Ah, the teenage
years! We’re often miserable, we’re occasionally happy, we yearn for…something,
and we’re never really sure what that something might be. We’re choosing our
style by trying out lots of them, many of which we will live to regret.
Hairstyles. Clothing styles. Oh, yeah, one more thing; lots of us have skin
problems, especially pimples, which truly do not go with any look. Ever.
Wouldn’t we just love to go back and point out to ourselves as teens that, of
all the things we try, this particular
thing right here at which I’m pointing this minute does not work, and
there’s a better choice?
But which, of all the
vast multitude of truly silly things we tried, would be the one thing to point
out to our younger selves, from the vantage point of our future, uh, brilliance?
For me it would be the ever popular ‘what are you going to do with your life?’
In my teenage years,
I tended to rethink career choices as often as I changed the length of my
bangs. I wanted to be a scientist, specifically an oceanographer. Hmm, maybe
being a poor swimmer might go against that as a career path. How about the time
I wanted to be a nurse, mostly because mom was? For someone who doesn’t deal
well with puke and snot and blood and stuff, perhaps not the optimum choice.
Teacher? Translator? Astronomer? Archaeologist? Engineer? All considered at one
time or another.
As you can see, I was
conflicted, especially since I was pretty good in math and science, being a
card-carrying science fiction geek from the moment I learned to read, but I
also wasn’t too shoddy in literature and languages, winning awards in French
and Latin to go along with my science and math awards. Yes, I admit it, with
some pride: I was a geek-with-a-capital-Gee.
But let’s deal with
the ‘moment I learned to read’ comment. Nothing, nothing—and I’m including boys
here, thank you very much—but nothing was then and has ever been as important
to me as reading. A natural progression, one might possibly consider, would be
to become a writer. Ya think?
Sadly, it took me
many years and several interesting-yet-unfulfilling career choices to finally
hit upon what I had already known forever was my path in life—writing.
I would give a lot to
go back and tell thirteen-year-old Me, “Hey, think about becoming a writer, why
doncha? You’re gonna love it. Trust me! I’m an adult. I know these things…”
Of course, I’d expect Me to laugh hysterically at that last comment, especially knowing Me, then and now.
~K.G.
K.G. McAbee has written a bunch
of books in genres like YA, Regency, fantasy, steampunk, pulp, horror, and even
comic books—some of them quite readable. Her most recent releases are the first
two books in the Clockwork Pirates YA Steampunk series: THE JOURNAL IN THE JUG and THE HEIRESS ON THE ISLAND, from MuseItUp Publishing. Her
short work can be found in lots of anthologies, both print and electronic. She
lives in upstate SC in a 200 year old log cabin with gorgeous husband, officially
confirmed ghost and spoiled dogs. Check out her author page at Amazon for more
info: https://www.amazon.com/author/kgmcabee or email her at kgmcabee@gmail.com 
‘When the paintings seem to glimmer, then
the portals start to shimmer…’
Twelve-year-old
Noah Macgregor can’t get that ridiculous line of poetry from an old journal out
of his head. And he certainly didn’t plan to get his older sister Holly, their
dog Gilbert and himself trapped.
It
was an accident. He and Holly were just following Gilbert through the dark
hallways of the old house that had belonged to a pirate two hundred years
before. They find Gilbert just in time to see him run full speed into…and it
looks like, through…a painting. Naturally, they follow their dog; wouldn’t you?
And Noah has at least a vague idea of what might be on the other side, thanks
to stuff he’d read in that same old journal he’d found inside a jug.
But
on the other side of the painting, he and his sister find themselves in a
strange sort of colonial South Carolina, where animals do some pretty
surprising things and men made of brass and bronze walk and talk. And it gets
worse. Captain Ambrose Craven is alive and even badder than expected.
Holly
Macgregor is trapped back in 1750s South Carolina, held captive on the island
prison of the dread pirate Captain Ambrose Craven. Alone except for fellow
captives Lady Isabel, who feels that a lady should always wait to be rescued,
Holly makes a desperate plan to escape.
Meanwhile,
her brother Noah is making plans of his own, with old friends and new to help
him out. Sticky-fingered Rowley the Raccoon is onboard, plus Don Orlando the
less-than-brave opossum and a new member of the team: blacksmith Fergus
Macgregor. Noah and his friends are on the way to Charles Towne, where they
hope to find a boat to take them to the island to rescue Holly.
And
what of the brave, if tubby, black Lab Gilbert? He’s disappeared into a
painting, on the trail of the treacherous tavern boy Barnabas.
Throw in an ill-tempered metal skull
named Mr. Wrycroft, a sneaky ocelot named Ozberto, a helpful spider and a
tearful alligator, not to mention the threat of a highwayman called the Grey
Ghost, and the mixture could be explosive!
2 comments:
Thanks for sharing with us, KG! I'd love to go back and tell my teenage self the same thing. Best of luck with your books. They sound intriguing!
Thanks for joining us KG! Your books sound very cool.
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