I didn’t mean to do it, I swear. But it doesn’t come as a shock either. I reduced a thirty year broadcast veteran to absolute mush or should I say my newly released book “Be Careful What You Wish For” did. He told me so during our recent interview.
Mike Wagner is the host of The Mike Wagner Show which broadcasts on Spotify, iHeart Radio, SoundCloud, Spreaker, Spotify, Buzzsprout, Youtube, Facebook, Podbean, Tunein, and more. He also weekend hosts for KYFR. He invited me to speak with him after reading the book which left him with a plethora of questions he needed answered so that he could undoubtedly go back to sleeping at night.
I will let you know when that podcast is available on his site so that you may hear it as well. Since the book released on October 30th, I have been receiving similar reactions to it, with one sought-after reviewer calling it my “magnum opus” even before she completed reading the thing. Needless to say, I joined Mike Wagner in my sleeplessness that night, so thrilled was I by this response.
This is a story that is meant to be read more than once. As book reviewer Morgan Amos points out in her review, “Be Careful What You Wish For has so many layers.”
No doubt, which of the characters you most relate to depends completely upon the stage of your life you find yourself in currently. More likely, the older you are, the more characters you will closely identify with. I’ve had a few readers read the book several times already, and with each new read, they fall in love with a completely different character… different from the one that they favored prior.
Don’t worry…in time, I will share all of these reviews and interviews with you, which includes that of Morgan Amos who, like Mike Wagner, has asked to couple her review with an interview as she too has some unanswered questions she would like to be answered. Seems to be a pattern and we’ve only just begun. The paranormal nature of this book and ‘how closely related these fictional characters are to the actual truth of my life and ME for that matter’ seem to be the dominant questions on everyone’s mind. In other words, “Do I see dead people?” like the main character does.
That answer lies in the reading of this book and the many, many interviews that are being queued up for me right now across news and talk mediums (no pun intended, I assure you). Then there is the growing film interest who recognize a compelling, one-of-a-kind story when they see one, especially when it meets the newest guidelines set forth by The Academy Award Association out of the gate. They may share those answers on the big screen in their own way, now known as Netflix, Hulu, HBO Max or the likes. How the movie world has changed.
What hasn’t however is how much an audience loves a good love story especially when it is uniquely original. As Morgan Amos goes on to say, “Be Careful What You Wish For is a story about forgiveness, a story about learning how to let go, and at its center; it’s a story about finding love, whether that be within yourself, family, friends, or with a partner…I was invested.”
I think our nation needs this type of investment especially now, whether it be a momentary distraction or a means of national healing. We do. This book is a literary roadmap to getting to the place, I believe, we ultimately all want to end up regardless of political party allegiance…or should anyway. It will bring people together as there is something or someone for everyone in the story and the realness and emotion that is conveyed can’t be avoided, denied or hidden from. You too will become invested. As another reviewer stated, “Be Careful What You Wish For is a mirror into all our lives, our beliefs, and that which we hold most dear.”
A good love story has a way of reminding all people that we aren’t so different after all. This book will do that in spades.