Author, author

     Is creativity contagious? Can you catch it from being around stimulating people?
     Those are the questions I walked away with after Rick and I went to a local authors night at our little library here in Chester, N.H. – a first for both of us.
     I had never heard of a library-sponsored authors night (do other places have them?) and didn’t know what to expect from the half-dozen or so homegrown writers who sat or stood at folding tables to chat and offer their works.
     First we ran into Tim Horvath, once a creative writing teacher at the late Chester College, whose writing “deftly interweaves the palpably real and the pyrotechnically funny,” in the words of one reviewer. What could we do? We bought his short story collection, “Understories.” But before even starting the book, we enjoyed just talking to him – his well-developed curiosity, the waterbug zigs and zags of his mind, his humor. Love to have him as a friend.
     And there was Robert Crawford, Chester’s own poet laureate, who is truly a latter-day Robert Frost (who writes in rhyme anymore?) and whose past includes a long stint working for the Pentagon (people are complex). He is a local treasure who should be a national one.
     And the impish Holly Robinson, whose memoir, “The Gerbil Farmer’s Daughter,” is the first of the books we bought that I intend to read. How’s this for a hilarious book-cover endorsement (from Donna Anastasi, president of the American Gerbil Society): “Holly Robinson reveals a fascinating, untold chapter in the history of the Mongolian gerbil in the United States… all the while struggling to hide a terrible family secret – the barns in the backyard house nine thousand gerbils.” I’ll share it when I’m done.
     And a writer convinced of God’s hand in the workings of the American Revolution. And a novel interweaving the lives of characters in the historic city of Portsmouth (one of our favorite Friday night places)…
     After buying four books, we decided to stop before we bought again.
     But we left excited, inspired and expanded for the experience – ready to go right back to the computer and write some more ourselves.
     Is creativity contagious?
     Yes, yes, yes!