I must go to various groups and talk about Louis XIV and Before Versailles again. It’s a little like reopening a closed book. I have shut the lid on my last book. For me, it’s over. Yet I have the opportunity to present it to the public again, and if I want to do that well–my presentation opens people to becoming readers, my readers–I have to do a little diving in the depths that were Before Versailles. Why did I write about what I did? What excited me? I have to let Louis charm me again, as he did as he began to take over a story that I thought belonged to either Henriette or Louise. I really liked the place Louis was in his life in the moments I chose to portray, and I geniunely liked the person I envisioned in those moments. He truly was a hero. I’m going to watch Le Roi Danse again or pieces of it anyway. Benoit Magimel, the actor who protrays Louis in this French film, captures the ardor, the innocence, the incipient and polite and steely determination, the attractiveness, the creativity that were all Louis XIV in 1661, that ensnared me as I worked to create a novel in which he was 
going to be a part but not the whole. And I have to dust off rusty social skills. I’m an oddball, and I am mostly at peace with that, but I do need to protect that part of me when I present to strangers.
How do you prepare yourself when you make presentations? Isn’t it strange, the life of a writer, so solitary and yet these public presentations (if we’re lucky)? How do you resolve the black and white of the differences?
Wish me luck……
Karleen Koen — writing life 
All the luck in the world to you, and it sounds like you are ensuring it through your preparation. Wish I could hear you.
Revisiting an old inspiration….very intriguing. You have my vote of confidence, Karleen. I’ve seen you in action (Rice U.) and had the privilege to sit and soak under your teaching. Keep leading the way courageously.
Karleen- you are the subject matter expert (SME) on your book. People come to hear what you say because they are fans. I can’t imagine hecklers show up at such events. You will be among friends.
There is an admirable confidence in your writing and in your presentation style.
Being comfortable as an “oddball” exhibits confidence as well.