Kimberly Joy Peters

The Letter Someone Didn't Want you to See

2012-01-09T18:43:00.000-08:00

For my 100th post (!) I'm going to share with you a letter that someone else didn't want you to see.

Intrigued? So was I, when Google Alerts notified me of this book review, recently posted on YouTube. Woohoo! I thought to myself. A video review of Maybe Never, Maybe Now!

I clicked on the link...the video loaded, and then, (before even watching the review) I saw the following comments from the reviewer:

"Heres my opinion on a terrible book.

Things I forgot to add in this video:

-Most unoriginal names ever. Tyler, Caitlyn, Conner? Wow. We're just missing Alex and Julie.

- It was really annoying when she explained what the french meant because I already understood what it meant. Its not that bad if you don't understand what une baguette is but if you're bilingual like me, do yourself a favor and don't read it.

...ALSO on Amazon.com it said this book was for: (ages 13 and up) ... it doesn't seam that way AT ALL"

OUCH!

I'm sorry she didn't like the book, but obviously, that sometimes happens. The reviewer goes on to describe everything she hates, and then, she tempts me by saying "sorry if you're the author and you're watching this".

So yes, I replied, asking her to be fair and post my comments along with hers. She didn't post my response, which is her prerogative, but since she is using a public forum to question me, I am using this public forum to address those questions.

And so, my reply:

"Hey there! I’m sorry I don’t know your name. Surprise! I AM the author of Maybe Never, Maybe Now, and there are no apologies necessary for your very honest review: nobody likes everything, and I was well aware of that fact when I “put myself out there” with a publisher. I do hope, however, that you’ll grant me the courtesy of reading (and posting) my response as I’d like to address some of your comments.

If you are in grade 11, you are much older than the target audience of 13+, so I am not surprised that you found the book too short and lacking in detailed description. As you mentioned in your review, Maybe Never, Maybe Now is actually the sequel to Painting Caitlyn, so was written in the same spare style. The quick pace and deliberate lack of extraneous description helped all of my books win numerous awards, and Painting Caitlyn’s appeared on the American Library Association’s prestigious “YALSA Quick Picks” list for Reluctant Readers in 2007 along with New Moon and a number of other more well known works by authors with whom I am truly honoured to be associated.

“Popularity” in books is actually harder to assess than you may realize. Did you know that publishers actually have to PURCHASE the front page space on websites such as Amazon, and the good display tables in bookstores? The bigger the publisher, the more they can spend convincing you to buy their books, so a whole table of one author doesn’t necessarily mean that the books are amazing, but it probably means the publisher has lots of money – and they may also have a larger budget for producing so-so books. Smaller publishers actually have to be much more careful with what they publish, and will often turn out great stuff that’s critically acclaimed, but harder to find, because bookstores might only carry one or two copies on the shelves, with the spines turned outwards instead of the covers. (Note that I’m not claiming to be great [though all of my books have been critically acclaimed by major reviewers] I am simply pointing out the irrelevance of describing a book as “popular” or “not very popular”.)

Character names, obviously, are always a matter of personal preference. I addressed the name issue both on my website http://www.kimberlyjoypeters.com/index_files/Page1030.htm (ie. how I chose the names) and in my blog (ie why I hate strange character names) http://kimberlyjoypeters.blogspot.com/search?q=names, so take a peek at both articles if you’re interested.

By day, I am a teacher of both French and English. The French teacher in me LOVES that you are bilingual, and apologizes for annoying you with translation, but hopes that you can recognize how unique and special your bilingualism makes you: translations were absolutely necessary for most readers.

The English teacher in me worries that you identified only the literal journey of going on an exchange to Quebec, and completely missed the figurative journey of learning to trust yourself again after you’ve been mistreated by someone you believed in. I know I did my job as an author and managed to make that message accessible to readers because School Library Journal recognized that the story “is about the emotional journey of healing and forgiveness…”

The reader in me knows that nobody enjoys everything they read. I HATED The Great Gatsby in high school for one of the same reasons you hated Maybe Never, Maybe Now: I couldn’t understand why the guy kept mooning over Daisy and didn’t just get on with his life. The thing was, at the time I read it, I’d never actually been in love, so I couldn’t identify with the characters or make any personal connections to the story. But guess what? When I had to re-read it, three years later in university after a devastating break-up, I felt Gatsby’s pain. I understood Daisy’s flirtations. I got it! And I loved it.

I receive lots of emails and letters from girls and women all over North America who identify with Caitlyn and her experiences. Many of them make me cry as they describe their own history of abusive relationships, and the lasting scars that result. So you know what? The woman in me is actually HAPPY that you did not relate to this character. I wish you continued joy and success in life, and in romance."

The End of the Innocence

2011-12-28T15:05:00.000-08:00

(With apologies to Don Henley for stealing his song title to label this post)

When did you lose your innocence? No, not that kind of innocence. The kind where the magic of Christmas is so strong - so unquestionably permanent in your schema - that you can't imagine it ever going away?

I lost mine at sixteen. I woke up early on Christmas morning and felt the usual thrill of holiday excitement that normally would have propelled me out of bed in the dark to see what Santa had left me. Only, that year, I glanced at the clock. And something shifted. I realized, in an instant, that if the gifts were already down there, they'd still be there in another hour. Or two. And then I did what up until that moment in my life would have been unthinkable: I rolled over, and went back to sleep on Christmas morning.

I've always described that morning as the day I "grew up". I actually thought it was sort of cool that I could pinpoint one specific moment in my emotional development that signified maturity and self-control.

But it wasn't until the other night, on a different Christmas Eve, that I realized the truth: my father had died ten months before that morning, and that was the first Christmas without him.

My decision to stay in bed probably didn't have anything to do with facing reality: it was actually all about avoiding it.

It seems obvious, as I type this, but it took me twenty-six years to make that connection. So maybe I really did hold on to my innocence a lot longer than I've always believed.

Or maybe now, at least, I know where it went.

Finally! The Secret of the Sisterhood!

2011-11-19T06:44:00.000-08:00

I'm a big fan of Ann Brashares' The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series. I didn't think I would be, as the premise of four girls sharing one pair of jeans seemed a little bizarre to me, but once I picked up the series, I grew to love the characters.

I did get over the idea of them sharing the pants, but I always wondered about their "you must never wash the pants" rule. Even in the movie version, this rule was addressed with an "EWWW". Today, Yahoo has provided me with their secret. I share it with you now:

"Denim retailers from Levi's to Gap want you to stop washing your jeans after every wear. Ultimately, the more you wash, the more water you waste and the more your denim will fade. To benefit the planet and your wallet, freeze your jeans instead. By slipping your pants into a plastic bag and tossing them in the freezer for a night or two, you can kill odour causing bacteria, preserve your worn-in fit, and maintain the colour so that they'll look brand new way longer. Plus, you will end up doing laundry less frequently. Time for a bigger freezer."

From: http://ca.shine.yahoo.com/quick-tip-freeze-jeans-190000285.html

November is National Novel Writing Month!

2011-11-01T15:56:00.000-07:00

...and while I don't expect any of us with "day jobs" will end up with final, polish works, the challenge of writing a set number of words every day could be just the motivator we need to hammer out a draft. I thought about my first novel, Painting Caitlyn, for years. But thinking didn't get it written. The Random House contest for a first Young Adult novel did inspire me to write, because I had a set deadline. I didn't win, but I ended up with a solid draft that only needed a bit of editing before Lobster Press picked it up. After that, I've written to contact deadlines (eg. I submit an outline of what I think will happen in a book, sign the contract, and THEN write it.) There's nothing like a little external pressure

And so, write away - after all, it's National Novel Writing Month!

Rick's Rant/Reasons to Read

2011-10-27T20:32:00.000-07:00

The media were abuzz today with the most recent "rant" by Canadian Comedian/Political Commentator Rick Mercer's latest "rant" about bullying and teen suicide. The specific case he referenced involved a teen who was depressed, was bullied for being gay, and ultimately took his own life.

In the video, Mercer noted that it's not enough to tell kids that "it will get better", because teens need role models.

I agree. And although I don't think there's any substitute for real, live role models, I think this is another example of a case where thoughtful, well-written young adult literature can be a powerful tool in making kids feel less lonely. I often receive email from readers who say my novels make a difference in their lives, because readers see themselves in the characters.

And I'll say it again here now: books had a huge impact on me, and on my own struggles during adolescence.

Mercer challenged adults to step up as role models, saying :

“If you’re gay and yu’re in public life, I’m sorry, you don’t have to run around with a Pride flag and bore the hell out of everyone, but you can’t be invisible. Not anymore. 300 kids is 300 too many,”

I'm not gay, so I can't be a role model from that perspective.

But as an author, I am out there in "public life". And I have suffered from depression off and on throughout my childhood and adult years, and as an author who has struggled with depression, I'm standing up now and saying "Let me be your role model, because it DOES get better."

I'm always trying to balance my author's persona with my teacher's persona, and in a small, small town, maybe I'm taking a big risk here by admitting to my struggles wtih depression. But nobody judges me harshly when I tell them I survived Thyroid Cancer at age twenty-nine, so maybe if more parents and kids can see me thriving post cancer AND post depression, they will come to understood that depression -- like cancer -- is a treatable medical condition.  And maybe if I tell them that there are a lot of amazing books out there about kids just like them, they won't feel so alone. And maybe by sharing my history I will help one person.  And that will be worth it.

If you think you might be depressed, know that IT'S NOT A WEAKNESS, IT'S NOT YOUR FAULT, and IT'S NOT JUST ABOUT MAKING YOURSELF CHEER UP.  Talk to someone you trust, or visit http://www.kidshelpphone.ca/teens/home/splash.aspx

Greg Loves Annie

2011-08-31T19:32:00.000-07:00

One of the things people always ask me about writing is this: "Where do you get your ideas?".

All around me.

Not everything I see or do or hear about is going to end up being a part of my writing projects. But lots of those things will trigger ideas that turn into something else.

Last summer, I became obsessed with Greg and Annie.

I don't know Greg and Annie they really are, but one of them began declaring their affections through grafitti. The graffiti was VERY noticeable, because I live in a small, scenic town with far more retirees than grafitti artists - or vandals, depending on your point of view.

I missed a few at the beginning (like the one on the railway crossing sign), but over the year that they appeared, I took pictures of quite a few of these "declarations". And in my mind, I began creating personalities for Greg and Annie. Physical descriptions. Background stories. I won't describe my own imaginings, but will share the photos here, so that you, too, might write their story in your own mind.

Think Deeply!

2011-08-11T20:35:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I blogged about the subjectivity of reading. I'm still thinking about it.

Maybe part of that reflection had to do with the fact that I spoke to another teacher this week about summer school. She said they'd read some amazing books, prescribed by the school board for summer school, but full of swearing that had been censored out of each book with thick black marker! As if teen readers won't know what the blacked-out word is, won't hear it in their minds as their eyes float past it, and never, ever, encounter profanity in their daily lives.

Or maybe it is because I am now tucked away in Niagara-on-the-Lake for a three day workshop on Critical Literacy, which essentially boils down to thinking deeply about things before forming your own opinions. Tonight, I share an example of why this is a super approach to life.

(Ahem). WAAAYYY back in the beginning of June, the great Laurie Halse Anderson responded to a Wall Street Journal article that criticized Young Adult Fiction. The title of the original article was: * “Darkness Too Visible,” by Meghan Cox Gurdon. The subtitle is “Contemporary fiction for teens is rife with explicit abuse, violence and depravity. Why is this considered a good idea?”

I've read both the original article, and Laurie's response. I encourage YOU to do the same. If you haven't read yesterday's post yet, you might want to look at that one, too. And then I encourage you to be "critically literate", think deeply, and form your own well-supported opinion.

Some Things Just Aren't Worth Arguing About...

2011-08-09T19:23:00.000-07:00

Yes, Virginia, I do read the reviews of my books. And no, they aren't all as favourable as the one I posted last week. Very occasionally, I see a review that upsets me. And then - much more than when I've had a good review - I find myself wishing I could engage in a "book talk" with the reviewer. You know: to explain to them what they didn't get. To make them like it.

Then the rational part of me remembers that we all have different taste. I only read two of the most popular vampire series ever. Liked the first one, wasn't really into the second one, and decided to call it quits after that. Was I missing out on subtleties and nuances that the author (or a fan) could explain to me, possibly helping me to see the series in a more positive light? Maybe. But probably not.

Sometimes, you're just not that into a book. Maybe you never will be. Or maybe you'll revisit it at another time in your life, and marvel at what you missed before.

This customer review from the Barnes and Noble website has been bugging me for a while:

"I love reading books about real life situations however this book barely even talks about being in an abusive relationship and the dangers of being in one like it says it is. It was more focused on her art and few family issues. If you want a book about abusive relationships I wouldn't read this one."

But last night I got this wonderful "fan letter" via email:

",,,[I] am a teen who has struggled with an abusive relationship rather similar to your novel Painting Caitlyn. I have read it numerous times and it has helped me in more ways than anyone who has tried. I have been thoroughly inspired and it has helped me to move on.... I wrote this to tell you that you have inspired me to stay strong and I wouldn't be where I am without reading your touching novels. I also want to thank you so much for writing them and just the opportunity to read your remarkable pieces of literature."

And even if I get a hundred of the negative comments, the positive ones like this always make me remember that the people who need the message will get it.

Another Five Star Review!

2011-08-03T17:21:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Jen Wardrip and the folks over at Teens Read Too for the five star review of Maybe Never, Maybe Now.

"Readers will sympathize with Caitlyn as she navigates the rough waters of new love and the heartbreak from her past. This novel is unique and good to the last drop."

Ahh..now I'm blushing!

Even if you've already read Maybe Never, Maybe Now (and if you haven't, why the heck not???), Teens Read Too is always a great site to find another amazing book.

Here's the trailer, again, to tempt you...

Remembering Sweet Honey

2011-08-02T20:45:00.000-07:00

I got a cheque in the mail today. A cheque for just over $500. But I'm not happy about it.

The cheque is part of the settlement from the tainted Menu Pet Foods several years ago. My beloved dog, Honey, was one of its first victims, as I purchased some pouch cat food as a "treat" for my mom's visiting cat, and my own. Neither cat would eat it. Nor would my sister's visiting Golden Retriever. I remember commenting about how bad it must taste, for a Golden Retriever to refuse it. But Honey was fourteen, and I suspect that her senses of taste and smell might have been failing. She ate some. And then she started vomiting. Several vet visits, IV treatments, one week, and a couple of broken hearts later, she died of liver failure. It didn't make sense, since, as an older dog, she'd had all her medical tests (including liver and kidney function) just a few weeks before.

It was six months before the tainted pet food story came out, and that that time they said it had only been a problem since December. But I knew, as soon as I heard about it, what had really happened to Honey. I watched the lists as more and more products- with earlier and earlier dates - were identified, until finally I saw it: the cat food brand I had purchased, with the date stamp matching the unused packages I still had.

I didn't join the class action lawsuit because I thought it would bring justice: one of the guys in China who was responsible for the scandal had already been sentenced to die, and even that didn't make me feel better at all. I knew no payment would make Honey's death okay, and as a pet, I was entitled only to financial compensation for loss of "property" - nothing for my grief and personal loss. But I joined the lawsuit anyway, for her. To add her name to the list of victims. To point out - officially - that what happened to her was not okay. To say that she mattered.

And so, many years after I gathered up the vet bills and sent them away, I received reimbursement for some of them today (there were more claims than the settlement could cover, so claimants were offered only a percentage of what they submitted).

I know someone who makes beautiful things out of glass, and he has agreed to make me some jewelry, with Honey's ashes embedded in the glass, so that we can be "together" again. That is where part of the cheque will go. I'll be sad and angry when I wear it, but I'll be happy, too, remembering Sweet Honey.

Honey was my ring-bearer when I got married. Here we are in our wedding finery!

She loved a good game of Frisbee.

Hanging out with her cousin, Marbles.

And boat rides.

And playing in the snow.

But she loved spring, too.

And quiet time, on the couch.

Miss you everyday, Babygirl!

August 1, 2011

2011-08-01T20:40:00.000-07:00

It's August. And I haven't posted a single thing in over two months.

Ahh...vacation!

Several recent summers have been consumed by writing deadlines, and last year I was preparing for the launch of two books.

And because I still have a "day job" (which I love), June was crazy-busy.

So although at first, I was feeling guilty and slacker-ish for not posting here, I eventually decided to make it a conscious blogging break (which, of course, immediately meant I discovered all sorts of amazing blog-worthy material).

I had a full - but relaxing - July. It all started with a wedding, where the power went out! The bride was the daughter of my very good friend, Laura, who was my roomate in Quebec during the summer of 1988.

Shortly thereafter, I headed out to Winnipeg to visit relatives. It had been a long time since I went on the kind of vacation where I was just the guest, with no real touring or sightseeing or anything to do, and it was fabulous. Even more fabulous was the chance to reconnect with my cousins and their children.

I came home to a cottage full of longtime friends and their families - all together, we were six adults, four kids, three dogs, some delicious food and a lot of laughs.

Then, I spent a hot, hot week at home in Ontario during the heat wave, swimming in the lake almost every day (sometimes alone, often with my friend Joanne), entertaining my mother and my honorary "aunt" Mary, and going to an outdoor theatre in record breaking temperatures.

Right about then, my friend and colleague Colleen called me from Nova Scotia, to invite me out to visit her at her summer place in Guysborough. I don't usually lean towards spontaneity, but I'm trying to, more and more. So I cashed in some Aeroplan points for a flight to Halifax, and surfed the internet for a decent rental car rate: FYI, Alamo was about 1/3 the price of all of the other major rental places, including unlimited mileage! "Veronica" (my GPS) got me out of parking garage, and pointed me East as the radio played - I kid you not - "Born to Be Wild". (It turns out that it's tough to actually be wild at 41 and 44, with a six-year-old in the cottage, but we did manage to talk our way out of ticket one night...). I spent the final afternoon kicking around Halifax Harbour where I bought the beautful Sea Glass Hunters Handbook,

featuring a photo of a pink heart-shaped piece of seaglass much like the one I have, and featured in the trailer for Maybe Never, Maybe Now! My flight was scheduled to leave Halifax at 10:50 p.m., and at 11, they announced that due to a mechanical issue, it was cancelled! Most people on the flight were, understandably, frustrated and upset, but I was in the fortunate position of not really having to be anywhere else right away, so with a little help from someone I love, I managed to secure a reservation in one of the only area hotels that still had a vacancy. The shuttle arrived within fifteen minutes, and I spent a lovely night in a beautiful hotel room before finally flying back to Toronto the next day, just before noon.

I had a day or two to do my laundry and remind my pets that I do actually live here, before packing up the boat and heading out for the long weekend with another large group of friends.

In and amongst the craziness that was my month, I have read some wonderful books (which I will share with you, here), and begun to write anew (mostly in my head, but that's where all of my ideas root before I transplant them to keyboard). Reading back through the highlights of July, I notice the common threads of family and friends, many of whom I have not seen in previous summers as I shut myself in to write. My books are all about relationships - how lucky I am to be celebrating my own.

I look forward to renewing my blogging relationships, as well!

Will Work for Prom Dress!

2011-05-13T19:44:00.000-07:00

Author Aimee Ferris wrote a very cool looking book called Will Work for Prom Dress, and ever since its release, she's been inviting YA Authors to her "after party". That is, she's been inviting us to submit our own pictures. Check out mine here, and check out the book here!

PS: sorry (to anyone who might actually read this blog) that it's been so long since I've posted. Busy, busy. French exchange...new musical, book writing, etc. etc. I'll be back, though. I promise : )

Painting...Caitlyn....Cats...Book Trailers

2011-04-10T16:41:00.001-07:00

Just when I start to feel more like a busy teacher than an author (writing a French musical version of Jack and the Beanstalk right now as a follow-up to our wildly successful Hansel and Gretel last year/preparing for the second part of our SEVEC French language exchange/actually trying to do my regular job) I got a very eloquent "fan letter" - en francais - for Chloe: un portrait. (The French language version of Painting Caitlyn). And then, I discovered this way-cool Painting Caitlyn book trailer which was created for an English class. And that stuff makes me remember that I am an author, too. How awesome is that? PS The Georgina Arts Centre and Gallery is having their Celebrity Art Challenge in June this year. Once again, they are looking for celebrities to paint small canvases that can be auctioned off. They are clearly a bit desperate 'cuz they keep asking me. Anyone out there reading this know someone with a more recognizable name who could do a painting for them???? The one I did for them last year was this, inspired by a friend's cat, named Luna:

My Latest Discovery!

2011-03-29T19:22:00.000-07:00

How did I not know that we had a karaoke channel on our cable package?

My March Break through Children’s Literature

2011-03-21T18:40:00.000-07:00

Friday: Pearson International Airport (Toronto)to Rome, Italy

After spending the last couple of March Breaks just switching from teacher to author mode, and working through story deadlines, I decided to take a real trip this year!

I had this favourite line in my head as we headed for the airport: “Hooray, hooray! We’re on our way! Our summer vacation starts today” from The Bears’ Vacation (Yes, I know it’s only March Break, and not actually summer yet, but way before the Berenstein Bears got preachy and started pumping our book after book with moral lessons, they used to be funny. And they rhymed. And that’s the kind of thing that gets stuck in my head.)

And since getting things stuck in my head is commonplace for me, I ended up mentally linking each subsequent day of my trip with a favourite children’s book.

Saturday: Civitivecchia, Italy

The forecast for my Mediterranean cruise through Italy, Spain and France: Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs.

Sunday: Sicily (Italy)

Our after-dinner entertainment was a group of Chinese acrobats who juggled hats, tossing them onto and off of each other’s heads…reminding me of The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins.

Monday: Cagliari (Island of Sardinia), Italy

Full of delicious food after a lovely tour of an olive oil factory and a winery followed by a two hour dinner in the dining room. With so many beautiful places to see, and everyone giving me things to eat and drink – plus a bit of rough sailing on rough seas -- I’d have to say felt a bit like Alice's Adventures in Wonderland!

Tuesday: Palma de Mallorca, Spain

Ferdinand the Bull, who adored flowers in The Story of Ferdinand, would have loved the flower markets here. One of the loveliest cities I have ever visited. The sights and smells were heavenly!

Wednesday: Barcelona, Spain

So beautiful. But so much traffic. And I almost got killed by a speeding scooter as I crossed the road. Much like Mrs. Mallard in Make Way for Ducklings!

Thursday: Aix-en-Provence and Marseilles, France

Started my morning with the most delicious chocolate cream-filled éclair in Provence, and finished my afternoon drinking un chocolat chaud in a sidewalk café. Okay – it wasn’t Paris – but as group after group of children passed me on the streets speaking French, I couldn’t help but think of Madeleine.

Friday: Savona and Genoa, Italy
The crocodiles in the Genoa Aquarium, and
the reproduction pirate ship outside it – were reminiscent of Peter Pan!

Saturday: Back to Rome

Digging through my suitcase for a pair of clean socks, and feeling a lot like Harry the Dirty Dog. The only thing I really wanted to see here was the Coliseum. Not just for the beautiful architecture (and certainly not for its gory history ) but because I had heard that many, many feral cats live there. I saw only one. But she/he strongly resembled Sacha, a cat I adored for fourteen years. (Maybe a place that has seen so much death makes it easier for spirits to visit their loved ones, and it was her?) In any case, she/he completed my visit, and made me smile remembering the way she used to sleep draped over my shoulders as I wrote university essays, teacher’s college projects, short stories and even the early bits of Painting Caitlyn. I have other special cats in my life now. But thinking about Sacha, and a friend who passed away last year at the end of March Break, reminded me of The Tenth Good Thing About Barney.

Sunday: Home via London

…with thoughts of A Bear Called Paddington whirling amidst the suitcases and British accents!

My Quebec...Caitlyn's Quebec

2011-02-12T08:11:00.000-08:00

Bonjour tout le monde!

I am wearing my "teacher hat" this week. I've brought 21 of my grade 7 and 8 students to Quebec City for a SEVEC exchange! It's an amazing program through which we were "twinned" with another school. Each of my students spends a week billeting at the home of one of their students, and during the day, we all come together for touristy educational activities. In May, our twins will visit Beaverton!

But the author in me is coming out this week, too. The fictional exchange that Caitlyn does in Maybe Never, Maybe Now was based on a combination of the last SEVEC exchange I organized, and the six week summer immersion program I did between high school and university. And we spent yesterday visiting many of the places described in the book. Places such as the Chateau Frontenac,

(This picture was actually taken a few years ago - the walkway below is undergoing reconstruction.)

Place Royale:

And the sculpture, Dialogue with History - it's the white squarish thing between the buildings below. For a better shot, see photographer Jonathan Houle's website.

Today, we are off to the Quebec Winter Carnival.

Salut!

What's in a Name?

2011-01-28T18:07:00.000-08:00

A lot.

And just like people judge books by their titles, I judge books by the characters' names.

I understand that authors want memorable characters.

I understand that a name says something about a character, such as how old they are, or what their parents are like.

But I hate, hate, hate it when characters have weird names.

I'm not talking about names from languages other than English. Those are cool.

I'm talking about the HUGE number of YA books that have female protagonists with traditionally male names, like "Max" or "Eddie" - which honestly hardly ever happens in real life, but seems in fiction to be an every day occurance.

Or the more unusual, such as characters who explain that they were named after bottles of alcohol, or the diner where their parents met, or whatever.

I don't know why it bugs me so much. Some of my favourite names in real life are rare and unusual. And Taiton and Destiny were kind enough to "loan" me their names for Definitely Not Camelot, so I guess I've done it, too.

But Taiton needed a name from an unspecified non-English speaking place (more on that later). And Destiny was a minor character.

When I'm reading about an unusually named main character, it distracts me.

And it makes it feel as if the author is trying too hard to show how unique and special his or her character is.

Kind of like parents who give their kids long, fancy monikers with Roman numerals at the end.

Reason to smile...

2011-01-25T18:04:00.000-08:00

This video.

Movies, Martinis, and Manicures

2011-01-23T11:15:00.001-08:00

On Thursday, I attended my second Movies, Martinis and Manicures event at The Roxy theatre in Uxbridge, Ontario.

It's a fundraiser which they theme around a chick flick. This year's movie was the 1997 flick My Best Friend's Wedding. We received mini veils with our tickets, and garters upon arrival. Guests were encouraged to send in their actual wedding photos in advance for inclusion in a slideshow on the big screen before the event, as well as to dress up in wedding attire.

I did send this wedding pic (circa 1994 - the glasses betray the date, but I think my dress and hair still have a classic feel). It's one of my faves, because a) it's casual and b) my eyes are actually open.

But I have to admit that I caved on the costume factor, for a number of reasons: I didn't want to wreck any of my good dresses, some of them don't fit right now, and I just really, really, really hate being cold. This is not me acting like an old lady. This is me being honest about who I am, and always have been. Even in high school, when everyone else was wearing running shoes through th snow and pulling their hands inside their sleeves and their shoulders up to their ears thinking that looked "cooler" than dressing properly for winter weather, I was the exception in boots, mittens, and hats or earmuffs. So let's just say that the other night I wore "Vegas wedding" attire:

(that's my friend Mary beside me).

So, pre-show, we ate wedding themed hors d'oeuvres, bit on silent auction items, had our pictures taken, and got our nails done by a number of local manicurists who donated their own time. Then they set us up with popcorn, a dessert table, and a "candy buffet". The candy buffet got me to thinking about the differences between children and adults. When you are a kid, it sounds like a dream to have enough money and independence to go to the candy store whenever you want and buy as much as you want. When you are an adult, you can. But most of us don't. And then when you find yourself at a fundraiser filling small paper bags with Glossettes, licorice, gummi bears, etc., you get crazy excited! At least, the women I saw did.

Anyway, the biggest gasp of the night came during the opening scene of the movie, when Julia Roberts' character reached into her handbag and pulled out a GIANT cell phone which she not only had to flip open, but also raise the antenna on. Crazy!

Four Things I Wish I'd Known Years Ago

2011-01-16T10:30:00.000-08:00

(Ahem). Allow me to share with you the wisdom of my years, and pass along four bits of knowledge that have been LIFE CHANGING for me.

1) You can freeze lemon slices. This way, you always have them ready for a glass of water or a cup of tea. They act as ice cubes to cool down your drink. And you don't end up with a bunch of shrivelled up half-used lemons in the back of your fridge.

2) A disposable razor stored in a lidded jar of rubbing alcohol stays sharp and lasts ten times longer. Seriously - it does. And you only need enough alcohol to cover the blade.

3) Bacon is easy to cook - and far less messy - if you do it on parchment paper in the oven. Obviously, you need to use a cookie sheet with sides. Line it with parchment paper (I like to double up the thickness). Lay bacon out in strips. Cook in low oven - about 300 degrees F. for 20 - 30 minutes. Comes out cheaper and better than the pre-cooked stuff, there's no splattering, and it's easy to do a whole package this way in advance for a brunch. (I got this tip, and a lot of great recipes, by attending a cooking class with a humble chef. Check out his blog!)

4) Everyone should have a laundry hampers with separate sections for different colours. Mine has three removable mesh bags. I didn't think I spent a lot of time sorting laundry before, but this one makes it super fast and super easy to guage whether or not you have enough of one colour to run a load, grab it, and get it in.

You're welcome!

If only there was a way to work some chocolate into this...

2011-01-11T18:16:00.001-08:00

I just stumbled upon the coolest contest, featuring many, many things I love!

1) Cats
2) Black cats
3) Funny pictures
4) An excuse to surf the internet
5) The opportunity to write
6) Books!

In my world, that's almost a perfect evening!

Author Sean Cummings has posted an LOL Cats contest, featuring Gary in a pink bathtub.

(Exhibit A)

All YOU have to do to win a copy of Sean's book UNSEEN WORLD is come up with the funniest caption for Gary's photo.

Here's my submission:

All Hail the Digital Age of Publishing!

2011-01-09T12:32:00.000-08:00

Key Porter Books announced this week that it has "suspended publishing operations and is considering selling off parts of its backlist. "

Yikes!

Canadian publishers have had a rough couple of years, and there's been a lot of speculation about how digital publishing, e-books, etc. are going to change the industry. Yes, some traditional publishers will fall away in the shuffle. But I'm not sure that the digital reading revolution is going to be as terrible as some think.

Consider the music industry.

Back in my day - aka, the 80's - the sharing of music was very uncommon. You might copy an LP onto a cassette tape for yourself, to play in your oh-so-tiny (see my tongue in my cheek?) Sony Walkman, or receive a mixed tape from your boyfriend if he really liked you, but it wasn't a common thing to share and trade the albums you'd purchased. For one thing, they were pricey. And volatile. Tapes could get "eaten" by rogue equipment; albums were easily scratched/dirtied/warped. Copying things was also time consuming, as making a mixed tape using several LPs meant you had to sit through each song, pausing the tape recorder after each selection. It used to take all day.

Fast forward to 2011: all I have to do to get new music is click a couple of buttons. If I'm clever, I don't even need to pay for it. I also don't need cumbersome tapes or discs, because I can store it all on my hard drive, or an mp3 player. And even though I'd be breaking copyright, I can post that music on other file sharing sites, providing it for free to millions of others.

Digitization, then, for the music industry, has probably meant lower sales, and lower revenues.

But for the publishing industry, it may work in the opposite way.

Let's go back to the 80's. Or even 2005, before I had the inside scoop on royalties.

Books were the original victims of "file sharing". If I got a book I liked, I would recommend it to someone else. And then I'd hand it to them. And they'd hand it to someone else. And so on, and so on. In fact, I'm pretty sure that my friend Karen's $5.95 copy of Flowers in the Attic made it's way through every girl in my grade seven class without one of us ever going out to purchase a copy. Books are easy to share, because unlike albums, we aren't as likely to revisit them, even if we love them. Besides which: the more we love them, the more we want other people to read them, so that we can talk about them. And so they have traditionally been passed around, person to person, in much the same way that digital music is shared today.

Digital books will actually reverse this trend. Perhaps having learned from the music industry, e-readers don't make it easy to share files. And the equipment required to read an e-book is expensive - and personal - enough that even when I enjoy something, I am NOT going to hand over my Kindle to someone else to read. Instead, I'll recommend it. And they will buy their own copy, so both publisher and the author will receive the royalties that they deserve.

Here's another little secret that I learned years ago, but have been amazed to discover that so many others don't know: the publishing industry has traditionally had a ridiculous, environmentally irresponsible model that needed to be overhauled. Here's how it works: books are printed and shipped to bookstores. Six months go by. Bookstores need more space. They return unsold books to the publishers. Who else does that? Seriously. Can you imagine a grocery store sending unsold lettuce back to the farmer who grew it? There is absolutely no pressure whatsoever on the bookstore to research its product or order responsibly, because they aren't going to get stuck with anything unsold. And they don't even have to pay for return shipping, because massmarket paperbacks just get the covers ripped off of them and then get destroyed. The covers are much lighter and less expensive to ship, and tearing them off for return proves to the publisher that they actually went unsold, so the bookstore doesn't get billed for them. Picture the same system in a jewelery store:

Hmm..this batch of diamond rings didn't sell! Oh well!
We'll just rip the gemstones out of their settings and send back the gold to
prove it....then we don't have to pay our supplier for any of the
unsold rings, and the publisher can just absorb the manufacturing costs themselves! <>

Pretty dumb, eh?

If ebooks can eliminate that kind of waste and stupidity then bookstores and publishers can both get paid for the things that sell, and
nobody has to take any extra hits for things that don't.

Best of all, trees don't have to die for my art.

Where does inspiration end and Copyright Infringement begin?

2011-01-04T18:57:00.001-08:00

I've been thinking about art, and copyrights, ever since Boxing Day, when I read about this issue in The Toronto Star. They had a cover contest for an "emerging artist," promising to publish the winning entry - themed around Christmas in Toronto - on their front cover on Christmas Eve. And pay the winner $2500! (One wonders what might have happened if there had actually been BIG NEWS that day. But I digress.)

The winning illustration was BEAUTIFUL - an impressionistic "streetcars-in-snow" painting that captures the beauty of the season amidst the hustle and bustle.

The problem, however, was that the winning artist may have been "inspired" by a photo she saw on Flickr. She didn't mention it to anyone until the photographer approached The Star, at which time she claimed to have looked at a lot of photos for inspiration. You can see the comparison here, but to me, the composition and tones are so similar that there is no question that her work is based on his.

So is it copying? Or being inspired? Would it have been different if she had contacted the photographer, or acknowledged him in the original article?

And just when I was feeling completely indignant on behalf of the photographer, my friend Kirsten Koza sent me this very cool website, wherein artist Dave Devries embellishes children's drawings to look like professional illustrations. So magnificent. Or so awful. Maybe he's enhancing their work to make it appear the way they envisioned it. Or maybe he's saying that the way they did it themselves wasn't actually good enough.

As an art teacher, I struggle with that concept all the time. The "less-is-more" part of me (which, I'm sure you've noticed, is only the part that does my hair, and cleans my house, and creates visual art - not the part that tries to write short blog entries and then can't stop....) wants my students NOT to write their names in giant letters on the middle of the page. NOT to make fifty snowmen floating on the page at all sorts of weird angles. NOT to entirely cover their shiny silver ornament, carefully decorated with a handprint that becomes snowmen, in red Sharpie marker. But I don't want to squash their creativity, or make them feel that their work isn't valid.

On the other hand, when they ask, and I can help by suggesting we move a line a little to the left, or by making it more symmetrical, I love to see how delighted and proud they are as their art becomes more like that which they imagined.

I think we all - young and old - would love to have an art makeover by Dave Devries.

As long as we know he's doing it.

Oops - now I have to do another supersized post!

2010-12-31T10:45:00.000-08:00

(Ahem). So many things to write about. So little time to sit down and do so.

Logically, I should save my topics (or pre-write them) and post more regularly. But someof them are "timely", and realistically, I just don't know if I'll get around to doing them individually anyway. So this post will be both eclectic and lengthy. Grab a snack. But don't whine to me about gaining "three pounds". Three pounds is nothing. Three pounds is just eat some fibre and away you go. And when you are clearly at a healthy weight, complaining about "three pounds" I don't know what to say because a) you may just be looking for validation but b) if I DO think you've gained too much weight you're either going to make me a liar (no - really - you look great!) or a big meany (yeah, those pants do actually make you look kind of chunky). And c) it makes me think you're a bit of a meany because - seriously - I need to lose quite a few more than three pounds and if you are being that harsh with yourself, I can only imagine what you are thinking about me. (You can deny it, and I can even believe it's possible that you're not directing your judgment to me, because we're usually harder on ourselves than on others, but remember: I am a WRITER. I will IMAGINE your internal dialogue and PUT WORDS INTO YOUR MOUTH if you give me reason to do so. I'm not saying you shouldn't be proactive and lose that three pounds before it breeds into twenty...I'm just saying pretend you are French and deal with it quietly.

And speaking of breeding and multiplying...remember Me, The Cat Lady? The saga continues. I have't seen my neighbour's black and white cat (identified in the post as "Sylvester") since summertime. I did ask my neighbour about him, because I was worried...and he said Sylvester was "at the neighbour's". Then he got into his car and drove away. Fast forward to the beginning of wintery weather - the grey and white one (identified as "Tweety") is cold. He has nothing to eat. He is hanging out in the driveway under our boat. He begins sneaking in. Majik loves him. They snuggle up together in the basement. Often. I leave a note for my neighbour saying "he's over here a lot - come get him". I hear nothing. I don't want to be accused of stealing him...but he likes it here. A lot. I don't think of it as cat burglering when he's free to come and go at will. And when he's just next door. And when his "family" (can you call them that, if they ignore him???) has been notified of his whereabouts. "Tweety" doesn't make sense as a name without Sylvester around. I'm calling him "Merlin" now. It keeps up with the magic imagery, and it's also a type of airplane. Even the cat-resistors in the house (yes, that includes Spencer) love him. So one year after Majik joined me (happy anniverary little guy!) I have gone from cat-less to cat-blessed. How cool is that?

Other stuff going on around here:

I went skiing the other night, just before Christmas, by myself. I'm very comfortable by myself, and when I'm doing anything even remotely athletic, I actually prefer it, because I can do things at my own pace. I especially love going at night because it's never crowded, and it becomes almost meditative for me as I glide down the hills, or float up on the chair lift. The other night, they were making snow, which added to the ethereal feel. Here's a picture:

And, speaking of Christmas, we did something different this year and STAYED HOME on Christmas Eve. Wow. Loved it. Woke up rested and not feeling grinchy on Christmas Day. Must do it again. Watched It's a Wonderful Life, which I have seen before, but only once. Thought it was kind of funny that, had the Jimmy Steward character never been born, the whole town would have fallen to ruin, men would have been jailbirds, alcoholics, poverty-stricken and homeless but the worst fate they could come up with for the woman who was his wife was that, without him, she would have been "an old-maid librarian". HA! I'm trying to re-frame it, and look at it from the point of view that she would have missed out on having love in her life, which would be tragic for anyone, but still, it's funny. And it says a lot about the era in which the movie was produced.

My favourite gift was this, from my husband:

It's a framed compilation of all of my book covers (including the French version of Painting Caitlyn). So cool. Thank you, Lobster Press, for coordinating the colours to look great together!

And speaking of Lobster Press, I see from their website that their "Grim Hill" series is about to become an animated television series. Jealous.

Are you still reading? Thanks! Happy New Year!

The Holiday Newsletter...

2010-12-12T16:50:00.000-08:00

Where did November go? Why didn't I post? I don't exactly know...

Same thing happened to 2010 (and, to be honest, pretty much every decade since 1989).

Which leads me to today's hot topic: the holiday newsletter.

This is the time of year when magazines, bloggers, sitcoms and even comic strips are criticizing the holiday newsletters that some people send in their Christmas cards.

I, for one, am not going to take it anymore. I'm going to shout it out into the blogosphere: I LOVE HOLIDAY NEWSLETTERS!

And, yes, I write them, too.

I love catching up with my busy friends' lives via their holiday letters. I adore hearing about the great things happening in their families, and I don't consider it "braggy" for someone to share happy news, because I am happy FOR THEM. (Your kid made the honour roll? AWESOME! You finally took that tropical vacation? Hooray! More people should do that, because it's good for your health, and good for relationships, and actually makes the world economy go round...)

It means so much more to me to read a letter than to just open a card with a generic signature, because it reconnects me with the people who sent it.

Yes, it would be better to spend face to face time with people. Yes, the telephone is always an option. But timezones and schedules are often hard to sync, and even when calls happen, it's impossible to say everything.

So I'll probably be sending my own newsletter again, complete as always with pics of the dog and cat in funny Santa hats, because I don't have any kids to include. Some of the people I send it to might think it's hokey, or braggy when I say I published two books this year, but I hope that the people who care about me will delight in my good fortune as I delight in theirs.

On Friendship

2010-11-07T17:43:00.001-08:00

I've been thinking a lot about friendship lately. Partly, I think, because of my recent visit to my former high school, and reunion with some university pals. Then, someone posted a comment about my books saying that they love books about friendship. And when I was doing the TRT Book Club interview, and thinking about how we all write about certain themes, I realized that friendship is one of my themes.

You know how some people spend their whole lives looking for that one perfect romantic partner, because they've read all the romances and seen all the movies about how it's supposed to be? And then the real people - the ones who burp and have messy hair and leave their dirty socks lying around - never seem to measure up to the Handsome Prince on a white horse that Person Number One imagined in their dreams?

I think I've spent a lot of my life suffering from that same kind of delusion - only instead of looking for the Handsome Prince/Romance, I've spent a lot of time in search of The BFF (Best Friend Forever).

Don't get me wrong: I have some amazing friends. Amazing. People who let me cry all over them for months on end when I needed to. People who let me call them out of the blue when they haven't heard from me in months, and are totally there for me anyway. People who have celebrated birthdays with me since we were nine years old. People who honoured me first by choosing me as a maid of honour, and then again by letting me do it a second time when their first marriage didn't "take". People who make me laugh and make me smarter and make me feel good about myself.

But just as happens with romances, I've had my "break-ups", too. Sometimes it's circumstantial, but other times, there has been no explanation, and they have simply disappeared, leaving me with that "it's not you, it's me..." feelling that always makes you think it really is you.

Which it may be. Because maybe I've got my own "intimacy issues". While part of me thinks I want that BFF who will there for me every day -- and who will want me to be there for her - another part of me - a part that I think is more authentically me - doesn't always want that kind of pressure. (I know, I know - if it's true friendship, it shouldn't feel like pressure, right?)

I love having time to myself! I get crabby when it doesn't happen. Ask my husband. Or my sister. Or my mom. Or anyone who has ever spent more than six hours straight with me. Even if we're doing something "fun".

Apparently, it started early. My mom tells me that even when I was very young, my sister would play and play and play with other children, while I would hang out for a bit, then quietly remove myself, go into my room, and just be.

I'm still like that. I enjoy hanging out with other people. I adore good conversation. But I need time alone too much to give all I have to any one "best" friend.

Instead, I have many, have had many, and hope to have many yet to come.

And in the meantime, I'll keep writing about friendship. And maybe I'll learn something about it along the way.

What to do on a November weekend?

2010-11-06T13:50:00.001-07:00

Why not curl up on a good book?

Me, the Crocodile Hunter

2010-10-31T12:29:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, my last-minute costumes are the biggest success. I raided my husband's closet for most of this...added a net for humour (not showing) and stuffed the pockets with some crocodile puppets I use at school. The costume was so effective, I even "caught" a child-sized croc, pictured here but airbrushed as I didn't ask her family for permission to post on the internet. Got a ton of compliments!

Happy Halloween!

Yippee!

2010-10-28T17:53:00.001-07:00

1. Another excellent review for Maybe Never, Maybe Now. Page Turner's Blog calls it a "fantastic follow-up to Painting Caitlyn" and "a wonderful read".

2. My book trailer took third place in the October contest over at You Gotta Read Videos.

3. Tomorrow is Halloween at school! (but no costume yet...)

4. Here is the picture of me and my friends at our alumni dinner!

Meet me over at TRTBlogspot!

2010-10-27T17:16:00.000-07:00

I'm the "guest" at the Teens Read Too blog today! Come see me there, and maybe win a prize!

Back to the Future!

2010-10-25T18:48:00.000-07:00

Okay - so as promised, more info on the high school/university visits the other day!

On Friday, I went back to Cameron Heights Collegiate Institute. It's the high school I attended, and I haven't been back since I graduated in 1988. I went to play "alumni author", read to the group of girls who gave up their lunch hour to come meet me, and then chatted up the Writer's Craft class in the exact classroom that was my first homeroom. SO FUN! Back when I was taking Writer's Craft, we were promised an extra 3% on our grades if we could get published - in any form - during the year. I wrote a letter to the editor of the local paper complaining about some really rude, denigrating jokes about women and was THRILLED when I got my name in print. Not, as it turned out, because of the 3%, which didn't really excite me all that much, but because someone thought something I'd written was worth putting in print. (You have to bear with me and understand that this was WAAAY before the internet, blogging opportunities, etc. People had to actually pick up pens to write things, and you were really "high-tech" if you had an electric typewriter).

Anyway, it seems that not a lot has changed, physically, in that building. Some pics:

A mural that was painted (not by me) during my time there, and remains today:

One of these lockers is the last one I ever had. Still know what the combination was, and remember clearly that Mike Raletic's locker was on my right, and Christa Ptatschek's locker was on my left, but couldn't pick the actual locker out of the line-up (sniff!):

A locker decorated for someone's birthday, just as we used to do, and described in my book Painting Caitlyn:

After the high school visit, I headed over to the University of Waterloo for the 50th anniversary of it's Faculty of Arts, where I sat with some of the smartest women I know. My friend Wendi, Executive Director of the Foodbank of Waterloo Region. Theresa (my first roomate!) works for Kraft Foods, and is partially responsible for hilarity like this bit on chocolate. And the ever effervescent Sandy is now perfectly positioned as a Twitter goddess (@sassygirlcanada) and communications expert for Research In Motion (yes, the Blackberry people). I don't see them often. But when I do, it's super fun. And since this was an alumni event, we were younger than almost everyone else, easily making us still the hottest girls in the place! (will post pics of us when I get copies of the ones the photographer took).

Finally, here's what the high school and the university had in common:

THEY BOTH GAVE ME FANCY CHOCOLATE!!!

Around the world in Five Short Days...(at least, that's what it felt like)

2010-10-24T19:06:00.000-07:00

Last week was crazy. I keep saying I have to cut that out, 'cuz it's my own fault if I'm busy, but it was FUN crazy. I'll try to make the basic explanation quick (but you know I love to type)...

Monday: Art History night at the Georgina Arts Centre and Gallery with my friend Joanne.
Tuesday: Agility Class at Paus n' Train with my dog. Here is a brief video showing how much he loves it:

Wednesday: At school until 6 p.m. getting ready for two days of supply teachers.
Thursday: Teaching other teachers at the Board Office until 3 p.m., then back to the Beaverton Public Library for an author appearance at 4 p.m., followed by a meeting with parents about a school trip at 7 p.m., and a trip to Kitchener at 9 p.m.
Friday: Two author type thing-ys at Cameron Heights Collegiate Institute (the high school I attended!) followed by dinner with longtime university pals Wendi, Theresa and Sandy at the University of Waterloo's Faculty of Arts 50th Anniversary Event .

More on the high school/university flashbacks (with pics) tomorrow.

Caitlyn's finding her voice!

2010-10-20T19:57:00.001-07:00

Even with the new books out, the old ones live on. Page Turner's Blog just reviewed Painting Caitlyn. I can hardly believe that it's been four years since it was first released, but am so thrilled that it continues to touch people. My favourite part of the review was this: "marvelous". I also love that the website is highliting domestic abuse for the entire month of October, and the reviewer went out of her way to highlight Ten Warning Signs of Abuse. Marvelous!

Tomorrow: The Beaverton Public Library, 4 p.m.

Friday: My former high school, Cameron Heights Collegiate, in Kitchener, ON.

Release Day!!!!

2010-10-15T18:47:00.000-07:00

Dinner with friends, too much food/wine/champagne/baklava.

Need to sleep.

Two days until release, and another solid review...

2010-10-13T18:53:00.000-07:00

Thank you to CM Magazine for the following kind words about Definitely Not Camelot:

"Like Caitlyn from Peters' other books, Ashley is a very relatable teen...the author does a commendable job of portraying the wide range of emotions that a teen who is faced with a parent's serious illness might experience...she also adeptly captures the high school environment in which rumours and jealousies and misunderstandings can all lead to a situation in which a young person quickly feels like s/he is losing control. Whether readers have read the preceding book Posing as Ashley, or are meeting her for the first time, they will most certainly enjoy the experience."

MNMN on You Gotta Read Videos!

2010-10-11T16:35:00.000-07:00

Okay - so again, I'm a bit behind...partly due to some surgery in the family that required my presence, and partly due to "the cold that wouldn't die", which I've been fighting since the first week of September. Started in my throat. Went to my sinuses. Sat there for three weeks. Hopped back down my throat, slid into my lungs...has basically left me a hacking, disgusting mess. And all I want to do is sleep.

But I musn't sleep, because there is so much great book news happening! For one thing, the trailer for Maybe Never, Maybe Now , is on You Gotta Read Videos this month. Visit! Vote for it! Watch some other trailers and find something else that's good to read! (but still vote for me!).

Happy Thanksgiving, my fellow Canadians!

Download a chapter for free! Yay!

2010-10-03T15:07:00.000-07:00

Hi all - Maybe Never, Maybe Now and Definitely Not Camelot are out in less than two weeks! Yay!

Amazon is still listing their author as simply "Kimberly Peters", and therefore not cross-referencing with their award winning predecessors, Painting Caitlyn and Posing as Ashley. Boo!

Lobster Press is offering you the chance to download a free first chapter RIGHT NOW! Yay!

I'm still sick with a bad cold. Boo.

Maybe Never Maybe Now got some good reviews! Yay!

I just found out my website had a bad link, and wasn't directing everyone to all of my books. Boo.

It's fixed now. Yay!

Things that creep me out...

2010-09-20T18:15:00.000-07:00

I'm not afraid of spiders. They don't bother me - although they can be kind of tickly on bare skin - and their webs are beautiful. Arachnaphobia is something I've never understood. Snakes don't bug me much, either. Bears? More scared of me than I of them. Likewise wolves. So what do I worry about when I'm out walking my dog? Finding a body. A dead, decaying, corpse. Or a fresh one. Either way, the idea freaks me out. And unlike the attack of the killer spider (seriously, how often have you heard of THAT happening in Canada?), dog walkers find dead bodies all the time. It's a disgusting fact of life, but a) dog walkers are out in the same kind of sideroad/brush/field/forested/watery areas that appeal to killers who need to dump bodies and b) dogs just love to roll in dead stuff.

Granted, I am a writer, and I do have an active imagination. Still, you can imagine where my mind went when I ran into this lovely find this afternoon....

Thank goodness I don't live in British Columbia where the shoes wash up with the feet still in them.

Some Things are Worth the Time...

2010-09-13T11:23:00.000-07:00

I was back at school officially for seven work days, only four of which I had to teach, and already I have come down with a brutal head cold. Sore throat, plugged ears, painful sinuses (sini? what's the plural there?), the whole works.

I don't even feel like reading. Which, for me, means I'm pretty messed up. And I ended up watching more television this weekend than I normally would for this time of year, when the weather is still okay and I am busy with back to work stuff and the new shows aren't on yet anyway.

And over and over, I kept seeing this stupid commercial for mashed potatoes. Except they aren't actually mashed yet. They are just potatoes. And they have their own commercial.

Because, according to the ad, "who has time to make mashed potatoes?"

Umm, I would think pretty much anyone who can figure out that a ten pound bag of potatoes for $2.49 is a much better deal than one bowl of potatoes for $2.99 on sale with a coupon (yes, I just Googled a grocery store flyer to make sure my facts were correct).

I'm not naming the product, because I don't want to get in trouble for my disparaging attitude, but their name implies purity of product. And the ingredients list says potatoes and sodium phosphate (whose first definition FYI is "used as a laxative to cleanse the bowels"). Mmmm. Yummy.

The rationale for this product is that nobody has time for all the washing, peeling and cutting. By purchasing the new kind "home-made" potatoes and simply adding your own ingredients after you've steamed them in the microwave, you can mash them yourself.

Honestly, I thinkn it would slow down my dinner preparations MORE to find the bag in the freezer and microwave it than to rinse four potatoes, peel them, and drop them into a pot of water. but apparently I've been doing it wrong all these years, because I don't scrub vigorously when i know I'm peeling. And I don't do a bunch of cutting when i know I'm mashing. Silly me.

We all have places where we cut corners. I do love "no boil" lasagna noodles, because I can't detect a difference, and they save a couple of major steps. And pancake mix that just needs water probably has a lot of weird ingredients, but can be pretty awesome when you are camping and don't want to waste cooler space on milk, eggs, and oil.

Other things, to me, are worth spending extra time on. Like homemade macaroni and cheese. Or hanging my laundry outside: it smells better, the fabric lasts longer, I use less energy, and it gets me outside at least a couple of times, even on days when I'm doing housework. Still<> And maybe the real reason they are so pressed for time is that instead of putting a roast in the slowecooker or oven ahead of time (total prep time if you add a half cup of water: 2 minutes) and boiling their potatoes on the stove top, they're waiting for the microwave to finish one dish so they can put the second one in before running out to get a payday loan because their roast beef dinner cost $15.00 without leftovers instead of $9.99 with enough left over for another dinner and a couple of lunches.

it's almost enough to make me wish I was teaching math again. Someone has to.

(Sigh)

2010-08-31T12:58:00.001-07:00

Summer's over and I've got Poison Ivy again.

Contemplation

2010-08-16T18:57:00.000-07:00

There is a message on my answering machine from an internationally recognized radio and television personality. I won't say who, because I'd like to protect their privacy, but I will acknowledge that this person cottages just across the street from me, and that 9 out of 10 of my friends would immediately recognize the voice if I replayed the message for them.

The message is about the Georgina Arts Centre and Gallery's Dinah Christie Celebrity Challenge. The Celebrity Challenge is a fundraiser for children's art programs at the gallery, which raises money by auctioning off small paintings by celebrities.

I am not a celebrity. Certainly, not like my neighbour. But the gallery is nearby and a few years ago when they were initiating the idea, and my first book had just been published, a friend nominated me as a bit of a local celebrity. They were desperate, I got in.

Anyway, this year I asked my oh-so-much-more-famous neighbour to participate. And the response on my answering machine is "thank you, but no - I haven't got an artistic bone in my body and it would just cause me too much angst."

Angst? Angst??? How could this simple thing cause angst? I wondered. All you have to do is paint a picture...

(This is my 2010 submission. It's called "Contemplation," and you can buy it at the auction this Saturday night, August 21st, at the auction described above.)

All you have to do is paint a picture.

And yet. And yet if it was a celebrity softball tournament, I wouldn't consider it for a second. I can't catch flying objects, and I barely run fast enough to catch a cold! I don't do sports. My neighbour doesn't do art.

All of which got me thinking about a conversation I had with my aunt a few weeks ago. I was telling her about a friend of mine who, back in high school, had marks that averaged in the 90's, held a part time job, and still always made time for other people. (Later, she skipped her master's degree and went straight into a doctoral program, giving birth to her first child while preparing her doctoral thesis because - what the heck - she was off anyway!) "I think that's one of the things I really liked best about her," I explained. "She just does all these great things and makes it look easy, but I never have the sense that she's bragging or putting anyone else down," I said to my aunt.

"Although," I admitted, "sometimes I feel really pathetic in comparison. Like when I called to tell her I'd been accepted into teacher's college, and found out that she had just accepted a job as a univerity professor. I just don't personally feel that I can ever measure up to her."

"You know," my aunt said gently, "there are probably people who look at you, and the fact that you work full time and teach other teachers for the school board and write books, and think you're pretty accomplished, too."

She may be right, but I hadn't thought about it that way, because I -- like many people -- tend to compare myself to others who seem more accomplished, and focus on what I haven't yet achieved. It's probably okay to think that way if it keeps me humble or drives me try new things, but maybe we all need to believe in ourselves, and our abilities, a little more often.

When is a book no longer yours?

2010-08-06T13:42:00.001-07:00

I did an author appearance last week at a summer school class (hi girls!) and one of the questions that came up - as it often does - was "how do you pick the titles for your books?" In explaining that I have (thus far) been extremely lucky, and had the full support of my editor on all of my titles, we then got into a discussion about the editorial process, and the types of changes that happen throughout. My experiences with editing have ranged from the painless (Can we change "my parents will kill me" to "I'll be grounded for life"?) to gut-wrenching (No. Because of x, y and z, you absolutely can not include that plot element)...and, I suspect from reading other author's blogs that my experiences are not unique. And yet, the girls at summer school were - as most people outside of the publishing industry tend to be - absolutely SHOCKED that ANYONE besides an author should get any say in what gets written. Even when I got my first contract, I didn't yet understand that like a close friend who will be totally honest when you shop for bathing suits, a brilliant editor (and I have had them) will point out all of the opportunities for improvement, as well as the things that are already strong. Authors tend to get the credit for successful books, but good editors go a long way towards getting them there.

And then, there are ghost writers. The other night I was in a large chain bookstore in downtown Toronto, and found myself beside a huge line-up of book buyers all waiting for the "author" to sign their purchases. I put "author" in quotes because the person whose name appeared on the book - the person who was doing the autographs -- is actually the former drummer of a very popular 80's rock band. (Yes, I have their greatest hits, no, I'm not naming names). And maybe he did write his own memoirs - Jimmy Buffet has actually carved out quite a nice little fiction empire for himself - but I'll be honest: I wondered. Did this guy actually sit down at a keyboard and TYPE? Or did he do some interviews, and just approve the copy that came back to him? Is he still the author, if it's his life story but he didn't write a word? And more importantly, if it's a compelling story, does anybody actually care? Last January, The New York Times published this fascinating piece about author James Patterson's stable of ghost writers. And I've been thinking about it ever since. Then, today, I read this little blurb about creativity, which suggests, of all things, that group brainstorming DOES NOT WORK, and the theory that it does was actually disproved in 1958!!! So take that, army of ghost writers - James Patterson might be richer, but I can be more creative without you!

Swimming at sunset

2010-08-04T18:54:00.001-07:00

Me, a pool noodle, a warm night, and the sun setting over the lake.

Summer really doesn't get any better than this.

Unless there's chocolate.

Look! I caught a sunset!

Book trailer for Maybe Never, Maybe Now

2010-08-04T09:38:00.000-07:00

Watch this space for a contest related to this trailer!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEYoVpmH5p4

I Write Like...

2010-08-02T20:00:00.000-07:00

I Write like Lewis Carroll!

...or, at least, I did in my earler blog post "Me, the Cat Lady", which was the sample text I inserted HERE, on the "I Write Like..." text analyzer.

But when I insert the edited opening paragraphs of my new novel, Maybe Never, Maybe Now I write like J. K. Rowling.

The opening paragraphs of Definitely Not Camelot link me to Vladimir Nabokov (whom I only know of through the old Police song, "Don't Stand so Close to Me" in which Sting sings: "It's no use/he sees her/he starts to shake and cough/just like the/old man in/that book by Nabokov."

And a paragraph I wrote for the first draft Definitely Not Camelot - a paragraph my editor cut - apparently resembles the style of Stephen King.

Huh.

Me, the Frog Lady

2010-07-29T11:39:00.001-07:00

...and this afternoon, I have nine froglets in total peeking up at me out of the pond. These three were very cozy.

Me, the Cat Lady

2010-07-27T19:13:00.001-07:00

Oliver-Henry (missing since July 26, 2009)

Majik (adopted through Toronto Cat Rescue, December 30, 2009)

Oscar (my mom's cat, who often visits, brought to me as a stray kitten in August, 1995)

The neighbour's cat. I call him Sylvester. Isn't his goatee great?

The neighbour's other cat. I call him Tweety. He is a polydactyl, with extra toes.

So it has been 366 days since Oliver-Henry disappeared from my mom's backyard in Kitchener, Ontario, during a light rainfall, after slipping out of her back door. As many of you know, I searched for him desperately, and grieved his loss powerfully. But little by little, I've had to let go. Among the things I tried:

- Kijiji, Craigslist, and other internet classified ads
- begging for his return on Facebook, on my website, and on television when I appeared on What's Your Point? in December
- a Google alert that searched the internet every day for blogs and other postings for "found cats", and then sent that information to my inbox. I can now say, after a year of reading the results, that Michigan and Las Vegas sure have a lot of homelss kitties!
- hand delivering 1000 flyers to homes in my mom's neighbourhood
- asking employees of two of Kitchener's biggest employers (RIM and Manulife) to watch for him
- using regular mail to send colour posters and descriptions to every veterinarian's office in Kitchener-Waterloo
- enlisting the help of the local KW cat rescue organizations
- having my mom visit the Humane Society every other day for six months (after three days in the HS, the pound act says they can be put down or adopted out, so you have to check frequently. I hadn't been aware of this before).
- writing to several local churches, asking them to post his info in their bulletins-- offering author readings and rewards to nearby schools if they would share his description with their students
- maintaining a list of rescue organizations both in and outside KW and checking it regularly for updates

Despite all of my efforts, I did not find him. And that pisses me off! But I do feel that I made every reasonable effort, so although I will probably still be unable to stop myself from popping into Kijiji every once in a while, today I cancelled the Google alerts.

And it wasn't in vain. I do feel that I tried (no more goldfish-type dreams over this loss). I reunited a few other cats with their families, just by cross-referncing "lost cat" ads in one place with "found cat" ads in others. And also by searching someone out on Facebook. I experienced small-world coincidences, such as when I was contacted with a possible lead by author Marianne Paul, who I had never met, but who lives in my mom's neighbourhood and coincidentally had done an author reading one time with my fellow Lobster Press author, Christina Kilbourne.

And I got Majik (aka The Great Catsby)into my life.

When Oliver-Henry went missing, I kept saying that when the time was right, a new cat would come into my life. Lately, I've also been "parenting" several others. My neighbour decided in May that he would let his cats out. He then began using his house more as a cottage, and as far as I can tell, he is home only on Saturday nights. The rest of the time, his cats live in and around my garage. He does seem to leave a bowl of food out on Sunday afternoons, but the squirrels, raccons and skunks clean it out pretty quickly. I didn't start feeding "Sylvester" and "Tweety" (as I call them) until they began tearing open my garbage bags, but now they (and another, seemingly feral cat who won't let me near him) come regularly to dine. Add to that Taz, the cat from down the street, and my mom's cat, Oscar, who is visiting, and one would think that it would be cat-fight city out in my driveway, but so far, everyone seems to get along just beautifully, and I often find them sitting out there contentedly, together.

I've always loved cats. When I nine, I spent a week on my aunt's farm. First place I went every morning was out to the barn to feed the barn cats, even though most of them were wild and untouchable.

Before that, I'd fostered a batch of kittens with their mama cat, whom I'd found out in the woods while raspberry picking one summer.

I like to think that what goes around comes around, and if I love and take care of Majik, plus the brood outside, someone, somewhere, is loving and taking care of Oliver-Henry.

Why Jon Bon Jovi is my Edward Cullen

2010-07-25T16:09:00.000-07:00

1. The dazzling smile.
2. The superhuman powers (he can get 40,000 fans to sing, wave their arms, or freeze to listen in total silence, without saying a word).
3. He's been around forever, yet...
4. He doesn't seem to age
5. He has a way with words. ("You wanna make a memory..." Wow. So simple. And so much more romantic than most of the propositions I've heard over the years. )
6. He's loyal. Jon Bon Jovi -- one of the biggest rock stars ever -- is still married to his high school sweetheart. And I think that's the true appeal of both Edward and Jon - everyone wants to believe that there is one person out there who will be devoted to them forever.

Thanks to Samantha for this great site with footage of the July 21st concert at Rogers Centre in Toronto!

http://www.youtube.com/user/fictionmistress#p/u/0/jBmjloLLzyU

Memorables

2010-07-25T10:16:00.000-07:00

I'm listening to news of the Tour de France on the radio today, and remembering the race five years ago, when I just happened to be in Paris, and spontaneously decided to spend the afternoon watching the last laps. I'm not much of a sports fan, and I'd never watched the race on television before (nor have I since). But there is something about sharing a live experience with a crowd that just makes it special. Other once-in-a-lifetimes crowd things that come to mind include Rick Hansen's Man in Motion Tour, when I was in grade twelve, and getting up at five in the morning -- while at camp almost thirty years ago this week -- to watch the wedding of Lady Diana Spencer and Prince Charles. Back then, we didn't have CNN or YouTube or Yahoo to run repeats all day, so it was get up early with everyone else, or miss it altogether. And even though I wasn't actually at the wedding (though I was at Rick Hansen's Kitchener stop), there was something about watching it together, with everyone else from the camp, that made it more special.

I think that's why people still go to concerts. This week, I had the privilege of seeing Bon Jovi at the Rogers Centre in Toronto. Yes, I could have purchased a couple of their CD's for the ticket price I paid, and yes, the sound quality would have been better, and yes, I mostly watched the big screen anyway even though he was right there in front of me, but none of that would have given me that shared moment that comes from being at a live concert. When you are in a stadium, you just can't help but scream, and whistle, and stamp your feet along with everyone else. (Especially when JBJ flashes those pearly whites...but that's another blog post.)

Books aren't like that. Books are, by their very nature, solitary pursuits. But when you meet someone else who's been touched by a great story the way you have, and you connect over the shared enjoyment of it, a little bit of that shared elation shines through.

Hold Onto Sixteen, as Long as You Can....

2010-07-17T19:28:00.000-07:00

Above: a lyric from John Mellencamp's "Jack and Diane"...because I saw him in concert this week at Casino Rama! I'd been hoping, for a long time, to one day see him perform live (how long you ask? well, I can still remember when he was JOHNNY COUGAR..before I was sixteen!). And the tickets were still kind of expensive (mostly because Casino Rama shows generally run about 75 minutes, tops - they want people to go back out and gamble). But I was prepared to possibly be disappointed (yes, I'm a pessimist) because Mellencamp is almost sixty, because fifteen years ago, when I saw Rod Stewart--who would have only been about forty, the age I am now--he pulled out a stool, put on glasses, and read song lyrics like an old man. Ouch. Mellencamp, I am happy to report, did not disappoint. He sang. He danced. He chatted us up. He swore. He's obviously got the "hold onto sixteen" thing down.

Things I did this week to hold onto sixteen:
- went swimming in the lake
- went hot-tubbing with friends
- went to a Mellencamp concert!
- read a YA novel (Somewhere in Blue)
- ate chocolate syrup right out of the jar
- firmed up plans for the next concert: Bon Jovi!
- stayed up as late as I wanted and slept in the next day

Things I did this week that did not make me feel sixteen:
- shopped for a new bathing suit
- had my physical and was told that I now need regular mammograms, as I am over forty
- tried to be my own "hand model" for a Maybe Never, Maybe Now book trailer and realized that my hands just looked too...old. Older than a sixteen year old's, anyway. Had to recruit a friend's daughter, who was perfect with bitten fingernails and chipped blue polish.

LiveAid, 25 Years Later

2010-07-13T20:46:00.000-07:00

The media was (were?) buzzing today with reminders that it is the twenty-fifth anniversary of Live Aid. At the time, it was introduced as my generation's Woodstock. And maybe it wasn't for everyone, for me, I think that was true.

I hadn't actually planned on watching it, but somehow, I ended up turning on the television right near the beginning. I thought maybe I'd just watch until Madonna's performance, as she was my favourite at the time, but I got hooked. It's hard, now, to explain the impact of that concert, because so many things are culturally different. Back in 1985, VCRs were still relatively new, on-screen programming hadn't yet been invented, and taping things was complicated. TiVo and Personal TV were years and years in the future, as were endless internet replays. So if we wanted to watch something, we usually just did it in the moment. The offshoot of that was akin to something that many Canadians felt again this past February, during the men's gold medal hockey game: unity. Somehow, just knowing that so many others were sharing a live event with you - even if you were watching it alone - made you feel as if you were part of something huge.

Nowadays, it is common for performers to raise money through collaborative efforts. But in 1985, Band Aid and Live Aid were unique.

Five years ago I met someone who told me he'd just purchased the Live Aid DVDs. I reminisced about watching it live, seeing Madonna for the first time with auburn hair, and how it had influenced me. He had similar memories, and they joined us together with a common bond, twenty years later.

How cool is that?

Lessons from the Blackout of 2003

2010-07-10T19:30:00.000-07:00

It was hot this week. Super hot. And I had a lot of things to do: gardening, staining furniture, housework. But I also had a lot of things I wanted to do: reading, writing, painting. Often, I get caught up in the "shoulds", thinking that if I get them out of the way, I'll have time later for the "want tos"...but I never really do get through the "shoulds", and the "want tos" lose out.

Seven years ago, (plus a month), in similarly brutal heat, Ontario suffered from a massive blackout. For three days, the power was out. I couldn't vacuum...or power wash...or do any of the chores that were on my list. It wasn't wasted time, though, because I read books! Guilt free - without feeling like I should be doing something else. I swam -- for hours on end (It was hot! And I couldn't do any chores!). I wrote (with a pen!). I painted. It was one of the best "vacations" I'd ever had.

I remembered the joy of that time this week, in the heat, and I swam a lot. And I read. And I wrote - a little bit - for fun, not for work. It's going to be super hot again this week. Maybe the universe is trying to tell me something.

...and sometimes, it seems as if I'm slacking off...

2010-06-21T19:14:00.000-07:00

It's a sad irony that when I have the most stuff to blog about, I have the least amount of time to do so.

The solution? Another super-sized, multi-topic ramble, I suppose!

What I've been up to/thinking about/not blogging about during the last month:

1. My First 5K Run

Yes - I actually DID it! If you read my earlier posts about coaching a Girls on the Run group at school, you've likely been waiting breathlessly for news of my promised 5K. After ten weeks of training with the students, we headed to Downsview Park in Toronto on June 6th for the celebration run/walk. My personal goal had been to run the entire way. I didn't run fast, but I did jog without stopping. Except for those places along the post thunderstorm/totally under construction track where the mud got so deep that we could only pass through single file without losing out shoes and socks in the goop. In those places, I stood in line, like everyone else.

2. Hansel et Gretel, en musique

As if the coaching/run wasn't enough, (remember: my idea of fun is reading a book) I just mounted the coolest show ever with my grade seven students. "Hansel et Gretel en Musique" is an entirely original French musical version of the Hansel and Gretel story. "But, why?" you ask. "Because they are a super class, with many students who like to sing. Because I like to keep French class interesting and different. Because it turns out my inner Weird Al Yankovic was crying to be set free, and it turns out I can rhyme in two languages.

I painted a gingerbread house, then (quite by chance) ended up at a couple of yard sales where I got patio lanterns (light up gumdrops) and giant candy canes to finish it off. I made cardboard trees. And I turned songs like "Sweet Caroline" into funny show tunes like "Maison Sucree". I'd already talked the students into it when I heard about funding available through the Ontario Ministry of Education to "support increased opportunities for students in all FSL [French as a Second Language] programs to improve and apply, through clear educational objectives, their oral communication skills. The aim is to encourage students to pursue the study of French when it is no longer compulsory for their program." So perfect! We got the funding, I booked a school bus, and last Friday we took our show "on the road" to four area schools. "My kids" were amazing. I am so proud of them, for taking on this challenge, and believing in themselves! And I'll try to post a picture, if I can get permission from parents...

3. SEVEC

Still on the language teaching side of my life, I'm getting ready to book another SEVEC exchange for the 2010/2011 school year. Fundraising is already under way.

4. Spring
(Sigh) Yes, I know today is the first official day of summer. But I've been busy, okay? (See above). So busy. And my garden keeps growing, and the cottage is under renovation (an updated septic system so I don't have to worry about polluting the lake! Hooray! A dishwasher because I have a real septic system - hooray, hooray!). Some pics:

The woodlot beside my mail box (part of why I love living here!):

The roses and lilacs beside my house

5. Report Cards

'Nuff said.

Sometimes, I get it right

2010-05-23T21:09:00.000-07:00

My cousin Amanda posted this beautiful photo essay the other day on her blog, pondering how one knows when one is a good parent, and concluding, through her daughter's actions, that she must be doing something right.

I've often considered the same question in different contexts: how do I know whther or not I'm a good writer? For me, it's not about the number of books I sell, the awards I win, or even the great reviews. The real proof, for me, is in hearing about the positive impact my writing has had on readers. I've heard from girls who found the strength to end abusive relationships after reading Painting Caitlyn . I've heard from grown women who say they sobbed all the way through, because they recognized so much of their own history in the novel. Once, I even heard from a boy who had purchased the book for his sister, because he feared for her safety. Those are the stories that tell me I've touched someone's life. That's what tells me I've done a good job.

And today, I had one of those teacher moments (or maybe, it was a human being moment?). A student I once taught knocked unexpectedly on my door. She's almost seventeen now, and, through family circumstances that were completely beyond her control, living on her own. This kid - because yes, from where I sit, she is still a kid - has been through more personal tragedy and betrayal than anyone should ever experience, at any age. Enough *crap* to send any adult over the edge. I don't know if I can say she's thriving, but she's coping. She's still in school. She's drug-free. She's volunteering. And she's hoping to go to university. She's on her way to thriving.

And she stopped by to thank me for what seemed to me to be some very small things I contributed to her life. The thing is, to her, they weren't small. They mattered. They made a difference in her life. And she makes a difference in the world. Imagine the difference I can make now by putting in a conscious, consistent effort!

It's ALIVE!

2010-05-22T14:25:00.000-07:00

The town, that is. Here in Canada, we're having Victoria Day Weekend - the first long weekend of the summer season.

Traditionally, it's the weekend when we can finally plant our gardens without fear of frost, but many people also use it as a chance to get away. I have lots of fond memories of this weekend, including a trip to the beach with my friends during my senior year, a weekend at the cottage with the family of my first serious boyfriend, and one weekend where I was double-booked, spending time both at one friend's cottage, and on another's boat.

Now, as an adult, I have chosen to live in "cottage country", and I see the holiday weekend in a whole new way. Last night, as the sun began to set, the main intersection in town (still, blessedly, a traffic-light free four-way stop) had more teens than usual standing on the corner. The cars driving by had canoes and kayaks on top, or boat trailers behind them. Ice cream signs appeared in front of the businesses in town, and many stayed open late for what will now be their "summer hours". Lights came on in the cottages around my home, the scent of lilacs mingled with phlox and lily-of-the-valley and BBQ'd steak, and people came outside, tolerant of the first mosquitoes, because suddenly, it feels like summer, and the town is alive.

Titles

2010-05-08T20:21:00.000-07:00

Okay - I admit it. I go one step beyond Googling myself. I get Google alerts to tell me when someone has mentioned one of my books (or a found cat....)on the internet. Mostly, it's vanity, to see where I show up. Officially, though, it's so I don't miss out on a favorable review.

Last week Painting Caitlyn was mentioned in a blog

The author was discussing titles, and what a turn-off bad ones can be, and said:

For example, I was looking on Amazon the other day and came across a young adult book titled, Painting Caitlyn. Did I want to click on this book and read more about it? Absolutely not. I don't want to paint Caitlyn or even learn how to.

Although her opening question "How do authors come up with titles" was probably rhetorical, I couldn't resist replying. Click on the links to see thread.

“I know that you can do the impossible”

2010-04-30T19:48:00.000-07:00

I got approved for life insurance this week!

And April was cancer month. Or so said the National Cancer Society.

What do these two random items have in common? My thyroid. Because it was eleven years ago this week that I had the first of two surgeries for thyroid cancer. And while that's something to celebrate, it's also been eleven years since anyone has agreed to insure me. Every time I've tried for insurance, someone reads my health history form, sees the "cancer" box checked off, and rejects me. I've been told that I can't even donate blood. But this time was different. This time, I got a second letter, with a more detailed questionnaire, wanting to know about the type of cancer I'd had (Thyroid, papillary), size of tumor (2+ cm), stage (II), and treatment (surgery x2 plus radioactive iodine). And then finally after all these years, someone somewhere deemed me insurable. They believed in me.

I wish I could say that I'd always believed in myself, but there aren't a lot of cancer success stories out there. Or, at least, there haven't been in my own experience.

My father died of cancer in his early forties, as did his mother, so yes, I suspected that I'd need to be watchful when I got to that age. What I didn't know was that it would hit me so much earlier - at 28. The writer in me likens it to the final fairy in Sleeping Beauty. You know, the one who says she can't remove the curse of the evil fairy, but she can soften it a bit, by making it 100 years of slumber instead of instant death? I see my cancer kind of like that - as if it was, genetically, perhaps inevitable. But also as if someone (okay - my dad) was watching out for me, and trying to soften it a bit, by making it happen while I was young and otherwise healthy, and by making it one of the least deadly cancers.

My doctors all called it a "good" cancer, because of its excellent long term survival/cure rates when caught early, but I refuse to to describe any cancer as "good". Young or not, treatable or not, cancer is terrifying. And I didn't know, for a long time, whether I had the physical and emotional strength to get through it. But because I had my surgery in late April, and the final pathology report (aka official cancer diagnosis) in early May, the plastic grocery bags they were giving out that year right after I got the news were still left over from "cancer month", and they all said "Cancer Can be Beaten". Up until that time, I hadn't actually known many people who'd proven that. And honestly, today, I still don't. But I tore a bag open, stuck it on my fridge, and I left it there for months, through another surgery, through radioactive iodine treatment, and through the time I just felt awful because I'd lost the gland that controls everything in body, and the replacement hormones just didn't seem to be helping. And every time I looked at that bag, I felt a little bit of hope.

Today that bag is in the front of a scrap book I made during that awful period, along with pictures of all of the flower arrangements that I received, and every single "Get Well" card. Individually, they were all powerful. But together, they were tangible proof that other people believed in me when I couldn't do it myself.

Now that I've been approved for life insurance, I have proof that finally, eleven years later, the statistics believe in me, too.

Terry Fox said "I know that you can do the impossible". Breaking the family curse once felt impossible. But maybe I just did it.

The times they are a changin'

2010-04-21T18:32:00.000-07:00

Summer, 1983: Madonna bursts onto the music scene. I am just about to turn fourteen. Video is a brand new medium, and she uses it to her advantage, wearing edgy clothes that appeal to teen girls who want to be like her, and teen boys who want to date her. Parents, spurred on by the media, start freaking out. Then comes the "Like a Virgin" album.

It was LIKE a virgin, people. It wasn't a song about losing your virginity - it was a song about feeling as if everything is new.

I made it through the wilderness
somehow I made it through
didn't know how lost I was
until I found you

Like a virgin was a SIMILE, but most people didn't listen carefully enough to get that. I got it. I saw her as someone who was courageous, and went for what she wanted. And I've still got my "Virgin Tour 2005" T-shirt to prove it.

April 2010: Glee runs an "all Madonna" episode, using music from each decade of her career. They call her "empowered" and "empowering". They said she was a strong female role model.

So, what happened? Did she prove herself over the years through her staying power and constant reinvention? Did people start listening more carefully? Did anything really change? Does she just look tame now in comparison to today's video stars? Or are the "they" who are declaring her a role model just middle aged people like me who grew up with her?

The covers are coming! The covers are coming!

2010-04-12T19:34:00.000-07:00

I am delighted to share with you the covers for my forthcoming (and hopefully long awaited?) books, Definitely Not Camelot (sequel to Posing as Ashley), and Maybe Never, Maybe Now (sequel to Painting Caitlyn). Huge thanks to the goddess Tammy Desnoyers at Lobster Press for these gorgeous covers!

Autograph worthy?

2010-04-11T14:17:00.000-07:00

We had an author at school the other day. He arrived during what is normally the grade 4/5 French period, so I had to take the students down to the gymnasium, and as we were about to line up, they all started grabbing pieces of paper out of the scrap bin. "Why are you bringing paper to the gym?" I asked. "We want his autograph," they told me. "Because he's an author." I had to laugh, because to them, I'm their French teacher, which makes me so not autograph worthy...and yet, the very next day, I was off to Maxwell Heights Secondary School in Oshawa to be (tah dah!) their guest author.

It was a great audience, including members of their "Girl's Group" and "Creativity Club". They asked good questions about writing and inspiration. And many of them hung around after for autographed bookmarks. (No scrap paper for my fans!) As always, I was touched and humbled to hear from so many readers who said that weren't in the habit of picking up novels, but who, after picking up Painting Caitlyn, said they couldn't put it down until they'd finished. But the story that touched me the most was this: one girl said she'd loved the book, and taken it home to her mother, who was now reading with her. After the students had left, her teacher told me that this is a girl who has rarely had any sustained interactions with her mother - let alone positive ones. But they have connected through this story. That's the transformative power of books. The autographed bookmark might not last - but I hope she has the good memories of this time with her mother forever.

...and life goes on...

2010-04-04T18:11:00.000-07:00

Ever since my last post, about the sudden, premature death of my friend James Effer, I've been trying to figure out how to keep blogging. What can I write now that won't seem trivial? Self-involved? Pointless? Maybe nothing. But even though it feels - when something like this happens - as though everything should stop, it doesn't.

As a staff, we all went to school the day after we'd heard the news, and cried together in the staff room. Then the bell rang, and we had to tell the students. From then on, the rest of the week felt very unreal, and dream-like.

I spent two nights going through eight years of archived school photos, looking for pictures of Jim. It wasn't easy - because usually, he was our photographer. But I enjoyed the pictures, and felt a small burst of satisfaction every time I found one where we'd caught him for a change. It made me feel useful during a time when it feels like there is so little one can do. Then, on Wednesday night, I pulled an "all-nighter" getting a memorial slideshow ready for our students. At ten o'clock, I had the basics together, and probably could have burned it to DVD. But the music didn't line up the way I wanted, and I was hoping to add a few more photos. So I kept working. At midnight, I discovered a problem with my Windows Media Player, which I needed to convert some music for the show...I spent a long time mucking around with it, and then finally turned everything off, re-booted, and all was well. By 3 a.m. I'd hit that point where the adrenaline kicks in, and I couldn't have slept if I'd wanted to. I was creating something. I wanted it to be perfect. I wished I'd had more time to record voiceovers with the students who worked with Jim, but I reminded myself that what I had (no rehearsal, one take!) was authentic, and that counts for something, too. At 5:30 a.m. I put a disc into the computer and prayed that all would burn properly. At 5:45 I went to bed, and at 7:00a.m. I got up again.

The DVD burned properly, and I set up the data projector at school just the way Jim showed me. But I wanted a cable to connect the sound through the gym speakers, and nobody, at first, knew where the cable was, or how it worked. Made us miss Jim a little bit more, and wonder what other "soft knowledge" we'd be looking for without him.

I have never seen our students so solemn and respectful as they were that day. A teacher who told me she never cries - not even for her own father's funeral - said the tribute I'd made brought her to tears. My principal took my hand and said it had been perfect.

I will make copies for Jim's family. But I haven't done so yet.

We had a funeral to attend that afternoon. Then, because nobody felt quite ready to go home yet, we went out together as a staff. I needed a break from the sadness, and I couldn't do the DVDs that night anyway, as I had prepare for a conference the next day...

Life goes on. Forever altered, but still - thankfully - it goes on.

Our school pictures will be missing something now. So will our staff.

A Little Perspective

2010-03-21T10:43:00.000-07:00

Rainbow Over Beaverton Public School
by James Effer

I was all set to post about March Break - how great the weather was, how my sinuses are still inflamed and making me headachy, and how many things I have to do once I get back to school.

And then I got a phonecall saying that one of my colleagues has died.

James (Jim) Effer worked with me for eight years. He took the author portrait on my website, and here, on this blog. And he did it for free, because that's just the kind of guy he was. He actually LIKED helping people, and the pleasure he got from that showed on his face when you thanked him.

Jim had just returned from a week in the Dominican Republic when he collapsed. I hope it was a good holiday for him, and for his family. I hope they won't be traumatized by having been there, and not being able to help.

I was only fifteen when my own dad died. And while I would never wish cancer on anyone, I am grateful that I had time to prepare myself, and say good-bye. When the time came, as bad as it was to lose him, I was actually relieved to see his suffering end. I live with the sadness of not having him in my life, but I don't have any regrets about things that were unsaid, and in that, I am lucky.

Just last night - perhaps while Jim was passing on - my husband and I were talking about events that happened ten years ago. "We're getting old fast!" he said. And, as is my habit, I reminded him that "the alternative is worse", using the examples of his brother-in-law, who died at 34, and my dad, who didn't make it out of his forties, where I am now.

I meant it when I said it, but I mean it more today, because Jim's last gift to me was a fresh perspective on making the most of the time you've got.

Why I Read "Why Cats Paint"

2010-03-14T16:29:00.000-07:00

Wow - I'm turning into a devotee of Travis Jonker's "100 Scope Notes" blog!

His latest post included a number of links which he admitted might have been crazy to amass...but when I saw the picture of - Why Cats Paint, as a link to "Literary Oddities", I began to wonder if maybe I'm the oddity,because I own - and adore - it.

The general hypothesis of the book is that cats sometimes deliberately create art. So when my kitten, Nutmeg, tipped over the coffee cup of red Georgia sand that I kept on my bookshelf when I was a child, and then swept it back up into a perfectly neat pile, maybe it was art, and the sweeping didn't actually have anything to do with the fact that he peed in it first. That dead mouse I once found on the couch just before the company arrived? An installation by Sacha Cat. The scratch marks on a sofa? "Upholstery Art" that "represents the first stage of their artistic growth" as they explore non-traditional mediums.

Yeah, my husband never bought that one, either.

But honestly, books, cats and art all together? Anyone who knows me knows it's perfect. And when I pulled the book out to photograph it for this post, Majik/The Great Catsby seemed to agree.

Celebrations and Book Spine Poetry - My Entry

2010-03-10T18:08:00.000-08:00

First, a celebration - Maybe Never, Maybe Now, (which was starting to feel like a really ironic title) WENT TO PRODUCTION TODAY!!! Hooray! This means I can't tinker with it anymore, and (drumroll please) it WILL be out as scheduled this fall, with its companion novel, Definitely Not Camelot [huge sigh of relief growing into giggles of excitement].

I'm feeling very Zen tonight, as I spent the day on the slopes in the sunshine. Most of the day, anyway. Part of it I spent alone in the car, singing along with my Glee CD, with the sunroof open. And just after lunch, I found a lovely Muskoka chair beside the chalet, and I settled in comfortably in the sunshine with my MP3 player, my sunglasses, and a big smile on my face. The rest of the time, I soared down slopes of slushy snow. So I returned from my Wednesday night yoga class completely ready to "write" book spine poetry.

Here's my first poem:

Just in case you can't make some of it out, it says:

Your Many Faces
Speak
The Language of Goldfish
Awake and Dreaming
Negotiating with the Dead
In Summer Light
As I Lay Dying
Somewhere off the Coast of Maine

What does it mean? It means that tonight, I'm Zen.

Book Spine Poetry

2010-03-09T18:36:00.001-08:00

Okay - a two for one posting tonight, since this stupid flu, the report cards and my edits have kept me away so much in recent weeks. Also because I just found this awesome fun Book Spine Poetyry challenge at 100 Scope Notes and entries have to be submitted by Thursday!

Beginnings, Middles, and Endings

2010-03-09T18:18:00.000-08:00

Beginnings:
- March Break (in two days!)
- ski season! (hear me out). Despite my ski pass at Snow Valley, I've only made it out ONCE all season. Lack of snow, lack of time. But tomorrow is ski day at school, so I'm headed out to Horseshoe Valley for the day. In 10 degree Celsius weather - which is, like, ridiculously warm, and will make the snow mushy, but whatever. Hopefully, tomorrow will be the beginning of the season for me, and I can make up for lost time during March Break. I only learned to ski five years ago, so I feel like I need to make up for lost time!
- Term 3 at school - busy with extracurriculars, but usually easier than second term because the days are long and the end is in sight
- serious book promotions on my end, in anticipation of my *TWO* new releases for fall.

Middles:
- the week (tomorrow is Wednesday)

Endings
- (I hope) the flu virus that has been hanging on inside my bocy for almost three weeks. Sinus involvement. Chest congestion. Body aches. Fatigue. Loss of appetite. Not the H1N1, because I got vaccinated for that. Stubborn, though.
- Term 2 at school - report cards go home on Thursday.
- Book edits (for now). I thought they were done in December, but then they came back at me, hard and furious, in February. Simultaneously with the flu and the report cards (see above). But tomorrow, I believe, all will go to production, and I can sit back, and think about the next books.

Let me tell you about today's specials...

2010-03-07T15:56:00.000-08:00

Oops - sorry. I'm not sure there are any. I've been noticing it for awhile now - especially at school - and it makes me sad.

The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines "special" in the following way:

Special (adjective)
1. distinguised by some unusual quality; especially; being in some way superior
2. held in particular esteem
3. a) readily distinguishable from others in the same category
b) of, relating to, or constituting a species
4. being other than the usual
5. designed for a particular purpose or occasion

So what's the problem? Here, in North America, in 2010, people have so many things and experiences available to them that nothing seems "special" to them anymore.

A few examples:
1. When I was a child, pop and chips were special, because we only ever had them when a babysitter came over, or at a birthday party. Now, most of my students bring them in their lunch on a daily basis. Eating in restaurants was another treat for my childhood self, because we rarely did it. But I have nieces and nephews and students and even adult friends who do it all the time - restaurants have become the norm for them
2. Movies! Without VCRs or DVDs, we used to wait all year for the Christmas season, when classics like How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Frosty the Snowman, The Sound of Music, The Wizard of Oz, and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang would come on T.V. And then we'd watch them. Carefully. Because they were special, and we didn't know when we'd get to see them again. Now, (I've noticed) even when someone says they LOVE a movie, they talk all the way through it. They get up. They wander around. And I think it's because they've seen it before, and will again, and...so what?
3. Even favourite songs used to be something we waited for the on radio...then bought the 45 or LP, which we carefully transferred onto a cassette tape with other favourite songs. Now, at the push of a few buttons, you can have any song you want, at any time. Even without buying it.

The thing is, I LOVE pop and chips, and restaurants and movies and MP3's. I'm not criticizing them AT ALL. But I wonder if part of my love of them is that they are still, in some ways, novel to me. And I worry about the kids who are growing up without novelty, because what do they have to look forward to?

Then again, maybe novelty is subjective, and homecooked meals and playing outside will be "special" for this generation.

Apparently, my problems are all in my head...

2010-02-21T18:26:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I attended Coach's Training for Girls on the Run, which I am coordinating at school this spring. I agreed not because of the running aspect (exercise - yuck!) but because I was told that it is a self-esteem program for girls. Since most of my self-esteem issues over the years came about as a result of failed athletic pursuits, the idea of achieving self-esteem through running is pretty intriguing.

And what I discovered during the day was this: my self-esteem is actually pretty healthy!

One of the things they asked us to do was fill out three labels with the names of body parts that, given the chance, we'd like to change.

Everyone else started writing frantically - hips, butt, thighs, chin, nose...Once, I would have had a lot of things to write, too. But yesterday, I didn't. (Yes, my stomach is bigger than it ever has been or probably should be, but that is something that I CAN change - and will, as I run this 5k with the girls in the program) so I didn't think it counted. And I've always loved my nose...

So what did I come up with? Ears, because yesterday, I had an earache from a cold. Throat, because the same cold was giving me a sore throat. And thyroid, because I lost my thyroid to cancer eleven years ago, and the rest of my body is affected by that every single day.

How amazing to be at a place in my life where all of my body image issues revolve around health - vs. looks - but don't yet include constipation, cataracts, or incontinence!

Not a Fairytale Ending

2010-02-16T17:52:00.000-08:00

Today, someone I once knew well was convicted of several serious crimes. Even twenty-two years ago, there were clues - arrogance, a sense of entitlement, ambition that smelled like greed. So I can't honestly say that I was surprised by the news.

But there were good things about this person, too. Things like intelligence, generosity, and ambition that was boundless.

The prosecutor said a lot of people had been hurt. The jury returned a guilty verdict. I don't doubt that it was the right decision.

But I'm inexplicably sad about this turn of events, and I find myself crying now as I type. If this was a book, I could have redeemed the villain at the end, or, at the very least, rejoiced in the triumph of good over evil. But I don't like this ending at all.

He's my inspiration

2010-02-15T06:56:00.000-08:00

No disrespect to my husband, but I do have another significant other: our Lollie-pup (Lab/Collie cross), Spencer. And a lot of my best writing ideas seem to happen not while I'm parked in front of the keyboard, but when I give myself permission to take a break, stop thinking about the problem, and head outside for a walk with my favourite little doggy-dude. What is it about picking up dog poop that helps me write? E-How, suggests that

"when we feel good, our senses heighten, and we can be at our best creatively".

and while the poop scooping itself doesn't actually make me "feel good", being outside and seeing Spencer enjoy himself really does. (I mean, seriously - who can feel stressed when they're looking at a wiggly bum with a waggly tail? Who?) Watch this video of Spencer enjoying himself outside and tell me it doesn't make you smile!

Furthermore,

"overscheduling is an enemy of creativity."

The physical act of walking probably helps, too. In 2005, Creativity Research Journal published a study suggesting that

"aerobic exercise may positively impact creative potential, and that these effects may extend for some period of time,"

That's why Spencer is such a creative inspiration. He makes me get off my butt, and move. I'd like to be the type of person who just gets up and exercises because it's "fun" or "good for them". I know they exist, because I live with one. But, as stated in my January 27, 2010 blog entry, that is not me. I'd choose a dozen things over deliberate exercise. But I'd choose almost nothing over my pets.

Olympic aspirations...

2010-02-12T19:28:00.000-08:00

Just took a break from revisions to see the opening ceremonies of the 2010 Olympic Games hosted by my own country of Canada.

What was with the mini-length fur coats and bare legs on the sign bearers as each country's athletes entered the stadium? Do Canadian women really need to play the sexy card when we are HOSTING THE OLYMPICS FOR THE WORLD?

Spencer makes me happy during a week of over-extension and Editorial Hell

2010-02-10T19:37:00.000-08:00

Spencer thinks the cats - and my books - have had entirely too much attention in this blog. And so, as I caffenate for another long weekend of Editorial Hell (much of it self-inflicted, as I failed to read some small print...), a picture of my favourite doglet. (Taken this afternoon, with my new Blackberry. I didn't think I needed a new gadget, but I have to admit - kind of handy to have a camera!) Honestly, if it wasn't for him, I wouldn't have made it outside on this beautiful February afternoon. It's not a great shot of him, but it gives you some idea of how bouncy and delighted he was to go out on the frozen lake. Seeing him frolic in the snow is just one of the many ways that he makes me happy.

Highs and Lows of School Trips

2010-02-06T10:46:00.000-08:00

A picture from the trip:

...and a story to explain last week's comment about adult geeks vs. child geeks on school trips.

My first school trip was in January the year I was in grade 8. I went to a big school, with several grade 8 classes, so there was no way that the whole school could travel at the same time. Unfortunately, my best friends were not in my class, and their trip was scheduled for the beginning of the week, while mine was at the end. Consequently, I ended up rooming with another girl in my class who was immature in a "I'm thirteen but I still like playing Barbies with my ten year old brother" kind of way. Now, lest that sound judgmental, let me explain about my own situation. I was tall and awkward. I was the smart kid. I was not terribly interested in guys, or fashion, or wearing make-up. Maybe you could say that I was immature, too.

So we arrive at the outdoor education centre and discover that there are not enough rooms on the girls floor, and too many on the boys. Guess which girls got put downstairs? Yup. The ones the teachers trusted. I get that. I got it even then. No way would I have put the flirty impulsive ones down there. But still. It felt humiliating -- not as if the teachers were saying "we trust you" -- as if they were saying "you're not desirable to the guys". Ouch.

Predictably, the flirty impulsive girls tried to use me and my roomate, inventing lame excuses to "visit" our room.

I got through it. And you know what? By the time I got chosen as one of six students from our school to go on a Quebec trip five months later, one of the two boys who'd been selected – realizing that I didn't know the other three girls who were going -- said "Don't worry, Kim - you can hang out with me and Mike." I did hang out with Duncan and Mike. But I also got to know Cindy, Wendy and Andrea, (who you read about earlier in A Tale of Two Islands).

So why do I always remember the perceived humiliation of the winter trip, and not the triumph of Quebec?

Maybe because new research shows that

"Your brain preferentially scans for, registers, stores, recalls, and reacts to unpleasant experiences; it's like Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones. Consequently, even when positive experiences outnumber negative ones, the pile of negative...memories naturally grows faster."

.

Too bad. Because my students spent way more time on the ropes challenges, the hiking, the campfire, and the games than calling each other "flat", but no matter how much fun everything else was, the name calling is probably what two of them will remember most.

Remembering my Dad

2010-02-05T19:35:00.000-08:00

Today marks my mother's 73rd birthday. Hooray! It's also the twenty-fifth anniversary of my father's death. Sigh. I can type that fairly unemotionally because it's been so long, and I am practised. Apart from the first anniversary, I think maybe the weirdest one was ten years ago, when I realized I had lived as much of my life without a father as I had with one. I've just been building on the "without" side (and will continue to do so) ever since. But still - a quarter of a century. Wow.

Yes - I do think about how things might be different if he was alive today. He loved technology, and I believe that he would be crazy for digital photos and MP3 players and computing in general. It's safe to say that he'd still be eco-conscious (he was a pioneer in that area) but I hope he'd be a little bit more financially relaxed, and he'd spring for the good seats at the symphony, rather than waiting for intermission to move down in vacant ones closer to the front. Best of all, I'm pretty sure he'd still be super proud of me. I don't have him anymore, but I do have that.

Further Evidence of Geekdom...and winter fun awaits!

2010-01-31T19:46:00.000-08:00

I sometimes lurk around the blog of Dystel and Godrich Literary Management. Not because they are my agents (I don't have one), but because they are very current on publishing trends (and someday I might want an agent). The other day, in response to author J.D. Salinger's death, they blogged about "The Need to Write", and quoted him as saying that "a real writer writes because he must” (as opposed to because publication awaits him/her).

This, I believe, is further evidence of my geekdom. I agree - because, (as I noted in response to their blog) when I'm writing - seriously writing - I actually get an adrenaline rush. At least, I think that's what it is. I get alert, and productive, and excited to keep working. I feel bouncy and agitated and if I do have to stop, and try to sleep, it's nearly impossible, because my mind races and my body almost twitches with energy. It's not glamourous, but it's awesome.

I'm told that other people achieve this same high through exercise.

Exercise is not as fun (for me) as writing. But I'll get some this week. I am taking a grade six class on an overnight outdoor education trip this week, in place of their homeroom teacher, who is sick. (This is a bit like my cheerleading days, when, as a "sub", I had to wait for someone else's asthma to act up so that I could don my uniform...I feel guilty, but I'm excited!) Outdoor education no longer fills me with fear, because adult geeks do not suffer the same ridicule on class trips as child geeks. Yes, I have a story to tell about that, but I want to be the cool teacher - not the crabby one - and so now, I must sleep.

A very cool Majik trick

2010-01-29T15:51:00.000-08:00

(Or, how The Great Catsby shared his innermost feelings and gratitude)

Tomorrow marks one month since Majik came to live with us, and he is fitting in beautifully. He's brave enough to play with Spencer, but he also loves to cuddle, and usually sleeps beside me at night. This morning, he got up a little earlier than usual, and began prowling around -- quietly -- off the bed, under the bed, up into the windowsill. And then, suddenly, I heard clicking, and it occurred to me that he might be playing with the bedside stereo. Seconds later, Burton Cummings was belting out these words:

'Cause I have you now
I'll never have to make it alone

Saved my soul
Taught me how to fly
You picked me up
When I was falling

Saved my soul
Came right along
You picked me up
At the bottom
Saved my soul, saved me...

Yes, it might have been a coincidence that the cat stepped on the right button during that lyric on that particular song ...but I'd like to believe that he was thanking Toronto Cat Rescue for getting him off of death row, and me, for getting him out of foster care, and into my home. Finding a cat that makes everyone happy? Awesome. Finding one who serenades me in the morning? Majikal.

O wha tagee kiam

2010-01-27T19:34:00.000-08:00

Come on now - say it three times fast everyone! O wha tagee kiam...Owhatageekiam...O what a geek I am!

This week's proof, as if we needed it:

1. I based the title of my blog entry on a campfire skit that's at least 30 years old, if not more. I believe the line there actually makes you say "O what a goose I am", but it pretty much amounts to the same thing. There were so many campfire skits in my childhood...it's not the skits that make me geeky, but the fact that I can still remember so many of them!

2. I am reading The Happiness Project, by Gretchen Rubin, and page 21 had a line that perfectly defines my approach to life: "My idea of fun has always been to lie in bed reading. Preferably with a snack." Clearly, this woman is my soulmate.

3. Last week, I attended the fifth annual "Movies, Manicures and Martinis" event at The Roxy Theatre in Uxbridge. It's a fundraiser where guests are asked to dress according to whatever movie is being shown - food and activities are geared around the movie as well. This year's film was "Dirty Dancing". Does the fact that I first saw it in the theatre TWENTY-THREE YEARS AGO make me a geek? Not necessarily. The fact that I have seen it in both English AND French? Nope. The fact that I can quote most of it by heart? Kind of (who does that??? Oh yeah -- me, obviously). But most geeky of all is the fact that I didn't dress like "Baby" in a striped T-shirt and capri pants. I didn't put on a fancy samba dress like Penny, or even a sundress like Lisa. And why? Because it is January, and I DIDN'T WANT TO BE COLD ALL EVENING. Yup. I put comfort ahead of fashion. And I dressed like a man. I put on black jeans, a black T-shirt, and a black leather jacket (with black sunglasses) and went as Johnny Castle. He is the ultimate cool dude -- but me dressing like him so I wouldn't be cool clearly proves that I am, truly, the uncoolest of all.

How freeing it is to be at a point in my life where I don't care!

Goldfish dreams

2010-01-17T11:33:00.000-08:00

I dreamt about goldfish last night. Not just any goldfish - a whole bunch of them, in a great big tank that was maybe 10 feet by 10 feet.

This is NOT a result of the huge tanks I saw in the casinos in Vegas. This is because I am stressed.

Goldfish are a recurring theme in my dreams, and it took me years to make the connection, but they always show up when I am under pressure. I'm not a psychologist, but I think the reason is pretty obvious: in university, I made the decision to euthanize a fish I'd had for over 8 years. He'd outgrown his tank, and outlived his peers, and no matter what I did, I couldn't get his water to stay clean and chemically balanced, which was making him sick. I felt terrible about it, but he (she?) was miserable. In those days, we didn't have the internet, so although I researched the best I could, I just couldn't find any solutions. And I didn't want him to continue to suffer with fin rot and ammonia burns. So on the advice of a pet store clerk, I put him in a bucket, and slowly let him freeze to death. (Not as cruel as it may at first sound, since fish are cold-blooded and don't, apparently, feel it). Still. I feel like a quitter when I recall the incident. And I feel like a failure.

So now, whenever I am facing a challenge, I dream about goldfish in distress. Goldfish that have leapt out of their tanks, and need to get back into the water. Goldfish that live in my basement, but whom I have forgotten about and carelessly neglected. Goldfish who have multiplied beyond reason, and now need to be re-homed.

Don't get me wrong - I LOVE goldfish. And, as I said above, that particular fish was with me from eighth grade, all the way through high school and into university. He lived (I hope) a pretty good life, as feeder fish go.

I also had these two lovelies -- Dasher and Blitzen -- with me for over five years, moving from pond to classroom with the seasons, until one day they just mysteriously vanished, without a trace. (A raccoon? A Great Blue Heron? Alien invaders?) The cat they're "talking" to is Sacha, my first "chat noir" and baby girl.

But regardless of my affection for goldfish, and my continued efforts to give them the best possible care, they haunt my dreams.

Often, I won't even consciously know that I'm feeling pressured until I have a goldfish dream, but it's obvious that my subconscious won't let me forget my guiltiest failure (I must have been able to do SOMETHING differently!) and trots it out again for me every time I'm potentially facing another.

The stressor today? A combination of things, probably. A presentation I'm scheduled to give to other teachers in mid-February. Some stuff I need to do for school. And, most likely, the revisions I got from my editor last night. I thought we were done. I was basking in the freedom of NOT having two jobs, not working late into the night, not having to negotiate for what I want to say.

But now, I'm back to stalling/blogging. It probably won't make the fish go away, but at least it gives the cat a chance to come and purr on my lap. And that is one of the greatest de-stressors I know.

P.S. As always, photo courtesy me, all rights reserved.

New Year's in Vegas, New Cat in the House

2010-01-10T14:49:00.001-08:00

Happy New Year! (I know, I'm a week late already, but at least I'm saying it.) Yes, there is a new cat in my house. His name is Majik. He is not a replacement cat - he is an extra cat. Here's what happened: I saw his picture at www.torontocatrescue.ca while searching for Oliver-Henry. The picture and description (friendly, small, etc.) looked very similar, and I was hoping it was him. I emailed. It wasn't. But Kathleen, the "foster mother" likes to place homeless cats, and suggested I might take Majik and give him a home. I said I wasn't ready. But I kept thinking about him. And then, it occurred to me that although my husband would never willingly agree to two cats, he also wouldn't be so cruel as to make me give one back when Oliver-Henry comes home. So I decided to sneak an extra one in NOW, while I'm sad, and need cheering up. Bonus: black cats used to be considered good luck, and Julius Ceasar kept one for that reason. And if you read Posing as Ashley, you already know that. So now, with a little Majik in the house, Murphy's Law says Oliver-Henry's return is imminent.

As promised, this little guy is lovely. He is cuddled into my neck as I type. He squeaks softly more than mews. He is great with Spencer. And he has a fluffy tail, which is kind of fun, and nice, since the last two black cats did not, nor does Mr. M.I.A. He is believed to be about three years old, and has already had that all-important operation that will keep him home. All I know is that he was unclaimed and on death-row in a high-kill shelter in Hamilton before Toronto Cat Rescue sprung him to the foster home (she has since been able to save another, because I freed up a space in her home when I took Majik). So yes, I Googled "lost black cat Hamilton", still hoping to reunite him with whoever lost him. Sadly for them, and luckily for me, nothing came up. And that does make me a bit angry, because although I understand that not everyone will spend six months or longer searching all the shelters and rescue organizations, I would think most people could manage an internet classified. I feel badly for him that his first family isn't looking for him (or at least that I can't find them for him). On the other hand, it has been really healing for me to see how easily he's fit in here, and how quickly I fell in love again - it reminds me that even though I want Oliver-Henry back desperately, it is possible that he could be happy somewhere else, and someone else could love him lots. And that's comforting.

In other news, I was on the 401, on my way to pick Majik up, when my husband got a weekend flight to Vegas for New Year's Eve (he's a corporate pilot). I had to make a split second decision about whether or not to go, but when my mom agreed to some and critter-sit, I booked a flight to meet him down there. (Sidenote: on the way down, I had my first ever "pat-down", courtesy of airport security...) This is a picture in front of the MGM 29 seconds before midnight.

And this is me, out on the Vegas Strip right after midnight.

Hooray!

The Tenth Good Thing about O'Henry

2010-01-09T20:54:00.000-08:00

Oliver-Henry has been missing for almost six months. I believe he is well, and I believe I will find him. But I miss him, and I'm grieving, which reminded me of Judith Viorst's brilliant book about pet grief, The Tenth Good Thing about Barney. So here, not as an obituary, but as a refresher on who it is I'm looking for, and why he's so special:

The Tenth Good Thing about O'Henry.

1. The instant he arrived at my house, he walked right over, hopped up on the couch beside me, curled up and began to purr.
2. The instant my husband came home three days later, Oliver-Henry got off my lap, and went over to my husband, who really needed winning over.
3. Three of Oliver-Henry's multiple names start with “H” and end with “Y”, making him Oliver-Henry Harley Hershey Cat. (Take that, Duggars!)
4. As a kitten living in a barn, he got stepped on by a cow. He didn’t get medical treatment for his injuries, but he healed. And he got the ultimate revenge by eating a lot of cows my house.
5. His fur is the colour of chocolate.
6. His eyes are the colour of robins’ eggs.
7. Once, after he threw up in his kennel during a car trip, I let him out. I told him he’d have to sit perfectly still for the rest of the car ride, or for safety reasons, I'd have to confine him again. He settled into my lap and didn’t budge during the forty-five minutes it took to get home.
8. He couldn’t have understood me when I told him not to move, because he’s deaf. His deafness makes him fearless.
9. He loves to climb into the bottom of the refrigerator.
10.He’s going to come home to me in a very cool way. I can just feel it.

How I performed a Christmas Miracle (and what it did to me)

2009-12-28T08:44:00.001-08:00

Short version: Facebook. Kijiji. Empathy. And perseverance.

The long version goes like this:

As regular readers of this blog (ha! there aren't any...but I digress) already know, my cat, Oliver-Henry, has been missing since July, 2009. Despite the naysayers who tell me to "give it up," I continue to search for him. He disappeared in Kitchener, but in August I had a dream that he was in Hamilton. So sometimes, I check the Kijiji.ca classified ads in Hamilton for "found cats" just to reassure myself that he's not there, waiting for me to track him down.

One day, at the beginning of December, I saw the following ad (names are changed to protect privacy):

We had a cat- male/neutered brown tabby brought into our clinic. He was found on Queen Victoria Avenue in Hamilton. He has a microchip which is registered to a "Mary" and "Bob" Smith who live here in Hamilton, but we cannot locate them as she did not update their information through the microchip company. We learned through the microchip company that his name is "Sam"If you have any information or know a person named "Mary" with a cat named Sam, please contact us at Pet Vet Eastside"

Okay - I didn't TOTALLY change the names - the last name WAS Smith. And there are a lot of Smiths in Hamilton.

And clearly, the cat isn't mine. But I thought about how sad it was that this cat had been found, and his family didn't know. And then it occurred to me that maybe his family were Facebook users. So I searched, and came up with several possible "Mary" and "Bob" Smiths in Hamilton. Then I started sending them messages, asking if they'd lost a cat named Sam.

It took until December 23rd, but then, finally, in my inbox, was this reply from "Mary":

"Hi , I have only been on Facebook once before and just happened to go on this a.m. and saw this message about Sam. I truly thought I would never hear of or see him again. "

By the time I saw the message, she'd already contacted the vet's office, and was awaiting the return phone call with Sam's whereabouts.

The good news of their reunion got me all mixed up inside, and by the time my poor husband got home from the grocery store I was sobbing over the sink. I was crying because I was so happy to be a part of "Mary" and Sam's reunion. And because I was jealous.

I'm still jealous. But I'm proud, too. And I have renewed faith in the mysterious workings of the universe.

50 ways life has changed in the last 10 years

2009-12-21T19:42:00.000-08:00

Love this article from The Toronto Star!

50 ways life has changed in the last 10 years - thestar.com

Some of my fave changes:
- digital photos (once upon a time, you crossed your fingers and hoped you had the shot. Now, you can get a second chance to capture that perfect moment)
- GPS (how cool to have your very own map reader, even when you're traveling alone)
- IPods (okay - mine is a no-name MP3 player, but still. I am old enough to remember painstakingly making mixed cassette tapes out of vinyl LPs, and then endlessly fast forwarding/rewinding to find the song you wanted...)

My "not-so-faves"
- reality television (I know it dates me, but I just don't get the appeal...)
- crocs (I am NOT so old that I will wear plastic shoes...)

And, my least fave of all:
- HELICOPTER PARENTING (described in the article as parents who hover, like helicoptors). I know, I know: I don't have kids, a dog isn't the same thing, I can't possibly understand. But here's what I do know: many of my friends have spent the past decade in hover mode. I know people who wouldn't let their child's grandparents, aunts or uncles babysit, even for an hour or so. People who homeschooled because they were afraid to let their children out of their sight. Stay at home mothers with nannies because they can't handle the IVF brood they've bred (no, it's not Kate Gosselin). People who don't want their teenagers to have weekend jobs because it ties them down. And you know what? I miss those friends, and I feel sorry for their children. Remember the feeling of independence you had the first time you took your bike down the street without your parents? Or the way you looked forward to your favorite babysitter, because it was almost like having a friend over, and it was cool that the "big kids" were hanging out with you? My part time jobs taught me not just about finances (eg. were those cute earrings really worth two hours over a deep fryer?) but also about time management (still had to get those essays in!), cooperation, tolerance, responsibility, disappointment and perseverance. Helicoptor children don't get these moments of independence, nor the pride that comes from knowing they did something on their own.

At school this last decade, I have seen a real increase in kids who are afraid to try anything they won't succeed in, who give up the minute that something becomes difficult, and who label all challenges as "boring". I am all for doing things well, and thoroughly, and to the best of your ability. But surely, part of being a good parent is raising confident, competent children? Larry Wingett agrees. He's got a new book, called Your Kids are Your Own Fault: A Guide for Raising Responsible, Productive Adults. I think, after a decade of indulgence, that his timing is perfect. I wish him much success.

If Santa wrote YA

2009-12-20T20:00:00.000-08:00

Santa Claus is a busy guy. Every December, he makes mounds of toys and delivers them on a tight schedule to children all over the world. It’s a multi-tasking feat that only the most dedicated (read: craziest) of people could pull off. And for a YA author, it's a required skill.

As writers, we, like Santa, are often trying to finish projects on deadline even as we are marketing previous work and thinking about the next book. Some of us still have “day jobs,” as well. So why do we do it? Because we love it. Writing is part of who we are, just as generosity is the essence of Santa Claus.

Which leads me into the issue of family and friends. Santa couldn’t pull off his amazing feats of festivity without an amazing “inner circle”. Mrs. Claus, surely, knows that sometimes Santa’s going to be too busy to hang out with her, and other times, he’s going to be so weary that he needs nothing more than a shoulder to lean on. But she’s okay with that, because she loves him, and she honors his work. Lucky Santa already has the sympathetic support system an author needs.

Santa’s got the perfect space for writing, too. He’s way up North, where door-to-door salespeople don’t bother to stop, and he can’t sneak off to the local coffee shop “for a couple of minutes”. He’s got breathtaking scenery for inspirational walks, but it never gets so warm outside that he ends up lazing the day away in the backyard by the pool. Instead, he can set himself up by a cozy fire, with a mug of homemade hot chocolate (‘cuz we all need a little sugar and caffeine to keep us going).

And it won’t be a problem if that mug of hot chocolate needs a cookie – or twelve – to dunk in it. As an author, working from home, stress-eating happens (in my case, at a rate of about .1 pounds per page). Especially if an editor is seeking many, many new chapters, ASAP. But Santa’s comfortable with his body image. He’ll be okay if his inspiration shows up on a plate (and around his middle) in the form of Peppermint Cocoa Marshmallow Perfection.

Santa’s not really one to seek the limelight anyway. Sure, he gets invited to a lot of parades and holiday parties, and he’s happy to go, but only because it makes his fans happy. He doesn’t do it for the personal accolades. Just as an author sends her work out into the world, hoping it speaks to someone, and stands on its own, so does Santa toil quietly, often in isolation, hoping his work makes people happy.

And boy – does he know how to make people happy! Santa makes the kind of happy that people remember for the rest of their lives. (A feat every author dreams of). How hard could it actually be for him, if he took up writing, to please his editor, publisher, audience and critics alike? He’s already been giving the perfect gifts to the pickiest of people for centuries. Santa knows when you are sleeping. He knows when you’re awake. He knows if you’ve been bad or good – so surely, he knows what adolescents would like to read.

Which, when it comes right down to it, is the ultimate reason Santa why should write YA. Nobody understands children the way Santa does. And as children become young adults, and begin to question everything around them – including the future, their own self worth and (gasp!) the very existence of the magic that is Santa Claus, they need quality literature. Santa makes us want to believe, even as we question. Great YA authors do it, too.

Advantages of being a woman???

2009-12-06T17:36:00.000-08:00

Twenty years ago today, Marc Lepine entered the École Polytechnique in Montreal and shot and killed the following women:

Geneviève Bergeron (born 1968), civil engineering student
Hélène Colgan (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
Nathalie Croteau (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
Barbara Daigneault (born 1967), mechanical engineering student
Anne-Marie Edward (born 1968), chemical engineering student
Maud Haviernick (born 1960), materials engineering student
Maryse Laganière (born 1964), budget clerk in the École Polytechnique's finance department
Maryse Leclair (born 1966), materials engineering student
Anne-Marie Lemay (born 1967), mechanical engineering student
Sonia Pelletier (born 1961), mechanical engineering student
Michèle Richard (born 1968), materials engineering student
Annie St-Arneault (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
Annie Turcotte (born 1969), materials engineering student
Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz (born 1958), nursing student

I didn't attend École Polytechnique, and I wasn't an engineering student. But at the time of the shooting, I was a university student, I was a woman, I was a feminist, and for me, that day was as horrifically memorable and life-altering as the events of September 11, 2001.

The "Montreal Massacre" was the first school shooting in Canada, and most of us just didn't believe that that kind of thing happened here. But it was also very different from so many of the mass shootings we hear about even today. For one thing, Marc Lepine did not personally know any of his victims. He did not attend the school with them. It wasn't a simple case of someone being bullied to the point where it was intolerable, or having a personal issue with someone and innocent bystanders getting in the way - it was a deliberate, premeditated attack on an entire gender. Women.

Marc Lepine separated male students from female, and targeted women exclusively during his rampage. His suicide note said he hated feminists,

"for seeking social changes that "retain the advantages of being women [...]
while trying to grab those of the men."

Because he targeted women, December 6th has become (in Canada), a national day of mourning for all female victims of all violent men.

But when we talk about Marc Lepine as a symbol of violence against women, we usually do so because he targeted women. I think it might be more important to remember that Lepine himself witnessed - and was a victim of -- domestic violence while growing up. Statistics clearly prove that "75% of boys who witness domestic violence have been found to have demonstrable behavioral problems". So maybe it's more fitting to see Marc Lepine as a symbol of violence against women because he was also a victim of it, and the violence he witnessed and experienced in his own home as a child (probably) contributed to the deaths of fourteen others.

Domestic and dating violence are so much more than "private" problems. They are big issues, with far-reaching implications.

I would never presume to lump an entire gender together the way Lepine did, by declaring that all men are evil. But twenty years after the massacre, most cases of domestic and dating violence continue to be perpetrated by men (the ones who do have problems) against women.

So much for the "advantages" of being a woman.

More information on the Montreal Massacre:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89cole_Polytechnique_massacre

More information on Domestic Violence
http://www.mcedv.org/

For more information on feminism:
http://www.gurl.com/findout/label/pages/0,,694923,00.html.

Still writing books, still blogging in my head...

2009-11-28T16:30:00.001-08:00

I know, I know. It doesn't count if you can't read it onscreen. Kind of like that proverbial tree falling in the forest. But then again, I have no followers (sigh) so maybe it's okay that I only blog regularly in my brain?

In case anyone cares, here comes another supersized blog to make up for...umm...the lack of November postings.

1. I'm still looking for Oliver-Henry! Some people have hinted that they think I should give up, because he has been gone for almost four months. But I keep watching all the classified ads for the area in which he got lost, and people are STILL posting ads like this: "Found cat needs a home. A cat has been living under my deck since May but I can't keep it because I already have a cat and they don't get along. I would like to find a home for it now that the weather is getting colder." Oliver-Henry was a barn cat before I started spoiling him, and he has good survival instincts. And, as the great Dr. Seuss said in McElligot's Pool: "if such a thing could be it certainly would be." And that's why I think that I'm not such a fool, as I sit and I surf on my internet tool(bar).

2. Meanwhile, I continue to dream about him, every night. I had a really weird thing happen last week, though, where in the middle of the dream, I stopped and said to myself: "Wait a minute. Every night I dream that I found him, and every morning I wake up and it's not true. So am I actually dreaming this?" Sadly (or interestingly?) My dreaming self convinced my dreaming self that I actually WAS awake. But I wasn't. Does that make any sense????

3. Professionally, I am working on revisions of book number four, Maybe Never, Maybe Now. It's the sequel to Painting Caitlyn. It took me a long time to get started on it, because I am not, in general, a lover of sequels. (Confession: although I adored the originals, I couldn't finish Love, Stargirl, and I haven't made it past New Moon). I know that it unusual, but I grew up on Judy Blume and Lois Lowry's stand-alone novels, and sometimes revisiting a character I loved is a little bit like running into the guys I adored in high school now that we're forty: many of them are pudgy and wrinkly and not nearly as interesting as they used to seem, which taints the original memories a little bit.

Anyway, I felt very protective of "Caitlyn," and thus found it really difficult to begin writing about her again. I am THRILLED to say, however, that once I invited her back, she had a lot to share, and I think I managed to stay true to her in every way. My editor seems to agree, as I have (happily) not been asked to do any major re-writing - it's mostly just shortening sentences here and there. (Which, as you can see fromt he above, tends to be an issue for me!).

So here's the other cool thing about it: Maybe Never, Maybe Now will be out in the fall, along with Definitely Not Camelot, which is the sequel to Posing as Ashley. Ashley narrates DNC, and Caitlyn narrates MNMN, and each book has it's own plot, and can stand alone without the other - but the two books take place during the same time period, with the characters in different locations, each telling about what's happened to them. It's kind of like a she said/she said thing, with the stories intersecting here and there as the girls communicate with each other via telephone and email. More to follow on this as I am allowed to share.

4. I saw the movie Amelia a little while ago, and I have to say I was disappointed in the way they portrayed the main character. I get that they wanted to show Amelia Earhart's independence and rebellion against societal expectations by showing her refusal to either be loyal or demand loyalty in her marriage, but it really just ended up making her husband look like a long-suffering good guy. The truth is, HE was married when they got together, and they totally avoided mentioning that. Apparently, women who sleep around are still newsworthy, but boys will be boys. Sheesh.

5. Moonlight, Lace and Mayhem has revamped their blog. The guest blog I did for them in August on Nine Ways Writing YA Mirrors my Adolescence can now be found here. (And yes, it was a HUGE thrill to be in the virtual company of authors like Susan Beth Pfeffer, who I read when I actually was an adolescent, along with Jay Asher and Sara Zarr, who are, like, the A to Z of great YA right now!!!!

Hooray - with apologies to the Berenstein Bears

2009-11-11T19:40:00.001-08:00

Hooray! Hooray! I'm on my way! I finished the draft of book four today!

And now, on to report cards...

A Tale of Two Islands

2009-10-10T19:42:00.001-07:00

You wouldn't know it to look in the archives, but I actually blog every day. In my mind. In fact, I'm almost always "blogging" as I'm walking the dog, or trying to get to sleep - but clearly, if I don't actually get the ideas out of my head (brilliant or dull as they might be) and post them here, they don't really count.

Sometimes, I need time to think and arrange before I type (my first book, Painting Caitlyn, actually rolled around inside my head for YEARS before I finally started pulling it together as text), but usually, it's just distraction and procrastination that keep me from doing it. And so, an entry about the distractions that occurred between August and October.

1. Obviously, Oliver Henry
I am still looking for my cat (see preceeding post). All of the free surfing time I can find goes to perusing Craig's List, Kijiji, and random Google searches for "Found Cats" in Kitchener, Ontario.

2. Actual (not imaginary) deadlines

(Drumroll, please) Book three, Definitely Not Camelot is finished. It even has a cover, but I'm not sure whether or not I'm allowed to share that yet, so we'll save it for a future post. Book four, Maybe Never, Maybe Now is "in process" (ie. I'm stalling on it right now by catching up on blogging!!!) and will be finished very, very soon.

Okay - so enough of the numbered lists of excuses. Here's the coolest thing that's happened lately: I turned FORTY!!! Woo hoo! Now, I know it's unusual to cheer about turning forty, because it makes me sound really, really, old. I do. And I worry - just a tiny bit - that the number itself could be a "turn-off" to my YA audience. But here's the thing: my maternal grandmother died from cancer at 45. She had just one biological child (my dad), and he died from cancer at 46. I am his only biological child, and I've already had cancer (thyroid, when I was 28 - yet another subject for another day). I could worry about what genetic horrors may be lying in wait for me over the next few years, but instead, I'm celebrating that I've made it this far. And that the journey, for the most part, has been positive. In the middle of August, I invited several friends to join me for a weekend at my cottage on Thorah Island, in celebration of "The Twenty-Fourth Anniversary of Our Sixteenth Birthdays", but before arriving, I asked each of them to email me with one thing they know now (in their forties) that they wish they'd known then (in their teens). Some of them have been my friends since high school. One was my first roomate in university. And one of them is now a co-worker. Here is some of our collective wisdom:

Theresa wishes she'd known how short "forever" is.
Karen wishes she'd known that forty isn't really that old
Colleen says that great legs will eventually sag, too.
And Andrea said "You only live once. Take more chances."
Me, I just wish I'd understood that even though my breasts were small, they went beautifully with my flat stomach.

This is a picture I took just before we got in the boat to go to Thorah Island for my girls' retreat:

And this is the view from the dock that weekend:

Anyway, we ate chips and sat in the sun and swam in the lake and walked around the island and got caught up on each other's lives, and it made me feel happy and young and mature all at the same time. (oh yeah - and in the spirit of taking more chances, I drove the boat. Exhilarating!)

And then, at the end of September, when I had my REAL birthday, I finally got to fulfil a dream of mine and go to Pelee Island. I've wanted to go there for years, because of the monarch butterfly migration that happens there around the weekend of my birthday. Unfortunately, the butterflies didn't know I was coming, and departed early this year. Despite the definite lack of butterflies, I had an amazing time. My husband had booked us in at the best B&B on the island and we hiked and toured the winery and walked on the beach and had dinner with two other couples who were also staying there. The only sucky part was when I threw up (repeatedly) in the back of his plane on the way home. But then, the first time I did that, I was twenty, and we weren't even dating yet. So in a way, that made me feel kind of young, too.

This is the view of our B&B as we arrived at Pelee Island.

This is the view from the B&B:

And THIS (another drumroll, please!) is what FORTY looks like, without make-up, early in the morning at the end of the party:

(I wish I'd known, at sixteen, that I didn't need make-up to be beautiful) HOORAY!!!!!

Guest Blog Appearance!

2009-08-22T11:16:00.000-07:00

Hey guys - switch over to http://www.moonlightlacemayhem.blogspot.com/ where I am the guest author blogger today!

The Hunt for Oliver Henry

2009-08-16T20:10:00.000-07:00

Hi All - I got off track on my book deadline (yikes!) last week because I have been DESPERATELY searching for Oliver-Henry, my new little kitty friend who snuck out on my mom while she was kitty-sitting. He is deaf, and my mom lives two hours away, both of which make finding him quite a bit trickier, but I have taken (I think) some very creative steps towards "getting the word out", and I remain hopeful that he WILL return. He is quite a special little guy: started life as a barn cat, got stepped on by a cow (major injuries, no veterinary care, but he pulled through), started sneaking into the farmhouse because hey, it's safer in there! Started getting tossed out of the farmhouse - by the tail - into the pine tree. Continued sneaking in, continued getting tossed. Was "saved" by the farmer's daughter-in-law (my friend Colleen!) and delivered to me in May.Here's the thing: my husband has never really bonded with any of our cats. He tried with Sacha, but she'd decided years before I met him that she really didn't like anyone except me. He sort of tried with Sam, but Sam was already 16 when he moved in, and he woke us up A LOT at night, which made it kind of hard for them to get along. But Oliver-Henry (O'Henry) played it differently, and climbed right up onto my husband's lap every chance he got. He also quickly learned to hang around on my desk while I write. Unfortunately, as a former barn cat, he needed neutering, and I was advised to wait until six weeks after he'd had his final set of vaccinations...so now he's at large in Kitchener-Waterloo with testicles, and that may mean that he's a long, long way from where he started out. It also means that in a few weeks time, there may be many more chocolate brown/black kitties in Kitchener-Waterloo looking for homes. And that sucks. Because I have been brutally reminded this past few wees that animal shelters and rescue groups are full, full, full. In KW, they stay at the Humane Society for only 72 hours before going out for adoption. I walked through one day (but mostly my mom's been doing it for me) and there were so, so many cats who were in the middle of that 72 hour period - all lovely, all needing their people to come and get them out. But their people weren't there, and if my heart hadn't already been broken and heavy from the loss of O'Henry, it would have broken there. So even though I know I said it already in Posing as Ashley, please hear me out again, and get your pets spayed or neutered (I really was going to - really - he had an appointment booked). Even if you happen to find homes for all the kittens, that's a bunch of homes that are no longer available to the thousands of adult cats who already need homes. And just in case you're thinking kittens are more fun, here's Ten Reasons to Adopt an Older Cat.And if you happen to be in the Kitchener/Waterloo/Cambridge area, keep an eye out for O'Henry.Meanwhile, as I said, I am behind on my deadlines, and feeling unprofessional about it. But sometimes it's more important to be unprofessional than uncaring.

Anagrams

2009-07-12T13:02:00.000-07:00

Originally posted at LiveJournal May. 2nd, 2009 at 5:42 PM

I’ve been playing with Anagram generators online recently. They’re all over the internet: all you have to do is type “anagram finder” into the search engine of your choice (but I like http://www.wordsmith.org/anagram/ for lots of choice and custome options, or http://www.anagramgenius.com/server.html for a quick blurb) and voila! you can rearrange the letters of anything you want into cool little sayings.

There are lots of famous examples of amazingly coincidental anagrams, like “Dormitory”, which can be rearranged into “Dirty room” or “George Bush”, which anagrams to “He bugs Gore,” but sometimes, it’s more fun to research things that are personal to you, and to your life.

For example:

My name, Kimberly Peters, can be anagrammed to: “Berserk, yet limp” – and some days, when I’m so overwhelmed with things I have to do that I’m paralyzed into inaction, that’s a pretty good description!

And my second book, “Posing as Ashley”, anagrams to: “A sylph agonises”, which, if you’ve read it, is also kind of fitting.But it never would have occurred to me that "Principle Gibson" would have all the same letters as "So brain clipping".

Try it, then send me your results!

Body Image Week

2009-07-12T12:59:00.000-07:00

Originally posted on LiveJournal Apr. 26th, 2009 at 10:21 AM

It’s Body Image Week over at My Favorite Author, and back in my world, where I’m the Health teacher for grades 7 and 8, it’s the beginning of our “Growth and Development” unit. Yup – that’s “Puberty and Reproduction” or, as the students like to call it, “Sex Ed”.

Many teachers dread this unit, and while some leave it until the very last few days of the school year and then rush through in the most clinical way possible, or others “run out of time” and don’t cover it at all, I think it’s the most important information our students receive. And they know it! There is nothing else I teach – Visual Arts and Physical Education included -- that garners me such an engaged, attentive audience.

Why do I think it’s so important? Because everyone goes through puberty. You can live your whole life perfectly well without ever learning another language. There are people in the world who have never picked up a basketball, or a paintbrush or even – yes - a book. So while languages and physical education, and visual arts enhance our lives, they aren’t universal experiences like growth and development. Even if you live completely isolated in the most remote jungle in the world, you’re going to grow pubic hair and breasts and you’re going to have questions about it and you’re going to feel differently about yourself and other people after that happens.

The reality for the students I teach is that they don’t live in isolation. So even before their bodies start to change, they are bombarded every day with make-over programs telling them to surgically enhance their breasts. Spammers tell them their penises can be enlarged.

Infomercials recommend getting “ripped”. The porn they download shows adult bodies waxed and plucked as smooth as a pre-pubescent child. And even if they manage to avoid all of the expectations of the rest of the world, sometimes all it takes is one little “joke”, made by a sibling about the size of their hips, to send them off on a lifetime of body-image angst.

So I doubt that they believe me, their Health teacher, as I read to them from textbooks and curriculum documents that say pubic hair can be thick or sparse or heart shaped or diamond shaped, because a lot of them are probably already thinking they just want it off, and even if they don’t think that already, some of them will have partners who ask them to remove it, because that’s what they've seen and that's what they expect. And I don’t know if I can actually influence my students in any way when I explain to them that “size doesn’t matter”, because penises and breasts can do their jobs regardless of how big or small they are.

But I try. Because I hope that someday they will be emotionally strong enough to recognize that real human beings can be lumpy and hairy and natural and physically “flawed” and still be completely wonderful and loveable.

Yummy Inspiration/Food for Thought

2009-07-12T12:52:00.000-07:00

Originally posted on LiveJournal Apr. 19th, 2009 at 9:22 PM

My current favourite writer's aid? The recipe conversion calculator at

http://www.fruitfromwashington.com/Recipes/scale/recipeconversions.php where I can enter the original recipe for a dessert like the one below and reduce its quantity to .25% -- enough for a snack, but not an entire pan full for me to eat all alone while my pilot husband is away!(Now, I need to do a bunch of crunches, because reduced quantity or not, I can't look like the girl on that book cover if I keep making desserts!)

Apple Caramel Pudding Cake for One or Two (original quantities in brackets)
1/4 cup flour (1 cup)
2 tablespoons + 2 teaspoons sugar (2/3 cup)
1/2 teaspoon bkg powder (2 teaspoons)
1/4 teaspoon lemon rind (1 teaspoons)
1/8 teaspoon salt (1/2 teaspoons)
1/8 teaspoon ginger (1/2 teaspoons)
1/8 teaspoon cinnamon (1/2 teaspoons)
1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons apple (2 1/2 cup)
2 tablespoons milk (1/2 cup)

(Mix above ingredients and place in a French Onion Soup bowl, or similar sized baking dish)

Topping
1/2 cup boiling water (2 cup)
1/4 cup brown sugar (1 cup)
1 1/2 teaspoons butter (2 tablespoons)

Mix topping ingredients together and pour over batter, but DO NOT STIR. Bake about 40 minutes at 350. (Original recipe needs an hour).

Why “I” Narrate my Novels

2009-07-12T12:49:00.000-07:00

Originally posted on LiveJournal Mar. 26th, 2009 at 8:00 PM

On March 2, author Dawn_Metcalf blogged about the first person narrative, and how she often finds that “The ‘I’s and ‘me’s and ‘my’s stand out like flares on the page; too noticeable, presumptive and commanding.“

I’ve been thinking about her point of view ever since – mostly because it is so different from my own.

Part of what I love about a well-written book is the way it can draw me into the story, and make me feel like I’m a part of it. I’m a people person, and I love getting to know a story’s characters. When the narration happens in the first person, it’s almost as if I am sitting down with the protagonist, and he or she is telling me what happened to them. Rather than commanding, I find it endearing. They want me know all about them – how they feel, how they act, why they make the choices they make. I am a confidant - they trust me with their story! And something about that implied trust makes me care all the more about what happened – it helps me invest in the character, and in the story.

I learned about the omniscient point of view as most people do, in high school. It was explained to me that its power comes from its ability to report, objectively, on everything: and yet although it knows everything, it always leaves me with more questions. Who is actually telling this story? Why? How is that they know everything? Why should I care? I mean, if a character (through first person narration) confides in me that she felt embarrassed or ashamed, I get that – the person telling his or her own story knows how they felt at that particular time – and I can empathize, because they are revealing their innermost thoughts. But when an omniscient narrator tells me that she felt that way, I want to ask them how they know! Were they spying on the character? Did they read her diaries? How can they also know what the guy down the street was thinking? It makes me sort of crazy.

I have read many, many wonderful books with omniscient narration. But the ones that stay with me, the characters I adore, are the ones let me in, and sit me down, and let me get to know them on a close, personal level. And isn’t that what we also love most about a good blog?

Everything I Need to Know I Learned from Playing with Barbie™

2009-07-12T12:48:00.000-07:00

Originally posted on LiveJournal Mar. 10th, 2009 at 11:48 PM

OOPS! Thought I'd posted this weeks ago, when it actually WAS Barbie's birthday - but I just came in to post again and discovered it as a saved draft. Clearly, I don't have the hang of this yet. Surprise - two posts in one day!

Everything I Need to Know I Learned from Playing with Barbie™
(on the occasion of her 50th birthday)

Blonde doesn’t mean dumb.
Sexy doesn’t have to be slutty.
Independent doesn’t mean lonely.
Childless doesn’t mean unfulfilled.
You can be anything you want. Even an astronaut.
You don’t have stay in a job that doesn’t make you happy. If you’re tired of being an astronaut, you can be a dentist. Or a rockstar. Or a teacher. Or a cowgirl.
Work hard.
Play harder.
Travel.
Friends are important, and….
Men are wonderful, but…
You don’t need anyone to make you happy.
You are not doomed to a life of failure just because your parents may be physically or emotionally absent.
Be confident.
Be adventurous.
Save your money until you can treat yourself to a great car, condo, pony, purse, or puppy, because you deserve it.
The right clothes can make any occasion special.
Share.
Don’t share things you can’t afford to lose.
The wrong haircut can haunt you forever.
Think twice before getting a marker moustache. Or a tattoo. Some things just can’t be undone.
Nobody is going to clean up the mess you made, except you.
We don't all look like Sweet Sixteen Barbie™ when we turn sixteen. Or ever. But life goes on.
Everyone is imperfect when they are naked.
Imagination is everything.

Self-Censorship and YA Literature

2009-07-12T12:45:00.000-07:00

Originally Posted on LiveJournal Feb. 26th, 2009 at 9:43 PM

Okay, so it's been WEEKS since I decided to do this thing called blogging, and then panicked, and never came back. Why? Censorship, mostly. Self censorship. (Which, I guess, is better than self-centeredness, but I digress). I was worried about confusing Americans with spellings like "colour" and "neighbour"...then someone commented that most Americans would know I wasn't an idiot (I'm paraphrasing), because if they have half a brain, they'd recognize it as legitimate spellings...which made me worry that I'd offended Americans by suggesting they weren't sophisticated enough to pick up on the cultural variation. I also worry about revealing too much of my private self (because once I start wrtiing, I just can't stop!) and accidentally saying something about my students that will get me fired (because teaching is my day job - hi kids!!!!). Hence, I haven't done a thing here. Today, though, I got the nudge I needed, in the form of an email and conversation with our school librarian. The email was all about CENSORSHIP.
School Library Journal recently ran an article about librarians, and how they often act as their own censors when choosing material they deem appropriate for children and young adults. You can read the article here if you are interested, but it was the last two paragraphs that really struck me: “Librarians need to remember that it’s not their job to impose their own ideologies on the kids they serve or to parent or protect them, Scales says. And even though schools are required to act in loco parentis—Latin for ‘in place of parent’—the doctrine only applies to school librarians when it comes to the safety and health of their students, not when it comes to censorship, she adds.'You won’t ever make a difference if you don’t step out of the box,” she says. “And we can make a difference to children. Who knows? That very book that you thought was inappropriate may be the one that turns a child in the direction that he needs to be going or that gives a child quiet hope about a situation.’”
Ironically, it was our school librarian who first alerted me to the article. Less than twenty-four hours later, however, he mentioned to me that he has $4000 to spend on new books for our school library, Kindergarten through grade eight. I got excited, because I’d just loaned him two of my current YA favourites – Sweethearts, by Sara Zarr, and Twisted, by Laurie Halse Anderson. “You’re going to get Sweethearts and Twisted, right?” I asked, breathless with anticipation of cool book talks with fiction-loving grade eight students. “I don’t know…” he said. “They aren’t as good as your book…” (I think he’s wrong, but yay) “…and anyway, the older kids don’t read, so I don’t want to spend the money there.” HELLOOO???? What’s wrong with this picture??? Everything, everything, we know about literacy says kids need engaging material. My books (Painting Caitlyn and Posing as Ashley) are never on the shelf in our school library– they are ALWAYS signed out. I know a lot of that is just because I am their French teacher, and it is waaaay cool to read the words “breast” and “sex” when – OMG – your teacher wrote it!!! But YALSA also chose Painting Caitlyn as a Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers, so I like to believe that the books have some merit on their own, apart from the students’ personal connections to the author. The fact that they are always signed out proves that by putting quality material, chosen by teen advisory groups, in the library, we can make them readers . Our librarian doesn’t want to spend money on the older kids because they don’t read….but what are they supposed to read if we don’t spend money on them? And why doesn’t our librarian see that giving up on YA readers is one of the most insidious forms of censorship there is?