We are excited to announce that Unglued by Jeffrey Zuckerman has been named as a finalist in the prestigious Minnesota Book Awards. Unglued is a tremendous book that deserves recognition. Congratulations to Jeff and all of the finalists!

Jeffrey Zuckerman‘s book recounts his harrowing five-year ride which began months before his wife Leah was diagnosed with late-onset bipolar disorder. After thirty years of marriage, Jeff, a semiretired editor and a second-string catcher on a recreational softball team, nearly became unglued himself as the woman he loved endured an agonizing manic episode and severe depression. Struggling to manage his own self-care, Jeff needed to learn how to overcome the stigma, loneliness, and guilt that accompanied his wife’s battle with a mood disorder.

Unglued is a candid, funny, and refreshingly irreverent portrayal of the role a spouse takes in loving a partner with a mental illness. Intimate and ultimately hopeful, Jeff’s story chronicles the power of compassion, faith, and resilience in the survival of a marriage and a caregiver’s own well-being.

Unglued is anything but dismal. Zuckerman’s clear, compelling, self-revealing writing pulls you into his emotion and despair — laced with laughs. . . .

— Neal Gendler, book reviewer for the American Jewish World

The work of a master storyteller, Unglued is a mixture of sadness and levity. It’s a valuable resource for the mental health community, for consumers of mental health services and their partners, as well as for providers. It portrays the dilemmas of empathy and alienation in accessible narratives.

— Bruce Lackie, PhD, clinical social worker and trauma therapist, Orono, Maine

I had a hard time putting the book down. Beautifully written, engrossing, fascinating, scary, funny, sad, and hopeful. A work of art, and a huge service for many people.

— Judy Bergh, retired, Minnesota Department of Health, Office of Rural Health and Primary Care

Find your copy of Unglued at a major retailer or request a copy from your favorite local bookstore. Click here to learn more about Jeffrey Zuckerman’s remarkable work.

Interested in becoming a published author? We’ve developed a five-step plan that will guide you through the process. For a limited time, download a free copy of The Self-Publishing Handbook here.

Rose Ann Kalister is the author of Boyle & Dalton’s latest release, Sister of Saidnaya: A Syrian Immigrant’s Tale. This fantastic debut novel tells the story of Nadra, a passionate Syrian immigrant woman who fights to balance the expectations of her heritage with the temptation of independence in the new world.

Find Sister of Saidnaya on Amazon.com here, or ask for it at your favorite bookseller. 

While Sister of Saidnaya is fiction, Rose Ann drew from her own experiences as she wrote the book. Below she writes of the changing cultural landscape of America:

When I was growing up the first question we asked a new friend was “What are you?” Those who said something like “Irish” or “Italian” had it easy.  When I said “Syrian” I got the blank look, sometimes suspicious. Once I figured out the location of Syria, I tried the geographical explanation.  That didn’t help.  No one knew or cared about geography.

My family were foreigners to the West by-God! Virginians and what we ate was also foreign.  Now we say “exotic.”  I’m still amazed when my friends haul out pita, olives, and hummus for snacks.  Now everybody even knows the various spellings for tabbouli.  I once asked my mother why she never made falafel.  She raised her brows and said “That’s street food!”  My mother was a purist, in more ways than that.

I see that the new restaurants are hawking imjaddrah, either alone or as a base for meat or veggies.  In my day imjaddrah was what we had to eat on Friday, the day of abstinence, if mother didn’t want to fry fish.  And other than perch, there was no fish worth frying in West Virginia. I still remember the day I saw that large jar with baba Ghanoug swimming in olive oil.  I was afraid of it!

Rose Ann Kalister has a BA in English from Wheeling Jesuit University, an MA in English and Drama from John Carroll University, and graduate courses from Ohio University. She taught English at John Carroll University, West Virginia University, and Ohio University.  Her longest tenure was at Ohio Dominican University where she was Director of the Academic Center and a Lecturer in Humanities. She is a member of The Dramatists Guild, the National Association of American PEN Women and Writers Satellite.

Learn more about Rose Ann Kalister and Sister of Saidnaya here: RoseAnnKalister.com