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In which Serena Agusto-Cox of Savvy Verse and Wit discovers the breadcrumb clues I've been leaving for readers all along, book to book. So many thanks for this truly gorgeous review of This Is the Story of You.

From the end of the review:

This Is the Story of You by Beth Kephart will astonish you with the resilience of young people, their drive to make things right, and their ability to withstand more than expected, but it is in the final pages that the true mystery is resolved.  I will say this, I’m not often surprised by book endings or mysteries, but Kephart exceeded my detective skills for the first time in a long while.  (I had suspicions, but not a fully formed conclusion.)  Readers who love to immerse themselves in realistic places and explore humanity won’t be disappointed.  Kephart is a talent at creating places that come alive and characters that grab hold of us emotionally.

**You’ve probably already suspected this is a contender for the best of 2016 list at the end of the year!**

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My great appreciation for Serena Agusto-Cox, for being the very first reader (beyond the team and the kind blurbers) of LOVE: A Philadelphia Affair. The very first.

What kindness lives in this busy mother, writer, reader, worker.

She has a special knack for finding those ineffable qualities I work toward and hope through in the pages of my books.

I don't want to preempt her. And so I link to her. With greatest thanks.

Savvy Verse & Wit, on LOVE, is here.

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Writing, we tunnel in. We go to dark places. Walk contorted paths. Stumble. It takes a long time before we re-emerge, our eyes blinking into the sun.

Hard to know, in all that desperate making, if we have created something whole. We wait to hear from those who have read.

This morning I am so very grateful to find these words from Serena Agusto-Cox.

Her review begins like this:

One Thing Stolen by Beth Kephart, which will be published in April, has crafted a testament to artistry and the adaptability of the human mind.  Set in Florence, Italy, the birthplace of the Renaissance, Kephart transports readers across the ocean from Philadelphia, Pa., to the cobbled streets of Italy.  Nadia Cara is a young teen who builds nests by weaving seemingly incongruous materials together, making things of beauty.  She’s an artist on overdrive as other parts of her life disappear and flounder amidst the detritus of memory.  She knows that she’s struggling, she knows that she is becoming someone she does not want to be, but she also knows that she is powerless to stop it.

And can be read in its entirety here.

Thank you, Serena.

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This is the 25th anniversary year of the fall of the Berlin Wall—an anniversary that is being commemorated with lights, balloons, exhibitions, proposals of hope. And yet, in so many places, for so many different reasons, we remain a world divided.

I write of those contradictions, those residual fears, in today's Publishing Perspectives, in a piece that begins like this:

We live in a world of infinite gradations and restless infiltrations. We live in a world of checkpoints, watchtowers, walls. We are free to go, or we are not. We are here, but never entirely there. We are fenced in or fenced out. We are on the move (some 232 million around the world left one country for another in 2013, according to the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs) or we are hunkered down—stuck—behind a fortress of distance-making words: “Aliens.” “Illegals.”

We are global.

We are divided.

... and continues here.

My hope, today, is that you'll find time to read this piece and, if you are so moved, to share it.

My hope, too, is that you will send Miss Serena Agusto-Cox, most faithful and intelligent reader and writer, all kinds of yellow-tulip thoughts, for she has written such kind words about Going Over and soft launched the blog tour with all kinds of goodies, including the offer of a free book to one reader. You can find the whole thing here. I share, below, Serena's final words about the book:

Kephart’s Going Over is stunning, and like the punk rock of the 80s, it strives to stir the pot, make readers think, and evoke togetherness, love, and even heartbreak — there are lessons in each.

 Thank you.

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I have ignored many things this week, but that has to be okay.  I'll get caught up.  I always do.

My heart and mind and thoughts were here, with the fabulous YoungArts writing finalists of 2013.

While away, Serena Agusto-Cox whispered word of this goodness into my virtual ear.  I can't tell you how much it means to me to know that Small Damages continues to find its generous readership.

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Twenty by Jenny is home to some of the most thoughtful reviews of books written for children and teens—anywhere.  That is because Jenny Brown, its creator, has cared about youth literature for all of her adult life—as a teacher sharing stories, as an editor producing them, and as a critic and enthusiast writing for countless publications, including Shelf Awareness.  Jenny Brown trails golden light.

But I did not know, until late last night, that Jenny Brown, who had written the exquisite Shelf Awareness review of Small Damages, had also taken the time to reflect on Small Damages in Twenty by Jenny.  Her essay is called "Regeneration."  It is, in every way, stunning.  It taught me about my own book, made me step back with new understanding.  This kind of reflection is built of love.  And I am so grateful, Jenny Brown.  I am.

I am so grateful, too, to the ever-vigilant Serena Agusto-Cox, for letting me know.

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Two years ago, in Appleton, WI, I had what will always remain one of the happiest few days in my writing life.  I'd been invited to the Appleton Book Festival, and I had nine official events in two-and-half days—teaching memoir in libraries, talking about the future with high school students, standing on big stages in middle school auditoriums to address entire student bodies, taking over a lovely green-rugged library, working one-on-one with rising poets, talking to the darling editors of school newspapers, consulting with a boy who wanted me to write his personal story.  Everywhere I went I was received with such open-hearted goodness, and one morning, in the elevator, I met Ted Kooser, that laureate poet, and told him how I had read his poems to my mother during her final days.  I loved Appleton with a passion. I walked her river in the few hours when I wasn't teaching and ate alone at night in a restaurant that soon felt like my own.  These were, in so many ways, perfect days.

Yesterday, my friend Serena Agusto-Cox wrote to tell me that an Appleton librarian named Tasha (of Waking Brain Cells) had read Small Damages and had very kind things to say.  (Serena sends word of kind reviews from time to time, and because of her, I get to thank the reviewers.)  Tasha's beautiful words are deeply moving; they epitomize the graciousness of her city.

Late last night, meanwhile, I received an email from Tamara Smith, who had interviewed me so graciously about the role of landscape in my work (and mind) a few weeks ago.  Tamara's BookBrowse review of Small Damages had gone live, and she was writing to let me know.  The review is breathtaking—and it, too, says as much about the person behind the review as it does about the story I tried to tell.  Perhaps even more.

A morning hug, to you all.

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The most important thing about this day is that it marks my son's twenty-third birthday.  He came into the world after thirty-six hours of labor.  He had a full head of thick, black hair.  He reached for my husband's finger and squeezed it tight.  The next day, we drove him to my mother's house in a beat-up Ford Mustang—his hat still on despite the July heat.

There's no accounting for a mother's love.  There's no math that will contain it.  The baby became a boy became a kid became a man—so bright, so inventive, so funny, so adventuresome, so thoughtful, and with a raft of terrific friends, and with a future that seems (thanks to some recent interviews) so close and within reach, and with a talent for loving.

That boy traveled to Spain with me and my husband, several times, to visit my brother-in-law.  We together met characters like an old man named Luis, and like a count who raised Spain's prized fighting bulls.  We traveled out to a broad cortijo, watched the gypsies dance, sat front row at flamenco shows.  We ate paella at midnight on the streets, tapas in tiny bars.  We went in and out of bull rings and up cathedral towers and in between the narrow spaces of Seville.  We watched the nuns flutter by.  We saw children playing on rooftops.  And when I started to write a novel with all of this as the backdrop, this son of mine listened to me read out loud—this passage or that at the kitchen table.  He steered the ship with his spare comments and would not let me give up in the face of grave disappointments.  He said, "Believe in yourself."

I don't think there would be a Small Damages without this guy, and that brings us to birthday number two.  Small Damages, a book that has always been dedicated to my son, is being launched today.  That it is a book, that it has come this far, is all thanks to the extremely extraordinary Tamra Tuller, Michael Green, Jessica Shoffel, and Jill Santopolo of Philomel. That it has been welcomed into this world is all thanks to the generosity of readers and bloggers and reviewers and interviewers, whose goodness is unfathomable and restorative and redeeming and proof that maybe a girl can write and write and write and not be especially famous, but keep writing, and then have a moment in time like this one.

An unforgettable moment in time.

To all of you, and to my agent Amy Rennert, who has been there through all fourteen books, thick and thin (and so much thin), thank you.

Cake is now being served for all.

The icing is here, in these words from the great (truly great) Pam van Hylckama of Bookalicious.org and in this kindness from the ever-kind and supportive Serena Agusto-Cox.

From Pam:

It is not often that a book that makes you lose your breath. You read novel that makes you want t

6 Comments on two birthdays: a son's, a book's, last added: 7/22/2012

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Serena said, on 7/19/2012 3:49:00 AM

Congrats to all of you and happy birthday to your son.

bermudaonion said, on 7/19/2012 5:01:00 AM

Happy birthday to your son! I thought Vance had a head full of dark hair but your son has him beat. Congratulations on your book!!

The1stdaughter said, on 7/19/2012 8:50:00 AM

Such a wonderful post for a wonderful day. Congratulations and Happy Birthday to both you and your son. So so happy for you. And can I just say ditto to everything Pam said? Perfect. Such a great day!

Liviania said, on 7/19/2012 9:56:00 AM

Congratulations! I think that's the most hair I've ever seen on a newborn - wow.

Kimberley Griffiths Little said, on 7/20/2012 10:03:00 AM

Congratulations, Beth, and Happy Birthday to your gift of a son and the gift of your beautiful book.

KFP said, on 7/22/2012 9:14:00 AM

This picture of your son takes my breath away. He is just too beautiful.

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I've never been to Brazil, but I have longed to go.  For the time being, You Are My Only is going in my stead, thanks to the good work of Amy Rennert and the Jenny Meyer Literary Agency, Inc.  Brazilian-Portuguese rights to the book have been sold to Novo Conceito.

You Are My Only also, as many of you know, went into a third U.S. printing this week.  For that enormous bit of good fortune, I have the world of generous bloggers and independent booksellers (and of course Darcy Jacobs, of Family Circle) to thank. Thanks today especially to Serena Agusto-Cox, who placed You Are My Only on the D.C. Literature Examiner gift book buying guide.  Check out the entire list for some spectacular recommendations from a very fine reader.

I thank you all.  From the bottom of my heart, I do.

Many thanks, too, to Elizabeth Law of Egmont USA, for being the bearer of good news.

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Best of the year, best of the genre, best of right now lists proliferate at this time of year.  I love seeing what others have loved, what they will not forget but carry forward.  I myself am rather incapable of such sorting.  So much moves me.  So much matters.  So much registers within me as special.

But today a different kind of list made its way to me, thanks to the keen eye of the ever-dear Serena Agusto-Cox.  It's a list that was fashioned by the one and only Danielle of There's a Book.  It's an invitation I would most definitely accept, if I only lived 3,000 miles closer.  It is, indeed, a most gracious tendering.

Thanksgiving, indeed.

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I am having a small dinner party this evening—an early Thanksgiving Day meal with friends.  That means that I spent much of yesterday polishing things, trying to see my house the way others might see it.  I realized, as I worked, that my little house is lit by trees.  (Later in the afternoon the house was lit by Kelly Simmons, who stopped by with a manuscript in progress I have been begging to read and a bunch of autumnal calla lilies.)

This morning I did not turn the computer on at once—wanted a few spare moments of quiet to reflect and think before I got into the business of the day.  When I did dial into the world, I discovered a most outrageously compassionate, well-written, and deep-thinking review of You Are My Only, penned by Serena Agusto-Cox, a reader, writer, poet, and mom who advocated so fiercely on behalf of this book, even long before she had read it.  True faith—oh so rare, and so appreciated.  Serena was one of the YAMO Treasure Hunt winners, and so I have had the pleasure now of reviewing her own work.  She has Facebooked and believed and conducted giveaways—even invited me to participate in a YAMO interview—the only YAMO interview on record (please check back later today for that).

I don't have the capacity to fully state how much this kind of support has meant to me—how much it means to any author.  But I will share just a few words of Serena's review here, with the hope that you will visit her blog and find out more about what she reads and how she sees:

You Are My Only is an emotional powerhouse drawing redemption out of the shattered pieces of lives rendered asunder by a single event.  Through faith and love these characters can begin the heal, rebuild, and flourish.  What more could readers ask for?  Stunning, precious, and captivating from beginning to end.

Thank you so much, Serena.