Amy Newmark's Blog - Posts Tagged "covid-19"

We are so grateful for the healthcare workers out there. And worried about them, too. My own daughter is an OB/GYN, and I worry about her contracting COVID-19 and having to be quarantined from her baby. But all the nurses and doctors and EMTs and other medical professionals out there are working away on the frontlines for the rest of us.

What to do? It’s only a drop in the bucket, but we’ve made our latest book for nurses and other healthcare workers free. Anyone who wants to read Chicken Soup for the Soul: Inspiration for Nurses: 101 Stories of Appreciation and Wisdom free can do so by downloading the ebook version wherever you like to get your ebooks.

My coauthor for the book LeAnn Thieman, is a nurse who travels the country speaking to thousands of nurses every year. She and I realized this free ebook could help not only nurses, but everyone involved in this coronavirus battle—from the cleaning crews to the orderlies to the nurses, doctors, EMTs, technicians, and other healthcare professionals.

We hope this small gesture shows all healthcare workers how much we appreciate what they are doing for the rest of us. And we know nurses and other healthcare workers may be too busy to read now, but we’d love for them to download the book and read it whenever they can, even if it’s months from now.

The free ebook version of Chicken Soup for the Soul: Inspiration for Nurses is available for free until at least May 3, 2020 on all ebook platforms.

Please share this news with all the healthcare workers you know. And if you can, stay home and stay safe. We’re doing the same while we make more books for you, for the future.


Amy Newmark

In 2007 my life changed. Our last child was going off to college and we were looking for our next business venture. Chicken Soup for the Soul was for sale and we were interested. As we evaluated the business, one of my jobs was to read 100 of the old Chicken Soup for the Soul books to understand “the product.”

I remember laughing and crying so much that I had to change my two-week contact lenses every week because I was ruining them with my tears. Those 100 books, containing 10,000 real-life stories from real people, became my crash course in Chicken Soup for the Soul advice and wisdom. That was the beginning of a new life for me. Now, 12 years later, I’ve read and edited tens of thousands more stories in the 165 new books I’ve published.

Everyone tells me I’ve changed. I feel different: more relaxed; more compassionate and less judgmental; more grounded and grateful for everything that I have; and way more knowledgeable about what makes people tick. I truly believe that reading Chicken Soup for the Soul stories has helped me through a lot of challenges—my mother dying, my father getting dementia, my cancer treatment, and now, COVID-19 and the way it’s affecting my family, friends, and colleagues — plus the damage it’s doing to our business because most bookstores are closed.

Here in the epicenter—the NY metro area—we’re plugging away making new books for the future. In the meantime, because we can all use a little Chicken Soup for the Soul, we decided to make our iconic book, the one that started it all, free as an e-book. You can download it wherever you like to get your ebooks. You’ll get all the classic stories from the original Chicken Soup for the Soul book, plus 20 bonus stories from 20 of today’s best-known motivational speakers and authors.

Stay home if you can, and stay safe. We hope the stories in this book will make everything just a little bit better for you.


Amy Newmark

With most bookstores closed and people staying home, our book business is under siege. But we’re plugging away making new books for the future. In the meantime, because we can all use a little Chicken Soup for the Soul, we decided to make our iconic book, the one that started it all, free as an e-book. You can download it wherever you like to get your ebooks. You’ll get all the classic stories from the original Chicken Soup for the Soul book, plus 20 bonus stories from 20 of today’s best-known motivational speakers and authors.

Chicken Soup for the Soul: All Your Favorite Original Stories Plus 20 Bonus Stories for the Next 20 Years contains not only new stories from Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen and me, the editor-in-chief and publisher of Chicken Soup for the Soul, but also other powerful and inspiring stories from MK Asante, Reverend Michael Beckwith, Gabrielle Bernstein, Kris Carr, Deepak Chopra, Lori Deschene, Eric Handler, Darren Hardy, Robert Holden, Tory Johnson, Mastin Kipp, Nick Ortner, Dr. Mehmet Oz, Anthony Robbins and don Miguel Ruiz.

One of my favorite classic stories in the book is the one about the man and the starfish. This story comes in various versions, but basically it’s about a man who was walking down the beach and saw a man in the distance, leaning down, picking something up, and throwing it out into the water. He did that over and over again. Picking something up and throwing it into the ocean.

When the man got closer he realized the man was picking up starfish that had washed up on the beach. He said to him, “There must be thousands of these starfish. You can’t possibly save them all.”

And the man leaned down, picked up another starfish, threw it in the ocean, and said, “I made a difference to that one.”

This is our little way of helping out. We so appreciate all our readers during normal times, and while we sit here eagerly waiting for things to get back to normal in the book business, we figured we might as well share some inspiration with all of you. We love that this original Chicken Soup for the Soul book embodies the hope, comfort, and inspiration that we all need right now. Even if you are super busy right now, working on the frontlines or educating your children at home, please download your free copy of the book. You can read it later if you can’t get to it today.

Stay home if you can, and stay safe. We hope this free ebook will make things better for you, one story at a time.


Amy Newmark

We are so excited about our new book, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Listen to Your Dreams. This is the third book we have done on dreams and their power to help you improve your life. Because here is what happens. During the day you're busy and distracted and you can't focus on your innermost thoughts and knowledge. But at night, while you are sleeping, your subconscious can get your attention, and say, "hey, here's what you need to think about or process or decide."

Here are previews of two of my favorite stories from the book that show ways you can use your dreams for personal transformation. Enjoy!

Dreams can give you courage.
In Rebecca Radicchi's story "Turned Messenger" she had a recurrent dream in which a tidal wave was roaring straight at her and she stood there frozen, watching it approach. Finally, after years of this nightmare, Rebecca decided to analyze it. She realized something very important: “Those colossal waves had never actually overtaken me. Not once.” Rebecca understood that no matter what kind of awfulness came at her, she would prevail.

She says, “From then on, I viewed those walls of water as a gift. They reminded me to balance out my feelings with facts. They encouraged me to deal with challenges by facing them. And they reassured me that no matter what comes, I’ll never be overcome.”

Dreams can save your life.
Have you ever had a premonition that something bad was about to happen? Perhaps you changed your day to avoid that bad event, or you warned someone else. In Marya Morin's story "Hush" she had so many dreams and premonitions that came true that her parents warned her not to tell anyone. Her story concerns her discovery of her gift as a young child, and her later reluctance to tell the man she was dating about it, until they were about to have a tire blow out on a mountain road. She screamed at her date to stop moments before their front tire exploded.

As they sat in the car on the shoulder of that treacherous road, trembling, she confessed that she had dreamed the night before about the tire and the ravine they would plunge into. Marya says that unlike her parents, “He expressed no fear or distaste—only relief for saving our lives and sympathy for the many omens I’d never disclosed to anyone.” They’ve been married for decades now.


Amy Newmark