A Matter of Mercy

A Matter of Mercy

  I’m thrilled to introduce you to my new novel, A MATTER OF MERCY, published August 1.  This one has so much of my heart in it.  Set in Wellfleet on Cape Cod, it began when I became friends with one of the oyster farmers, Barbara Austin, whom I met...
A Love Story

A Love Story

I have spent all morning lying in the sunshine on the floor with Hannah the Lab, knowing it’s our last morning together.  She can’t get to her feet by herself anymore.  It came on fairly suddenly last week, this final diminishment.  My husband and I can...

Writing About The Elderly

Hannah, my chocolate Lab, a main character in Where The Trail Grows Faint, will be thirteen next month.  Our forays into the woods have changed, although she still shows me that she wants to go by following me to the door in the late afternoon when I get up from...

Do The Right Thing Even If You Look Like An Idiot

Have you ever tried to do what you were pretty sure was the right thing only to have it explode?  Even have two other seemingly sane and intelligent people tell you yes, you should do it before you went ahead and did that thing that exploded? So here’s the...

On Zusak, Gadhafi and Surprise

An unexpected ludicrous moment, a twist into tragedy, a flash of tenderness:  surprise by a character is a crucial element of a riveting story.  Speaking yesterday at the College of Mount Saint Joseph in Cincinnati, Ohio, Marcus  Zusak discussed this as well as...