Look what came in the mail today! The first foreign edition of She Made a Monster (or, as I call it, SMAM!) Somehow this is almost more thrilling to see than the original book--I guess because it's so familiar and foreign at the same time. I wish I could read it--I wonder if it was… Continue reading Gained in Translation!
I bought this beautiful teapot from a ceramic artist at a sale in Walnut Creek... ... She sold it to me for a fabulous price because the sale was almost over. She said she really didn't care that much about making money from her pieces, because she just liked to make things and she wanted… Continue reading Brewing Inspiration…
January is more than half over. The holiday train wreck has been cleared from the tracks, and I have no more excuses not to finish this novel. By “finish,” of course, I mean complete the first draft from A to Z. (If only you could just write “the end” and then have a finished book!)… Continue reading January–Time to get going!
I hit the NaNoWriMo milestone today: 50,000 words! Never mind that it’s December 13, not November 30. Or that I started with 20,000 words I’d already written. Or that I still have miles of story left to tell… It still feels like 50,000 is a magic number. That’s about 200 pages, maybe more if you… Continue reading Beyond 50,000
As if I knew. But there are no “how to do it” rules. There are only “how I did it” stories. And each one of those stories is different. So here’s mine. Anybody who writes with the hope of getting published has heard, “Never give up! Keep trying! Be persistent!” But I did give up.… Continue reading How to Get Published (ha!)
I really enjoyed answering these questions on the blog of Deborah Kalb, a children's book author and journalist. She asked me why I decided to write about Mary Shelley and what I think kids will get out of the story of She Made a Monster, among other things. She also asked me what I'm working… Continue reading Q & A on Deborah Kalb’s Blog!
Tomorrow--SCHOOL VISITS in Fremont. Saturday: VALLEJO FRANKENFEST with Trick-or-Treating downtown for the kiddos. I'll be at the Vallejo Bookstore at 11 AM, then back to Pleasant Hill for the FALL FINE ART SHOW! (in the pic at left, mine are the peppers and the cup full of pencils, but I'll be showing abstracts at the fair, plus… Continue reading Getting ready for a busy weekend!
