In January, 2016, Lillian McCloy celebrated her 90th birthday. For this momentous occasion, her daughter Johanna McCloy presented her with the following gift: she would transcribe, edit, and publish the memoir that Lillian drafted on her Selectric typewriter over 20 years earlier.
Johanna McCloy, a freelance writer and editor, published Six Car Lengths Behind an Elephant: Undercover & Overwhelmed as a CIA Wife and Mother under the Bordertown Publishing imprint. With no advance marketing and very limited exposure, Lillian McCloy’s memoir continues to garner prominent author endorsements and rave reader reviews.
Johanna was also a longtime editor of the website, Dare to be Fabulous, featuring women’s personal stories of daring, joy and empowerment. As such, she curated a selection of those stories for her next book publication Dare to be Fabulous. She also created the Dare to be Fabulous Journal Notebook, an optional companion for following the writing prompts in the book.
What’s next? Johanna is currently co-authoring a spy novel with retired CIA Senior Intelligence Officer, James Lawler. 😎 Publisher is pending.
FEATURED SPEAKER
Johanna is a featured speaker at Arts & Culture events, recounting her mother’s extraordinary life as the wife of an undercover CIA officer and her own experiences as a spy’s daughter. She also speaks and leads discussions around the theme of Dare to be Fabulous. Please contact Bordertown Publishing if you’d like to host Johanna for a speaking event.
Join Johanna on Substack for her posts, book and event updates, and more. Her publication is titled In This Life.
