I am so excited! There is so much
going on I hardly know where to start.
I am working with Atriad Press,
which is one of the top publishers of Texana in the world, on a
book about Texas museums. Did you know that there are over 650
museums in Texas, encompassing everything from world-class fine
art to barbed wire and just about everything else in between? I
don’t know how we’re going to get all this information in one
book! The working title is A FIELD GUIDE TO TEXAS MUSEUMS. It
should be out sometime next summer.
If anyone had told me I would turn out to write children’s books,
I’d have laughed in their face, but that just proves one should
never say never. I just got the contract for my third (yes,
t-h-i-r-d!) children’s book with Vintage Imaginations. The second,
which sold just a few weeks earlier, is called THE TRUE ADVENTURES
OF MINDY MOO THE MONKEY DOG, but that’s just a working title that
might be changed. There really is a Mindy Moo the Monkey Dog;
she’s asleep at my feet as I type this. The story’s about how she
was dumped and almost died and then got rescued. The new story is
tentatively titled FATTY PATTY, and it’s about how a fat little
girl who is always the last chosen for anything saves her school
in a spelling bee and learns that everyone can succeed at
something.
My first children’s book, DANNY AND THE DUST BUNNIES, is due out
this October. The illustrations are done by the fantastically
talented Shelley Forster. I’m buying
one of the original paintings she did to hang on my office wall.
When the book sold my husband took one look at the title and told
me he was delighted my bad housekeeping had finally paid off.
Unfortunately, I am all too familiar with dust bunnies!
A couple of weeks ago I sold a
grown-up book called SING A SONG OF SPYING to my wonderful Red
Rose Publishing. It’s about a choir director who takes an a
capella singing group to an international competition in Jerusalem
and suddenly she has to save her life by convincing everyone she
is not a spy. A couple of incidents in the story are based on a
few of my adventures when I was over there working on a film a
number of years ago, but no handsome men fell in love with me and
no one ever thought I was a spy. Pity. It should be out before the
end of the year, I hope, and I’ve put up an excerpt.
Every year Wolfmont Press does an
anthology for Christmas with the proceeds going to charity. Up
until now it has benefited Toys for Tots, but this year the money
will go to Homes for Our Troops -
http://www.homesforourtroops.org/
This wonderful organization remodels or builds homes for
those service men and women who are seriously injured and have
amputations or other life changing injuries. None of the authors
are taking a penny from this anthology, so more money can go to
help those who have lost so much in our service. In previous years
the anthology had a Christmas theme, but this year the focus has
shifted to the military and it is called MURDER TO MIL-SPEC. I am
very flattered and humbled that my story DANGER FROM WITHIN has
been chosen for inclusion. (It’s about a Navy wife trapped by a
storm in an airport USO with a murderer on the loose.) So – as
soon as the anthology is available, buy a copy and support our
troops. Better yet, buy two or even more – they make wonderful
gifts. Remember, every book sold helps our injured service people.
The military is a big part of my
life. I am a Navy wife, and my reservist husband has just left for
a year-long deployment overseas – his fourth in eight years. I am
so very proud of him and of the necessary job he does, but I still
miss him. It’s just a year, and that’s not so overwhelming a time.
A year will pass quickly; it’s just the days that are long.
At least I will get some writing done!
I most sincerely hope all is well in your world. Thanks for
stopping by my website, and I hope you come back!
