Welcome to my Blog

As many of you know I am a huge fan of Ms. Lane's book 'Finding Poe'. So when she contacted me and said she read my book 'Shifters' and found some edits, I was grateful. I can edit for style and flow easily enough but I really need to go back to school and learn more about editing for punctuation (I am a comma junkie.) <--See like that; do I put the period on the inside of the parenthesis or the outside? I was so focused on being a zookeeper that I sort of ignored anything that wasn't about animals or organic chemistry. She sent me what had to be hours of work on her part cleaning up my grammatical messes and punctuational problems. She did not ask for anything in return. I asked her if I could list her as editor and she thanked me. That's right, the woman who had spent hours polishing up my gem thanked me for crediting her for it. This is the sort of camaraderie you find often in the Indie community. We help each other with cover art and with editing...

So here I am wired up and stuck in a bed for however many days it takes. It was supposed to be a week but hopefully I'll get out sooner. Did I mention I'm having a video EEG? Not only am I wired up for the week but they'll have video of it too. Yay.  I mean really, who doesn't want video of them looking perfectly horrid? I feel rather sorry for the poor chap that has to stare at my mug for a week. I can tell you that the glue they use for the electrodes itches like crazy. I can also tell you nurses and PAs do not get enough money. The ones I've met here have been downright awesome. For those who don't know my background here's a little summary: Nine years ago I was a successful zoo keeper. I was working at the Detroit Zoo and was in bliss. I had the greatest managers, curators, and coworkers anyone could hope to have. One day I was scrubbing the Penguinarium and this pain shot down my left arm into my pinky finger. It brought me to my knees. Mind you, ...

I just want to say thank you to everyone who downloaded a free copy of Shifters this weekend. It made my weekend to see that over 400 people snagged a copy and that the book made it to #27 in Amazon's Top 100 Free Horror. You guys are downright awesome!

I love my characters, they come to me to tell their stories and once they've finished usually a bittersweet goodbye follows. There are those that stick around, the ones you just know will make a series and this blog entry is about one of those. He's a character I dearly hope makes it to another book. Right now I call him 'The Narrator'. He hasn't told me his name yet, and he is so interesting that it's hard for me to remember to ask for it. He pops up at the oddest times and begs for me to write more. Yet, all I really know of him so far is what he's told me to help me twine together the tales I wrote for 'Oh, The Humanity'. He tells me of the creatures you'll meet in the book and how they came to find themselves in the positions they inevitably fall into. I could write him for hours and still enjoy his soothing voice. He is simply the best, well... narrator, I could hope to have. He's made a haunting impact on me, I can't seem to res...

This morning I came downstairs to find our buddy Turtle Tuck floating facedown in the aquarium. My two boys were standing around the fish tank wondering what happened to their beloved turtle. Quickly, instinct (and nearly a decade and a half of on the job training) took over and I pulled her out of the tank. She was stone cold. 'Aw, crap!' I thought to myself 'She's dead. What do I tell the kids?' Then she started opening her eyes. 'Hallelujah! She is still alive!' I quickly ran the warm water and when I hit that perfect temprature I began running the water over the back of her shell, keeping her head out of the stream, so she could still breathe. She took a huge gulp of air and I knew she was going to be ok. I had to keep her warm, but she was still too cold to move, so I couldn't just leave her in the sink. Wrapping her in paper towels, I did what any animal person does when they need to care for a sick critter. I bit the bullet and stuffed the turtle...

Gerry Kearns was a good woman. Her husband was the president of the chamber of commerce and his family was quite wealthy, so she didn't need to work. Instead, she spent twenty hours a week as a candy striper at the local hospital. She was on the board for the local no-kill shelter and always did her best to make sure the family donated whatever money and food items they could when the local food drives came up. So when the man limped up to her in the parking garage, she didn't think twice about trying to help him get his unruly dog in the van. She only had to see the cast on his leg and that large heart of hers took over. She had spent the latter part of her life working hard to help people. That sort of training caused a type of forgetfulness when it came to personal safety. As she maneuvered the Golden retriever into the white, windowless, heavy duty work van the man who had requested her aid grinned and pulled the trigger on his taser. Before she could process what was h...

My husband's uncle passed last week after a year long battle with cancer. He was buried today instead of last week because he wouldn't have wanted to upset anyone's Easter plans. Yes, that is the amazing angel we were all blessed to know. He was a selfless and loving man and thankfully, he has passed these traits on to his children. I am forever blessed to be a part of the Johnesee, Kowalski, and Glitz family. They are the most loving and wonderful souls it has ever been my luck to encounter. With my health being all kinds of wonky I don't have many good days and have missed more family functions than I attended and regardless of how many I have missed they still greet me with open arms and hearts when I am able to attend. So in honor of Uncle Ron Kowalski I will be putting up a free short story on my website. A story that he helped inspire two years ago during an extended family vacation to Myrtle Beach. We had gone to dinner at a Brazillian steakhouse that both R...