Me or Books?

Both Please!

 "Grandma, what do you love the most, Me or books?"

  Well the answer was easy, but the fact that she knows books are one of the major contenders for my heart is no surprise.

"I love you most of all. I love sharing books with you because the stories matter, but we could share stories every day and never open a book or turn on a screen."


"We Could?"

 Of course we could.  We do.  When you tell me about how you are going to work every job when you grow up, and be a pirate and then an astronaut and then teach and then work at Mcdonalds"s those are stories we enjoy right now, long before they come true. And when I tell you about when I was little, or about your Dad as a baby, those are still stories that help you connect to your place in our family.

"I love being in our family."

Me too Sugar girl, more than ever now.

Being an Iron Writer

B Street Pier, Crescent City, CA

 Recently, I have been sick and sad and not writing, but a writer I met at the South Coast Writer's Conference a couple years ago, has started something he calls the Iron Writer's Challenge on facebook.  It seems like it will work for me. The idea is that we are each responsible for setting our own goals in four different areas, and then asking for what we need to help us get to where we want to be.  Its a long path, but we divide where we are going.

 We are supposed to encourage each other in these four areas;
1. Writing,
2. Health,
3. Relationships
 and
4. Finances

 I still most want to finish my Pompeii/Portland blended time tale so that is being broken down into steps, but I also need to find out why I'm aging prematurely and losing the ability to do some pretty basic movements. My family and friends and co-worker area is my strength, so I'm not changing that up, just celebrating. Financially, ugh!!!

So anyway, less facebook time, more talking to Dr.s and more research.  If you are interested in joining us, and can't find the closed group on facebook, let me know. Dixie Dawn Miller Goode

Duffy Barkley: the Third Charm

It gives me a lot of happiness to finally be able to announce that the Third book in the Tales of Uhrlin is available. This has been one long process, and I had fun working on it, but for awhile I felt like I was telling too many stories and had lost the p;ace where they could intersect. Sometimes I plan the story I tell, but this one seemed to be running ahead of me, telling me I was much too slow in following after and jotting down my notes.  Even once the story was completed, I kept making strange things happen in the book formatting so that I was being told it would need a minimum price of $72 !!! 

 Finally I got it to $15 for the paper book and $2.99 on kindle.  So this adventure begins without Duffy. He is 13 in this third book, and his sister Izzy and his Great-Aunt Peg go missing from Peg's farm. Many of the old friends show up again of course, and Uhrlin as always, has danger and adventure enough to make a tale worth telling, and worth reading.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01BH38TWO?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

The paperback may not be live until February 8th, which is a good day for me, my Father-In-Law has been a second Father to me for 33 years now and it is his 87th birthday.

This map was the source of my pricing headaches, as trying to have a color map made the printer think the entire book needed to be priced as if the pages were all in full color. 

SeaBee meets a tiny Hippocampus

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.

NaNoWriMo by Day 24

 My writing was zipping right along, a bit behind schedule but highly motivated until three days ago, when my dog and I both got sick with the stomach bug that was sending my students home in droves four days before that. Then while I was sick, it got cold and while I know that cold here, isn't what a lot of the country calls cold

 I also know my house here has like zero insulation so when the outside hits freezing, the inside hits 43* even with a fire in my wood stove.  So I was too sick to lift the logs we feed the fire with, and huddled under a mountain of blankets instead. Every time I had to run for the toilet the air in the house felt like I had plunged into an icy river.  Yeah, maybe I had a fever too

 But when I awoke on Saturday, feeling like food was on the agenda
there came a brisk wind that took the temperature from freezing to 80*

 and then everything went still and the grey whale migration came in close to land, so I didn't write the either.

 Instead my husband and I watched whales and chatted with tourists and then went to see "Catching Fire" and out for Chinese food.  Ok the food was a mistake, so I just smiled at the plate for awhile then had it boxed up and had soup instead - but it felt so good to feel good to be alive again.

 and today I am back at the keyboard, better writing than I could have done without the break anyway.

 These are two large rocks but the whales were hanging right beside them, spouting and showing a flipper or tail every now and then

So what have I been writing?

more about two boys 1901 years apart but both in areas with impending volcanic eruptions

here is a brief sample, unedited

"Marcus guided the Fortunatus family out of the boat at Naples. He was grateful to step onto an unmoving surface with the farmer and his wife and children. The farmer and his wife had both been seasick, or simply sick with terror but the children seemed to love the adventure of the nighttime boat crossing. And it had been more adventure than Marcus ever hoped to endure again. The Bay heaved and seemed to try to pushed them away from shore. The Air was clogged with dust and ash and smoke so that even in the dawn it was dark. Back toward vesuvius there was lightning and flames and both white smoke and black ashes blocking everything and roiling through the earth.

Once they were clear of the crowds he sought out directions to the artists home and hoped his Father was still waiting there. Then he gestured to the family to come with him. The older man hesitated again, clearly uncomfortable going uninvited to a stranger's home, but glancing at his children and the crowds of refugees convinced him to set his pride aside. The streets were covered with ash like snow.

It wasn't possible to move quickly through the crowded streets with the children and the few possessions that were meager enough and yet still weighed them down.

The crowds were in disarray, everyone was speaking, shouting questions, and not just in Latin but in Greek and other languages as well. Where people could, they searched the incoming refugees for familiar faces, and sometimes there were shout of joy at a successful reunion, and that gave everyone a more hopeful feeling. Still, many people milled about with no idea where to go now, or any hope left on their faces. The disaster had brought out both the best and worst in people, so some of the locals had come down to the harbor bearing extra blankets and clothing and food. Some had come trying to make a quick profit off of necessities they themselves had paid almost nothing for. There were fishermen and boat owners preparing to go for more survivors and there were thieves stealing from the overburdened and vulnerable crowd, knowing those burdens contained all the earthly treasures those refugees carried.

There were people spreading stories that they had no way of knowing if they were true or not, but the audiences they found believed them. If reality was this bad, of course it was probably even worse. At times the air would almost clear, the daylight could come through, and that seemed even more wrong somehow. The ashes falling and the smokey air seemed to tell the truth that the familiar mountain was now and forever unfamiliar and threatening.

Farmer Fortunatus, without a farm now, and still too close to the loss, to realize how fortunate the Fortunatus family had been, kept turning to look toward his family home, pointing up in the air, beyond the new crest of the mountain, to where he had been so comfortable in his old home and terraced fields. It had to still be there, because it always had been.

Finally Marcus and the family were pushing through the door, greeting Veruses master and then Marcus was grabbed into a strong hug as his father pulled him close and they wept on each other's shoulders.

“Oy! Marcus, so glad you are safe, my boy. Your Brother?”

“No problem, Father. The boat was full and I had promised to help this family, but Verus and Aemiliana were safe. They were there at the beach with us, and while he insisted I come ahead, they were waiting for the next boat. They will probably have smoother tides and better winds than we did. And they are together. I imagine they are right behind us, maybe already at the dock.”

“I went down to the ocean when people began talking about the strange cloud, I wanted to find Verus but I had told him to go and I did not know where he had gone exactly, only why. He was going for medicine, he must have heard of the eruption and caught one of the boats as soon as it happened, but I wish that he had come back for me. He probably thought I'd be too old to help. No, I'm sure he only thought of getting to the girl.” Father began to tell his story, much relieved to know that his family was safe."

Talking about the Writing Process with Peers

On October 28th I posted this on my facebook page

Why are peers so much more terrifying than anyone else? I've talked about my books to classes many times, talked at writers conferences, art fairs and libraries but tonight I'm going to talk to a book club of my friends and coworkers and I'm feeling so nervous I might as well be back in Jr. high facing the dreaded ninth grade speech and presentation. People were so intimidated by that someone called in a bomb threat. Of course that was back when bombs in school were pretty much guaranteed to be a false alarm.

and the next morning this was my report to the Backpacker.com site where I chat with friends

Last night I was really shaking in my shoes, too nervous to eat, feeling like I had in 9th grade with a huge class project on erosion to present to the whole 9th grade.  I've talked up my books at lots of places, but this time 11 woman teachers had bought and read the Oregon trail one, and asked me to talk to their book club.  The whole peer thing was way harder than talking in a class of kids or among other writers.

They loved it, and had a lot of questions about the research and kept asking me to write a sequel when the girls had grown up a few more hers, and saying, it would make a great movie, you need to write a script.

So, relieved. 



So I am going to share some of the things I showed them, that I also talked about with the classes I have visited as an author.  In fact a couple of them have now had me booked to come talk to their classes.

I always knew I wanted to be a writer, and when I go to give a talk about being an author, I share the first books I wrote, including one in pencil and crayon from when I was a ten year old. It is called "The Police Twins on Death Island" and includes lots of death and drama and is bound up with yellow yarn through the holes meant for the binder.

and I showed them the first, small font, cramped, and scribbled on manuscript that I printed out an read to some of my family after doing 50,000 words on it in my first NaNoWriMo,  (National Novel Writing Month) and putting it away until I was no longer sick of it, a year later, and then adding another 38,000 words

And then I explained that back in those olden days it cost me $109 to print out four copies of my finished manuscript an then began the expensive and lengthy and ultimately depressing process of mailing out copies to agents and editor who were already swamped with mountains of unasked for manuscripts.

but fortunately times change and it is easier now to attach a document in pdf form to email and get it where it is going cheaply and that same day.  Not any more likely to be a happy result, but quicker and cheaper.  Now that I am 50 and willing to take a chance as an Independent author, and now that it is easier and friendlier to be your own book publisher and marketer I have found that I delight in the experience.  I love designing a book and writing and editing it and sharing it with people around the world.

I love doodling and outlining and watching those simple beginnings grow into a finished book and then head out into the world.  I find it a lot like raising my children.  Once they leave my home, who they interact with and how they are received may reflect back on me at times, but much of it I will never know about, and the reactions that do find there way to me are surprising. The things I love may be overlooked while things I barely noticed are loved.  It is a discovery and an adventure every moment.

That is OK because the books I have loved and that have shaped me, were only faintly binding me to their authors but more about connecting me to the world as one filled with many people with different stories but all capable of being loved and hurt and worthy of compassion.

So now it is November, and another NaNoWriMo finds me digging into the history of two Volcanoes. The next Double Time book is growing this month, while the third Duffy Barkley takes a rest and waits for me to return with fresh eyes, and a rainbow book of colors is starting to take shape as my first picture book.

I am delighted that the students I met through a teacher in the bookclub are participating in a program called being a writer and are hoping I will guide them through the steps to publishing a class collection in the spring.  Life is filled with surprises and the next generation is discovering that as things change, there is still value in books