Meet the Author: Jane Rose Wicks (and the story behind her book)
Published about 2 months ago • 2 min read
Hi Reader,
Today, we’d love to introduce you to someone very special, Jane Rose Wicks, along with the artist who helped bring her story to life, Kenny Forbes.
Jane is the author of The Green Goddess and the Gift of Grief, a teen's book that tenderly explores love, loss, and what it means to keep the heart open after grief.
The Green Goddess and the Gift of Grief
Jane Rose Wicks
Alongside her dear friend and artist illustrator, Ken Forbes, ... a Brooklyn-based artist known for his multisensory work and exploration of the human experience, often creating with coffee and cacao, and exploring themes of mental health, the challenges faced by minorities and the underprivileged, and the essence of the divine feminine ... t, they created a very special book.
This is a teen’s book about grief, but not in the way you might expect. It is not about fixing, rushing, or explaining grief away. It is about making space for it. About understanding that grief exists because love exists, and that remembering is part of healing.
What makes this book so special is where it came from.
Jane didn’t sit down to write a book for the sake of writing one. This story grew out of her own lived experience. Over time, she began to recognize how much unspoken grief she had been carrying. Loss had shaped parts of her life, and like many of us, she had never fully been given the language or space to process it.
What followed was a deeply personal journey. Through reflection, support, and a willingness to look inward, Jane came to a powerful realization.
Grief is not something separate from love. It is an expression of it.
That understanding became the foundation for this story.
Through the voice of Ella, a young girl navigating loss, Jane creates a space that feels honest, compassionate, and real. As she shared with us during our conversation, “I am Ella.” This story is not just imagined. It is felt.
And in many ways, it reflects something universal. We have all experienced moments where we didn’t have the words. Moments where something changed us, and we weren’t sure how to move forward.
This book gently meets readers in that space.
It offers teens a way to understand their feelings without pressure. It offers adults a way to begin conversations that can feel difficult to start. And most of all, it reminds us that we are not alone in what we feel.
Today marks the beginning of this book’s journey into the world, we would love your help in supporting Jane and this story as it finds its way into the hands of those who need it.
Here are a few meaningful ways to support her:
✅ Buy your copy today. Early support helps this story reach more families, classrooms, and hearts that may need it.
✅ Leave a review. Even a few words can help another parent, educator, or reader feel confident choosing this book during a tender moment.
✅ Share it with someone who may need it. A quiet recommendation to a friend, a teacher, or a caregiver can make all the difference.
✅ Engage with Jane’s work online. A like, comment, or message of support helps this conversation around grief, love, and healing travel further.
Jane shared something else that stayed with us. Grief is where we overlap. It is one of the most human experiences we share. And coming from someone as genuinely joyful as Jane, her perspective on grief feels both grounding and unexpectedly uplifting. She holds space for the hard, while still reminding us that light is never fully lost.
If this feels like something you or someone in your world may need, we invite you to explore Jane’s work.
