Writing myself away

One cloudy day a few years ago a few miles north of Newport Oregon

Urchin in a tide pool
- taken that same cloudy day.

It’s a windy, snowy day up here in Northern Wisconsin. There’s not enough snow to ski or ice to skate and the trails are too slippery for a nice long walk. In other words, it’s a good day to stay inside and write myself into another place and time. Right now I’m working on a piece set on the Oregon coast, an astonishingly beautiful place I lived many years ago. Writing about it now brings back the wonderful smell of cedar forests, the marine scent of the harbor and the relentless sound of the surf. Maybe one of the reasons setting is so important to me as a writer is this feeling of being transported away – this time to the land of craggy rocks and purple sea urchins. In the story that comes out this month (Sacred Hearts – from Loose Id on December 18) I went to Puerto Vallarta Mexico, which was much warmer than the Antarctica where I spent a few months in August Ice. I love globe trotting my kitchen table.