Imagine a world that is efficient, safe and painless. Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? No one is rude, crime is not a problem, no one ever goes hungry. Every member of the community contributes in a helpful, organized manner, and life glides along as easily as sled runners on a snowy hill. Except there are […]
Sea Cutter, by Timothy L. Davis, 2011, Book Review
MMGM is a weekly meme hosted by middle grade author, Shannon Messenger. (Finally! A meme that fits perfectly with my content!) I’m going to postpone the book review I had planned for today and feature instead a super novel by Tim Davis. I reviewed the book a year ago, but seeing as it was such a fun […]
Challenges Indies Face (Unmasking an Author Series, #1)
Today marks the first of a four part series I’ll be doing on author visibility. The single most crippling obstacle all new authors face is invisibility. No one has ever heard of us before. Our work is untested, unfamiliar. Why would anyone chance good money on a newbie? That highlights the single most advantageous reason, in […]
Beneath the Slashings Blog Tour
To celebrate the August 2012 release of my middle grade novel, Beneath the Slashings, I put together a pretty awesome blog tour. Now that it’s over, I reshuffled this post a bit. I’ve condensed all the links into a single, cohesive list below, just in case you missed any. If you’re unfamiliar with the book or the Divided Decade […]
A Front Porch, a Corkboard, and a Stationary Bike
Why do you blog? That’s a good question, one I’ve been asked many times. Sometimes the question translates, Why do you waste your time doing something that I would find more painful than shooting myself in the feet? Other times it means, Everyone blogs. What makes you think you’ve got anything to add to the […]
Slow and Steady Writes the Novel
In my last Friday Freebie, before I vacated for the Smokies, I posted about trimming our writing schedules to avoid burnout. Today it may seem like I’m talking out of the other side of my face: quit procrastinating and write! But I don’t think these two bits of wisdom are contradictory at all. You see, writing, […]
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, by J. K. Rowling, 2007, Book Review
It took me fall, winter, and spring, but I finished my third venture through the Harry Potter series. And you know what? I enjoyed it as much as the first time. I’m amazed at the imagination and intricacy of the books, and I’m doubly amazed at how much I forget in a few years’ time. In […]
Out From Boneville (Bone, book one), by Jeff Smith, 2005
I’ve heard good things about this series of easy graphic novels from several sources. And I admit book one was engaging. Fone Bone is a cute little white critter that reminds me a bit of Casper the ghost. He’s even-tempered, reasonable and likeable. But he, along with his cousins Phoney Bone and Smiley Bone, are […]
The Island Stallion, by Walter Farley, 1948, Book Review
After rereading The Black Stallion a few weeks ago (read my review), I had to revisit my second favorite book by Mr. Farley. This is the first of a companion series, one I put off reading as a child because after cruising through a dozen books featuring the Black, my loyalties were firmly entrenched. I […]
The Phantom Tollbooth, by Norton Juster, 1961, Book Review
This book gets the highest rating I’ve ever given a book I didn’t finish. What I mean is the writing was phenomenal, but the story was boring. Did you get that? Let me explain: Mr. Juster is a master of language. Every sentence is a work of art. He has a quirky roundabout style that […]