Author Fan Clubs:
Camille Alexa
R.A. Allen
Kevin David Anderson
Peter Andrews
Thomas Anselm
Carol Ayer
Victor J. Banis
Cynthia S. Becker
Sally Bellerose
Karen Bernardo
Venita Blackburn
Andrea Bodel
Bruce Boston
Michael Bracken
Warren Bull
Mort Castle
John Chabot
Keri Clark
T.F. Davenport
O'Neil De Noux
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Simon Wood
Sally Bellerose has held many jobs including, but not limited to, fence painter, babysitter, hall guard, tobacco picker, short order cook, hole-punch operator, cashier, bus driver, security guard, EMT, nurses’ aid, Personal Care Attendant, editor, RN, author, and gardener. Once, as a laundress, in the era when he used the name Cassius Clay, she washed many pairs of Muhammad Ali’s exquisitely knit socks and handed them directly to him. With the possible exception of her son, he was the most beautiful man she has ever seen. She has held many other jobs that she has forgotten or chooses not to reveal.
Sexuality, illness, and class are common themes in Sally’s writing. Whether writing about growing up in the 60s, lesbian love, nursing, or her elderly parents, she has found the basic themes haven’t changed much. The older she gets, the more interested she becomes in the line between sentimentality and empathy in her work and the value of embracing humor, irony, and absurdity in her life and writing. She is also trying to wrestle with the messy, confusing, and complicated relationships of anger, love, and transcendence. She is fiercely working class and struggles with her passions and prejudices when exploring the ways class, race, good or bad luck, and ability interact and inform each other.
Sally’s awards include a Fellowship from The National Endowment for the Arts, The Barbara Deming Prize, and The Rick DeMarinis Award. Her work appears in a call to nursing, Crab Orchard Review, The Sun, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Cutthroat, Per Contra, Sniplits, and dozens of other anthologies and publications. Her short Story Fishwives won first place in the Saints and Sinners Writers Conference where she as a featured reader. Her novel, The Girls Club won the Bywater Prize and is available from Bywater Books, Amazon and most booksellers.
Love, jealousy, and a shared sense of family humor.
Time: 3:56 / $0.49 Sample Add to Cart
Even the loneliest and most mundane lives can be transcended.
Time: 63:36 / $1.29 Sample Add to Cart
Reviews
“In her debut novel, Bellerose deftly tells the story of Cora Rose, Marie, and Renee LaBarre, a trio of working-class sisters in small-town Massachusetts who are best friends, mortal enemies, and forever loyal to each other. Told from youngest sister Cora Rose’s perspective, the story begins in the late 1960s and wends through the 70s as the sisters each graduate from high school and come to terms with a number of difficult issues—ranging from teen pregnancy to parenting to health issues to coming to terms with their sexuality, all liberally seasoned with a healthy dose of Catholic guilt. Throughout, the sisters—as well as their boyfriends, husbands, and girlfriends—muddle through with hope and love. Bellerose’s sympathetic characters are all the more appealing and realistic for their lack of perfection. No matter what one’s view of sexuality, the portrayal of Cora Rose, a lesbian struggling to deny her realities to everyone including herself, is riveting and at times heartbreaking.
A fast-paced, well-written tale with characters who will linger in the reader’s memory long after the final page is turned.” - Publisher's Weekly July 25, 2011