audio book

Audiobook FINISHED! Chapters 23-24 now available

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It’s finished, guys! I thought this would take me until January to get finished, but once I decided to do it, I found ways to keep going. The Forest at the Edge of the World is complete! (And that last chapter is just over an hour, so take an extra long walk or deep clean your fridge as you listen. Why do I write such long chapters?!)

Yes, that means Book 2, Soldier at the Door, will be coming soon. I need to work on the thumbnail for it, then I’ll start recording chapter by chapter for that one as well.

Audiobook Chapters 20-22

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Today I took my students through some Emerson, and one student said, “I feel he’s calling me out! I’m always procrastinating and I just can’t make myself do something it it’s not going to be perfect. He says we doubt ourselves and that holds us back!”

“Well?” I responded.

“Well, he’s right!” she declared, guiltily and angrily.

“And what was true nearly 200 hundred years is true now. This is just human nature, but we can dare to be better.” Then I told them about my great fear and hesitation to make these Youtube videos of me reading very imperfectly my imperfect book chapters, but that I’m doing it anyway. I can’t wait for perfection; I’ve always been a B+ student, and sometimes B+ is the best we can hope for.

And that this process has been immensely fun and going faster than I anticipated.

They claimed they were going to listen to my chapters someday, but they can’t now because none of them are allowed computers in our treatment center. And when they leave our program, they’ll have forgotten all about this and I’ll be safe from their mocking. (Whew.)

Still, this has been so much fun. I’m totally enjoying this. And it seems about half a dozen people are as well. Last couple of chapters should be up this week sometime.

Audiobook Chapters 17-19

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I teach high school English at a residential treatment center, and today I showed my students selections of “Mulan” as part of a unit in Campbell’s Hero’s Journey. (We’re tracking the cycle in a variety of stories and movies, such as Harry Potter and Hunger Games).

As my students spontaneously sang along with, “Make a Man Out of You!” I realized that Capt. Shang has a lot in common with Perrin, except that Perrin is of Japanese descent (“shin” means “truth”) while Shang is Chinese.

I hadn’t realized before how much Shang may have unconsciously influenced my character development of Perrin:

“Tranquil as the forest . . .”

(Admit you, you sang along in your head, didn’t you?)

“Mysterious as the dark side of the moooooon!”

(There. We both knew we had to finish it.)

Audiobook Chapters 11-13 ready (14 delayed by Relf-voice)

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I was really hoping I could 14 done tonight, too, but my voice couldn’t hold out for two long chapters, and started sounding as gravelly as Relf Shin. Sadly, I didn’t have any Relf Shin lines to read, though. (Mahrree’s lines were really starting to sound bad.)

I’ll have to record chapter 14 tomorrow. Stay tuned . . .

Chapters 6-10 Audiobook ready on Youtube

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Yeah, I’m cranking these out. It’s absolute joy.

I can’t tell you how much I look forward to going to my closet to read out loud. When I’m having a rough time at work (I teach at a residential treatment center for high school girls), I remind myself, “Just a few more hours and I get to read out loud about Edge. That’s your reward!”

There’s so much in these chapters that I couldn’t think of which to “meme” (plus I’m late with making dinner, so I don’t have time). But I’m finding myself startled by how much I wrote is actually happening to us right now. I kind of suspected some day these problems would be ours, but I didn’t think it’d be so soon.

The big questions: Who do you trust? And what would it take for you to completely change your mind about something?

Chapters 3, 4, and 5 Audiobook “Forest at the Edge of the World”

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I never thought sitting in my closet talking to my laptop could be so fun. (And not only because I heard my husband walk into the closet and exclaim, “A chair? Why is there a chair in here?” Our walk-in closet is also part of the bathroom, so he was really confused as to my purpose. I think he’s put it together now, though, when I vanish in there for an hour at a time and talk to my clothes.)

It’s fun just reading these stories out loud, and also freeing. A dear friend of mine assured me that perfection isn’t necessary; my best is enough. What a liberating, delightful assurance! God also doesn’t ask for perfection; He asks for our best, and that is enough.

Wow. You can really get through life with that attitude.

(I did redo one of these chapters entirely, though, because I had a coughing fit in the middle of it and realized that was not my best effort.)

You can subscribe to my Youtube channel here and get updates immediately: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYu2xT0b_plwsNnIK7P6ZBw

Chapter 2, Book 1 Audiobook

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Wow, two evenings in a row! (I better not let this heady success get to me.)

I’ve decided that, when I remember, I’ll also put up a line that stood out to me in the chapter. Here’s what stuck in my mind last night:

Here’s chapter two for your listening . . . uh, pleasure?

An Audiobook! Sort of . . .

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For years (about eight, I think) I’ve been wanting to turn my books into audiobooks. But the process is time-consuming if you do it yourself, and expensive if you hire someone else to do it. Since I don’t make any money off of my books, and I’m a school teacher, affording a few thousand bucks per book just wasn’t realistic, nor did I have the time to do it all myself.

But then, early in the morning of Labor Day, I had a bizarre dream that woke me up, and I eventually came to the realization that I could do a YouTube channel of me just reading my books, as I do for my high school students. The recordings didn’t have to be perfect (which I can never do anyway) so a LOT of pressure was taken away, I could make a video-per-chapter relatively quickly and easy, and best of all it’d be free–for you and for me!

So my goal is to read a few chapters a week, beginning with Book 1, and see just how far I can go.

You can subscribe to my YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYu2xT0b_plwsNnIK7P6ZBw

And here’s my first attempt at mangling my own books. (I wouldn’t dare read anyone else’s and record it, so it’s ok if I do an only half-way decent job on my own!)

Merry Christmas and have a NEW SHORT STORY! (And there’s a free AUDIO version!)

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My Christmas gift to you: a new short story! “Teeria Rigoff; Age–over 50”.

Teeria Rigoff short story cover

This was actually a “deleted scene” from Book 7, The Soldier in the Middle of the World. I took it out because it wasn’t quite fitting the pace. But Teeria Rigoff is one of those minor characters you just really grow to love. She’s solid and reliable, and because of that, often doesn’t get the credit she deserves.

Well, I wanted Teeria to get her day. So I took the “deleted scene” and developed into a full short story which you can find only here.

But I tried something more: I read it out loud and recorded it, meaning you can LISTEN to me reading the whole story! (Still not sure if that’s a good thing or not.) Click here for the audio format.

Huge, huge thanks to the lovely Jason and Bethany Cousins of Numinous Band for editing and converting my audio file. (Really, I have no idea if any of that jargon is correct. All I know is that I sent them all of my hiccups and coughs, and they beautifully put it together with bits of music that makes me sound half-way competent.)

Many friends have said they don’t have time to read my books, but would listen. So I took a random scene from far into the series and turned that into audio. Not sure if that’s what you were expecting, but there you go. My students like it when I read out loud to them, but I think it’s because it puts them to sleep.

(I’m really not selling this well at all, am I? Good thing I’m just giving it away for free.)

So THANK YOU all for your support and emails and reading my books. Here’s what I can give back: A short story that I hope you’ll like, even if you are age 50 or older, like me.

Short story pdf: CLICK HERE Teeria Rigoff–age, over 50

Audio book: CLICK HERE