Harper Horizon’s mission, according to the imprint’s publisher, Andrea Fleck-Nisbet, is to publish books that not only thrill and delight readers but also titles that inspire readers to better themselves and their communities.
For readers who are also mothers, this comes in the form of an array of new books offering advice, encouragement, and vision. In A Coat of Yellow Paint, Naomi Davis, the blogger behind Love Taza, shares vulnerable essays about the life lessons she’s learned as a Juilliard dancer and mother of five. In these tales, Davis reveals how she works to balance motherhood and a career, her challenges with infertility, and how she rediscovered her faith.
The Zen Mama Guide to Finding Your Rhythm in Pregnancy, Birth, and Beyond by Teresa Palmer and Sarah Wright Olsen shares the wisdom and knowledge of two mothers from different sides of the globe on how they work to raise happy, empathetic children while working and traveling the world. The founders of the Your Zen Mama blog share real-life stories about the challenges and joys of parenting, with tips on finding Zen along the way.
Molly Galbraith’s Strong Women Lift Each Other Up debunks the myth that women must compete in order to succeed, arguing instead that strength and success are built on empowerment and connection. The evidence-based book from the cofounder of Girls Gone Strong serves as a guide to help women improve their own lives, which in turn can open doors for other women and girls.
“From the parenting resource The Zen Mama Guide to Finding Your Rhythm in Pregnancy, Birth, and Beyond to the confidence-boosting Strong Women Lift Each Other Up, each book in this diverse collection,” Fleck-Nisbet says, “offers mothers inspiring narratives and aspirational goals that align with the core values of family, community, purpose, and strength.”
Resilience is found in the pages of these new titles, as Katie Russell Newland illustrates in A Season with Mom: Love, Loss, and the Ultimate Baseball Adventure. Russell Newland—a PhD in language and literacy and a survivor of both Hodgkin’s lymphoma and melanoma—recounts her travels to all 30 Major League Baseball ballparks, which served as an opportunity to recall her bond with her mother over a shared love of baseball and to find joy amid the despair of cancer.
“Each person has his or her unique challenges and obstacles,” says Fleck-Nisbet. “For parents, each difficulty can be multiplied by watching their children struggle. Our books capture the real struggles of our authors, from Coach Rob Mendez’s tetra-amelia syndrome in Who Says I Can’t? to Naomi Davis’s struggle with infertility in A Coat of Yellow Paint. They also capture the courage of the human spirit to overcome.”
In Who Says I Can’t: The Astonishing Story of a Fearless Life, Rob Mendez, who, due to an extraordinarily rare condition called tetra-amelia, has no arms or legs, inspires by overcoming adversity and becoming a football coach. Mendez meets challenges by seeing his opportunities and reframing the perception of life with a disability.
Becca Stevens also sees opportunity in finding hope during challenging times. The Episcopal priest, survivor of childhood sexual abuse, social justice innovator, and women’s advocate has raised more than $55 million for the various charities she has founded to lift women out of poverty. In Practically Divine, she encourages readers to do good in their lives, arguing that doing good for others taps into divine inspiration and can spread across the globe.
“Courage is one of the most important characteristics a parent can instill in their children,” Fleck-Nisbet says. “Hopefully, when a parent reads a Horizon book, they’ll be inspired to live out courage in front of their children. We all know the best lessons are the ones we not only hear in words but also see in action.”
