In 1991 I went to a writing workshop in a castle on the Irish Sea. While the waves banged and the sheep bleated and baa baa-ed, the participants wrote about loss. I learned there that writing was a way of “resurrecting” the lost.

My missing person was a twenty-month old baby brother, blind and deaf. I can’t tell you anymore, because I want you to read the memoir. That’s what the marketing experts teach newly published writers. I’m listening to these experts, now that my own memoir is waiting patiently for a second reading by a feminist publisher.

If it’s a go, I’ll be blogging more regularly and flooding the internet with my name, Judy Labensohn, and title, Our Names Do Not Appear.

Our Names Do Not Appear

The publishing experts advise short blog posts from writers who want people to read their books. I’m ready for a new job. Why not marketing?

If you get tired of my hopefully frequent upcoming blog posts, feel free to unsubscribe. One click below. It’s easy. If you like the posts, do share them with your extended family, friends, enemies, whoever reads.

See. I already sound like a marketing writer and I don’t even have a contract.

Overcoming my self-consciousness to market my memoir shouldn’t take me more than a decade. After all, it has taken me only thirty-four years to complete my “project.” During this time, the publishing world has changed. My book will not be a book in the old-fashioned sense of that word. If all goes well, my memoir will first be an e-book, to be downloaded onto a “device,” and only later, a print-on-demand book. POD BOOK. It could be that by the time the memoir gets “published,” I will not have the technological skills to buy my own book. Fortunately, I have a hard copy and a Disk on Key that I have mastered, though this devilish little DOK device often disappears in the cracks between the shelf and the wall.

Over the years I have come to recognize that my memoir, as well as being well-written, may also help people stick to their goal, as in If this Judy in Israel could spend 34 years writing one amazing book, I can at least (i.e. make dinner, read Moby Dick, write a new Moby Dick.).

I’m already looking forward to dissecting my “grief memoir” into fifty-two usable topics for blog posts.  I promise not to overdo the grief, as many potential readers do not want to go there. I personally, revel in grief. Tisha b’Av is my favorite Jewish day of the year. Not that I want to “resurrect” the lost Temple, but I do believe in integrating lost parts of ourselves into our messy identities.

All for now, folks. My first short marketing post. Fingers crossed.

I’ll let you know “how things develop,” as they say in the marketing world.

Hope this endeavor will prove more successful than my hair-cutting “business.” No, I never cut off anyone’s ear, but my appointment book stares at me with that cunning dare of the proverbial blank page.