Happy Spring!!!

Yes, "Happy Spring" even though our driveway would be skate-able if the ice had frozen flat instead of rutted with tire tracks and footprints. "Happy Spring!" even though some sites are calling for more snow this week (Not all, of course, some are calling for rain and some for sun, it is Halifax after all). "Happy Spring!" even though we're only sixteen days through the worst month of the year...

Why then? Because, BASEBALL!!!

Pitchers and Catchers have reported to spring training! The Jays first full work out is February 21 and they play Philly on the 27th. YAY!

I've written sports into each of my stories, at least in passing. To me, sports are an essential part of life. For my kids sports (hockey, basketball, baseball) teach persistence, practice, sportsmanship and FairPlay, confidence, graceful losing and classy winning, priorities and full effort. In Game Plan basketball was important enough to make the cover. Ella's star status on her basketball team was a huge pedestal from which to fall, was something important put at risk by her pregnancy and gave her something to move forward for during and after the story. It gave her a connection to Kat and Danny too, as he played university ball, like she was hoping to do. Her basketball gave her something to connect her to her brother and her friends, it gave her something nonverbal with which she could interact on a fair and even plane even when she was struggling to feel competent socially.

My short story, Nine, is narrated over nine innings of a baseball game. Mike is a big league picture who has returned to the game after the sudden death of his wife. He struggles to stay in the game and through the game works through some of the fallout of her death. In celebration of the Jays' spring training, I've put the price of Nine down to 50% on Kobo. Check it out!

N