Avi Morris's Blog
June 14, 2016
Fighting Child Abuse
It's been a while since I posted. I, along with my wife, have been doing more and more straight advocacy regarding victims of child abuse and in particular the needs of abused kids who find their way into the foster care system. When I wrote Crocodile Mothers Eat Their Young, at the top of my wish list was that if the book moved even one reader to do something to help a child in need, I will have accomplished something
The foster daughter of ours who was the model for my main character, Valentina (Tina) Diaz is now an adult, married mom and still a part of our family. I named the character Valentina because the real young woman was - is - a valentine to us, changing our lives for the good as much as I hope we did the same for her. She's become part of our advocacy team, and will be with us in a short time when we do a workshop at a national foster care providers convention. We should have her do it alone. She's the one everyone remembers, she has such a powerful story to tell, her sweetness shining through along with the force of her sincerity.
The workshop is all about the special needs of teens approaching the prospect of independence. What combination of personality and experiences do a lot of these kids have in common that might go beyond the normal trials of being a teenager. Most of these kids have been in situations where individual growth was squashed, peer relationships non-existent or minimal, and self-esteem just a dictionary phrase. Getting them to understand the sort of persistence it takes to "make it" in the adult world, whatever that means.
In the United States, at any given time there are about 460000 kids in foster care, about a quarter available for adoption. Of that large number, only about 4% can be expected to lead productive, healthy adult lives. Abysmal. Anything that can can improve a child's prospects and substantially improve that percentage is worth it. Mentoring - most states have such programs, joining one of the many advocacy groups that exist in every state of the union, fostering of course, even adoption, but always love. It's the biggest confidence booster. Figure what healthy interests a child has, any talent, and nurture it, encourage it and praise it. Finding other kids with the same interests. Teaching them how to deal with frustrations without acting out and without quitting - grit as the word is used these days. Helping them learn how to trust, sometimes the hardest of all.
Even if it's a few hours a month of volunteering or mentoring, it's worth it. Remember, helping even one child makes a difference, Make a child your own valentine.
The foster daughter of ours who was the model for my main character, Valentina (Tina) Diaz is now an adult, married mom and still a part of our family. I named the character Valentina because the real young woman was - is - a valentine to us, changing our lives for the good as much as I hope we did the same for her. She's become part of our advocacy team, and will be with us in a short time when we do a workshop at a national foster care providers convention. We should have her do it alone. She's the one everyone remembers, she has such a powerful story to tell, her sweetness shining through along with the force of her sincerity.
The workshop is all about the special needs of teens approaching the prospect of independence. What combination of personality and experiences do a lot of these kids have in common that might go beyond the normal trials of being a teenager. Most of these kids have been in situations where individual growth was squashed, peer relationships non-existent or minimal, and self-esteem just a dictionary phrase. Getting them to understand the sort of persistence it takes to "make it" in the adult world, whatever that means.
In the United States, at any given time there are about 460000 kids in foster care, about a quarter available for adoption. Of that large number, only about 4% can be expected to lead productive, healthy adult lives. Abysmal. Anything that can can improve a child's prospects and substantially improve that percentage is worth it. Mentoring - most states have such programs, joining one of the many advocacy groups that exist in every state of the union, fostering of course, even adoption, but always love. It's the biggest confidence booster. Figure what healthy interests a child has, any talent, and nurture it, encourage it and praise it. Finding other kids with the same interests. Teaching them how to deal with frustrations without acting out and without quitting - grit as the word is used these days. Helping them learn how to trust, sometimes the hardest of all.
Even if it's a few hours a month of volunteering or mentoring, it's worth it. Remember, helping even one child makes a difference, Make a child your own valentine.
February 2, 2016
Writer's Block Strikes
I sit on the horns of a dilemma. My writing is a lot like my reading. Several books at the same time and I can't seem to get beyond page 50 in any of them. At least not within my lifetime which is now decidedly on the short end of the straw.
I have three projects going, two of which should be fairly easy to wrap up, and the third, well,,,,
Anyway, the two "easy" ones, are actually older works that I'm updating. Although both are in the twenty year old vintage or so, the themes aren't outdated. They were written at a time when self-publishing was truly for those who had to see their work in print, and most of it was dreadful - says he flashing his arrogant sneer. My first had a month stay with a real literary agent before said he no. It's pretty philosophical. Sort of the Noah's Ark story but with a touch of sci-fi. Funny, but I rarely read sci-fi. The second was with an e-book publisher for three agonizing months before they decided against it. Ha, they are out of business. My book, doubtless, would have assured their fortune. It's a parody of American talk TV and election year politics. The timing might be right. I didn't pursue either any further at the time because my kids were getting to be college age plus I had to focus on my bill-paying day job and didn't want my hard-working wife to lock me out.
The third is a bear of writer's block for me. For anyone who read my first published novel, Crocodile Mothers Eat Their Young, the new one is also drawn from a true story. But unlike the first book where the lives of the real people I based the story on were well past the main drama when I was writing, the life of the young person featured in the new novel is still unfolding in an uncertain direction. Hard drug addiction will do that to a person. I want the ending to be happy, and maybe it will be. But the real story keeps getting in the way. I have a two or three page section written that could be a prologue, an epilogue, or anything in between. I think it's the best few page stretch I've ever written. It's been sitting by its lonely self for a while now. I want to finish it before the straw gets much shorter. Maybe writing this today will clear the mind. We'll see what tomorrow brings. Thanks for giving me a shoulder to lean on. More importantly, pray for the troubled young man.
I have three projects going, two of which should be fairly easy to wrap up, and the third, well,,,,
Anyway, the two "easy" ones, are actually older works that I'm updating. Although both are in the twenty year old vintage or so, the themes aren't outdated. They were written at a time when self-publishing was truly for those who had to see their work in print, and most of it was dreadful - says he flashing his arrogant sneer. My first had a month stay with a real literary agent before said he no. It's pretty philosophical. Sort of the Noah's Ark story but with a touch of sci-fi. Funny, but I rarely read sci-fi. The second was with an e-book publisher for three agonizing months before they decided against it. Ha, they are out of business. My book, doubtless, would have assured their fortune. It's a parody of American talk TV and election year politics. The timing might be right. I didn't pursue either any further at the time because my kids were getting to be college age plus I had to focus on my bill-paying day job and didn't want my hard-working wife to lock me out.
The third is a bear of writer's block for me. For anyone who read my first published novel, Crocodile Mothers Eat Their Young, the new one is also drawn from a true story. But unlike the first book where the lives of the real people I based the story on were well past the main drama when I was writing, the life of the young person featured in the new novel is still unfolding in an uncertain direction. Hard drug addiction will do that to a person. I want the ending to be happy, and maybe it will be. But the real story keeps getting in the way. I have a two or three page section written that could be a prologue, an epilogue, or anything in between. I think it's the best few page stretch I've ever written. It's been sitting by its lonely self for a while now. I want to finish it before the straw gets much shorter. Maybe writing this today will clear the mind. We'll see what tomorrow brings. Thanks for giving me a shoulder to lean on. More importantly, pray for the troubled young man.
May 23, 2015
Universal Pre-school
In the United States, one of the great issues of our day relates to the problem of endemic poverty and few positive life skills moving across many generations among significant parts of the population.
One of the glaring characteristics of people seemingly stuck in that cycle is a low interest in education and low family stability. Programs abound to try and subsidize income, stimulate welfare to work etc. and have for years, but the cycle is a stubborn one and is far from being broken.
It seems to me that one important element in giving people the right mindset about the future has a lot to do with an early interest in learning. One typical characteristic among people who have had a better start on a road to a potentially better or productive life is that quite often they were introduced to books and reading,starting even in infancy, and well before any entry into organized education. Books not only open a child to the world of literacy and information about the the world around them, they also spark the imagination. Imagination is such an important piece of intellectual development and the ability to conceptualize things whether a person's future be a nuclear physicist, an auto mechanic, a truck driver or a great novelist. Reading also improves writing skills.It's relatively rare for kids born into a poverty cycle to have been introduced to books and reading as an every day event before reaching kindergarten, and there tends to be little reinforcement of the skill when back at home.
Universal pre-school where a child begins at a fairly early age to be read to and encouraged to love books might not be a magic solution, but I believe it's a valuable piece of an answer that hasn't nearly been explored enough. If the poverty cycle is to broken, along with all the negatives not only for the individual lives of people but also for the economic drag on the greater society that seems to come part and parcel with endemic poverty in the forms of welfare assistance, crime rates, and other problems,then it's time for untried measures. There is certainly a cost to it, but I believe that a universal pre-school system could attract a large number of volunteers to supplement professionals just to handle the reading element of pre-school. High school and college students, any adult with the time and interest could provide the personnel and the role-modeling that kids need.
Universal pre-school has been proposed politically as a national approach, but it hasn't gained a lot of momentum yet. The cost almost always becomes an issue. and certainly localities would need to have financial support form higher levels of government. But the reality, it seems to me, is that not doing something often comes with its own cost. Deferred maintenance of anything leads either to total breakdown or a much greater expense down the road. It's been too long that the problem of poverty cycles and related issues to the greater society have simply been described and complained about without the real commitment to invest in the steps that might truly break the cycle. Getting people genuinely focused on a positive attitude toward learning should be tried at the earliest practical age.
One of the glaring characteristics of people seemingly stuck in that cycle is a low interest in education and low family stability. Programs abound to try and subsidize income, stimulate welfare to work etc. and have for years, but the cycle is a stubborn one and is far from being broken.
It seems to me that one important element in giving people the right mindset about the future has a lot to do with an early interest in learning. One typical characteristic among people who have had a better start on a road to a potentially better or productive life is that quite often they were introduced to books and reading,starting even in infancy, and well before any entry into organized education. Books not only open a child to the world of literacy and information about the the world around them, they also spark the imagination. Imagination is such an important piece of intellectual development and the ability to conceptualize things whether a person's future be a nuclear physicist, an auto mechanic, a truck driver or a great novelist. Reading also improves writing skills.It's relatively rare for kids born into a poverty cycle to have been introduced to books and reading as an every day event before reaching kindergarten, and there tends to be little reinforcement of the skill when back at home.
Universal pre-school where a child begins at a fairly early age to be read to and encouraged to love books might not be a magic solution, but I believe it's a valuable piece of an answer that hasn't nearly been explored enough. If the poverty cycle is to broken, along with all the negatives not only for the individual lives of people but also for the economic drag on the greater society that seems to come part and parcel with endemic poverty in the forms of welfare assistance, crime rates, and other problems,then it's time for untried measures. There is certainly a cost to it, but I believe that a universal pre-school system could attract a large number of volunteers to supplement professionals just to handle the reading element of pre-school. High school and college students, any adult with the time and interest could provide the personnel and the role-modeling that kids need.
Universal pre-school has been proposed politically as a national approach, but it hasn't gained a lot of momentum yet. The cost almost always becomes an issue. and certainly localities would need to have financial support form higher levels of government. But the reality, it seems to me, is that not doing something often comes with its own cost. Deferred maintenance of anything leads either to total breakdown or a much greater expense down the road. It's been too long that the problem of poverty cycles and related issues to the greater society have simply been described and complained about without the real commitment to invest in the steps that might truly break the cycle. Getting people genuinely focused on a positive attitude toward learning should be tried at the earliest practical age.
May 4, 2015
Great People
This past weekend was a first for me, a result of the publication of my first novel - based on a true story - Crocodile Mothers Eat Their Young. It was at the annual conference of the Connecticut Association of Foster and Adoptive Parents (CAFAP) at the Marriott in Mystic Connecticut. I was there in two roles: As a vendor of my book in the exhibition hall and as a workshop presenter along with my wife and my former foster daughter who is the model for my novel's main character.
First, the workshop. While I have experience as a speaker and in my former life as an attorney many tough situtions, I was not accustomed to a workshop presentation, and with the knowledge that several of our audience had fostered many more children than I, it was a bit scary. My wife to the rescue. She is a veteran workshop presenter on writing and literacy, so she organized me and settled the nerves, assuring me that we had a great workshop.
Then there was my ex-foster daughter, now 29, who saved both my wife and me from our ineptitude with creating a power point presentation. She was great at that, not to mention how effective she was in recounting the horrendous story of her abused childhood. She, now married and a mom, is quite a young woman. Our topic, by the way, was on how to help create a foundation for possible success as a teen-aged abuse victim moved on into the adult world.
But the best part of the two day experience was meeting the amazing people who dedicate their lives and their homes to kids in need. One family was recognized for fostering over 100 kids over 40 years. One single dad has fostered only teens, often many at a time. Teens, which was our universe of foster kids, are typically the hardest to place and the hardest to find adoption interest in cases where the natural parent has lost parental rights. One story after another of the selfless contribution to child welfare. Quite moving. Foster homes can get a bad rap from news reports of the odd situation of a bad foster home or parents who are supposedly in it for the money. Believe me, those are the rare cases and the money cannot compensate nearly what the foster parents contribute on their own to try and make a decent life for kids, almost all of whom have had to live through unspeakable trauma.
The event itself was a good as it gets. between three and four hundred people attended. There is zero cost for attending, including the workshops (many choices) and the meals. All the funding comes from donor contributions. The event organizers did a perfect job, and I'm sure overcoming little catastrophes that nobody else was aware of. The Marriott did a great job with the food. It's fair to say that I've never been to a hotel based conference that had more impressive meals, and I'm pretty sure that was the unanimous feeling.
The conference and the day of our workshop (day two of the event) happened to coincide with a milestone birthday of mine. It was a totally memorable day.
First, the workshop. While I have experience as a speaker and in my former life as an attorney many tough situtions, I was not accustomed to a workshop presentation, and with the knowledge that several of our audience had fostered many more children than I, it was a bit scary. My wife to the rescue. She is a veteran workshop presenter on writing and literacy, so she organized me and settled the nerves, assuring me that we had a great workshop.
Then there was my ex-foster daughter, now 29, who saved both my wife and me from our ineptitude with creating a power point presentation. She was great at that, not to mention how effective she was in recounting the horrendous story of her abused childhood. She, now married and a mom, is quite a young woman. Our topic, by the way, was on how to help create a foundation for possible success as a teen-aged abuse victim moved on into the adult world.
But the best part of the two day experience was meeting the amazing people who dedicate their lives and their homes to kids in need. One family was recognized for fostering over 100 kids over 40 years. One single dad has fostered only teens, often many at a time. Teens, which was our universe of foster kids, are typically the hardest to place and the hardest to find adoption interest in cases where the natural parent has lost parental rights. One story after another of the selfless contribution to child welfare. Quite moving. Foster homes can get a bad rap from news reports of the odd situation of a bad foster home or parents who are supposedly in it for the money. Believe me, those are the rare cases and the money cannot compensate nearly what the foster parents contribute on their own to try and make a decent life for kids, almost all of whom have had to live through unspeakable trauma.
The event itself was a good as it gets. between three and four hundred people attended. There is zero cost for attending, including the workshops (many choices) and the meals. All the funding comes from donor contributions. The event organizers did a perfect job, and I'm sure overcoming little catastrophes that nobody else was aware of. The Marriott did a great job with the food. It's fair to say that I've never been to a hotel based conference that had more impressive meals, and I'm pretty sure that was the unanimous feeling.
The conference and the day of our workshop (day two of the event) happened to coincide with a milestone birthday of mine. It was a totally memorable day.
March 24, 2015
To The Real World
Sometimes a little break is needed from the whirlwind of marketing a book, figuring out the plot of a new one, and wishing income tax day would be dropped from the calendar. Add in the horrible New England winter of 2014-2015, and the tropics are just what the doctor ordered.
Is there any place on the planet with better weather than Aruba? Some are prettier, some are busier, some are bigger, but for plain sunshine and warmth everyday, there are none better. Okay, I've probably been on less than 1/10 of 1% of all of the tropical islands in the world, but allow me my perfect escape. The turquoise water, the cool, coral sand beaches, iguana that seem to think that people are a nuisance to be tolerated or on a good day, an easy source of junk food (don't feed the iguana folks, our food is not good for them). Today I look at the unmelted snow in my frozen yard on the fourth day of spring, scarcely believing that forty-eight hours ago I was in heaven.
So, what does a newly-published author do, lazily stretched out on his poolside chaise while inviting a case of first degree sunburn? He daydreams he's meandering down Duval Street in equally balmy Key West, locked arm in arm with Ernest Hemingway, having emerged from a round of martinis at Sloppy Joe's. Hemingway, dragging his young companion toward his fishing pier, is intent on absorbing the pearls of artistic advice I'm offering. "Ernie, ya hafta sharpen your prose," I slur, and he agrees, but warns that he hates to be called "Ernie."
The vision faded, and the heat of the day forced me to seek the shade of a coconut palm. I looked around. My travel companions were wading in the over-sized, meandering pool. Almost everyone at else at the pool is reading. But, they aren't reading my book.They probably haven't heard of my book.
"You're on vacation," I reminded myself.
"Don't do it," I scolded, "they're on vacation, too."
The fancy new business cards I'd stashed in my wallet (good deal from Staples) were calling my name. In not so many words, they begged people to buy the best novel in history, but idle in my wallet, they were just useless pieces of paper. As if impelled by some wicked force, I walked up to my first unsuspecting customer, clicking on to the next page of her latest Grisham. "Excuse me," I said, "but I couldn't help noticing that you're reading." She gave me a strange look, and nodded. Feeling a bit clumsy, I asked her if she'd like to know about a great new book from a wonderful author. I started to reach for my wallet. "Who would that be," she asked. Suddenly sweating - not from the Aruban heat - I was wishing my business cards would be quiet, and fumbled for an answer. As the improbable words "Ernest Hem...." were escaping my mouth, a poke in the ribs startled me.
"Avi, wake up, you're talking in your sleep and burning to a crisp," my wife warned. Pleasure island or not, marketing never takes a holiday. I did get one poor guy from Cincinnati to buy Crocodile Mothers Eat Their Young, the best novel ever written Just ask my business cards.
Is there any place on the planet with better weather than Aruba? Some are prettier, some are busier, some are bigger, but for plain sunshine and warmth everyday, there are none better. Okay, I've probably been on less than 1/10 of 1% of all of the tropical islands in the world, but allow me my perfect escape. The turquoise water, the cool, coral sand beaches, iguana that seem to think that people are a nuisance to be tolerated or on a good day, an easy source of junk food (don't feed the iguana folks, our food is not good for them). Today I look at the unmelted snow in my frozen yard on the fourth day of spring, scarcely believing that forty-eight hours ago I was in heaven.
So, what does a newly-published author do, lazily stretched out on his poolside chaise while inviting a case of first degree sunburn? He daydreams he's meandering down Duval Street in equally balmy Key West, locked arm in arm with Ernest Hemingway, having emerged from a round of martinis at Sloppy Joe's. Hemingway, dragging his young companion toward his fishing pier, is intent on absorbing the pearls of artistic advice I'm offering. "Ernie, ya hafta sharpen your prose," I slur, and he agrees, but warns that he hates to be called "Ernie."
The vision faded, and the heat of the day forced me to seek the shade of a coconut palm. I looked around. My travel companions were wading in the over-sized, meandering pool. Almost everyone at else at the pool is reading. But, they aren't reading my book.They probably haven't heard of my book.
"You're on vacation," I reminded myself.
"Don't do it," I scolded, "they're on vacation, too."
The fancy new business cards I'd stashed in my wallet (good deal from Staples) were calling my name. In not so many words, they begged people to buy the best novel in history, but idle in my wallet, they were just useless pieces of paper. As if impelled by some wicked force, I walked up to my first unsuspecting customer, clicking on to the next page of her latest Grisham. "Excuse me," I said, "but I couldn't help noticing that you're reading." She gave me a strange look, and nodded. Feeling a bit clumsy, I asked her if she'd like to know about a great new book from a wonderful author. I started to reach for my wallet. "Who would that be," she asked. Suddenly sweating - not from the Aruban heat - I was wishing my business cards would be quiet, and fumbled for an answer. As the improbable words "Ernest Hem...." were escaping my mouth, a poke in the ribs startled me.
"Avi, wake up, you're talking in your sleep and burning to a crisp," my wife warned. Pleasure island or not, marketing never takes a holiday. I did get one poor guy from Cincinnati to buy Crocodile Mothers Eat Their Young, the best novel ever written Just ask my business cards.
February 14, 2015
Amazing Experiences
This is my first ever blog entry, another adventure I never envisioned when my wife and I decided to become foster parents. Writing my first published novel, Crocodile Mothers Eat Their Young, another unexpected result of becoming a foster parent, has been nothing but good.
Crocodile Mothers is not the first novel I've written, but the others, written a few decades ago, never quite saw the light of the printing press. This one is easily the most important. My wife, who inspires almost every good thing in my life, wisely predicted that this book would have an audience. That the audience would lead me to discover so many other writers who, unlike me, were the victims of child abuse, or to have perfect strangers come up to me at book signings to reveal for the first time, often decades later, that they had been abused, is an experience I won't forget.
If there is any good coming from a child suffering terrible abuse, it's that I got to know the remarkable young woman who is the model for my main character, Tina Diaz as well as her sister who is the model for Selena. I also got to know the younger half sister who is the model for Juanita. Their home life as kids can't properly be called family life. That all three, with a few bumps here and there, have become wonderful adults who will never follow in the footsteps of their adult authority figures, shows me the sort of strength that's possible from people one might not anticipate.
In the process of doing outreach to potential readers, I've found and gotten to befriend to one on-line degree or another, some impressive people. Whether it was a step in a personal healing process, a desire to advocate and inform or any other reason, admiration for these people revealing themselves is too mild a word for what I feel. That is not to mention how gracious they have been to me, a stranger those writers know only through Goodreads. CeeCee James,Eleanor Cowan and KL Randis have gut-wrenching personal stories of survival that might never have been known without their courage to come forward and share things that, sadly, have not become unimaginable.Elle Klass is another friend whose series about an abandoned, homeless child brings an important message to readers. That they have all been willing to share writing experiences with me, a newbie, is an extension of their generous spirits. I will always be grateful to them and to all of my readers who have made such positive comments about my book.
See my website, http://www.avimorrisnovels.com
and the Facebook page for Crocodile Mothers Eat Their Young https://www.facebook.com/crocodilemot...
Crocodile Mothers is not the first novel I've written, but the others, written a few decades ago, never quite saw the light of the printing press. This one is easily the most important. My wife, who inspires almost every good thing in my life, wisely predicted that this book would have an audience. That the audience would lead me to discover so many other writers who, unlike me, were the victims of child abuse, or to have perfect strangers come up to me at book signings to reveal for the first time, often decades later, that they had been abused, is an experience I won't forget.
If there is any good coming from a child suffering terrible abuse, it's that I got to know the remarkable young woman who is the model for my main character, Tina Diaz as well as her sister who is the model for Selena. I also got to know the younger half sister who is the model for Juanita. Their home life as kids can't properly be called family life. That all three, with a few bumps here and there, have become wonderful adults who will never follow in the footsteps of their adult authority figures, shows me the sort of strength that's possible from people one might not anticipate.
In the process of doing outreach to potential readers, I've found and gotten to befriend to one on-line degree or another, some impressive people. Whether it was a step in a personal healing process, a desire to advocate and inform or any other reason, admiration for these people revealing themselves is too mild a word for what I feel. That is not to mention how gracious they have been to me, a stranger those writers know only through Goodreads. CeeCee James,Eleanor Cowan and KL Randis have gut-wrenching personal stories of survival that might never have been known without their courage to come forward and share things that, sadly, have not become unimaginable.Elle Klass is another friend whose series about an abandoned, homeless child brings an important message to readers. That they have all been willing to share writing experiences with me, a newbie, is an extension of their generous spirits. I will always be grateful to them and to all of my readers who have made such positive comments about my book.
See my website, http://www.avimorrisnovels.com
and the Facebook page for Crocodile Mothers Eat Their Young https://www.facebook.com/crocodilemot...
