Giveaway Winners
Thank you so much, everyone who read and responded so openly to the last post. I wish I could send a book to every single person. I hope people will take the time to go back to it and read the comments. Maybe they will remind you, as they did me, that often we have no...
Another Opening–and A Giveaway
Do you remember that song, "Another Opening, Another Show"? One stanzas goes, "You cross your fingers and hold your heart. It's curtain time and away we go..." I can't cross my fingers (makes typing impossible), but I do hold my heart and my breath as I write to you:...
Looking Back and Ahead
I think most people have probably had a year here or there that was just really rough. 2019 has been that way for my family. My husband had prostate cancer (successfully treated, I'm thankful to say), quickly followed by a hip replacement, then his opposite knee had...
Gratitude
Maybe this happens to you, too? You’re breathing out relief because you got through something—and you look back and feel immense gratitude for the help that carried you to the other side. My husband and I have limped through a tough year with a lot of help from our...
The Dog’s Publication Day Complaint
I have always been an animal lover. Possibly, like enough of my identity to be embarrassing, it was born of rebellion against my parents. Well, actually my mother. It was she who was most vocal in her adamant refusal to let me and my sister have a pet. Jan and I...
The Story Behind The Story
In case you’re one of the few people who’ve managed to miss my news, THE TESTAMENT OF HAROLD’S WIFE is coming out September 25 from Kensington Books. I thought you might enjoy the real-life stories that gave life to this novel. There were two completely different...
Unfinished Stories
Nancy’s husband sent a picture two days before she died. In that one, she wore a white sleeveless nightgown. Her grown sons leaned over either side of her, a hospice tray with a cup of applesauce in the foreground. She was sleeping. Perhaps she’d slipped into the...
Our Recalcitrant Robot
We were recently with our daughter's family. They have two kids, two dogs--one of which is a Labrador retriever--and astonishingly immaculate hardwood floors. We have no little kids at home, one Labrador retriever, and hardwood floors that make people wonder if we’re...
Heroism: It All Counts, Right?
I’ve spent a couple of years trying to figure out how my very smart dog—who can remember and break into any place food is stored—can have such an extremely short memory. Every day, when Scout the Lab sees the horrible menace of the mail truck as it stops in front of...