Why I dedicated my stories to Whitney Houston

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007U78HEC

The stories in My Darling You ( love stories-sort of) are dedicated to Whitney Houston. I have been asked why. There is more than one answer.

First, I was completing putting them together in February 2012 when she died, and everybody was playing her music. I started listening keenly and fell in love with her voice and personality. The title, My Darling You, comes from I Will Always Love You. Nobody can sing that song like she does, even if they copy the range of her voice, her timing,control and emotion elude all imitators. The emotion she puts into that song reaches every woman who has had to step away from love. At one of her performances, I  watched a woman in the audience re-living her personal experience while Whitney sang. When she holds on to 'I' and 'You' as her voice climbs up and down the notes one understands why they are called personal pronouns.

Listening to her recordings is great, but her performances were outstanding.(Thanks Youtube)  She was bubbly, charming, witty, graceful, beautiful – one could go on and on. The comments on Youtube, for example, show how overwhelmingly she was loved, despite the relatively few disgruntled idiots who must always give vent to their negative feelings.

So after watching those performances (as well as the many interviews), she didn't feel like a stranger any more. My favourite performance is Live in Washington 1997 (the second performance).

Then there were the songs like: All at Once, Heartbreak Hotel, Where do Broken Hearts Go? Didn't We Almost Have it All – If there is a theme for the six stories in this collection, My Darling You, it is that love is a choice and sometimes the main characters (as in real life) do not get to choose. Some of Whitney's songs reflect that theme.

So there you have it.

It's only $2.99. Hop across and buy a copy http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007U78HEC

Choosing the title My Darling You (ebook) #5

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007U78HEC

I was finished writing the six stories in this collection of (sort-of-love) stories My Darling You and I still didn't have a title. Very often, one of the titles of the stories is chosen as the title for a collection, but none of the six seemed right to me. I was probably leaning toward Emancipation Park, simply because it is my favourite story in the collection, but it didn't sound right for the book.
And then Whitney Houston died and everybody was playing her songs, especially I Will Always Love You. I have listened to her singing that song at many different venues and always she manages to project such strong emotion. So I had my book title, not the song title but that first My darling, you - a YOU that includes everybody and makes all women who have lost out on love feel that she was singing that song for them. Since in some of the stories 'happily ever after' is not a possibility, I thought this was just right, and when I passed the idea by some friends they absolutely loved it.


The illustration is an indulgence - a picture of me and my husband at our wedding reception, many, many years ago. So now you know.


I actually dedicated the book to Whitney Houston. The more I listen to her music, the more I realize how superlatively extra special she was. As everybody has been saying, only once in a lifetime do we get a voice (and personality) like that. 
purchase here