Author Cassandra Wilson Joseph announces the new release of 8 Reid Street: Snapshots from an Australian Beach. In it, she shines a light on losing her mother at a young age and growing up with a single dad.
Cassandra Wilson Joseph, now in her 70s, is a former journalist for the LA Times and college linguistics instructor. She has degrees in journalism, English and linguistics, in addition to certificates allowing her to teach English as a Second Language.
Cassandra Wilson Joseph was born and raised at the beach. Newcastle, New South Wales located on the east coast of Australia was the springboard from which she dove headfirst into her adventures.
Today, Wilson Joseph and her husband Jim live in Dana Point, California where she decided to write her story.
“In 2021, I opened an office in San Clemente, California and began cleaning out boxes taken from a closed storage unit. I came across typed and handwritten essays and stories, just little chapters of events I began writing about over the years about growing up in Australia, along with decades old snapshots of people from long ago. My purpose was to neaten up my life, trim things down. I’m comfortable writing, so I chose to document my early years living on Reid Street in a home grown book accompanied by the photos that would at last have their own story. My family could easily lift this book off a shelf and at leisure learn about their mother and that she began her journey on a rocky shore, eventually gaining her footing.”
Due to lockdowns and the pandemic, she had a lot of time to write saying, “I had fun sitting alone in an almost empty building joining up old stories with new ones and rewriting them to match the appropriate picture. However, when I recognized the implications associated with being a pregnant teen, and the ensuing complications that still occur today, I became focused. I went at it like a job. That changed the complexion of everything and I learned very quickly in order to tell this story better, I needed help. I found people who could do well what I could not. I’m not particularly computer savvy, I cant restore ripped photographs, I have a problem with too many commas, and I needed an editor or two or three. You may want to throw in the towel.”
“Don’t. Don’t give up. Talk to friends and family. They will all try to be honest, so keep checking with people who will be straightforward with you and choose to offer a solution. You will come through the other end,” she says encouragingly.
Find 8 Reid Street: Snapshots from an Australian Beach on Amazon.
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