Our Hazel Moon protagonist, November Rainer Savitchian, proudly Armenian, was inspired by one of our dear friends over the years, also Armenian, Christine Martin (on the right in the picture below). Early on in the process of conceiving, writing, and publishing our book we'd imagined sharing it with members of the Armenian Diaspora living here in America, but especially in our home town, Racine, Wisconsin. Well, today, that dream became a reality!
An unexpected celebrity was seated only a few feet from our book signing table upping the wow factor for our overall experience! Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, made an appearance to the delight of many of his supporters who had attended Armenian Fest!
One of the first amazing things that happened involved life imitating art. In the Prologue of our book, Hazel Moon, there is a scene where November has a Turkish Coffee drink prepared for her by a barista...and...not 10 feet from our book signing table was a vendor preparing, yes, Armenian (Turkish) Coffee!! Lori had just driven back from a long weekend performing up north and the delicious coffee was just the stimulant ticked to get up back up for the signing. (of course we had to drink our coffee from a straw!)
A note to you aspiring writers out there, getting your book published is just the first hurdle. Getting our book accepted by the Armenian Fest committee took persistence and perseverance, but in the end it was all well worth it.
The committee was looking for Armenian characters in any book before they would consider the authors for a book signing during their once-a-year festival. We had to provide an advance copy, some weeks passed, fortunately the church librarian, Pam, immediately returned a follow-up call, supporting the book, making everything possible. It was her influence that just got Hazel Moon accepted in time for the August 7th festival date.
The people running the cultural center could not have been nicer, engaged us about the book and it's Armenian character, November, gave us suggestions which we plan to use to up the Armenian factor in the book and or in its sequel, Hawthorn Moon.
For example, I wanted to honor the colors of the Armenian flag, red, blue, and apricot, by painting my nails those colors, but speaking with one of our customers, an Armenian professor, we learned that the colors of the flag had been a source of contention creating factions in the Armenian Diaspora.
But in 1991, with the collapse of the Soviet Empire, Armenian was once again resurrected as an independent country and the original flag with its original colors were once again accepted by all or most Armenians around the globe.
When we were discussing adding a scene with November painting her nails the colors of the flag, that sparked a lively discussion. With the book set in 1984, doing such a thing would have depended on which Armenian faction November's father identified with as to what he would have taught her about honoring the flag and its colors. On the other hand, November was something of a rebel anyway, her mother had died, then her father, so without being affiliated with an Armenian church, we all agreed that adding such a scene would be true to the character and not pose an ethical problem for today's Armenian reader.
So many wonderful people stopped by our book signing station, a number of them purchased books, but what was most surprising was their level of engagement and respect for our project once they learned that it featured an Armenian protagonist.
The professor was pleased that our story didn't focus on the Holocaust. He'd been hoping more authors would use fiction to describe the more modern experience of members of today's Armenian Diaspora, exploring the challenges of adapting to modern life in America and or in the Armenian conclaves anywhere else in the world.
When our book signing period ended, it was off to sample the wonderful ethnic food; the sarma and the hummus and the cheese beoreg squares, and the lahmajoon, the kebobs and pastries; the bourmah, mavish, shekerlama, zylook, katah and choreg, meet and greet a few other people, but then it was out to enjoy the music.
And the dancing...
Lori and I are known to be unable to just sit and watch when the right kind of music hits our ears. True to form, we tried to hold back, but first Lori...
...then I joined in...
...and amazingly Lori's performance practically stopped the band as they were transfixed by her beauty, grace, charm, and unique allure on the dance floor!
A wonderful time was had by all, our book signing was an unqualified success, and we felt grateful to have been able to share our story and our character, November Rainer Savitchian, with these incredible people today.
