Ninjas

Nurikabe

Posted by on Apr 4, 2019 in Book: Deadly Wish, Japanese Demons, Ninjas | 0 comments

800px-Torin_Nukaribe

A visual representation of an invisible force–this nurikabe will hunker down in front of you and block your path.

It occurs to me that I haven’t shared a Japanese demon with you in a while. Meet the nurikabe, or invisible wall.

Not terribly threatening, but frustrating, especially if you have to be somewhere in a hurry, the nurikabe will spring up out of nowhere to block your path. It can’t be seen, it can’t be scaled, and it can’t be broken–but if you run a stick or a staff along the bottom (where I imagine its feet must be, to let it move about like it does), it will vanish. Perhaps it’s ticklish.

They are said to like narrow streets and alleyways, which is where Kata and her companions encounter one (or perhaps a pair working in tandem) in Deadly Wish.

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Epilog to Deadly Wish

Posted by on Jul 19, 2018 in Book: Deadly Wish, Japanese Demons, Ninjas | 0 comments

Deadly Wish

My editor and I disagreed about the epilog to Deadly Wish. She is a very sagacious lady so quite likely she is right and I am wrong, but I have always been fond of this epilog. If you’d like to find out what happened to the pearl with the demon’s soul inside once it ended up in the possession of a sailor from Portugal (thought by Kata to be a demon because who else could smell so bad?), read on!

Up ahead, Luys could see the place where the path curved around an ancient chestnut tree. He knew that it would head down a small slope through Jorge Velho’s olive grove, and from there he’d be able to see the lights of his village.

 

Night was gathering, but Luys didn’t need light to walk this path. Even after five years, his feet knew every stone, every rut, every hollow. And his heart was fuller of joy with every step.

 

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Chenery Book Festival

Posted by on Jun 8, 2018 in Book: Deadly Flowers, Book: Deadly Wish, Events, Ninjas | 0 comments

IMG_0627 Version 2I love this book festival in Belmont, Massachusetts! Always a great crowd of interesting, engaging, talented writers and kids, parents, and teachers who are enthusiastic about books. This year I brought along the Ninja Rope Puzzle to promote Deadly Flowers and Deadly Wish, and watched pair after pair of brave aspiring ninjas try to get themselves untangled. They all made it (eventually!)

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Best Question

Posted by on May 25, 2018 in Book: Deadly Flowers, Book: Deadly Wish, Book: Dragon's Egg, Book: The Eureka Key, Ninjas, Secrets of the Seven, SERIES: Secrets of the Seven | 0 comments

Dragon's Egg

Mella also does not suffer fools gladly.

Best question I’ve been asked during a school visit this year: If you were a character in one of your books, which one would you be?

Hmmmmm…. I had to give this some thought. My first reaction was Kata, from Deadly Flowers and Deadly Wish, because who would not want to be a deadly female ninja? But Kata’s life is very difficult. I’m not sure I actually want to live like that. In the end I said Marty, from the Secrets of the Seven series, since she is a) brilliant and b) rich. But after thinking it over, I’m leaning toward Mella from Dragon’s Egg. Because I want my own herd of small pet dragons. Yep.

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