I Owe it All to Tom Webb

One year ago, this month, I was in a dark place.  I had just been laid off from my job of 12 years, a job I absolutely adored.  I was depressed.  Broken hearted.  I felt as if all I had ever done, all I had worked up to in my life, was for nothing.  I was floundering without any direction in my life.

I was lost.

I’ve always been an avid reader.  I love books!  Now that I had all this time on my hands I became even more enamored of them.  I began to scour Amazon for more good books to read.  As I became more familiar with the site and read more reviews of books I potentially wanted to read I noticed a particular reviewer always had such entertaining and thoughtful reviews.  That reviewer signed his reviews “Tom Webb”.  Curious, I Googled his name.  Lo and behold, he had a website!  

I just had to check it out.  Hours and hours I spent reading all of his reviews.  Then I saw something.  He had referenced another site.

“Goodreads?”  I said to myself.  “What the heck is Goodreads?”

Oh, the wonders Mr. Webb has shown me!  I immediately signed up.  Navigating my way through I was excited to the point of being giddy.  I started listing and rating all the books I‘ve read.  Then I started to send my favorite authors friend requests.  Only authors at first - I was scared to ask other people to be my friend for fear of rejection.  Not for long though.  I finally screwed up the courage to friend request someone who wasn’t an author.  Just another reader who I could tell I had a lot in common with reading-wise.  Her name was Sara and she loved boys who loved boys.  I now call her Red.  

And it just exploded from there.

A couple of months later and I was completely immersed in the site.  I had quite a few friends and belonged to several groups.  I posted a simple status update - just three words and three letters - that garnered over 400 comments between a small group of friends.  One of them suggested  we create a group just for us and WHAM!  

The birth of the Unicorn Mafia.

Over the past nine months I have come to love each and every member of the UM as family.  No, more than that.  We have played together, read together, created a review blog together, been shoulders to cry on and cheerleaders for each other.  I have never felt more of a kinship for anyone as I do my fellow unicorns.  Who says you can't be real friends with people on the internet?  I feel closer to these people than those in my real life.  They know more about me, about who I am as a person than (with the exception of my husband) anyone in real life.  They are the ones that got me through this past year and are encouraging me to pursue my dreams in the next chapter of my life.

And I owe it all to Tom Webb.

So, thank you Tom.  Thank you for posting amazing reviews and piquing my interest enough to check out your blog.  I wouldn’t have met the best friends I’ve ever had without you.

♥