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Born in Los Angeles California, Susan Joyce spent most of her childhood in Tucson, Arizona and returned to LA as a young working woman.
Inspired as a child by postcards from her globe-trotting great aunt, Susan left the United States at age 20 to see the world. She planned on being gone for a year, but ended up living her 20s and 30s in Europe and the Middle East. As a Jill of all trades, she worked as a secretary, freelance writer, taught computer classes, wrote songs, and became an accomplished artist while writing her first children's book. An award winning author and editor of children's books, Susan is also an inspirational speaker.
Susan lives with her husband, two dogs, and a loud cat in a beach town in Uruguay, South America.
Reviewed by Mamta Madhavan for Readers' Favorite
The Lullaby Illusion: A Journey of Awakening by Susan Joyce is the story of an American woman and the situations she faced in her life while living in Europe and the Middle East. The story takes you to the time when Susan was living in Cyprus and how the coup affected normal life. She finds her life changing as a border refugee. Later she gets rescued from a boat in the Indian Ocean. Along with the story of her survival and resilience runs the story of her miscarriages and tragic still-birth. The setbacks see her reinventing herself as an artist.
The memoir is a compelling read. The military coup and getting trapped in the middle of a war, a failing marriage, and a suspicion that her husband is a spy give many dimensions to the theme. There is a lot of action and emotion happening in the story which makes it fast paced and exciting. Her travel descriptions lend color to the story. The book sees the transformation of the author from a housewife to that of a confident and determined woman. The dialogues are rich, the travel descriptions are detailed, adding to the visual appeal of the scenes. As extras, the history and humor make it a beautiful memoir.
I found the book inspiring, sad, beautiful, humorous and it will strike a chord within readers on many levels. It is a remarkable and truly inspiring story. Though her story is scary and dangerous in the beginning, it ends on an uplifting note. There are so many dimensions and levels to the author's experiences that make it an engaging read.
