I Am Writing Again

 Today being July First means that Camp NaNoWriMo is once again open and letting people explore the thrill of writing fast and intently without too much regard for the finished product.  This is after all, meant to be a quick and dirty rough draft of a novel.

 I'm not there.  I have been working on this novel for quite awhile and have 60,000 words which tell me not to ignore them just because it is camp time. So this year, I am not beginning fresh, and I am editing and writing and loving it.  Such a good feeling to open a manuscript i had closed months ago, and find things I no longer remember writing, and realizing it is better than I hold even though it is a long way from done.

The first draft of Duffy Barkley and my first completed "books", from when I was 10

 Because it is July, and I am not teaching (or unfortunately bringing in any income) I have time to write, and time to play as long as the play is cheap, so I have also been walking at the Redwoods near home. What a great place to look for something to spark my imagination.

 Nothing makes me feel smaller, or yet more a part of something beautiful, than the redwoods

 Also, I managed to capture a rainbow in my living room, if I can do that, surely I can capture the third adventure of Duffy Barkley on paper

Here is a brief sample from where I got to rereading this morning

Oh-oh-ing's eyes gave him sympathy, but no mercy. “Of course it is hard to be you Duffy, it is hard to be anyone. We all have our burdens and the times when the energy to make the effort seems impossible. Then we keep making the effort until we die and our children keep on in our place.”

“Oh, thanks a lot!” he muttered sarcastically.

“You are welcome.” She answered sincerely. He looked up in time to see her mouth twist into a smile that was part amused, part sympathetic but wholly without unkindness. Then she used both of her hands to push her mane back from the sides of her face and when she dropped her hands to his shoulders again her face was serious.

“I don't know what we do next,” Duffy said, with nevertheless, a bit more hope than before he had been reminded that he wasn't alone.

The gathering of Oorah were no longer looking directly at Duffy but had turned away, and now faced the forest. There was a movement in the crowd as it parted left and right and opened a clear path from the back to just in front of Duffy. Oh-oh-ing kept an arm around Duffy's shoulders and murmured low so that only he could hear, “You are not our only unexpected guests at the present time. You remember?”

Duffy's jaw dropped as he stared at the approaching trio. The spectacle their combined presence created would not have looked out of place in the Big Parades back on Earth. A large blue bear, not painted, not a teddy bear costume on a man, not a balloon, but a sky blue, lumbering, four legged predator came down the aisle the parted crowd had created.

He would have been spectacular alone.

He was not alone. Riding on his back was a vividly, orange, wildcat. She stood with her four paws in his fur and balanced gracefully as he swayed from side to side. She was not maned, but her pointed ears were echoed in little pointed feathers of fur at the sides of her mouth and long whiskers twitched there as well.

Walking at the bear's right side was a tall, slender girl who appeared whiter than milk. A spiky tuft of green rose from her forehead above a black, v shaped patch of skin descending from her brow to between her eyes and giving a heart shaped look to her face.

She was wearing a simple wrapped skirt and top of a glittering sequined blue cloth. Duffy had every reason to suspect that the beautiful wrapping was actually soft, supple leather made from fish skin with gleaming scales in place.

At one time Duffy had traveled with and befriended the girl. He had met the bear and wildcat before they helped him get home on his first time in Uhrlin, but the three of them looked so impressive that he froze, uncertain if he should bow or hug them, he did nothing.

The girl stopped and met his eyes and then laughed and twirled in place, skirt flaring wide as her arms swept in a circle that included everyone, “Oh, This is perfect! Duffy is here!” and she bounded toward him and hugged him quickly. As she dropped her arms and turned back to her companions, all Duffy could see was her obsidian black back and the green mane that reached down to between her shoulder blades.

Starting A Novel on April Fool's Day

Given that only getting to be insane one month out of the year doesn't quite seem like something I want to confine myself too, when writing insanely fast and unleashed is so very much fun.  November's National Novel Writing Month extravaganza is when I started seeing myself actively pursuing the dream I'd had since I fell in love with books on my grandmother's arthritic knees.  Writing 50,000 words and letting the characters cut loose and go where they want is fun, but then, I collapse, exhausted from racing after them taking notes, and I shove the writing away and forget it, and work on teaching, and book promoting and being a mom, wife and daughter.  Sitting there alone, it becomes a creature in a cocoon and when I release it and look again the metamorphosis is far from complete, but wonderful writing has become error laden and honestly horrible and throw away experiments suddenly work well and time has wrought some magic and allows me to see the novel with the eyes of an avid reader.

So here 4 months have passed, full of holidays and school and food and family. I've blogged and scribbled and contributed to forums but I haven't "written"

I have put on my other hat and sold copies of my three printed novels, 4 copies here, 12 there, but the fun one for me was finding a school district, with a director of curriculum and a group of fifth grade teacher, willing to invest in my Double Time on the Oregon Trail as a teachable class set of 38 books.

But I haven't written, so here I am, April Fool's Day, spring break having ended yesterday and the house quiet again, and the kids and husband gone to what they do, and CampNaNoWriMo comes knocking at my door.  Commit to another 50,000 words, get exhausted being creative and having fun, be selfish and do what you love. Spend your computer time being productive instead of on facebook.

So if you write,

or have always wanted to,

if you want to create something great and have not gotten around to it yet,

if you don't have the time

but you do have the dream

I'll see you at campnanowrimo.org

No Joke!

Goode Books Free Kindle Days are Over, Results Here

Free Ebooks for Kindle from Me with update on progress

I decided to update what has been happening with this experiment with a few details. 

After 24 hours free on the Amazon site

Duffy Barkley  was uploaded 2 times in the UK and 55 in the USA                           Oregon Trail had  2 in Canada and 4 in Uk and 89 in US

after 48 hours

Duffy had 135 in US and 5 in Uk and 3 in Germany plus 1 in Japan and 3 in Canada                Oregon Trail had 210 in USA and 5 in UK with 1 in Germany plus 1 in Japan and 2 in Canada

but then something happened

I don't know what,

 but I suspect a better read blog

or a kindle freebie facebook page

talked about The Double Time on the Oregon Trail Book

so

after 36 hours the Oregon Trail book took off

Duffy Barkley is Not a Dog still did OK. It showed up with 158 in USA and 6 in UK and 3 in Germany, 1 in France, 2 in Japan and 5 in Canada 

    

Double Time On The Oregon Trail uploaded  a surprising (to me)  565 in USA and 7 in UK, 1 in Germany, 2 in Japan and 5 in Canada

And after the end of the 5 days, I had the fun of realizing that in 5 days exactly 1000 copies of my kindle books, or my paperbacks had been ordered and would be getting out into the world to serve as eager ambassadors to tell my stories and maybe encourage a few more people to try kindness and tolerance instead of anger as a first response to those who seem to be different.

And during that fun, even though it gets me no $$$, event I learned that an action from months ago had payed off

I had given a copy of the Oregon Trail novel to a fifth grade teacher

after his wife told me that he teaches a unit on the Oregon Trail.

That was not long before he told me that he had passed it on to the director of the County's Unified School District Curriculum

now, 4 months later

I found out that the district has approved and ordered 38 copies of my novel

to teach as a class set, and to base in the district IMC

and Someone in the UK has bought the Sequel to Duffy Barkley is Not a Dog, now as well

So, Ok

I only get a couple bucks a copy there too, but 

I'm an internationally read author :)

with a book being used as a textbook in a California School District.

It doesn't pay the rent but it keeps me smiling.

Older post below tell you more about the books

Write Again

 Today is Halloween and that used to mean candy and costumes and taking the children trick-or-treating.  But I live at the end of a dark country road where trick-or-treaters have never come, unless you count the raccoons and the bear who has been here all week, exchanging the apples on my tree for steaming piles of apple peal laden bear scat.

 Now, my children are not children and what they do at Halloween is up to them, and what I do is watch for midnight and the starting gun for NaNoWriMo!  I get to indulge in the thing I love with a strange obsessive passion.  Storytelling with abandon and speed writing with no editing or doubts until I reach at least 50, 000 words.  I know, technically I can write any time, and often I do, but most of the year there is the lack of a deadline so there is the flexibility which lets me procrastinate and yep, I do.  And when I do write I take less risks and go back frequently and re-read and change and edit.

 November is National Novel Writing Month but actually in needs to admit that it has gone International and world wide.  All around the world, as people Reach November they begin the sleep deprived, insane rush to cram writing a novel into 30 days where regular life insists on continuing in spite of the commitment.  Me, I give up a lot of my extra indulgences, I read a lot less, stay off facebook and my forums most of the time, and as a reward, I bake more and keep the coffee pot filled, and emptied and filled again.

 If you are interested in signing up go to http://www.nanowrimo.org/en/dashboard and join the fun and conversation and tell he world the story that only you have in you.  I have signed up and tried at least 6 times, and I don't always finish, and I never finish with a finished novel, but three times the magic has worked to give me enough that I could put it away until I recover and then open the file again, pick up the threads, add and subtract and eventually end up with a novel I believe in enough to throw our into the world as my small contribution to the beauty of this big blue planet we are lucky enough to share.

Free on Kindle for a short time

Duffy Barkley, The protagonist of Duffy Barkley Is Not a Dog, has returned in the sequel, Duffy Barkley: Seek Well.  Now 11 years old, he cannot remember the events that happened the first time that he was in Uhrlin, or a time when his Cerebral palsy was cured, or when he flew.  But those memories are breaking through and Uhrlin remembers him and is calling him back.  He can't remember why he is fascinated by Guatemala, or anything about a giant, bald, orca colored mer-woman with the voice of an angel.  But he has to seek her.


For 5 days this book is free on kindle

http://www.amazon.com/Duffy-Barkley-Tales-Uhrlin-ebook/dp/B005CQ5Z8E/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_3 

and the first book in my series is only 99 cents on kindle at

 http://www.amazon.com/Duffy-Barkley-Tales-Uhrlin-ebook/dp/B004478F5M/ref=pd_sim_kstore_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2

Remember being with a group of friends where you felt safer and more included than you had ever felt at home, friends you had always wanted, who made you look around with a lump in your throat, wishing you could stop time? They were a lot like the groups in all the popular stories. They were the reason people love MASH, Harry Potter, Narnia, Friends, The Lord of the Rings etc. They were a group of imperfect, overwhelmed and harassed people who became winners because they didn't have to face the overwhelming odds, alone. Even in the face of dark wizards, popular girls, bad hair days or War, they had each other's back. When one of them had a weakness, another had a strength to balance it out. When one was a jerk, someone else saved the day, and forgave them eventually. Now times are turning more difficult again. The world needs that kind of support. We need a source of encouragement so that we can find a way to be that kind of support when we are needed. As times are dark, people look for a reason to laugh, love and hope again. Duffy Barkley is not a dog, a middle grade fantasy, gives you those friends, that escape, that voice of hope in the darkness. Duffy is alone, handicapped, desperate. He is picked-on, lost, & yet, never defeated. In the most alien of places he finds friends. In the most dire of emergencies he finds courage. In the most evil of villains he finds compassion and a solution. In giving away what he most needs, he gains everything. Duffy, a 9 year old boy with cerebral palsy, survives tragedy in the form of a school shooting in which his younger sister is seriously injured. Falling into a new world, he regains his health but finds himself the focus of historic prophecy. While trying to deny his place in their prophecies he discovers his own abilities & changes his life & that of others in both worlds. He enjoys being physically strong but must give it up to save the villain, and find his way back to save his sister, Izzy.

 

The Growth of a Story

When I began to tell my sons stories about Duffy Barkley and the fantasy world of Uhrlin, it was only natural to incorporate the things I knew with the things we imagined.  So I told them short stories and the stories grew longer as my children asked questions which had to develop answers.

 My love of dolphins and merpeople is one of my first memories, and as a small town, Wyoming, land locked child, I remember fighting with my mother when I was barely a toddler, angry that she hadn't named me "flipper."  I also had an intense love of Keiko, the free-willie whale who lived for a few years just north of us when my own children were toddlers, and the killer whales markings influenced the coloring I chose for my own mer-people and their Princess SeaBee.

 The lovely water of the Smith River in summer always reminded bye of living, liquid jade, and provided the first inspiration for flowstone.  Flowstone, is a colony of microscopic creatures who form a group which can be solid or liquid based on how fast they vibrate and which lives symbiotically with a tamarin like creature, forming the clothing and homes of the city of Oohline.  From a distance Oohline looks like a cluster of green grapes or a pile of glass fishing floats.  Well, finding one of those floats washed up on the beaches where  we live now is a goal like a treasure hunt.  Then one day, building sand castles with my youngest son, the castle kept crumbling and he'd scoop up and re-use the sand, and the idea of a city, where the rooms could detach and move around was born.  And the boys loved trampolines, and we thought how much fun it would be to live where the land was like a trampoline, and then we wondered if you would even walk if the land was that springy, so the tamarin, monkey like creatures began to roll up like a ball and bounce, and so did their flowstone bubble homes.

 I started sketching and painting images from the story which made me think of even more details.

I was a teacher of young children with severe handicaps, a role I grew into after being blessed with a brother with Down's Syndrome.  Most of my students had been amazingly strong, loving people who thrived with teaching and attention, and the ones I found able to express themselves had very strong opinions, so I made my main character a very opinionated 9 year old with Cerebral Palsy who hated being told "No"

 I wrote out our stories and drew a map and edited and re-edited the book, and still thought of it as a simple thing that I could share with the two boys I loved so much.  And then I printed it, and a sequel and now I find myself in the curious, wonderful position of not being the only one who knows and loves Duffy.

 I grew up by Yellowstone, so part of my fantasy land had strong ties to that amazing landscape

 but I live in the redwoods by the sea so towering first and ocean found a place there too.

 And my best friend as a child, was this chimp, named Judy after the one on Daktari, and many of the characters in Uhrlin have something of Judy in them, and something of the toddlers my children were.

Now, I am delighted to look on line and discover other people talking about my characters, and reading my books and leaving wonderful reviews on the kindle and paperback sites on Amazon.  I always wanted to be a storyteller, but i had never realized how much of myself would show up in my stories, or how much fantasy is shaped by my life.