On the Road Again...

trav·el /ˈtravəl/

verb

go from one place to another, typically over a distance of some length.

"FLYGIRL traveled to Idyllwild California this week."

FLYGIRL gets around. She recently accompanied me to Idyllwild, California, a mountain town I'd always wanted to visit. Her first major appearance was as an addition to the guest library at the Idyllwild Bunkhouse, where I stayed during my getaway. Here she is with Raj, the proprietor of this quiet, rustic getaway location. I have never known the kind of hospitality that Raj provides.

Then, we made sure she was safely ensconced at the Idyllwild Public Library. The librarian was thrilled to add this volume to their collection. Do you have an Idyllwild library card? Check out FLYGIRL!

My original plan was to come here and do some writing. I'd finished the first draft of Book #3 of The Flygirl Series a couple of weeks ago, and wanted a quiet place to go about the difficult work of revising it. I need to get it in shape to be edited by a professional, and I thought this would be a terrific place to do it.

Then my friend Gail and her best friend Trek agreed to join me for a day of hiking. The sights we saw together were quite spectacular. Nature never, ever disappoints.

Little did I know that right smack in the middle of my visit, Idyllwild would be hit with a big winter storm. Over 30 inches of snow fell, which meant I had to break out my scraper/brush, which I hadn't used since I moved to California from Chicago 12 years ago. It was one of the things I kept "just in case," and it sure got a workout.

But the falling snow was quite beautiful, and the environment perfect for creativity. Here's hoping my muse followed me there, and that I made some progress on this novel that I am so anxious to share with you. It completes the character arc of Tris Miles, and once again addresses social challenges important to us all.

Hope you are all safe and dry, wherever you are. I was just thrilled to be back on the road again.

Everybody has One...

o·pin·ion /əˈpinyən/

noun a view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge "Every reader is entitled to their opinion of your book--whether they've read it or not."

You thought about it. You slaved over it. You finished it. And, by cracky, you published it. Then you wonder, "What have I done?"

It took me 25 years from when I first conceived my debut novel Flygirl to see it published. The book was inspired by actual unpleasant events I experienced during my professional flying career. In that sense, it was very personal to me.

But it was never my "baby." I didn't feel the kind of attachment to it that one might to a child or a favored relative or pet. I remember thinking, "Here we go. Bring on the haters!"

Fortunately, they must have been walking or had car trouble, since it took them almost two years to arrive. I recently did a world-wide promotion to celebrate Flygirl's second anniversary. It began on a Wednesday.

By early Thursday morning, I had received a terse one-star review from a reader in the UK which read, in part, "I don't think there is anything to recommend about this book." Ah. Sorry you wasted your 99 pence.

I suspect this reader never finished the book, and maybe didn't read past the first few pages before deciding it wasn't for them. And that's just fine.

I wrote Flygirl because I wanted to tell the story. I published it because I wanted to share the story with others. There was never a moment when I assumed everyone would love it.

That's my message to all of you would-be published novelists out there. Yes, you are making art. Surely you've seen a painting or photograph you didn't care for, or picked up a book you couldn't finish. We are all entitled to not like something. Some readers won't enjoy your book. It's not the end of the world.

I feel compelled to add that this review was one of 110, so it didn't effect my 4.4 star rating. I guess there's that.

The Sound of Spirit

crack·le

/ˈkrak(ə)l/

verb

make a rapid succession of slight cracking noises

“I could hear the aurora crackle, even when I couldn’t see it.”

I’m all about fulfilling my dreams. And one of them was to witness the Aurora Borealis, the famous Northern Lights, in person.

In January 2016, I flew up to Fairbanks, Alaska. Statistics told me that in January, to have an 80% chance of seeing the Aurora, I had to stay in town for four days. Planning to stay for eight, I was leaving nothing to chance.

On my second night in Fairbanks, I saw them for the first time. They danced in the sky, tickling the tops of trees and shimmying across the horizon. More than enchanting, it was intoxicating.

I needed more. Up near Cleary Summit, atop the fog layer that sometimes hung over the City of Fairbanks, was the Aurora Borealis Lodge. Complete with huge picture windows and an unobstructed view of the sky, I spent four nights and five mornings mesmerized by those lights.

More than see, I heard them. The sky was alive, protons and electrons disturbed by solar wind complaining in the form of undulating bright colors. The faster the wind, the more “excited” the particles, the more complex their shifting shapes.

I am not religious. I believe in something more than what we can see here on earth, but before I went to Fairbanks, that belief was based solely on an intellectual form of faith.

Now I know for sure there is something more, something moving all the time, something that is there whether I can see it or not.

I live in Southern California where there is no chance I’ll ever look up and see those Northern Lights. Still, I sit outside in the middle of the night…and listen.