Author: Karen GoatKeeper

Karen GoatKeeper loves to write. Her books include picture books, novels and nonfiction for science activity books and nature books. A recent inclusion are science teaching units.
The coming year has goals for two new novels, a picture book and some books of personal essays. This is ambitious and ignores time constraints.
She lives in the Missouri Ozarks with her small herd of Nubian dairy goats. The Ozarks provides the inspiration and setting for most of her books.

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GKP Writing News

Long Lived Books

Some books are called classics, but really aren’t. Classics are long lived books that speak to readers many years, even centuries after they were written.

An author may dream of writing such a book, but it’s rare to achieve it. And the author will probably never know their book has become a classic.

What Makes a Classic Tale?

The simple answer is: I don’t really know. The things such books seem to have in common are: timeless themes; unforgettable characters; and intriguing plots.

Another thing classics seem to have in common is how well the theme, characters and plot can be molded into new tales. Romeo and Juliet comes to mind.

Shakespeare based his play on a tale he knew from his time. That tale is long forgotten. But his play lives on even though his lines are difficult for modern people to say and understand.

How many other stories, novels, plays and movies can you think of that are rewrites of Romeo and Juliet? West Side Story is an easy one for me.

Why Think About Long Lived Books?

I’ve just finished rereading “Gift From the Sea” by Anne Morrow Lindberg. My copy is a 1975 reissue printed 20 years after the 1955 original with a note by the author at the end.

whelk shell
Using shells such as this whelk, Anne Morrow Lindbergh in “Gift From the Sea” invites the reader to examine her life, to find the perfect shell that gets buried by life.

It’s a series of essays revolving around shells she picked up on a beach during a short vacation. Each shell is linked to a time in a woman’s life.

The idea behind the essays is a chance to re-evaluate your life. Her answer is to try to simplify, admittedly almost an impossibility for women with so many responsibilities. Yet, it sets a goal for a woman to find herself and hold on to what she is in spite of all the distractions and responsibilities. One aspect so many of us have lost is taking time for ourselves, for reflection, for thought, time without interruption by phones, texts, emails, children, friends, family. This may be only a short time each day, but it lets us define who we are for ourselves instead of letting others tell us who they think we are or should be.

Classic?

“Gift From the Sea” may not be a classic tale, but it is one of the long lived books. I would be thrilled to have one of my books be so valued by readers, still speak to readers, 20 years after I wrote it.

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GKP Writing News

Edwina’s Strange World

Edwina’s strange world began in a rather mundane way. I heard about a divorce and its aftermath from a friend.

Although I do base many of my novels on true tales or people I’ve known over the years, I don’t write about them. So this divorce tale was a base to build on and embellish.

Creating Aleta

The plot began revolving around Aleta. Her parents were divorcing. She, as an only child, is lost. Trite.

Then the father remarries. Now Aleta is even more lost as the new wife comes with children and raises foster children. Aleta needs a friend.

cover for "Edwina" by Karen GoatKeeper
This upper middle grade novel may deal with some real issues, but it has a fantasy side along with it. The eBook is free from Smashwords using coupon code RUCH5. You can go to the book page by clicking on the eBook button on the book page.

Enter Edwina

About that time we watched an old movie called “Harvey” starring Jimmy Stewart. The idea of this invisible being was intriguing. I did some research and Edwina’s strange world emerged.

Suddenly there were lots of possibilities. One was that Edwina could influence things around her without being seen. A second was that Aleta would be seen as strange talking to an invisible being.

Was Aleta reverting to being a child? Was she having mental problems?

Siblings and Bullying

Bullying at school is nothing new. Even with all the modern interventions and training for teachers, bullies still flourish. They just become more devious or, now, move online.

Now Edwina and Aleta had enemies to thwart. Of course, they did become a bit unrealistic. However, the premise is sound.

Sibling rivalry is nothing new. Aleta and Megan are set at odds as each was the first in their former lives. Both want to maintain that status.

Somehow these two girls must find a way to co-exist. If they succeed in dragging their parents into it, the new family may be doomed.

Fantasy Fun

Edwina’s strange world is fantasy. In my own world, big, black, red-eyed dogs invisible to all but one don’t exist. That world was fun to visit for a time.

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Latest From High Reaches

Flash Flood Aftermath

The big storm srrived in the Ozarks and left use ith a good two inches. It seemed to be over until we got up in the morning to find the flash flood aftermath staring at us out the window.

How both of us managed to sleep through what must have been a downpour, puzzles us. Perhaps we were more tired than we realized.

flash flood aftermath damages fences
The main part of the flood had gone by morning. The debris line on the road indicated the water was at least 18 inches deep where it crossed the road. Water still flowed down over half the road as it sought to get to the creek. This area of fence has a place for the water to get through. However the water brought down leaves and small branches which caught in the fence. Road gravel piled up with the leaves. The water pushed hard and the posts leaned over as the water topped the debris to get into the pasture.

The Road

A small wet weather flow comes down along the yard. It was still running in the morning, but the debris indicated it had been over a foot deep overnight.

The water carried mulch left by the electric company, leaves and small branches down across the road, down the road, covering most of the road. Some of the water diverted down an old creek bed into the buck’s small pasture.

Field fence is great fencing for goats. It’s a disaster in a flood.

The flash flood aftermath at the fence was a heap of small branches, leaves and shredded wood piled up against the fence. The only way to clear this mess is to wade in, pull up armloads and dump it over the fence.

flash flood aftermath debris on bridge
Weather changes have made flash floods more the rule than the exception for several years here in the Ozarks. These rise quickly, tear out the creek banks and subside fast. This latest one didn’t top what remains of the bridge, only topped it enough to pile it with branches, leaves and whatever is tangled in these. Such floods used to carry off the bridge planks, but there are several old railroad ties on one side now to hold them in place. So far, these are working.

The Bridge

After the previous two inches of rain, the creek was flowing strongly. The more than two inch downpour brought the creek up over the edges of the bridge where it piled up branches and leaves.

This means working my way across the bridge one pile at a time. The leaves and small stuff can be shoved off into the creek with a hoe. Larger branches and small pieces of trees must be pulled up, shoved across and into the creek to lodge somewhere else doesn the way.

Animals

The flash flood aftermath was almost tragic for the Canada geese. Their nest is down in the creek floodplain. The flood waters came within a foot of sweeping it away.

I found a few creatures in the debris on the bridge. A snail was tossed over onto the grass across the creek. A spider ran off. A small midland brown snake was carried up to a brush pile and turned loose.

How many other creatures were swept away? There’s no way of knowing. A flash flood aftermath may mean lots of cleaning up for us, but it’s a disaster for small creatures.

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GKP Writing News

Opal and Agate Picture Books

I enjoy reading picture books and have been reading four a week to do reviews on my Goodreads blog. However, this is making writing my Opal and Agate picture books harder.

There are so many wonderful picture books on the shelves of my library. Some tell stories, fun or scary. Others tell about events or activities. They make me wonder if I can write picture books as good as they are.

Nubian doe kid Opal will star in some animal stories
Nubian doe High Reaches Opal deserves a good picture book series.

Picture Book Goats

A famous goat story is Billy Goats Gruff. It’s a cute story. Dairy goat owners tend to despise the illustrations. These are of caricature goats with shaggy coats, big horns and big goatees.

My library just acquired a beginning reading book about farm goats. It uses photographs of goats. Except almost all of them have horns and the book makes a big deal about horns.

My take is that the author knew nothing about goats, had never owned a goat or talked to many people who owned goats and never been to a goat show.

Yes, goats are usually born with horns. However, dairy goats with the exception of Nigerian Dwarfs have those horns removed. Any horned dairy goat in a show is disqualified.

Novel boring times can use friendly faces like Nubian goats
No horns. No shaggy coats. Nubian goats from my herd. High Reaches Spring is in front.

My Goats?

My goats don’t go to shows. They stay on the farm now. However, I do take their horns off and try to maintain the dairy goat standards for Nubians. These standards were set up to improve the breed to live longer, healthier lives and give more milk.

My goats are getting old now. Violet is fourteen. Drucilla, Opal’s mother, is thirteen. Goats usually live twelve to fifteen years.

The herd still goes out on good days – no rain or snow. They still climb the hills. Yes, they are slower, but they still range widely.

I want my Opal and Agate picture books to show how beautiful Nubian goats can be, no horns, no shaggy coats.

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Latest From High Reaches

Baby Chicks and Weather

The year 2012 brought a terrible drought and the beginning of weather upheaval. I’ve always started with baby chicks in April with its relatively settled weather. Now I’m juggling baby chicks and weather every year.

Baby Chick Requirements

Other than the obvious food purchased from the feed store and water from the well, baby chicks require a warm, not too hot, temperature. a heat lamp with a light bulb worked quite well as the wattage could be increased or decreased as necessary.

Now LED bulbs give off no heat. This necessitates purchasing a heat bulb. They come in two sizes: 250W which is much too hot for my little chick house and old heat lamp or 150W which works most of the time.

baby chicks and weather must be balanced
At a week old, these baby chicks are growing tails and wings. They still like it warm with plenty of food and water available. This is a mixed bunch from eggs set in an incubator.

Setting Up

As the heat lamp won’t heat the entire chick house, there are several things I do ahead of the chick arrival day. One is to put down paper, enough layers to last ten to fourteen days, on the back half of the house.

Some sources discourage using paper. The print on newspaper can confuse baby chicks looking for food. Paper is slick making walking harder.

I still use paper and haven’t seen much of either problem. What I appreciate is the ease of cleaning, another important aspect of raising chicks. When the paper gets dirty (usually every day), I move the food and water containers out for refilling, roll up the top paper layer making sure the chicks move off of it as I roll and end up with clean paper to put the food and water containers back on.

Then I divide the house with a cardboard barrier. The back half of the house is plenty big enough for twenty chicks for two weeks, about the time it takes for them to mostly feather out.

Baby Chicks and Weather

The chick house has two windows and a door, all closed. The heat lamp is suspended from a roost over the back section and turned on. Chicks are turned loose in the section.

On warm days the chicks wander around the section. They eat, drink and sleep. they move under the light or out as they need to.

On hot days a window or both plus the door on really hot days are opened. The light is not turned off, but the heat leaves. The barrier can be moved over to give the chicks more room to escape the direct heat.

Cold days are another matter. Blankets are draped over the roost. This is safe as the lamp is below the roost. They can even be placed to surround the section.

Balancing these conditions wasn’t too hard for years. Things have changed. Now conditions can change from one day to another or even from day to night. Occasionally conditions change during the day.

Baby chicks and weather may be challenging now. Still, those fresh pullet eggs next winter are worth the time and trouble.

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Latest From High Reaches

Summer Birds Return

Last night, as I came in from milking, I heard him. The lone whip-o-will remaining in our valley has returned. His call reminds me that the summer birds return this month banishing winter for now.

Watching the bird feeder, the titmice, juncos and sparrows are gone. They’ve been replaced by purple finches and goldfinches. The hummingbirds are back. The season has changed.

new summer birds return Canada geese
I was standing in the barn doorway waiting for some goats to finish eating when I first saw these birds off in the pasture. They had long necks like turkeys, but didn’t stand like turkeys. Binoculars showed the pair to be Canada geese. A week or so later, only the gander was still walking around in the pasture.

New Birds

For the first time a pair of Canada geese have decided to visit with us. The pastures are lush and green for them to enjoy grazing. The creek is flowing well.

Evidently the pair found our place to their liking. The goose has disappeared leaving the gander parading around. The crows have discovered they are no longer welcome in his stretch of the creek.

In several more weeks the goose will probably be back with little goslings following behind. We still don’t know why the pair decided to stay when there is only the creek for water.

goldfinch summer bird returns
Later in the summer the goldfinches hang on the chicory stalks eating the seeds. That is the time to get some good pictures of these wary birds.

Flashes of Yellow

When summer birds return, finches are among them. The purple finches have purple on their heads and necks. The goldfinches are drab greens.

Now the male goldfinches are dressed in their summer finery. Walking out the door this morning to do chores, a small flock flew up out of the yard. All fled to the bushes except one. He stopped on the wire around the persimmon tree to strut his stuff. His golden feathers and black cap were striking.

Plenty of Food

Although many birds do keep coming by the bird feeder, most are off eating the many insects now flying and crawling around in the plants. If the cicadas emerge here, that food supply will increase dramatically.

The one item I wish was more popular are the ticks. They are in great abundance this year.

A fairly dry winter became a fairly wet spring just in time for the summer birds return. Now the rain needs to keep coming to water my garden.

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GKP Writing News

Writing Goat Puzzles

Pencil puzzles are probably not the best use of my time, true. However, these are fun to do now and then. Except none of the regular pencil puzzles are about goats. That started me writing goat puzzles.

My new computer sat on the desk begging to be used. These goat puzzles were a great way to find out new ways of using my computer.

Now What?

There were sixty-four goat puzzles on my computer. It took a lot of time to create all of these. What was I to do with all of these goat puzzles?

Checking around I found I was the only one writing goat puzzles. Evidently people thought horse, dog and cat puzzles were much more interesting. There were books of these kinds of puzzles.

cover for "Goat Games" by Karen GoatKeeper
Learn about goats through interviews with goat owners, pencil puzzles, trivia and more.

Creating a Book

These other puzzle books had more in them than just puzzles. If I was going to have a book, I needed to have other things in the book besides the puzzles.

My goats are all Nubian dairy goats. There are lots of kinds of goats, hundreds of kinds around the world. These are not just dairy goats, but meat goats and fiber goats too. And there were people around my area with some of these goats.

Fifteen kinds of goats have pages in my book. Recipes for meat, milk and cheese were added. And the goat associations got a page.

So There Is a Book

I asked a publisher about my book. It seems goats aren’t as popular as other animals, so my book was rejected. The editor liked the book, but didn’t think enough people would buy one to pay for printing it.

The publisher was right. I self published “Goat Games” and found few people wanted to buy a copy.

But that’s all right. I had a good time writing goat puzzles, met a lot of other goat owners and learned a lot of new things about my goats.

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GKP Writing News

Only Nine Carduans

There may be forty-five soon-to-be Carduans on Ship Eighteen, but they are fourteen weeks away from Cardua. Ship Nineteen has only nine Carduans on board.

Somehow these nine need to find a place to live and make it habitable, find sources of food and water and devise methods of defending themselves from the many predators living on Cardua.

Who Are These Carduans?

Three are ship officers. They know how to fly a space ship and not much else.

Six are young people ranging from ten-year-old Tico to seventeen-year-old Hirs. Their backgrounds vary, but they are young. They do have skills learned from their parents or experiences.

Supplies Are Needed

The advantage Ship Nineteen has is that it was a cargo flight. Those six young people were overflow from the passenger ships ahead of them. There are lots of crates filled with useful things packed on the ship.

The disadvantage is that these people don’t know how to use many of the supplies. There are solar panels and electrical supplies. No one know how to set them up. There are cooking supplies for a restaurant. No one knows how to cook.

Lygo does know about sewing and has lots of supplies originally destined for a shop she was opening with her mother, a seamstress. Tico knows some carpentry and there are lots of supplies originally destined for a furniture shop his carpenter father was going to open.

defensive black snake
If you are only four inches tall, this is a terrifying sight. How can one of my Carduans defend themselves from a snake wanting to eat them?

Finding Their Skills

Only nine Carduans face a new world filled with plants and animals that tower over their mere four inch height. Each must find their skills and find ways to use them as part of a team.

As far as these people know, they are alone. Their former lives are only memories. All of their friends and relations are now memories.

There may be only nine Carduans, but they must overcome their pasts, their griefs, their ignorance and become a group to face this new world. That is the only way they will survive.

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Disappearing Sun

Back in 2017 we were close to the total eclipse path. We drove over to watch the disappearing sun as the moon slid across it. The area got dark, mostly. We saw some shadows.

This year the magazines, the news, everything seemed to be talking about the eclipse. And we were again close to the path of totality.

To Go or Not To Go

The 2017 eclipse was interesting, but not really awesome. We saw many of the things the media listed. We spent a day driving and standing around.

This time the area of near totality went right over us, some 99% +. Wouldn’t this be good enough? We could stay home, get things done and see the eclipse too.

A friend was thinking along the same lines. Somehow, as we talked about it, we decided to drive down into the path of totality. After all, the area of a minute and a half was a mere 30 miles away.

Watching the Disappearing Sun

Bunker was close, but Ellington with over two minutes was only another half hour’s drive away. We headed south expecting huge crowds.

Wherever the crowds were, they weren’t in Ellington. Still, we headed out to a nearby Conservation Area where we were the only people around.

The edge of the sun was just disappearing as the truck pulled into a parking area. We piled out, put out some chairs and watched.

disappearing sun darkens road
The Mark Twain Conservation Area road kept getting darker and darker as the sun disappeared behind the moon.

Totality

I’m used to being out around sunset. The gathering darkness wasn’t like that at all. Instead it had that eerie look as when a big storm is coming, when the air darkens and clears, the shadows darken.

The moon continued to slip across the sun. The disappearing sun had an orange tint.

Then it got dark, really dark. A couple of stars came out. There was a bright spot at the bottom of the hidden sun we later found out was a solar flare. A pastel reddish orange glow ran around the horizon.

disappearing sun light effects
These patches of light got noticed when the first chip of sun reappeared after the total eclipse.

Afterwards

When a smidgeon of the sun peeked out, the world started lighting up. The trees cast these strange rippled shadows.

By the time the sun was half clear, day had reappeared. We packed up and headed home.

later shadow effect from reappearing sun
As more of the sun reappeared after the eclipse, the light patches got bigger, but kept their odd arc shape effect. The shadows were from tall pine and oak trees.

At Home

The goats and chickens were out all day. They didn’t seem at all upset about the eclipse.

Now we have these sun gazing glasses left over. Although these were for viewing the eclipse, they can be used to look at the sun. Maybe I will hold on to them for a time.

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GKP Writing News

eBook Changes

I have published eBooks through Smashwords for many years. Their automated system did create problems at times, but these were often my mistakes, not theirs. But now eBook changes are coming.

Smashwords has been absorbed into Draft2Digital. My account just switched over and I am still looking it over. My main page is definitely different and I’m having trouble finding things like how to create coupons for free copies.

Now What?

These eBook changes will affect my books. I’m not really sure how much yet. According to the information, those books I have already published will stay the same.

However, new books may be different. Smashwords created many different formats. Draft2Digital may only do epub. I like having the many formats including pdf available. A number of my books look best in pdf.

cover for "Edwina" by Karen GoatKeeper
Only Aleta can see this big black, red-eyed dog, but that doesn’t keep them from getting into trouble. This upper middle grade novel will be the next one with digital copies offered for a month for free.

“Edwina”

I had intended to offer free digital copies of “Edwina” this month. It is another of my upper middle grade novels.

Due to these eBook changes, the offer is put on hold for now. I will find out more about this in the next couple of weeks and hope to make this offer available next month.

In the Meantime

I am deep into a rewrite for Ship Nineteen in “The Carduan Chronicles”. So far I’m on the easy part with mostly editing needed and not a lot of that. Things will change in another fifty pages or less.

There is Life’s Rules to finish. The crazy thing about this is that I know where the plot is going, but can’t seem to get there.

And I do have to consider opening my own book store on my website to offer pdf versions of my books, expecially the science books. That is not something I want to do, having tried that years ago and found it was a real mess to keep up with.

There are so many times lately when I wish the world would stop changing. It ignores me. The eBook changes are coming, indeed, they are here. Like it or not.