Spotlight and Giveaway: Memoir Mania!

Today we are featuring two memoirs that have recently been published. Thanks to SparkPoint Studio, one lucky reader will be receiving a copy of both!

Two Minus One
(November 6th)

“You can quit waiting for the other shoe to drop: I’m in it for life.” Those are the fateful, repeated words that help convince Kathryn Taylor to remarry, retire from her thirty-year profession, sell her home, and relocate in support of her new husband’s career. But five years later, in a car packed with food she has carefully prepared to nourish her husband’s dying brother, the other shoe does drop. Without any explanation, he tells her he is done with the marriage.

With this, the life Taylor has come to know is over. Relying on the strength of a lifelong friend who refuses to let her succumb to the intense waves of grief, she slowly begins to find her way out of the shadows of heartache. Over the course of two years, through appointments with attorneys and therapists, purging shared belongings, and pushing herself to meet new people and do new things, Taylor not only regains a sense of control in her life, she also learns to enjoy the new friendships she’s formed—and to savor her newfound strength.

Kathryn Taylor was born at the Great Lakes Naval Station near Chicago, Illinois and spent much of her life in the Chicagoland area. She is a retired teacher and had taught in the schools of Illinois, California, and Virginia before her retirement and relocation to South Carolina. It was there where she wrote her book, Two Minus One: A Memoir following the unexpected abandonment by her second husband. An avid reader, enthusiastic traveler, and incurable beach lover, she resides outside of Charleston, SC, which affords her the opportunity to enjoy all three of her favorite past times. This is her first book. Visit Kathryn at her website, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Broken Whole (November 13th)

At the age of thirty-five, desperate to salvage a self that has been suffocating for years―and to save her two-year-old son from witnessing a miserable relationship between his parents―Jane Binns leaves her husband of twelve years. She has no plan or intention but to leave, however, and therein begins the misadventures lying in wait for her.

Over the years that follow, Binns falls in love with Steve, a man eighteen years her senior who has been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder since his return from military service in Vietnam forty years prior, and who has a talent for making her feel heard. Despite his inability to provide anything more than a spurious connection, run on a mercurial and erratic schedule, and despite his repeated rejections of her love, she continues to pursue him. During their off periods, she dates other men―but she inevitably compares each new suitor to Steve, and all of them fall short. Ultimately, it takes the loss of her father in the summer of 2014, followed by the death of her ex-husband five months later, for her to finally let go of Steve―and, in the process, fully unearth the self she’s been chasing all along.

Jane Binns grew up in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She holds a BS from Eastern Michigan University, an MS in education from Syracuse University, and an MFA in prose from Naropa University. In 1998, she was awarded the Jack Kerouac Award for Prose. She was the managing editor of Bombay Gin with Lisa Birman from 1998 to 1999. She is an English composition instructor at Arapahoe Community College in Littleton, CO, and has worked in online learning assisting faculty, students, and staff with the online platform since 2006. Visit Jane at her website, Facebook, and Twitter.

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Giveaway ends November 25th at midnight EST.