Book Lovers Blog Hop
January 15, 2012
This is the backdrop of my story, about a lesbian couple living in a small Nevada ranching town, that became subject to the outcry and abuse leveled verbally against the news that a gay man was convicted of a criminal offense. The news set the town into a frenzy… (Continue reading at the site’s link above and meet a group of wonderful best selling award winning authors. Also enter a giveaway for a kindle).
January 17, 2012
http://tlctouchedwithfire.wordpress.com/book-lovers-blog-hop/comment-page-1/#comment-30
Meet Paulette Mahurin!
First let me say a big heartfelt thank you to my lovely hostess, Terri Callsen for hosting me.
Author Interview Questions:
What genre do you write?
The Persecution of Mildred Dunlap is a historical fiction but I write in different genres. I’ve written non-fiction, a murder mystery, and romance but this book is my first full-length published book. For me, it’s not about the genre but the story, is it a good story?
What’s the best part about being an author?
I love writing. It’s a passion. And, that I can do it, that I am able to sit and spend the time writing puts me a zone that I love. And, I love stories. It’s so much fun, amazement, to see them come to life through my writing.
What’s the worst part?
Some of the feedback can be brutal, even if it isn’t directed against my writing in particular, like comments that are hateful, homophobic, racist or anti-Semitic. And, of course, in the beginning, before my skin was thickened through the process/the journey of getting it out and published with some great feedback, before all that I had some brutal comments that stopped me cold. Luckily I learned from this to not take things too personally (still haven’t totally mastered that one), to filter out the things that are helpful and discard the rest.
How long have you been writing?
As far back as I can remember. I can never remember a time when I didn’t write but when I was ten I kept a diary and started to write short stories. I still have a lot of them and it’s fun to look back on them with my young handwriting in pencil on notebook paper. Writing has always been a place of safety, a sanctuary, for me, where I can be myself without worry about what will others think.
What are some of the things you’re passionate about?
Definitely writing but the biggest passion in my life is dogs, rescuing them. My husband and I have been into animal rescue for the past 28 years, mainly Rottweilers. I can’t imagine a world without dogs, that bring so much joy and laughter to my life, but then there’s the sorrow that they have such short lives and the overpopulation problem (animals on death row) kills me. All profits from my book are going to animal rescue, the Santa Paula Animal Rescue Center, the first and only no-kill animal shelter in Ventura County, CA. where I live. Thankfully the book’s been doing well and we’ve been getting funds to them. (Here’s a large-scale press article on my efforts here and the link for the shelter. VC STAR Sept. 9, 2012 Sunday Life Section:
http://www.vcstar.com/news/2012/sep/08/ojai-authors-historical-novel-teaches-tolerance/SHELTER PROFITS ARE GOING TO: http://www.santapaulaarc.org/)
At the end of the day what keeps you “moving forward”?
I’m grateful to be alive. I’m just at the tail end of a long bout with Lyme disease, where I was seriously ill (heart and nervous system involvement) and to come through something like that (I’m 95% there) makes you appreciate life in a whole new way. I don’t take being alive for granted. I am motivated by many things: advocating for tolerance, advocating for animals, and as a Nurse Practitioner advocating for women and women’s health issues. I have a full life with a great husband and two dogs (from a kill-shelter) who I adore and just to hang with them is fulfilling enough, to have these other things on top of that…there isn’t enough time in the day.
When you’re depressed what helps bring you out?
Boy, that’s a powerful question. I am very aware of the fact that what I think impacts me. Negative thoughts create stressful chemistry, cortisone & adrenaline (which also suppress the immune system). Positive thoughts, endorphins & serotonin. There’s a whole book written on this by Candace Pert, “Molecules of Emotion.” She was up for the Novel Peace Prize in medicine for her work. I try to watch my way of thinking, my worldview, and keep a focus to the positive.
I am also very aware that I have no control over most things in life. I’d like to feel differently but I’m a realist. When I have a down mood, and believe me I had plenty when going through my worst Lyme days, I ride it out. Things that also help are exercising, spending quality time with friends, writing, and even distracting myself with a good book or movie. Nature is also very uplifting and soothing for me and fortunately I live in a town that’s beautiful, my own home has a park-like setting with a creek running through it. When I look out the window at the calmness of the trees and nature it helps to calm my insides and I breathe with that and let pass whatever is there I might be resisting.
If there was one statement you could make that you stand for what would it be?
I am a human being, like all others. No better, no worse, than anyone else. I am not what I do so please don’t label and hate me if what I do doesn’t agree with you, your worldview, as long as I am not hurting anyone. This is the whole message in my book, The Persecution of Mildred Dunlap, tolerance. It centers around the imprisonment of Oscar Wilde for homosexual activity, for which he was sentenced to two years of hard-labour, not allowed pen and paper, slept on wooden board, fed watery porridge and ordered to a treadmill for six hours a day. For what? For doing what came natural, yet others could not tolerate it and so they had to label him bad, wrong, evil, and punish him for what he could no more help than a dog from wagging its tail, a bird from flying, or a leaf taking in carbon-dioxide, all things of nature.
How do you “combat” negativity when it presents itself?
I stay clear of it. I do my best to not get sucked in to someone else’s drama, and also not judge it to be “negative” or “bad” but just something that doesn’t work for me to be around and so I distance it from me. If it’s something I can’t distance myself from then I do my best to incorporate all the things I mentioned for how I combat depression to keep myself in balance. Negativity is such a subjective thing. What’s negative depends on “my buttons,” my physiology and upbringing, and what I’ve been conditioned to feel is negative, but there is also real evil and not-good actions out there to be mindful of. While working in the emergency room a few years back a gang member rushed in with a gun drawn. There’s no question in my mind that was not good. Not everything is that clear-cut.
What’s your favorite movie?
Way too many to answer. Really.
Who is/are the people that inspire you to keep moving forward?
My husband. My close family members. A group of very good friends/good people who are there for me. People that I read about that are overcoming struggles or suffering, the heroes that abound doing simple acts of kindness to help make the world a nicer place. And, my dogs because I have to be there for them, to ensure they have a good life.
Do you have any links that you’d like to share with us?
GOODREADS:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14061559-the-persecution-of-mildred-dunlap
SHELFARI:
http://www.shelfari.com/books/28821838/The-Persecution-of-Mildred-Dunlap
FACEBOOK:
https://www.facebook.com/ThePersecutionOfMildredDunlap
BOOK’S BLOG:
http://thepersecutionofmildreddunlap.wordpress.com/
TWITTER:
https://twitter.com/MahurinPaulette
BOOK’S WEBSITE:
http://bookpromogroup2.weebly.com/paulette-mahurin.html
PRESS ARTICLE:
VC STAR Sept. 9, 2012 Sunday Life Section:
http://www.vcstar.com/news/2012/sep/08/ojai-authors-historical-novel-teaches-tolerance/
Paulette Mahurin, an award-winning author, is a Nurse Practitioner who lives in Ojai, California with her husband Terry and their two dogs–Max and Bella. She practices women’s health in a rural clinic and writes in her spare time.
January 18, 2012
Friday, January 18, 2013
Guest Post by Paulette Mahurin
Connect with Paulette via Twitter Facebook Book’s Blog Goodreads and Shelfari
Purchase her book on Amazo
January 21, 2012
http://mimibarbour.blogspot.com/2013/01/meet-paulette-mahurin-author-and-dog.html
Meet Paulette Mahurin – Author and Dog Lover!
I have had several loves in my life, but ranking at that top is Tazzie, my beloved Rottweiler girl, who went on to the rainbow bridge September, 2011, seems like yesterday. I still miss her, the wagging of her little stubby tail when I came home, the drool at the side of her mouth to let me know it’s meal time, the spot on the carpet where her body left and imprint, beside my bed, her collar still hanging in the entrance hall, and yes a year later little black hair keeps showing up. I loved her with every cell in my body. She lived a good long life, fifteen plus years for that breed is ancient. We got her from our local shelter, here in Ojai, CA, where I live with my husband, Terry and our two new babies, Max & Bella (also rescued from a kill-shelter), over sixteen years ago. She was a purebred, from a puppy mill in Arkansas, shipped out to a pet shop in Los Angeles, and sold to a couple who live in an adjoining city to ours, until the day she ran into the street and was hit by a truck. That was the day, they threw her away to be disposed of, seems the truck broke her femur and they didn’t want to help her. Since is was a straight fracture, it wouldn’t have required much, just keep her calm, but they still decided to throw her away. Lucky for me. Since my husband and I were into animal rescue for a lot of years already and I’m a Nurse Practitioner, taking care of a dog, no problem. She came to us with another problem, a tick infestation, of which I contracted a few, one carrying the Lyme bacteria. Tazzie’s femur was fully healed by the time I became very symptomatic, fell off the face of the earth. In my worst days she was there, through all the years, at my side, some days she was the only thing that gave me any reason to want to live (I was debilitated with meningitis, cardiac valve involvement, crippling arthritis, and no energy). I look back at that time as a gift from God, she my angel, because it brought me to myself, to face everything in my life up till now I ran from. In facing, sitting at the seat of my demons, I gained a new freedom, to just be, without any need to be anything. With and through Tazzie, I found myself, what I like to consider is my authentic self. What greater gift could there be? As the years moved along and I started to regain my health, hers failed. At first it was her hind legs growing weak, then her heart, a cancer in an eye, until the day, at the ripe old age of fifteen years and two weeks, she stopped drinking and went to sleep. She died at home, in my arms, three days later. It wasn’t long after that; I finished my novel, The Persecution of Mildred Dunlap. It was also a coincidence that the first and only no-kill animal shelter opened in Ventura County, Santa Paula Animal Rescue Center, where I live. Tazzie would want me to help other dogs like her, throw-aways, to be disposed of because they were born or were an inconvenience, so it was no stroke of genius on my part to decide to give all profits from my book to this shelter, in the memory of my one of my all time best friends and great loves of my life, Tazzie Mahurin. (August 25, 1996 – September 7, 2011) That’s why I tirelessly keep at it, promoting my book, in hopes someone will pick it, read it, spread the word, and fury kids like Tazzie will get out of those cells and find their forever homes.
AMAZON.COM:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=The+persecution+of+mildred+Dunlap
AMAZON U.K. http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=the+persecution+of+mildred+dunlap
GOODREADS: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14061559-the-persecution-of-mildred-dunlap SHELFARI: http://www.shelfari.com/books/28821838/The-Persecution-of-Mildred-Dunlap FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/ThePersecutionOfMildredDunlap
BOOK’S BLOG: http://thepersecutionofmildreddunlap.wordpress.com/
TWITTER: https://twitter.com/MahurinPaulette
BOOK’S WEBSITE: http://bookpromogroup2.weebly.com/paulette-mahurin.html
PRESS ARTICLE: VC STAR Sept. 9, 2012 Sunday Life Section: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2012/sep/08/ojai-authors-historical-novel-teaches-tolerance /
SHELTER PROFITS ARE GOING TO : http://www.santapaulaarc.org/
JANUARY 27, 2012:
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Guest post from the resplendent Paulette Mahurin
(To see the rest of the article and please go to : http://emeraldseer.blogspot.com/2013/01/guest-post-from-resplendent-paulette.html?showComment=1359309196504#c7453037989516786660)
Welcome Guest Author Paulette Mahurin and her book, The Persecution Of Mildred Dunlap
Welcome to Paulette Mahurin to the blog today. She’s been gracious enough to stop by during the First Love Blog Hop to share an excerpt of her book, The Persecution of Mildred Dunlap.
“One can survive everything nowadays, except death, and live down everything except a good reputation.” Oscar Wilde
~Prologue
1895
Telegraphs clacked around the world with the breaking news of the conviction of Oscar Wilde. Mr. Wilde, noted celebrity and one of the most successful playwrights, novelists, poets, and short story writers, suffered a stunning defeat when he was sentenced to two years of hard labor in prison after being convicted for “gross indecency.” Wilde’s case, one of the first tried under Britain’s recently passed Criminal Law Amendment Act, criminalized sexual activity between members of the same sex, thus changing people’s attitudes about homosexuality from a mood of pity and tolerance to hatred and abuse.
The unofficial buzz in the tabloids was that Wilde was caught in the act with another male, Lord Douglas, the son of the Marquis of Queensberry, and Victorian London would have none of it. The news of trial and conviction spread fast and furiously to towns large and small around the world, exactly the kind of news story Red River Pass, a small town in Nevada, relished.
“I know you’re not going to say anything. But you know it’s true.” Gus looked over at the stacks of books. “That’s why I read so much. A book isn’t going to hurt me. A book isn’t going to form some opinion about me that could wreck my life. I learn about so many new and great things from reading. I keep to myself with a good book and a shot of whiskey and I’m right with the world.” He went on to tell him about some of the great books he had read over the years, mentioning a few of the ones in his private stack.
SHORT BIO:
Paulette Mahurin, an award-winning author, is a Nurse Practitioner who lives in Ojai, California with her husband Terry and their two dogs–Max and Bella. She practices women’s health in a rural clinic and writes in her spare time. She has been involved in dog rescue for the past 28 years. All profits from her book are going to the first an only no-kill animal shelter in Ventura County, CA. (Santa Paula Animal Rescue Center (http://www.santapaulaarc.org/)
Meet First Love Blog Hop Author Paulette Mahurin
From Paulette:
First let me give a big heartfelt thank you to Elyse Grant for inviting me over to this great blog site.
Paulette Mahurin, an award-winning best selling author, is a Nurse Practitioner who lives in Ojai, California with her husband Terry and their two dogs–Max and Bella. She practices women’s health in a rural clinic and writes in her spare time. She is an animal advocate and has been involved with dog rescue, along with her husband, for the past twenty-eight years. All profits from her book, The Persecution of Mildred Dunlap, are going to the Santa Paula Animal Rescue Center (the first and only no-kill shelter in Ventura County, CA).
You do a great job of promoting your book!
Thanks so much for stopping by, Lorna’s Voice. My passion for shining a light on intolerance and helping with animal rescue inspires me to put it out there.
Thank you for your heartfelt work in what you stand on and for.
Yisraela
Thank you back for you very supportive and kind words. It means a lot.
I think it’s a damn shame that you humans are forever torturing each other. You’d never see a dog treat another dog like that.
Oh rumbpydog, you speak only truth. We can learn so much from you and other fury friends.
Sometimes tolerance seems to be a very rare thing.
Wisdom view from my fury friend, Clowie! This seems so, sadly.
Rape was part of the cure? That’s atrocious!
^ Women’s History Then & Now – Madness. Cwrl.utexas.edu (2002-05-18). Retrieved on 2010-11-30. ” in the 19th century openly lesbian women were thought to be mentally ill. Those admitted to insane asylums often faced forced marriages. While in asylums, furthermore, they were subject to being sexually abused and raped under the care of their physicians in the belief that sexual encounters with men would ‘cure’ them” …
TBM: There’s still a mentality around the world that rape will cure a lesbian (South Africa, Asia, Africa, etc.). This is why I continue to speak up, in the name of tolerance, because as you wrote, “That’s atrocious!”
Thank you so much for stopping by. I’m always happy to make new cyber friends.
Paulette
Definitely will check out The Persecution of Mildred Dunlap. Congratulations on your book. Happy writing.
Thank you, sister-oatmeal-lover-K.S. Bowers! Very happy to have the likes of you pop over and connect up.
Reblogged this on Flying With Red Haircrow and commented:
A widely well-reviewed work not only for those interested in GLBTIIQ literature and works, but for anyone who seriously desires or should be exposed stories that highlight the discrimination that existed yet still sadly continues. We are all the same as humans, let’s remember that, no matter where we live, our ethnicity or culture: or who we choose or need to love.
Thank you for the reblog, Red Haircrow, and your inspiring words. I’m grateful for our connection.