At a pull-out during my recent Yellowstone wolf tour, one of our guides ended up chatting with an expert on Japanese wolves. The story relayed was so fascinating that when I got home I had to fact check and share. The tale begins long ago when wolves were revered in Japan. The dictates of Buddhism had led…
If you’ve been reading along with me all week, you probably have a question — what tour did I sign up for and do I recommend it? Short answers: Yellowstone Wolf Tracker. And, yes, all of those five-star reviews on Trip Advisor are very much deserved. For five days, I completely lost track of the…
A lone wolf, a wolf family, three coyotes, and a grizzly bear taught me an important lesson on the power of pack last week. Perhaps you’d like to share in the excitement? Before I continue, I should warn you that all of the closeup photos in this post are from a different place and time….
Today was our first full day in the park and we were on a mission — finding wolves. On the surface, this sounds utterly impossible. Currently, there are between 80 and 100 wolves living in the 3,741 square mile park. And, okay, so half of the eight packs live in the north range where we…
I’m currently enjoying a once-in-a-lifetime adventure — a wolf-watching tour in Yellowstone National Park! I’d planned to save up a week’s worth of thoughts and photos and compile them into several thoughtful blog posts. But the truth is that at the end of day one, I’m just too excited not to share! So, come along…
I’m only a few chapters into the first draft of my 2019 series, which means the characters, the plot, and even the world are entirely in flux. This is the dreamtime of a novel, when I submerge myself in ideas without requiring any of them to stick. Here’s what I know: My heroine is a modern-day…
I can’t actually remember what was going through my head a year ago when decided that my next protagonist was going to be a kitsune — a Japanese fox shifter. I think I was perusing lists of traditional shifter types and stumbled across this unfamiliar being with so many fascinating traits. Despite that gap in…
My first novel-length story erupted out of me during late elementary school. I remember spending hours scribbling down Violet’s adventures, but the plot is completely lost to the mists of time…or so I thought until last week. Imagine my surprise when my mother dug up the drawing and typed scene above, proving that Violet was…
In addition to pushing my social boundaries, the writing retreat I recently attended sent me home with a half-finished short story and lots of actionable authorial tips. I include the best of the latter here just in case you’re a writer as well as a reader. And if you don’t care for writing…maybe the pictures…
Here’s what you need to know about me. I learned to read at four years old and have loved books ever since. I write werewolf novels for a living. And I haven’t taken an English class since twelfth grade. Perhaps that’s why walking into a retreat center full of literary writers felt like willingly throwing…