a Lupus Patient is a non-fiction journey through Lupus Erythematosus and is written to give hope and knowledge.

She is the co-facilitator of the Fort Worth Lupus Support Group, North Texas Chapter, Lupus Foundation of America and counsels newly diagnosed persons and their families about the ravages of systemic lupus erythematosus. She has taped various radio interviews, such as Artist First, local cable television programs, most recently Sizzlin’Seniors on Comcast Television and is accustomed to speaking to groups on the subject of lupus. Being involved in the military brats communities, the Lupus Foundation and her children and grandchildren are her passions.

You can visit Marilyn online at www.freewebs.com/marilyncmorris

The FORCES OF NATURE VIRTUAL BOOK TOUR '08 will officially begin on December 1 and end on December 23. You can visit Marilyn's blog stops at www.virtualbooktours.wordpress.com in December to find out where she is appearing!

As a special promotion for all our authors, Pump Up Your Book Promotion is giving away a FREE virtual book tour to a published author or a $50 Amazon gift certificate to those not published who comments on our authors' blog stops. More prizes will be announced as they become available. The winner will be announced by Pump Up Your Book Promotion on December 23rd!

Marilyn Morris talks about Diagnosis: Lupus

Today I am giving the lovely, Marilyn Morris the floor to talk about her experience of sitting on a Q & A Panel which aims to help people who suffer from Lupus. In her book, Diagnosis: Lupus: The Intimate Journal of a Lupus Patient, Marilyn shares her journey of living with chronic joint pain, frustration, anger, and grief, revealing her unexpected spiritual growth and gratitude for life, in the hopes that her story may help other Lupus sufferers.



Without further ado, I give you a talented author, a wonderful lady, and a friend--Marilyn Morris.


My Experiences on a Q&A Panel

Marilyn Celeste Morris

I was reminded once again of its quirks at a lupus symposium
held last week at the University of Texas, Dallas campus. Of about
one hundred persons there, I can safely say, none of us had exactly
the same experiences at the same time. Several were newly diagnosed, bewildered by the suddenness of their illness, and the shock of knowing there is no cure and treatment varies in each individual.

Most of us, however, rely on the tried-and-true use of steroids (to reduce the swelling of joints) and Plaquenil, an anti-malerial that was discovered quite by accident to have a remitting effect on lupus activity. However, the use of steroids causes extreme weight gain with a "moon-face" effect, thus causing yet another crushing blow to the patient, and taking Plaquenil requires a yearly visit to the ophthalmologist to ensure vision is retained. As I succinctly summed it up after my initial diagnosis and given a prescription for Plaquenil with the caution that I might lose my eyesight: "Oh, I get it. I can either hurt or go blind?"

There are days I still feel that way – conflicted and afflicted. Conflicted about the treatment for lupus, and afflicted by its limitations on me for that day. And yet, I have learned to rely on those last two words as gospel truth: "That day." It won't last forever. Whatever is going on inside my body will not last forever. It will either get better, get worse, go away for a while, or I can learn to live with it, one day at a time.

At this point I must relate the experience I perceived of one person in the audience of lupus patients. Although she had been diagnosed at 11 years of age, and she is now in her mid-twenties, she is still seeking answers. How long will this last? Will I keep getting sick with the same symptoms? How can I file for disability when they tell me I'm not sick enough?

We on the panel and in the audience attempted to answer her questions, but it soon began to dawn on me that she wasn't willing to listen to our answers.

She wanted attention. For her own particular set of symptoms, for that day. And we were not set up to deal with one individual's case history at the expense of others. I began to realize that since the age of 11, she had been playing "Victim." And she had no idea she was doing that. Yet in her baby-sized voice, and her singsong questions, she was reverting to childhood. Soon some of us "old timers" began exchanging knowing looks, and the moderator began somewhat unsuccessfully to cut off her incessant questions. Yet how could we squelch someone's quest for answers? After all, isn't that what we were there for?

Yes and no. Yes, we could provide her with the information that we are all affected differently at different times. And no, we couldn't recommend any one treatment that she hasn't already had and she needed to ask her own doctors. In an age where we can pull up an answer to almost any question in the universe by using a Google search, medicine cannot give certain answers to an uncertain disease. And that's a shame.

I know now what I should have told her. (Don't you just love it when you leave an argument or a situation where you think, "I should have said…..?) I was told early on by a very frustrated doctor who told me I "might" have lupus. "You will find that lupus is a do-it-yourself- disease. You will have to become your own best physician."

Our fifteen minute office visit is over. Pay on the way out, please.

The Lupus Foundation of America is the nation's leading nonprofit voluntary health organization dedicated to lupus. The LFA has a dual mission: to provide support and services to all people affected by lupus, and to fund research to find the causes of and cure for lupus. The LFA has a nationwide network of nearly 300 chapters, branches and support groups. Visit www.lupus.org or call toll-free 1-888-38-LUPUS (1-888-385-8787) for more information.


This virtual book tour has been brought to you by:

Marilyn Morris talks about Diagnosis: Lupus

When she was suddenly assaulted by myriad baffling symptoms of joint pain and extreme fatigue, Marilyn Celeste Morris embarked on an intensive three-year, five- doctor search for diagnosis and treatment of what would be diagnosed as systemic lupus erythematosus, a little-known autoimmune disease that promised to destroy her body, her mind and her spirit. From the pages of her intimate daily journal came a book, Diagnosis: Lupus: The Intimate Journal of a Lupus Patient (PublishAmerica ISBN# 1-4137-6789-3). While journaling daily, Marilyn writes of her chronic pain, frustration, anger and grief of her former self to her current state of remission.

“Far from being a litany of complaints, these pages reveal not only what this disease did to me, but also what this disease did for me: an unexpected spiritual growth and gratitude for life itself.

“I hope this book will lead those who suffer from this chronic disease and other diseases to a better understanding of themselves and acceptance of their conditions,” she says.

In this book, she reveals:

* her struggles with anger and depression and their direct correlation to dealing with an alphabet soup of social service agencies;
* her loss of self-esteem and its direct correlation to weight gain;
* her frustration with insurance companies, physicians and employers;
* her daily struggle to simply get out of bed and go to work, in many places where employers and coworkers didn’t understand her disease;
* and, ultimately, a spiritual crisis, which taught her important life lessons.

This book can reassure readers that their pain, confusion, anger and depression are typical for lupus patients, and encourage them to keep moving forward toward definitive diagnosis, treatment, and eventual remission.

Ms. Morris is the co-facilitator of the Fort Worth Lupus Support Group, North Texas Chapter, Lupus Foundation of America and is also the author of two other books, Sabbath’s Room, a supernatural novel; and Once a Brat, detailing her life with her army officer father all over the world directly after WWII until his (their) retirement in 1958.



To book her as a speaker or for further information, email her at marilyncmorris@sbcglobal.net. The book is available at http://www.PublishAmerica.com, Amazon.com and other online bookstores, or your local bookstore may order for you.

Half the proceeds will be donated to The Lupus Foundation of America for research and education.

Military Brat Marilyn Morris talks about her latest book

July really is turning out to be a month of special treats. Today, author and editor Marilyn Celeste Morris joins me to chat about her latest novel The Women of Camp Sobingo, which was released by Mardi Gras Publishing http://www.mardigraspublishing.com/womenofcampsobingo.html in June .

Welcome to my blog Marilyn. I am thrilled to have you here.

It’s my pleasure. I think all writers love to talk about their work, and especially their latest project.

Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? How long have you been writing? Did anyone inspire you to become a writer?

I think I was born with a pencil in my hand. My family was all about reading, and I learned to read before I went to kindergarten. There, it dawned on me that letters made words, and words made sentences, and sentences made stories. I wrote a lot for my own amusement when I was an army brat stationed overseas with my army officer father.

What is your writing process like? Do you write every day? Is there a time of day you are more productive than others?

I try to write something every day. I am more productive during the morning hours; I try to begin at least sitting at my keyboard at 9:00 a.m. but if I don’t make that schedule, I don’t beat myself up. There are plenty of people in the world who would be happy to do that for me!

After reading the synopsis of The Women of Camp Sobingo and an excerpt, I knew this was one book I had to make a part of my reading collection. What inspired you to write this story?

Wow, thanks! I had thought about my days in Korea when I was about 8-9 years old and my mother played bridge – a lot of bridge – with three other women. One of those women chose to end her life there, and although I had very little information about that, I always wondered why she did it. Through my mental health training, I realized her childhood must have had a large part in her decision, so I made up a background for her – and for the other women. From there, it just grew. My characters kind of took over the writing for me.

So, four very different women become friends on the trip to join their Army officer husbands in Korea in 1946. Three women learn to adjust to the situation, but one ends up taking her own life. And when these women reunite twenty-five years later, they discover new things about that time in their lives--including why their friend really decided to kill herself. How did you go about developing these four very different women? Did you use character sketches?

Actually, they are composites of women I have known, or wish I had known, and the main character is definitely one I would have liked to have been in real life! I did a sort of background sketch on each woman, where she came from and what were her strengths, and used those in the writing of the book, so all the plot advances would be consistent to that character. For instance, why did Trudy inherit her father in-law’s publishing empire instead of her husband?

Why will readers care about these women? What is it about these women that will help readers relate to them?

I think they will relate to how these ordinary women faced extraordinary circumstances, and they were strengthened by their backgrounds. Take Nell, for instance. She was a West Texas school girl who hoped she would escape her life of wood-burning stoves, hauling water from a well, etc. and yet she finds herself in a primitive country teaching other women how to cook on a wood-burning stove. Maggie is a rebel from birth and she uses her rebellion to her best advantage as she marries her childhood sweetheart despite her mother’s objections. I believe we all have something in our childhoods that we can draw upon for strength during tough times. Leah, however, had no such strength to lead her through her troubled life and affairs with men other than her hometown husband.

Being a self-proclaimed Military Brat yourself, is it different to reflect upon those memories of your childhood as an adult? Did a new understanding of that time in your life impact how you approached the writing of The Women of Camp Sobingo?

Great question! While I was writing my memoirs of my Military Brat days, Once a Brat, I relived my childhood and the ghost of this woman who ended her life in Korea came up repeatedly and I knew I had to do something about that. I had also watched my mother cope with such a nomadic life, and grew to really admire her and respect her innate strength. I am always finding my childhood traits as a Military Brat that either strengthen me or give me some insight into who I have become because of that life.

Did you rely solely on your past experiences for this novel or did you research certain details?

It’s about half my experiences and half fiction. I could have done some research into Camp Sobingo, but didn’t want the present day Camp to mar my memories of those days right after WWII. As this novel is fiction, I felt I could take some liberties with time and location, and felt that researching the present-day site would take away from the fictional content.

Like I said before, this sounds like a truly amazing story. How can readers get their hands on a copy?

It can be ordered online at the Mardi Gras Publishing site:

http://www.mardigraspublishing.com/womenofcampsobingo.html

What’s up next for you? Is there anything you would like to share with fans and your fellow writers?

I have several more novels in varying states of completion. One is a sequel to my first novel, Sabbath’s Room, which is titled Sabbath’s House, where Joanna and her little family move into a huge old house in the Texas Hill Country that has a sinister secret; a romance novel titled, The Unexplored Heart (my first venture into that genre); a novel about a military jet crashing into a crowded shopping mall during a terrible tornado, titled, Forces of Nature; another murder mystery, The Murders at 5400; and my newest effort will probably be a science fiction story, Fireflies in a Jar. I am having fun playing around with these novels and try to work on them whenever time permits.

Is there anything else you would like to add?

I’ve always enjoyed writing; however, marketing my work is somewhat new to me. I may have been born without that gene, but fortunately, I have a couple of publicists who are handling that part for me. They are Dorothy Thompson and Jamieson Wolf, and their new business venture is Pump Up Your Book, found at http://www.pumpupyourbookpromotion.com/
I recommend them highly.

Thank you for sharing so much about yourself and your novel. Good luck with the rest of your virtual book tour and much success in the future.

And thank you for thinking of me and inviting me to do this interview. Best to you in your writing.

Marilyn and her novel are touring the blogosphere the entire month of July so make sure you check out her tour schedule at http://virtualbooktoursforauthors.blogspot.com/2007/06/women-of-camp-sobingo-virtual-book-tour.html to see where you can find out more about this talented author and her amazing book.