12 Days of Self-Promotion, Sorta

Is it okay to promote yourself? Over at High Calling Blogs, I've said it's not only okay, but necessary. I'll let you read the full lowdown over there.

Suffice it to say, self-promotion on-line is best done through genuine other-promotion. Which is why we're encouraging bloggers to engage in 12 Days of Community, by featuring at least 12 other bloggers on their personal sites throughout the month of December.

I'm going to try it out, starting with long-time colleague Mary E. DeMuth. I first met Mary over an awesome salad at Mount Hermon Christian Writers Conference. She answered my newbie-writer questions through many email exchanges, long before I ever wrote my first book.

This week, almost like a writer-auntie, she actually wrote an Advent Reflection rooted in that first book. While I appreciate the way it promotes my work, what really quieted me was the beauty of Mary's own writing.

She made me think of Advent in a way I never had before. She wrote in the way I like best from Mary.

If you haven't met Mary, over salad or otherwise, I can tell you she's authored eight books. Her latest book, Thin Places, is a memoir releasing in February. You can watch the trailer here. In some ways, her story reminds me of mine. Yet not. The way good stories always do.

Sorta.



Christmas Tree Up Close, by Sonia. Used with permission.

THE 12 DAYS:
1. Mary's Advent (this post)
2. Laura in the Moss
3. Social Media Guys
4. Snow-White Butterfly Tree

Top Christmas Book Picks

There are books I return to, because they give me new gifts every time I open them. Sometimes these books give me old gifts too, and that is good, because I delight to relive the wonder or joy, the philosophy or challenge.

When I consider these again-and-again books, I realize that although I've taken certain things from them, they also promise to give general gifts to their readers. Perhaps some of these gifts are the kind you might want to put on your wish list or share with someone else this Christmas...


The gift of writing-freedom

The Soul Tells A Story: Engaging Creativity With Spirituality In The Writing Life and The Right to Write: An Invitation and Initiation into the Writing Life. Does writing call you? Are you answering that call? What gets in the way? What might move you forward? Here are my two favorite books that offer writing-freedom, not just anecdote or advice.


The gift of spiritual rejuvenation

Sacred Rhythms: Arranging Our Lives for Spiritual Transformation. Are you tired, maybe disillusioned, or in search of deeper direction in your spiritual life? This gentle book is worth reading once a year.


The gift of reassurance for mothers

Ordinary Mom, Extraordinary God: Encouragement to Refresh Your Soul. This is my standard baby-shower gift, or anytime gift for mothers who could use wisdom, solace and a dose of light humor.


The gift of reconciliation (denominational and ethnic respectively)

The Real Mary: Why Evangelical Christians Can Embrace the Mother of Jesus and Reconciliation Blues: A Black Evangelical's Inside View of White Christianity. Both of these books give a new twist on subjects we think we already know about. And they pave the way for reconciliation. The latter might even bring you to tears, it's so honest and beautifully written.


The gift of forgiveness

Stone Crossings: Finding Grace in Hard and Hidden Places. I used to think this was a book about grace. And it is, in its way. But somewhere along the line, I realized that many people were finding a particular kind of grace in its pages: forgiveness. One woman wrote to tell me that she'd been told to forgive for a long, long time... through friends, sermons, religious books, and nothing had ever made it possible. Until she read Stone Crossings. This sentiment has been echoed elsewhere, including in Glynn Young's precious revelation of how the book helped him forgive his father.


The gift of a poignant story

The Summer Book is a gorgeous telling of the relationship between a young girl and her grandmother, both coming to life and facing endings in their own ways. Kristin Lavransdatter changed the way I write. Undset's choice of details is often simple, yet conveys powerful emotions of love and loss. The Things They Carried was one of those books that took me by surprise. I don't ordinarily prefer war stories, but this one gets to the heart of humanity in amazing ways. It also makes you think about the nature of truth and story.


The gift of poetry

How to Read a Poem: And Fall in Love with Poetry and Poemcrazy: Freeing Your Life with Words. As children, we are naturally drawn to poetry. Yet many of us lose our love of it along the way. Both of these books will help you find the joy and necessity of poetry again, the first lyrically so and the second creatively so.


The gift of better blogging

Naked Conversations: How Blogs are Changing the Way Businesses Talk with Customers. This is one of my all-time favorite books on how to navigate the blogsophere and grow an audience. Every blogger should read it at least once.


The gift of thoughtful morning devotions

Celtic Devotions: A Guide to Morning and Evening Prayer. Simple yet deep, this is a beautiful book. The prayers are like poetry (which makes sense, because many are taken from Celtic song).


The gift of smart humor

The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible. This one is hilarious and gives a fun perspective on our Old Testament roots. It's worth buying the book just for the description of how he tries to live the Proverb "slow to anger" while at Mail Boxes, Etc. (Do remember that this is a book written by an agnostic. I probably don't need to say that, but I didn't want anyone to be surprised when the author admits to believing or not believing in things that various kinds of Christians might hold dear.)


The gift of simplicity

Not So Fast: Slow-Down Solutions for Frenzied Families. This good-humored book will make you smile while giving you practical ways to simplify your life and dig deep into family relationships.


The gift of art

A Profound Weakness: Christians & Kitsch is a bit expensive, but if you can afford the price tag it's full of excellent art philosophy. And the pictures are gorgeous (all the more amazing because she has photographed kitsch in unusual, beautiful ways.)

Refractions: A Journey of Faith, Art, and Culture will give you new ways to think about art and faith. The essays have a great balance of both the personal and philosophical.

What gift do you want to give someone this year? Maybe you can find it in this little Christmas list.


Stone Crossings Christmas photo, by L.L. Barkat.

The Real Thing

Somewhere, sometime, a little old man or maybe a verbal child coined the word authentic. The real thing. Which implies there are false things. Fake things. Unreal things.

I've been musing about this because my friend Mary DeMuth just wrote a book called Authentic Parenting in a Postmodern Culture. (God bless her. Sounds like a true challenge.)

Anyway, I'm wondering, what does it mean to be authentic, real. Not just as a parent, but also as a friend. Or maybe as an artist or a writer. I'm puzzling... do we have a sense of things being "true or false"? Authentic or inauthentic? Why does this matter to us, or doesn't it?

Maybe it's time to start a new word revolution, if everything we see, touch, taste, think, do is just as real as the next thing. Maybe the word authentic needs to go the way of the dodo bird. Or not.


Plastic Cup photo, by L.L. Barkat

Seedlings Invitation: If you write a post related to this post and Link It Back Here, let me know and I'll link to yours.

For more thoughts on Mary's book, check out Spaghettipie's current blog tour