(From Shanti)
Hi from me to all of you.
As you will know The Letters Book originally started as the correspondence between Joseph and I. Over time more and more people have become involved and even added their own stories as well.
First, we began to involve our spouses Lizamoa and Mike in our letter writing. Later our friends became involved, Jenny and Peter, then Steve and Sharon from New Zealand. While in India the couples, Sarvesh and Amita, Jeevan and Mandara were involved. And I have just come to learn that Mootie and Hansini have now become involved as well. Joseph will tell the story of how this happened in the next story we send to you all.
When we were in India we decided to give each couple their own copy of The Letters Book so as soon as I got back to New Zealand I started working on this project but I must admit that I didn’t get very far. As I had to give up work before my baby was born, this project was a good one for me to pick-up and complete.
I found some beautiful black leather binders which I decided to use. I carefully went back through all the letters editing them and then making enough copies for everyone. So now you will all have your very own copies of the Letters Series to enjoy for your private fun.
It was expensive sending these heavy, made-up volumes to India but I'm sure you will agree it was worth it. Once this current volume is finished it will be easier to send the empty binders then you will fill them yourselves. Now I hope this means we will get to read and write many more stories for the "Naughty Letters Book." Ha! Ha!
I found some beautiful black leather binders which I decided to use. I carefully went back through all the letters editing them and then making enough copies for everyone. So now you will all have your very own copies of the Letters Series to enjoy for your private fun.
It was expensive sending these heavy, made-up volumes to India but I'm sure you will agree it was worth it. Once this current volume is finished it will be easier to send the empty binders then you will fill them yourselves. Now I hope this means we will get to read and write many more stories for the "Naughty Letters Book." Ha! Ha!
Now to the point of my letter. As you already know Joseph and Lizamoa have recently moved to New Zealand. Since they are living in our house at the moment and soon will have their own house nearby it kind of makes the idea of writing letters to each other a bit obsolete. Our original intention was for the series to end at this point, but we enjoy the story writing and want to continue so this is what we have decided to do.
We will be dividing into two teams, the New Zealand Team and the Indian Team. From now on both teams will exchange letters/stories instead of Joseph and I writing to each other. As they get a story to tell, any member of a team can then be the writer for all or part of any particular letter.
There are two team coordinators, Amita in India and me in New Zealand. We will take any stories written by our team, type them up, take copies for our team and then E-mail to the other team. We will also receive and make copies of all incoming letters/stories as well. This means everyone will be regularly updated as new letters are exchanged and they will receive their copies using the correct type fonts.
I am very happy with this new plan but I must be honest and give credit to who came up with it. Thank you very much, Amita. Because of your good suggestion, The Letters Book will survive and continue to grow.
As you know recently we began using the leather binders I mentioned above. Well already we have filled four volumes and so please find enclosed with this letter the binder for the fifth volume.
To keep with everyone else, since this is a changing point in The Letters Book, you will want to make this the first letter of Volume Five.
Now just one last thing before I end. I want to welcome Mootie and Hansini to our letter writing. In your parcel, you will have found the four leather volumes of all of our old letters going right back to the very beginning. Also, I have enclosed the empty binder for Volume Five. There is a trick to attaching new pages so let Amita show you how to do it.
I hope you both can find plenty of spare time because you now have a lot of “naughty” reading to do. Ha. Ha.
Now Amita tells me that you are writing a letter/story Hansini, telling us how you became involved with The Letters Book. I know Joseph and Lizamoa have told us some of this story already but I am looking forward to reading your account as I’m sure it will be interesting.
If you need help, ask Amita to give you a hand with the editing but try as much as possible to keep it in your own words because this adds to the character of The Letters Book. Also, you might want to try and include conversation in your story. I know it is impossible to remember every exact word which was spoken but you can usually get the general idea of a conversation and fill it out from there. Reading your writing out loud to somebody helps to make it sound right as many of us like reading or hearing the letters being read out loud.
Well bye from me now.
And all of those living here in this house at the moment send our love.
Shanti.