hats off to hennepin!

I LOVE libraries and this week I'm saluting the Hennepin County Library in Minnesota as they've ordered 4 copies of The Frontiersman's Daughter and already have 1 request pending to read it. Lest this go to my head, they also seem to have ordered 4 copies of every book available in the nation for the next 6 months. Anyway, this library system looks huge and they like books, plus they are next door to my publisher. Thank you, Hennepin!

My own library shelf is bursting with books. There's no such thing as just stopping buying books. I simply need more shelves. Is it a terrible thing to have designs on your son's room when he is only 12? I'm already building bookcases in my mind and repainting his room and he won't leave home for another 6 years, if then. Poor Wyatt. I have visions of a library in my little house but don't know if it will ever be.

The contents of someone's bookcase are part of his history, like an ancestral portrait. -Anatole Brayard

The good book is always a book of travel; it is about a life's journey. -HM Tomlinson

I know not how to abstain from reading. -Samuel Pepys

bookmarks and book clubs

Do any of you readers belong to a book club? Would you be interested in reading The Frontiersman's Daughter as a group? If so, I would love to join your club via conference call and talk books! I was thinking today how much I'd love to be a part of a book club which has for many years been something of a dream of mine. And now I might, Lord willing, be able to do some book club hopping at last!

I've been working on a reader's guide for book clubs interested in Lael's story. Developing the questions is really a great deal of fun but requires a lot of thought to be thought-provoking to the reader. My publisher will be posting these discussion questions on their site in future so I'm busy thinking of engaging material.

I think I've said in an earlier post how much I like bookmarks. I collect them and enjoy giving them as gifts. My publisher has just confirmed that they'll be sending me a BIG BOX of bookmarks and postcards prior to The Frontiersman's Daughter's release. Only 145 more days! That may sound like a long time but I began this blog last April and that was a long time from release date! Now it seems right around the corner close and I'm thankful.

So if you love books, are a member of a book club, or simply want to receive a bookmark and postcard from me prior to The Frontiersman's Daughter's release, I would love to get that to you. Just email me at laurafrantz61@yahoo.com and leave your name and mailing address. Your info will be confidential, of course. This will also enter you in the drawing for a free copy of the book come August and some unique Kentucky gifts (not grits!).

Come to think of it, I might start a book club myself. How does Joyce Bible Church Book Club sound? If you belong to a book club I'd love to hear ideas of how they're established and kept going. Also, would love to hear what books you readers are reading!

Bless you!

bald boys

Early this morning Randy and I took the boys east toward civilization (Silverdale) to the Awana Olympics for a day of games with hundreds of other kids. Paul and Wyatt begged me to shave their heads for the occasion, thinking a lack of hair would somehow make them more fleet of foot, so I obliged and they are two very bald boys:) Wyatt won the tug of war with his team and Paul did well in a relay and now they are very tired tonight.

It was a joy to see so many families and kids come together. I was reminded of the verse of how we are to love God with all our hearts and soul and strength - these words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. Deuteronomy 6:6-7. It was good to see families trying to live that out through Awana which is worldwide now.

We had to do the eating thing while there - Red Lobster:) I think Silverdale must have one of the biggest Barnes & Nobles on the planet and I'm both sad and relieved I didn't succumb to the temptation to walk through their doors. I was busy being derailed by deck furniture at Home Depot. When we headed back to the woods, we ran into snow! So much for deck furniture! But it was beautiful nonetheless.

Right now it's May in book 3 and Roxie's garden is burgeoning beneath all that Kentucke sunshine. No, that's not a typo. Kentucky used to be spelled Kentucke and I've been true to that in my books. I must let go of Roxie and the Falls of the Ohio now and get back to book 2 and the Red River since I'm almost finished with the page proofs for The Frontiersman's Daughter. I think I mentioned that I'm having flashes of book 4. That's how it always starts for me - just brief glimpses of characters and situations that flash like lightning and disappear quick as a summer storm. I write them down as they come to me and find that they eventually meld together and become a book. And no, I don't understand it either!

I've been in love three hundred times in my life, and all but five were with books.
-Leo Glickstein

friday night tacos

When I have a deadline, and even when I don't, this is one of our family's favorite meals. Don't be fooled by the recipe's simplicity. My 9 year old nephew who was visiting ate seven in one sitting! They're that good!

Tacos
1 lb. ground beef
1-15 oz. can refried beans
thin yellow corn tortillas
vegetable oil
shredded lettuce, grated cheddar cheese, sweet chopped onion, diced tomato, etc.

Brown ground beef in large skillet. Season with salt and pepper. Add one can refried beans and mix well; simmer. Meanwhile, in small nonstick pan, add 1/2 inch vegetable oil and heat on medium-high till it sizzles when corn tortilla is added. Using tongs, fry corn tortillas one at a time in oil, a few seconds on each side. Drain on paper towels. I make a stack of tortillas to keep them warm. Tortillas should still be soft, not stiff.

To serve, place small amount of taco filing in each shell and top with toppings. Enjoy!

I have a very small, old book printed in 1911 entitled Grace Before Meals that has a prayer for each day of the year. Today's prayer for March 6 reads:

O dear Heavenly Father, who lookest down upon us in mercy and pitying love, we do thank Thee for our daily repast from Thine earthly store, for our burden is light with Thy grace. Amen.

Happy Friday!

march winds doth blow

I love March but admit we're kind of worn down this time of year. My little fiddler has been sick though he did make it to his lesson yesterday and tried hard not to cough on his teacher. In the good old days on the Kentucky frontier and in the colonies, March was perhaps the least favorite month, per my research. After the long, lean months of mostly meat and bread and being cooped up indoors, March was known for illness. I used to wish I'd been born in the 18th-century but I doubt I would have lived beyond childhood. Through my books, I still get to go back but don't have to eat possum stew and spin flax and bathe once a year:)

Outside my windows the sun is shining and that March wind is making music with the chimes under the eaves. Time to haul all the homeschool stuff out (we took our spring break when company came) and get busy again. Paul is playing Old Joe Clark this week and learning a new bowing technique called the shuffle, perfect for square dancing. He played a Mozart duet with his teacher yesterday and it sounded heavenly to me. I wish I wasn't so musically challenged! He has his eye on the banjo next. I told him he has to get good enough fiddling to play a certain piece at my funeral (Neil Gow's Scottish Lament) and then he can take up banjo after I'm dead!

I finished reading through the pages of TFD last night and am going to start again in a few minutes. I've caught very few errors at this stage. And I stand amazed at the work involved in producing a book on the publisher's end! I don't need a Stephen King quote today. I have one of my own.

Those who criticize books have never written one. -Laura Frantz

read across america week

We're now into Read Across America Week and I'm so glad to be a bibliophile! I've been saving a treasure of a book by James Alexander Thom, an autographed copy of Sign-Talker. It's a fictionalized account of the adventures of George Drouillard on the Lewis and Clark Expedition, which I can't seem to get enough of. Now's the time! Sometimes I dream of getting lost in Indiana and finding Thom's cabin in the hills. I think I came close last August when I got lost trying to find Locust Grove in Louisville, remember? It was the best being lost experience I've ever had!

I shouldn't be reading Thom and perusing these pages of TFD with a deadline looming but I'm learning to juggle all these books. I didn't say I liked it but I'm learning! I prefer to stay with one book at a time, but now I'm working on all three at once again. It's a little bewildering at times but The Frontiersman's Daughter is at the very end of production, Red River Daughter is being edited heavily by me before the August deadline, and I'm only 221 pages into The Scrivener's Daughter which is first draft material thus far. Stranger still, I keep having these flashes of book 4 which I welcome, but please, maybe not this soon!

Right now I am chuckling at Stephen King who said, "By the time a book is actually in print, I've been over it a dozen times or more, can quote whole passages, and only wish the #@&!? old smelly thing would go away."

See, I told you he had a sense of humor! And I'm pleased to say that I came close to that when I was a galleys slave last Christmas but this present read-through is pretty fine, thanks to the hard work in December. I'm not complaining, mind you, just reminiscing. This is all still over the rainbow stuff to me:) And He gets all the credit.

greetings from baker publishing group!

I love to get anything from my publisher as they always begin with the above greeting which seems like some sort of Biblical exhortation, at least to me! The FedEx truck arrived this morning with the actual pages of The Frontiersman's Daughter so I have a new, delightful deadline:) The end stages of production are so much fun. It is a joy to hold the book in my hands, albeit without its cover and binding, etc. I am bubbling over with thankfulness if you couldn't tell. This is all such a gift! I get to read through the novel one final time, then it is off to the printer to become a bonafide book.

Meanwhile, my poor Kentucky momma is snowed in in North Carolina with those normally snow-deprived southerners who own itty-bitty snow shovels if they own one at all. Mom left Seattle last night on a night flight and arrived in Charlotte this morning to an overflowing airport and planes parked on the tarmac. I don't know when she'll get home to Kentucky. My brother is headed to sunnier climes and leaves for Spain March 18th. Bye, Chris!

And now I'm at home with a sick son, a missing cat, and my pages. Better get busy.

This world belongs to the enthusiastic. -Emerson

To have joy one must share it. -Lord Byron

Find ecstasy in life - the mere sense of living is joy enough. - Emily Dickinson

If you want to be happy, BE. -Tolstoy

I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. John 10:10

winding down

Tomorrow my Kentucky momma leaves. So today we had brunch at our favorite breakfast place in Port Angeles - Cafe Garden. We always have the same thing- Angel's Eggs - which are just as divine as they sound. Lots of cream cheese, fresh mushrooms, green onion, and hollandaise sauce with a croissant or two thrown in. Nothing fattening about that! I've secretly been dreaming of Panera on Richmond Road in Lexington. There are no Paneras or Cracker Barrels this side of the Rockies to my knowledge:( Personally, I'm relieved that this eating thing is winding down. I need to get back to writing.

My mom keeps exclaiming about the birds we have out here. We have GIANT robins and woodpeckers - like something out of a Stephen King novel, truly! She keeps asking me to identify birds which I am dismal at doing. Need to get a bird book in my stack of stuff. All I know is that we have zero Kentucky cardinals here.

About those books... Soon I should receive The Frontiersman's Daughter in actual book format to review a final time. Only 153 more days till it's on bookshelves!!!! I am so excited and amazed still - maybe a little nervous. Still no wireless in the woods but maybe it doesn't really matter. I'm no Stephen King with reader mail stacking up!

I think I have this erroneous idea that once the book comes out my life will get a little more hectic. But I don't think this is true. I'm sure it depends on how the book does - whether it sinks or swims. Revell has an amazing marketing team. I'm so thankful for that. But really, it's all in His hands. I've done what I can. Going public with anything is a bit frightening. Writers usually are, by nature, a quiet lot and writing is a lonely profession. But like Stephen King said, it's all the playground personally and I think sales figures have little to do with that. I think King would enjoy writing just as much if Carrie had been backlist, though I'm sure his success has sweetened the whole writing experience overall.

I love this King quote: I have written because it fulfilled me... I did it for the buzz. I did it for the pure joy of the thing. And if you can do it for joy, you can do it forever.

Amen, again!

snow days and stephen king

It snowed last night and schools are closed today though I see blue sky outside my window. My stack of books is growing beside my writing chair. Always a happy feeling to sit beside a stack of books! And Amazon has more on the way:) I was in the Port Angeles library a couple of days ago checking out books for my mom who's here (she's reading J.A. Jance, by the way), and I came across a little book on writing. It's the first book I've ever read by Stephen King.

I'm afraid I'm not a horror fan any more than King is a fan of TFD but this little book, entitled, On Writing, A Memoir of the Craft, is really interesting. The cover isn't bloody or eerie or anything like that but decidedly unKing-like with flowers and a bay window and root cellar door (now that door does look sort of mysterious and unfriendly, on second glance) but I do like what he has to say about writing.

King writes almost every day, even Christmas Day, and feels strange when he isn't writing and even has trouble sleeping. "For me, not writing is the real work. When I'm writing, it's all the playground, and the worst three hours I ever spent there were still pretty good." Amen to that, I say!

When interviewers ask him why he writes what he writes, as if he's in control of his stories, he remembers the quote by SciFi writer, Alfred Bester, who said, "The book is the boss." Simply put, the book drives the author, the author doesn't drive the book.

Lastly, King wonders why some authors are so prolific (Briton John Creasey wrote 500 novels, some in two days, under 10 different names) and why others like the brilliant Harper Lee and her solo To Kill a Mockingbird, are not. He says, "If God gives you something you can do, why in God's name wouldn't you do it?" Amen again!

I made one surprising discovery about Stephen King. Not only is he a master horror writer, he is a very humorous writer. If you like to write (and laugh) you should read this book. My only caution is that while I abhor profanity, King does not. But he offers a world of advice to writers everywhere, of all genres, and I learned a few tricks of the trade I'd not considered.

Now, off to play in that snow!

a time to dance

I was reading in Ecclesiates this morning that there is a time for everything (Ecc. 3:1-9). A time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance... When times are good, we are to be happy. When times are bad we are to consider that He has made the one as well as the other. I'd rather dance!

Life is usually stuffed so full of things I don't remember particular months. But I do recall last February '08 vividly. And I was not dancing. I was waiting to hear if Baker Book's wanted The Frontiersman's Daughter. While I waited the boys came down with the stomach flu (at the same time) and I was sick with a sinus infection, etc. It was raining buckets and it seemed we didn't leave the house for a month. My old computer was having issues which left me wondering if I'd even get the publisher's email telling me I'd been rejected. This was not a fun month - but it sure was memorable!

Fast forward to this February! A time to dance, indeed. I almost hate to move to March as this month has been so much fun. But melancholy as I am, I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. Just how much fun can one have? It seems I've exceeded maximum capacity and some sort of penalty will soon be exacted. Did you know Moses was a melancholy? He also had anger management issues. But I digress!

I'm thankful for this February. But I'm also thankful for last February. It was miserable and I'd not want to repeat it, but I think I learned a tremendous amount about waiting and endurance and trust. I was a different person come March. Maybe a better one.

I was touched by what I found in the front of Silas House's novel, Clay's Quilt. He wrote this dedication:

For Cheyenne and Olivia
I hope you dance

I'm guessing these are his daughters. And I think I understand the sentiment behind it. Let's dance!