Book Author Butterflies, Part 2
“I’m reading an excerpt from Chapter 9 of Angel Hero.” I hoped my voice wasn’t shaking. “Dark clouds extinguished the starlight and spewed out rain as my borrowed Ford with bald tires skidded along an unlit stretch of highway. “Everything’s going to be fine,” I whispered, and chanted “Om” again and again.
“A flash of lightning lit up a dark VW van on the right shoulder of the road. Squinting, I tried to make out the color of the van. Another flash of lightning sizzled in the dark sky, brighter this time. In that incandescent moment, the sight of a rag knotted over the license plate of the van seared itself into my brain.
“Oh my god. I shook at the certainty that this was the brown van Jaku claimed belonged to the toughs who maimed anyone and everyone who crossed Jaku. The sight of the van made me realize Jaku thought I would take the stand on Vic’s behalf, and had sent his goons to silence me. My worst fear had come to pass.
“How did they know I would travel this road? Had someone told Jaku where I lived? Had he sent his goons to hunt me down, beat me up, kill me?
“My right leg shook so spasmodically the car bucked and skidded dangerously close to the van. Something inside me snapped open, and anger rushed in to fill the gap. ‘Screw you, Jaku! Screw your thugs!’ I yelled. ‘You jerks aren’t going to defeat me without a fight!’”
A glance at the audience revealed 50 pairs of eyes all staring at me. Speechless, I breathed deeply, trying to slow my too-fast heart. How ironic, I thought, to be reading about feeling the fear and fighting back anyway, when here I am, shaking in my shoes, and…
A sudden epiphany overtook me. Wait a minute! I’m feeling the fear and speaking anyway, aren’t I? Good on me! A woman in the audience smiled at me. I smiled back.
I read: “Detective Jet had insisted, “Fear is just fear.” But he’d also said my fear that Jaku would get even with me if I confronted him was a reasonable one. However, this fear was still a fear, and fear, I believed, was the antithesis of faith. Maybe Jet had been right after all.”
Listeners told me later my story grabbed them. A dozen of them took a couple of the Angel Hero bookmarks I’d scattered across the tables. Two women bought my book.
In case Oprah interviews me some day, I’ll continue practicing speeches and hopefully learn how to banish some of those pesky butterflies from my stomach. But only in the privacy of Barry’s and my home. For now, I will pursue less terrifying ways of getting the word out about my book. I’ll put links here to my Author pages on Facebook and Amazon, and to my Twitter account. Until we meet again, then, in cyberspace.