Self-help title turns the trauma of being fired into opportunity An expert’s debut empowers women to be resilient after experiencing job loss New York, NY – A quick-witted and fast-paced self-help book from debut author and rainmaker, Robin Merle, dives into the emotional trauma of women whose job loss wasn’t part of the original plan. Involuntary Exit: A Woman’s Guide to Thriving After Being Fired (She Writes Press, Oct. 19, 2021) is about moving forward, illustrated by women’s remarkable stories of pain, progress, and purpose as they chart their own journey to more meaningful success. It can take less than a minute to get fired. Less than a minute to hear the words that change your life as you’ve known it. You’re stunned, shocked, humiliated because your career has defined your life and you’ve been blindsided. You’re a company Loyalist with a capital L, and you’ve been sucker punched professionally. How do you even talk about this? With advice for every unexpected twist, turn, and emotional trigger, this book is based on author Robin Merle’s experience at the top of billion-dollar organizations, as well as her interviews with accomplished women who were suddenly severed from their organizations and navigated their way back to success. The real-life examples she offers in these pages prove that readers are not alone and that they, too, can get through this. Whether being fired or needing to move on, Involuntary Exit will help readers rediscover their value and emerge as stronger leaders on their own terms. Find your resilience -- no matter what has happened to your job, whether voluntary or involuntary -- with Robin Merle on Dropping In.

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Involuntary Exit: What to Do if You've Been Fired! w/ Robin Merle

Rea and the Blood of the Nectar tells the story of Rea Chettri, a 12-year-old girl living a simple, if boring, life on the tea plantations of Darjeeling, India. Without warning, Rea's life gets turned on its head when her twin brother, Rohan, goes missing. Determined to save him, Rea embarks on a secret adventure by portaling into the enchanted world of Astranthia. In this thrilling tale of family and friendship, Rea will have to grapple with dark truths, discover her true self, and save Astranthia from a potentially deadly fate. But the clock is ticking. Can Rea rescue Rohan, save Astranthia? Drop In with us to find out what's important to an adolescent girl ,as she makes her way on the journey of a lifetime!

Rea and the Blood of the Nectar: Young Adventure with Payal Doshi

OFTEN USING HISTORY AS A LENS TO GAIN INSIGHT INTO THE ROLES GENDER AND RACE PLAY IN SELF-DETERMINATION, CHANDRA CREATES VIVID CHARACTERS IN STORIES THAT ENGAGE READERS AND INSPIRE DISCUSSION. Prasad says, “I knew from an early age, eleven or twelve, that I wanted to be an author. When I was a child, one of my favorite activities was spending quiet hours in my room writing short stories (come to think of it, that is still one of my favorite activities). I also reveled in make-believe games with my two brothers; I remember pretending to be pirates and Ghostbusters and jewel thieves and deep-sea divers. Those early, fanciful imaginings no doubt gave me creative fodder for the books that I’ve written, and the books that I hope are still to come.” After her life is upended by divorce and a cross-country move, 16-year-old Saskia Brown feels like an outsider at her new school—not only is she a transplant, she’s biracial in a population of mostly white students. One day while visiting her only friend at her part-time library job, Saskia encounters a vial of liquid mercury, then touches an old daguerreotype—the precursor of the modern-day photograph—and makes a startling discovery. She is somehow able to visit the man in the portrait: Robert Cornelius, a brilliant young inventor from the nineteenth century. The hitch: she can see him only in her dreams. Saskia shares her revelation with some classmates, hoping to find connection and friendship among strangers. The other girls steal portraits from a local college's daguerreotype collection and try the dangerous experiment for themselves. Soon, they each form a bond with their own Mercury Boy or Girl from an injured Union soldier to a charming pickpocket in New York City. At night, the girls visit the boys in their dreams. During the day, they hold clandestine meetings of their new secret society. At first, the Mercury Boys Club is a thrilling diversion from their troubled everyday lives, but it's not long before jealousy, violence, and secrets threaten everything the girls hold dear. Drop In with us to find out what happens and whether there is a real life happy ending ~

Mercury Boys: Young Adult Fantasy & its Issues w/ Chandra Prasad

This week on Dropping In, from the author of A Delightful Little Book on Aging Stephanie Raffleock joins us with her new book Creatrix Rising . Raffelock lays out—through personal stories and essays—the highlights of the past fifty years, in which women have gone from a quiet strength to a resounding voice. Over time, maiden, mother, and crone have represented the three stages assigned to a woman’s life cycle – the limiting categories of both ancient and modern (neo-pagan) mythology. None of us has ever truly fit the old-crone image, and for today’s midlife women, a new archetype is being birthed: the Creatrix. She invites us along on her own transformational journey by providing probing questions for reflection so that we can flesh out and bring to life this new archetype within ourselves. Friday at 11 am CT

Creatrix Rising: The Power of Midlife Women w/Stephanie Raffelock

A chance to finally understand the pain of separation & loss, and how to move through it awaits in this week's Dropping In conversation. Odyssey of Ashes: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Letting Go begins with the sudden death of Cheryl Krauter’s spouse. Five months later, in a stroke of irony and magic, her husband wins a long-desired guided fly fishing trip in a raffle?and Cheryl decides to go in his place, fulfilling a promise to scatter his ashes by a trout stream.Part I of this memoir is an account of the first year after Cheryl’s husband’s death, where she becomes an explorer in the infinite stream of grief and loss, a time traveler between the darkness of sorrow and the light of daily life. Part II concludes with stories of the poignant and humorous adventures she had during the ensuing year. Tying it all together and woven throughout is Cheryl’s account of the creation of an altar assembled during the three-day ritual of Los Días de los Muertos.Poetic and mythological, Odyssey of Ashes is a raw story of loss and the deep transformation that traveling through darkness and returning to light can bring. Drop In with us to find out how a professional copes with the unthinkable; the sudden loss of her husband, usually the traumatic crisis for which her clients have come to her. Cheryl Krauter gives us an unblinking view of the gaping hole and the wholeness that can ensue, told through the lens of the favourite pastime of she and her late husband -- fly-fishing.

Odyssey of Ashes: A Memoir, Love/Loss/Letting Go - Cheryl Krauter

For anyone who has experienced an enmeshed relationship with their mother, who needs or needed to step out of her shadow, or who yearns or yearned to find herself in spite of it, our conversation with Deborah is for you! A vault of family secrets needed prying open here ~ An only child, Deborah Burns grew up in prim 1950s America in the shadow of a her beautiful, unconventional, rule-breaking mother, Dorothy—a red-haired beauty who looked like Rita Hayworth and skirted norms with a style and flare that made her the darling of men and women alike. Married to the son of a renowned Italian family with ties to the underworld, Dorothy fervently eschewed motherhood and domesticity, turning Deborah over to her spinster aunts to raise while she was the star of a vibrant social life. As a child, Deborah revered her charismatic mother, but Dorothy was a woman full of secrets with a troubled past—a mistress of illusion whose love seemed just out of her daughter’s grasp. In vivid, lyrical prose, Saturday’s Child tells the story of Deborah’s eccentric upbringing and her quest in midlife, long after her parents’ death, to uncover the truth about her mother and their complex relationship. No longer under the spell of her maternal goddess, but still caught in a wrenching cycle of love and longing, Deborah must finally confront the reality of her mother’s legacy—and finally claim her own. Drop In with us to experience the pain, the reflections and ultimately the triumph.

Saturday's Child: A Daughter's Memoir with Deborah Burns

America Calling : A Foreign Student in a Country of Possibility We talk about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, as our founding fathers declared, but is it for everyone? Growing up in middle-class India, Rajika Bhandari has seen generations of her family look westward, where an American education means status and success. But she resists the lure of America because those who left never return-they all become flies trapped in honey in a land of opportunity. As a young woman, however, she finds herself heading to a US university to study, following her heart and a relationship. When that relationship ends and she fails in her attempt to move back to India as a foreign-educated woman, she returns to the US and finds herself in a job where the personal is political and professional: she is immersed in the lives of international students who come to America from over 200 countries, the universities that attract them, and the tangled web of immigration that a student must navigate. An unflinching and insightful narrative that explores the global appeal of a Made in America education that is a bridge to America's successful past and to its future, America Calling is both a deeply personal story of Bhandari's search for her place and voice, and an incisive analysis of America's relationship with the rest of the world through the most powerful tool of diplomacy: education. At a time of growing nationalism, a turning inward, and fear of the other, America Calling is ultimately a call to action to keep America's borders-and minds-open. International students and immigrants have been the secret ingredient in America’s recipe for global success. America Calling shares one immigrant’s story, a tale that reflects millions more, and shows us why preventing the world’s best and brightest from seeking the American Dream will put this country’s future in jeopardy. At a time when immigration could not be more important, Drop In with us to hear firsthand the impact of coming to America -- both for the person and for our country.

America Calling: Rajika Bhandari on Answering the Call

COVID-19 has launched a second pandemic: a mental health crisis in America. Since the lockdowns started, calls to suicide prevention hotlines have gone up 1000%; in a recent Census Bureau questionnaire, over one-third of U.S. adults self-identified as clinically anxious or depressed; and experts have predicted that 75,000 additional deaths may be caused by coronavirus despair. There has never been a time in our history when an immediate and in-depth focus on mental health issues was so necessary, or so urgent. Yet despite these alarming statistics, mental illness remains a clouded topic in our society. What does it look like? What can we do about it? In MODERN MADNESS: An Owner’s Manual (Hachette), Terri Cheney provides the answers and clarity we need, now more than ever before. In her celebrated New York Times bestseller Manic, Cheney depicted her harrowing double life as an elite entertainment attorney suffering from bipolar disorder. Now she once again uses her compelling narrative gifts to flip mental illness inside out, exposing the visceral story of the struggles, stigma, relationship dilemmas, treatments, and recovery techniques she and others have encountered. Using the familiar framework of an owner’s manual, MODERN MADNESS brilliantly imposes order on a frightening and forbidding topic. Cheney’s juxtaposition of conventional clinical language with real, lived experience unpacks the myths and realities of mental illness. With a combination of the tongue-in-cheek (“The World’s Worst Party Guest”) and the all-too-real (“The Rules of Suicide”), Cheney’s stories are by turns gritty, brutally honest, slyly funny, and always revelatory. She takes readers to the far reaches of reality, and back again. Her unusual ability to translate madness will forever change how you look at mental health—and mental illness. Not just for readers with a diagnosis, MODERN MADNESS will be invaluable for anyone trying to understand the complexities of the mental health issues currently confronting our nation. This week, we'll also hear firsthand how Terri, a highly competent lawyer transitioned to being an esteemed writer -- what is her approach to writing? What is her process? What are the implications of mental illness on the discipline of writing? How does one develop a second professional proficiency while coping with mental illness? You'll hear it here. Please do Drop In with us!

MODERN MADNESS: An Owner’s Manual & MANIC: A Memoir--Terri Cheney

Come with us as we travel to Mauritius, to look at a beautiful turbulent country through the lens of a you boy. In the 1950s, Vishnu Bhushan is a young boy yet to learn the truth beyond the rumors of his family's fractured histories - an alliance, as his mother says, of two bankrupt families. In evocative chapters, the first two decades of Vishnu's life in Mauritius unfolds with heart-wrenching closeness as he battles to experience the world beyond, and the cultural, political, and familial turmoil that hold on to him. Through gorgeous and precise language, Silent Winds, Dry Seas conjures the spirit and rich life of Mauritius, even as its diverse peoples live under colonial rule. Weaving the soaring hopes, fierce love, and heartbreaking tragedies of Vishnu's proud Mauritian family together with his country's turbulent path to gain independence, Busjeet masterfully evokes the epic sweep of history in the intimate moments of a boy's life. Silent Winds, Dry Seas is a poetic, powerful, and universal novel of identity and place, of the legacies of colonialism, of tradition, modernity, and emigration, and of what a family will sacrifice for its children to thrive. Drop In with us to hear this compelling story, so relevant to people in flux today.

Silent Winds, Dry Seas: Vinod Busjeet on Colonialism, ID, & Place

Have you ever wondered about the nature of witches? Be they modern or historic, witches never fail to compel us -- to curiosity, to reverence, to awe or fear. Even now, why is that? Nancy Hayes Kilgore’s powerful new novel, BITTER MAGIC (Milford House, an imprint of Sunbury Press), is based on the life of Isobel Gowdie, who confessed to witchcraft in Scotland in 1662. During this time, witches were burned at the stake, but the historical record is inconclusive about what actually happened to Gowdie. Kilgore’s story springs from that silence to imagine what Gowdie’s fate might have been. BITTER MAGIC is told by Isobel herself and also by Margaret Hay, a fictionalized seventeen-year-old noble woman. When Margaret stumbles across Isobel one day, it seems as though Isobel is commanding the dolphins in the ocean to jump. Margaret is enchanted. She becomes interested in Isobel’s magic, in fairies, and in herbal remedies; Isobel freely shares her knowledge. While Margaret worries that being around Isobel could be dangerous, she also respects Isobel’s medical successes and comes to believe that acknowledging the efficacy of herbal remedies or believing in fairies does not challenge her Christianity. But Isobel believes in more than cheery fairies and herbal medicine. She has dark wishes as well, unknown to most people. Isobel seeks vengeance against the local lord who executed her mother for witchcraft. More important, Isobel’s trance experiences (or are they dreams?) lead her to confess to a wide range of sins, including consorting with the devil. Then, during her trial, Isobel names thirteen others, calling them all witches. To her great shock, Margaret hears her own name. Can her tutor, a Christian mystic named Katharine, save them? In this gripping and beautifully written tale, Kilgore’s characters debate whether Gowdie is fantasizing or a real witch, and whether young Margaret and the others are complicit. But their debate soon expands to consider the effects of Isobel’s poverty, being powerless, and ultimately the very nature of faith and forgiveness. Drop In with us for a spirited conversation with Nancy Hayes Kilgore!

Bitter Magic! What Witches Have to Tell Us -- With Nancy Kilgore

The Creative Formula: Compose, Choreograph, and Capture Your Masterpiece Do you feel frustrated or hopeless because you know there's great work inside of you, but you can't seem to get it out of your head and onto the stage? This book can help.... Another resource? Holly's podcast on Voice America! An entrancing look at the world of performance and creativity. Learn about the neuroscience of the “it” factor, listen to artists who channel ghosts to create their work, and hear firsthand from a booking agent about how to promote yourself as an artist. Host, Holly Shaw, a hypnotherapist and performance coach to Emmy award winning and Grammy nominated artists, includes spotlight coaching sessions, the open channel game where guests go into trance and answer questions, and wildly far-out conversations with musicians, actors, choreographers, and influencers on this podcast. We uncover the common threads between you, your creativity, and the process that can reveal the whole undiscovered continent, where you really live.

Making Art in the Middle of Madness: Holly Shaw on Our Creativity

Are you spread too thin? Mad with confusion? Making decisions for others? Trying to find the time for self-care, their care, family care and staying sane all at once? You're not alone. Designed to help caregivers understand how to cope with and overcome the overwhelming challenges that arise while caregiving for a loved one?especially an aging parent?Role Reversal is a comprehensive guide to navigating the enormous daily challenges faced by caregivers. In these pages, Waichler blends her personal experience caring for her beloved father with her forty years of expertise as a patient advocate and clinical social worker. It includes hers and her father's voices telling his life story and using it as a springboard to address universal caregiving issues.The result is a book offering invaluable information on topics ranging from estate planning to grief and anger to building a support network and finding the right level of care for your elderly parent. Iris's book, Role Reversal, How to Take Care of Yourself and Your Aging Parents winner of : Finalist Best Book Award 2016 Finalist Indie Excellence Award 2016 Living Now Silver Award Winner 2017 Honorable Mention Readers Favorite Award 2017 Book Excellence Award 2017 Runner Up Award Florida Book Festival 2018 Honorable Mention Hollywood Book Festival 2018. Iris is also Author of Riding the Infertility Roller Coaster: A Guide to Educate and Inspire: Mom's Choice Gold Award Winner for Best Book of the Year. Winner of the National Parenting Publications (NAPPA) Gold Award for best book of the year. Winner of the finalist award for Foreword Magazine 2007 non-fiction Book of the Year. Drop in with us as Iris offers her sage advice on these trickiest and deepest life dilemmas. Facebook Page @ site https://www.facebook.com/RoleReversal1

Role Reversal: Care of Yourself & Ageing Parents w/ Iris Waichler

The marriage pass by Briana Cole twists and turns and turns on in unexpected ways! In a smart, sexy spin-off from her Unconditional Series, Briana Cole continues to explore unconventional relationships and question all assumptions about love, lust, and monogamy in this tantalizing drama that takes the what if of a free pass to a whole new level... Can you really have the best of both worlds? He's rich, successful--and has been faithfully married to his longtime girlfriend for nearly one grueling year. Because for Dr. Dorian Graham, too many women is never too much--no matter how loyal his wife, Shantae, has been since their college days. So when she proposes they both celebrate their first anniversary by spending a no-questions-asked, no-consequences night with their greatest temptation, Dorian is shocked, but can't resist. Especially since Shantae's wild-card younger sister, Reagan, is gorgeous, uninhibited--and the one who got away... It turns out one sizzling night with Reagan isn't enough. Yet the more Dorian takes, the more she demands--and the more he suddenly has to lose. Soon, with his mind games being used against him and his every move checkmated, Dorian will be forced to go all-in on one last desperate play to win. But winning might just be another way to crash and burn... Drop In with us to find out how all the mysteries unravel in a tantalising story of suspense, drama, and straight up sex.

The Marriage Pass: Briana Cole on How Sex in Open Marriage Works!

Miriam and Craig are both artists and their four children carry on the legacy. When their teenage son, Nick, is diagnosed with schizophrenia, a tumultuous decade ensues in which the family careens permanently off the conventional course. Like the ten Biblical plagues, they are hit by one catastrophe after another; violence, evictions, arrests, a suicide attempt, a near-drowning, even cancer and a brain tumor play against the backdrop of a wild teenage bacchanal of artmaking and drugs. With no time for hand-wringing, Miriam advances, convinced she can fix everything. This is the story of how mental illness unspools an entire family. As Miriam fights to reclaim her son from the ruthless, invisible enemy, we are given an unflinching view into a world few could imagine. He Came In With It is the legacy of, and for, her son Nick. Witness the story of Miriam, Craig, Nick & their family when the unthinkable, that could happen to anyone, happens to them. Drop in to the conversation ~

Encore Invisible Enemy: How Miriam Feldman's Son Morphed through Mental Illness in He Came In With It

Candace Park knows a lot about playing a role. For most of her life, she’s been playing a role of the quiet Korean girl who takes all AP classes and plays a classical instrument, keeping her dreams of stardom-and her obsession with SLK, K-pop’s top boyband to herself. She doesn’t see how a regular girl like her could possibly become one of those K-pop goddesses she sees on YouTube. Even though she can sing. Like, really sing. So when Candace secretly enters a global audition held by SLK’s music label, the last thing she expects is to actually get a coveted spot in their trainee program. And convincing her strict parents to let her go is all but impossible…although it’s nothing compared to what comes next. Under strict supervision of her instructors at the label’s headquarters in Seoul, Candace must perfect her performance skills to within an inch of her life, learn to speak Korean fluently, and navigate the complex hierarchies of her fellow trainees, all while following the strict rules of the industry. Rule number one? NO DATING, which becomes impossible to follow when she meets a dreamy boy trainee. And in the all-out battle to debut, Candace is in danger of planting herself in the middle of a scandal lighting up the K-pop fandom around the world. If she doesn’t what it takes to become a perfect, hair-flipping K-pop idol, what will that mean for her family, who have sacrificed everything to give her the chance? And is a spot in the most hyped K-pop girl group of all time really worth risking her friendships, her future, and everything she believes in? Drop In with us to find out!

K-Pop Confidential: Stephan Lee on The K-Pop Culture/ Sub-Culture

At Dropping In we’ll explore diverse stories about identity. What makes people unique? We’re done with shoe-horning ourselves into preconceived notions of who we should be or being told who we are. Dropping In Stories are stories of self-discovery. They enable us to find our truth, re-configure ourselves to that truth, and becoming stronger for it. It brings the juice to re-imagine who we want to be. By listening to others talk about their own path, ours becomes less fearful. We’re always supposed to know what we’re doing, where we’re going, but we often don’t, and there’s no shame in that. We need a compass. Drop into the conversation. Create a new dialogue. You might get clues on your direction, the answers you seek, or even the questions you want to avoid. The adventure continues on Dropping In where unique stories become part of the fabric of diversity.

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