Hazel Stearns
I've always wanted to write and, most of all, I've wanted to write something that would make people laugh. Growing up, Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn were two of my favorite books. Later in life I appreciated the television series Wonder Years and the movie A Christmas Story, because they featured the same, simple, everyday humor.
Today, I think kids miss the fun of imagining because everything is presented to them from the time they’re born. The children of the early 1950s were the last who had to use imagination. With no television, and years of visualizing, they could come up with the most exaggerated stories and creative forms of entertainment from the simplest stimulation. In my younger years, the heroes who shaped my life were Huck Finn and Amelia Earhart, who represented freedom and independence, the unsinkable Molly Brown because she never gave up, and Auntie Mame because she wasn't afraid to try something new. Much later in life, I realized my parents’ contributions. My mother taught me to put away emotions until I worked through any crisis. My father implanted the desire to see distant places, the courage to follow my dreams, and the tenacity to start businesses from the kitchen table. Both parents instilled the work ethic that is necessary to be successful. Now retired and finally writing, Shaping Kate is my "something new." The biggest thrill I can imagine is to walk into a waiting room and hear someone laughing at something they’re reading from a book I’ve written. |
Book Published
Shaping Kate is a women's fiction novel that was published 2012.
Shaping Kate
Shaping Kate is a story about a rebellious tomboy who fights to retain her adventurous independence until, one day, she is forced to exchange her dirty jeans for a fancy dress that changes her life.
Most of the story takes place in Hesperia, California, but it could be any small town in America in the mid-Twentieth Century. Shaping Kate evokes memories of the 1950s, when it was a simpler time. And it highlights the lessons & punishment-by-belt, common to that era, that shaped a young girl's values. Shaping Kate is available at: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Books a Million. |