Blog Archives
The Beauty of Imagination
What I Would Wish to Be follows Trey and his father on an adventure where they use imagination to become anything they want. How did you come up with the idea behind this story?
I had decided that I wanted to try my hand at composing children’s books. What I Would Wish to Be was the first one I was able to put together. I don’t know what it is like for anyone else, but I often have moments when I wonder what it would be like to become something else or someone else. I mean, you see a bee sailing through the air, and you wonder – is their life as hard of yours seems to be? Yes, they’re working all the time, but do they have to live with any sort of expectation for their life other than to just being a bee? The beauty of imagination is that we open ourselves up to the world around us.
Do you think all children have a good imagination, or is that something they need to work on?
I think that all children have the potential to cultivate wonderful imaginations. Now whether they will depends on the encouragement they get from the people they are surrounded with and love. If you’re not encouraged to think for yourself, to find your own solutions to problems, then your imaginative journey has been cut short before it has begun. I lived on a farm when I was a kid, so I was miles from any of my friends to be able to play with them. Imagination became my friend. As long as I could entertain myself, I was never truly lonely.
What do you hope young readers take away from your book?
It would be great if my book taught young readers to think outside the box. Yeah, everybody wants to be an astronaut at some point, but not everyone is going to get that chance, and yes, none of us will ever have the ability to turn into a bee, but neither of these things prevent us from imagining that we can have extraordinary lives. Empathy starts when we can put ourselves into other people’s shoes. Cultivate wonder around you about the amazing world in which we live.
What is the next book that you are working on and when will it be available?
The next children’s book I’m currently working on is about luck and Leprechauns. It will become available at the beginning of March – just in time for St. Patrick’s Day. May the luck of the Irish be with us all! 😉
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What I Would Wish to Be
When you were a child, what did you wish to be? Was it an astronaut so you could explore space or a doctor to heal the sick? In What I would Wish to Be, Trey’s father asks him if he could be anything he wanted, what would it be? Trey’s responses are creative and unexpected and throw his father for a loop when he mentions he wishes to be a tree, the wind, the sea, and much more.
Author Michele Sayre sparks young readers’ curiosity with her charming story of Trey and his conversation with his father. I felt that Trey’s responses were spot on, and it was as if I were speaking to a child. I loved Trey’s imagination and how he dared to be something that others wouldn’t think of. This creative and free-spirited read will surely spark the imagination of young readers.
This is the perfect book for teachers to read to their students and, as an exercise, have them write about what they want to be and see what they come up with. The illustrations are eye-catching and reminded me of the Baby John videos. The rhyming scheme made this a fun read that will teach young readers how to rhyme without them even realizing it.
I highly recommend What I would Wish to Be to parents and young readers as this is the perfect book to spark up a conversation before bedtime.
Pages: 46 | ASIN : B0BRGYC5LX
I Infuse Raw Emotion and Honesty Into My Work
Guiding Spirits: (Veritas) is a collection of poetry from your mid-twenties. What made you decide to publish these poems now?
Frankly, I decided to publish now because the conditions were finally right. In regards to poetry, there are only two ways to get published – a publishing company or self-publishing. Most publishing houses don’t really want to deal with poetry unless it comes from a well-known person because then they have a chance for their endeavor to be cost-effective. Self-publishing, until at least fifteen years ago, was always done at great cost to the poet/author. You had to publish so many books, and if they didn’t sell, then you ate that cost and were stuck with a lot of books.
Self-publishing today is completely different. The only cost to the poet is their time and effort to complete their work, and then get it published on platforms like Amazon Kindle Publishing. Only a book that gets ordered gets published and the poet gets a percentage of the royalties that would have gone to the publisher or their agent otherwise. An author can take their destiny into their own hands. They don’t have to face dozens of rejections from publishers who often let writers like J.K. Rowling slide through their fingers because their opinions are subjective. Independent, self-publishing allows that book to get out into the universe to be bought by readers based on their preferences – not what the publisher thinks readers may or may not like.
I’ll take my chances on the readers. My books will either sell or not sell depending on their own merits . . . and authors and poets like me can now get their work out into the universe when they would never have been given that opportunity before with the technology that hadn’t existed until about fifteen years ago.
What was it like going back and reading these poems at this point in your life? Do they still resonate with where you are currently in life?
One of my greatest concerns was that I had been self-delusional in my youth and maybe my poetry wasn’t as good as I remembered it to be. My poetry style today is much more complicated and definitely less repetitious. I was really surprised at how well the poetry had held up over time. I think it was because of the raw emotion and honesty I was able to infuse into my work. It definitely was like a diary entry for me. My stepfather had died around this time period, so it made me question everything, including my place in the universe. I could still relate to the poetry because of that emotion.
What poem from this collection has held the most meaning for you and why?
My favorite poem in the book is “Sweet Music.” I just love the rhythmic movement of it and the imagery. It’s about the ultimate expression of a woman and a man’s love. Lovemaking is more than about the physicality of the act – when done right, it is the blending of two souls into the closest thing human beings can attain towards bringing Heaven to Earth.
Do you plan to publish additional collections of poetry written from this stage of your life?
Yes, there will be many more poetry books to come. By the end of the year, I’ll have two more poetry books published. They still have a simplicity and emotional honesty to them, but they cover stages in my life throughout the years. Guiding Spirits was about opening myself to the universe. The next book is about the anger of realizing I gave away my power to others and taking it back. The third poetry book is how my journey of self-discovery transforms my life.
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The beauty of poetry is that we try to express with the fewest words possible the entirety of life and our natures and what it is like for us to live upon this planet. Words become a song that we sing out into the universe, trying to reach out to like-minded souls. It is our nature to express ourselves and share who we are with the cosmos. There’s a certain fearlessness attached to a poem when it’s presented to the world. There’s always that one iota of fear where the poet feels that they are alone in their views and someone else will not get them at their most basic level of humanity. Poetry is saying, “Here I am universe. Take me as I am. I hope you love me, but, if that cannot happen, I will be satisfied if you just don’t ignore me.” To be heard is to matter, and that is all any of us want – to fulfill the wish that our lives matter. That what we think and feel and hope matters to someone other than ourselves.
This book is an exploration and experiencing of the world around us through the poet’s eyes when she was much younger than she is now. Through any age, we all experience the same emotions, desires, wants, dreams, and just a heart-felt wish that we matter to someone in this universe – even if it’s ourselves.
Guiding Spirits
Veritas is a Latin phrase that stands for “Truth is mighty and will prevail.” Guiding Spirits by author Michele L Sayer is a compilation of poems exploring the constant truths in life like love, family, God, emotion, and change. The poems were written at a much younger age in the author’s life. A time when her life was filled with dynamic changes, her mid-twenties. This is a point in life where you are figuring out who you are and where life may take you. While we all are still grappling with the idea of being adults, there are a lot of critical life-altering decisions that we make. There is no one to tell us what to do, and whatever we do at this stage decides the trajectory of our lives. Sayer talks about these very timeless issues in these poems.
The poems are written in a very personal tone, as they were once in Sayre’s diary. A significant tone of the book is relatability and connection. From a literary point of view, the poems are very basic. The poem style varies across the book, with repetition being the dominant literary device. The poet uses repetition to highlight the all-encompassing nature of these emotions, like loneliness in the poem “I am Lonely.” The themes covered and the messages conveyed are straightforward without a lot of symbolism. I found it interesting that the book’s format looks raw and basic, almost like reading a personal diary filled with poems. It made it seem like the author was sharing a piece of her writing that is close to her, making the poems very relatable.
Throughout the book, there is artwork done by three different artists: Brycen Pancrazio, Isabel Sayre, and Gabriel Sayre. What is unique about these artists is they are all children. Each of them is special in Sayer’s life and adds a special touch to the poems included in this collection.
Guiding Spirits: (Veritas) is a thought-provoking collection of poetry. Written when the author was in her mid-twenties, the topics are highly relatable to that age group. however, anyone that is at a stage of life undergoing significant changes will find this collection meaningful.
Page: 214 | ASIN : B09SZ9LZWH
LITERARY TITAN 