Fern Ellis
AUTHOR
Fern began writing at age seven when her mother, who called her Miss Storyteller, gave her a heart-shaped diary with a lock and told her to write her feelings and stories in it. Which she did. And she never stopped. While working as a freelance writer in Miami and Los Angeles, she specialized in copywriting and scriptwriting for advertising agencies; interviewing renowned musicians and writing articles about them for classical music magazines; composing music and lyrics for herself and other musicians. She wrote video scripts for the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) and the California legislature. As an educator, Fern developed and taught the first women’s history course “Herstory” at Miami Dade Community College. She also created the first educational program for the homeless at Covenant house through the LAUSD. She has taught English, French, Spanish, Creative Writing, Tai Chi/Qigong, Pilates, and Gyrotonic®.
In addition to co-authoring an English as a Second Language textbook for Simon and Schuster, Fern’s book publishing credits include the award-winning biography Courageous Triumph: The Story of Miriam Gopman’s Survival and Success as well as her first novel, Cosmic Sonata. Stay tuned for her soon to be published Lotus Blossom Zen, a compilation of Fern’s original sayings and photographs.
Lotus Blossom Zen
Sayings & Photographs for Self-Discovery
We’re all travelers on life’s highway so why not make it a fun ride! Seems to me that sharing gems we’ve uncovered on our path can light up the way for fellow travelers too. Which in turn might ignite our inner circuitry to teach us jewels about ourselves. Ah, yes, out of the darkness shines the light. Just like the beautiful lotus that grows up out of the mud, we can uncover our own inner light and let ourselves become who we are.
Cosmic Sonata
Fern's new novel
Flow Freely left a stable writing career in the US during the turbulent 1970s to seek a more spiritually centered life working as a translator in France, where the same cultural issues provide no escape. Success eludes her, just as it does the characters who surround her at the seedy residential hotel where she lives. When she cries out to the universe for guidance, a seemingly chance encounter with a couple of intergalactic travelers turns into an odyssey that will change her life forever.
Courageous Triumph
The Story of Miriam Gopman's Survival and Success
Serendipity brought author Fern Ellis together with Holocaust survivor Miriam Gopman, who attended a weekly exercise class for two years that Fern taught in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida. One Sunday they both arrived early to class. “As I gazed out at the ocean,” Fern recalls, “the clear blue sky, the palm trees swaying in the gentle breeze, I said to Miriam, ‘We have so much to be thankful for.’ Miriam replied, ‘Yes, I’m thankful every day that I wake up and the Nazis aren’t chasing me.'” Thus began the telling of Miriam Gopman’s compelling story of courage, survival and triumph that takes place across three continents and seven decades.