Introducing MEMORIES OF JAKE

So I just released another book, Memories of Jake. This makes six … five novels and one non-fiction memoir.

For thirty-some years I was part of the theater community where I live, directing high school and community musicals (that’s what the memoir, entitled “More Fog, Please”: 31 Years Directing Community and High School Musicals” is about). So when I released my first book in the fall of 2013, How I Grew Up, it was a Big Deal. People knew me as a theater person, and now I was trying my hand at writing. I appreciated the congratulations and the book sales. When I released the second novel, Eli’s Heart, it also created a bit of a stir.

Since then hardly anybody blinks when I release a new book. I suppose that’s what happens to most of us, though, and one of the reasons writing can be a lonely endeavor. I keep remembering Anne Lamott’s comment in Bird by Bird, “Writing is its own reward.” And in most ways, that is a truth.

I really love it, though, when somebody buys a book. I love it even more when somebody buys a book, reads it, and WRITES A REVIEW! That’s a standing ovation. With each novel I have worked at improving my craft. I think all the stories I’ve told are good stories, and people seem to have enjoyed reading them. I think Memories of Jake is my best effort to date, without question.

So this blog post is pure, shameless self-promotion (it comes with the territory). I would love for you to read my story. And if you love it, please write a review. Here’s one that was definitely that standing ovation:

Susan Moore Jordan’s extraordinary new novel, Memories of Jake, is dedicated to “all those whose souls have been bruised by war and with admiration for those who found their way back to life through the power of creativity.” In Jordan’s story, wars can be personal struggles as well as political conflicts, and the power of creativity may extend to the expression, pain and redemption of love itself.

A horrific childhood trauma forges the bond between brothers Andrew and Jacob Cameron. As adults, their experiences in Vietnam seem somehow to resonate with the childhood drama. Amnesia enters the picture, but to say more would give away the intricate and sometimes shocking plot. As in Jordan’s other novels, music plays an important part, in this case the glorious requiems of Verdi, Fauré, and Brahms, especially Brahms. 

Although Memories of Jake is a free-standing book and may be read on its own, many of the affectionately-drawn characters will be familiar from Jordan’s Carousel Trilogy (How I Grew Up, Eli’s Heart, You Are My Song) and Jamie’s Children. In fact, Andrew and Jacob are the little boys who witnessed a murder in the first book of the trilogy. In Man With No Yesterdays, scheduled for release in the fall, Jacob’s account will take front and center. - Michaele Benedict

 cover by Tristan Flanagan

Memories of Jake is available on Amazon, paperback and Kindle:

https://www.amazon.com/Memories-Jake-Susan-Moore-Jordan/dp/1544274203/

or visit my website www.susanmoorejordan.com