Welcome to the RPLA Showcase
Each year at the Royal Palm Literary Award Banquet, authors experience the joy of earning accolades for all the hard work that is often done in the privacy of the home with little to no recognition. Our goal is to showcase the best of the best at the 2015 Royal Palm Literary Awards and provide First Place winners with a well-deserved spotlight. Not only are we recognizing extraordinary talent, but we’re giving readers an opportunity to sample excerpts from the winning stories.
2015 Published Autobiography/Memoir
One Woman, Four Decades, Eight Wishes by Marilyn Murray Willison
Marilyn Murray Willison won First Place in the Published Autobiography/Memoir category. In One Woman, Four Decades, Eight Wishes, a former journalist examines her self-created mantra and how it affected her life and career.
Click the link to read a sample:
Excerpt from One Woman, Four Decades, Eight Wishes
Q & A with Marilyn Murray Willison
Q: Where do you get your story ideas?
A: Since I write nonfiction, I find inspiration everywhere, and I am particularly intrigued by and interested in any issue that relates to the experiences of and issues that relate to women. Each of my six published non-fiction books deals with some aspect of my personal life—from Diary of a Divorced Mother back in 1980 to When Your Life Includes a Wheelchair in 2004 to my current RPLA 2015 winner.
Q: Anything in particular about your award-winning RPLA entry that you’d like to share?
A: One Woman, Four Decades, Eight Wishes recaps how—when I turned 65—I embarked on a journey of re-evaluating several important aspects of my life. In the process, I learned how a variety of people and events had profoundly affected me, and how the years had helped me grow and change—especially in ways that I could have never predicted.
Q: Who do you credit with inspiring your writing?
A: Since I have been a voracious reader (and book reviewer) for decades, it’s a real challenge to pinpoint solid sources of inspiration. Having said that, I have read (and loved) every word written by Anne Morrow Lindbergh. I also enjoy anything written by Adela Rogers St. Johns, Anne Tyler, Ruth Reichl, David Brooks, Elizabeth Gilbert, Gretchen Rubin and my current new literary heroine, Amanda Duckworth. Obviously, non-fiction heavily outweighs novels when it comes to my library…
Q: Any tips for new writers?
A: When I’m not working on my own book projects, I help aspiring authors get their manuscripts ready for publication. I’ve definitely noticed that those who read the most usually write the best. I’m pretty old fashioned when it comes to grammar, punctuation and syntax because it’s fairly obvious that those time-honored techniques really help create smooth and effective prose. To me, an aspiring author who doesn’t love, love, love to read is almost like a chef who doesn’t enjoy eating.
