Writings by Diane

Jeffery Deaver is one of my favorite authors. If I’m in the mood for a great crime drama, full of more twists and turns than a roller coaster, I pick up one of his books. However, he is not my favorite author just for his writing. A few years ago, I had come across a Reader’s Digest Condensed Book. It consisted of two books that were edited and complied into one volume. One of these books was Jeffery Deaver’s The Stone Monkey. For the life of me, I cannot recall the other book, obviously, it did not make such an impact with me.  I had never heard of Jeffery Deaver before I read The Stone Monkey. However, from the first chapter, I was intrigued. This is my rule of thumb with books—if I’m not hooked by the first chapter, I stop reading it. The characters were vivid, the mystery was intense.  The grittiness and violence of the book was toned down (it was, after all, a condensed book), but the basic story was strong. It held me captive from beginning to end. The book resonated with me so

Isn’t it amazing how a chance meeting will make you have a flashback on an incident in your life? This sort of thing happened to me one evening. I was out with my husband and son when my husband got a maintenance call at one of the chain of convenience stores that he works for.   He drove out to the call and left our son and me in our mini-van.   He proceeded into the store to fix the technical problems they were having.               My son and I decided to pass the time by using his pack of Yu-Gi-Oh! cards as a makeshift memory game.    We were having fun, a good mother and son bonding moment.   He was getting a kick out of how I was stumbling on the characters names that he knew by heart. I then noticed out of the corner of my eye a woman coming our way from the parking lot.   She stopped at the driver’s window that was partially down.    For some reason, I just knew what she was up to--she was going to beg for money.   Being from a large city, I have had my share of solicitors.   

My earliest memories of my grandmother are of her crocheting. She would make intricate, delicate doilies and table covers. I was fascinated how she was able to wield the slender crochet hook and create these lacey items. My mother also crochets; her specialties are afghans, and sweaters.   I figured I would never carry on the tradition of creating with yarn—this was based on my attempt at knitting. I only knitted one item, a lavender scarf that started being about six inches wide and ended up doubling its width. How I did that, I will never know! Then years later, at work I saw a co-worker by the name of Sophie crocheting. I remarked to her I could never do that. She responded that was nonsense, and offered to teach me.   During our lunch breaks, my fumbling fingers tried to get used to working with the crochet hook. Sophie was always encouraging and patient. Eventually, I was able to produce stitches that resembled something other than a large knot. Once I was able to maneuver with th

One of my favorite authors is Dr. Leo Buscaglia. However, it wasn’t always that way. I remember when I was pre-teen, my mother watching The Phil Donahue. His guest was Dr. Leo Buscaglia, who taught a class on Love, a first of its kind, at USC. My mother had read many of his books and was an avid fan.   As I watched the show, I was puzzled by him. Here was this man talking passionately about how we all need to show we love each other, both strangers and family. He had walked through the streets of Chicago (where the Donahue show was filmed) wearing a button that said something to the effect “Hugs for free.”   I was positive he would be avoided like the plague in such a big city. To my surprise, he regaled how many people stopped him in the street to give him a hug. He couldn’t contain his joy, his arms flapping about, looking like he would burst through the TV screen. Frankly, I was embarrassed by him. I shook my head, dismissing him as a kooky guy.                 Years later, out of t

I wrote Eye of Leomander back when I was 13 years old. My father was my editor and my mother was my proof-reader. Throughout the years, I would take it out of the drawer and revised it, hoping one day the opportunity would come along to publish it. When I got married 10 years later, my husband read the manuscript and thought it was great. He urged me to publish it. So, I sent out query letters to many publishers, but received no responses. I think that was worse than receiving rejections--at least I would know they read the letter and the sample chapters! I got discouraged and stopped. A few years later, after our son was born, I tried again with the query letters, and heard nothing back. My husband had suggested subsidiary publishing, but that was way out of our price range. I never gave up my dream to publish this book--I just didn't know how to do it. Then, last year, I saw an advertisement in the window of the dry cleaners. It read at the top "Attention Writers".