My middle grade novel, The Thing About Dad, is out now and available everywhere. Here's the summary:
For
thirteen-year-old Jack Lansford, moving from upstate New York to Virginia is a
prison sentence. At least that’s what it feels like when his dad takes a job
down south and asks him to “give it a year.” Moving in, Jack's misery turns to
confusion when he stumbles across a box of letters to his mother that forever
changes the way he sees his light-hearted dad.
As close as Jack is with his father, they never talk about Mom, or the
car accident that took her life when he was only three. So Jack can’t help
himself from sneaking back to the journals—pages of heartfelt confessions about
the mother he never knew. School begins and Jack tries to find his place—playing
drums in the basement band with his dad and the neighbors while making a few
friends along the way.
Jack
confides in Miranda, the girl next door with the voice of a young Aretha
Franklin. But when he shows her a poem his father wrote about his Mom, she
decides it’s the song they should perform at the local band jam. With that, The
Wallywalkers are primed for the big time, but first Jack has to summon the
courage to have the talk of all talks with his dad.
