Tuesdays with Story

		Juliette Crane Juliette Crane has been writing stories all her life. After careers as a news and arts reporter, graphic designer, photographer, and web developer, she now writes fiction full-time while living in Madison, Wisconsin. She is a graduate of the Odyssey Writer's Workshop and currently hard at work on a children's fantasy novel.
		Check out her website and blog.

Alicia Connolly-Lohr

Today, I'm a non-practicing lawyer and a stay-at- home mom of eight year old twin girls. I'm having great fun writing my first practice novel about Hitler's mistress, Eva Braun.

At the UW -- Eau Claire, I did well in English courses but I stuck with the late ‘70's fad major, Psychology. After working in the field for one year, I decided the staff's behavior topped the patients' in craziness. I started toward a second B.A. in Journalism and Spanish at the U of Minn. I missed out, by a hair, on becoming the medical beat reporter for the Minnesota Daily -- just when worldwide news was breaking at the university hospitals in liver and kidney transplants. You know that feeling of watching your could-have-been career flash before your eyes? I floundered in Minneapolis for a few years, traveled to San Francisco and Peru looking for opportunities. Then, I went to law school at Hamline in St. Paul . In 1988, I joined the Navy for a job and adventure (the posters don't lie.) For about seven years, I served as a Judge Advocate officer in Charleston , South Carolina , Misawa , Japan and Washington , D.C. I stayed in the D.C. area after getting out of the Navy and worked as a federal attorney on a defense contract case involving a stealth fighter aircraft. I also continued with the Reserves and am retirement eligible in 2009. I married in 1997 and relocated to Oklahoma . There, I dabbled in adult ed writing courses and worked for the Attorney General's Office. Next, I moved back to Maryland in 2002 for another federal attorney job. Finally, in 2005, my husband's job change brought me back to Wisconsin . Here, I found the Madison Writer's Group. It's a wonderful, casual way to be critiqued and it exposes its members to other writing styles and genres.

Lawyering gave me an array of work experiences: individual legal assistance, including some three hundred wills for sailors aboard ships and submarines, legal adviser to a five hundred person intelligence command overseas, court room criminal prosecution in the District of Columbia, administrative license cases (guns, pharmacy) in Oklahoma City, civil litigation, military appellate defense, a huge toxic tort claim suit, and medical malpractice. Thus far, my writing has been a hobby. Over the years, life and work have carried me to a number of places: New England, the South, the West Coast, Asia, D.C., Oklahoma City , London , Naples , Italy , Ukraine and Germany . I believe I now hold a ripe collection of great writing material: keystone cop spy catchers, Japanese hot baths, an internet pharmacy scam operation, domestic violence murders, hidden frolics, angels, stealth aircraft intrigues, and of course, an overabundance of whacky lawyer personalities, and more.

Bill Dries

Author of "Last Man Tales" published by Blitz Publishing Company.

I'm a mechanical and metallurgical engineer by training, graduating from UW/Madison first with a degree in mechanical engineering in 1953. In April of that year, I joined the Army Signal Corps. I completed my tour of duty in January 1955 and returned to UW/Madison to work on a master's degree in mechanical engineering. I received that in 1956 and, three years later, was back at the university, working on a doctorate, this time in metallurgical engineering. I received that degree in 1962.

I organized my own consulting firm, Dries Associates. We do project management and design mechanical and electrical systems for commercial and industrial facilities. Energy audits and energy conservation projects are a specialty of our firm. Our jobs have taken us to Philippines, Germany, Armenia, Belarus, Russia, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, Poland, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Georgia, India, Syria and the Ukraine.

Sixty percent of my time, for the 29 years between 1962 and 1991, I worked for UW/Madison's Engineering Professional Development Department teaching and organizing adult education courses.

I admit it; I love politics. I served six years (1967-1973) as an alderman for Madison's 21st district, and I've been president of the Madison City Council.

Outside of my job and city politics, I've served as vice-president and president of Project Home, a non-profit corporation to help low-income, elderly and handicapped people.

On the writing front, I was inspired to write a book of short stories about my life experiences by friends who would listen to my stories and say: "You should write a book."

Shel Ellestad

Shel presents himself as a ‘sixty-something' Norwegian Bachelor Farmer. He's also a world traveler and is writing a memoir about his experiences.

Most of you know about one of my lifetime achievements, circling our globe for 20 months without getting killed…barely as the first-and-third Tuesday group now knows.

Another of my achievements was to build my home by hand on four acres of wonderful wooded hillside I call ‘Three Cliffs.' I'm proud the house survives after 30 years. For someone who loves traveling in cultures as far from ours as possible, I have a passion for my home in the woods. I'm a bit of a nature-boy having absorbed a solid understanding of the creatures and plants around me. Yes, there are three cliffs adding beauty to my place.

For almost 30 years I'd called my place ‘Oak Hill Ranch.' A much more rustic, plebeian...and honest name. It's a small A Frame cottage in a rough, wooded hillside. I run about a hundred head of squirrel, twenty head of deer, fifteen turkeys and assorted coons, possums and a couple coyotes on my spread.

The recent encroachment of giant palatial edifices are forcing me to think of the time I will leave. Looking ahead to selling caused me to look for a new name. Since I have over the last couple years dug, scraped and exposed three cliffs, that name -- ‘Three Cliffs' -- jumped out. It invites pictures of grandeur which I hope to use to my advantage at selling time.

I was the founding director of Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin and served in that capacity for eleven years. We provided over a million pounds of donated food a year, solicited from corporations and provided to hundreds of organizations feeding the needy.

Most recently, I managed volunteer operations for Wisconsin Public Television. The joke at WPT was that after a 26-year probation, they hired me. I've volunteered for 30 years as on-air TV talent, auctioneering and MCing their live TV auctions and doing pledge drives. Yes, I'm the guy badgering you to make big pledges. I've also done several national programs.

I rode motorcycles for 25 years before a lawn mower accident forced me into bicycle touring. Biking is healthier anyway.

"My -- gulp -- writing career began after friends told me I must write the many stories I've told about my world travels. Put it in a book, they said. Like my world tour itself and building my home, I started without knowing how to write a book. You all have my heartiest thanks for patiently helping me learn how to do it gooder. Oh, mischief is a life-long trait.

Jack Freiburger

We know Jack principally as a serious poet and very able at his craft.
He's working on a novel, too.

I also write a large number of technical articles covering subjects such as materials science, historic restoration, building code concerns, and structural engineering. Regret that none of my technical writing has been nominated for any prizes whatsoever. That's strange because it's better than my poetry, and that was recognized, long ago when I was a grad student.

After a bachelor's degree from Notre Dame, where I took my one and only lit course, Indiana gave me a math M.S. and prize money for writing a few poems. As a starving grad student, I was honestly able to list my profession as poet on my income tax form. Math logic and systems analysis attracted me at Indiana. After that, it was off to Scotland to do more logic and then here to the UW for Ph.D. work. Dissertation was an analysis of historical data regarding land use. I promise to not read it to the group.

I taught for seven years, but found consulting engineering to be great fun, sort of playing detective and getting paid for it. Also fell in love with old buildings and developed a practice in historic restoration consulting. I do no useful work, but analyze, write, talk, and plan projects, support litigation, and do problem solving along with some partners and staff.

A lover got me back into writing by having me edit and argue over her work. Found that all those years of doing deconstruction, language analysis, and logic were pretty useful in reading and editing. I've always loved Modernism, so taking things apart and looking for levels of meaning and reference is second nature. That's why I sound like such a pedantic twit in group sessions.

But she did get me writing poetry again, which has been an on and mostly off recreation since I stopped being serious about it twenty years ago. I have a farm and raise horses, so that chthonic life informs much of what I write. The novel got started with her encouragement also. It may not be readable but it's very well organized!

The group has allowed me to discover and refine reading skills. They put up with my comments, maybe because most are honestly positive, or at least are meant to be helpful. Over time perhaps skilled reading and editing will become decent writing. I'm hoping that I'll find a voice at some point that others will enjoy hearing or find worth considering. If it happens, that will be the result of our Tuesday eve interactions.

Chris Gehrmann

"I don't remember ever not writing."

In sixth grade, I wrote a short fiction story about a family forced to take shelter in the basement of their home because of a tornado. That was based on a true-life experience, a tornado that knocked out half of our subdivision, left us without electricity for four days, and sent us on numerous trips to McDonald's. I showed the story to my teacher, and she said, "You should be a writer."

I took that to heart, became an elementary teacher, an editor/writer for the 440th Air Force Reserve's base newspaper in Milwaukee, and a mom.

I am now sharing the third novel I have begun with the first-and-third Tuesday group. I have many more stories rolling around in my head. The problem is I never seem to finish any of these projects.

The beginning of my most recent novel (no title yet) was well received by the group and one person actually understood the main character is a ghost. So . . . I hope Tuesdays With Story will give me the inspiration, support, and gut-wrenching critiques necessary to finish this novel and get it published. Plus I love all the jokes, the smiles, and that uplifting feeling as I leave B&N every other Tuesday evening.

Mary C. Gesteland (Hopi)

I wanted to write when I was a child and dabbled as children will do. I began writing poetry and children's stories seriously while at the university, studying German literature. I had a professor who took a special interest in my work and encouraged me to continue. I received my MA and had a small book of poems published.

We lived abroad for 26 years. All but one of my six children was born abroad. I am thankful that all of them are adults now.

My views have been shaped by living in Germany, Austria, Italy, England, India and Singapore. I made an effort to learn the language of the country and understand each of their cultures. These experiences enriched my life and broadened my outlook.

In Italy, I worked as a photo-journalist for an American newspaper in Rome. That two-year stint honed my writing skills, forcing me to write short, active sentences. I then wrote freelance articles and actually earned some money.

In Singapore, I taught English at the Japanese School and worked as a tutor and mentor for more than a dozen Japanese youngsters who wanted to go to the British or American School. Many of those students still keep in contact with me. During that five years, I added a number of magazines for my articles.

I have not written any poetry for the last few years, but have been working on autobiographical material. One memoir about India is finished and the second one about our adopted daughter is in the works.

I have belonged to a number of writing groups, but the Tuesday sessions have been far the best. A group like this is not good without honest criticism and I find that here. So I am happy to be a member of this very special group of people.

Leigh Gregg

By now you've read the first chapter of her novel, The Snowman.

I was born in Huntington, West Virginia, but reared across the river in southern Ohio. I'm a river rat--grew up where Kentucky, West Virginia and Ohio meet. There's a reason my home town is called South Point.

Got my bachelor's at Marshall University, my master's at West Virginia U., and my Ph.D. at UW/Madison--all in journalism. I was a reporter on two daily newspapers in Ohio and Pennsylvania, then taught middle school for two years in Florida. That cured me. I swore I'd never teach 8th and 9th graders again. I spent the next 15 years teaching journalism at West Virginia University, Salem (WV) College, UW/Madison's School of Journalism, UW/Madison's Department of Agricultural Journalism & Consumer Sciences, and finally Rutgers.

I returned to Madison in 1985 to work at CUNA, the trade association for credit unions, not the insurance company. There I was editor of various publications over the years. For the past five years I've been online editorial director for CUNA's News Now, its electronic daily service news for the nation's credit unions. News Now has sections on Washington news, CU system news, market news, competition news, consumer news, products and services news, and international news.

I typically work 9 1/2 to 10 hours a day and I scan hundreds of stories a day, coordinating assignments, plus write a lot and edit everything. I can write a news story in my sleep. But it's taken a toll on my writing energy at home. I've finished one novel and was half way through the second one when I made some changes, so I'm starting over.

I have a 22-year-old son, Elliott. He prefers Grog . . . just moved to Orlando to study to become a video game developer and designer.

Mindy Habecker

Hello all. I'm originally from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and moved to Wisconsin in 1985 after living several years in West Virginia. I work in the field of natural resource and community development education for Dane County UW-Extension Service.

As far as my writing goes, I have had a passion for it since I was 15. I do a variety of writing, including keeping a daily journal. I also work actively on a variety of theme books such as: What Dreams May Come, Geology of Relationships, Children at Play, Wanderings of a Bike, Candybar Knights, Ladybeatle Journal and others. Whatever I feel like theming about.

I write poetry but also sketch out short stories. I also do a great deal of technical, report, news release, historical articles and other such writing for my work.

I have been part of several writing groups in various states. I have worked for several university literary journals as an editor and have worked as a volunteer writer for a few local newsletters and newspapers.

I read quite a bit, have had training in technical writing, but none in creative writing. I live on a farm south of Mount Horeb and work in Madison's far east side. Yes, I'm a big-time commuter 4X per week.

Jeff Herwig

Jeff writes fantasy and stage plays.

Terry Hoffman

You've been reading her novel, Snowbird.

I was born in Chicago to a father who loved cars and made them his career (he worked on Al Capone's vehicles), and a mother who was a Rosie-the-Riveter during World War II. It was like growing up with Lucille Ball and Jackie Gleason. You will meet Lucy and Jack in Snowbird.

As a child, I was never without a pencil and paper. I drew everything and anything, and when I wasn't drawing, I was writing stories that I passed around to friends at school. In eighth grade, my English teacher mimeographed one of my stories to hand out in a toy store where she worked during Christmas break.

When I announced I was going to become a writer, my mother, in an attempt to encourage me to become a better speller first, said, ‘You can't be a writer. You can't spell.' I didn't understand, so I quit writing and didn't write for a long time. When I did write, I never showed my work to anyone.

In college, I met the man who would become my first husband. We married and I quit school. That relationship spawned my first novel, Necessary Choices, currently being reviewed by Diversity Inc. It's the story of two women who grew up as best friends. When they reunite after 17 years, Jenny is a widow by choice and Beth is a decision point in an abusive marriage. A struggle ensues with the secrets, denial and lies that surround abuse and Jenny's fierce determination to save her friend.

"My job history is diverse. It includes party-plan sales, gift-store management, dental chairside, dental-offices management, and human resources department management. Five years ago, I quit the corporate world to devote my time to writing and painting.

For the last three years, I've volunteered with Domestic Abuse Intervention Services and developed a program to teach middle and high school students about teen dating violence and healthy relationships. Last year, I spoke to more than a thousand young men and women.

I have a self-help book in the works called When You are Sick and Tired of Being Sick and Tired: Fighting the self-talk that keeps you stuck.

You'll see me driving around town in my little red Berretta, license plate LKY NLV: writer, wife, mother and grandmother. Yes, my husband of 14 years, Jan and I claim four children and six grandchildren.

Carol Hornung

Carol is one of the several mystery writers in the group. She's set the manuscript you've been reading, North of the Loop, in Chicago.

When I was in high school, I joined a creative writing club, but we had nothing to critique. Our teacher, Bill Rodriguez, who is still at James Madison Memorial, said, ‘Go home and write! Write something. Anything. Write about a conversation with a cup of coffee. I don't care! Just write something!'

My short story, Conversation with a Cup of Coffee, won a National Scholastic award that year and was published in Pressions, Volume one (the high school's creative writing magazine -- they are up to volume 22). I've been hooked on writing ever since.

Writing appeals to me because it's behind the scenes. While at Ripon College, I worked in the drama department as part of tech crew, and I ushered for several years at the American Players Theatre in Spring Green. Though my primary job is traffic director (commercial scheduler) for Triple M and the Buzz radio, my office is right next door to the news director's, and I can feel the behind-the-scenes excitement when a big story develops.

In high school, I hung out with the sci-fi geeks, but when I became more serious about writing, I realized my favorite authors were in the mystery realm, and it was hard to find light, adventurous stories with females at the lead. So that's what I write. Character tends to take precedence over logic and plot at times, but there's nothing like the high you get after churning out several pages or rewriting a problem scene and finally getting it to work.

When I turned 30, my goal was to be published by the time I was 40. I'm running out of time, though technically I do have a short piece in the American Players Theatre's Book of Lore, which came out this summer. With luck, one day, I'll invite all of you to a book signing for North of the Loop.

Thomas Jannusch

Thomas is working on his fantasy novel, Twice Rescued.

Andrea Kirchman

Chris Lacey

Visit her writing blog at http://chrmisha.blogspot.com

I'm a Wisconsin native who loves to write in any form. I'm currently seeking publication for a Spanish children's book and working on a historical romance. My next book up is a romantic suspense novel set in Washington, D.C. For fun, I write poetry and short stories.

Beyond this passion for putting words on paper, I draw and paint, do photography, and dabble in horticulture.

I have a straight-forward life philosophy: Live and let live. And if I could subscribe to a way of living, it would be to be a "creative free spirit."

Brandy Larson (Yosephi)

(click on photo for full picture)

I saw our group's notice in Isthmus and attended a few meetings sharing a short story or two with the group in spring of 2004 after returning to Madison after 2 years living in Istanbul, Turkey. (Since then I have mainly participated in the Fifth Tuesday get togethers and enjoy Jerry's weekly Writers Newsletter). I had been working in Istanbul for two years as an art teacher at Uskudar American Academy, one of the oldest American schools in the city, founded in 1876. Then took a break from teaching (those Turkish kids really wore me out!) and moved to the Mediterranean town of Kumkuyu, Turkey for 6 months.

In my younger days I wrote quite a bit of poetry, but after taking the "Creative Writing of Poetry" from UW-Madison Extension in the mid 1990's I pretty much stopped, being "up against the wall" of modern poetry. (It was a great class, but took some of the "fun" out).

I kept a diary as pre teen and young teenager. I finally tossed all but one of those (the mind of a young suburban girl - so mundane!). I started reading hundred of books every year starting at the age of 9, mainly novels. I began writing journals staring when I was 20. I was very influenced by Anais Nin. I have 3 huge boxes of large, hand-written, hardbound journals (31 years worth), with various ephemera, stored in my sister's basement "up north." In 2001 I started using the Internet (always a late bloomer!), so the handwritten journals kind of phased themselves out, tho still keep a small one when I travel.

I have written some short stories. Indeed, I took "Creative Writing of the Short Story," also through UW Extension. Laurel Yourke was the instructor. I produced a hand full of pretty decent stories (I think...) based for the most part on 6 months of living in Treasure Beach, in southwest Jamaica - a fishing village with a light sprinkling of tourists. I worked as a free lance masseuse at the trendy Jake's Resort (www.islandoutpost.com). I volunteered at Sandy Bank Primary School when I first arrived in the fall, working as an English tutor and art teacher. I even wrote a grant for "The Reading Room" - a literacy school for adults in the community. I applied to major corporations but but never got any funding! Literacy in the Caribbean is a low priority I found out! The grant writing process was rigorous and I learned a lot!

Thanks to Laurel and her class I learned a lot about the short story and improved my writing ability. But alas, I have a page of ideas for short stories, but have not written many since I finished the class around 2001.

I'm still keeping my journal - on line. I sent some of my observations to our group via our newsletter when I got another foreign teaching job in Cairo, Egypt in 2006. Cairo is a nice place to visit - but bring your gas mask. It was declared the most polluted city in the world shortly after I arrived (yes, even worse than Bejing). I was overloaded with students (400 of them!) so ran away - back to Istanbul - in December of 2006 since I was "in the neighborhood." I didn't feel too bad about bailing as the school had been going through about one art teacher every semester in the past 4 years! The whole school called it the "curse of the art teachers." But it turned out to be a blessing for me!

I got a beautiful apartment in Istanbul on the European side (of the Bosporus) with a fantastic view of the water and set up as a masseuse working on international businessmen, a few Turks and an occasional tourists. (I have had my own massage business - which I combined with teaching - since 1994). Surprisingly my craigslist ad in Istanbul landed me top listing for Google "massage - Istanbul." I watched no TV for 15 months while I was abroad and read dozens of novels. It was a strange array of writing, as I relied on the English books available at the second hand books stores in my neighborhood in Old Istanbul and in Madi, the foreigner's district in Cairo.

Shortly after arriving back in Istanbul I met Simon (Jalil) from Tabriz, Iran, at an Internet cafe/ coffee shop early in January of 2006. He soon introduced me to his best friend Amir, who had come to Istanbul a year earlier and was working as an English teacher. We hit it off immediately and at our get togethers the three of us just about laughed our heads off joking about life in Turkey. We hit the discos, art openings and nargile (water pipe) cafes. I showed off my "domestic side" by cooking up huge Turkish breakfasts and having dinner parties. When I broke two bones in my foot leaping out of the way of a careening motorcycle on one of Istanbul's many steep hills, Amir came over to check on me and help me out at my 6th floor walk up! One thing led to another...

So here I am back in Madison again. I married Amir on June 20, 2008. After a very happy 9 months I moved back to Madison and have been working on our immigration process (which is a BEAR) for the better part of the past year. The K3-Marriage Visa, which is supposed to be completed in 6 months, has been dragging on and on! I believe Amir will eventually be allowed to immigrate (1.5 years is the time frame from what I've heard from others bringing their foreign spouses back to the good old US of A). The final piece of the puzzle - the actual Visa application - was mailed off a few weeks ago (44 pages of it!). Amir should soon get his interview at the US Embassy in Ankara, the capitol of Turkey. Then the "background check," - a minimum of 2 months, probably longer given his country of origin: "Persia."

So now am married - without husband. I have been single the better part of my life, so although I miss Amir, and we are on the phone and messenger nearly every day, I do not miss the "work" of being married. But as my friend Signe say "at least this way you will not die and OLD MAID!"

I will fly to Istanbul to accompany Amir when he finally gets approval - hopefully around New Year's. Since a flight to Istanbul costs about $1000 these days I'm waiting on my visit until then! Perhaps someday I will write "our story." I hope it has a happy ending!

Millie Mader

Millie is currently working on a novel after encouragement from the group to expand her short story, Life on Hold.

Emma Martinson

You've read chapters from her To Die For novel and a number of her poems. Now Emma is working on her novel, Ancient Voices.

I'm a native Madisonian and currently attend Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin where I study writing and music.

I started writing poetry in the 7th grade and joined our writers group in its first stages of existence a few years ago. I have finished my first novel, titled To Die For, which the group has been critiquing. I'm currently at work on a second novel in this series I'm calling The Heart's Soul Saga, and have all my plans made for the third and fourth novels.

Call me crazy, but in May I started two new novels, both completely different from what I've been writing. One is about a teenage werewolf, the other is the first in a young adult series along the lines of an existing book series called The Saddle Club. So, as a grand total, I'm writing seven novels, though I'm not actively working on all of them. My main focus is To Die For and Rekindled Spirit, the second novel in The Heart's Soul Saga series.

Beyond writing, I play the flute and piccolo, despite that instrument incredibly high notes and squeaky-ness, in my school's top band. I also own, ride and show a horse. Yes, my baby. He's a five-year-old Hanoverian/Thoroughbred, very tall, and very puppy-doggish. I show him in dressage, hunter, jumper, and this summer I will do my first two-day event with him. Eventing is a three-day competition consisting of Dressage (day 1), cross country (day 2), and stadium jumping (day 3). If you saw or heard about the Kentucky Rolex, that's what I hope to be doing someday.

Come time for college, I want to be a Music and English (performance) major, maybe even combine the two and become a songwriter. I haven't thought about specific colleges yet, maybe UW/Madison.

As of now, I'm taking a break from submitting new chapters of To Die For to rewrite the last few chapters for the second-and-fourth Tuesday group. I do send my chapters and rewrites to everybody in both groups because I value every comment I receive."

Incidentally, Emma signs her correspondence "Emma, Captain Sir Herald the Ironfist, Lordess of the Void, Servant of oh-great-one-who-never-had-a-title-but-named-Elizabeth." Says Emma of so grand a name, "It's my official fencing guild title, and according to My Lady, I must use it or ‘feel the wrath of my [Elizabeth's] foil.'

Tim Mickleburgh

Tim has moved from the world of non-fiction to the world of fiction where he's been working on his novel Lois and Mi.

Jaime Nelson

Jaime is working on a modern fantasy novel, Riff.

Check out Jaime's website.

I've written stories all my life, but didn't get into novels until around sophomore year in high school, which is when I discovered Tuesdays with Story (which didn't even have a name back then). The group critiqued my entire first novel, Emerican Adventure. I quickly realized that I had a lot left to learn about writing.

Five years later, I have written four novels and still have a lot left to learn. I started with a Douglas Adams flavored science fiction novel, moved on to a Terry Pratchett style comical satire, moved again to a YA fantasy, and landed (though probably not for long) on a dark modern fantasy reminiscent of Dante but with a touch of Gaiman influence.

I'm studying Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin La Crosse. I had the honor of living in London for one semester, just down the street from Douglas Adams's old flat. When I'm not up at school or traveling the world, I'm living in the house I grew up in on the east side of Madison.

Although writing is my first passion, I also enjoy filmmaking, drawing, playing music, taking pictures, web design, traveling, collecting quotes, and even doing a little paper mache.

Susan Parsons

Susan is writing a chick-lit novel.

Spike Pedersen

Spike is writing his adventure novel, First Light.

My maternal grandfather made a big impact on his daughters. All of them named a son after him. I was introduced to my father as Lester. He said welcome home Spike.

In fact, as adults us Lesters are known as Butch, Buzz and Spike. Spike being the first name of a popular singer at that moment. A little research can get you my age.

I have two grown children. Trevor is in the last days of law school, and Amber is working with children at a daycare.

I am a project manager for Homz Management. But in the past, I slaved on the family farm, worked as a welder, owned a retail lumber and hardware business, and managed rental property. My dream job is to be a columnist for a motorcycle magazine. Test ride them all, all over the world, write with an attitude and get paid for it. (sigh)

My writing had to wait for technology to develop Spellcheck before I could start. I then wrote an article about my friends and the motorcycle racing lifestyle. I got paid $500 and published it in a motorcycle magazine. They never called back. (sigh) After that, I started writing a column for the Green Bay Press Gazette about hardware and building. (Write what you know.) Now I am currently writing a long fiction about adventure and love.

I really enjoy interacting with the group. It's great to see someone else who is also tormented with a story inside that won't come out in finished form.

Jerry Peterson

Jerry is working on a series of crime novels starring Sheriff James Early.

I got my start as a writer when, as a kid of 12, my parents gave me a toy printing press for Christmas. That winter, the stories I wrote -- the subjects now long forgotten -- I set in rubber type which I inked and printed on paper that came with the rotary press.

I wrote for student newspapers in high school and college, then followed those experiences into the working world p.r. -- I wrote and edited membership publications for state Farm Bureaus in Wisconsin, Michigan and Kansas. After I left an executive position with the Colorado Farm Bureau in 1979, I became a real journalist -- a reporter and columnist for the Douglas County News-Press in Castle Rock, Colorado. I followed that with reporting and editing positions with weekly, semi-weekly and daily newspapers in West Virginia, Virginia and Tennessee.

After a decade of that, I left daily journalism to become a graduate student in journalism and mass communications at the University of Tennessee/Knoxville. There I began collecting stories that I've put into short stories and novels set in the Great Smoky Mountains. Several of my shorter works have been published in literary and popular culture journals.

I had the distinct pleasure of studying creative writing under novelists Wilma Dykeman and Allen Wier, and I've participated in writing workshops led by novelists Lee Smith and Robert Morgan and mystery writer Jeremiah Healy and Anne Perry.

I'm a member of the Knoxville Writers Guild and the Mystery Writers of America. The editors of the Writers Guild's 2004 anthology selected my short story, "The Gimp Club," for inclusion in that edition. And the editors of the Great Manhattan Mystery Conclave's 2005 anthology selected my short stories, "Dead Pool" and "Big Dam Foolishness," for inclusion in that volume.

I've taught speech, English and theater in Wisconsin high schools and editing at the University of Tennessee.

Today I work at my computer. I'm a writer. Five Star Mysteries brings out my first crime novel, Early's Fall, in 2009.

Devin Quamme

Rebecca Rettenmund

I grew up in Madison, with a passion for writing and the arts from an early age. In 4th grade, I started a library with a friend. The library featured books my friend and I wrote. In 5th grade, I had the grammar skills of a 12th grader. In 9th grade, my creative writing teacher told me I wrote like Stephen King.

However, I always got recognized first for my drawing skills, so I pursued a career in art at Madison Area Technical College. December 1994, I graduated with not only an associate's degree in commercial art, but I also landed employment with a prestigious computer game company (Raven Software) and a different job as a freelance illustrator.

In 1996, I moved to Seattle to spread my artistic wings. The 6 years I lived there, I got laid off 5 times, worked in a 72-story skyscraper, witnessed a 6.0 earthquake, broke up with two boyfriends, and purchased a coin-operated pony ride.

I have been credited for 6 game titles in my career. My favorite that I worked on was called Total Annihilation Kingdoms. The art director on the project recognized me for changing the genre of the game from big robots to the fantasy kind with elves and dragons. The company had programmers design in-house proprietary tools for animations. The art staff was asked to play with the new tools to see what they could do. At the time, Total Annihilation featured big robots, but I preferred to animate animals. When the art director looked over my shoulder, he saw I used the tool to make a dragon fly through the air. He showed the board of directors, and they were so impressed that they changed to a fantasy genre. I also had seniority over the animals created in the game. By the time the project was completed, I modeled and animated 22 characters for Kingdoms including 3 of the 4 super-power dragons. Game companies, especially startups will tease employees with big salaries and fancy titles, and when the project is over, the whole team is kicked to the curb. Some friends from Raven Software started their own company and offered me a job back in Madison.

April 2004, in typical game-company fashion, I got laid off from that job, too. Today I enjoy the wonderful world of retail, ride my bicycle whenever the weather permits, read books that have been made into movies, dance my ass off at local clubs, and write stories that never seem to end.

Cathy Riddle

This is the master of flash fiction, those one-page stories that really zing.

I will try to present myself coherently to those of you I haven't met, and fill in a few blanks for those who have had the, um, honor of reading and critiquing my literary efforts.

This much I know for sure. I wrote my first story at age six. My mother saved it for me. The main characters in this early ouevre were horseback-riding people who were very busy throwing ‘bonearozs' at each other as they thundered across an empty landscape that rather resembled the calm, Polish-Irish neighborhood in Milwaukee where I grew up.

More stories followed this early western. My spelling improved slightly. The e's were no longer backwards by the time I graduated UW-Madison with a degree in journalism, bound for Northwestern, where I would learn the true meaning of competition as well as professional comradery. Graduate school highlights include getting a Washington, D.C., byline frequently and once scooping seasoned Capitol Hill reporters on a story.

Still thrilled with chasing people down and asking them what they thought, did, didn't do or denied doing, I spent nearly four years as a reporter for The South's Oldest (and most conservative, crazy) Newspaper, in Augusta, Georgia. Highlights of that period include falling in love with the South and being dirt poor and bone tired. I ate on assignment when I could. Ah, those NAACP breakfast conferences were a peach of an assignment. The grits and bacon...

One time, I couldn't afford a dentist for a basic cleaning, so I went to the Medical College of Georgia students. My, those students worked hard with their pointy utensils. Then their teachers had to double check the work, after which the students had to repeat the maneuver care-fu-ll-y to make sure they mastered it. I left two hours later, throbbing with pain, only to be told back in the newsroom I needed a story for the next day. Of course, I wrote about dentists.

After the Augusta newspaper, I worked as a copywriter for a clothing company. In advertising, I saved lots of money, but built up numerous bad-grammar habits I'm still trying to break.

In my personal life, I'm an at-home mom of a toddler, belong to a busy church mothers' group, like to canoe and camp and occasionally paint with watercolors. I write short stories and flash fiction. I am interested in what it takes to be a novelist, and have, in the back of my head, a profound dream of becoming a playwright.

John Schneller

John is working on a middle-grade fantasy book series about talking animals and a boy far from home.

Many of you grew up loving words and paragraphs, and words and stanzas. I grew up loving pigs, cows, hay bales, and summer vacations. From the farm in Sauk County, I headed to River Falls and later the University of Minnesota.

Farrier work kept me on the bottom side of horses and in the good graces of the finance office through vet school.

My work as a veterinarian has narrowed since 1979. I've kept the same job, but moved from general practice to large animal, to food animal, to cattle, and to cattle embryo transfer over the past 25 years. My present work gets me around southwest Wisconsin and eastern Iowa. The ‘while you're here, Doc' requests and the miles beyond the Mississippi are why I miss some of our Tuesday meetings.

I'm not a world traveler like Shel, but I have had the opportunity to get into a few countries working with Christian Veterinary Mission and Students International. Tremendous experiences.

These days I'm busy enjoying time with my kids. Next year I'll shift to a mostly correspondence relationship with Claire as she heads to UW/La Crosse. Josh is a sophomore at Sauk Prairie High School and a good buddy.

I work a bit more than I like, fish a little less than I'd like, and love to garden and pound nails when I can.

"The mythic fiction I'm working on is my first literary work. I wrote down a story and discovered I needed to learn how to write. It's been both fun and work.

When I see a row of cows, I can distinguish the active from the passive ones without a second glance. To do the same with verbs and sentences has not been quite as natural. Thanks for the help and input you give me each week.

Kashmira Sheth

Author of Blue Jasmine, Keeping Corner, Koyal Dark Mango Sweet, Monsoon Afternoon, and My Dadima Wears a Sari.

Visit Kashmira's web-blog.

I was born and raised in India. My favorite childhood memories are listening to stories from Indian epics, Mahabharat and Ramayana, and sitting in my tropical garden filled with plumaria, hibiscus, mango, guava and a pet turtle. My not so fond memories are of snakes, lizards, and scorpions.

When I was in my early teens, I enjoyed reading historical fiction set in India. Those are still some of my favorite books. As a child, I learned traditional dances that told stories.

I came to the US as a teenager. After I received a BS from Iowa State University and an MS in bacteriology from the University of Wisconsin/Madison, I worked for the state government.

In 1988, I decided to be a full-time mother. A year later, I founded the dance group, Dances of India. During the next 10 years, I taught Indian folk and classical dances to children and young adults aged 5 to 21, and the group performed throughout Wisconsin. Around that time, I started reading children's literature (written in English). My daughters, Rupa and Neha, shared their books and thoughts with me. I believe these two activities, teaching dance to children and reading juvenile literature, prepared me for writing children's books.

Blue Jasmine is my first published middle-grade novel. It was published by Hyperion Books for Children and won the first Paul Zindel First Novel Award. I also has a picture book under contract with Peachtree Publishers.

My husband Rajan, daughters, Rupa and Neha, my parents, my extended family, and my friends have been very supportive of my writing. I'm grateful to them and to my writing friends for their encouragement, critiques, and support.

I travel to India often. On two of her visits, I was attacked by monkeys and escaped unharmed. That doesn't deter me. I'm ready to go back.

Ruth Smelser

Ruth is writing a series of mystery novels about two women in the antique business.

I'm a retired anthropologist married to a retired cryogenics engineer. With the interaction of our varied careers, we've led an interesting life: rich in experience, scanty in riches. As hobbies I've dabbled in art and writing; my husband in building, riding and flying motorcycles and gliders. I have lived and taught in Colorado, California, Missouri, Texas, and, finally, Wisconsin (to see more of our son and daughter and their families). I've done fieldwork with the Indians of New Mexico, the Northern Kwakiutl (Bella Bella) of British Columbia, and the Blackfoot Indians of Montana, and was director of an archaeological and historical survey team writing the history, from prehistoric times to early European settlement, of a township in southwest Missouri.

I've had academic training in anthropology, archaeology, art history, and geography, and specialized in the arts and technologies of primitive cultures. I've taught anthropology, primitive art, and geography at the University of Colorado in Boulder and Denver, Southwest Missouri State, Drury College, Evangel College (these three in Springfield, Missouri), and at Texas A&M. Before and while doing academic work, I worked in a bank, for five years in the public health field, four years for the Upper Air Laboratory of the University of Colorado in the early days of rocket research, and five years for the National Bureau of Standards Electronic Calibration Laboratories.

In my spare (!) time, I raised two children, painted and sketched, and dabbled in architecture. We remodeled many houses and apartments. I finally designed and drew plans for and contracted, our shops and four-bedroom energy-efficient house in Texas. (I've toyed with the idea of writing a book about this titled THE PLUMBER CALLED ME SIR.) Along the way I organized all sorts of things: among them a food co-op, a nursery for working wives, several dairy co-ops, and several non-profit, tax-exempt organizations. For twenty-five years, on and off, my husband and I raised prize-winning French Alpine dairy goats and ran goat dairies in Missouri and Texas, selling milk to makers of gourmet goat cheese and to people raising exotic livestock. As an interesting sideline, in Missouri we ran a successful mail-order business selling miniature supplies and parts to dollhouse makers.

I've read thousands of books, and have been a writer all my life. For five years I wrote, illustrated, and published my own collectors' newsletter and had subscribers all over the United States and in three foreign countries. For this I wrote in-depth articles covering collectible art objects of every age and culture, every material, and every value. Some bungled surgery swept me off my feet and forced an end to many of these activities, though I'm still remodeling living spaces, including our present condo and a new one to be built in the fall. Our current mission is to make builders aware of the needs of the disabled in their designs.

In retirement, I've switched to writing fiction. I'm currently working on a series about two women who run a small collectibles and antiques store and in the process get involved in interesting situations and predicaments which they must get themselves out of. Their wares are an integral part of the stories, serving up both clues and information to interested readers. When I introduced the characters in a short story, which won second place in a contest, I was encouraged to go on. Each book has a different focus.

In the first (almost ready to publish) book, the background deals with antique bottles, vintage clothing, and designer jewelry. I own a cobalt blue poison bottle, the OLD BLUE DEADLY of the title. The mystery revolves around a series of deaths connected to the poison bottles from an old woman's bottle collection. In the second (almost complete) book, NUTCRACKER DEATH DANCE, the characters help stage a Christmas Nutcracker ballet and mount a display of a collection of antique nutcrackers. The mystery revolves around the murder of one of the dancers, thievery, and a threat to the daughter of one of the women. In the third book (now plotting), BANK ON MURDER, the background will be antique mechanical cast-iron penny banks, toys and dolls, with an intricate mystery in the midst of a big toy auction. The possibilities for more adventures are endless, if I can just sell the first book and get moving! The last editor who reviewed it said it needed more tension, so I'm back at the seventh rewrite to put my characters in more peril.

Bharti Solanki

I was born in Fiji Islands, and sometimes in my mind I still live there.

I lived in California for about thirteen years before I came to Madison and the University of Wisconsin for graduate school in genetics. I have been addicted to science, in particular genetics, since I was in high school.

These days my time is spent doing research, writing, trying to invent a game, and having fun with a boyfriend and friends.

A typical day consists of collecting zebrafish embryos in the morning hours, observing whether they're mutant or normal, and then staining them with various dyes to look for certain proteins in the afternoons. I am also trying to locate the gene I am studying in the zebrafish genome.

I love to read, sometimes more than I love to write. It amazes me how writers put words together in ways that I would never have thought of. Eating, playing games and dancing are my other favorite pastimes.

The beach is a heavenly place to be. The sun is a very important part in this scenario. However, if a beach isn't available, any body of water with the warm sun will do.

Thank you for all the great input regarding my narrative. In the beginning I was not sure if it would be interesting or if anyone would want to read it. However, listening to your comments has assured me and has energized me to keep writing, writing more and writing better.

Kane Walent

Kane is working on his novel, Duesenberg Profiles.

Sandi Walker

Karen Zethmayr

You've read her picture book, It's Pink I Think, and watch her art grow that illustrates it.

Visit Karen's website.

Why not start with the fun stuff? Life's short; eat dessert first. My favorite ways to goof off are canoeing, camping, music, and art museums.

I grew up in the burbs of Chicago. I used to take the CB&Q into the city on Saturday mornings with my brother for youth orchestra rehearsals. What was cool about that was we got to play our concerts in Orchestra Hall on Michigan Avenue. Favorite though rare evening treats in high school days were Old Town and Second City. There are lots of perks to having a big bro, among them being allowed to go more places.

The CB&Q Railroad was where I worked summers during college. The souvenir I treasure from those times is a phrase in a directory I had to proofread: electrometalurgical potlining scrap. One of those things you can pull out of your noodle when you're feeling down, a mantra to tapdance down the street to. The other souvenir is the memory of the superjerk who supervised us smartass college kids. He was our age, and he made my skin crawl mostly because of his noisily redneck attitudes. He slammed a bunch of papers down on the table for me to alphabetize (our primary task) and said, 'When yer done wid it mark it sorted and put it on the cart.' I alphabetized it, marked it 'sordid,' just as he'd pronounced it, and put it on the cart.

I attended Lawrence College in the 'Sixties as a ‘connie' (conservatory student) and was in the process of working on a master's at American Conservatory in Chicago, when my husband was drafted in '67 and we were sent to Germany. Stroke of luck. Hilary was 3 months old when we went, and her first language was German. Karl was born there. We never lived in the American ghetto but found housing in German neighborhoods. Hilary went to a Montessori school, and I was hired as a teacher assistant. The kids there raised my level of everyday German.

When we came back to the U.S., my husband decided to do a residency at a hospital in Rochester, N.Y.. Eastman School of Music is there, and I took a course in Suzuki pedagogy and was hired to teach violin to 3-12 year olds in Eastman's preparatory department. My husband and I were paid from the same U. of Rochester bursar's office for doctoring and music. When we figured the hours a resident puts in round the clock with one night on in 3, my hourly rate was way over his. A hospital is no place to be when you're sick.

When we moved to Madison, I taught Suzuki violin for several years. Somewhere in the middle of all that Josh was born. I went to UW for certifications in music and in reading and subbed 7 years in the Madison schools, discovering that the part of teaching I most intensely enjoyed was writing and illustrating for kids.

The big life changes of the last decade were divorce and another return to school, this time to MATC for commercial art.

I'm now doing freelance design and illustration. My current day job isn't big bucks, but I do get to fiddle on the job. I work at an assisted living center for adults and do a fiddle program once a week.

My website, http://grandmaskite.com, has educational resources (fancy word for fun stuff for kids, drawn, composed, written and animated.) Most of it's music, and there are a few greeting cards."