My debut novel, Making Arrangements, is available for pre-order on Amazon. Published by Kindle Press, it is a story of funerals, flowers and forgiveness and features “delightfully rich writing with characters you’ll want to slap.”
Surprised to be alive after battling cancer, Lang Eldridge spent her supposed final year of life making arrangements so her soon-to-be-widowed husband could manage without her. Ha. The secret he carried to his grave could destroy her life. If she lets it.
The characters in “Making Arrangements” include a a cheerful veterinarian who resembles Wimpy, a little mute stray dog that turns out to be just what the doctor ordered, a grammar-butchering fashion plate who cheats at tennis, and a heavy-hipped protagonist who finds love where she least expects it. The title, “Making Arrangements,” refers in part to the lovingly written notes, frozen caramel cakes and instructions she arranged for her husband so he could survive without her.
Making Arrangements www.ferrisrobinson.com
Ferris Robinson 
Hey this is kinda of off topic but I was wondering
if blogs use WYSIWYG editors or if you have to manually code
with HTML. I’m starting a blog soon but have no coding experience so I wanted to get advice from someone with experience. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Hi friend Ferris,
It has been quite some time since we wrote to each other. I hope you and your family are all doing well and you enjoyed the past Christmas Day with your friends and loved ones.
Happy New Year,
Hamza
Hamza, I am glad to hear from you! I think everyone is doing well and thank you for asking! I am giving you the name of my other blog, http://www.easingintomyfifties.wordpress.org and will email you another chicken soup story as soon as I can, and really appreciate your interest! I also write for an onlind paper, http://www.chattanoogan,com and have a column called ‘Life with Ferris’. I hope all is well with you and yours, and I will track down my chicken soup story about baseball. Thanks and best wishes, Ferris
How are you doing, Ferris, and how is the rest of your family? If you wrote any other stories for the Chicken Soup various books, please email me one more story to enjoy. Here is my email address: hamamizo2@hotmail.com
Hamza, your kind email is posted in my kitchen, with your beautiful sentences highlighted. Thank you for reaching out to me and I wish you the best of luck with your writing, and with everything! Best! Ferris
Thank you, Ferris, for sharing your websites with me. I don’t have a website and wish to create one. In fact, I am not writer and did not even try to write anything in my life before even though most of my friends urged me to write. Moreover, English language is not my mother tongue because I was born and raised in Arab World. But reading more than 2,500 Chicken Soup short stories, including yours, is what improved my language and opened my insight to the world.
Have a blessed weekend,
Hamza
Wow! That’s a true keeper! Thanks so much for sharing with me! I need to remember the coffee God has provided, and I love your images. Thank you! Ferris Ps( I have a more current blog at http://www.easingintomyfifties.wordpress.com if you are interested. Do you have one? You should!!)
Hi Ferris,
You were about to sink in the sea of your life’s troubles and stresses, but your son became a lifeboat for you when he asked you to go out with him and to watch him fish. Life is a godsend, we have to cherish each and every moment we are alive. Life is a piano, what we get out of it depends on how we play it and your son knew how to play it.
A group of graduated students visited their professor who recently retired. Soon, the conversation turned to complaints about life stress. Offering his guests coffee, the professor went to the kitchen and came back with a large pot of coffee and an assortment of cups – porcelain, glass, crystal, some plain looking, some expensive, and some exquisite – telling them to help themselves to the coffee.
The professor noticed that all the nice cups were taken by the students leaving behind the plain and cheap cups. He waited for a moment and said, “I noticed that you consciously went to the nice cups and began eyeing each other’s cup, while all what you want is the coffee. This is the source of your problems and stresses. The cup that you are drinking from adds nothing to the quality of the coffee. Life is the coffee. Your jobs, money, cars, and positions in society are the cups. They are just tools to hold and contain life. The cup you have does not define nor change the quality of life you have. Sometimes by concentrating only on the cups, we fail to enjoy the coffee God has provided us.”
It is better to lose count while naming our blessings than to lose our blessings while counting our troubles. From the blue heron to the crickets to the sound of the dove to the sunset, your son was in fact enjoying the coffee God has provided him and inadvertently teaching you to savour its wonderful taste.
All the best,
Hamza
Hamza, I have to tell you, you made my DAY! I think that is the nicest thing anyone has ever said, and I appreciate it so much! Chicken Soup selecting that story to send was very timely for us and we needed to be reminded of the important things. Thank you for taking the time to send such wonderful encouragement to me! Best, Ferris Robinson
Hello Ms. Ferris Robinson,
I am not sure whether or not you are the one who wrote the wonderful story “Fishing with Robby,” from ‘The Wisdom of Dads’ book of the Chicken Soup for the Soul Series. The story, however, touched my heart and soothed my soul in a very positive way and it is no doubt the heart of the book.
Best regards,
Hamza Balol
Saudi Arabia