Do snow days signal to you that it's a good time to curl up with a cup of cocoa and a good book? They do to me, unless I'm in the mountains and the ski resorts are open! I know I may be a little obsessed with skiing, but it's not for everyone. If you found this blog, you are probably a reader like me. 

Today is as good a day as any to get a jump on your holiday gift shopping. If you are in the Denver area, come join me and 35+ other local authors at Bookies, 2085 S. Holly Street from 10 am to 2 pm. Meet the authors, get your gift books signed, find a good snow day read or three. This is a Society of Book Writers and Illustrators event sponsored by Bookies, and you will find this year's picture, middle grade and young adult books all in one place. 

​See you there!

​Not only did this beautiful creature stop and pose very thoughtfully and long enough for me to run for my camera, but she then caught and ate a mouse right then and there! Way to go! Look at that bushy tail, all ready for the cold winds about to blow in snow (according to the forecast). 

I am delighted to report that my book has gained recognition and momentum from readers who post reviews on Goodreads and Amazon. Thank you so much, reviewers! Your work has encouraged over 14,000 to add my books to their want-to-read lists. That is really encouraging. 

Today I want to offer a little teaser for those of you who might be on the fence on whether to start this book. How about an excerpt that tells the Netah origin story? 

Since the books take place in north America, and I decided that the Netahs predate the humans. I imagined a kind of fable they would tell their children. Many native American stories include people who could transform into animals. In fact, cultures around the world have such stories, so it seemed only natural. Finally, Robin Wall Kimmerer's Braiding Sweetgrass, showed how her people care for their world. I highly recommend her book. 

In addition, I have some experience taking fables, fairy tales, poems, and short stories, and turning them into something else. In my book, Literary Ideas and Scripts for Young Playwrights, I turned those things into short plays for the classroom, demonstrating how to take an old, familiar story and make it new again. This is also not a new idea. Did you know that the Disney's Lion King is based on Shakespeare's Hamlet?

Those were my thoughts when writing this fictional origin story. I placed it in book 2, when Hesta, the elk Netah chief, is leading Josh "Down in the Valley," hence the title of the book. They stop for the night and Hesta tells Josh a story about their people. 

In the beginning, there were people and animals, and they all got along very well. The people took care of the animals when they were injured or sick. The animals taught the people where to find good foods like berries, nuts and fish. The people were grateful to their older brothers for teaching them how to live in the world. The makers were very proud of the people and animals and decided to give them a gift. If they wanted, they could transform from an animal into a human or from a human into an animal. 
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Some people liked the idea, some didn’t. The animals had the same reaction. 
Two separate societies formed on that day. The ones who didn’t chose to change in the beginning were never able to do it later, and they became angry and jealous. This led to wars. Animals attacked people, and people killed animals. The makers were very upset that their gift had created such problems but were unable to make things right again.
The Netahs found their own solution. They separated themselves from the others and made their own societies and villages. Wars still happened when the Netah villages were discovered. The makers gave the Netahs another gift to help them. They took away the Netah’s scent so they could hide more easily.
Hesta stopped talking. He noticed that Josh was very still. “Josh?”
“Hmm?”
“Good night.”

So there you have it. This is what happens when writers read other authors, as I mentioned last month, when I read J.K. Rowling's From the Wizarding Archive. If you are also a writer, consider reading this, and particularly the foreword by Evanna Lynch. It is inspiring as well as loads of fun for Potter fans.

Okay, maybe it wasn’t my favorite kind of weather for writing, because I didn’t do much of it. Also, I’ve been a little distracted playing with my canoe buddies!
What I have been working on is character background sketches. I downloaded the latest J.K. Rowling offering, an audible book called From the Wizarding Archive. In it, the author shares some of her famously detailed background information on her characters, places, magical artifacts and creatures. This kind of information is an essential part of world building for any fantasy writer. It was great fun, plus it gave me loads of ideas and inspiration.
I thought about my own built world. While I am comfortable with the backstory for my main character, Josh, other characters are more mysterious. Why is that information important to an author? And why am I allowing it to distract me from the satisfying task of spending time with my characters as I throw them into new circumstances and watch for their reactions? (Like with my canoe buddies?) It’s not for world building, I placed my secret society in the wilds of my beloved Colorado.
Instead, it's all about motivation. What drives Josh to persevere in his new circumstances? What makes some Netahs helpful and others obstructive? So far, Josh has been very reactive. I want him to be more proactive in book 3. I want him to decide what he wants and to go for it.
What does he want? He has new friends, both of the male and female persuasion. He has a new found family. What he wants is romance. He wants love, a deeper connection to someone in his community, a soul mate, a person he can turn to in bad or good times. Don’t we all? This will inform his actions in book 3.
This is why I am such a huge fan of Ms. Rowling. She not only entertains, she teaches. Thank you, Ms. Rowling!

I haven’t written more than 15 pages in the last 3 weeks since I returned from a trip. I’ve had family visiting, including 2 small boys who love to create, hike, bike, build sand castles and lego spacecraft, play cards, build card cities, and even help wage the battle of the dandelions. You guessed right, I’m having a blast.

I’m also struggling as a lot of writers do with what could perhaps be best classified as performance anxiety. How can I consider myself a writer when I don’t write?

This is when I remind myself that lack of pages written has been replaced with a wealth of new experiences, from deciding to build our own fairy homesite in my backyard, to looking up how to make air-dry-clay (click here to find the instructions on Pinterest). What does a fairy homesite need? Why mushrooms, of course, and guard snails and a snake, plus a garden bench, a hot tub, and dishes and plates, pitchers and cups for the fairy to use. Don’t forget, you need a fairy!
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(I apologize if I just scared you with my alien-looking fairy. In my defense, he is only 2 inches high so he could fit into his house! The eye dots give him a very menacing look, not to mention the green Spock ears.)

It all must be painted with acrylic paints, spray painted with clear lacquer to seal it against the rain and installed in the best place possible in the yard. All these decisions are performed as a team, with ideas building on ideas. About the fairy home, a trip to the grocery store for supplies, gave us a foil bread pan and a bag of 100 wooden skewers for grilling. The skewers were cut to size and glued to the pan sides, a door and window cut, and “camouflage” paint added to the roof to make it blend into the site.

​Did you know fairies especially like beds made out of fresh young aspen leaves?
Also, the vole, now named Vicious, who already lived in the yard, has been very entertaining to watch as he visited and inspected his new neighbors. In fact he inspected one of the guard snails so closely that a little glue surgery was required!

Have I gone off-topic? No, all this is to demonstrate how the creative juices nurtured during my trip are still flowing steadily, especially in my back yard. Writing more pages had to go on the back burner while we created memories. Now that’s worth more than…everything in the world, combined, doubled.

Did I mention the two boats we built from found branches and sticks? One was engineered with twine, the other with a power screwdriver and hand saw by the resident building and maintenance expert. They had to be raced of course. The twine one was lighter and therefore faster. Who’d a thunk?
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Hope you’ve had a very creative summer as well!