PARTY TIME - MY NEW BOOK HAS ARRIVED!

A box arrived this morning and I opened it to find my preview copies of Story Frames for Teaching Literacy - 270 pages of my heart and soul - plus about 80 pages of additional online material. I lost count somewhere along the way! It is available for sale to the public on April 2, 2021, at Brookes and on  Amazon.

This book is the culmination of two decades of work as a young adult author and a speech-language pathologist in the public schools as well as in my private practice working with students with dyslexia. 

Here I am below, looking a little more composed.

In Story Frames, I combine my insights as a fiction novelist with my experience working with struggling learners to show students how to think and create stories like a professional writer. I owe a debt of gratitude to the parents and students who allowed me to share their stories in my book. Thank you to all my students, young and old, who inspired me to find a method to teach storytelling and writing that is accessible to anyone. 

Here is a little secret - I use the same basic strategies with first graders, middle school students, and teens as I do when I teach novel plotting to adults who want to become professionally published authors. I am able to do this because almost all stories (movies, novels, and even picture books) are based on a universal structure found in myths and fairy around the world. 

I shared these strategies with my friend and fellow author, Jennifer Cervantes (as best-selling author of the Storm Runner series she goes by J.C. Cervantes), and she used the strategies to teach her college literature students the structure of stories.

"I used this text with my university students to illustrate story structure as well as highlight the most important elements of a hero’s journey." - Jennifer Cervantes

Whether you are young or old, a published author or a struggling writer, whether you want to publish the next great novel or simply want to preserve your personal family stories, I hope you find inspiration from my little book.  

To find out more about Story Frames, please join me on March 31 for an online Coffee Chat hosted by Brookes Publishing. Register for the Coffee Chat HERE. Sign up for my mailing list HERE and get a code in my April Newsletter for 20% off of Story Frames.

Now I have to go. It's party time! My new book has arrived.

Happy Writing!