How I’m Spending My Summer Vacation
by Laurie Cass
Not so very long ago, I sent my editor the manuscript for the third bookmobile cat book, Borrowed Crime, a full three hours before the deadline. Hooray!
I celebrated in style by checking some books out of the library and settling in with a healthy quantity of dark chocolate. After a few days I resurfaced, blinked at the bright shiny world, and said “Hey, I don’t have a book due any time soon.”
Matter of fact, I have months and months until the next one is scheduled for delivery. For the rest of the summer, I can be a normal person! There will be no need for me to write in the morning before starting the day job. For a few weeks I won’t have to write during my lunch hour, and I won’t have to spend the summer inside writing when my family and friends are outside playing in the sunshine!
After that blinding realization, I started thinking about all the things that I could do to fill my summer. There will, of course, be a lot of reading, specifically reading outside. Reading on the porch, reading in the hammock, reading on the patio, reading on the swing, reading at the beach, etc.
And gardening. I want to do lots of gardening. Last summer I was so busy writing that I never caught up with either the weeds, the plant-moving, or the trimming and I’m loving a chance to roll up my sleeves, pull on the gardening gloves, and get down to the wonderfully dirty work of gardening.
Plus, not far away, there’s an outstanding new mountain biking trail system that I’ve been wanting to explore. And there’s waterskiing to do – maybe this will be the summer that I learn to do one-handed turns. And there are a number of new restaurants in the area whose menus look extremely interesting. And, once I get the piano tuned, the Maple Leaf Rag is still waiting for me.
Then again, if I don’t have to work on a book for a few weeks, I’ll have time to do all that promotional stuff I’ve wanted to do but never had time. Last winter, a reader suggested that I create an Eddie bookmark and put it up on my website so people can download and print it at home. Wonderful idea! And now I have time!
And I’ve also wanted to come up with a paper version of my fictional bookmobile. Thanks to the Association of Bookmobile and Outreach Services, I have a blank version of the cutest little bookmobile ever – all I have to do is work the graphics onto it.
And I can’t forget the author events I have lined up this summer, which can be great fun. And I should get going on setting up a template for my e-newsletter.
Plus, there’s some research I’d like to do for future book ideas. I have a couple of potential plots in mind, but to make sure they’ll actually, you know, make sense, I have to do some delving.
But, hang on. Maybe it would make more sense to get a head start on the next bookmobile cat book, the books that my husband calls “the Eddie books.” Or…should I try to be more normal this summer?
Such a dilemma. I think there are three conclusions to this:
- All that stuff is never going to get done. (And I didn’t even mention painting the house.)
- I’m a writer and should, by now, be used to the idea that I’m never going to be a normal person.
- I’m okay with both 1) and 2).
About the Author:
Laurie Cass grew up in Michigan and graduated from Eastern Michigan University in the 80’s with a (mostly unused) Bachelor of Science degree in geology. Currently, Laurie and her husband share their house with two cats, the inestimable Eddie, and the adorably cute Sinii. When Laurie isn’t writing, she’s working at her day job, reading, yanking weeds out of her garden, or doing some variety of skiing.
Jennifer’s Review of Tailing a Tabby
Review (4 Stars): Tailing a Tabby is an enjoyable fun mystery and I love that Minnie’s job is to drive the bookmobile all around the community. Libraries mean a lot to me and I remember visiting our bookmobile as a child because the local library was too far for us to go to on a regular basis. Minnie is an adorable character that is sweet and spunky and I love her cat, Eddie. Some of the scenes with Eddie are so cute and I can understand why he is such a hit with the bookmobile patrons.
Tailing a Tabby is the second book in the Bookmobile Cat mystery series and Ms. Cass has a delightful writing style that makes it easy for you to become involved in the story and you don’t have to read them in order to follow along. I’m looking forward to reading more of Minnie’s adventures with her adorable cat in the future and this reminds me that I need to thank a librarian for helping me discover the joys of reading at an early age.
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