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Patricia Sands

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Liza Perrat

A breast cancer journey …

October 18, 2017 by Patricia Sands 65 Comments

 

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month in countries all around the world.

If you are like me, your life has been touched in one way or another by this pervasive disease. My mother had breast cancer in her eighties that resulted in a mastectomy. One of our daughters is a THRIVER … a term I learned many woman choose to use as they move on with their lives. After a vicious attack, double mastectomy and reconstruction, chemotherapy and radiation, seven years later she is strong and healthy.

Treatments have improved so much, the future is bright for so many who receive the initial frightening diagnosis.

Today, to honour the fight against breast cancer, I would like to highlight the journey of a friend and fellow author, Liza Perrat. I was so pleased when she agreed to write this post for us. Liza is a talented author, originally from Australia, who married a French man and has raised her family in France. More about that later. Here is the story she would like to share with us:

A Reluctant Journey

Reluctant because you’d not planned it, did not want it, had no time for it in your busy life. But most of all because you feared this breast cancer journey that had been foisted upon you one chill autumn morning of 2016.

No, no, no, not you! Surely not? There’s a mistake? No mistake, Liza, this time it’s you. And, whether you want it or not, you are going on this journey.

Reluctantly, you pack your suitcase: passport (with visa stamped, “To Hell and, maybe, Back”), bottle of lavender oil to massage away chemo headaches, tube of special cream to avoid radiotherapy burns, all-cotton-sports-support-wireless-bras in assorted colours.  Oh and don’t forget the “fighting, positive” spirit; you’re going to need barrels of that, where you’re off to.

You lock up the house, take a big breath and lug that suitcase out into the cold. The next three seasons –– the time you’ll be away (if all goes well) –– stretch before you, dauntingly, fearfully, as if you are standing at the foot of Mount Everest.

From your hospital bed, post-surgery, you watch the leaves turn their brilliant autumn shades of scarlet, mustard, cinnamon. Beautiful, you think, when the surgeon says, “I think we got it all… it only metastasized to one lymph node.” Those autumn hues are more exquisite than you’d ever noticed before.

Autumn quickly recedes to dismal winter, its grey moments of despair, self-pity and depression hovering like storm clouds over that mountain. Some days you feel like your journey is a never-ending uphill climb, the peak receding like a desert mirage.

But as the surgical scars begin to heal, the melting snow washes away the darkness. You look towards the next mountainous challenge: chemotherapy.

You turn up every third Thursday very early in the morning. No sleep in for the wicked! You slump down in the waiting room with other travellers, many of whom you guess, by the looks of them, are going nowhere. You breathe sharply. You’re ok, you’re going to be ok. You’ll make this journey; you’re climbing to that mountain peak. Between those dark clouds, you catch glimpses of a sunny summit.

You shed most of your hair along the sinewy trail, but, hey, who cares? It’s still cold; you can wear a pretty hat. Besides, a comb or brush is one less thing to carry in your bag. No razor either. Your legs have never been smoother, wow! No eyebrows is ugly though, and your red, stinging eyes make you realise that eyelashes really do have a purpose.

You tell your family and friends it’s not really that bad, this journey, as you keep dragging the heavy suitcase behind you.

Incredibly, you discover some surprises along the way. Pleasant surprises about your own strength, and the loveliness of your supportive network of friends and family who relentlessly cheer you on towards your destination with flowers, ginger sweets, fluffy socks, cashmere shawl, homebaked lasagna and cookies

Spring arrives and you leave behind the chemo. Yay, champagne! Only 6 weeks of radiotherapy left! You lumber down the other side of that mountain, the birdsong cheering you on, the tiny leaf buds nodding at you in the gentle breeze, as if saying, “Yes, keep going, you’re almost there.”  You’re breathless with the scent of new flowers; the heady fragrance of hope. The fabulous smell of happiness to simply be alive.

It’s summer now, and you stagger across the Welcome mat of The Refuge: place where you can unpack, recover, get “back to normal”.

“Normal” though, has become an incredible privilege, because the journey has taught you that you’re lucky. Luckier than many of the travellers you met along the way; lucky that your ticket was not a one-way. This time.

Yes, you can relax a bit, for now. Go on, smell the jasmine, gaze in wonder at the starry night sky, laugh at muddy dog paws on the sofa, bake a chocolate cake and eat it all.

Drink in your luck, savour it, guard it preciously. Because now you know that one day you might have to pack that suitcase again and travel back out into the cold. Return, or one-way. Because, who knows if that mountain will beckon once again?

To celebrate everyone who has faced or is facing the cancer journey, Liza is offering a giveaway: 2 sets of her French historical trilogy: The Bone Angel series (3 e-books each set). To enter, leave a comment below and Liza will draw two names. Good luck!

The Bone Angel trilogy consists of three standalone stories exploring the tragedies and triumphs of a French village family of midwife-healers during the French Revolution (Spirit of Lost Angels), WW2 Nazi-occupied France (Wolfsangel) and the 1348 Black Plague (Blood Rose Angel). (Note from Patricia ~ I absolutely devoured all three stories! The details are fascinating and the reader is truly drawn into the history of the time. Good luck, everyone!) Click here to order.

 

 

 

 

 

Liza Perrat grew up in Australia, working as a general nurse and midwife. She has now been living in France for over twenty years, where she works as a part-time medical translator and a novelist.

Her latest novel, The Silent Kookaburra, is a psychological suspense set in the 1970s of her homeland, Australia.

Liza is a co-founder and member of the writers’ collective Triskele Books and also reviews books for Bookmuse.

Sign up  for information on Liza’s book releases and receive a FREE copy of Ill-Fated Rose, short story that inspired The Bone Angel French historical series.

Connect with Liza online:

WEBSITE

BLOG

TWITTER

FACEBOOK

Liza, thank you very much for writing this post for us and sharing some of your journey. What happy news that you have already celebrated the first anniversary of your recovery. Onward! To all those still in the midst of a battle, we are all in this together and hold each other close in our hearts.

 

 

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Filed Under: Blog, Social issues, Uncategorized, Writing Tagged With: Bone Angel trilogy, breast cancer, Breast Cancer Awareness Month, France, giveaway, Liza Perrat, October, Patricia Sands

Calling all historical fiction fans!

October 24, 2014 by Patricia Sands 51 Comments

If it’s Friday, it must be France …

As I was working on my WIP this morning, my characters were lingering (on the pages) over a delicious lunch and a few glasses of rosé, in one of my favourite villages. I began thinking about joining them! Right there in this inviting little square! Do you know where we (… in my dreams …) are?

If you think you know, please leave a comment below.  Even if you don’t know, leave a comment anyway because I have a very special giveaway that you aren’t going to want to miss. We’ll do a random draw from all the names and if you guess the correct name of this village, your name will go into the draw three times.

If you are a fan of historical fiction, you’ll be pleased to know that my friendWolfsangel_CoverFinal_EBOOK Liza Perrat is offering an ebook of her WW II novel, WOLFSANGEL today on my blog. I read it last month and simply could not put the book down.  Coming from me, it’s no surprise to discover it is set in France. Oui?

“A beautifully laid-out spiral of unfolding tragedy in German-occupied France; a tale of courage, hardship, forbidden love and the possibility of redemption in times of terror.’ Perry Iles, proofreader and author of A Dictionary of Linguistic Absurdities.”

We also offered a giveaway of this in my latest newsletter, so if you are a subscriber and entered there, you can enter again here too. Bonne chance! (And if you aren’t a subscriber, you can be by clicking right here!)

lizaFor more information about the talented Liza Perrat, please visit her website. Originally from Australia, she lives my dream with her family in the countryside not far from Lyon. Wolfsangel is the second book in a trilogy, but easily read as a stand-alone novel.  The story is based on the true history of events that occurred in the village of Oradour-sur-Glane in 1944.

After Liza visited the historical site, she knew one day she would write about it. In her words: “I visited the ruins several years ago, staring in disbelief at the burnt-out homes and buildings as I walked about. Tram tracks ran everywhere, but to nowhere. The car from which the village mayor was hauled and shot lay rusting by the roadside. A few items had survived the inferno: a sewing machine, plates set at a table for the midday meal, theOradour-photo credit to Dennis Nisson charred remains of a child’s doll, the blackened, crumbling façades of their homes. A rusty, flattened pram littered the church floor in front of the altar – all gruesome witnesses to a village full of living, laughing and loving people; families cut down in the midst of their usual daily routine.
Fortunately, there were barely any tourists, so I could stop and listen, and it seemed their ghostly sounds echoed in my ears – the banter of adults, the playful shrieks of children, the barking of dogs, the cries of the village artisans. The echoes of a village obliterated.”

The entire village was left as it was on the orders of General Charles DeGaulle, as a permanent memorial.

Trust me, Wolfsangel a gripping tale from beginning to end. You can also visit with Liza here:

Blog: http://lizaperrat.blogspot.com
Twitter: @LizaPerrat
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/liza.perrat.5

Say hello to Liza from me if you stop by! It’s always fun to be introduced to new authors, isn’t it? Do you have a favourite historical fiction novel? Share it with us here! 

 

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Filed Under: Author Promotion, Blog, France, General Travel, If it is France..., Writing Tagged With: France, giveaway, historical fiction, Liza Perrat, Oradour-sur-Glane, Patricia Sands, The Promise of Provence, Wolfsangel, WW II

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