Two Awards and Apologies for the Long Silence

Inspiring Blogger Award from
Julia Hones

Liebster Award from Sandra Cox
See below the info that comes with
the Inspiring Blogger Award

First the apologies for not blogging. 

1.) I've been busy working on my mystery. My goal is to finish this draft by mid-September. There's 24-25 chapters in mind, and I'm on chapter 17 so far. 

2.) We've had company and made a couple of out-of-town trips to visit folks we hadn't seen for a long time, due to travels. 

And 3.) We are getting ready for another long trip to Spain and Portugal. (I haven't even finished blogging about the last trip, but that's how it goes sometimes. Oh, the stories I'd like to tell!)

Meanwhile, two very nice blog friends gave me awards that you can see at the top of this page and read about below. Thank you so much, ladies!

Julia Hones gave me the Inspiring Blogger Award, which I find quite an honor. Julia has a marvelous blog called My Writing Life that I love to read and find inspiring in its own right, and you will too, so do check it out. She's also had many short stories and poems published and is the poetry editor of Southern Pacific Review. 

As a recipient of the award, I'm supposed to reveal 7 things about myself and then pass the award on to others whose blogs I find inspiring. Hmm. 7 reveals . . . Okay, here we go.

1. In my junior year in college, after finals, I let a girlfriend talk me into bleaching my hair blonde. (She was bleaching her hair, and we were hyper from finals, so I thought, "Why not?") Because I have a lot of red in my hair, it went red instead of blonde. Because I have a few freckles, everyone who met me as a redhead thought I really was a redhead -- to the point that when I got tired of it and decided to dye it back to dark brown, I was told, "No, don't do that, it won't look natural."

2. My favorite dessert is a cookie. Forget pies, cakes, and rich creamy custards. Give me a cookie. Any cookie, although I like sugar, shortbread, oatmeal, or peanutbutter the best.

3. I am a crossword puzzle nut. I love the New York Times crossword puzzle. I can't always finish it (Fridays and Saturdays), but I usually start the day with it. For one thing, it wakes me up and gets the wheels turning for writing later in the day.

4. My husband and I met through a cat named Meathead. That is a ve-r-r-r-y long story, that only some of our friends know and would take up too much space here. But we have very fond feelings for our feline cat-alyst from long ago.

5. I used to write everything in longhand first, but the computer has spoiled me. Cut and paste is so convenient. Even so, I miss that feeling of connection between pen or pencil and heart, and I still write my poetry first in longhand.

6. This is probably a horrible confession for an author to make, particularly one who writes children's books, but . . . I never liked The Wind in the Willows. I know, I know, one of the world's great classics. What's wrong with me! But I never could get into it, no matter how many times I tried. 

7. I loved Edith Nesbit and Edgar Eavers, though. And they stand the test of time. I re-read a couple of their books recently and still found them so funny.

And now the nominees:

1. Keith Wynne has a truly inspiring blog called Musings of an Unapologetic Dreamer . He'll also send a little blurb via email called Thought of the Day, if you sign up for it at his site. I bookmark nearly everyone of these blurbs, as they are quite pithy and inspiring.

2. Catherine Ensley is an author of inspirational romance novels and is writing a four-part series. On her blog she "shares her thoughts on country life, simple living, adventure, reading, writing and faith that transforms." I think you will find it very enjoyable. 

3. Victoria Lindstrom's Writ of Whimsy blog is rich with Middle Grade book reviews, poetry tidbits, thoughts on writing, and a section I love, "Whimsical Word of the Week." Check out her site; it's great fun.

4. Lynda Young has a wonderful blog called W.I.P. It: an Author's Journey in which she addresses many issues for writers with insights and reminders that are so helpful to all of us on this common journey. 

5. Check out Carol Riggs, a published YA author with a personable writing style. Her blog, Artzicarol Ramblings, is full of writing tips, YA book reviews, and shares of her own personal journey with agents and publishers. 

6. Renee Hand's The Crypto-Capers Review is a children's book review blog as well as a platform for her radio show, Stories from Unknown Authors. Renee also writes winning interactive mysteries. How cool is that? Check out her site, and you may find yourself being interviewed if you've written a children's book.

7. Mark Noce has a rather eclectic blog, sharing news about his flash fiction publications, gardening, music he likes, and news about other writers. It's always a feel-good experience to read one of his posts. 

On to the Liebster Award, which Sandra Cox kindly gave to me. Sandra's blog is called, not surprisingly, Sandra's Blog  . Sandra is a prolific blogger as well as a prolific author. Spend a little time at her site. Her pictures will make you smile. Meanwhile, the Liebster Award is given to bloggers with less than 200 followers, ferreting out blogs you think are worthy of more followers. (Thank you, Sandra!) The rules for accepting the award are to share 11 random facts about myself, answer 11 questions posed by the blogger who nominated me, nominate 11 bloggers who qualify, and pose 11 questions to them. Happily, Sandra modified the rules, asking 6 questions, and nominating 5 newbies. So I am following her lead:

The questions she asked:
1. If you were an animal, what would you be? Probably a dog. I love animals, but dogs have a special place in my heart. They are so loving and loyal.
2. What is your favorite genre? That's a hard one. Mysteries and historical novels are about equal.
3. When reading, do you prefer paper or a hand held device? Paper, for sure!
4. What's your favorite vacation spot? Galicia, Spain. 
5. What's your favorite charity? Another hard one. We contribute to a number. I suppose Southern Poverty Law Center, a remarkable organization that goes after hate groups in this country and prosecutes hate crimes.
6. If given the choice, where would you live? Right where we live now. As a runner up, Galicia would be next, but we are quite happy where we are.

Okay, my nominees are:
Richard Hughes at Writing and Living by Richard P. Hughes , is an eclectic blogger, sharing thoughts about writing, art, life in general, publishing issues. Right now he's running an interesting series of interviews with other bloggers, called, "Where I Live and Why I Like It.

Rosi Hollinbeck at The Write Stuff reviews children's books, interviews authors, and does a wonderful job of culling and sharing links to help writers in every sphere of writing. I always look forward to her posts, and you will too.

Kenda Turner at Words and Such posts book reviews, interviews, and shares rich thoughts about the writer's journey. Always a good read.

Loretta Proctor at Books and Other Things blogs about books, art, and music, "and all things creative and beautiful." Her current post is about Seamus Heaney, one of my favorite poets.

Jeanmarie Anaya's delightful blog, Jeanmarie Anaya is definitely worth your while. Humorous, pithy, eloquent. She writes about a number of writing issues, and wrote a lovely tribute to Robin Williams. 

And here are my six questions for these worthy recipients:
1. Where is your favorite place to read a book?
2. When beginning a new W.I.P., do you write by hand or wordprocess?
3. What are three of your favorite books? 
4. If you could be a character in a novel you've read, who would you be?
5. Which author, living or dead, do you wish you had the opportunity to meet?
6. When did you begin to write for yourself (as opposed to doing early homework assignments)?

And that's it, folks. I look forward to your comments, (feel free to answer any of the questions I posed for the nominees), and I do hope you check out the blogs in both sections of this post.

Ciao for now . . .

Back to The World of Blogging

I haven't been blogging because. . . A series of FORTUNATE events have been keeping me busy.


 There was the art show in March. I always love setting it up. But then there was taking it down again before our trip to Spain. Busy, busy, when you are packing too.

The art show in the window of Are Ellis.

There was the trip to Galicia. Wonderful, as always.  This is our village, Trasulfe.

But this time there was not much time to blog, because I was doing a rewrite of my mystery for an agent who is interested. She liked many of the changes, but wanted more changes. So. . . , that meant another rewrite before surgery, along with the year's wind up of art club. And I still have another rewrite coming up. But I love doing it. I thought the book was ready before, but it's much better now, and I like the agent's approach.

Here is a location that is important in Book 1.

In our absence, our friends in Galicia arranged for an exhibit of my husband's photos of places in Galicia. We couldn't be there for it, but we heard it went well. There were 60 photos in all. Here are four of them:








And then there was the surgery itself, two days ago. (But you don't want photos of that.)  I spent the last two weeks in pre-op appointments as well as gardening. I am so glad I pulled weeds and made the garden beautiful. Now, bed-bound,I can look out my back window and enjoy roses and geraniums when I get tired of reading. Rajan also put a huge bouquet of sunflowers in a vase on the desk in my writing nook here inthe bedroom. Another restful sight, and so cheery! (Don't have a picture of that yet, but I will.)



We also visited friends,because for about 7 weeks I won't be traveling anywhere except into cyberspace! (I AM looking forward to reading your blogs again after being so focused on my own activities for so long.)


Meanwhile the surgery went quite well. I'm supposed to stay off that foot and keep it elevated for about 7 weeks. I'm well-armed with books to read. So you can expect some book reviews in days to come. Also I have my writing notebooks to keep me occupied, and hopefully the time will fly until I'm back at my desk and working on Book 2 of this mystery series.


How about you? How do you plan for those times when health issues change your schedule? Do you put everything on hold? Or do you find a way to maintain a schedule of sorts?

This Was The Week That Was

This week I hardly did any writing for three reasons: 1) We had more company than we've had for awhile (and boy was I ready to see emmisaries from the outside world again!)  2) I was going through the procedure to set up my book, The Fourth Wish, on Kindle. 3) I was answering interview questions (via email) about writing The Fourth Wish (quite fun.)

I'll work backwards:
Interview: Diane Gross writes book reviews for Sacramento Book Examiner and will be reviewing my book later in the week (I'll tweet it when she does). The two part interview is prelude to the review, and you can read part one of her interview here.


Kindle: Ah, Kindle! Friends have been telling me I should put my book on Kindle, and so I decided to do just that. Originally, I self-published The Fourth Wish through CreateSpace, a very user-friendly publishing site with links to Amazon -- you can sell your book through both sites.  CreateSpace also offers incredible technical support. (I speak gratefully, since I am one who can be one click away from disaster whenever I try new ventures in technology.) They helped me immensely when setting up the original publication, and they helped me set it up for Kindle (charging a small fee to first format the book for Kindle). By phone, a technician walked me through the whole process of  downloading a free Kindle for Mac from Amazon, downloading my formatted book so I could read it to see if it looked good (it did), and then uploading it into my Kindle account. This was last Wednesday, and CreateSpace will connect the two links so that all reviews, etc. go to both sites, and both the paperback sites and the Kindle site are shown together, giving one a choice of which way to purchase. (The paperback sells for $14.95; the Kindle for $6.99.)


Visitors: I have been truly lucky, even before this week.  One of my classmates from art class has stopped by a couple of times with the teacher's demo pictures she saved for me. She also brought pasta, pasta sauce, and fresh basil. My wonderful neighbor has stopped by several times with books to read, a bag of  eats and treats, and a beautifully potted African Violet. (Visits I especially appreciate, as she has had surgery of her own to deal with.)

But last week's visits came all in a bunch: A writer friend stopped by with a beautiful potted succulent plant whose name I can't pronounce. Our nephew out from New York and stayed overnight. Friends from Colfax brought us lunch -- tortalini, salad, fresh bread, fruit salad, berry pie -- we are still marvelling over their kindness. (Especially kind for Sir Husband, as I am not cooking yet.) And yesterday my picture book writing group met at our house, since I also am not driving yet.

But I will be, and soon! I'll be doing all of it, and then my news will encompass more than the state of my foot. Until then, I look forward to visiting your blogs again and catching up on your news.

And please leave some recommendations for good reads.  I'm reading again.

Reader Glut and Writer Excitement

Even though this is Book Review Friday, recent posts were all book reviews while my foot was healing up.  Today I just have to share how good it feels to be up and about again.  That, plus the fact that I read about 16 books in the past 5 weeks and I am experiencing "reader glut".  My well has been filled with what feels like a lake!

The doctor removed the pin yesterday and gave me some truly uncomfortable toe excercises to do three times a day (but they are already taking positive effect!)  Meanwhile, when I rest, my foot still needs to be elevated, but activity is good for it, so I am making a point of walking around the house as often as possible.  And yesterday I had both lunch and dinner on the patio, enjoying close up and personal the garden I had been looking wistfully at out the bedroom window for 5 weeks.  Listening to bird calls and watching butterflies.  Feeling a faint breeze.  Joy!

So, what have I been doing besides reading these past weeks?  I am happy to say that I submitted 5 poems to various online sites, listened to some great writing tutorials, took notes in my notebook for my WIP, Granny's Jig, and bookmarked magazines to submit to, and agents to query. I also started a new book, inspired by Martha Alderson's wonderful tutorials on plot.  Martha Alderson is "The Plot Whisperer", and her approach to plotting is one I like a lot.  I first found her on Jill Corcoran's blog, here, and oh, how I wish I were writing the books Jill Corcoran is looking for, because she gives such great advice on her site.

Today Sir Husband set up my computer and printer on a table in the livingroom so I can sit at the computer and work with my foot propped up on a comfortable padded chair. ("Sir Husband"because I knighted him a few weeks back for taking such good care of me and treating me like royalty.  He's still doing that, too.)  Let me just say it feels great to be hunched over my keyboard instead of balancing my computer on one knee.  So my agenda today includes snail submissions for three children's poems, and some query letters for two of my books.  (Cross fingers, as I send them out into the world.)

Meanwhile, I have to thank all the reading I did for how mentally massaged I feel, how ready to write again. With all that input, it's time for output again, and I'm all revved up.  This is a case where deprivation made the heart grow fonder.

I also want to thank all of you for your comments during this period.  It was so cheering to hear from you, and I've enjoyed making new blog friends as well.

How about you?  Have you ever had "reader's glut" but appreciated it because it left you wanting to write again? I'd love to hear your thoughts on that.