Russell’s War!

RUSSELL’S WAR IS NOW AVAILABLE! The complete collection of Russell short pieces—yes, ALL of them—is available in a gorgeous shiny new paperback from my good friends at Poisoned Pen Press. I signed for the Poisoned Pen bookshop on Saturday—and, since Les Klinger was there too, if you snatch at one soon, you’ll get a copy…

Read More

Novel therapy

One of my favorite bloggers, The Passive Voice, reposted a piece about novel therapy: British libraries offer full bibliotherapy services, including recommendations and exhaustive reading lists based on condition, to anyone, at every library in the U.K., at no cost.   Experts say books featuring characters or people that share a patient’s struggles can be an…

Read More

Construction Site

We’re going to be conducting some site maintenance while we work on converting over to a new and improved website, so posts and comments will be turned off for a short while. Thanks for your patience!

Read More

Writing Companions

1993 was a big year in my life. A Grave Talent was published, and didn’t disappear entirely. The Beekeeper’s Apprentice was prepared for publication, and I went to New York to meet that mysterious and all-powerful individual, an editor. The publishers made it clear that they wanted more books, and would give me money for…

Read More

A doughty 2009 to us all

Here’s wishing us all a sturdy and cheerful 2009. (From a 1939 British propaganda poster, sent me by the stupendous Tony Broadbent whose character Jethro the cat burglar is sure to encounter Mary Russell one of these days.)

Read More

Baking memories

Christmas can be a tough time of year, especially the first year or two after you’ve lost someone close to you. After my father died, it took me some time before any of us could face producing the sorts of cookies he always baked for the season. Eventually, my mother started making the individual fruitcakes…

Read More

Unusual Suspects

There’s a new Laurie King on the shelves—a new LRK short story, at any rate: Long long ago, in a galaxy far away, I did an event we called “Writer’s Improv,” which meant I sat down one lovely May morning and wrote a story with the world looking over my shoulder, online. That day I…

Read More

Giving thanks for books (and readers)

Sorry for the silence here, my Mac was off playing with friends at the Apple store, and in the meantime the copyedit for The Language of Bees landed on my desk—oh, and isn’t today some kind of a holiday? Because my house is awfully full of people all of a sudden… But I just wanted…

Read More

A Star is Born

My good buddy Dana Stabenow is a video star! It’s a great example of how to make, and use, a video, with pizazz, personality, and humor. This is how it came about, in her words: 1. I saw the Reduced Shakespeare Company in London. 2. I moved back to Kachemak Bay and joined the Homer…

Read More

Dulce et decorum

Remembrance Day in Commonwealth countries, Veteran’s Day here in the US. Ninety years ago, November 11, 1918, the guns fell silent for the first time in more than four years. In London, there was silence, and the bells rang, and people wept. I was 13 when the first US combat troops landed in Vietnam. That…

Read More