The First Announcement

I'm delighted that in just two weeks I give my first reading from The Dream Antilles. It's October 26, 2005, at 7:30 pm, at the Old Farm Store in Harlemville. The announcement is on the left. To me this is a huge thrill and tremendously exciting! You're all invited. And if you come, I'll sign your books! And, as the ad says, there will even be refreshments.

When I was writing The Dream Antilles I wanted people to be able to read it and come away with both enjoyment and something of value. I wanted to book to be literature, because I believe in literature's capacity to change the world, to be revolutionary. I didn't want the book to turn out to be a lecture. Personally, as I've said before, I simply can't stand books that masquerade as novels but really are sermons or instructions about how to grasp enlightenment. What I wanted was more difficult: I wanted The Dream Antilles mostly to be fun.

But when I thought about it, I didn't think I was going to end up reading aloud from the book. I thought you, dear reader, were going to read it to yourself on a beautiful beach, beneath a palm tree, with a bowl of papaya and banana on the table. Maybe you'd read it aloud to a close friend. But, lo and behold, it appears that I'm going to read some of it aloud at the Farm Store.

This reading "out loud", as I always say it, almost always brings me to tears. I think that I cry because what I've written touches me so deeply. It's a surprise to me even now how deeply what I've written touches me. And when I read it to you, it touches me in my heart. The tears, I always think, are the lubricant that allows the doors of my heart to open. They're good tears, and I'm full of gratitude both that I have them and that I can read my words to you. I can only hope that this book touches you as it has touched me.