After living abroad in France, Dubai, Oman, Norway and the Netherlands, author and journalist, Jo Parfitt, has compiled here, an anthology of the poetry that has 'saved her life' during the 20 years she has been on the road. This is a memoir in poetry of a life overseas. Join the author on her journey through culture shock, repatriation, motherhood, the world of work and self-discovery as she shares the moments when she was on top of the world, in the valley of shadows, and many places in between. This is a book in which expatriates everywhere can find themselves.
My first book was accepted by the first publisher I approached, back in 1984. The book was 'French Tarts' and the publisher was Octopus. I went on to have 13 word processing and desktop publishing handbooks published by Macmillan, McGraw-Hill, Pitman and Paradigm, over the next few years. By then I had become an 'expat wife' and was living in Dubai. In 1993 we were posted to Oman, Word had become the only WP program and so my other work dried up. Inspired by the landscape and produce of Oman I decided to co-author another cookbook and create Summertime Publishing in order to do it myself. 'Dates' sold thousands of copies but in 1996 we were posted to Norway. Here, I realised my decade abroad had taught me much about expat life and portable careers. Summertime published 'Forced to Fly' and 'Career in Your Suitcase'. I had become an expat expert and my career as a journalist specialising in expat issues and speaker at international conferences took off.
In 1997 we returned to England for a while and I published 'Find Your Passion' and 'Grow Your Own Networks'. In 2005 we moved to the Netherlands and I returned to traditional publishing and new editions of 'Find Your Passion' and 'Career in Your Suitcase' were published by Lean Marketing Press and 'Dates' by Zodiac. In addition LMP published my books 'Release the Book Within' and 'Expat Entrepreneur'.
Today, I'm still in Holland and Summertime Publishing is back on full throttle, not only as a publisher but also as a complete mentoring and publishing service. In March I published my poetry memoir, 'A Moving Landscape' and have now begun publishing other people's books too.
