Growing up Wild

By popular demand I have written and illustrated volume two of The Magic Barn. I thought I was writing it for kids, but adults are buying it. It’s sort of Tomboy Sawyer with a painting to illustrate each short story.

I realized that all the stories are from a kid’s point of view and now wonder if I have any other point of view at all. An excerpt follows:

A Visit to the Turtle Wizard

Through the woods, over the sandhill and across a hay field-in a little valley by a little pond lived a Turtle Master, Deer Slayer, and quite possibly Wizard-in-Disguise, whose name was Billy Wolf.  He had snapping turtle shells big as laundry baskets nailed up on the front of his shack, bleaching white in the sun, along with deer antlers and cow skulls.

Would you walk up to an old man with bones hanging on his house and say “Hello?” I did and he told me stories about where he got all the bones. Finally I asked, “How do I catch a snapping turtle, Mr. Billy?” He peered at me for a bit and then said simply, “You don’t.”

Sometimes wizards disguised as regular old people like Billy Wolf give us good advice. Sometimes we don’t follow that advice and wish we did. But that’s the next story.

The Magic Barn available here