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Alma Mater
The University of California Santa Cruz (“The original authority on questioning authority”) is my alma mater, and has continued to nourish me long after she handed me my degree. Five years ago, I was tremendously honored to be named one of this relatively new university’s “45+5” alumni. And coming up on the 25th, I will be participating…
Read MoreRain! Rain!
It’s actually raining here on the Central Coast: real, long-lasting downpours. Which will probably end instantly, now that I’ve said it aloud, but it’s so lovely to have real wet soggy ground outside my window. And so, for today’s Throwback Thursday picture, an image of yours truly in the Australian so-called desert, following a rare…
Read MoreThe past, in the present
The book I’m working on has, among its several elements, an episode in Papua New Guinea. So, today’s throwback Thursday… In 1977, a highland air strip (that’s the plane’s strut above my head) and no, I’m not standing far in front of these ladies, they’re just really, really short. And fascinated by this figure from…
Read MoreThe young writer’s Thursday
Today’s TBT is the picture of a young writer…’s work: English descriptive paragraph Laurie Richardson Nov. 21, 1967 San Francisco, as I last saw it, was enough to stir the heart of any native Californian. The scene was movingly beautiful. I can remember it as if I saw it just yesterday. It was from the…
Read MoreTwenty five years of earth moving
This Throwback Thursday concerns twenty-five years ago tomorrow, when the Loma Prieta earthquake killed 63 people and rewrote the face of northern California. At 5:04 that afternoon, I was sitting with my writing pad in my lap with soccer practice going on in front of me. The roar of an approaching train grew as windows shattered and walls…
Read MoreLaurie, on the road
Happy TBT! Now coming to you from 1977, it’s Laurie, Noel, and A Large Friend, on Easter Island.Hmm, what would you think about a story set on Easter Island…?
Read MoreLaurie, before the volcano
This week’s Throwback Thursday takes us to a place that no longer exists. Spirit Lake was spectacularly beautiful, a church summer camp smack on the top of Mount St. Helens. Remember Mount St. Helens? Blew up in 1980, taking a lot of people and this lake with it? It was so beautiful…and the lake was…
Read MoreTBT: Aww, isn’t Laurie cute?
“Cute” may not be a word that comes immediately to mind when you think of Laurie R. King. But Laurie Richardson? On a Throwback Thursday? Oh, why not? This was taken in 1966, when I was fourteen, about the age of Mary Russell in Monday’s ongoing Mary Russell’s War. I was living in Saratoga, CA, and remembering the…
Read MoreTBT: Devil in the Details
Sherman, let’s hop into our Wayback Machine for another Throwback Thursday, this one from 1972. The quilt, which I first pieced, then quilted (hence the frame) illustrates that the devil is in the details, whether for quilting, cooking, or plotting a story. Any of you out there have time to quilt?
Read MoreTBT: Intro to LRK
This Throwback Thursday brought to you by Bantam Books. Bantam (now a division of Penguin Random House, aka the Randy Penguin) showed me the love from the very beginning, with the mass market paperback for A Grave Talent forming one third of a summer special in 1995, along with Mary Willis Walker and John Straley. They did T-shirts,…
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