NaNoWriMo and firing my characters

So I can hear your questions all the way from here. What is a NaNoWriMo, do you eat it or sprinkle it on your carpet after pet accidents? Does it hurt and/or does it involve outer space? National Novel Writing Month, its formal name, is a nonprofit organization that internationally promotes creative writing. It’s best … Read more

More things my cats have taught me about ballet

I wrote my first post on this in 2013, mere months after I’d started my blog. I didn’t have a lot of posts or readers back then. I’d feel lucky to get twenty views a day, and I’d savor that number, cheering when it rose to thirty and feeling teary when it dropped to ten … Read more

A Mother’s Day gift to everyone

To celebrate Mother’s Day all month long, enjoy the recently released Other Stages, for 99 cents through May, a “motherhood meets the performing arts” conclusion to the Ballet Theatre Chronicles. Today I wish everyone a Happy Mother’s Day, and I mean everyone. Because, however the dice rolled for you in that department, someone gave birth … Read more

OTHER STAGES, and when Amazon ruins your launch day

First things first… Today, January 25th, Book 4 of the Ballet Theatre Chronicles, Other Stages, has launched!  Woo hoo! From the author of Outside the Limelight—named a Kirkus Best Book of 2017—comes a story about parenting, the performing arts, surviving high school and fighting back, in this gripping finale to the Ballet Theatre Chronicles. “An accomplished interweaving … Read more

The pure, true beauty of “O Holy Night”

  Confession: I stopped writing this essay on “O Holy Night,” soured by something I couldn’t name, bogged down by the online research. I set it aside, but the urge returned and I started it up again several days later. Then it happened again, an edgy, almost negative feeling as I read article after article … Read more