Book signing for mother coping with son's death

EPHRATA - There will be a book signing at the Bookery this Saturday, Jan. 26, by a Wenatchee mother-author who has penned a book about coping with her first-born son's suicide.

Julie Zielinski will sign her book, "Matt's Last Call," between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. The Bookery is located at 1 Basin St. NW in Ephrata.

When Zielinski's fun-loving, tough U.S. Marine, sheriff's deputy son commits suicide, her world comes crashing down. Questions flood her mind.

How could she have stopped this?

What next?

And mostly, why?

As Zielinski grieves for her son in Matt's Last Call: Surviving Our Protectors, she reflects on the life he lived and the memories she will hold onto forever.

For instance, the time his captain allowed him a leave from the marine corps in order to spend time with his ill grandfather in Hawaii. Or remembering what he looked like in his oversized baseball cap and uniform.

Zielinski's energetic son turned into a man who loved nothing more than his family and country.

With memories from Matt's father, friends, and family, this memoir will surely pull at heartstrings.

"Life does not train you for this," Zielinski writes. "Tragedies like this can easily separate you from your sanity. All the usual unanswerable questions begin to flood your mind.

"Almost from the beginning, however, the Lord would not permit me to go there. There seemed to be some God-ordained plan in motion that would turn this evil into something good."

As Zielinski reflects on the death of her son, she reminds parents and children of the ever-present danger of suicide, the difficulty of coping with one, the pain of everyday life for those left behind and, lastly, the days that happiness returns, even if just a little bit.