September, 2013
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Story Sparks 

"Stories are the sparks that light our ancestor's lives, the embers we blow on to illuminate our own"

 

WhereTheLilacs   

 

There are some moments in a life when, to paraphrase Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung, we "don't just believe, we know."  Maybe it's the day we simply knew we'd be hired for a job or we knew "that person" was the one for us. A day in 2009 stands out for me. I stopped with my friend at the Hulda Klager Lilac gardens in Woodland, WA. We were on our way to a women's retreat and I'd finally agreed to meet a descendant of Hulda Klager at the gardens. She'd been sending me news articles and bits and pieces of Hulda's story hoping I might consider writing it. I'd resisted because I have a purple not a green thumb.

 

As I walked around inhaling the fragrances, viewing the eye feast of flowers, hearing the madrigal singers serenade the visitors and experiencing the enthusiasm of dozens of volunteers and one wonderful descendant, Betty Mills tell the story of Hulda Klager, well, I knew someday I'd write about it, just not when.

 

Both the persistence of Hulda, a simple immigrant housewife and her generosity captured me. I worried that my lack of gardening skills would somehow diminish this grand story. But the horticulturists at the garden promised they'd help me and so they did. Judy Card, a local historian and her husband practically adopted me and answered dozens of questions as I wrote. Just as volunteers helped Hulda.

 

What intrigued me most was that when floods came, Hulda and her surviving children pulled up lilacs and laid them on little rafts Frank Klager built and tied to trees. There the roots exposed floated until the water receded and they could replant the lilacs. In her lifetime, Hulda hybridized over 250 unique varieties of lilacs tending them in just that way. Many she gave away. It pleased her no end to see the joy and hear the stories of how a lilac start she'd passed on infused lives with beauty and grace. Thousands came to her garden during lilac days.

That day in May in 2009 I knew that story had to be told. And in 2011, WaterBrook/Multnomah, a division of Random House, published that book.

 

A screenwriter might call that place of knowing, the "turning point." Some call it "the defining moment." A moment of knowing does something for us, something that takes us beyond merely speculating or considering and wallowing in the place of head thoughts where we are allowed to hesitate and stay the same. Knowing permits us to move, to act and to resist the negative voices saying, "Who would want to read that kind of story?" Hulda at some point must have known that her life's passion of hybridizing lilacs would bring not just joy but healing to a wounded world.

 

C.S Lewis once wrote that we find God only in the present. I believe - no, I know - that God wants us not to simply sit and vegetate, not to rest forever on the warm white sands of a vacationing mind, but to know, truly know that God is with us, that we are not alone on our journeys. Hulda believed that. I'd say she knew that as she endured great losses well beyond her lilacs. In our knowing we can act, and our acts of courage will be the light in a sometimes dark and dreary world.

 

This week I learned from my agent that Where Lilacs Still Bloom, the story of Hulda Klager and her lilac gardens, won the wonderful Carol Award for the best in Christian Historical Fiction published for 2013. At a gala event in Indianapolis, members of American Christian Fiction Writers, librarians and booksellers announced their picks for this year's Carol awards. What a joy that a story I finally knew ought to be told earned the respect of writers, readers and the publishing industry. Thanks to the many volunteers at the Hulda Klager Lilac Gardens and her granddaughter-in-law for keeping the story and the gardens alive. I knew it was a good story! It's a nice confirmation that others knew it too.

In This Issue
Surprise
Jane's Schedule
Word Whisperings
Facing Forward

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An October Surprise

 

Montana/Seattle writer Ivan Doig is one of my favorite authors. His book English Creek is a novel I've read three times, once out loud to my husband, Jerry. isHis stories engage from the first sentence and the characters become friends we don't ever want to lose touch with. I read English Creek not long after Jerry's oldest son was killed and that story brought healing to both of us. Another favorite author is Barry Lopez. It was in his book Arctic Dreams that he captured what Jerry especially and I experienced in leaving the ranch. Mr. Lopez noted that some people "are not finished at the skin." They send out luminous fibers that go deep into the soil of places we come to love; they become a part of us and when we leave them it is not that we simply move on, but that we experience an amputation. These two authors hold a special place in my heart. Mr. Lopez and I are also recipients of the prestigious Caldera Recognition Award given by the Nature of Words begun here in Central Oregon. Mr. Doig's memoir This House of Sky was National Book Award Finalist. Mr. Lopez's Arctic Dreams won the National Book Award.

           

So image my surprise and awe at learning that I'll be on stage with them both on October 6th at the Pacific Northwest Booksellers convention in Portland, OR! Just the three of us and the moderator Brad Smith, owner of two favorite bookstores named Paulina Springs Books in Sisters and Redmond. Each has a new book out: Mr. Doig's novel Sweet Thunder (see Word Whisperings) is a gem; and Mr. Lopez's Crossing Open Ground  is on my nightstand to read. Booksellers from throughout the Northwest will be the audience. My publisher, WaterBrook/Random House, is sending me and there'll be a signing of One Glorious Ambition afterwards along with the gentlemen's' titles. One of the rewards of this writing life is meeting writers I admire. Now if I can keep my star-struck tongue from being tied....

Jane's Schedule               
JaneKirkpatrick

 

What's next on my schedule?  

Take a look and see where our paths might cross during upcoming events.

 

      

 

Be sure to check the website for updated event information!

 

 

September 29 - First Presbyterian Church, Bend, OR. Jane is giving the message at the 9:00a.m., 10:45a.m. and 5:01p.m. services. She'll be telling stories....
  
October

 

October 6 - PNBA. Jane is on stage in Portland. Open only to booksellers and member authors. Send articulate thoughts Jane's way.

 

The Aurora Colony Museum is hosting their 41st annual quilt show October 11-20th. Celebrating original colony quilts and the 50th anniversary of the society formation. While Jane won't be able to attend, if you can, please do! Find out about a special evening performance of "If Quilts could Talk" at www.auroracolony.org

 

October 9-13 - Kansas City, MO. Women Writing the West Conference. Jane will attend workshops, follow up on Missouri research questions, hug old friends, greet winners of the WILLA Literary Award and participate in a book Signing on Saturday 4:30 to 5:30 at the Embassy Suites-Kansas City Plaza. Open to the public. For more information contact www.womenwritingthewest.org. Jerry is traveling with Jane. They missed this event last year due to Jerry's many fractures. He's had none since December!

 

October 15,10:00 AM Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration Women's Guild, 68825 Brooks Camp Road, Sisters, OR 68825. Contact Judy Beaver [email protected] for reservations. There is no charge.Jane will be speaking about the Power of Stories to Heal and Transform.

 

October 18-19 - Clarkston, WA. Several events sponsored by ......and Books, too! a lovely bookstore in this Eastern Washington city.

 

October 18

10:00 -noon Book Signing at the bookstore, 918 6th Street Clarkston, WA.

4:30 historic Asotin Methodist Church, 315 2nd street, Asotin, WA

            Silent auction fundraiser.

5:30-6:30 -Dinner (by ticket only. Contact Judi Wutzke at ..and Books too! ( 509) 798 3626

            After dinner music by Dana Lohrey offering Old Time Southern Gospel music

7:00p.m.   - Jane's presentation: Finding Yourself Inside Family Stories

 

Sat. Oct 19 -

10:00 a.m. Asotin County Museum, 3rd and Filmore, Clarkston. Informal Q & A with Jane. Refreshments by the Asotin County Museum Board. Open to the public

12:30 to 2:30 - DAR meeting with Jane speaking at 2:30. Closed event.

 4:00 PM Asotin County Library.Main Branch: 417 Sycamore St. Clarkston, WA 99403-2666 509-758-5454. Jane will present The Power of One, a public presentation based on One Glorious Ambition: The Compassionate Crusade of Dorothea Dix.

 

November

 

November 6, 7:00p.m. Central Oregon Community College, Hitchcock Auditorium - Rising Star Awards. Jane will be one of the judges presenting awards to the Rising Star writing competition winners sponsored for young writers by the Nature of Words." Exceptional writing is an understatement for the selections I judged."

 

November 7-9 Jane will be volunteering to support the Literary Festival in Bend sponsored by The Nature of Words. visit www.natureorwords.org for details of the authors coming to Bend. Jane highlighted Border Songs by Jim Lynch in an earlier Story Sparks. He is one of several fine authors bringing their love of literature to the region.

 

November 22, 7:00 PM Friendsview Retirement Community, Newberg, OR. Join Jane as she makes her presentation about stories and the power of each of us to make a difference regardless of our age. Visit http://www.friendsview.org/ for more information as plans progress.

 

November 23 - Wild Arts Festival noon to 4:00 pm at Montgomery Park, Portland. www.wildartsfestival.org A great place for holiday shopping with many artists and writers present.

 

November 24  - Aurora, OR. An event to celebrate the publication of Emma of Aurora, a Three in One of re-issue of the Change and Cherish Series; and as a fundraiser for the Aurora Museum.
  

 

 

For all event information and updates, please visit 
Jane's website and click on Jane's Calendar.  Or follow this link directly to her calendar.

 

Thanks!   
Word Whisperings 

Sweet Thunder (Riverhead books) by Ivan Doig

 

If you read The Whistling Season by Ivan Doig you'll be pleased to know that Morie Morgan is back to his antics both pugilist and literary all taking place in Butte, Montana in the early 1920s. What I love about Doig's books are the way his characters keep changing in authentic though unpredictable ways with history like a lariat wrapped around them, their decisions giving them more and more trouble. In this novel, Morie becomes the editorial writer for Thunder a union post taking on the copper giant Anaconda Mining Company that made Butte a company town. The Daily Post is the company mouthpiece with dueling editorial writers. In between are mysteries and Morie's marital woes that make this one of Doig's finest excursions into the history of the American West and the human spirit. You'll want to read The Whistling Season afterwards (or before) to fully appreciate this couplet of stories.

The finish comes way too soon.

  
Facing Forward               

Gwen My latest manuscript Facing Forward is now in the hands of my editor. But I'm still researching and will be revising Letitia Carson's story as one of the first black women to cross the Oregon Trail. We know of her because she brought a lawsuit against a white man during a time when standing out was a dangerous and courageous thing for a black woman to do in Oregon. Last week I traveled with researchers Dr. Bob Zyback and Janet Meranda as well as Southern Oregon historians Jenneane Johns and Black Pioneer Association Vice-Chair Gwen Carr, (pictured left), along with Roxanne Hanneman, a documentary film maker, seeking clues about Letitia's life. Jenneane had marked the cabin site. The rest of us found the gravesite after a little side trip. Letitia's story becomes so real I dream about her. And last night I also dreamed about my next project. Sigmund Freud (a contemporary of Carl Jung) wandered into my dream and I wondered "what was Freud's wife like?" But never mind. My stories will be set in the American West and I don't think Freud ever crossed the Atlantic let alone the Mississippi. Nor his wife either. So you'll have to wait awhile to learn about the next project but apparently Dr. Freud was curious....

  
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I do hope you keep dreaming about what lies ahead, making the most of this short life we have. Thanks for sparing a few precious minutes of it with me.

 

Warmly,

 

Jane Kirkpatrick