My blog

Sweet ‘ums, I’ve neglected you.  I’ve been off from work/life/writing, lounging and eating and even going for long, aimless hikes in the damp winter air.  I’ve considered [...]

How did I make fully grown humans?  I’m not even sure.  But here they are during our fabulous Christmas Eve celebration.  In keeping with Latino tradition, our big party happens on the [...]

To top off my highest travel year to date, last week I headed to San Francisco for a whirlwind three-day trip full of fun, eating, more eating and one fabulous party.  I had drinks in the Castro [...]

THE SECRET SIDE OF EMPTY is in pretty awesome company on this list of Top 10 Latino Books of 2014 by School Library Journal, including my friend Skila Brown’s beautiful novel in verse, [...]

I am what is known as an introvert.  A lot of people think that means I’m shy.  If you’ve ever seen me holding court at a gathering, reveling in making a group laugh, you know I am [...]

It was a small thing.  It was on one of those groups where newly published authors cluster together, shaking, kind of like those people on Naked and Afraid.  Except the thing scaring us is [...]

The other day, after dropping off my kids at school, I stopped at the local CVS.  It’s become something of a habit of late, now that I don’t have to scurry off with the rest of the [...]

In a little over 1,700 days, I will stop being the me I currently am and start being a new me.  What she will look like or how she will fill her days, I have no idea.  But the countdown has [...]

I try to skip lightly through the dark parking lot.  I have at least had enough common sense to give in to the elements and not wear party shoes, instead opting for a sensible pair of boots.  I [...]

My mission was to find Thanksgiving vegetables. But there I stood, holding the kohlrabi, something I’d never willingly consume. I’d put the Swiss chard in the cart, along with the [...]

My editor wrote to congratulate me yesterday that THE SECRET SIDE OF EMPTY has been nominated for a YALSA Quick Pick for Reluctant Readers.  Yay!  As they say in “the biz,” it’s [...]

Are you getting sick of me writing about divorce?  Apologies. I can’t help it.  It’s not like I’m a fan or anything.  But never before in my life have I learned so powerful a [...]

Until this year, I’ve been telling myself that I have more life ahead of me than behind me.  But – midlife crisis alert! – at 44 years old it’s getting harder to make that [...]

Yesterday I wrote about some icky feelings I’d been having.  After doing that, I felt much better.  It always works that way for me. Today, a Facebook friend pasted a link to an article [...]

Hello, darlings.  Here it is, one of my absolute favorite days to be an American… Thanksgiving. I didn’t celebrate Thanksgiving when I was little.  As recent immigrants, my parents [...]

I waited for the announcement about the grand jury’s decision on the shooting of Michael Brown as the minutes dragged on.  I didn’t understand -still can’t understand – [...]

A recent study showed that men are more helpful to women in high heels.  The study, published in the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior, measured how people responded to the same woman either [...]

Today I saw this text in an article.  It was sent by a student in the library at FSU when the gunman burst in. The first thing that happened when I saw it is that my eyes filled up with tears.  I [...]

I cheated today.  I’m not proud to admit it, but confession is good for the soul, so here goes. It was getting late in the afternoon and I hadn’t written yet.  I was at risk of not [...]

Hello, sugar cubes! Happy Saturday!  I just wanted to check in at the start of my day.  Without kids (they’re about to both go spend the day with friends), I have a fun day ahead and I [...]

Just to counterbalance my super-heavy gun control post of earlier, allow me a moment of shallow consumerism while I share just how happy these little gadgets make me.  Pretty!

Yesterday, I read with interest and a little concern the big headline story about the study that suggests that soldiers at high risk for suicide can be identified through a mathematical model. [...]

I was in my big meeting of the week yesterday when I got a text from my daughter, “They evacuated us. It’s not a drill.” She’d called first but since I was on a conference [...]

A few days ago I got my nerd on and watched an awesome Smithsonian Channel documentary called The Perfect Runner.  It’s the story of why humans have evolved to be the best distance runners [...]

I was honored to learn that I’ve been named to Latino Stories’ 2015 Top Ten New Latino Authors to Watch list.  It’s full of impressive names with books that are getting much [...]

Happy Friday! Today I am joyful and grateful for many things. I was reminded of this when I saw my strong little Knockout rose still braving a bloom. So many small joys this week: a kickboxing [...]

It bears noting: no, it is not yet Christmas. It is not even a little bit Christmas. There’s still Halloween candy left in that pot by the door and you haven’t lugged the plastic [...]

Not gonna lie, peeps, this NaNo is making me feel pretty badass. Yesterday I had a crazy hectic day, worked like mad, voted, had to juggle an appliance repair visit, meetings, a kid with a tennis [...]

If you’re looking to keep up a certain daily word count, Write or Die is a great tool. Enter your target word count of the amount of time you want to write and set the system to reward or [...]

Things to know about NaNoWriMo: it stands for National Novel Writing Month and every year over 300,000 people participate in it. The goal is to write 50,000 words in one month (average YA novel [...]