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When I was nine years old, my mother, baby brother and I found ourselves snowbound in a small cabin in the mountains of Northern California. After I'd read all the books we had, I decided to write my own stories. The first one was called "The Mystery of the Missing Cigarettes." Mama liked it. When I was ten, despite my scowling displeasure, my teacher made me write a poem. The teacher liked it, sent it to a magazine, and it was published. I thought, "This is great! When I grow up, I'll be a rich and famous author." (Not a poet. That was my first and last poem.) So I wrote another story--this one about a kitten coming to live in a home with several children and a large dog--from the POV of the kitten. I sent it to the magazine, "Jack and Jill." They rejected it. So much for my idea of becoming a rich and famous author.
Soon after this, I blossomed, and boys discovered me. Writing and music were left behind. Soon (too soon!) I got married and had children. Lots of children. Through the ups and downs of my life, I wrote letters. People told me they saved these letters that made them laugh, made them cry, or both. "You ought to be a writer!" they told me. Periodically, I'd say, "Yeah! I'm going to do that!" I'd sit down and write and write and write--but when I'd read what I'd written, I'd realize it was really garbage. So I'd tear it up and throw it away. One day, as I told yet another group of people about how Ken with his five children and I with my four became one big happy family, the people said, "You ought to write a book!" And I said, "Yeah! I'm going to do that." So I wrote and wrote and wrote--and of course it was really garbage. But this time I went to the library and read every book I could find on "How to Write." Then I rewrote and rewrote and rewrote. At the end of three years, I had a 125,000 word manuscript that proves I AM A WRITER! That manuscript is not publishable. (At least not yet.) But it was how I learned to write. Pieces of that story have appeared in the more than 100 stories and articles I've written during the past 25 years. (To read one of those articles, click on the articles link above.) FINDING
MARIAH, a YA Suspense, was my first published book. . |
When
I was twelve, I wrote an opera, strongly influenced by the flying monkey
scenes from the movie, "The Wizard of Oz." When I performed it
for my piano teacher, I played and sang all the parts. Although he was
the conductor for our local symphony, he declined my offer to let him
orchestrate my opera and perform it for free.