Buzz on the Latest Book

The Ghost of Dixboro is now up and ready to be downloaded onto everyone's Kindle.  Or if you prefer actual print books you can purchase a copy through Amazon.

This book represents a departure for me, since it is the first book that is a fictionalization of actual events.

Check out this post to get the scoop on where the story comes from.

I am grateful for the support I've been getting from the Dixboro Facebook page.  I think it was my cousin Kris Koch-Jones who first posted about the book.  And since then many people have commented.  Keep the buzz going guys, I love it!  And hopefully the Dixboro General Store will be carrying it soon, if they aren't already.

Events coming up

I will be at the Bellaire Harvest Festival on Saturday, September 24 signing and selling books.

Then on October 1st, I will be in Grayling at the Arts and Crafts show.

On October 29, I will be in Dixboro at a quilting retreat and hopefully I will be doing a signing there as well, at the Dixboro General Store.

Then on November 5, I will be back in Bellaire at their Holiday Gift Fair.  Books make the greatest gifts!

This winter I will be stepping up my schedule and branching out to do library events.  I can certainly talk for 45 minutes about writing in general and mine in particular.  I will have to limit my comments, because once I get going I don't stop.  

If you have any suggestions as to libraries where I could come and speak, please contact me through this site.  I will get back with you at once.

What's been on my mind?

This summer has been busier than a bee in a clover field.  I had some good events in Elk Rapids, Frankfort and up at the Straits in Mackinac City.  I thoroughly enjoyed myself except for one rainy day in Mackinac City.  But there is nothing that will spoil an outdoor Art Fair faster than rain.  

But all in all, I love getting out to these things because I truly enjoy speaking with people who appreciate the written word.  I am getting so that I can tell if someone is a reader or not, because their eyes go right toward printed material as if they are hungry for it.  Once I recognize my kindred spirits I can easily get them to walk in under my tent and talk with me about my work.  In Mackinac City, I actually had a line of people waiting for me to sign books.  It was great!  I had two women who bought four of my six books the first day of the show and then came back the second day to buy the other two.  It was fun!

That's why I came straight home and signed up for three more events before the end of the year.

My biggest problem is that my employee (who doubles as my personal chef (and my son)) has another job now working at Qdoba up the road from us.  So now I may have to do some of these events on my own.  It's OK, Qdoba is paying him more than I could.

New Projects:

I've already decided which book will be next.  "Border Babes" is being Beta Read right now by two people and as soon as I get their feedback I will be publishing it.  So be on the lookout.

Nanowrimo is coming up soon and I will be writing a book about two people who meet a bus station.  The working title of it surprisingly enough is "The Guy at the Bus Station."

Zach is a hard working medical student who is studying in Chicago but who hails from Marquette Michigan.  Amber is an angry young woman who had to take a few years out of her life to nurse her dying mother but who now is on her way to college in Marquette.  They meet at the bus station in Gladstone and spend the next weekend together.  Zach goes back to school and things are going well for him.  But Amber finds things falling apart around her. After having her life put on hold for four years she finds it's not just falling into place now either, but rather than live through another holding pattern, she gets angry and finds another solution to waiting.  She embarks on an adventure, flitting from one job to another, a dealer in Vegas and then awaitress on a cruise ship.  However, Zach, totally smitten with this lovely girl, comes home to find  her gone.  He goes a little insane and starts stalking her.  His obsession turns into a self-destructive spiral until he finally finds her.  She has been having the time of her life.  And barely recognizes the young man who has chased her around the world at the cost of his own dreams.

New Poll:

OK, here are the books that I still need to Edit.  I will set up a poll as to which books you would most like to see me come out with next.

1.  Blackburn--An Historical novel that takes place on Mackinac Island before, during and after the war of 1812.  Blackburn, thwarted in love has turned into a surly youth who hates everything and everyone.  Life doesn't matter to him any more so he joins the Pennsylvania Regulars who are stationed on the frontier between the new United States and Canada.  There is about to be a major disagreement between not just the U.S. and Canada, but also the tribes of Native Americans who have been promised their own nation consisting of what is now all of Michigan's two peninsulas.  The problem is that the promise was made by the Canadians but was never agreed to by the United States who had already begun to enforce their manifest destiny over all the lands owned by the indigenous peoples.  Samuel Blackburn is thrust into this and must fight for what will one day be his. 

2.  Roaming Tide Creator--Cathryn's family is dying.  Her mother has been dying since she was in grade school, but it looks like the Breast Cancer that she's been fighting is going to metastasize in Cathryn's senior year.  But Cathryn is self-sufficient, and she has a couple of very good friends who love her and want to help her.  So her mother prepares her for the worst while still fostering her hope for the future.

Lance on the other hand, thinks HIS life sucks.  His father is an Astronaut.  He has two older brothers who have made it their life mission to make sure he has no self-confidence at all.  And the one thing he wanted above all other things in the world is a dog that is so big that no one can handle it.  Then the worst thing possible happens to him, His father retires from NASA and they come back to Michigan where Lance had to get used to a whole new school and make all new friends.  But with no self-confidence how is he ever going to introduce himself to the cute girl on the track team?

Lance thinks his life sucks, but Cathryn's life really does suck.

3.  The Artesian Quilt Shop--Casey, Ar, and Daisy have been best friends for a long time, but now that their husband's are all retired it's time for them to pursue their dream of owning a quilt shop.  They buy a huge building in the Upper Peninsula and renovate it so that the main floor is the quilt shop complete with long arm room class room and office space and the upper story is their combined living quarters and individual apartments.  They sink all of their retirement money into this endeavor and get some of their family members involved in it too.  When it's all accomplished and they have moved in they discover the building is haunted.  

4.  The Life and Times of the Notorious Jedrick Jaxon--"My name is Molly Jaxon.  I was a nineteen year old sophomore in college when the 20-minute war happened."  This is the first line of a post-apocalyptic book.  Molly rises to see all the problems with the world and works to solve these problems.  The book is filled with common sense solutions to a world gone haywire.  Molly is a heroine for the new era.  This incredibly complex book may have to come out in more than one volume.  It is probably longer than the Wolves that watch.  I have to rewrite it before I begin the edits. But it is looking like it could be my masterpiece.  More on this later.

So which should I work on next?  

Take the Poll to the right.

In Focus

Instead of making New Year’s Resolutions this year I decided that I was going to try something new.  I’m going to focus on four things.  When I think of the word focus, it has a general meaning, but it also has a specific meaning in photography.  You focus on your subject.  You can have a wide variety of focus points, depending on where you are looking at your focus.  We’ve all seen the movies where the cameraman focuses his lens on one thing in the foreground and then the focus shifts to another thing in the background, it’s a way of getting our attention on different elements in the frame.  We might see a girl in the foreground minding her own business and then focus changes to a man in the background looking at the girl.  Depending on many different visual clues this could mean anything from the man is in love with the girl, or obsessed with the girl, or he means the girl harm, or he is the girl’s father or husband, or anything!  We only know that the man is looking at the girl because the cameraman has given us the visual clue.  What we make of it depends on how the scene is acted, the context of the scene the roles, what has come before and what comes after.

So here are my 4 things that are coming into focus for me this year:

   1.  My Career--I’m an Author.  I want to promote the books that I have out now, and keep building my titles.  I ran across a good piece of advice a while back.  Even if the first book isn’t selling, keep writing and adding to your titles on your author’s page because if someone does like what you write, they will want more.

   2.  Reading--As  an author, I want to continually become a better author for myself and for my readers.  One way to do that is to keep up with reading other writers and learning from them.  I might find that I want to be the kind of writer that Pat Conroy is rather than the kind of writer that John Steinbeck was which is who I thought I want to be.

   3.  Happiness/Contentedness--I am old enough now to know what makes me happy and what does not, and I want to be contented in my old age.  I don’t want to live with doubts and regrets.  So I want to focus on removing the things that make me crazy and focus on things that make me happy and contented such as the things that are pictured below.  Knitting socks, reading, learning new things, watching good movies and TV shows on Netflix with no commercial interruptions, and playing words with friends on my Kindle.  I no doubt will write another Blog on this topic in the very near future.

  4.  Simplicity--In years past I have made lists, calculations, step-by-step procedures, strict schedules, and in depth goals that I then just ignored.  This year I want to adopt a new form of simplicity.  So what I'm going to do is just keep my spaces clear and if there is something that needs to be done, I will simply lay it on the table.  Then as soon as I have time, I will do the thing.

So there you have it.  And again, I plan to do some more Blogs on these four focuses as I go through the year.  So stay tuned.  Follow my Blog, follow me on Facebook.  Check out my Pinterest Boards, Follow me on Twitter.  Check out my Author pages on Amazon and Goodreads.  And stay in touch!  I would love to hear from you.

Cindy Koch-Krol, 1/4/16.

Artesian Quilt Shop Novel is well under way

My latest Nanowrimo effort is a story about a group of quilters and their husbands who had a dream for their retirement. They wanted to retire in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and open a quilt shop. When they found the old Artesian Well Water Company Building, a classic old brick building that started it's life as a school house but has lain empty for nearly 40 years, they thought they'd found their dream.

But even before they moved in things began to happen. One of the painters painting the trim just under the 40 foot high roof mysteriously fell from the scaffolding and injured his back. Then more things started to happen, freak accidents, shelves full of bolts of fabric turned over as if they had been in an earthquake. Books flinging themselves across the room. Apparitions appearing in the alcove, in the long-arm room, and in the basement.

Not willing to give up on their dream, the six people decide to ignore the problem and even to make concessions to keep the more violent things from happening. They form a theory that whoever is haunting the quilt shop doesn't like it when they say prayers out loud.

So instead, they go out into the field behind the house, through the forest to the north and do their praying and meditating, in nature, the way God intended. In doing they wake some spirits who reside there.

It seems that a major spiritual upheaval is in the making, one that has many layers of descent. These three couples have unknowingly opened up a wound that has been festering for more than a hundred years. An injury wrought by people like them who had good intentions but who operated under the assumption that their way was the only way, and could not see that the people they were trying to help didn't need or want their help.

The theme of this book is tolerance for others religions. We have freedom of religion in this country. It is a right protected by our government. We also have the separation of Church and State, which means that our government cannot be run by or have any association with one particular religion. This is why everyone is free to worship in their own way, the two things that guarantee that right. My answer to all "Christians" who think it's a travesty that their children can't pray in school is this: if you really want your children to express their religion in school then don't send them to a state run school. Send them to a school run by your religion. If you want a free education, then you just have to abide by the rules of our government.
Religious intolerance has always been a raspberry seed in my wisdom tooth. I've always seen evangelism as a true evil in our society. But I console myself with the phrase, "A person convinced against their will, is of their same opinion still."
Be sure to check out the Links on the right to my Amazon Author's page and to my other newly published books. Thanks for reading!

A Tribute to Jean Marie

My long delay from blogging is due to the passing of my dear mother, Jean Marie Koch who went to her eternal reward on April 19, 2015.

As you know, I spent a lot of time with her over the past few years despite living in two different cities separated by a 6 hour drive. I don't regret a moment of it. I moved up there last summer to help her after a fall. When someone asked me how long I was going to be in Marquette, my mother answered for me saying, "Till death us do part." That was my mother! She had a dry, ironic sense of humor. She had no problem professing untrue statements about anyone, including herself. She had a bad habit of telling people that I "took" things that she had given me. She gave me her gas grill saying that no one would ever use it up there again since she was on oxygen. So My husband and I wrestled it into the truck and got it home. Next time my brother came up and wanted to cook some burgers on the grill she said. "I haven't got a grill, Cindy took it." All of my relatives thought I was a thief. It would have been more precise to say, "I gave it to Cindy to take home since I hadn't used in more than 2 years."

These are the type of things that I now look back on as being laughingly typical of my relationship with my mother. The photo above is the last picture I ever took of her, and it's also the last time she was ever outside of her apartment. We put her in the wheel chair and wheeled her out onto the porch one warm day in April. Less than a week later she died in her own bed. She didn't want to die in a hospital, she wanted to be home with family in the next room.

In fact, she was insistent on doing things her way. She planned her own memorial service, chose the music and the food. She told me she wanted to be cremated and her ashes buried in Ann Arbor next to her husband, my dad.

I once came across a book on how to write screenplays that said if you write the words, "The Desert, Dawn" on the top of your screen play be aware that sometime in the next 5 years you will wake up in a trailer 25 miles outside of Flagstaff Arizona at 3 A.M.

I thought of this statement many times over the next three months as I planned my mother's interment. This is what her grave ultimately looked like the day we finally put her in the ground, about 3 months after her death.

Note the prevalent color theme?

I officiated this non-secular event. We had already had the memorial service in Marquette, and a priest presided over that, so it didn't really matter. Jeff and I decided to just leave it loose. I came up with a poem to read about strong women, and Aunt Norene wanted to play a piece of music that she and my mother both loved. Before the ceremony, my cousin Kim asked me how Mom and Dad met, since Mom was from Marquette and Dad was from Dixboro. So I told the story about how mom came to Ann Arbor to get a job at a beauty salon. She had a roommate by the name of Dory Burdick. Dory was dating this guy named Nellie Rose who had a buddy that had just gotten out of the military. This guy was a local boy who had served in Korea and Japan during the Korean War.(See his scrap book here). Nellie suggested Dory bring her roommate along on a double date thinking they might hit it off. That's how my parents met.

Mom spent half of her life in Marquette, beginning and ending, and half her life in Ann Arbor, the middle. So My brother and I decided that it felt right to leave half of her in Marquette. This is where we left her.

The Pavilion on Presque Isle in Marquette was one of her favorite places on Earth. Don worked there when they were first together, a kind of easy retirement job. It was right up his alley, he could putter around and dead-head the flowers in the garden and sweep the building, and in between talk with the people who wandered in. The man dearly loved to talk and had that easy manner that could talk with anyone. Mom would take him his meals up there. They spent many happy hours there. But we didn't actually leave her ashes in or around the pavilion. We put them out on the beach in front of the pavilion at the edge of Lake Superior, and poured a bottle of Grand McNish Scotch over them as well according to my brother's wishes. So here is her view.

Mama, we miss you! We miss the parties you loved to throw. We miss your bright face, and your weird sense of humor, and your ability to keep us young. After all, you could reduce us down in age to the single digits. And you needed to do that because that way you could keep telling people you were only 39 yourself! I love you, Mama!

More from the U.P.

I am no longer living the U.P. Now the U.P. is living in me!
Yes, it's true. The more I travel in the U.P. the more I know it's where I wish to end up in my life. Lately I've been having fantasies about this building in McMillan, Michigan. It started it's life as a school. Then it became a bottling plant for an artesian water company. Now it's a huge empty building on 27 acres of land.

But I realize this is a pipe dream, so instead I'm turning it into a story idea. In the story, (the ME character) a woman and her two best friends, all quilters, decide to move to the U.P. Their husbands all worked for the same Engineering firm and thus they are all rich. They have all just retired and their plan is to move up to the U.P. and live in this huge building and make it into a quilt shop and Hobby shop. Each of the men have a different hobby. One is a model train builder, one is a guitarist, and the other is a computer builder. The three women all are interested in different styles of quilting so the main story of the building is a quilt shop. On top of that, they are involved in making this little community into a summertime destination. They are planning to show movies on a giant blow up screen in the backyard, host baseball games between communities, and build a dormitory style sleeping quarters so they can host retreats. In addition one of their sons is a chef and in with this deal they open up a local eatery from one that had been shut down years before.
I'm thinking this will become a ghost story! Just thinking out loud!

My mother sees angels everywhere. She insisted I take a picture of this one.

I took this picture from my cousin's front door. The Albino Deer pictured here is a regular resident in the neighborhood. I never thought I'd see an albino deer let alone get 20 pictures of one. It stayed in his neighbors yard for a good fifteen minutes so I could photograph it. Rather accommodating of her wasn't it?

Here is a picture of a pair of socks that I designed. The pattern for them will be available later this week through Ravelry and on the Quiltlynx Designs Blog (see link to the right of this post.) It will also be available in my Etsy store once I get that up and running. I plan to get my store going by the end of January. On Etsy, I will sell, baskets, beaded necklaces, patterns, other finished craft projects, oh and my books. Everything that I plan to have in my booth at the farmer's market and craft shows this summer. Let's face it. If I actually get all this done, I will be organized for the very first time in my long drawn out life! Wish me luck! Haunting the U.P. like never before, Cindy K-K

Haunting Marquette

For those of you who don't know, my mother is getting on in years and I have moved to Marquette to take care of her. One of the things I have taken up to keep us both involved is a daily drive out to Presque Isle. We look for deer, ore ships, and whatever else we can see.

There is a man who goes out there nearly every weekday and sets up a hammock between two trees and reads a book out next to the lake. We have seen him many times. When he is NOT there we speculate on why. "Maybe he's found a job," Mom said one day. The next day she quipped that maybe his wife found out where he was going and put a stop to it. Silly Mom!

The Michipicoten has often been seen lately anchored in the Marquette harbor right at the end of Wright Street. (See my Blog on the Ore ships: link at right.) I've developed a major interest in the topic of Ore Ships since I've come here.

Oh, and I've made some friends, one of whom, Carolyn Scott, has given me some yarn she no longer wanted. So I made this afghan. When I took the colors out of the garbage bag I saw that they all went together. They reminded me of citrusy sherbert colors so I call this the sherbert afghan. Just as I was getting to know Carolyn she had a change in plans and is now moving out of town about 30 miles. I probably won't get to see her as often now. With her living right upstairs all I had to do is shout out and she would come down and spend time with me. But after she moves we will have to schedule appointments to get together. That's OK, we will, we have become very good friends. We respect each other's privacy but we still enjoying doing things together. I've never had a problem making friends. I haven't even tried the local quilt guild yet. Those are friends waiting to be made!

All in all, this move has been good for me. Taking care of my mother is difficult because she needs to have noise in the house at all times. If she isn't watching TV in the kitchen, she has the radio on and listening to music. I can't concentrate hard enough to READ a book, let alone WRITE one. So I have been walking in the mornings, usually with Carolyn, but also by myself, and then going to the local library where I can find a quiet cubical in the mornings to write for a while. When I need time to think I have been going for long morning drives out to the Island and sitting there to watch the ships. I come back with the pictures to prove it, but I always take a little time for myself.

I also have been known to go "shopping" mostly at thrift stores. And yes again I come home with certain little things that I have purchased at these stores but mostly I go there and walk around or sit in my car and listen to an audio book, or walk in the park with my camera. Anything at all to get away and let my own thoughts filter through the nonsense!

Carolyn is good at doing this for me as well. She sometimes suggests we go somewhere and get out and walk around, be at one with nature. I discovered one place on the Island that I had never seen simply because I've never gotten out of the car on this particular stretch. The entire back of the Island is cliffs overlooking Lake Superior and at certain vantage points you can see them from the land.

The day I took these photos was a clear day in late May, notice that there are still icebergs on the lake! It's such a beautiful place, Presque Isle.

School kids must have made this into a tradition, to put their locks on this overlook fence.

Flamingos I suppose aren't the only birds who save one leg. Mom and I saw this gull Picnic Rocks. A day or two later we saw what we thought was the same bird at the Island. I can only presume that it's a trait they all share.

I don't really blame them for saving their feet, this is how they use them. How many of us would survive barefooted on the icebergs!

Critical Mass

We have all heard this term before. How if many people all over the world begin to feel one way, they will create a critical mass and shift the goings on of the planet to their way of thinking. What "they" don't tell you is that it takes decades to accomplish. I think there is another form of critical mass thinking and that is more personal. For a while now I have been thinking about a better way of doing things. My Critical Mass thinking is about my own life. I know what needs to be done and if I think about it enough I will eventually do something about it. I will end up seeing my way clear to doing these things that I know have to happen.

This is what I've been up to lately. I need to do three major things:

First and foremost, I need to expand my life expectancy by starting a walking regimen. This has to be followed by a second day and a third and then eventually enough days strung together to make it into a habit. This is one of the hardest things for me to do. I've done it before with some success, but I've always gotten out of the habit at some point. This time I cannot get out of the habit. It needs to continue if I am to continue.

Second, I need to rid myself of all nonsense in my life. By nonsense I mean things that take up my time that serve no purpose, like advertising, television, crafting, buying the new latest gadget, especially when the old one works perfectly well yet. To this I will add getting rid of everything that doesn't work, like the electric company and the phone company, and the everything that doesn't fit into our lifestyle. Getting rid of bills for things that happened years ago.

Third, I need to read more, I need to write more, and I need to create more. These are going to be the things that will sustain me and all of us in the years to come. When the monetary system of our country collapses under it's own unbalanced weight, the people who will be ready to take on the challenges of the future will be those who have information and those who have learned to live without. Story of my life!

So I begin again! Today!

Cindy Koch-Krol

Haunting inside my own mind!

The Ghost of Dixboro

For my new Nanowrimo book, I have chosen the novelization of the screenplay that I wrote a few years ago for Script Frenzy called "The Ghost of Dixboro." This story is based on a sworn deposition given in front of William Perry Esq. Justice of the Peace in Washtenaw County Michigan on December 8, 1845. So yes, it's a true story.

Here is the text of the deposition:

"On Saturday night, the 27th of September, between seven and eight o'clock I was standing in front of the window of said house; my wife had stepped into Mrs. Hammond's about two rods distant, my two little boys were in the back yard, for I had passed through the house (to the front yard) and was combing my hair, when I saw a light through the window.

"I put my hand on the window sill and looked in; (I) saw a woman with a candlestick in her hand in which was a candle burning. She held it in her left hand. She was a middling sized woman, wore a loose gown, had a white cloth around her head, her right hand clasped in her clothes near the waist. She was s little bent forward, her eyes large and much sunken, very pale indeed; her lips projected and her teeth showed some.

"She moved slowly across the the floor until she entered the bedroom and the door closed. I then went up and opened the bedroom door, and all was dark. I stepped forward and lighted a candle with a match, looked forward but saw no one, not heard any noise, except just before I opened the bedroom door I thought I heard one of the bureau drawers open and shut.

"I spoke of what I had seen several days after, and then learned for the first time that the house in which I then lived had been previously occupied by a Willow Mulholland, and that she died there.

"The second time I saw her was in October about one o'clock in the morning. I got up, started to go our of the back door. As I opened the bedroom door it was light in the outer room. I saw no candle, but I saw the same woman that I had seen before. I was about five feel from her. She said, 'Don't touch me--touch me not.'

"I stepped back a little and asked her what she wanted. She said, 'He has got it. He robbed me little by little, until they kilt me! They kilt me! Now he has got it all!' I then asked her who had it all. She said, 'James, James, yes James had got it at last, but it won't do him long. Joseph! Oh, Joseph! I wish Joseph would come away.' Then all was dark and still.

October--"The third time I saw her, I awoke int he night, know not what hour, the bedroom was entirely light. I saw no candle, but saw the same woman. She said, 'James can't hurt me any more. No! he can't. I am out of his reach. Why don't they get Joseph away? Oh, my boy! Why not come away?' And all was dark and still.

October--"The fourth time I saw her about eleven o'clock P.M. I was sitting with my feet on the stove hearth. My family had retired and I was eating a lunch, when all at once the front door stood open, and I saw the same woman i the door supported in the arms of a man whom I knew. She said nothing, but the man said, 'She is dying. She will die.' And all disappeared and the door closed without noise.

October--"The fifth time I saw her was a little after sunrise. I came out of the house to go to my work, and I saw the same woman in the front yard. She said, 'I wanted Joseph to keep my papers, but they are _____,' Here something seemed to stop her utterance. Then she said, 'Joseph! Joseph! I fear something will befall my boy.' And all was gone.

October--"The sixth time I saw her was near midnight. It was the same woman standing in the bedroom. The room was again light as before, no candle was visible. I looked at my wife, fearing she might awake. She then raised her hand and said, 'She will not awake." She seemed to be in great pain; she leaned over and grasped her bowels in one hand and in the other held a phial containing a liquid. I asked her what it was. 'The doctor said it was Balm of Gilead,' she replied, and all disappeared.

October--"The seventh time I saw her, I was working at a little bench, which was standing in the room, and which I worked on evenings. I saw the same woman. 'I wanted to tell James something, but I could not, I could not.' I asked her what she wanted to tell. 'Oh! He gave me a great deal of trouble in my mind,' she replied. (A note on the affidavit explained that Martha referred to the man to whom she was engaged while she was a widow, but broke the engagement in accordance with her friends' wishes.) 'O they kilt me! They kilt me! she repeated several times. I walked forward and tried to reach her but she kept the same distance from me. I asked her if she had taken anything that had killed her. She answered, 'Oh, I don't _____ Oh, I don't ______' The froth in her mouth seemed to stop her utterance. Then she said, 'Oh, they kilt me.' I asked her, 'Who killed you?' 'I will show you,' she said. Then she went out of the back door near the fence, and I followed her. There I saw two men whom I knew, standing. They looked cast down and dejected. I saw them begin at the feet and melt down like lead melting until they were entirely melted; then a blue blaze two inches thick burned over the surface of the melted mass. Then all began bubbling up like lime slacking. I turned to see where the woman was, but she was gone. I looked back again and all was gone and dark. "The next time I saw the woman was in the backyard, about five o'clock P.M. She said, 'I want you to tell James to repent. Oh! if he would repent. But he won't, he can't. John was a bad man,' and muttered something I could not understand. She then said, 'Do you know where Frain's Lake is?' Then she asked another question of much importance, and said 'Don't tell of that.' (Van Woert later revealed that this latter question pertained to a well at the corner of Main and Mill Streets, near Martha Mulholland's house.)

"I asked her if I should inform the public on the two men that she said had killed her. She replied, 'There will be a time. The time is coming. The time will come. But oh, their end! Their end! Their wicked end! She muttered something about Joseph, and all was dark.

"The last time I saw her was on the sixth of November, about midnight, in the bedroom. She was dressed in white; her hands hung down by her side; she stood very straight and looked very pale. She said, 'I don't want anybody here, I don't want anybody here," and muttered over something I did not understand, except now and then the word Joseph. She then said, 'I wanted to tell a secret, and I thought I had.' And all was gone and dark." (The Van Woerts moved out of the house the next day.

"In all her conversations, she used the Irish accent; intermixed in all her conversations was the expression very often repeated, "They have Kilt me, oh, they have kilt me! and also the name Joseph."

The above was duly sworn to before William Perry Esq. at Ann Arbor, December 8, 1845.

The following two paragraphs were added at the end of one of the old copies of Van Woert's affidavit:

"As may be expected, the excitement which these strange events have given rise to, has started many reports, doubtless, entirely unfounded, and exaggerated things which may have some foundation in truth. Consequently they have been the basis of several prosecutions for slanders, none of them however, are leveled at Van Woert. Several trials it is understood are to take place in March and at that time some further developments most probably, some will confirm or dissipate suspicion.

"One fact will suffice to show the tendency of the human mind to the varvelious particularly when thusly excited. Mr. Sillson the famous magnetist from Detroit has been on the ground reaping a harvest of success from the soil of credulity and excitement thus prepared."

And now you know the rest of the story!!!

And you wondered why I call this blog "Haunts!"

Cindy K.-K.

Sand Hill Cranes and other Inspirations

Do you know how beautiful these birds are? Jeff and I have been seeing them on our trips through the U.P. They stand in the fields of wheat and in the ditches and behind the tree lines. They are always a pleasant surprise. There are flocks of them in the farm lands around Sault Ste. Marie and along M-28. On our last trip we saw two of them crossing the road ahead of us. When our truck got too close they lifted their six foot wings and glided, long legs down to the edge of the road and out of our way. I will never forget that sight. I reached for the camera but was too late.

Have you ever thought that you should live your life through the eye of the lens so you won't miss any opportunities to capture a beautiful moment like that? I prefer to capture things on the page. That's why I'm a writer and not a photographer.

Take this farm for example. This is taken on U.S. 31 just north of Acme. Gorgeous? Yeah, how would I describe this scene in print?

I have taken the summer off from writing, or so I've been telling people. I've gotten a lot of sewing done during this time. I finished the Josh Groban Quilt wanna see it?

This is the whole finished quilt and below is a detail of it after he signed it!! Yeah, he did!

I'm going to do more of these! I love face quilts.

During our last trip to the U.P. during that season in Michigan called "Road Construction," I saw something that I had never thought about before. We have all seen those road side crosses put out by grieving loved ones to mark the place where someone has perished in an accident. The construction crew had to dig one of them up and had it leaning against a tree on the other side of a ditch. I had never thought about how big these crosses are, most of which buried in the ground. It was four feet long and was chopped into a sharp point so it could more easily be driven into the ground. I looked at the thing and thought at once about what a great tool it would make for killing a vampire. I told this to Jeff and Soon we were brain storming about the story line. I had to begin writing it at once!

The only writing tools I had in the truck at the time was a spiral notebook which I was using as a journal and a pen. I rarely write fiction with anything but my lap top these days. But I was compelled.

I have to say that I enjoyed the process and when I got home I typed the story into my shorts file. I don't think I changed a word of it. Those of you who have read me know that I am fairly wordy. But this didn't seem to have too many unnecessary words at all. Writing long hand tends to make one choose the language a bit more carefully. I need to explore this idea more thoroughly.

Now, as soon as I can, I need to research where to send this story. Who out there is publishing Vampire fiction? I dare say, I'll find someone! I hope it's original enough. Vampire fiction seems to be everywhere, which is why I hesitated to write any. I've been burned by this before. I wrote a World War II novel once and then found out it was unpublishable because there were too many non-fiction WWII books coming out and they were better and more unbelievable than the fiction.

Meanwhile I'm gearing up a story for Nanowrimo this year. More on that later. I still have two or three more sewing projects to finish up before the fall season kicks in and writing starts again in earnest.

Haunting from my handwritten Journal,

Cindy K.-K.

Rejections are Rolling In!

Yep, I've started a new file for rejection letters from my novels. I had a huge file folder full of rejection letters from a few years ago when I was freelancing. I didn't use them as wallpaper but I couldn't see destroying them either. I'm quite proud of the list of newspapers, magazines, agents, and publishing houses that have rejected me!

It's just a part of this business and not even an important one. I'm not going to state which great authors were rejected over and over before finally winning the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. It's too common of a story, and I like stories that are more unique.

I just finished the final edits of "The Wolves that Watch" and it is now completely ready to send full versions of it out to publishers and agents. I've been sending queries for a few months now. We shall see what happens.

In the mean time, can't let any grass grow! I've been working in my mind on two more books. One is the second in the Tessa Gates series, and the other is a Utopian dream book. Maybe I should tell you about them both and let you, my dedicated readers decide. I want to write them both before the end of the year, and before I start edits on the first Tessa Gates book, Working title: Tessa's Travels. (For more on this story check out Tessa's Blog, see link to the right.)

The sequel to Tessa's Travels is going to be working titled, something about Minnesota. Tessa and Woofy continue on their trek to find the most unusual food in the country, eat it and report on it. Tess and Woofy travel with her new adopted brother in their newly acquired Motor home. By the time the reader is finished reading Tessa's Travels they will know the supernatural nature of Woofy and his link with Tess, but their adventure will continue. They will become enmeshed in other interesting species and creatures. While in Minnesota Tess and Woofy become separated in the woods and their bond is tested as Woofy's life is endangered this time.

The other book is about two people again, who find each other. The man, years ago when he was a teenager, had been given a tarot card reading which turned out to be prophetic. He was told that he would meet a woman whom he would marry and would literally not be able to take his eyes off of her. But he was to be careful of her, because this woman would have secrets. He would have to let go of nearly everything he had grown to be in order to overcome her secrets and be with her. He dismissed the whole reading from his mind, to all outward appearance, meanwhile making every decision in his life as if the reading were absolutely true. Then as he is nearing his 30th birthday, she appears.

She walks into his life and he cannot take his eyes off of her. She is taken aback by this rude stranger and challenges him to keep staring by walking right up to him and talking with him. He does not back down.

Several days later, this man has taken matters into his own hands. He has taken his life savings and started his own business. He puts out a help wanted sign and she applies for the job. Later she tells him that if he couldn't take his eyes off her she thought it was only right that he pay her for the privilege. They begin their friendship and then a relationship, and then a love affair. But what is her secret? What does he have to fear from this woman? And what will it mean to him and his family, and the entire little town in which he has lived his entire life? And where does the Utopian dream come into it? Wait and see.

Like I said, I want to finish writing both of these books before the end of this year. I'll write one during Nanowrimo, and the other one I will start on now.

Sorry, I have to choose, I can't wait for a poll! Maybe next time, followers! Although, Pie Lady, if you would like to give me your thoughts at once, I'd love them!

Also, is there anyone out there who likes to do graphic design and who would like to help me with a design for the cover for "The Wolves that Watch." I'm thinking that maybe a socket wrench on top of a piano with drops of blood on the keyboard, or maybe two wolves feeding on a deer. Or maybe a raccoon walking along a road behind a jogging girl. Just thinking out loud!

Have a good week, and I'll write again with my progress in a while. Cindy K-K.

Sights while Editing!

Here is what I look at while I edit my latest novel. And yes, I have been editing The Wolves that Watch for almost an entire year now. I've gotten a few other things done in that year. I had another Nanowrimo victory and wrote most of the novel about the Border Babes. It's a kind of an unpleasant novel though, so it was a hard one to write. My friend Kathy Atwater has agreed to proof-read Wolves for me though, so we are almost finished with that.

I've also gotten some quilting accomplished, finished some old projects, started a few new ones, same old/same old. I took up drawing Zentangles.

And I started a new pattern designing business, Quiltlynx Designs. See my new link to the right.

The patterns are only available at Interquilten for the time being. But they each have their own UPC code so it's a possibility that they could be distributed farther. That's on the agenda.

What else is new? I'm like Buckaroo Bonzai, going in several different directions at once! Do you all remember that movie? Did you ever see it? I love that movie. It's the only movie that I ever bought more than one copy of. I had it on Beta Max, then bought it on VHF, and then recently found it on DVD. If I ever get a Blu Ray player I'll have to buy it again. It's my movie version of the White Album!

I just finished reading the Orchardist last night and found it to be a wholey unsatisfying book. There was a lot left unsaid at the end. But then I found that to be true in much of the book. I think if it were to be made into a movie it would be a quiet movie similar to New World where the characters to speak to each other in intimate whispers befitting the peaceful nature of the orchard where they live and work. Also I kept wanting the loose ends to be tied up in the story, like where did Talmadge's sister go? Was she really abducted by Michaelson like it was hinted at? Or did Talmadge's sister, whose first name was Elizabeth, have noting to do with the Elizabeth that appears in Della's flashbacks. I didn't want Elizabeth to have been abducted by Michaelson, but at the same time I thought it would be right for Talmadge to develop a deep caring for Elizabeth's possible offspring. It's very complicated but also very simple. The fact that not everything is spelled out leads to much speculation on the part of the reader.

That's my update, I hope all you readers and movie goers out there are enjoying yourselves. Love, Cindy

The Wolves that Watch

I have changed the name of my novel again. I'm still getting use to it, but I like it better. It comes from an obscure line from the book itself. In the book Sarah has a dream at a particularly critical time in her life and it is interpretted by Nick to mean something other than what she thought it meant. Most of us would see it as a nightmare, to be eaten by a pack of wolves. But Nick interprets the dream as being spiritual in nature and tells her that wolves are symbolic of her family since wolves are family oriented beings. There is not a pack of wolves in her dream but just two. One wolf eats her while the other watches. These, he tells her are representative of her two families.

At first she mistakenly thinks he means her father's side of the family and her mother's side. But that's not right. He means the two families are first the one that we come from, our family of origin, going back to all our ancestors. Not just the family that we share blood with but everyone who has had a hand in raising us, teaching, and shaping us into the person we become.

The second family is the family that we create. Our spouses, our children, grandchildren and on down through the generations.

The first family nourishes us. The second family we nourish with our bodies and our hearts. We give our all to the generations that come after us until there is nothing left but dust and memory.

The dream is one of hope for the future and inspiration about how to continue from this day forward.

In the story Sarah is at a crossroads in her life. She is just beginning the family that she will nourish, and she has suffered a horrendous trauma. Nick is at a loss as to how to help her get through this trauma and turns to his step-father for help. His step-father reminds him of the dream and tells Nick, "We are the Wolves that Watch."

Nick then knows how to help her.

In other news: I just signed up for another year of Nanowrimo. In November I will be writing another book. I spent several months this past year re-writing the book that I have just been discussing, "The Wolves that Watch" and now I think I am nearly ready to begin sending it publishers.

I self-published my first book "A Haunting at Mackinac" because it had made the rounds to publishers to no avail. I have bigger hopes for this next book. For one thing, it's a much better book!

In resigning on to the Nano- website, I editted my author's profile and realized that there was some info there followers of this blog should know about. So I opened a new side bar. Check it out!

The picture up top is of Munising Falls. It is visible from the highway outside of Munising Michigan. I love the waterfalls up by the Picture rocks National Lake shore. Views of the U.P. are always in my mind when I design quilts. This one is no exception. And that's dear old hubby, Jeff who never fails to try to climb onto rocks that may or may not hold him, just to get into the picture! God love him, and so do I!

Summer is just so busy, but I hope I can post more this winter. I have some hefty goals for this winter. More on that later,

Cindy K.-K.

Haunting the Nanowrimo site!

Snow and being Sequestered!

Grand Traverse County has been deemed a disaster area after Saturday's snow storm. More than 30,000 people were left without power when an average of 18 inches of heavy wet snow was piled on us in one 24 hour period. Today is Monday now and we are still trying to get ourselves unburied. Branches came down in my yard, pictured here. Also
my neighbor had several trees just pulled right over because of the snow. This one landed on her roof. And the last picture shows one of the trees from her yard bent over the fence and our cable line literally holding it up. I had Jake go out there and hit the snow off the tree to get it to stand back up. Saturday while we were outside trying to shovel the wind would come up and the snow would fall in big wet clumps down into the tops of our jackets, sliding all the way down our backs! We all needed hot bathes when we got the cars unstuck.
It took all our ingenuity to get them out too. There was no power so the electric starter on the snow blower wouldn't work. We had to shovel. We have an electric stove so we couldn't cook any food. We thought about the gas grill which would have worked except we went ahead and had sandwiches for lunch and by dinner time the power was back on. In this we were fortunate. Our friends were without power for more than 48 hours some of them. They were keeping warm in front of fireplaces and gas ovens.

This is the first major disaster I've ever actually been in when my life was in danger, and I must tell you, I got a little scared. It's making me see that we rely way to much on electricity.

On the lighter side, with out the Internet to distract us, my family gathered around the kitchen table and played a game of Scrabble. I got interested in a good book that I've been meaning to read and everyone took a good long nap. The DVD player began to blink when the power came back on, and my husband's computer started making noises. That is what gave us the first clues that the power was back. We sighed with relief and turned the heat up!

We'd had a few days before this relative nice weather, but I was sequestered nonetheless with my writing. I managed to finish the book I had begun during last November's Nanowrimo. It is the pre-quel to "A Haunting at Mackinac." It's called "Blackburn" and is about a man who fights the war of 1812 on Mackinac Island. Those of you who have read my first book will recognize some of the characters and events. It needs a lot of work though, it needs fleshing out. There are a lot of Telling details in there, and it would be better if I could figure out how to Show them instead!

So I've put it away for a couple of months so I can get back to it with a fresh eye. Meanwhile, I'm getting back into Tessa's Travels and will do more Blogging on that sight as I get into it. So keep an eye out for that. I'm learning Scrivener now so I can be ready to use it in April for Scriptfrenzy.

Speaking of Scriptfrenzy, there is still time to vote on which project you would like me to pursue first. I'm thinking that the second choice will be a vehicle for that great actor of small stature Peter Dinkledge who most of you will have seen in the Movie Station Agent, if you missed him the HBO series "Game of Thrones". Of course I will write it two ways, one for him addressing the special problems short people have with dating, and one for normal sized actors in which case anyone from Brad Pit to Zach Ephron could play him.

While I've been sitting here updating my Blog, I noticed a yellow throated bird out here at my feeder. It's a yellow-throated Vireo. Only took about 15 minutes of Internet research to figure it out. I tried to take a good picture of it through the window but my camera is not allowing it.

Have a nice winter! In my neck of the woods it's going to last at three more days, but rumor has it it's going to be 60 degrees by Thursday. Ah, Michigan! don't you just love it!

Inspirational half week at Caroline's Sewing Room!

Welcome to Caroline's Sewing Room. This is a big front porch area that is all glassed in and very comfortable. Through the door to the left of this picture is Caroline's Bed and breakfast, and through the kitchen is the door to her quilt shop. We had the luxury of living there for three days this past week and six of us from TC enjoyed it immensely! Sue is in the picture putting up one of her latest finishes. We hung things in front of every window as we finished project after project! It was fabulous.

Caroline is a wonderful Grandmotherly type of lady who is funny and earthy and warm. She is easy going, often telling us that we could use anything we found in her kitchen or pantry while we were there, and always coming out with jars of pickles, and beets and whatever else telling us in no uncertain terms that we had to try this! On top of her very giving hospitality she also is a very faithful woman thanking God daily for her life and her prosperity.

All in all I was totally inspired by this woman and her "family" of employees. Rose, runs the store, and is from Scotland. Brenda who does the Long Arm Quilting at the shop and who bakes such special enticing treats such as bread for the soup and fruit filled coffee cake for Mardi Gras! Carolyn (not to be confused with Caroline) is the bookkeeper and the wife of Caroline's minister. Caroline always keeps her cell phone handy in her pocket so she can call someone at a moments whim to ask them a question or to get advice, like when we accidentally blocked the sink with an orange peel, and when someone wanted to know if there were cloves in the pickles she was serving us.

Then there is Cubby! Cubby is the cutest little Terrier mix that I've ever encounter since my own terrier mix died when I was in my twenties. He was the most well behaved dog I've run across since Lassie! He was just as quiet as a mouse and as easy going as his mommy. The only time we heard him bark was when someone came to the door after the shop closed. He knew they didn't belong there and he was making sure we knew that. He kept whimpering the whole time until the person left.

We decided to go for a walk on our first day and Caroline asked us if we wanted to take Cubby. Someone said, yes, they would love to. So we went out to another fabric shop two doors down and after a quick glance through I realized there was nothing in the shop I wanted so I went out to spell the lady who was walking Cubby. I took his leash and let her go into the shop. I waited there for a while but then I thought, oh why not, so I walked down the road slowly with Cubby and he did his business. We were around the corner in a very few minutes and we kept going slowly around the little block. Well by the time we got to next corner the others hadn't even gotten to the first corner yet. So Cubby and I finished out walk together. He was very good. When a car came along he came right back to my side, just like he was supposed to. Then when nothing was around I would let him go and explore. He'd sniff around once in a while so I could stop and catch my breath. Then we'd keep going. Along the highway I had him heel so that he wouldn't get too close to the road. He knew just want to do.

The next day Caroline comes down into the sewing room and tells us this story:
"I woke up in the middle of the night and Cubby was asleep on the bed. I couldn't wake him up and was getting a little worried about him because usually he wakes up when I get up in the middle of the night. So I shook him and eventually he woke up. I let him out to do his little business and he came back in and fell asleep again on the bed. You must have had a real good walk, cuz you wore him out!"

He had the cutest toys too. He had a little duck and a rooster that actually crowed when he shook it, and several other things. He brought them out into the sewing room to show us. If I had a dog like him I would walk him daily just to spend quality time with him. Oh well!

Gas was cheaper in West Branch, they have a store that sells quality cuts of beef for less than I've seen anywhere, and it's the home town of Kaye Wood, of TV fame. I could live there, for no other reason than to be near Caroline! If you would like to schedule a retreat at Caroline's here is her website: http://carolinessewing.com/

But I really shouldn't be promoting it, because I don't want her to overbook, I may not be able to get back there if she is!

More on this whole topic later! Love you guys down there in West Branch. Hope to see you soon.

Cindy K-K

More about the Poll

At your right you can see the poll I am speaking about. I plan to write all of these stories in one form or another. I just wish to know which of them you would most like to see first. Here is a larger description of each of them:

1. Hell to Pay--Actually I also began to call this one Frozen Hell as in Hell Freezing over. A comedy about a married couple in their fifties who have always been in debt. In the opening scene we have the woman pouring herself coffee in the morning. Her husband is heard groaning in the next room and then we see him appear as well. They are both overweight, both are looking a bit low key with their morning ritual. Woman says: Hey, do you remember when we were young and first married? We used to talk about growing old together.
Man: (underwhelmed) Yeah?
Woman: (brightly) Done! Accomplished that goal! What do you want to do next?
Man smiles at the joke, then says: Get out of debt?
Woman nods dejected and goes back to sipping her coffee.

They talk about their bucket list, now that they can check off growing old together. But everything else on the list costs money. Whether its a hot air balloon ride or a trip to Yellowstone Park. So they have to conclude that the next thing on their bucket list will be to die debt free. So what are their conflicts? Everything from their son's student loan debts, to rising prices on gas and groceries, to their own poor health, until it seems they will never be debt free.

I have a lot of funny lines and some poignant moments between these two characters and I believe there is enough there to build a lot of scenes from. Just keep in mind that any resemblance to persons living or dead or who belong to my family are strictly coincidental. ((NOT!!))

MDQ (Major Dramatic Question): Will they get out of debt? More to the point, what keeps this particular couple struggling all these years together without their soul crushing debt tearing them apart?

2. Decisions: For those of you with my particular background in Literature or who have subjected themselves with Thomas Hardy's writing even by accident, you might recognize this story as a retelling of "Far From the Madding Crowd." But I didn't intend any such thing really.

It's about a woman who moves into a small town outside of Chicago for two reasons, one because it was the only place she could find a job that would pay enough to cover her rent. She is an artist and spends all of her spare time doing Multi-media found object art which is her passion. She shows her art in a consignment shop in Grand Rapids Michigan. Early on in the story she is excited because she finds that one of pieces has sold from the shop.

She works as a bartender doing the late shift four nights a week. She lives in a boarding house in a basement studio apartment. She chose this place because her landlady is allowing her to use the rest of the basement as her work area, but she has to share it with her landlady's nephew who does handyman work for her. As the weeks progress it seems that he has no other job and little job ambition.

One night at the bar she sees a young man about her age who is very handsome. She serves him a drink and he seems very kind. He looks her in the eye which is unusual for the men who frequent this bar. Usually their eyes don't get above her chin. She is intrigued and finds out that he is the manager of a computer store in town. Smart, well-to-do, and handsome, he seems to be just the kind of guy she would like to be with. Except all her new female friends think he's a light-weight and talk about him being such a geek in high school. They inform her that he was literally the guy that wheeled the projector cart from place to place. Because of that they could not see the handsome successful guy that he has become. She begins to date him.

Just after she starts her relationship with this guy, yet another fellow comes into her life. He is an older man with a southern drawl and very sexy for his age. He buys one of her pieces at an art show and strikes up a conversation with her. He wants to see more of her work so she invites him to her studio. He pulls some strings and gets her into a Chicago gallery where her work will get more exposure and he makes it financially possible for her to produce more work by paying off her credit card and setting up an account for her at a wholesale art supply distributor. At first she takes his help because she is convinced he only wants to patronize her. But all along he makes comments about how lovely she is and how he would not be opposed to a more steady relationship.

Meanwhile the nephew hangs out in the basement with her more and more often and she is getting used to him being around. They talk as friends and to most observing eyes it is apparent that he has fallen for her.

The MDQ: Which will she choose? Rich patron of the arts? Handsome, smart well to do business man? or friend with little job ambition? Which would you choose? There is a secondary MDQ as well concerning the sale of her art from the place in Grand Rapids. Who could have bought that piece? Was it one of her new friends from this small town? And if so who? (A question that has been on my mind since I began to sell books. At first I could tell you every person who bought one, but no more. Now I have no idea who could possibly be reading my stuff.)

3. Fate: Woman and her Autistic brother move to a small Northern Michigan community after the death of their parents. She is in her mid-twenties. Her brother is fairly high functioning but not able to live on his own. They move there because they have inherited their grandmother's house in this town. This woman knew she couldn't afford to keep the big house in Chicago that her parents owned so she sold that so that they could live more simply for a time until they establish themselves in the new town.

Meanwhile there is a man who has lived in this town his entire life. When he was 14 a fortune teller told him that one day he would meet a woman and from the moment he saw her he would not be able to take his eyes off her. But to beware of her because she would be keeping a secret from him.

Two days after she moves to town she goes into the grocery store and he sees her there for the first time. He literally cannot take his eyes off of her. He works at the deli counter and when she sees that he is noticing her, she goes up to him and orders more from the deli than she and her brother could eat in a week. But he is not intimidated, he just watches her as he is filling her order.

She decides to buy her groceries in the bigger town 20 minutes away from then on. A few weeks later she is walking downtown in this little town. She's decided she has to try to find some sort of a job, she wants to get herself established in this community and she thinks that a job will get her out into the public and meeting people. A brand new deli has opened up next door to the grocery store and there is a help-wanted sign in the window. She goes in to apply for the job and sees that it's this same man who has now opened up his own deli. She gets the job, needless to say. And the two of them start working together. But what is the big secret? He knows there is one, but he is too in love with her to worry about what she could be hiding from him.

MDQ: What is the secret? Is it something that will tear them apart or once shared bring them closer? And what impact will it have on this little town?

I've extended the dates on the poll, so come back and vote again and often (this isn't a national election). Tell your friends!

Cindy K-K

I Finally got some honest feedback!

Two people have now told me some honest feedback about "A Haunting at Mackinac." I find this good for two reasons:

1. People are reading it, actually reading it!! And paying attention to it!
2. So far I've heard how good the story is, and how interesting it is, and everyone is encouraging me to get out a print version. But before the print version comes out I wanted to make sure it was as perfect as it could be. Well, each time I go through it I find more to change. It's never going to be totally perfect, I began writing it almost 20 years ago or more. It's just not ever going to be my best work. But some of the things people have come up with are continuity errors that should have been caught by a previous read through. The funniest one is this: apparently in the first four days they are on the Island, they hire the same carriage driver for a week at time on three different occasions. Each time they are pleased and surprised to see it's the same carriage driver and at the end of the trip they pay him for a whole week. Now, even the most greedy cab driver will let someone know that they already paid him a fair wage. This was clearly a problem with me forgetting as I was writing that I had already had the characters hire the guy for the week.

So I am in the process of reading through it again for continuity errors before I put it out in print. I will also update the Kindle version. So anyone else who buys it for Kindle will get the corrected version. I don't know how it will work for people who have already bought it. So I apologize about that but I can't do anything about it.

I have also added quotations to the beginning and a glossary of Ojibwa and Algonquin words and phrases. So I will keep you all informed as to when this whole process will be finished so you can go to your local bookstore and ask for them to order my book for you in the print version! Can't wait to hold it in my hand!

On other newsy fronts: I have three new ideas about screenplays that I could write for April's Script Frenzy. I'd love some feedback about which one would interest you the most. See the sidebar for a short synapses of the three projects.

Thanks for your input!

Was today wasted? You decide!

I started out today with the simple mission of getting enough ink to print out my next novel manuscript for my Editor Clover McKinley. She's read 250 manuscript pages of it out of about 1500 pages. I went to Cartridge world and got three new refills of ink. Came home and installed one. Started printing and managed to print about half of the first part before I had spooler problems. After rebooting the computer and the printer both about three times, I finally got so it would print the rest. But while waiting for all of those reboots, out of habit, and out of pure joy, I began to read what was in front of me.

What was in front of me was my own novel. I just started picking it up and reading right where it was.

I got the printing done and kept on reading. Now, let me tell you. I have re-read this book about fourteen times. Each time I was in some mode, clear the clutter, read for typos and misspellings, read for wordiness (yeah like that works!) I even read it through once to find out if the dialog was plausible. You have to read that out loud to discover it.

But today I just kept on reading out of the pure pleasure of it. I wonder now if Stephen King ever picked up a copy of Cujo by accident in a library and just opened the book at random and at once was pulled into that world and got caught, a world of his own making? Or maybe Dan Brown in a hospital waiting room happens to see a copy of Angels and Demons in a staff book exchange shelf and started reading chapter 16, just to have something he wouldn't have to concentrate on and then get caught. Or maybe Dickens, in one of the endless handwritten re-writes looked at David Copperfield with new eyes and lost himself in the text instead of copying it.

All at once Jake came out into the living room and said, "Hey mom, are you busy?"

I didn't know how to answer him. I wasn't doing anything I needed to do. I've been through this manuscript a dozen times. Now it's up to the professional editor to have at it. One part that I had read this afternoon had already been printed out for the editor so any changes I made on it would not be on her print out. How useless is that? I went to see what my son wanted and he suggested that the bananas I was saving for banana-nut muffins, were already at their optimum amount of black-peeled ripeness and should be made toot-sweet or they may soon turn into garbage. So I quickly made a double batch (I do nothing in singles) and as I put the first pan of them into the oven to bake, I realized that I had been hurrying that job so I could get back to the book.

I don't know why this book has me this captivated. Unless it's the two main characters. Nick and Sarah. Nick is a very hurt man. He was betrayed by his friends and took the rap for them. He did two years and eight months in prison on a five year sentence for breaking and entering. He admits to being there but wouldn't say who else was in the building with him. When he gets out he clings to the one thought that he never wants to go back, not for any reason. Yet, within a year he is again arrested. Why?

Then there is Sarah, she has also been hurt, in the worst way a girl can be hurt and still survive. She wasn't even able to confront her attacker because she was whisked away from the area without even putting forth an accusation. When she meets the hurt man, Nick, she is at a crossroads in her life. Nick too is at a crossroads in his life. Will he be able to make it outside of prison, and keep his word to himself? Will he find something to live for and be happy about? Will Sarah be able to heal herself from her abuse and go on to lead a productive life? I already know the answers to all of these questions, but still I found myself drawn up into their stories, and wishing to experience it again.

Is this vanity? Is this like that one girl in high school looking in the mirror and saying, "Oh my, I'm so cute today!" Is this me saying I'm God's gift to literature? Maybe? All I know is I love what I write. I was experiencing pure joy today re-reading the most emotional parts of this book.

I have never been in a position of self-aggrandizement before this. I was never the cutest girl in school, or the smartest, or the most talented, or the best dressed. But I know one thing, and that is this. I love this book!

So did I waste my time today, re-reading just for the joy of it? Or did I need to do this today to boost my self-confidence and self esteem. Now that I'm out there, being read, (and I am being read. Someone shared with me that they got their book club to read my book) maybe what I really needed was to reassure myself that what I write is good, enjoyable, worthy. Maybe I needed this today. Tomorrow it goes to the editor.

Cindy K-K