Author Martha Perritti returns February 8

to southwest Florida to speak

Isle-ettes of Isles Yacht Club to host author

PUNTA GORDA, FLORIDA--Author Martha Perritti will return to southwest Florida as special guest speaker for the Isle-ettes at the Isles Yacht Club in Punta Gorda, Florida. In addition to her pre-lunch remarks, Perritti will be available for book signings afterwards.
    
    Perritti’s February 8 appearance takes place under the temporary “Big Top” tent at 10:45am-11:00am and will feature her newest book, the widely-acclaimed historical novel, Standing against the Wind. Based on her family, the novel is rich in Cherokee heritage, including how family members experienced the tragedy of the Trail of Tears.  For reservations for members and guests, contact Jolene Mowry at 941/575-9924. The Isles Yacht Club is located at 1780 West Marion Avenue in Punta Gorda.
    
    Be sure to mark your calendar for Perritti’s February 8 presentation and book signing and spend some time with this personable author and her fascinating stories. Along with this newest novel, Perritti will have her collection of books on hand to sign. Recently, Perritti moved to Tallahassee, Florida from Bokeelia on Pine Island, Florida. She was born in the valley of the Caddo Mountains in Alabama, featured in portions of Standing against the Wind.

About the novel

     Standing against the Wind is a family story based on fact and written in the framework of fiction. It’s about three Cherokee women--all of whom were Perritti’s great grandmothers. At the age of 60, Perritti discovered her Cherokee heritage, thus her fact-based story begins in the Cumberland Gap and follows the path her Cherokee family unfolds for her. The reader travels through early Native Americans living peacefully in the Carolina mountains, to the treacherous Trail of Tears, the Civil War and to the final removal of Native Americans from Martha’s family homestead in the Caddo Mountains of northern Alabama.
    
    Standing against the Wind (Lifestyles Press) took three years to research and write. Part of the research involved Perritti traveling the actual trail in each of the states where her great grandmothers traveled and lived.
  
    Perritti, a self-taught writer and independent scholar, writes in longhand, with very little rewrite—a natural gift she has learned to accept and allow to flow. Perritti’s unique novel form provides outlined historical summaries along the way that situates the reader in the historical framework of the story. 
    
    Her latest novel, featured last year at the London Book Fair, has been compared to Cold Mountain. It was chosen as a book club selection on Greg Screw’s Book Club on the Alabama

ABC affiliate WAAY-TV.  Recommended highly by Screw, he said, “It’s a remarkable story….the Trail of Tears….popular story for people here in north Alabama about the Cherokee nation and what they had to do…the trials and heartbreaks.  If you like history, if you like stories about the Cherokee nation, the Trail of Tears, then you’ll like this…. [Standing against the Wind].”  

     Perritti was also a recent guest interview with southwest Florida’s public radio/NPR’s news host, Amy Tardif. For Tardif, this story was an interesting read, filled with real versus accepted facts about the Cherokee, their customs and experiences in America. You can listen to the online interview, which aired on public radio in 2004. Just click on Perritti’s web site at www.Marthalouperritti.com and select “radio interview.”

     Standing against the Wind is available on Amazon.com, on Perritti’s website-- Marthalouperritti.com and on Sanibel Island, Florida at The Island Book Nook, MacIntosh Book Shop, Inc. and the Sanibel Island Book Shop. For media inquiries, contact publicist Lynda Long at email LKL47@comcast.net.