LET'S WELCOME Chana this morning
with a question and answers to her book!
Q&A with Chana Wilson, Author of Riding Fury Home
- What led you to write the book?
When I
decided to become a therapist, it meant I had to go back to college to finish
my bachelor’s degree before grad school, but my dilemma was that I had a
terrible writer’s block. I asked myself,
“What about writing scares you?” and what leapt out of my mouth was, “That the
truth might come out!” That truth was
all the realities of my childhood that I had to keep secret because of stigma
and shame. So, I took a creative writing
class where I deliberately wrote those stories.
In class, we did short free writes, and sweat would be pouring off my
body. Then, we had to read out loud what
we’d just written. The first time, as I
read a story of one of Mom’s suicide attempts, there was a potent silence. Afterwards, I could see how moved my
classmates were, and some of them shared hard stories of their own. The shame ebbed away as I saw that my very
intimate, vulnerable stories resonated in others, and became a story larger
than just my own.
I put my
creative writing away for years and wrote academic papers. When my mother was ill with cancer, she said,
“I’m going to lick this thing and live to write a book about my life.” When she didn’t make it, at first I thought I
was writing her story for her, but I soon found I had to re-inhabit the story
myself, and explore my own narrative.
2.
What is the meaning of the title of your memoir?
Riding
Fury Home has multiple meanings. One theme
is a child’s suppressed rage at her fragile mother. My mother attempted suicide and was committed
to a mental hospital when I was just seven, and there was no room to express my
need for her and my grief at losing her.
My father and the doctors said that she needed me, so I had to be very good
to her. All that discounting of self led
to a deeply buried rage. To ride that
home is the journey of working through the hurt and anger between my mother and
me to come to some forgiveness.
I was also
crazy about horses. In the chapter
titled “Riding Fury Home,” my mother takes me to a rodeo where Fury, a horse
from my favorite TV show, is making an appearance. My mother had developed a driving phobia, so
we lurch down the road with her sweating and cursing at the wheel. At the rodeo, I’m completely entranced as
Fury, a wild black stallion, races around the arena with no rider, looking so
beautiful and free. But as we drive
home, I’m ripped from reverie by my mother’s driving, and I feel hatred for her
for ruining my happy dreaming.
3.
What would your mother have thought about the book?
Writing the book after my mother died
gave me a certain freedom. If she’d been
alive, I would have had to push myself to be fully honest in spite of my fears
of hurting her. I think some of it would
have been hard for her to hear, because the book went deeper than we’d
gone. We would have had to go through
another round of processing the impact of her being unable to mother me in my
childhood. But I believe that it would
have been healing for us, and in the end, she would have welcomed that
process.
On another level, my mother was my
biggest booster, always proud of my accomplishments. Purely in her “mom” role, she would have
cheered wildly for me as an author. She
would have backed my writing the book, because as a therapist and feminist, she
believed in revealing complex human truths.
That I acknowledge in the memoir the profound gift of her love and
mothering of me later in life would have thrilled her. And she would have been delighted that Riding
Fury Home pays tribute to her resilience and zest for life.
This book will be gifted today!
Members of the Perseus Books Group | Distributed by Publishers Group West
Twitter: twitter.com/moonguides | twitter.com/sealpress
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A huge thanks to the following sponsors for offering up some very heartfelt presents for the month of December... Besides the featured Authors book each day, we will have weekly PRESENTS of the following..
From top to bottom.....Pellon is gifting 2 pillows, 1 batting for a throw, some pillow stuffing, and some wonder under to 2 winners who stick with Pellon!
Aurifil is gifting 4 boxes of large threads in a variety of colours to 4 lovers of threads....
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Purdy's Chocolate is gifting 4 large boxes of chocolates...( I did not even peak under the wrapper, so I am not sure what is there ) to 4 lucky chocolate lovers.
Andover Fabrics is gifting 4 beautiful assorted fat quarter bundles to 4 fabric lovers...
And Seal Press will be gifting the book that is featured each day!
Our whole month of December we cheerleaders will be celebrating all of YOU, who have been
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WE hope you will be visiting us and leaving lovely comments for all of our guests who have
made this month possible.... Take this time to thank those around you for all of our blessings...
It will be a very special month....
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With warmest blessings from our cheerleading TEAM...
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( p.s. stuck at airport, flights cancelled, big storm, sorry for not replying to all messages these
past few days...trying to get everyone home lol) WE will be resuming to our regular programming of blog hops very soon....
