I am hard at work putting the finishing touches on a new short story collection. I want to let readers know that nine of my books are now available as paperbacks on Kindle! Soon the longer books will also be available as hardbacks. My novella I WANT MY OWN BRAIN can be purchased as an audiobook. I plan to hire voice actors to make more audio books.

I've had ELDITHA P. WARNER, VIGILANTE AT LARGE on my computer for more than sixteen years! I finally got around to finishing it. Feels good to put it on the done pile. I had so much fun writing Mother Maud and the chauffeur, though. It was hard to part with them.

I'm excited to read my books aloud in a quiet room. I love writing comic dialog. Currently, I'm polishing twelve short stories, and I have two novels in early stages. It's great fun to form them and witness their evolution! I surprise myself.

I'm currently reading WOLF IN WHITE VAN and I AM A CAT. I read just about anything and everything I find on the shelves of my public library or as an e-book or a cheap paperback.

I throw down stuff wildly at first. I work when I want to work and don't work if I don't want to. If time is being taken from me, I discipline myself to begin immediately with any time I have, but that's only if other things are impinging and I can't jettison them. I used to run into the house after work as a lunch lady and the first thing I did was turn on the computer. I had only an hour before picking up my daughter! I used every silent second.

As a young girl I adored mournful animal stories and marked my place in those books with tissues, handy for the next tearful reading session. An evil adult was always about to shoot some poor kid's dog or pony. I think one of the first sad animal books I read was ALONG CAME A DOG with a very doleful black dog cowering on the cover. That book had no discernible plot. This may explain my rebellion against plotting or something. Any port in a storm. Also, I remember the chickens in the book were given prosthetic feet.

I sometimes read on an early black and white Kindle which has a screen saver showing authors' portraits. I also read on my laptop and sometimes even my phone if I'm on the move.

Usually I have my laptop on my lap and I don't use a desk. However, my desk used to be a low coffee table topped with tiles purchased by my father in Guaymas, Mexico in the late 1940s. The tiles show a mission, a lake, and five towering pines. If you've read "On the Rio Mayo," my father and grandfather found the tiles while returning from that fishing trip. That story is based on their real adventure during that trip, but the tiles don't figure into the story. And yes, an Indian actually came into their camp with a deer on his shoulders. Right now plants sit on that desk, but it's often in the same room with me when I write. I think it's an inspiration to me.

Recently I have been remaking my covers on GIMP. My cover for ELDITHA P. WARNER, VIGILANTE AT LARGE is now a cartoon that I drew. I made sure I WANT MY OWN BRAIN showed something humorous and quirky. That's the book that gets the most downloads at more than 3,000 now. An old pink serape of mine that was bright provided the cover for LAST DAYS IN THE DESERT. I wanted it to pop, but I changed the hues recently. I have a fish for JUAN and WILLY, and you have to read the book to know why the fish is on the cover.

They mean a lot. I have reached over 21,000 downloads because of them and they're the reason I keep going. I write whimsical comedies mostly, because my mind seems to drift in that direction, and I used to wonder if anyone would laugh at the antics of the undergrads in LAST DAYS IN THE DESERT, for example. Finally I got a review saying they thought it was quite funny. The idea that someone had their day lightened by my writing really encouraged me.

WOLF IN WHITE VAN is actually stunning me. What a tale. CONFESSIONS OF A MASK because the author had some scary images in that book which I had dreamed before I read the book! I was worried that I would have to write those frightening things and I found someone had already. Thank goodness. Is this the collective unconscious in action? TALES OF GENJI is so much fun; I can dive in anywhere and enjoy another abandoned castle and sad maiden. I suppose you are noticing that I like Japanese literature. A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES never fails to make me smile. TO THE LIGHTHOUSE was so beautiful that I cried. That Virginia kid knew what it was to have a mother, and to lose one. I'm sorry if you're a Joyce fan, but Virginia packed a greater wallop. Emotional truth tops just about everything else.

When I write something odd, spontaneously, that simply emerges from the drifting ether, the result is overwhelming joy. It can be shocking at times to discover that I have captured an aspect of life that I never recognized.

At seventeen, I wrote a creepy story about a wealthy young rancher and a floozy who trapped him in a loveless marriage. I wrote an unintentionally funny sex scene that took place on a laundry room floor. Hey, maybe that story was better than I thought! It wasn't what most people would want to read, however. The lady was evil, a modern Becky Sharpe, as I recall. I can't remember writing stories as a kid. I was busy running around in the arroyos in Tucson.

I'm terrible at this aspect of writing, but I'm working on it. All my books are available as paperbacks now. Readers in Tucson might find my books in Little Free Libraries un the center of town. I have one audiobook, which does get purchased. In terms of ebooks, I WANT MY OWN BRAIN is doing the best of all my works with 3,000 downloads. TROMBONES CAN LAUGH has really picked up readers in the last couple of years and is above 2,000 downloads along with LAST DAYS IN THE DESERT and A PHANTOM HERD. GENUINE ABORIGINAL DEMOCRACY is a few short of 2,000. Just about every book needs new covers to give me a consistent brand, improved inside promos, and promotion on social media. I've used Twitter in the past, but it has very little influence right now. On Smashwords I embedded videos for some of my books and those were fun to find. I didn't try to tape myself promoting the books, but found some fun related videos. I think I would enjoy these, so maybe my readers will too. Eventually I'll make a video of me. I'm on Wattpad and Goodreads.

I was born in Tucson, Arizona, the land of saguaro cactus and junky streets. My great grandfather came to Tucson to take care of the mules at Fort Lowell in 1872. I suppose I was completely distorted by the experience of living here. Many years ago I learned that Ray Bradbury lived in Tucson as a child. I'm pretty sure it influenced him to be imaginative. The deep purple canyons north of town are like magical kingdoms.

I wrote a comedy column in junior high. I was writing short stories by seventeen. The rest is extremely obscure history. I had some short stories published when I was in my late thirties and that gave me confidence to continue.

I was scared when some favorite journals disappeared and I realized the industry was changing. At a local writing conference in Tucson in 2005, I heard the keynote speaker mention some experiences he had publishing micro stories online. That was relatively new, I think, and it intrigued me. Industries do change over time. Artists now have a direct connection to the consumer. The absence of the middleman is disconcerting, but a little thrilling.

I have a vegetable garden, and I also volunteer at the schools in Tucson. I like inspiring kids to read books.

Usually they are project Gutenberg books, like THE UNDERDOGS, about Mexican Revolutionaries. I haven't found that book in any bookstores, though it may be available on Amazon.

I can't believe people are actually reading my works on Smashwords and liking them as much as they occasionally do. I almost threw LAST DAYS IN THE DESERT away. Someone gave it a bunch of stars, so you never know. Somebody else liked JUAN AND WILLY, which I thought was pretty funny, but I believed no one else would appreciate it. Of course, lots of readers hate REVERIE, my oddest book, and another person detested BEWITCHING EARTH (too much description) and PHANTOM STRAYS (monologues of the mother bored them), so I have to keep some perspective on all the glory.