Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
This is my debut nonfiction memoir. I have written two smaller ebooks in the past but this is my baby.
Gloria Oren has a powerful perspective to find the positive in experiences on the roller coaster lurches that leave many in panic.
She is an editor with Muse It Up Publishing, and writes nonfiction and book reviews which she posts on her blog when time allows. A graduate of Long Ridge Writers Group “Breaking Into Print” program, a past member of the Willamette Writers Group, and longtime member pf the Redmond Association of Spokenword (RASP), is also the founder of the Women Writers Editors Agents and Publishers group on Facebook. She lives with her husband and eldest son in Washington State.
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Bonded at Birth: An Adoptee’s Search for Her Roots is a story of loss, survival, determination, and persistence. It covers one state, three countries, and two continents. It covers sixteen years of searching and a little over four decades since my first adoption. It wasn’t until seven years post-reunion that my second adoption occurred when my birth mother adopted me to close the circle.
What inspired me to write my story was the realization that adoptees do have the right to their own information regarding their origins and medical histories. I had almost no information to go on, yet things have a way of happening, and because of them and the help of others I was found. I had to share my story with adult adoptees who wish to search but hesitate, adoptive parents confronted by their adopted child’s wish to search, and by birth parents who fear searching not wanting to intrude on their biological offspring’s life. It will also attract memoir readers who enjoy a unique story. And couples contemplating adoption will learn the damage secrecy can lead to, and with hope, this book will ensure that they will be the ones to talk to their adopted children about their adoptions.
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
No, I just write when the thoughts come to mind. And then it somehow all comes together.
What authors, or books have influenced you?
I love Belva Plain and Jodi Picoult. But for memoir I’d have to say it was a few of the adoption memoirists I’ve read, for example Judy Land.
What are you working on now?
I am in the research state. There were seven elected presidents before George Washington. I want to learn more about them, about the duties of those elected presidents, and how they were elected. What else they did in their personal lives. Did they have families and who were they. What were those years like and how did events of daily life affect those men. I became interested in this when I heard it mentioned on the radio and when I asked around no one seemed to know anything about this. I don’t recall having learned about this in school.
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I’m just a newbie to book marketing. I have only promoted free promo days so far and have had a pretty good turnout from what little I’ve done. I am in preparation of a virtual book tour during November to coincide with National Adoption Day.
Do you have any advice for new authors?
Just do it. Write daily. Get that horrible first draft done and then let it sit a few days, at least, before going back and revise and tighten as much as you can.
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Never give up on your dream(s).
What are you reading now?
Right now I’m reading Change of Heart by Jodi Picoult.
What’s next for you as a writer?
Right now I’m concentrating on prepping the VBT and what will come later is yet to be seen.
If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Foraging & Feasting: A Field Guide and Wild Food Cookbook so I would have something to eat; Making Shelter in the Wild so I could have someplace to sleep; and a Soduko booklet so I would have something to do.
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