Uncontrollable by Sara Staggs

Epilepsy, seizures, brain surgery—these are not the everyday problems of everyday people. For Casey Scott, a high-powered civil rights attorney in Portland, Oregon, they are a part of her life. Like many smart and super capable women, she is determined to manage her demanding boss, two kids, a husband—also with a big career—and her health conditions, until one day she can’t. Finally, up against a wall where sudden death from a seizure is a real possibility, Casey must make a heart-breaking decision that will alter everything she had carefully planned for her successful life.

Based on her real-life struggles with epilepsy, UNCONTROLLABLE (Black Rose Writing, 978-1-68513-201-9, $22.95, May 23, 2023) is a debut novel by Sara Staggs. It is the story of 

Casey and Jonah Scott, a power couple, who fell in love and married expecting to conquer the world. But when Casey’s seizures start occurring more frequently Jonah insists that they need to get serious medical help and make extreme changes to her career plans. 

An extensive hospital stay and painful testing takes Casey halfway across the country, while Jonah tries to handle his own failing aspirations at work and with the kids. Meanwhile, Casey is determined to return to work on a prominent civil rights case, after brain surgery. The strain on their marriage has unexpected consequences and Jonah and Casey will have to find even more strength and courage to save Casey and their family.

Sara Staggs was a civil litigator in Portland, Oregon. Two brain surgeries were successful at limiting the severity of her seizures, which can now be controlled with medication and proper self-care. She had to close her law practice and bid farewell to that chapter of her life for good. For Sara, writing is the next frontier. She has contributed to several publications including: Huffington Post, Flash Fiction Magazine, In Parentheses Literary Journal, Five Minute Lit, and Tiny Seed Literary Journal literary journals. She also has several other projects in the pipeline.

UNCONTROLLABLE is an inspirational story of a woman whose life is derailed by something out of her control, and how she chooses to face life on its terms, abandoning what she once dreamed she could be. 

SARA STAGGS was born and raised in Dallas, Texas. She practiced civil rights litigation for several years before turning to writing. Her debut novel, Uncontrollable, is based on her experiences with epilepsy, and has been called “a compelling story that tackles complex themes with sensitivity and nuance” by Pacific Book Review and is a Five-Star Readers’ Favorite.

She loves to write fiction, both adult contemporary and YA. Sara is an epilepsy advocate and an LGBTQ+ advocate. She writes a blog that covers epilepsy, LGBTQ+ concerns, writing and publishing tips. She has appeared on television and podcasts to talk about epilepsy and works to dispel the stigma that surrounds the condition. She lives in Portland, Oregon, and, when she’s not writing, can be found reading, hiking, mountain biking, or camping with her husband and two children. 

 

Find her online at www.sarastaggswrites.com

Hamlet’s Mirror by Elma Linz Kanefield with Dianne Conjeaud

Cover image for Hamlet's MirrorAt her audition, a young woman walked on stage and prepared herself to sing, but when she opened her mouth there was no sound.

This story sounds like a nightmare, but for Elma Linz Kanefield it was very real and life changing.  She wanted to understand how and why this “stage fright” happens and what makes some performers succeed while others struggle.

Elma’s trauma inspired her to become one of the world’s only specialists in the psychology of the performing artist. This September, she will share how she empowers performers and restores their mental health in her new book Hamlet’s Mirror: Reaching Your Performance Potential Onstage and Off (September 2022, Original Trade Paperback, $15.99).

Elma defines Performance Potential as “being the best you can be and doing the best you can do based on what you know in the moment of performance.”   This is an internal state when you are emotionally and mentally able to balance the challenges, fears, and insecurities that can come with entertaining others.

In Hamlet’s Mirror, Elma explores the performer’s culture:  its challenges, the highs and the lows.  Then she delves into the four performing personality profiles she identified in her work:

  1. Problem-Ridden Performer
  2. Pugnacious Performer
  3. Promising Performer
  4. Potential-Realized Performer

Each section of the book is accompanied by fictionalized anecdotes of real performers who worked with Elma throughout four decades of having a New York City psychotherapy practice exclusive to performing artists.  Also included are questions and reflections for readers who will have an opportunity to identify what kind of performer they are.  Finally, Elma reveals how to reach your performance potential and adds examples to support her points.

Hamlet’s Mirror is for anyone considering a life in the performing arts from young people preparing to enter the “real world” of professional artists to seasoned performers who feel they are not realizing their performance potential.

Hamlet’s Mirror
by Elma Linz Kanefield, LCSW with Dianne Conjeaud
Publication Date: Sep 15, 2022
Paperback ISBN: 979-8-9862605-0-1
Price: $15.99
Page count: 212

In Hindsight by Sharon Bonanno and Lisa Scott

In Hindsight By Sharon Bonanno and Lisa ScottThis is our story. 

On the outside, Sharon and Lisa appear to be two normal sisters living life in a quiet suburban neighborhood of New Jersey. Their parents divorce when they are young; every other weekend is spent at their dad’s house with his new wife, Janet, and their two children, who seem to dominate their father’s time and devotion. Their mother, on the other hand, works multiple jobs at a time to stay afloat and provide everything she possibly can for her beloved daughters.

“Mom had a way of finding out what we wanted and needed and made sure that it appeared.”

Like many sisters, Sharon and Lisa are competitive; they fight for their parents’ attention and call each other out when necessary. However, as they enter adulthood, life takes two very different turns for the women. Sharon moves into a career and starts a family, while Lisa finds herself tumbling down a dark path of addiction, deceit, and depression – a path only tough love and accountability can help pull her out of. But when Lisa’s drug addiction and constant deception lead to her inevitable breaking point, it’s no one other than Sharon who provides the wake-up call Lisa needs to finally seek professional help. 

“But when I looked at Mom, and then at Sharon, I could see how injured they were, and I knew that I’d done it to them. That realization shattered the shell inside my skin that I thought had been protecting me but really had been holding me captive.”

IN HINDSIGHT: The Story of Two Sisters Who Hurt, Hindered, and Healed Each Other (Advantage Publishing, ISBN: 978-1-64225-131-9, Original Trade Paperback) explores both the good and bad sides of Sharon and Lisa’s childhoods while also examining the differences between their personalities and perspectives. It authentically highlights the duo’s unbreakable bond that allows them to conquer hardships and challenge each other to be the best versions of themselves. This woven memoir acts as an incredible success story for those who have battled with their own inner demons, proving you too can turn your life around and even find success assisting those who struggle with the same issues you were once able to defeat. 

“I understand that we model behavior unconsciously. But I also know that it is possible to transcend your past, consider how your behavior affects others, and end abusive cycles.”

IN HINDSIGHT is a beautiful representation of the special bond sisters share and a true testament to all that can happen when you not only overcome your situation, but flourish into the successful person you were always meant to be.  

About the Authors: 

Sharon Bonanno is a wife, mother, daughter, sister, aunt, and friend. She takes her relationships seriously and always makes them a priority. Sharon has been a teacher for 22+ years and is passionate about her job. Leading and guiding young people has been her specialty since 1994. Her goal every day is to continue to make people feel that there isn’t anything they can’t do and to help others be the best versions of themselves.

Lisa Scott is a wife, mother, and experienced entrepreneur. Driven by her passion for helping others, she is motivated by her belief that all people deserve second chances. Her number one goal is to show as many people as possible that they can achieve anything they want in life.  Lisa is forever optimistic and believes that life is always speaking to us; we just have to learn to listen.

IN HINDSIGHT: The Story of How Two Sisters Who Hurt, Hindered, and Healed Each Other
By Sharon Bonanno and Lisa Scott
Advantage Publishing
ISBN: 978-1-64225-131-9
Price: $19.99
Original Trade Paperback
165 pages

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The Adventures of Veggieman: Food Fight by Karla Farach

The Adventures of Veggieman: Food Fight It is the first day at his new school, and Niko can already sense trouble in the air. Kids are throwing candy wrappers at each other, jumping on tables, and even sleeping at their desks. Perhaps the most shocking part of it all is that their teacher is doing nothing to stop the chaos. Naturally, Niko knew he had to step in and try to find the principal. Little did he know he would find himself in the middle of an epic battle between the forces of good and evil – evil junk food and good fruits and vegetables, that is.

In book one of THE ADVENTURES OF VEGGIEMAN: Food Fight! (Mascot Publishing; July 2020, ISBN: ; Original Trade Paperback), author Karla Farach takes young readers for a ride as they follow Niko, Veggieman, and more healthy superheroes in a battle for wellness against the gummy villain. Will the evil junk food’s pandemonium persevere? Or will the good guys come out on top in pursuit of health and vitality? 

Perhaps most important of all, THE ADVENTURES OF VEGGIEMAN acts as a fun, engaging, and informative tool for parents and educators to start conversations with their children about the power of wellness and the ability to make smart food choices. It’s a helpful reminder that it is never too early to teach kids about the benefits of healthy eating habits as well as the dangers of overconsumption. Farach’s ultimate goal with this book is to empower every child to become curators of their own superhero stories of health.

About the Author: Karla Farach is the CEO of Mothers of Health, LLC, a company she founded to inspire women and parents to adopt a healthier lifestyle. She is passionate about nutrition and wellness and is certified as a health and life coach by the Institute of Integrative Nutrition. Karla was born and raised in the Dominican Republic and lives in Greenwich, Connecticut with her husband and two sons. Karla’s favorite vegetable is kale.

You can visit her on the web at www.veggieman.com.

THE ADVENTURES OF VEGGIEMAN: Food Fight!
By Karla Farach
Mascot Publishing
Publication Date: July, 2020
ISBN (lib.): 
Format: Paperback
Price:
Page Count: 60

A Surgeon’s Odyssey by Richard Moss

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

“[A SURGEON’S ODYSSEY] belongs on the bookshelf as a modern tale next to the Iliad, the Odyssey, Ulysses, and the biblical Exodus.”
—John F.X. Ryan Jr., Former Managing Director, Sovran Limited and Pac West Distributing Inc., Executive Assistant, Lieutenant Governor, Indiana

“Dr. Moss gives the reader a glimpse of his three-year expedition into an exotic world, a true-life quest that is inspiring, uplifting, and tragic.”
Danny J. Barrett, Director, International Agreements, Commander, US Naval Forces, Japan

“A fantastic journey through third world Asian medicine, culture, and spirituality. Dr. Moss’s odyssey exposes the reader to people and worlds that would otherwise remain hidden. A must-read for the adventurous!”
—Diane Larson, RN, Charge Nurse of Endoscopy Services, Memorial Hospital Outpatient Surgery Center

“Moss is a captivating storyteller who from the first page masterfully pulls the reader into the world of his life as a young head and neck surgeon…Readers will be swept away in this incredible journey.”
—Kimberly Wagner, Featured Writer at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum and children’s book author

A SURGEON’S ODYSSEY
A Memoir
By Dr. Richard Moss

“Do not forsake your dreams for material security.” This wisdom, inscribed on a fortune cookie in a downtown Manhattan Chinese restaurant, was the catalyst a newly-licensed Dr. Richard Moss needed to book a ticket to Asia and start the next chapter in his life healing people overseas. In his exploratory and moving new memoir, A SURGEON’S ODYSSEY (Archway Books; May 2018), Dr. Moss tells his story of entering the medical field by helping those in need and going on the adventure of a lifetime.

As a 33-year-old surgeon, fresh out of his residency training in Manhattan for Otolaryngology (Ear Nose and Throat), Dr. Moss dedicated 14 years of his life to becoming a doctor and was finally at the point where he could start a practice and earn money. But when a letter from the hospital at Chiang Mai University in Thailand arrived, asking to put his experience to work in their Otolaryngology department, Dr. Moss was at a crossroads…Until fortune stepped in and made him realize what he wanted to do all along.

In A SURGEON’S ODYSSEY, Dr. Moss takes readers along his exciting journey as a young doctor learning to navigate the medical field on a foreign continent, far from his humble beginnings in the Bronx. He shares how, as a cancer surgeon of Jewish faith living in the exotic landscapes of Thailand, Nepal, India, and Bangladesh, he had to teach himself to view situations from different cultural and religious perspectives.

Dr. Moss juggles his responsibility to heal with his bizarre and otherworldly wanderings through Asia, including: Meeting his wife Ying, a Buddhist Thai nurse he married in the context of unexpected and powerful Thai cultural imperatives; encountering the enigmatic Jewish-American Buddhist monk Uttamo living in the jungle at the Thai-Malaysia border; operating on a man by candlelight in Bangladesh when the power cut out in the hospital during a monsoon; motorcycling with Ying through the Himalayas and nearly getting rammed off a cliff by a mother Yak protecting her calf; practicing walking meditation in a forest temple in southern Thailand; surviving one of the worst typhoons and mudslides in modern history; getting shot at by a Burmese soldier when trying to cross the border; pounding a drum all night to ward off evil spirits at a Buddhist ceremony; receiving a prize chicken and newborn goat from a poor family as a token of their gratitude for a surgery performed on a loved one; and getting robbed on a train in India, only for Ying to jump on the thief’s back and successfully retrieve his stolen wallet.

Forgoing comfort and financial security to find himself in a strange but beautiful world, A SURGEON’S ODYSSEY is the unique and inspiring journey of a cancer surgeon who, against conventional wisdom, embarks on a pilgrimage of healing, working under daunting circumstances among some of the most fascinating cultures in the world.

About the Author
RICHARD MOSS, M.D., is a board-certified head and neck surgeon with a private practice in Jasper, Indiana, where he has lived for over 25 years with his wife and four children. Dr. Moss earned his Doctor of Medicine degree at the Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis.  He is a columnist, a local businessman, and has sought political office. He is also the author of Matilda’s Triumph: A Memoir.

About the Publisher
Simon & Schuster, a company with nearly 90 years of publishing experience, has teamed up with Author Solutions, the leading self-publishing company worldwide, to create Archway Publishing. With unique resources to support books of all kinds, Archway Publishing offers a specialized approach to help every author reach his or her desired audience.

A SURGEON’S ODYSSEY: A Memoir | Dr. Richard Moss
Archway Publishing from Simon & Schuster | May 2018

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