Book Cover Reveal
Light in Bandaged Places – Healing in the Wake of Young Betrayal is the title of my upcoming memoir, coming out later this year, on September 5. One of the most fun milestones in the book publishing process is when the cover design is finalized.
After many iterations with the designer and soliciting feedback from family and friends, the cover you see here was born.
The book title is based on a quote from the Persian poet Rumi: “Don’t look away from the bandaged places. That’s where the light enters you.”
The gold you see throughout the cover is reminiscent of the Japanese art of mending broken pottery with gold – called kintsugi. The cracks are highlighted, drawing attention to, rather than away from, the breaks. Symbolizing healing and resilience, the broken object accepts that its imperfect past makes it more robust, beautiful, and precious than before it was broken. The broken, imperfect, and painful parts of ourselves radiate light, gold, and beauty.
My story is one of healing. I resonate with the kintsugi pottery pieces; by looking deeply into what was hurt and damaged in myself, I found the way to transforming that hurt into not just a repaired, but a more vivid and resilient version of myself.
In the following excerpt, I describe a part of this process. Patricia, referred to here, was my therapist:
“Patricia’s loving presence in my life for over ten years was instrumental in restoring my true self. She helped me find and foster my “essence,” as we called it—the part of me that was undamaged, strong, and connected to something much larger than my personal story…After years of living a dissociated and fearful life, in a long string of relationships chosen and driven by fear, emotional protection, and the embodied belief I was not good enough, I was finally waking up to the richness of living with an open heart.”
Stay tuned for more milestones in the process of birthing this book! For those who are interested, there are many ways to mid-wife the process and help bring my book to those who might benefit from it the most. Let me know if you’d like to know more!
For now, I am happy to share the cover excitement with you.
I’m curious – how do you experience the Rumi quote? Does it speak to you? Unsettle you?
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