Archive for June 2010
The Glamorous Life of the Touring Author
Mix five authors, eight stops and three states, and you get one exhausting, exhilarating book tour.
Read MoreWanda is REAL and she’s living in Toronto: Lemon Meringue Pie from an Expert
Sometimes life is stranger than fiction. And sometimes it’s strange because of fiction. Take Wanda, for example. Not Wanda of Happiness Key and Fortunate Harbor. The very real Wanda of Wanda’s Pie in the Sky in Toronto. And had I never written about a pie shop named Wanda’s Wonderful Pies, I never would have “met”…
Read MoreA Gift From My Publisher: A Coupon for Fortunate Harbor
Enjoy a coupon for $1.50 off the price of Fortunate Harbor, good for the first week on sale from June 29, 2010 through July 6, 2010.
Read MoreGreat Expectations–The Chapters That Did NOT Get Written
I had great expectations for my time here, but the reality was even better. Sometimes it’s important to let go of expectations, to see what transpires without them. Some of life’s finest gifts arrive that way. My gift this past month was making new friends and learning to appreciate this remarkable community in a whole new way. I just bet, in the long run, Tracy, Wanda, Janya and Alice will all be better off for it when I settle in, once again, to tell their story.
Read MoreI Am Fortunate Because. . .
Just as writing Happiness Key made me think extra hard about what makes me happy and why, writing Fortunate Harbor made me think about all the ways I’ve been fortunate in my life. Taking a blessing inventory, if you will, is a thought-provoking discipline, and I’ve found the more I think about this, the more fortunate I…
Read MoreThe Pollyanna Syndrome: Finding Things To Be Glad About
As a child, Pollyanna was one of my favorite movies. I loved everything about it. The setting, the acting, the story. I ached for the unloved little girl who played the “Glad” game to deal with a difficult life. I’m all for having goals. I’m all for working on them. But maybe what most of us need even more is to be glad about the things we already have, to count our blessings, because isn’t there the possibility that if we don’t, when we reach that long sought goal, we won’t even notice? We’ll just screw up our faces, tense our muscles, and start concentrating on the next one.
Read MoreTrash or Treasure–It All Depends On How You Look At Things
It’s time to make a confession. Remember Helen Henry in Wedding Ring? That’s right, Helen, the grandmother who had just the teensiest problem with throwing out things she loved. Problem was, Helen loved everything that couldn’t talk back to her. Old papers. Furniture. Dishes. Seed catalogs. Broken appliances–after all somebody ought to be able to…
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