Mendocino Word Lovers, Celebrate!

Confess! Admit you’re a word lover – or you wouldn’t be reading right now, perhaps. If you’re like me, you can’t possibly keep up with all the good books or authors out there; but, we keep trying!
Mendocino County’s most recent effort to help us is with the upcoming 2007 “Celebration of Word Lovers: Mendocino LitFest.” We’re in for a converging of emergent and established writers – sharing with us their poetry, memoirs or novels. And, this celebration is not just for some, but for all ages.
Many have read and revered the words of Gary Soto as we’ve grown up, with his California settings providing the backdrop for teen angst and family conflict. The keynote speaker of the LitFest, Soto will share with us as fellow humans and hopefully inspire fellow writers as well.
Another of my favorite authors in the Lit event is Dylan Schaffer – also a Californian. His two witty whodunits “Misdemeanor Man” and “I Right the Wrongs” are among the books I share with friends most often. Plus, he’s been featured in my column more than once.
The author lineup contains a couple dozen local and regional writers whose work is vast in its array of styles and topics. Check out all the biographies on the LitFest website. Editors and publishers will also be presenting vital information to aspiring writers who attend. Print out the event and workshop schedule available online. Click on www.mendolitfest.org/index.html.
A first-time book author, Claudia Crosetti, will be displaying her recently published “Rocks in My Pockets: Travels with Dad” at her own LitFest vendor booth. Since she isn’t featured on the website, I wanted to find out more about her publishing venture, so I interviewed Claudia and subsequently read her travel memoir.
Initially written as a journal of her trip to Italy with her father, Victor, her family suggested she publish for present and future relatives to enjoy. She found herself weaving in with that journey an earlier trip she took that also changed her life – with fellow breast cancer survivors to Argentina’s Mt. Aconcagua.
In Italy, Claudia and her father journey by foot and rail, disregarding more typical tourist paths. Visiting Venice with its canals and complete lack of vehicles then winding their way down to Rome with its “open, expansive” feel, the father-daughter duo indulges in the stimulating sights, sounds - and tastes.
Staying mostly in small apartments (pensiones), her detailed, colorful descriptions of their travels are eye and ear-candy for many of us who will never go there, each day usually beginning with a cappuccino and ending with another flavor of gelato. Of course, in between, we learn of strength and survival - not only of physical culture, but of personal growth as well.
Claudia feels anyone can benefit from creating their own travel or personal journals; it helps us to maintain perspective, she advises. She was fortunate to have a mentor writer who encouraged her to take it a step further. Although she admits her final composition was a “fun, but sometimes agonizing process,” she is now ready to partake of the fruits of her labor.
Deciding to “print on demand” through iUniverse (http://www.iuniverse.com/) was a positive experience. Although Claudia discovered how much work is involved – like many other writers who may even have their books bought by larger publishers today, she is not daunted by the marketing and schmoozing that writers must do to sell their own product.
She is proud of her hard work, of “taking the reader on two ventures,” and hopes they will enjoy the ride. Her blog is now set up for potential perusers and purchasers at ccrosetti.blogspot.com. Plus, she will be reading at our local Mendocino Book Company on Thursday evening, June 21st at 6:30 p.m. where her book is available, in addition to Amazon and Barnes & Noble’s online stores.
Another local woman writer will feature her first book in a LitFest vendor booth. Mary Zellachild, whose information is also not included in the festival’s billing, will be showcasing her novel, “Transitions.”
Her story focuses on a “sense of place and nature – a spiritual connection” as she follows three cousins who return to a grandparent’s property on the Mendocino Coast they now inherit as fifty-something’s. We flash back to their youth and learn – with them, of those vital human and land connections that years of living cannot erase.
Zellachild’s personal life exhibits these firm beliefs through her efforts on the coordinating committee of the Willits Economic LocaLization (W.E.L.L.) movement. In addition to her job working for international agri-businessman John Jeavons, she is now marketing her novel which she self-published. It will be available soon at local stores, plus online at Booklocker.com/books/2883.html.
So, all you word and book lovers, please mark your calendar for this Friday and Saturday’s events held at the Mendocino College campus. Celebrate our local writers!