I grew up in north Alabama surrounded by cotton fields and Saturn V rocket engines that every few days blew smoke through the pine woods that looked just like clouds. These days I'm a technical writer at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center . But what I really like doing is writing books that scare me.
My new book is called BREATHE MY NAME . It's about a girl named Frances who has a terrifying secret: eleven years ago, her mother murdered Frances' sisters and nearly killed Frances herself. Now Frances is in high school just trying to live her life and forget the past while crushing on the strangely wonderful new guy, Nix — until the day her mother sends her a chilling message: I need to see you. Please come right away. We have to finish.
My debut novel, TEACH ME , is about a science-minded girl named Nine who falls in love with her poetry teacher. But after things turn physical, Nine's life spirals into a dangerous nightmare of obsession and revenge.I've always been interested in things like ghosts, reincarnation, and ESP. I have an upcoming novel that features a ghost (DAYS OF LITTLE TEXAS, Knopf, 2009). It's unlike any ghost story you've ever read.(This is not the real cover. I was just playing around to guess what it might look like)Here's my web site . I'm going to be reworking it. Know any cool web designers?Please check out these other great books at Razorbill, my publisher .
Thanks for visiting, and especially thanks for reading!If you want to know more about me, here are a few of the one million things I'm interested in:
Astronomy, time travel, the outdoors, watching snow fall. Reading, everything from great poetry to love stories and fascinating non-fiction .The North American continent, circa 1500-1720. I fantasize about being an explorer, sans any raping and pillaging. But I'm also part Cherokee, so I'm at least 1/8 noble, proud and a total friend of nature.
Hiking and exploring "undiscovered places" like caves. Sitting still in deep natural places and just watching and listening. New scientific discoveries like Lake Vostok in the Antartic, a massive subsurface lake that hasn't seen the light of day for millions of years which NASA says resembles conditions on Jupiter's moon, Europa .Learning about quantum theory , which dovetails nicely with a lot of Eastern philosphy and is practically a religion for me. No, I can't do the math. Yet.Archeology, e.e. cummings and Sharon Olds, the Mars Rovers Spirit and Opportunity , South Dakota, college sports (they invented the term "smashmouth" down here), playing basketball, road trips to strange faraway places, Chumley's in the West Village, NYC, a literary watering hole for writers like Hemingway, Parker, and Fitzgerald (you can still see their signatures on the walls), mysterious ancient structures, historical sites famous and obscure, digging holes, trees, the afterlife, amazing comebacks, wildflowers, and lumberjack competitions. Ha. Just checking to see if you are still awake.
