Join The Street Team (for my new book)

I sat at this keyboard for the last year writing and writing and writing … writing a book that accompanied my descent into what has become the deepest darkness I’ve yet to experience in my life.

Shortly before I started writing (in January-ish 2022) my dad was diagnosed with Stage 4 Colon Cancer and shortly before I finished it (a little over a year later, in March 2023) he passed away.

To be honest, the book …

Started as one idea.

Then morphed into another.

Before evolving into something else.

… and finally becoming what it is today.

It looks at various stories from the Gospel of Matthew through the lens of Matthew’s 1st century readers/listeners who were living in the wake of Rome’s destruction of their Temple  …

The center of their universe.

Their holy place.

Their sacred place.

Their … everything.

… And wonders (given that context) how they might have received the stories that Matthew told. The book encourages the reader to get in touch with THEIR collapsed Temples, shattered dreams, and imploded universes as (together) we wonder what Matthew’s stories might mean for us.

For me?

The loss of my father is the destruction of my Temple - a center of my universe, a holy place, a sacred place, a safe place. His death was like a meteor to my life that I knew was coming, that I saw hurtling at me, but that I was powerless to stop. It has caused unbelievable pain, sadness, confusion, frustration, anger, tears, devastation … grief. And so although I only mention my story 2 or 3 times in the book, the book is very much a picture of me wrestling with my grief and bringing my pain and questions and confusion before God and the Scriptures I’ve been studying since I was a kid.

My hope isn’t that this book will sell a lot of copies or hit the top of some chart for a few days or weeks or months. None of that interests me, to be honest. Rather, it’s my hope that the book lands into the hands of even one person who might benefit from it. It’s not going to solve any problems or reconstruct any shattered Temples or give 5 or 6 steps to “overcome grief” … nothing like that. Instead, (I think) it’ll help people feel less crazy and less alone in the mess of emotions that our losses tend to leave in their wake and help people put words on feelings and emotions that no words can adequately describe.

And so, will you help me?

I want to put together a “Street Team” of sorts - not a Launch Team, but a Street Team. Why the difference? What’s the difference?

Well.

As I already said, I’m not looking to launch the book to the top of the charts and I’m not really interested in launching it to the corners of the globe … but I am interested in handing it to YOU on these streets of cyberspace in hopes that you might hand it to someone else and them to someone else and them to someone else and them to … you get the idea.

“Launching” feels sort of impersonal to me, it makes me feel like I’m putting the book into a rocket ship and sending it off into space where I hope it randomly lands in people’s hands whereas a “Street Team” makes me feel like I’m talking to a friend outside a local cafe on What If Project Street and passing along a book that might help them that they can then pass along to someone else in hopes that it might help them.

And so, what am I asking you to do?

Nothing too crazy. If you’re interested in being part of the team, I will send you a digital copy of the book that I will ask you to read or skim so that on the day of the release you can (1) leave a review on Amazon and (2) share a link along with a quote or blurb to your social media pages of choice.

I’m not asking you to buy a book.

I’m not asking you pre-order a book.

I’m not asking you to drop a dime.

(You can if you want to, though - HA!)

I’m just asking you to meet me at this virtual cafe on What If Project Street, take some time to glance through this corner of my heart that I’ve put onto paper, and pass it along on social media when it releases.

Interested?

Fill out the form below and as soon as I nail down a release date I’ll be in touch with a semi-finalized digital copy of the book. I may even be making some FREE physical copies available for members of the Street Team so that you can leave them around your community for people to have - at actual cafes, at the grocery store, etc. - and send me pictures of all the places the book makes it to in the streets of your hometown.

Cool?

Cool.

Thanks for your help, and thanks for all the good vibes you’ve been sending my family - we are eternally grateful.

Glenn Siepert