Rebecca M. Douglass, Author

Title: Almost Paradise Author: Corabel Shofner. Read by Eileen Stevens Publication Info: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2017. 288 pages in hardback. Audio edition by Blackstone Audio, 2017. Source: Library digital resources Publisher’s Blurb:  Twelve-year-old Ruby Clyde Henderson’s life turns upside down the day her mother’s boyfriend holds up a convenience store, and her mother is wrongly imprisoned for assisting with the crime. Ruby and her pet pig, Bunny, find their way to her estranged Aunt Eleanor's home. Aunt Eleanor is a nun who lives on a peach orchard called Paradise, and had turned away from their family long ago. With a little patience, she and Ruby begin to get along―but Eleanor has secrets of her own, secrets that might mean more hard times for Ruby. Ruby believes that she's the only one who can find a way to help heal her loved ones, save her mother, and bring her family back together again. But being in a family means that everyone has to work together to support ea...

My husband and I and our 21-year-old son are spending several months traveling and tramping in New Zealand. We arrived on the South Island Dec. 28, 2018, and spent January hiking like crazy with Dave’s brother and his wife, before sending them home and settling into a home base in Christchurch, allowing me a bit more time between adventures to get some blogging and writing done! I’m posting photo reports on our major tramping trips. This is the second half of the Rees-Dart loop. For the first part,  go here . Rees-Dart Track, Days 3-5 We left you last week with a late-afternoon arrival at the Dart Hut. It is a fairly new and comfortable hut, which was nice, because we were to spend two nights there (as most trampers do). The purpose: an all-day side-trip to Cascade Saddle, with views of the Dart Glacier, and over the mountain range to Mt. Aspiring and surrounding peaks. Knowing the hike would be long and hard, the senior members of our party got up at an ungodly hour in order to st...

My big news for this week is that I really will have a draft of Death By Library  ready for beta-readers  within the next few days. I have two readers lined up (I hope you remember who you are!) but would love to have some more. Please contact me or leave a comment if you would like to read a draft form of the 4th book in the Pismawallops PTA mystery series. I will warn that this is definitely a working read; there is quite a bit of work to be done yet. I am sending it out sooner than I might ordinarily do largely because I’ll be on the road for the next two months, so unable to do much on it myself. If I were really organized, I’d have a blurb ready to entice you to want to beta-read. I’ve been too busy trying to get the draft done, though, so I’ll just have to say... JJ has a new job at the library, where things turn deadly when a local news gadfly goes a bit too far... Of course, her personal life is as chaotic as ever, as she prepares for Thanksgiving with her mother in he...

It’s #FictionIn50 time again!  Please consider sharing your own 50-word creations, and join the hop. Fiction in 50 is a regular feature in the last week of every month and I invite any interested composers of mini-narrative to join in!       What is #Fi50? In the words of founder Bruce Gargoyle, "Fiction in 50: think of it as the anti-NaNoWriMo experience!" Pack a beginning, middle and end of story into 50 words or less (bonus points for hitting exactly 50 words). The rules for participation are simple : 1. Create a piece of fictional writing in 50 words or less, ideally using the prompt as title or theme or inspiration. That’s it!  But for those who wish to challenge themselves further, here’s an additional rule: 2. Post your piece of flash fiction on your blog or (for those poor blog-less souls) add it as a comment on the Ninja Librarian’s post for everyone to enjoy.   And for those thrill-seekers who really like to go the extra mile (...

Before I start with the photos, just a reminded that this week (or next) is #Fi50 –-Fiction in 50 (words). The March prompt is “Whenever.” Have at it, wordies! Also: I apologize for the wonky fonts. I can’t seem to clear them out and make it good, at least not with the iPad. Skip the text and enjoy the pictures :) Background: My husband and I and our 21-year-old son are spending several months traveling and tramping in New Zealand. We arrived on the South Island Dec. 28, 2018, and spent January hiking like crazy with Dave’s brother and his wife, before sending them home and settling into a home base in Christchurch, allowing me a bit more time between adventures to get some blogging and writing done! I’m posting photo reports on our major tramping trips. Rees-Dart, Part 1 (Days 1-2) In two trips to New Zealand, I’ve tramped at least 10 different tracks, if you count all the trips of at least one night. Out of them all, I have to say that the Rees-Dart loop is my favorite. The scenery i...

Plenty of distractions still in my life, but I’m here to say I’m still writing. In fact, progress on Death By Library has been good. I’ve completed the first read-through and made extensive editorial notes, and am about halfway through the MS trying to apply those notes. That’s pretty much all the writing—even this blog has fallen a bit by the wayside—but I did manage to submit one short story last week, so that my March submissions so far are... 1. Oh—and I wrote an opening line for the WriteClub19 contest. So maybe I’ll even manage to enter that! That’s about it for writer activities. We had a few nice outings in the last couple of weeks, but Friday’s horrible shooting in Christchurch rather put me off of everything for a few days. In the end, I found that the best thing I could do for my own sanity was to crawl inside my MS and stay there, though today it all came out in a horrible all-day headache. Sometimes you can’t see the forest for the trees. Sometimes you can’t tell the shad...

By the way, I love this cover: Title: The Curious World of Calpurnia Tate Author: Jacqueline Kelly Publisher: Henry Holt & Co, 2015. 315 pages (hardback) Publisher’s Blurb: Callie’s younger brother Travis keeps bringing home strays. And Callie has her hands full keeping the animals—Travis included—away from her mother’s critical eye. When a storm blows change into town in the form of a visiting veterinarian, Callie discovers a life and a vocation she desperately wants. But with societal expectations as they are, she will need all her wits and courage to realize her dreams. Whether it’s wrangling a rogue armadillo or stray dog, a guileless younger brother or standoffish cousin, the trials and tribulations of Callie Vee will have readers cheering for this most endearing heroine. My Review: As a sequel to a Newbery nominee and winner of multiple awards (see review) , this book had quite a bit to live up to. To my mind, it did it, though it left me looking for another sequel, which ...

Time for another photo essay! This time, we're heading out on the Hollyford Track, in the second week of January.  Background: My husband and I and our 21-year-old son are spending several months traveling and tramping in New Zealand. We arrived on the South Island Dec. 28, 2018, and spent January hiking like crazy with Dave’s brother and his wife, before sending them home and settling into a home base in Christchurch, allowing me a bit more time between adventures to get some blogging and writing done! The Hollyford is an interesting track, because you have two choices: you can do an out-and-back, including a 10-mile stretch along Lake McKerrow which is reported to be awful, with no views to redeem it, or you can get a flight in to Martin's Beach from Milford Sound and hike one way (there's another cheat, which we used, as you will see). Naturally, we chose the flight, and as we had two cars, we managed to set up a shuttle, leaving one at the Hollyford Trailhead and drivin...

Time for another review with Great Escapes Tours! Murder Between the Pages (The Nina Foster Mystery Series) Cozy Mystery 1st in Series The Wild Rose Press, Inc. (Crimson Rose) (December 19, 2018) Paperback: 264 pages ISBN-10: 1509223673 ISBN-13: 978-1509223671 Digital Print Length: 190 pages ASIN: B07JKZT5TM Publisher's Blurb: It’s a sad day for librarian Nina Foster when she discovers her good friend, bookstore owner Wildeen Bergman, dead on her office floor. Worse yet, another friend, romance writer Zelma Duke, becomes the police’s prime suspect. Nina knows Wildeen had something on Zelma. Was it enough to warrant murder? Handsome Stephen Kraslow, owner of the local newspaper, joins forces with Nina to find out the truth. The quest takes them on a dangerous journey of twists and turns before they reach the final outcome. My Review:  This was a quick, fun beach read, perfect for my southern-hemisphere summer holiday. It starts off strong, catching the reader’s attention without bei...