'I am ecstatic, elated, excited, and grateful, I have, at last, published The Magic Stick! My magical fantasy youth adventure story, that I wrote for my kids when they were little at the lake, has finally seen the light of day, as an eBook'...
The Magic Stick is Published at Last as an eBook!
'With this power
Of which I hold
Take me across
A new threshold.
The Douglas Squirrel
That I see
Is the creature
I desire to be'...
(one of the transformation spells from the story...)
I am ecstatic, elated, excited, and grateful, I have, at last, published The Magic Stick! My magical fantasy youth adventure story, that I wrote for my kids when they were little at the lake, has finally seen the light of day, as an eBook. Available on Amazon now, and on sale this week, (to celebrate Canada Day and the 4th of July), I am delighted to have my work available for my two wonderful boys, your children and you, dear readers, and all my beloved lake friends, at last!
The original story was written well over 20 years ago, and has always been a ‘family love/learn about our lake world’ project. I wrote this for my two sons, to teach them about the incredible local wildlife living with us around our beautiful lake and forests. I wanted them to learn about their creature neighbours, and how to get to know them, care about them and respect their part as neighbours living amongst us every summer as we resided at our little, off-grid, one-room cabin on my lake. I wanted them to have a sense of knowledge and learning in a fun way, with a dose of adventure, and a dash of magic.
I wrote The Magic Stick when my boys were quite little. Today they are now both grown men in their 30’s, and off on their own creating their own new lives.
I had to do a bit of learning and much research back then to get some of the facts straight about the animals, mammals, birds, fish, and crustaceans, that I wrote about. I tried to sprinkle the facts into the story in a fun way, because the older boy in the story is magically transformed into each lake or forest creature, and a few of the facts from back then are more general about these different creatures than being 100% relating to our specific lake.
Late at night, when my young boys would be snuggled into their sleeping bags, on their stacked bunk beds, I would sit on our bed in the dim light of the coal oil kerosene lamps, and ask them which chapter they wanted to hear that night. They would say, “the loon one,” or the “the squirrel one,” and then in agreement, I would read that chapter of my story aloud to them.
I always felt this was a wonderful way to spend quality family time after the busy, and often adventure-filled days, they had frolicking at our cabin on the lake. I felt the way I wrote the story, filled with facts on top of treasure hunting and adventure, with a sprinkling of magic, was a great way to teach them, and have them happily tucked in for the night with an extra dose of knowledge and fantasy in their young minds before they fell off to sleep in their young dreams.
My father was a firm believer in learning about the cabin and all the life that surrounded it. I can remember all the old books we had in our little bookshelf at the lake, references for all types of things, like the animals, the fish, the vegetation, the birds, the reptiles and more. We often pulled them open and referred to them as my younger brother and I saw something in our day at the lake. Unfortunately, one year we had quite a mess of mice get in, and they chewed all the bindings right off of these old books, presumably to get at the glue, and I suppose the paper bits, too. Most of those reference books were lost then, and had to be thrown out, but I still remember them all lined up on the wooden shelf supported by bricks with fond memories. This was, of course, a long time before the Internet and Google, and since we did not have power there, even after my 57 years there, books and reading, were always how we learned about our lake world.
Over the past year, I have learned to draw digitally on my iPad with an app, and I am delighted to bring parts of my story to life with my own, all be it, sometimes a bit raw, drawings. I think it adds a little something extra with this youth fantasy tale.
I hope you enjoy The Magic Stick. It is an especially delightful read for young campers who can see and relate to the wildlife around them. It is also a lovely way to read sitting around the campfire as a family when you are out in Nature and away from your regular city life.
I hope my boys forgive me for the one or two updates, but the world, and our lake world has been growing and developing over the past 20+ years since I first wrote this story. Believe it or not, the last time I was at the lake I still had no power, no shower, no road access, and so, it was still in its original state and off-grid for me. Things are changing there now, but that is a story for another day…