This fun “Acrostic Story” was prompted by an expired contest from Brucedale Press in Ontario. It should be easy enough to spot the parameters — follow the link ↑ to confirm your suspicion!

You’ll never guess what I saw on my way to pick up supplies for my daughter’s school project. XL: that was the shirt size she insisted on. Where did she get a nonsense idea like that?

Should there be illustrations in novels? My response? Of course there should! If we as a culture are moving from text-based articles to vlogs, from text-based books to audio books — and if many nonfiction works include illustrations as a matter of course, why should we omit visual enhancements from novels “just because”? At any rate, I have always loved illustrated fiction.

Ever since I was a little girl, I would spend hours studying the printed layout of classic books and how they looked overall. And I was always really enamored by those novels that included illustrations by the author.…

Introducing Dream Worlds [ and Open Systems ], Ellen’s upcoming debut novel.

Based on some of her own dreams and habit of metaphysical thinking, the story follows a girl and her adventures during the summer months of her first year in town. Written ostensibly for teens, its appeal extends to middle grade readers and young adults of all ages. 

Her dreams were troubling her, but that wasn’t half of what she had in store. Jan finally found the courage to enter the forest, but what she encountered was far more than she had bargained for.