One of the great things in my writing career has been that every now and then, out of the blue, I receive emails from readers telling me something about what my books have meant to them.

Usually it’s good stuff. (The bad stuff turns up on review sites like Goodreads.)

Recently I’ve received a couple of really lovely emails about the Ishmael Trilogy.

It seems a little strange that for a series with a male narrator and dominated by male characters, that most of the correspondence I get about the Ishmael books comes from female readers whose emails are invariably touching and heartfelt.

This week I got an email from a girl who first began reading and enjoying the Ishmael series when she was 12 years old and in Grade Six which is quite young for these books. Now she is 17 and has read the books numerous times.

The final book of the series (Ishmael and the Hoops of Steel) ends at a Year 12 Graduation night with the character of Ishmael contemplating going on to University and all the possibilities of an unknowable future.

As Ishmael muses – sometimes life is like one of those movies with a perfect, happy-ending. And sometimes it’s definitely not.

My most recent email correspondent wrote to me because she now finds herself in the same situation as Ishmael in the last pages of the trilogy. She is a high school graduate contemplating university, the future in general and the glorious uncertainty of it all.

Or to use her own beautiful words: “I sit at the edge of high school and university, childhood and adulthood.”

In her email she explained her thoughts and feelings at this important moment in her life journey.

What a lovely privilege it is when a reader takes the time to share with you, not just their views about something you’ve written, but also a little bit of themselves and their life as well.

In my reply I told her that her email had made more than just my day. And it really did.

Cheers
Michael

BONUS EXTRAS!

I call this photo ‘Me and a Creek’. I’m the one in the foreground.

And here’s some of my recent reading: