A Minnesota book “The Overcoat”, about a Minnesota family, based on a Minnesota WW1 veteran from POPE County, Central Minnesota.           

It took me three years to get this book to being available for the public. I am so humbled by the responses across the country. My sons were rolling on the floor laughing that dad was writing a book. They now seem quite proud!

I had inspiration from my youngest sister Eileen Stark from Kensington Minnesota who wouldn’t let her final days battling cancer stop her from asking me what the next chapter was all about. Her persistence in knowing the novel was going to be completed  kept her pushing me. We had talked after our mother passed away two years back about what was to become of our family story. It was only my sister and I left and our children who weren’t interested in family tree stuff yet.

I started writing and working on a computer family tree program. I ran into so many dead ends for the lack of family to help me develop a good family tree program. The more I put the story together the worse I felt about telling the story. I tried to imagine telling this story to a grandchild and it was too sad. I had always felt that complaining didn’t help you to get very far in life so this book idea was not going very far.

When my mother had passed away we found a set of three full journals written by her father. The more I read into those journals I became convinced that a story had to be written for a family legacy. I had heard about a new concept of combining history and fiction. I was also told that good fiction contained a lot of truths.

My book style concept is fictional history. I weaved a mystery suspense tale around my Grandfather’s WW1 experiences and his life after the war and his heirs after his death all the way to my mother death.

The courage and faith one has in their life gets tested in some happenings that make some of us fall apart. This book addresses family tragedies, stresses, relentless pain, and shows character we all wish we had. Characters portrayed in this novel are real and their suffering is real as is their survival and victory.

I have had a comment submitted to my book’s website guest page that said “I have never read a book with such intense tragedy.

Another commenter said “Thanks for the encouragement that your book brought me.”

Writing this book posed some great challenges for me. I hadn’t read a book for enjoyment in my life but I have read a lot for work. The editing process became impossible. I couldn’t see the mistake’s as I was caught up into the story. I made a few books and got them into the hands of friends and asked for help. Two of my sister-in-laws Madelyn Neher from Dodge Center, Miriam Shook from Johnston, Iowa, Dorothy Brewer my aunt –in-law from Sydney, Australia and my son Travis Larson from St Louis, Missouri came through for me.

The book has a website www.myovercoat.com with WW1 pictures as well as pictures of the characters portrayed in book. I  want to ask all of you that have memories that should be written done to get started now even it is only a page as that might be all your grandchild will have of their heritage.

This book has opened doors for me to helping veterans and others. I have spoken to Veterans groups as far away as Arizona. My goals for this book have far exceeded my expectations as I was called one evening by a reader asking about how the real characters were able to manage. Being given the privileged to tell the real story made my day!