Showing posts with label Ken Shaw. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ken Shaw. Show all posts

Monday, September 10, 2012

Sharing lessons of hope

Ken Shaw wasn’t into essays or poetry – or writing of any kind – but he knew he had his own story to tell. So, two years ago he told that story by publishing a 136-page book, and he hopes his life lessons will help others.

“I hope people come away with a better attitude,” he said from Ferncliff Gardens Apartments in Rochester. Even with tough times, “People can still have a good life and be able to be happy.”

Shaw’s book, Trying to Fill the Void, tells how he learned to cope with the death of his father, a Rochester police officer killed in the line of duty when Shaw was only 19 months old. The book also touches on difficult relationships that Shaw has navigated and some of his physical challenges.

“I think the book is really about how my life has progressed – and how it hasn’t progressed,” he said, adding that his friends have enjoyed the book, which is available through Amazon.com. “I’m proud of it.”

And a recent stay in the hospital has planted the seeds for a possible second book.

“It would be mostly fact,” he said as his first book sat nearby. “Fiction would be too hard to write.”