LORNA STUBER

When I contacted Lorna and inquired about her background, she told me the following about herself:

“By the time I was twenty-five, I had lived on three continents (North and South America as well as Asia) and had made it a goal to check the other three off the list someday. While I’m fluent only in English, I have studied German and Japanese, and whenever I travel somewhere English is not the predominant language, I make a point of picking up a few words and phrases so I can at least express my thanks. I’m a former ESL teacher who is deeply fascinated with linguistics and anything to do with cultural anthropology.”

After Lorna and I agreed to work together, she admitted to me that during our initial talks, she was trying hard not to get her heart set on working on this project in case I chose to hire someone else.

To provide her a glimpse of my intent, I shared with her the rough first draft of the manuscript (80,000 words). In response, she said, “When I finished reading the first draft, I was gobsmacked. Your story could be a university course in any number of disciplines: sociology, cultural anthropology, history, Middle Eastern and African studies, linguistics, religion, even women’s studies. Everything I am passionate about.”

I said to myself, She will require the least amount of time to orient.

After having shared with her my guilt, fear, and emotional challenges, I asked Lorna if she could do the heavy lifting of developing the manuscript without altering my voice. I suggested that she probe me—push me—to dig deep within myself and verbally explain to her my feelings about the events of my life so that she could fill in the gaps in my writing. We would need to have multiple conversations to make up for my shortcomings in expressing my thoughts and emotions so that we could prompt readers to bring their own emotions to the book.

She agreed!

She was the first team member, with a few more to come!

Website - https://lornastuber.com/