Why am I a writer? That's a good
question. I have always been a storyteller. Perhaps I get it from
my father. He would tell us stories by candlelight every night in the
summertime. Each night one of his four children would be the hero of the
adventure, rescuing the others from imminent danger or leading the way back
home to safety. We would hold our breath
during the climaxes every time, even though we knew the story would end
happily. Maybe that was it. Life situations don’t always end happily, but
in stories they can.
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| The Storyteller |
I don’t write fantasy, I write contemporary short stories,
mostly YA. No vampires or zombies or
aliens. While they are all fascinating
stories, mine are grounded in possibilities.
Some protagonists have parents, some don’t. But no matter what happens in the story,
somehow the protagonist learns to deal with the life situation he or she is
living. That’s not to say that nothing
exciting happens in my stories. I LOVE
adventure and I LOVE nature, so I usually combine the two to create action in
the story. I have children lost in a
cave while the protagonist deals with feelings of loss and anger and another
situation where a young protagonist is the only one home to rescue her
grandfather from danger. My characters
deal with unwanted responsibilities and desires to make others happy. While I realize that these are universal
themes, I hope to make my stories unique in their situations.
I love to learn, as I have said before. I enjoy researching topics and speaking with
experts for short articles I write for a local magazine. Whether I am learning something new with the
students I substitute teach or learning along with my classmates in a new
online course I’m taking, I enjoy telling stories of my learning experiences. That’s what I will be doing in my memoir
about going to college with five children in tow. My learning stories encompass how to study on
the go, attending my children’s sporting events, creating chemistry
presentations with the twins, and creating French videos with NON-French
speaking camera crew—okay, my younger children.
What about you? Do you like to create stories or relay family anecdotes?