Ray's favorite story with each of his parents

"Selfie”  is Book no. 2 of our series, Moments Carved in Paper, focusing on a story about each of Ray’s parents. The desire to preserve these 2 stories as ink on paper was the catalyst for this series of books. My story about my mother is going to her first rock concert at age 58. My father's story is about twists and turns in the Vatican Musuem.

Wouldn’t it be nice to take all of your siblings, kids, grandkids and friends, and collect everyone’s favorite story about your own parents while they are alive and able to share it? And if you can’t think of a good story, you need to make one happen. The kids and grandkids need to make one happen for each of them: fishing, cooking hot dogs, reading books, keeping a secret.

The 2nd & 3rd images to the left show a sample page and the 1940s selfie photograph that defines Ray’s image of how he sees his parents.

Moments Carved in Paper is a series of autobiographical books, printed via letterpress and hand bound. They are available through Lead Graffiti’s online store in softcover and clamshell versions. The series is bound in a flutter book format with a wrap-around jacket. The cover for Book no. 2 is printed on Fabriano Tiziano Sage 160 gsm with the text pages printed on Somerset Textured White 300 gsm in an edition of 115, 15 reserved for clamshell boxes.

THE DELUXE CLAMSHELL BOX EDITION of #2 will contain an original Cars vinyl album, entitled "The Cars," a photo of my father with Pope Paul VI (given that the Sistine Chapel is his chapel, and it is really too bad we didn't catch him in it), and maybe throw in some Italian money from back in the day (no longer usable for those Italian government reasons).

Prices / ordering

• Softcover edition is $65 plus shipping.

• Deluxe clamshell edition is $375 plus shipping.