It’s weird having a new book out. It’s weird having another new book coming out in five months. It’s weird having all these reissues (thank you, Harlequin, Bantam, and St. Martin’s Press) hitting in rapid succession. But mostly it’s just weird having any books out there, these stories that I think are entertaining, interesting, important when they’re safe in my laptop, and then I send them out and everything changes because sometimes people read them. Then it gets even weirder because people evaluate them. “Jenny Crusie had this fantasy and I thought it stunk.” Still, I can cope pretty well with the weirdness because hey, that’s publishing. It’s the chaser of guilt that follows the weird that makes me crazier than usual. Continue reading →

We have a new pet, sort of: Walter, the dumbest squirrel in the forest. He got his name after we watched him speed around the deck with five barking dogs after him, never thinking to jump onto one of the zillion trees around the deck. Or as Lani said, “Poor Walter. Never was the same after he got hit with that walnut.” (This place gets bombarded by walnuts in the fall; sounds like the house is being shelled.) My introduction to Walter came when I was crocheting in the living room and saw this squirrel leap for a branch, miss, and plummet to the deck. Did I mention, a zillion trees? You’d have to work hard to miss them all, but Walter managed it. Then the dogs went crazy (“SQUIRREL!”) and Walter jumped up on a table where they couldn’t get him, and the dogs surrounded him. Now Walter has some options. He can run along the wide railing and jump on a tree. He can jump off the table and onto the narrow decking under the window that the dogs can’t get to. He can leap for one of the zillion branches that are right beside him. Or he can leap down into the middle of the dogs. Guess which one Walter picked? It was such an astoundingly stupid move that the dogs just looked at him and then at each other, like “This isn’t it right, must be a trick.” Then Walter staggered over and fell through the railing. I’d say his days are numbered, but clearly God loves the little rat. Either that or he does it on purpose because he loves the drama. We get a lot of that around here. Continue reading →