Only ten days until release day for my new mountain story, An Appalachian Summer. A new book being out for readers is always an exciting time. Seems many of my books have had a summer release date. Just in time for some sweet afternoons reading in the porch swing or maybe in a reclining chair on a beach somewhere. You can …
Eventually you reach a point when you stop lying about your age and start bragging about it. Will Rogers My husband’s birthday is today. He’s clocked a few years and hopes to add on more. Not too long ago we celebrated our 50th anniversary. This is our picture from the party the kids had for us. The other picture is us …
I’m still working hard to trim my new novel down to size and so I’m sharing some smiles tonight. This was a pass-around on social media a few years ago that I happened to save. I’ve hung out many lines of clothes in my life. There’s nothing quite as fragrant as sheets and towels off the line. But in the …
“A sunset is nothing more and nothing less than the backside of a sunrise.” ~Craig D. Lounsbrough What a neat thought about sunsets and so true. When the sun is setting for me, it’s rising for someone else. If I stretch my thinking on this a bit, embellish it some, I can consider the end of a book as some …
In ecology, resilience is defined as the capacity of an ecosystem to respond to a disturbance by resisting damage and recovering quickly. Here in Kentucky this year, we had a beautiful early spring in March. The grass turned green. The flowers bloomed. The trees pushed out their leaves. Fruit trees bloomed, including the wild pawpaw trees over in the field …
Writers write stories they want readers to read. This is certainly true for this writer. I sometimes say that a book takes two to truly come to life. The writer who spills the story out onto the pages and the reader who then invites those words into his or her imagination to experience that story. That’s not to say …
Have you ever seen a spot like this on one of your plants or maybe in your yard where it looks as though somebody spit on your plant and it stuck? I spotted this bit of spittle on a plant while I was walking with the dogs sometime this week. I’ve seen the spit spots before and knew they were …
I’m working hard to try to finish my new book. It’s been a struggle on some of the writing days. It’s not that I haven’t had time for writing what with the shelter in place advisories for the last two months. But some stories take a little more tugging and pulling to get them out of my imagination. So to …
When I give a book talk, I like the question and answer part the best. One of the questions I’m often asked is “What is your favorite book?” I always tell whoever asked what a hard question that is for an author to answer. It’s something like asking a mother which is her favorite child. All these books shown in …
In Kentucky we usually have several cold snaps before spring finally comes to stay. So we call them winters. Redbud winter. Dogwood winter. Locust winter. Blackberry winter. The names come from whatever is blooming when the chilly air sweeps back into the area the way it has several times this spring. This year the cool spells have been colder than …