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Picture Credits:
2+2+50 = 1,000,000
By Nan Jacobs ©1998
My son--awash with indignation--tells me the answer is 54. Perhaps you think this equation is some strange new Theory of Chaos?
Naw. Just a very basic premise, one we tend to think about more seriously during the holiday season: Outreach.
The term 'Outreach' brings to my mind community service, or special interest and religious groups offering assistance to those in need, reaching out with food, clothing, shelter, toys. But what about emotional needs?
Writers possess a remarkable tool of emotional outreach: words. With them, we are able to toss a figurative pebble and witness the ripple effect. 2+2+50 = 1,000,000.
What powerful messages today's novels can send: Hope, love, empowerment. Perhaps your book's surface theme is 'trust'. Despite the obstacles they must overcome, the hero and heroine learn first to trust themselves, then each other and ultimately find love (in a romance novel). The life issues we give them, and how they surmount the problems presented by those issues--those are the things which reach out to our readers, in ways we may not have envisioned.
Imagine the subliminal messages our writing can deliver to a victim of domestic violence, or a single parent struggling to raise a family on his/her own. "I am not alone". "I am not the problem". "There is hope". "I can do this". "I deserve to be loved". Or perhaps you open the reader's eyes to the plight of a close friend or relative: "I had no idea what my sister has been going through. After reading this, I know I need to be more supportive".
Vicki Hinze, author of SHADES OF GRAY, a 7/98 St. Martin's release, says the light dawned for her after the publication of her novel MAYBE THIS TIME (1996), a book she wrote to grieve her father. She received a letter from a woman who thanked her for helping her to deal with the death of a close family member. Through reading the novel, the woman regained a sense of herself and discovered value in a painful life experience. Vicki's realization of the power of her words to touch people on a deeper level than she'd thought, and the humbling recognition of the responsibility that goes hand-in-hand with such power, changed her focus in writing. She is adamant that if you write a story you feel a passion for, a story you 'love to the depths of your soul', you will reach out and touch someone.
If we touch just one life with our words, we've made a difference.
Two writers reach out with two messages, fifty readers pass it along... and along. One million lives touched.
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