Monday, May 21, 2012

Review of Occasional Writers

I was always amazed by personal stories tell by people I have never met in my life, and no matter how my experience may differ from theirs, are able through its contents to make me feel close and connected. This is exactly what I got from reading this book. Occasional Writers show people from different walks of life, lawyers, teachers, homemakers, and others who carried different memories in their hearts while meeting at the same place, with the same goal—to bring the past forward. Based in Charleston, Illinois, the memoir group called Past/Forward wrote short stories, poems, words through which they preserved and shared their memories, and words through which a reader is reminded of many reasons why we laugh, why we cry, why we cherish some experience more than others, and why people come into and leave out our lives. We can read from a first date in the childhood to a marriage proposal, adored father, some beautiful moments from a grandmother’s life and many others. This book proves that behind every life is a story, and Occasional Writers might actually inspire others to write their own. It certainly inspired me, as one of the poems in the book goes: I wish, I wish, I wish, that I could write just one more poem. Past cannot be changed; we can only change its role in our lives. Every moment is destined to become past and many of us, just as people who wrote Occasional Writers, have those moments that we want always to remember. 

New Book! Coming Soon!