Tag Archives: author Linda Townsdin

My Long-time Love Affair with Libraries

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Our family moved often when I was a child.  As a young, single woman, I wanted to see and experience new horizons and my grandmother used to say I had wandering feet. Then I married a journalist and we moved several times during the first years of our marriage. We’ve stayed in California a long time now, although the desire to pick up and move every so often still comes over me.

One constant everywhere I’ve lived has been my connection to my neighborhood library. I can’t remember the first time a smiling librarian placed a library card in my hand, but wherever I’ve moved over the years, I don’t feel settled until I’ve visited the library and received my card.

I carried on the tradition with my children. We started visiting the library every week as soon as they were old enough to hold a book in their hands, and maybe even before. They attended story hours and special children’s events and were proud bearers of their own library cards.

Capitol Crimes, my local chapter of Sisters in Crime, holds its meetings in Sacramento library community rooms. And, since publishing my first book, I’ve participated in author events at several Sacramento libraries to talk about my books and discuss how I work. As an introvert, the fact that these events have been held in familiar and welcoming settings has made what could have been stressful, a pleasant experience every time.

On April 12, I’ll be among forty authors from the Sacramento area invited to participate in the Sacramento Public Library’s Local Author Book Festival. We’ll be gathering at the downtown galleria library from 1-3 p.m. to talk about our books and say hello to family, friends and visitors.

For me, libraries have been a place of wonder, refuge at times and always an important part of my life. I can’t think of any place I’d rather be, and I hope you’ll join us.

th

Mirror Writing

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This morning I held a pen in each hand and wrote the same sentence backward with my left and forward with my right simultaneously, starting at the middle of the page and working out. It was easy and legible (It’s called mirror writing so you have to turn the paper over to see the left-handed backward writing the correct way). Oddly enough, I’ve been writing backward with my left hand since I was a kid, but it never occurred to me to try writing with my right at the same time until Lee Lofland, a former police investigator and the presenter at our Capitol Crimes chapter of Sisters in Crime meeting mentioned that he was left handed and could write that way. I’d never even heard of it before.

I had to try it and it worked as if I’d always done it. That made me wonder what else I could do that I’d never tried. This was a hands-on experiment (pun intended) with a big lesson attached.

I couldn’t leave it alone and started searching the Internet for more information. I was elated to discover that I was in good company. Leonardo Da Vinci was a mirror writer! Unfortunately, I kept digging only to find out that it could have something to do with dyslexia or possibly neurological issues of the dubious kind. But that aside, I’m definitely interested in discovering what else I don’t know I can do. Are there skills you didn’t know you had until you somehow managed to try them?

mirror

To really mess with some basic truths we’ve all been taught, I recommend watching this TED talk. It opened my mind in a slightly different way.

10 Myths about Psychology Debunked

Love Letter

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Writer Unboxed, one of my favorite blogs, inspired me this morning with Julia Munroe Martin’s post, Writing….Will You Be My Valentine?

Check it out for several fun and touching love letters to writing. Here’s mine:

Dear Writing,

You’re my soul mate. We’ve been together as long as I can remember. You whisper enticing stories and ideas to me that magically, and sometimes painfully (love hurts) appear on the page.

We’ve had our differences of opinion, a word here or there, a stubborn impasse, but those moments are short-lived. I can’t imagine my existence without you, and I know you wouldn’t exist without my fingertips holding a pen or tapping on a keyboard. We are one.

Forever yours,

Linda

What would your love letter to writing say?

Annual Check-up

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Art by Julie Williams

Art by Julie Williams

This blog is about my writing journey, and this morning I woke up thinking about all I’d intended to create and accomplish in 2014, and didn’t.

  • An audio book for Focused on Murder
  • Letting marketing opportunities fly by
  • Blogging regularly—something I love to do, but I let other activities take precedence
  • And too many unrealized smaller intentions to list

I was disappointed in myself for a few minutes, but decided it would be more productive to look at what I’d achieved, rather than what I hadn’t.

I reviewed a few of my journals, my Facebook page and new author page, blog and new book page, and realized that 2014 was one of the best and busiest years of my life. Not only because of all the writing-related goals I reached, but the big realization—that those conferences and book panels and steps forward wouldn’t have meant nearly as much without the time spent with my family and friends and the time alone for my inner-space to grow and thrive. Worth trading a few missed goals for all those moments that make a rich and balanced life? I think so.

About those goals I didn’t accomplish?

I can do them this year. My long-term intention is to keep writing and publishing. I love my series and characters and want to keep them in my life. The second in the series is nearly ready to roll out and I know a lot of intentions will fall through the cracks in 2015, but many will come to fruition.

How’s your writing journey working out for you?

Blind Spots

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blind spot

We all have them in our relationships, in how we recall incidents from our histories, and I have also learned, in our novel drafts.

Believing that I’d taken Close Up on Murder, the second in my Spirit Lake Mystery series as far as I could, I sent the draft out to my beta readers a couple of months ago, and I’m a lucky writer because each one came back to me with comments and suggestions that helped make it a stronger manuscript.

Their generous gifts of time, expertise, attention to detail and willingness to point out blind spots filled me with gratitude at the start of this new year. Their comments opened my mind to alternative ways of looking at some of the elements in my story, even though it meant going through the painful process of writing new scenes and scrapping others.

It’s been a year since Focused on Murder, the first in the series, was published and that’s also been a lesson in what readers see when they read a book. Every reader comes away with his or her own personal reactions based on their unique interests, history and temperament. Writers and readers are collaborators. That’s an exciting and liberating concept. The only control I have is in the words I choose to put on the page to communicate my vision of the story. After that, it belongs to you, the reader.

As a long-time book lover, I’ve experienced that symbiotic relationship between reader and writer countless times. Writing my own books has been more of a shift in perspective than a huge change. I continue to read as much as always, and read a little differently now because of my experiences writing my own books.

In my next post, I’ll highlight some of the interesting books I’ve read this year, and my reaction to how the writers went about constructing and telling their stories.

Happy reading and writing in 2015!