Shelly is native of Bluefield West Virginia, but she lives in Charlotte, NC. She’s accounting manager, author, and motivational speaker.
The lovely, Shelly R. Clark, has been very vocal about her struggles, and conquering the odds with 2019 memoir, Beyond the Cracks: Finding God’s Grace & Mercy. She’s back with another soul-rendering book that’s bursting with golden nuggets called Freedom: Beyond the Cracks.
When referencing the term freedom, that idea is lost in this era of servitude, and simply existing; especially for Women, as well as Black and Latina people, who are considered defunct by a bias, radically driven system of politicians, and big banks. The fabric that the capricious acts of freedom were built on, is challenged at every turn from Roe v. Wade to economical disproportion of blacks, redlining, gentrification, healthcare, and systemic racism, just to name a few bouts. That doesn’t compensate mental bondage, an enigma that keeps your brain barren from birthing dreams and ideas into fruition.
It beckons to a dynamic question: What do you need to be freed from? More importantly, can you use Freedom: Beyond the Cracks to figure that out?
Shelly toggles over nine topics, while carefully drawing analysis and conclusion for each subject, which allows for thoughtful reflection from the reader. She uses many biblical references but with relatable similes. For instance, She talks about “Under Armor” (wearing the suit of Armor, and protected by God), “Chasing the Bag,” and one of my favorite subjects, “It’s Already Yours.”
Catching up with the novelist over the weekend after her successful launch Saturday July 29, 2022, at Courtyard by Marriot (9110 Harris Corners Parkway, Charlotte, NC 28269), she elaborated more on the premises for her newest tome Freedom: Beyond the Cracks.
About the event, flaming radio personality and fellow author of children's books, "Ya Girl Nikki,” hosted the soiree with about 50 attendees during the first half of the presentation, including celebrity publicist of Imerge Public Relations, Tanganyika Watts.
Shelly says that she should’ve written the book two years ago, but she couldn’t find the words to pen, “The Pandemic happened, and the words just came,” she revealed. “Freedom, it has a new meaning for me, in this post-covid world; and I felt like where we were all masked up and confined, we were ready to break out and experience Freedom in a new way. So, my newest book, Freedom Beyond the Cracks, I hope it leads the reader to freedom from whatever place they’ve found themselves bound in."
Although both books share an intrinsic subtitle, they are dissimilar records, covering different topics, and written from spiritual experiences. Shelly describes it as a rites of passage piece, where she had fallen (through the cracks) short. She wanted to communicate those lessons to others, to overcome those battles through God’s Grace and Mercy.
“Well, here we are,” she says, ‘two years later after Covid. We’re really finding ourselves in one huge crack altogether, one huge dark place; and I felt like we needed the 21-day journal to couple along with my first book, to help lead us and guide us out of those dark spaces ,if you will. What I’ve learned is there are lessons we could’ve only learned in the dark.”
The book can be purchased at Beyond The Cracks Here.
Visit Amazon for both books here.
It took Shelly 9 months to write the first book with guidance from her publisher Dr. Lawana Grant (Leadership DevelopMe, LLC), but it required more time to shape Freedom Beyond the Cracks. “I wish I could say it was easier. It wasn’t. It was different. It’s a completely different work. This is nine chapters of finding God’s Grace and Mercy,” she talks about the differences and symbolisms to the books. “This is a 21 devotional Beyond the Cracks, finding our way to Freedom.”
Shelly is in a better space mentally, and emotionally, where the first book offered therapeutic resolve from her past. “I’m in a different place, and I am grateful to have evolved to this newfound freedom, if you will; and I found that in the word of God,” she says.
Watch the entire interview below:
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