I, Gayle, have been busy at a terrifically successful and information-packed Vernon Writer’s Festival April 11-14; but unfortunately the neuropathy and arthritis in Ian’s feet have meant that he had to stay home. Those evenings I reluctantly skipped the book readings and open mic to go through my workshop notes with Ian, filling him in on some of the highlights. Thanks to Markella Mildenberger, our coordinator, and all the writers who participated, especially those who led the workshops: Ben Nuttall-Smith on “Dynamic Presenter,” “From Memoir to Novel,” and “From Scribbles to Publication”; George Opacic on “Using Your Corpus Callosum,” “E Publishing and E Readers,” and “Script-Writing”; Laisha Rosnau on “Story Structure”; Stella Harvey on “How A Novel Comes Together”; Patricia Donahue on “Character Development”; and Shawn Bird on “Blogging and Social Media”. I learned a lot, enjoyed selling some of our books and trading some for books by other authors present, as well as buying a few. Now I have a stack of great books to read by some of our talented British Columbia authors.

Here, then, is the next installment of the children’s chapter book we have been blogging: “Jake, Little Jimmy and Big Louie.” We welcome any comments, suggestions for improvements or constructive criticism readers may wish to give us. If you have such, please comment below or email us at gayleian@gmail.com. And to our great-grandchildren, Leland and Hannah, who are consultants on this book, we eagerly await some more comments and pictures from you. Thanks!

“JAKE, LITTLE JIMMY AND BIG LOUIE”   

by Ian Moore-Morrans

edited by Gayle Moore-Morrans

Copyright © 2012

CHAPTER EIGHT

Louie Takes Off

You can’t really talk to a bird, whether it’s a little budgie or a very large parrot, and ask it questions, or have a conversation with it. It works something like a tape recorder, not nearly as efficient, but a lot more fun. You have to repeat the same thing over and over and over again and someday (maybe), the bird might repeat what you say, although it wouldn’t know what the words meant.

(The rest of the chapter’s content has been deleted prior to the book’s publication.)

Picture suggestions: Louie and Jimmy “beak-clicking.”   Louie flying away.