Just finished reading The Magic Of Found Objects by Maddie Dawson. It is my kind of book — all about people and their relationships. A little romance and some family drama! Highly recommend! 🙂

I can’t remember not knowing how to read. But I have proof positive that I had to learn to write. In the back of my mother’s old Betty Crocker’s Good and Easy Cook Book (1954 edition), the index is covered in pencil scribbles. My pencil scribbles, circa 1958. Sometime during my toddler-hood, I decided I should write like Mommy and Daddy did. So I found the nearest pencil and the nearest paper—this cook book. And while my mother was otherwise occupied, I wrote. I think my mother was on the phone when I began my writing career. I knew as I

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This picture was taken shortly after my mother’s first Mother’s Day in 1956. That’s me on her lap—her oldest child. She loved reading, and she started teaching me early. Despite my mother’s early lessons, I spent the first thirty years of my life trying not to be like her. It wasn’t until around my 30th birthday that I realized how much alike we were. For more on this topic, see my post here. My mother died in 2014, but I’m thinking of her this week. Maybe I’ll read a book in her honor. What do you recall most about your mother from

Continue reading Happy Mother’s Day to My Mother, the Reader

Just finished reading a historical fiction called Fast Girls by Elise Hooper for my book club. Interesting look at the first women olympians in the track and field sports. A good read, but I might have liked it better if the author had focused on fewer girls/women. There are a lot of characters to follow!

When I saw this title, I just had to give it a shot. This is an epic fantasy tale turned on its head. Our hero is a three-header ogre who tells his tale like Kvothe (Name of the Wind). It’s a hilarious fantasy quest from the perspective of the monsters. If you love high fantasy and spoofs, this may be the book for you. I certainly enjoyed it.

The Things We Keep — Lots of characters to keep track of in this one. I enjoyed the way two major story lines came together: a woman losing her mental abilities due to Alzheimer’s and another starting over after her husband is caught running a Ponzi scheme and wrecks their lives. A story of how quickly life can change! As the photo indicates, I read with tea and chocolate! 🙂

If you are a writer of any kind, you will appreciate this book which encourages you to write “organically” rather than by outlining. Focus on what lies at the heart of your story: tension, desire, crisis, escalation, struggle, discovery, rather than plot templates and formulas. Important tips include: Set up promises for readers and deliver them.Discover how to craft a satisfying climax.Master the subtleties of characterization.Add mind-blowing twists to your fiction. Buy Link

I got a new toy today–a new tablet. I read most of my books as ebooks, and I like having a small tablet. This Samsung Galaxy Tab A7 Lite has an 8.7 inch screen and it’s lightweight. It’s far from the best tablet or ereader out there, but it is perfect for reading in bed (with a bluelight filter, of course). I normally hate getting new electronic devices, because the customization is so hard. But with Samsung SmartSwitch, it took less than an hour to transfer all my settings from my old tablet to this new one. Except for a

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My favorite reads include Lindsay Davis’s historical mystery series featuring Flavia Alba, the daughter of the tough Roman private eye Marcus Didius Falco. Davis’s research is impeccable and her stories engaging.