I was born in the last century, which makes me older than dirt, but I’m only 7 1/2 at heart. My birthday is September 22--a Virgo on the cusp of being a Libra.
My brother and I
I grew up in
Bay Shore, NY, which is on the Great South Bay, and I spent many days on the beach at
Robert Moses State Park. I think I had a typical late 1950s, early 1960s childhood. I played outside, hung around with the neighbor kids, went to school, was a brownie scout, unsuccessfully tried piano lessons, never quite learned to swim, spent many a Saturday at the movies, read, made things, etc.
Hey, don't laugh! I bet your school pictures are just as bad!
As a high school student I did fairly well, but I wasn’t especially "well-rounded." In other words, I didn’t play sports, join a lot of clubs, or play an instrument in the marching band. My parents owned an ice cream store, so I spent a lot of time scooping ice cream and making shakes.
In 1967 I went off to college and spent four years at the
College of Mt. St. Vincent in Riverdale, NY. Back then it was a small, Catholic, liberal arts, women’s college! I loved its 96 acres overseeing the Hudson River, its proximity to N.Y.C., and the great women I met. I also loved the black squirrels that lived on campus.
After I received my B.A. in English in 1971, I got married, moved to the Bronx and attended graduate school in library service at
Columbia University. In 1973, with a M.S. degree in hand, we moved to the Boston area because there were so many libraries there and I’d be sure to find a job--wrong! I ended up working for a computer company for 12+ years before finally landing a library job. But, that’s getting ahead of my story...
In 1976 we moved to New Hampshire, where I still live. My son, Jesse, was born in 1979 followed by a daughter, Gretchen, in 1983.
Jess and Gretchen at Diana's Falls in the White Mountains
When Jesse started in first grade, I volunteered in the school library, and then I finally got a job as a children’s librarian in the
public library in Windham, NH in 1986. That was 30 years ago and I’m still there. Now I work as the adult services librarian/assistant director. I get to spend someone else’s money buying books, DVDs, and CDs! What a great job! I also love doing research, and that is easier to do if you know your way around a library! And, you have an "in" with the reference librarian! (Here’s a hint for aspiring writers--make friends with your local librarian! I know for a fact, most of them love dark chocolate!)
I write a library blog called
Kurious Kitty’s Kurio Kabinet, Monday through Friday. Check it out!
My children are now grown and married and have children of their own. I live with cat, Skippy. I have always loved cats, and although I’m allergic to cats, I wouldn’t live without them!
Skippy looking all innocent
I spend hours each day on the internet, but, a lot of it is time spent researching ideas.
The late great Smudge on my keyboard
I'm organizationally challenged (can you tell from my desk in the picture above?), but I've learned to live with this limitation.
I’m also interested in politics, but, not in being a politician.
Stephen Colbert tries to talk me into running for office
Some of my best friends are librarians and children’s writers, and I enjoy their company.
Now about my writing career. I wasn’t a "born" writer, although I did write a little for the Bay Shore High School newspaper. When I became a children’s librarian, I read many books. After some, I would say, "I can write better than this!" But, when you say something like that, you have to prove it, so I started to write. At first it was mostly picture books and magazine pieces. I branched out to nonfiction, poetry, activities, etc. My first book was the
Everything Kids’ Money Book, published in 2000. The following year, my first picture book,
Littlebat’s Halloween Story, was published. My latest
Run, Turkey, Run! came out in the fall of 2007. (Learn more about my books on the
My Books page.)
What every writer needs is a supportive critique group. I’ve been blessed to find one. I was invited to join the group around 1994 (I’ve lost track of the date), and have been a member ever since. All children’s writers, we work well together and have joined forces to become
The Write Sisters!
I love to write now, which is a good thing since I spend an awful lot of time doing it! I may not have been born a writer, but I’ll surely die as one!
Eloise In Paris by Kay Thompson, illustrated by Hilary Knight. My parents went on a trip and brought back the book for me as a gift. I loved it because Eloise was a little naughty, and she spoke French, which I thought was very exotic! I also liked Millions of Cats by Wanda Gag. 
"Cowboy Talk." Boys’ Quest, Feb/Mar 2007.
In Stories from Where We Live: The North Atlantic Coast, an anthology edited by Sara St. Antoine (Milkweed Editions, 2000), there are several haiku that I wrote about the New Hampshire coastline in New Castle. (By the way, the New Hampshire coast is only 18 miles long, making it the shortest coastline of any ocean bordered state in the U.S.) My haiku have appeared in The Christian Science Monitor, in annual member anthologies published by the Haiku Society of America, and in numerous online journals such as The Heron's Nest, Notes from the Gean, Haiga Online, haijinx and Sketchbook.
Women of the Bay State: 25 Massachusetts Women You Should Know. For this volume I profiled Mary Mahoney, the first African-American professional nurse, Florence Bascom, an accomplished geologist, Edith Nourse Rogers, the longest serving woman in the U.S. Congress, Katherine Weems, who sculpted the dolphins that are seen in front of the New England Aquarium, and Joyce Chen, the woman who introduced America to Chinese cooking.
