I was a night owl from a young age.
My mother kept me up late when I was a baby, so I could see my father after he got home from night school around ten. With three naps a day, what did it matter if I slept late? And seeing Daddy after he’d been at work all day, and in class all evening, was important!
That schedule would have been harder once I started school. Luckily, Dad had his law degree then and was home by dinner time. But still I lay awake in darkness for hours, waiting on sleep. And sleep was often long in coming. I needed entertainment. What did I do? Made up stories, of course.
I liked stories about families best. I created several imaginary ones inspired by the illustrations in the flower fairy books by Cicely Mary Barker. Incredible paintings, those! Large families pleased me most. So I imagined broods of five or eight or twelve children. And then devised adventures for them.
As I write this, I am struck by uncanny parallels within my first published novel: one family of five children, another of nine, and a prince who awakens in darkness. Were the seeds of Troll-magic planted so early? Maybe.
I turned out to be a voracious reader. Dr. Seuss and Babar were first favorites. Eager’s Half Magic and Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows followed.
I floundered for a year when nothing in the library pleased my taste. Then my fourth grade teacher read A Wrinkle in Time aloud to the class. That same year I discovered C.S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. Ah! Science fiction and fantasy had been thin on the shelves in my school’s library, but the county repository was better stocked. And now I knew what to look for.
Did I know I was a writer-in-training? Not at all. But every writer needs to imbibe story, and I did. Not much output. The diary started at age ten lasted perhaps a month. The teen years yielded one short story written for French class (in French!) about a changeling traversing an alien labyrinth. But the input was . . . impressive? My teachers thought so, when faced by my book a day rate. It felt ordinary to me. School reading journals were a problem. They were geared toward summaries of a scene or two. That was fine for reading sessions in class, but once I got the book home, I finished it!
I journeyed on through The Dark Is Rising, Enchantress from the Stars, City of Lead and Gold, The Hobbit, The Zero Stone, Fahrenheit 451, 1984, Have Space Suit – Will Travel, Nine Princes in Amber, The Forgotten Beasts of Eld, The Silver Metal Lover, Dune, and Cuckoo’s Egg.
You would think my passion for story and my reverence for storytellers might have clued me in to my vocation. It didn’t, and I got lost traversing the maze out of childhood. And, yet, not wholly lost. Instinctually, almost without thought, I stayed close to the creative world: architecture, art galleries, adventure gaming, publishing, graphic design, and art direction all played their roles in my life.
Unknowingly, I was collecting the skills I would need as an indie author.
And here I am, stepping into the indie arena to write and publish for readers’ delight, your delight. Will my stories create a bridge, transmuting my own reading rapture into yours? That’s my hope. I do write what I’d like to read. 😀
My North-lands and the realms of myth and legend are my metaphor for enchantment – places where wonder still abides. Heroes and heroines depart the safe byways and dare peril, seeking freedom and magic, seeking more. I hope you enjoy your journey as you embark upon your own foray into my books.
Fair skies and fine fortune be yours, gentle traveler, gentle reader!
I encourage you to share your thoughts in the comments of the blog posts
or by email at j (dot) neygrimm (at) yahoo (dot) com.
I look forward to hearing from you!
I just discovered your books and look forward to reading them.
Nancy, that’s wonderful! I’ll be interested to hear what you think about them. In the meantime…enjoy!
(They are all e-books right now, but I’m hard at work on the paper edition for Troll-magic.)
Edited to add: All my books are now also available in paperback.
Troll-magic is now available in print! Here it is on Amazon. And here‘s my release announcement.
I’ve got a bunch more of my books available as paperbacks now in the March of 2014, and more on the way. 😀
Sarvet’s Wanderyar
Crossing the Naiad
Livli’s Gift
The Troll’s Belt
Skies of Navarys
Who did your cover. It’s great. I’m interested in getting someone to design my book cover. I live in Greenville VA. Near Staunton off of I-81
Thanks Cheers Nick
Hello, fellow Virginian! Thanks for your praise of my cover. Which one caught your eye? I’m curious.
As it happens, I do my own cover design. My educational background is in architecture, and my professional experience, in art direction for a small publishing company. That gave me a boost, although I’m still learning. Book cover design has some unique constraints.
There are many designers online, and I recommend you check them out. One that particularly impresses me is Streetlight Graphics. They do covers for Lindsay Buroker which are gorgeous. Here’s their URL: http://streetlightgraphics.com/#!/portfolio/.
And here’s Buroker’s URL: http://www.lindsayburoker.com/e-publishing/e-publishingwho-i-use-for-editing-formatting-and-cover-art-design/. She’s got a lot of good info on publishing in general.
I have a post about cover design on my blog here. Several writing readers have commented that even though they hire their cover design out to pros, knowing more about the process helps them work with their designer more effectively.
Good luck to you!
Hi. I found this site through the zoo anthology post.
I love your website, and I’m wondering, where did get that artwork on the header? The black and white Norse drawings, I mean. I love them!
Thanks.
Thank you!
I’m very lucky. A family treasure rests on my bookshelves. It’s a 1914 edition of East of the Sun and West of the Moon. It belonged to my grandmother. She gave it to my mother. My mother gave it to me.
The illustrations were drawn by Kay Nielsen (1886-1957). I agree that his work is gorgeous. I fell in love with both the pen & ink art and his watercolors the instant I saw them. Because the book was published before 1923, the drawings are in the public domain and I am free to feature them on my web site, as well as on the covers of some of my books.
Hey there 🙂 I followed Ruth Nestvold here 🙂
\’Have Spacesuit – Will Travel\’ was the first \’grown-up\’ SF story I ever read.
Widdershins! Great to have you visiting here.
It’s been more than a decade since I’ve re-read Have Space Suit – Will Travel. I think it might be time to dig it out of the boxes where we’re stashing the books that never got unpacked from the last move. 😉
Your picture is indeed on your About page – and I don’t know how I missed it!
I’m brain dead today – I’ll try again tomorrow. So close…
😀
You’ll get there. Sometimes a day of rest is perfect for allowing all the elements to come together in your subconscious, which allows you to do your best work the next day.