The Secret to Lying

What happens when your life becomes a lie?  *Colorado Book Award Winner* *Texas Library Association Teen Reading List Selection* *Pennsylvania Young Reader’s Choice Awards Selection*  E-book, paperback, and audiobook (read by Nick Podehl) now available! “Engrossing and entertaining…  a great read.”  —Publishers Weekly “An artful blurring between reality and fantasy, The Secret to Lying masterfully delves into one teen’s… [read]

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Backwards

Travel Backwards… *Winner of the Colorado Authors League Book Award* *Finalist for the Colorado Book Award* *Finalist for the Crystal Kite Award* *LitPick 5 Star Book Review Award* It was Saturday, November 15th, but I didn’t know that. I wouldn’t understand the strange countdown of days that formed my existence until later. All I knew… [read]

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A Flight of Angels

*A YALSA Top Ten Pick for Great Graphic Novels for Teens*  Now available in paperback, and it’s pretty flipping beautiful. Or stay classy with A FLIGHT OF ANGELS hardcover version. “Occasionally someone executes a standard storytelling device with such dazzling skill that it reminds you why that device became standard in the first place… [A Flight of Angels]… [read]

Angels cover

The Last Panther

What is a species worth? *Nautilus Book Award Winner!* *Colorado Book Award Winner!* *CAL Book Award Winner!* *A “Best Book of the Year“!* *A Southern Living “Best New Books for Kids” pick!* *Recommended by Florida Teachers and National Geographic!* *Green Earth Honor Book!*              “I loved this book, and I… [read]

The Namer of Spirits

 A thrilling steampunk eco-fantasy for ages 9 & up!         Amazon #1 New Release in Children’s Environment and Ecology Books! *American Fiction Awards Winner!* *A 2021 “Best Book Awards” Children’s Fiction Finalist!* ★★★★★ “The Namer of Spirits is among the best of its kind!” —Literary Titan *A LitPick 5-Star Book Review Award… [read]

The Traitor King

The Manannan family secret is about to be revealed… *Colorado Book Award Finalist* Now available on Kindle and Nook for under five bucks! Or check out the new paperback edition. “You MUST read this book.”  —TeensReadToo.com (starred) “Humor, menace, and mystery suffuse this fast-paced tale… New surprises and plot twists keep readers enthralled, because nothing -librarians, skeletal pursuers, or hard-drinking dads-… [read]

One-on-One Support for Writers & Creators!

The creative path can be a challenging one. You don’t have to walk it alone.   Learn to thrive personally and creatively through CreativePersonalDevelopment.com. The work I do with clients is informed by decades of experience writing, publishing, and teaching, and by my research into ways to enhance creative practices that I did for books […]

The One Thing I Wish Someone Had Told Me About Creating Characters

There’s a lot of conflicting advice out there about characters. Do you make them quirky and unusual (like Amelia Bedelia), or more ordinary  (like Charlie Brown)? Do you make them heroic (someone readers might aspire to be, like Katniss), or deeply flawed (like FH in Jesus’s Son)? Do you make them raw and human (like […]

Quick Writing Tips Free Video Series

Looking for some quick, easy ways to improve your writing? Here’s a free series of short (each is under 5 minutes) writing tips videos. They focus on some of the most common prose problems that I’ve seen writers struggle with over my two decades of teaching creative writing. My goal in making these videos was […]

Writing Advice Part II (my top six other best pieces of advice)

The single best piece of writing advice I ever got was to write the book you most want to read (more on that here). After that, here are six other bits of writing advice that have made the biggest difference for me (and that I need to keep reminding myself of to keep on going). […]

The Last Panther Teaching and Book Club Kit

Looking for materials to enhance using The Last Panther in the classroom or book club? This is the place to find and share those.  Although my first goal is always to write an entertaining story, it’s my hope that The Last Panther will help students creating vivid, personal connections to several areas of interest for 4th-7th grades, including: —Understanding […]

Create a Comic Book in 10 (simple?) Steps

Comics and other graphic texts are one of the fastest growing areas of publishing, and they seem to be getting stronger each year. If you haven’t considered getting graphic, you might want to.  This post is for creators, especially writers, who are interested in graphic story-telling. Even if your art skills are limited to crooked […]