On August 8, we lost Barbara Mertz. If that name doesn’t ring a bell, how about Barbara Michaels? Or Elizabeth Peters?
That’s the one that hits me. We’ve lost Elizabeth Peters. We’ll have no more Amelia Peabody forever. The marvelous adventures in Egypt have come to an end. No more beating people with parasols. No more shirts ruined.
I want to say something intelligent and insightful about this writer, but I really can’t. Except that she wrote nearly seventy novels. Excuse me–published nearly seventy novels.
That makes me feel like such a slacker.
When I made that comment on Twitter, my roommate took exception. She’s a writer, but though she’s finished at least one first draft of a novel, she has nothing she would call complete† while I have four published novels, so how can I call myself a slacker?
Seventy published novels.
Recently our dear Siri Paulson lamented that she has a hard time finding time and will to write, when it’s something she wants very much indeed. This month I’m doing a challenge to change my habits, and a bad habit I want rid of is my hours a night of frivolous internetting. I want to be writing instead. But I haven’t been.
Why is it so hard? I don’t know. But it shows just how amazing Barbara Mertz was. She earned a degree, wrote books, followed her dreams, and has and will inspire so many.
RIP, awesome writer person. You’ll be missed–but I’m comforted knowing I can always find you in your books. Just as soon as I wrest Crocodile on the Sandbank back from the friend I loaned it to.
Oh, Crocodile on the Sandbank is one of my favorites.
I completely missed that we’d lost her. Thanks for the heads up.
The Hippopotamus Pool may be my favorite, because they actually found–that thing. 😀
But oh, I do love when Emerson set his pocket on fire.