PURCHASING A COPY OF FARTHER ALONG: THE WRITING JOURNEY OF THIRTEEN BEREAVED MOTHERS:
If you live in Winston-Salem, Charlotte, Raleigh-Chapel Hill or Wilmington areas of North Carolina or in northern Virginia, you can contact any of the women in the writing group to purchase a copy directly from any of them. Proceeds go to the SECU Family House in Winston-Salem, the hospital hospitality house. http://www.familyhousews.org
Books are available at the events listed on Book Events and are also available from amazon.com and other online booksellers. SECU Family House (beside Hospice and Palliative CareCenter on Baldwin Drive) in Winston-Salem has books for sale. Also in the Winston-Salem area, Bethania Mill Stone General Store at 5455 Bethania Rd., Winston-Salem, NC 27106 and Barnhill’s Books at 811 Burke St., Winston-Salem, NC 27101 have books available.
- Scharme and her friend Mary Lou sold books at the one-year birthday celebration for the SECU Family House on September 23. All proceeds from the book benefit the SECU Family House, the hospital hospitality house in Winston-Salem, NC.
IN THE NEWS:
- August 16 article in the Carrboro Citizen
- Listen to a story by Keri Brown aired on WFDD FM on August 20.
- See p. 110 in August 2012 Forsyth Woman
- See “Writing Helps Grieving Mothers” in August 29 Chapel Hill News
- “Walk Slowly and Bow Often” from August 29 Chapel Hill News
- “Empty Chair at the Table” from August 29 Chapel Hill News
- “Worry Dolls and Letting Go” from August 29 Chapel Hill News
- See Sherrie Norris’s story “Memoir with a Mission” in the Sunday, September 2 Watauga Democrat
- October issue of All About Women includes a story featuring three of the writers who have Boone connections. See www.aawmag.com and choose the October issue.
- October 31 issue of FauquierNow includes a story about the symposium on November 3 in Warrenton, Virginia
- News article from the Salisbury Post on November 28
- Wilmington Star News article on December 28
- Salisbury Post article on April 21
WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING ABOUT THE BOOK:
When my son Josh died, I was inconsolable. My grief and rage were catastrophic. I became completely nonfunctional. I cried all the time. I lost thirty pounds. Weeks passed, then months. I was wearing out my husband and all my friends. Finally I went to a psychiatrist, a kind, rumpled man who formed his hands into a tent and listened to me scream and rave and cry for several weeks.
Then came the day when he held up his hand and said, ‘Enough.’
‘What?’ I stared at him.
‘I am going to give you a new prescription.’
‘Oh, good,’ I said, wanting more drugs, anything.
He ripped out the prescription and handed it to me.
‘Write every day,’ it said in his crabbed little hand.
I didn’t think I could do it, but I did. I got back to the novel I had barely begun when Josh died.
And three years later, I could find my way to the grocery store again, I could laugh again, and I could remember the good times. Josh had become a part of who I am now.
Though we are not all professional writers, I am convinced that the mysterious and healing alchemy of writing can help us all. Carol Henderson is an expert and trustworthy guide—besides, she knows the territory.”~ Lee Smith, author of Fair and Tender Ladies“In this brilliant, carefully wrought book, Carol Henderson has given us much more than a deeply healing practice for the bereaved and for those who would help them. Here are the very hearts of those who have lost a child, and here is a wise and practiced way to be a companion to and healer of the bereaved. Henderson herself has lost a child; she has turned that searing experience into a triumphant gift of detailed instructions and luminous experiences to assist those who must travel the same difficult journey.”~Pat Schneider, author of Writing Alone and With Others and founder of Amherst Writers and Artists (AWA)
“Mothers who have lost children often come to me, desperate to tell their stories, desperate for someone to listen. What Carol Henderson has done is give bereaved mothers a voice. And in FARTHER ALONG, she shows us all the pain of grief, mothers’ love, and the bravery of these women who put their stories on paper. This book should be a guide for counselors and teachers, for the bereaved, and for those who want to listen.” ~ Ann Hood, author of The Knitting Circle and Comfort: A Journey through Grief
Have you read the book? Leave your comments here:
I think the book launch for “Farther Long” at the Community Arts Cafe in downtown Winston-Salem was one of the most authentic gatherings I’ve ever attended. I was moved beyond words. Thank you all. Emily Herring Wilson
Thank you so much for coming and for sharing this book launch with us, Emily.
I am reading this book. Each page is filled with so much awareness of what is important in life that it has put me in touch with savoring the richness of each moment of life. Do not race though life overlooking precious people and times.
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From Jim Clemens, the brother of one of the Farther Along group members:
OK, so maybe it’s a bit odd that I chose to to bring along Farther Along on our 25th anniversary trip to the Bahamas, but I figured I would have some down time and a chance to reflect.
First, What a great read! Well done. After reading through it though, it dawned on me that I’ll bet you are getting many varied responses.
This is where it met me…
Where to begin..all the writing stuff seemed secondary, necessary, but not the main focus of the story. Also, oddly enough, the individual stories, again absolutely necessary, was still not the main purpose (for me) of the book..
To me it read kind of like and adventure story…let me try to explain….
Not to be cliche, but remember the first Lord of the Rings where you met all the individual characters and slowly they came together and eventually ended up on this mighty quest together? All those different personalities, going about it in different ways but all striving toward a common goal? As they were thrown together you could feel the awkwardness and/or tension coming from the group but by the end they had formed a union brought about by common experiences and goals. My favorite scene in that movie is at the end of the third one where the four hobbits are sitting around a table at a bar back in the shire while life goes on around them because no one else knows the truth that had been going on around them. The four hobbits knew and clung to one another through those common experiences.
How your group of women grew together was the most fascinating part of the story for me. A Journey into Authentic Community.
I was moved obviously by all the individual stories. Tragic. But in the end, life. We will all be touched by tragedy. Some more than others, sadly to say.
But what really jumped out of the pages to me was how you are all dealing with it within community.
Very good read! And may we all learn something about the journey of life from each other.