Today we welcome US author, Lisa Ard, talking about her book, Fright Flight.
Writing is an adventure for me. It’s been a long and winding journey to authoring a book. Here’s some of that journey’s highlights:
I grew up in Wenatchee, Washington, USA. Better look it up on the map, because it’s the Apple Capital of the World!
As a kid I played lots of sports, enjoyed art and photography, read lots of books (still do) and dreamed of traveling the world.
I left home to study at the University of Washington (Seattle) where I earned my Bachelor of Arts (4-year degree) in German. (And yes, my dad asked me “what are you going to do with a degree in German?”)
After a couple years living and working in Seattle, I went back to school. Now, you may be asking why I signed up for MORE school. Actually I’ve always thought school was pretty fun. I found a really cool school that let me work overseas. I got my Masters in International Business from the University of South Carolina and worked in Germany.
For the next 15 years, I worked in Finance and Quality departments for some really big companies. In other words, I went to lots of meetings, talked on the phone, traveled all over the country and sat in a cubicle for a lot of that time.
Then I fell in love, got married and had two wonderful kids. We now live happily ever after in Portland, Oregon.
That’s the story so far. I’m now starting the journey of author. How long that will last, I don’t know. However, I’m ready to enjoy the adventure.
ABOUT FRIGHT FLIGHT – BOOK ONE IN THE DREAM SEEKER SERIES
When I started to write Fright Flight, the first book in the Dream Seeker series, I knew I wanted a strong preteen boy as the main character. Patrick is twelve years old and at the age when he’s experiencing a lot of change, both physically and emotionally. Most of that change is out of his control, but how he reacts to that change is important.
Patrick’s family and best friends are important to his adventures too. When life and dreams seem out of control, Patrick knows he is not alone. Perhaps that’s my dream for my own kids, showing up in my writing. My hope is, that whatever challenges my two children face in life, they’ll know they can count on me and their dad and those that love them.
Kids ages 7-10 will enjoy Fright Flight’s humor, adventure and fantasy.
Here’s the blurb from the back cover:
For Patrick, being twelve years old can be challenging. Add to that the unusual ability to experience dreams as reality and you begin to understand Patrick’s need for a little self- control. A “sweet” dream devouring the world’s largest ice cream sundae can end with an enormous stomachache. A fall from a bike means Patrick wakes with a broken arm. Try explaining that to the emergency room doctor. Oh wait — that would be Patrick’s mom. She’s a dream seeker too, as are Patrick’s sister and brother. If Patrick follows the family’s dream-seeking rules he can have cool nighttime adventures.
But if he forgets…. Read an excerpt of Fright Flight at www.dreamseekeradventures.com
HOW I WROTE FRIGHT FLIGHT
A fair amount of planning went into my first children’s book: Fright Flight, Dream Seekers Book One. I talked with my local librarian about the available series appropriate for my target audience (2-4 graders). How to Train Your Dragon, Magic Tree House (although this series is for a little younger audience), and Geronimo Stilton are all series that I considered before determining the number of chapters, book length (total words) and sentence structure/complexity of my own work.
With the three examples above I typed the first few pages into Microsoft Word to get a sense of the sentence length and complexity. I noted the word count of those passages (Microsoft Word function) to estimate the number of words per chapter. I estimated a total word count for each book.
FREE WRITING ACTIVITY
In Fright Flight, Patrick uses an Earth term (picnic) that is unfamiliar to those living in outerspace. What other terms or activities would be unfamiliar and why?
In the first chapter of Fright Flight (excerpt available online at www.dreamseekeradventures.com), Patrick has an awesome experience with an ice cream sundae. How many senses (sight, hearing, taste, smell, touch) are used to describe this scene? Come up with more description using the senses not covered.
WHERE TO BUY FRIGHT FLIGHT
You can buy Fright Flight from my website: www.dreamseekeradventures.com
Or directly at:
on iTunes http://itunes.apple.com/us/book/fright-flight/id472742096?mt=11
on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Fright-Flight-Dreamseekers- ebook/dp/B005V72RBC/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1
To celebrate her new book, Lisa is offering free author visits to classrooms and libraries (via Skype). You can find out more at Lisa’s website
