Stop #3 of the FORGET ME NOT Ghost Tour

Join me today over at Brenda Drake's Blog to learn about the dark history of Raven Valley High School. Then stop over at Ghost Tour Central to find out what you missed and what's coming next on the tour. There is a rafflecopter contest at the bottom of the page and lots of free giveaways.

Autumn in the Land of Enchantment: The International Balloon Fiesta

It's International Balloon Fiesta time in Albuquerque. The sky explodes with color. Motorists stop at random places along the road to watch hot air balloons descend, chase crews can be seen racing all over town, the population expands by 90,000 tourists and over 500 hot air balloons, and a general aura of magic takes over the city. 

Locals like me usually avoid Balloon Fiesta Park, the take-off field built especially for this once a year event, unless we have out of town visitors we want to impress.

Everyone has to try it at least once. It's hard to describe the experience of watching hundreds of balloons inflating all around you as they slowly lift toward the sky. The traffic is a nightmare and you must get out there at 5:00 a.m. to find a decent parking place, but there's nothing like it.

There's plenty of action going on around town too, though. Locals and tourists alike gather at viewing hot spots. Depending on the direction of the wind, you might wake up to find balloons flying right over your house, and if they get low enough, you can hear the swoosh of the butane coming up from the basket as it inflates the balloon.

You never know where a balloon might land. This one came down in a vacant lot in the Trader Joe's near our house and further down the street another one landed at the middle School. A few years ago a balloon landed on the field right in the middle of my daughter's marching band practice. Sometimes they end up in parking lots, or even in the middle of the river, which is less hazardous than it sounds thanks to the drought. The photo below shows balloons landing on the Sandia Indian Reservation just north of town, and just a little further beyond that, the parking lot of the Sandia Casino is filled with people watching the event from the comfort of RVs, pickup trucks, and car hoods.

Balloons are finicky. They require certain weather conditions to be able to take off. Yesterday thousands of tourists left the field in disappointment because the wind prevented the balloons from going up at all. It wasn't a total disappointment. There is a fair-like atmosphere at Balloon Fiesta Park and the chance that the event you came thousands of miles to view may not happen at all, actually adds to the excitement when all goes well. Cheers go up from the crowd as balloons take off and there is a camaraderie of those who are brave enough to face the traffic and the chilly autumn morning.

The balloons remind me that things like rivers and air currents and life's events all flow in uncertain and fascinating ways. They make us all stop, sometimes in the middle of traffic, to watch in wonder and discover how enchanting it can be to embrace the unpredictable.

STOP #2 OF THE GHOST TOUR

Today visit Stop #2 of the FORGET ME NOT Ghost Tour.

Travel to Raven Valley, Virginia with Stacy and Shannan from GIRLS IN THE STACKS
as they go hunting for ghosts. Watch their video Here!

GHOST TOUR BEGINS TODAY

STOP #1 of the Forget Me Not GHOST TOUR goes live today at Kimberley's Wanderings.

Get a sneak peek of the poem
"The Nine Circles of Raven Valley High."

Find out what ghosts
gravitate to which areas
of the school and why.

Visit GHOST TOUR CENTRAL
to find out what's coming next.

Then tell your friends about it
in a tweet or post or text.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to My New Book

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

FORGET ME NOT

My paranormal verse novel goes on sale today at bookstores everywhere and amazon.com.
It's available in hardcover and as an e-reader.

Read the wonderful Kirkus review.

Here's another review from Alamosa Books.

And come back tomorrow, October 3 for the start of the Ghost Tour.

Fantasy and Science Fiction and Everything In Between - Interview with Bookseller Elizabeth Anker

The following is an excerpt from an article I wrote for this week's SPELLBINDERS post:

I was recently preparing to give a writing workshop entitled, "What's Hot in Teen Fiction." As I sat down to write my definitions for topics such as Steampunk and Dystopian, I realized I wasn't altogether sure about how to describe these fantasy sub-genres myself

That's when I decided to interview Elizabeth Anker, the owner of Alamosa Books, our local independent children's books store. I figured teachers and librarians would also be interested in exploring these different categories and hearing what a book seller thinks of their appeal to young readers. A large part of being able to recommend a book to a young person is knowing what these different genres contain. Below are Elizabeth's thoughts on the subject.

She says Steampunk started with good writers, mainly in Britain, writing on the edge of science fiction. Then editors saw the trend and began looking for other books with similar themes. These stories tend to be more about a similar look and an idea rather than a similar story line. The look is basically Victorian with Victorian type costumes, gadgets, inventions, and creative weaponry. Goggles of some kind are almost always involved. Plots involve adventurers out to seek their fortunes or defeat bad guys in creative and technological ways. Although drawing on elements of Victorian England, these stories are not so much set in the past as they are set in parallel worlds with Victorianesque influences.

Elizabeth says Sherlock Holmes stories, which actually take place in Victorian times, are a strong influence. Holmes's nemesis Moriarty is the perfect model for the archetypical steampunk bad guy is often based upon reliance on high tech (for the times) weaponry used by a villain who is trying to take over the world. Moriarty is not influenced by morality at all and many steam punk villains are equally as capitalistic.

Steam is often the primary energy source of the times, but something magical is usually involved as well. There is a lot of true science and pseudo science woven through these stories. In the better cases it's real science with pseudo science on the edge, but based in a true science like physics. In books trying for the trend but not so concerned with research it's purely magical in many cases.

Read the rest of the post at the Spellbinders Blog

How I Became a Teaching Author

Today I'm over visiting April Halprin Wayland at the Teaching Authors Blog talking about how I became a teaching author. Here's a peak at the interview...

April: What's a common problem your students have and how do you address it? 

Me: It's easy to get stuck staring at a big white page or a blank computer screen. I can't tell you how many times I hear the words, "I don't know what to write."  I reply, "writing isn't about knowing. There is no magic right or wrong answer as there is in other subjects.

Writing is about choosing, about considering the infinite possibilities and picking one." To this the student inevitably replies, "I still don't know what to write." Then I usually give the stumped pupil a whole list of suggestions which he or she usually doesn't like because that blank computer screen is still just so darn intimidating.

To read the rest of the interview visit Teaching Authors