I’ll tell you what, it was some project this time. I thought I had it all together, Melissa edited the print copy twice and I a final time and then I sent the book off for a proof print.

Meanwhile, the cover design that Dave did for me did not meet Booksurge specs. Within hours of boarding a plane to Japan, Dave quickly mended the problem and I uploaded the file to the publisher.  I was very grateful.

A week later the book arrived - with at least 32 spelling and grammatical errors inside as well as the wrong cover with spelling error! Ugh! I couldn’t believe it.

Book went from approval mode backwards. I had to fix the print errors and wait for another final copy to approval while also waiting for Dave to return from his trip to fix the cover design error. This put me back so that the book would not be available for the holidays. I was initially pretty upset, but realize that everything happens for a reason and let it go.

In any event, I approved copies again and received a second copy of the book (which cost me more money to do) and only found one (okay, maybe two) errors, but you know what? I wasn’t going to spend another $75 to fix one quotation mark and a wrongly italicized word! So, I approved it and it’s going to print.

“Wolf” should be available in another week on Amazon.com.

I am planning to purchase 200 copies and do a book signing at the yoga center on Sunday January 31st, after my open house (approximately 4-7pm) as well as at some local booksellers. So, watch for details on dates.

Thanks to everyone for your support, patience and interest in the status of my writings.

Many blessings, Tracey

While there are many who consider the Raven a symbol of death and demonic spirits, there are many more higher attributes of this bird. For example, the raven’s intelligence is possibly its most winning feature. Indeed, these birds can be trained to speak. This speaking ability leads into the legend of ravens being the ultimate oracle.

In fact, the raven is often heard to cackle utterances that sound like “cras, cras.” The actual word cras is tomorrow in Latin. This lends more fuel to the legendary fires that distinguish the raven as a bird who can foretell the future, and reveal omens and signs.

Countless cultures point to the raven as a harbinger of powerful secrets. Moreover, the raven is a messenger too, so its business is in both keeping and communicating deep mysteries.

Raven symbolism of wisdom and knowledge-keeping is connected with the Welsh hero Bran, the Blessed whose name means raven. Bran was the holder of ancestral memories, and his wisdom was legendary. So much so, that he had his head (the vessel of his powerful wisdom) removed and interred in the sacred White Mount in London. Ravens are still roosting there (in the Tower of London), and they’re thought to keep Bran’s wisdom protected and alive by their presence.

The raven is symbolic of mind, thought and wisdom according to Norse legend, as their god Odin was accompanied by two ravens: Hugin who represented the power of thought and active search for information. The other raven, Mugin represented the mind, and its ability to intuit meaning rather than hunting for it. Odin would send these two ravens out each day to sour across the lands. At day’s end, they would return to Odin and speak to him of all they had spied upon and learned on their journeys.

Odin was also known as the Raven God. He had many daughters known as Valkyries who could transform into ravens . The Valkyries would ride as ravens after a bloody battle and whisper to the souls of fallen Norse warriors to raise up from their bodies and come with them, where they would soar the skies to Valhalla. 

There’s more good news about raven symbolism from the ancient Greeks and Romans. In spite of its midnight-colored feathers, the raven was a solar animal in this culture, and was associated with both Athena and Apollo, both deities closely affiliated with the sun, and the light of wisdom .

Apollo was also a major oracular god, which makes its connection with the chatty and (and alarmingly human-like) conversational raven a smart match.

There are some Greco-Roman legends that say ravens were once all white. And, because the raven couldn’t keep a secret to save its life, Apollo punished the raven by turning its bright white feathers black after it divulged too many secrets. There’s also a version that said the owl replaced the raven by Athena’s side as her associate of wisdom because of raven’s blabber-mouthed tendencies.

Raven color changes are also mentioned in Christian lore when Noah sent a raven first to confirm the receding floodwaters. When the raven did not return, it was said God turned its feathers black for its failure, and Noah sent a dove out to do the raven’s job. And since then, the raven has gotten a bad rap as being anti-mankind.

On the contrary, it could be that (as long as we’re postulating over legends) the raven is very pro-mankind and its feathers turned black from sorrow - a heaviness in its heart to witness the floodwaters were still too high to accommodate the birthing ark.

Ravens are humanitarians in Native American symbolic legends too. In fact, the raven was a hero to many tribes. The Inuit for example believed the raven tricked a giant sea monster into submission, and to this day its body serves as the Alaskan mainland.

Other Native North American tribes saw the raven as the bringer of light. In fact, southwestern tribes (Hopi, Navajo, Zuni) felt the raven was flew out from the dark womb of the cosmos, and with it brought the light of the sun (dawning of understanding). Consequently, the raven is considered a venerated bird of creation, for without the raven, humans would forever live in darkness.

Dr. Carl Jung deemed raven symbolism to represent the shadow self, or the dark side of the psyche. This is quite acurate. Why? Because by acknowledging this dark side, we can effectively communicate with both halves of ourselves. This offers liberating balance, and facilitates tremendous wisdom (something the raven would be very pleased with).

In other words, through the consistent unveiling of inner depths, and the positive/active utilization of inner impulses the esoteric secrets become exposed to the light of our own consciousness. This is at the crux of what the raven speaks.

(Excerpts from www.whats-your-sign.com)

As you have read, this trilogy follows a young Tia Brooks from age eleven in “Butterfly,” and then jumps to her thirties for “Wolf.” In “Raven” I am striving to weave together the gaps in the stories and form a conclusion worthy of Tia and her struggles in life.

“Raven” begins with a senior-citizen aged Tia Brooks looking back on her life. There is a sadness in the air - a smell of death even.  Through “Raven”  we follow Tia through her memories, connecting the dots, finally dealing with that China Doll fear of hers, as well as find the source of the initial sadness.

“Raven” brings it all together and gives Tia, and hopefully all of those reading about her trials and tribulations, closure and peace.

Book 2: Wolf - Tia Brooks in her thirties, discovering herself.

Book 3: Raven - Tia Brooks! But how old and what is her journey of discovery about this time? All in good time; of course. But I’d like to hear your thoughts…what do you think will be Raven’s topic? If you guess correctly, you might just win something!  

Hmm….

Butterfly begins with our heroine cleaning out her closets. Wolf begins with our heroine hiding in a closet. Guess what? I was also afraid of closets. Funny that the heroine is not scared while in her closets and yet each story begins and ends with her in it. If my closet door was not shut completely, I couldn’t sleep…even into my thirties. Maybe I shouldn’t have shared that? Oh well, its out there now.

Another more subconscious fear that seems to come up throughout my books is that of abandonment and being left alone. I think a lot of people can relate to this fear. One doesn’t have to be a child to feel it. I hope that in Wolf I was able to find that nice balance of feeling “okay” with finding one’s alone time and being with one’s self.

But what I thought would be fun would be for us to share some childhood fears and how you have overcome them…or maybe not overcome them. I think what’s important is to know that no fear is silly or undeserving. Fears are real and by acknowledging them we can begin to discover their true meaning and hopefully let them go.

So, what are your childhood fears?

What an honor.

Yoga in America is an interesting look at Yoga through the eyes of many successful teachers. Although Yoga enthusiasts would most definitely enjoy it,  I believe even beginners and those with absolutely no experience with Yoga would find it an enlightening read.

The best part? Proceeds from the sale of the book go to fallen fire-fighters. A poinient thought given today’s date.

If you are interested in purchasing a copy, I have several on hand at One Yoga & Wellness Center. Stop by or make arrangements for me to mail you one. And as always, thank you for your support of my writing career.

     In Wolf, Tia reconnects with her friends and family and sets about to determine what she truly wants in her life and how to find real meaning in it. While Butterfly tackled the “tween” years, Wolf jumps ahead and takes a look at the single girl in her thirties.

     My second book, Wolf, finds Tia now in her thirties and battling to find meaning to her life after a gut-wrenching break-up. It is a story of self-discovery through both reconnecting with family and friends and using her own intuition.

     My third book with a working title of Raven once again will rejoin Tia and eventually tie all three books together.

     Many people commented that Butterfly seemed to end without an ending.  My only comment to them is to follow through the trilogy. In the end, everything will come together.

    Excerpt from Introduction:

      “Tia began to cry softly, heavily moved by the experience that she was having. She felt connected completely with this animal as if it she were truly there in the clearing with it, experiencing the visualization first-hand. But it was more than that. There was something in the animal’s eyes that told her she couldn’t hide any more – hide her thoughts, her feelings or her hopes and dreams. No, looking into his eyes, Tia knew that for the first time she had truly been seen. This was not just an animal. This was an old teacher that had come to lead her back to herself. And as welcoming as this feeling was, it was also quite overwhelming.”

     And so begins Tia Brooks journey. In my second novel, Tia learns that her animal spirit guide is a wolf through an ancient Lakota Indian meditation. Throughout the book each time Tia encounters this spirit guide, she is reminded by this old teacher to trust her intuitive self.

     Native American Indians have long honored Wolf energy in their culture. The Wolf is revered as a great teacher and healer as it helps to establish balance and harmony in our lives. The Wolf is an animal tremendously loyal to its family or “pack.” It is intelligent, social and ritualistic in its mannerisms. 

     The Wolf is aligned to the moon and thus to Lunar energies which teach us to respect our urges, emotions and our unspoiled child-like nature. Wolf represents a need or willingness to accept the darkness within the self. Lunar energies rule the psyche and psychic perceptions, so Wolf medicine teaches us to listen to our own intuition, especially when our mind seems to be compelling us to think otherwise.

     Each time Wolf shows up in my novel, it is to help guide Tia through a pivital stage in her life. In fact, the entire book is a pivital stage of Tia’s life as she begins her journey by breaking up with her boyfriend of seven-years, the man that she was convinced was her soul-mate and the love of her life and begins a soul-searching quest to determine just who she is. This journey of self-discovery leads Tia to reconnect with her girlfriends or her “loyal pack” and through their help realize that she is a strong, capable woman. But of what? And thus Tia’s journey to find meaning to her life and to connect to the truth within herself really begins.

My style of writing takes it’s verse from personal stories in my own life. But then I twist the stories and add artistic liberties. So while loosely based on real-life events, they are fictional stories and should not be taken literally. And while names have been changed to protect the innocent, if you know me well, you may just find a likeness of yourself in one of the characters.

After writing Butterfly I thought keeping the theme of an animal would be an interesting direction to go.  In thinking of a single young woman dating, several animals come to mind. I chose Wolf as a working title not for the obvious male dating aspects, but because of the qualities the native american indians equated with the wolf: creativity, purification & healing. Since our heroine begins this novel in a very dark place, she will need these energies to propel her along her journey. Also, since the book will introduce new female (and male) characters in comedic tales of dating, I thought it important to also convey this animal’s fiercly loyal qualities to their pack. Because, after all, boyfriends may come and go, but in the end your girls are always there for you.

I look forward to sharing more with you soon and am interested in your thoughts about Wolf.

Sincerely, Tracey