Those of us who write YA need to find a way back to the way we saw once saw the world. A magic portal that helps us remember the angst of fifteen and the dreams of seventeen. Think back. What scared you the most? What made you laugh? Then distill it down to six words and post.

If you haven’t read his YA novels, you should.

Vocation is a heavy word. It implies more than getting up each day and putting your hours in. It implies calling, something you are meant to do. Sometimes it seems silly to spend my time crafting words. After all, it’s arguably not as important as many jobs. But I believe it is important to do the thing you are gifted for well and to find joy in it. It’s work and it still means showing up each day even if your only companion is the empty page. And if in the end it touches someone’s life, that’s grace.

And if that wasn’t enough excitement, it turns out that my critique partner’s book, POD, comes out 7 days before mine! It will be an end cap war. Who gets the best display table? Which of our friends will pre-order both books, or just one? Who will have more books turned face out rather than spine? Let the games begin.

It occurs to me that inspecting the manuscript is very much like a parent inspecting a newly delivered infant. Are there ten toes and fingers? Does the face look like family? I think I see a resemblance to all my wonderful critiquers in the final product–Jeff’s eyebrows, Lenora’s smile, Steve’s eyes and Dennis’s impeccable nose.

What happens next? I look for errors in the manuscript. Then send the baby back to the factory for any repairs and wait, not so patiently, for a bound copy with cover art. November?

Refer 5 friends and this lovely signed edition can be yours!

Polliwogs. Tadpoles. Here on an island paradise, Serifos in Greece, I’m remembering polliwogs. When I was young I scooped them into jars from the muddy water in Vasonna Creek, took them home and waited for them to transform. They sprouted bulges that turned into legs, that turned into frogs. Starting out as undefined blobs with a tail, they became little hopping frogs. Miraculous. But you’ve experienced this if you’ve ever collected tadpoles.
One summer I put a small fish bowl of polliwogs on our back patio in California. It was a cement slab of a patio and every day I’d check the progress, blob to frog. I missed two days for a weekend trip, but biology progressed. Returning home, I found four perfect little frog bodies shriveled on the cement. Completing their transformation, they had jumped from the fish bowl to freedom. But the patio was too hot. Their feet made for cool mud had stuck fast to the hot surface. The new frogs fried in place.
That’s how I feel in acres of sun. A kind of panic sets in. Everything is too bright, too hot, too exposed. I might stick to the road. I don’t know if other people feel this way. Judging by the numbers sprawled on beaches, I think not. I’ve wondered if it has something to do with genetics. I don’t have a drop of Mediterranean blood running through my veins. Am I programmed genetically for mist and moors, for the volatile weather of Celtic coasts? Or maybe I’m just leery of perfection. I don’t quite trust it. Sure, I love the feel of sun soaking into my back, baking my face, but only for a short time. Then I expect a cloud to pass over, fog to roll in.
Growing up I spent a lot of time on California beaches, mostly Santa Cruz and Capitola. My parents would take me there when my asthma was so bad I couldn’t breathe, so I could suck in that pollen free sea air. Later as a teen ager some of my best friends were surfers. Weekends we haunted the beaches. But I always preferred the ones further north, the little coves of sand strung along Highway 1 north to San Francisco, Yellow Creek, Manzanita. The water was cold enough to freeze my feet. The fog didn’t burn off until noon.
In Athens and on Serifos, people sleep in the middle of the day as a way to escape the intense heat. Then they stay up late eating dinner at 9 or 10. They cheerfully fend off the sun with hats, with parasols, with gallons of sunscreen. But I can’t help feeling I’m trapped in a photograph that’s over exposed. I search for the shadow of the next olive tree, scan the sky for the errant cloud. I’m hoping for rain. Even if it is paradise.