Hello Sheri!

So glad you’re back. You say you’re a new creature at forty. Well I’m a new creature at fifty. And like you, suddenly everything seems possible.

Maybe it’s the onset of menopause. (I’m getting used to stripping off my clothes in the middle of the night, and, believe me, I’m not speaking in metaphor!) I don’t know. But I’m more and more shameless each passing day. A few weeks ago I even stood in the front row of the Today Show crowd with a big poster of my book.

Still, I can sympathize with Smile’s reticence to promote herself. At first, I, too, felt exceedingly uncomfortable. (This might be a woman thing.) But I believe in the power of my book, and that belief propels me onward. Who else is going to promote it if not me?

Notice that I said that I’m promoting my book. I’m not promoting myself. I’m spreading the word about something I’m passionate about, that I believe in with all my heart. It’s like pointing to the heavens and saying to a stranger walking by, “Look at that beautiful sunset!”

And, second, who will do this if I don’t? Yes, I have a publicist, a great guy named Howard Cohen that works for my publisher. But he has a stable of other authors, many with books that have come out more recently than mine. He lacks the energy, financial resources and motivation to put his heart and soul into making my book a best seller. But I have all three. Yes, money, to some extent, is an issue for me; but I’ve been networking on the Internet, which is free, and using many of Carolyn Howard-Johnson’s suggestions from “The Frugal Book Promoter.” Even my travels have been self-supporting. I make sure to do enough private events where I sell books at a profit to subsidize the events I do in bookstores where I make no money at all.

But I’m getting away from the underlying issue that Smile brings up, which is essentially a psychological one. I think the shift in consciousness for me came when I realized that promoting my book was an act of self-love.

I’m going out for a few hours, but I’ll expand on this last comment when I return.