Do Reading Logs Make Reading Horrible? Here’s a Handy Short-cut!

I don’t know about your school, but my kids’ school is pretty cool. If my kid wants to take his shoes off and run around in his socks, he can. If my daughter needs to chew gum because it keeps her from chewing her hair, no problem. I walk into the lobby, and I’m surrounded …

The REAL way to be a bad parent

There’s a list out there of “Ten Ways to be the Worst Mother in the World” (I can’t find it, but trust me, it’s out there) but it’s a total lie, because I read it to my kids, and they said, “You do all those things and they make you a great mother.” They’re not …

Does Timber Howligan pass the Bechdel test?

I believe in equal opportunity reading. Having both a boy and a girl, I’ve seen some differences in their preferences for certain kinds of stories…they’re gender differences, but is that a bad thing? When my daughter wants to fill her shelves with Fancy Nancy and Pinkalicious, I don’t make a big deal out of it. …

The Latest Fight Against the Machines

No, this has nothing to do with Terminator Genisys. But yes, it is a rehash of a familiar plot—not sending robots back in time, but my perpetual battle against my children and their “device time.” Why do I have to be the bad guy? Yeah, I’ve got something in common with Arnold, and I’m proud …

Timber Howligan First Month Update: Success!

Self-publishing is a business, so here’s the accounting: I promised to donate any proceeds to charity, the animal rescue organization Alley Cat Allies. Here’s what Timber earned in his first month out in the world: $4.07 from CreateSpace (11 copies) $11.87 from Draft2Digital (5 copies) $85.70 from paperbacks I sold directly (28 copies, including 12 …

America’s shame? Yes, but Britain’s hands aren’t clean.

The racially motivated terrorist attack/hate crime against the peaceful bible study participants at a Charleston church this week by one very sick individual has outraged our country and the world, opening us, yet again, to attacks by other countries--safe in their holier-than-thou gun control laws, convinced that these types of things wouldn't happen elsewhere. They …

Day before publication

Yesterday my husband came up with a really good idea for marketing Timber Howligan. “You should partner with Animal Rescue Societies, and get them to sell the book to raise money.” What I should have said was, “That’s a great idea, honey. Thanks for thinking of ways to help out. In a few months, once …

Summer reading fun, device-free

We work hard around here to protect our reading time. It isn't easy--those long summer days are great for swimming, bouncing on the trampoline, and once school ends, there's the biggest temptation of all: Device time. When my son turned eight, he earned himself the right to an iPad mini by being a voracious reader …

Less than a week–publication date June 12th!

Less than a week until Timber Howligan’s publication date (June 12th! June 12th!)! You may wonder what the penultimate week in a self-published author’s life looks like. This is my basement, where I set up shop… Screenprinting t-shirts. Yes, that’s right. My kids just finished their last week of school, so one batch of t-shirts …

Making things is fun…even books

It’s a long-standing controversy I probably have little original to add to it. But since some professional writers have argued that self-published novels dilute the quality of fiction on the market, making it harder for readers to find good reads, now that I’m actually self-publishing my first novel, I have a more informed opinion about …