Relaxation isn’t exactly the defining characteristic of this time of year. But to the rescue comes The Friends of the Santa Cruz Public Libraries. My local library Friends asked me to participate in a fundraiser that everyone can get behind. Here’s their flyer for the event: The First Annual Stay Home & Read a Book Santa Cruz…
Read MoreWhen I went house-shopping almost two years ago now, my only requirement was that it be closer to family than where I was. However, before long I had to admit to my real estate agent that I’d been spoiled, and I didn’t think I could bear to live any place but on top of a…
Read More(Two weeks is plenty of time for Christmas shopping, right? Right??) Want to know some things I’ve fallen in love with this year, that now I’m giving to a lot of people on my list? Pre-reader book: Journey, by Aaron Becker. This is a gift of time as well, and self, since there are no…
Read MoreHummingbirds are not supposed to stick around when the weather gets cold enough to freeze them out of the trees at night. Really not. But when there’s an endless source of high-calorie goo, they stay in the neighborhood, leaving the idiot who put the hanger up with the hard realization that the thing now…
Read MoreWhen I was in the Pacific Northwest last month for the fabulous Sherlock Seattle I sat down and talked with Bill Kenower with Author about, well, Sherlock Holmes–and also about Mary Russell, the temerity of an innocent, writer’s block, and what writing has taught me:
Read MoreIn the Dick Francis novel Decider, the protagonist is an architect with many sons and a difficult marriage. At one point he reflects on the unlikely things that make people buy one house over another—in his case, a large tree that he can envision his boys climbing. I bought a house last year. My decider…
Read MoreSmall Business Saturday is coming! For those of us who love local, who shudder at the thought of Target at 5:00 am the day after Thanksgiving, who believe in our bones that Thanksgiving shopping is a sign of the End Times, there’s Small Business Saturday. Shop local on the day after the day after Thanksgiving,…
Read MoreMany and many a year ago, Laurie King spent her life (parts of it, anyway) in realms academical. About half the novels I’ve written have some touch of my previous life in them: Brother Erasmus from To Play the Fool, the tutoring of Margery Childe in Monstrous Regiment, Anne Waverley in Darker Place/Birth of the…
Read MoreMary Russell is posting Tweets all day for Remembrance Day, from the diary of Gabriel Hughenfort. Russell, Holmes, and Mrs Hudson paused for silence at 11 am their time, in Sussex. Follow her here. (War photographer Helen Johns Kirtland in the trenches.)
Read MoreFunny, how things come together. This week, I’ve been working my way through my MA thesis, concerning the feminine aspects of Yahweh, trying to get it into shape for e-publication. At the same time I’ve been writing an essay for Sisters in Crime on the topic, “Belonging.” Which means I’ve had two things on my…
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