BOOKS
THE WEEPING DEGREE
ISBN: 978-1-957468-32-7
The Weeping Degree: How Astrology Saved Me From Suicide – is a raw and edgy memoir of poetry and flash prose. It became an International Amazon Best Seller August 2024 and was longlisted for numerous awards, winning DISTINGUISHED FAVOURITE with the INDEPENDENT PRESS AWARDS, U.S.; a BRONZE MEDAL with THE WISHING SHELF AWARDS U.K.; and a READERS' FAVOURITE 5-STAR REVIEW, U.S.
From its opening pages, Watt’s gritty poems tell the biography of a trauma, following the ripple effect of childhood abandonment and sexual abuse as it echoes throughout the author’s life, slowly transforming through time from a wound to a gift. Inspired by the author’s own astrological chart—Watt turns to astrology and Buddhism to make sense of her tragic experiences. Divided into three riveting sections: The Home for Little Girls, The Buddha and The Pink Futon, and Hands Across the World, this book travels the globe from the silent shadows of foster care in a bleak Scarborough suburb, to the light and sound of Sanskrit chanting in a Tibetan Buddhist monastery in Nepal.
Written for poetry lovers, spiritual seekers, astrology aficionados and mental health advocates alike, this collection will take you on a wild ride, where poetry is a sacred alchemical art; a place where our deepest sorrows are transmuted through imagination and creativity to self-empowerment and hope.
Praise for THE WEEPING DEGREE
The Weeping Degree is a poetic memoir by Kelly Watt... unflinchingly raw and thoroughly immersive. There's something heartachingly beautiful about Kelly's poetic storytelling...this is a very inspiring memoir that will perhaps help other abuse victims find closure in their own lives.
Pikasho Deka for Readers' Favourite,
5-star review
A thought-provoking set of poetry illustrating the author's journey from dark to light. A bronze medal winner and highly recommended.
The Wishing Shelf Book Awards, UK
That Watt has been able to spin poetry from her experiences is a feat in itself; that she has dared to do so is a testament to her courage, and to her abiding faith in the ability to heal.
Ruth Edgett, reviewer/author,
Microlit Magazine
A survivor of brutal childhood abuse and a suicide attempt journeys through astrology, Buddhism, therapy, and activism to reclaim her fractured self and turn her deepest wounds into witness and healing.
Falcon Review
The Weeping Degree is a poetic memoir by Kelly Watt. Inside, she shares her painful childhood experiences and the journey she had to undertake to recover and heal over time...
Reviewed by Pikasho Deka
Reader’s Favourite
CAMINO MEDITATIONS
Camino Meditations is a pocket book for spiritual adventurers. This small practical book includes short inspirational chapters, followed by simple walking meditations, journal exercises and action steps. The writing is peppered with Camino wisdoms Watt learned on her own pilgrimage walking with fellow meditation practitioners in 2008. Camino Meditations is small enough to slip into a knapsack or download on a mobile device, and is written for the spiritual seeker, regardless of religious persuasion, who wants an inner guide on their quest to “know thyself.”
Praise for Camino Meditations
These “meditations” are always engaging, easy to read, articulate – but above all, REALLY worth reading! I find every one of them thought-provoking, interesting, and true. I’d want to read this even if I never set foot on the Camino!
Barbara Turner-Vesselago | Author
MAD DOG
ISBN 978-0990376705 $16.95
In this gripping novel, Kelly Watt brings to life the wonderfully complex Sheryl-Anne, and with vivid, often frightening detail charts the destruction of a family. The work of a gifted storyteller, Mad Dog marks the arrival of an exceptional new talent.
Sheryl-Anne MacRae dreams of leaving her home on an apple orchard in southwestern Ontario to search for her long-lost mother. One day her adopted father, Fergus, brings home a beautiful young hitchhiker, Peter Lucas Angelo and Sheryl-Anne and Peter become fast friends.
But life in Eden Valley is not as idyllic as it would seem. As the summer progresses Peter is pulled deeper into the dangerous underworld Fergus inhabits -- a world of sex, drugs, and increasingly violent rituals. Sheryl-Anne’s daytime existence becomes more and more threatened by the frightening visions that torment her at night. In a terrifying climax, the brutal truth of Sheryl-Anne’s life is revealed.
To order Mad Dog by mail, click here.
To order from Amazon.com online, click here.
To order from Barnes and Noble online, click here.
To order as various e-book formats, click here.
Praise for Mad Dog
With her first novel, Watt has created a story of substance, layering the everyday concerns of an apple harvest over those of race riots and missing civil-rights activists, the apocalypse and pagan ritual over the longing of first love, cruelty endured over cruelty meted out. To be sure, there is ugliness in Mad Dog. But there is also solid writing, from a writer whose second book I, for one, will be sure to seek out.
Roxanne Ward | The Globe and Mail, Canada