This afternoon (Tue Dec 12) Amazon has named my new book Rain Falling on Tamarind Trees the #1 New Release in Vietnam Travel Guides (paperback edition). This came on the heel of the book last Sunday (Dec 10) hitting #1 on amazon.fr (France) among Books in English and Foreign Languages on … [Read more...]
An Early Christmas Present
This is a happy addendum to my recent post on Friday Dec 8. A day after I published the post and three weeks removed from the release date, Rain Falling on Tamarind Trees hit #1 on amazon.fr (France) among Books in English and Foreign Languages on Southeast Asia History, and #4 in Travel … [Read more...]
The Paths Unknown
In a post back in April, I shared with you some of the surprising paths that my earlier book, Once upon a Mulberry Field, had found itself on since its release in 2014 (click HERE to read again). As the author watching its progress, I felt like an … [Read more...]
My Travelogue of Vietnam
As mentioned in an earlier post, in late 2016 I had a chance to go back and visit Việt-Nam, my ancestral homeland. It was my first trip back in over four decades, and it touched me deeply. And so, upon my return to America, I immediately set aside all other projects to start recapturing the memories … [Read more...]
The Gift of Sharing
We all have our ups and downs, and it's only natural that we'd like to share most of them with our family and friends, our so-called support network. It's especially more fun and exciting to share those moments of triumph, big and small, with the people who always stand by us. From a … [Read more...]
A Must Write
What in the world is a "must write," you ask. I can best explain what it is by mentioning its counterpart, which you're probably familiar with since it's often found in readers' reviews of their favorite books---a "must read." Let me elaborate. A must write is something that I as a writer feel … [Read more...]
And the Beat Goes On
As a writer, nothing brings me greater pleasure or amazement than to know that somewhere out there some readers may find my book intriguing enough to invest their money and time in it. It's no surprise then that I've often wondered, with a certain sense of awe, where all the book has … [Read more...]
Why I (Continue to) Write
It's said that we've all got a book in us. I was fortunate enough, living in the age of self-publishing, to find that out for myself. In my case, it took me six years of hard labor---labor of love, as it's called---to research, write, and publish my first book, Once upon a Mulberry Field, a … [Read more...]
So Many Stories . . .
In 2008 when I started writing my book Once upon a Mulberry Field, a big concern I had was the size of it---how much material to include in it. From what I was able to gather at the time, the ideal length of a book should be anywhere between 60,000 and 90,000 words, which roughly translates into 200 … [Read more...]
Sweet Images
Warm greetings! The last few months have been busy for me, but it has been a good kind of busy (except for the tax returns, of course). I was invited to speak about my book at various venues and gladly accepted all those invitations, thus spending a lot of time on the road rather than at the … [Read more...]