Let’s Talk with Maggie Toussaint Archive

Beginnings and Endings

Something many unpublished authors rarely appreciate is the unlimited time to write that first book. Another undervalued perk of beginning to write is there are no reader expectations to meet. Brand new writers have the wonder and delight of working on a clean slate, of starting from scratch. What I love about beginnings is traveling […]

June 22 and siblings

In my family, June 22 is the day after two back-to-back family birthdays. We are normally sunburned, full of cookout food, and banking another fine set of sibling memories. This year my brother won’t make it home until early July, so it will be a solo birthday for my sister. She won’t want a big […]

Best Friends

I recently wrote a tribute on friendship. Once I finished, I had a startling revelation. My relationship with a childhood best friend formed the basis for Tabby and Sage, the twins in A Magic Candle Mysteries. In the series, Tabby and Sage are fraternal twins, but they are also more than sisters who shared a […]

Taxes, Smaxes

Earlier this spring I spent several days wrassling all my receipts, giveaways, and everything else into a spreadsheet for my 2022 income taxes. Every year I moan and groan about the process, even though I have all the receipts squirreled away and waiting for me. It is a thankless task of sneaky typos, squinting to […]

Glass Half-Empty or Glass Half-full?

I consider myself a glass half-full person, but there are times when I plunge into the deep end of glass half-empty. Concern for loved ones will do that, and health issues can shift me off-center. And then I stop and realize those concerns are totally out of my control. Worry isn’t positive. It can, in […]

New Year Thoughts

For 2023, our author collective resolves to take positive actions to make the world better in some way. There’s so much we can do for the people we already know and for those we haven’t met yet. Here are a few thoughts about how one kindness often begets another. First we shouldn’t worry about what […]

Happy Holidays to All of You from All of Us!

Happy Holidays to all of our friends, fans, and writing communities! Our authors are here to share their self-care tips that help them make it through the busy holidays. When your schedule gets overloaded, remember to take time for yourself. It will get better. Plus, what fun it is to de-stress with us! Maggie Toussaint: […]

Giving Thanks in a Post-Covid (I Hope) World

Happy Thanksgiving to All! Many of us have blessings we always mention on this occasion. Family, friends, home, career, transportation, personal health and mobility, community, pets, rewarding hobbies, and more are blessings that come to mind. However, our world changed in recent years. Covid took a toll on every level, with its stranglehold of fear […]

Twins and Other Duos

In my upcoming A Magic Candle Shop Mystery book one, SNUFFED OUT, writing as Valona Jones, My main character Tabby Winslow has a twin sister named Sage. They are fraternal twins, and, in case you aren’t familiar with that term, it means that they aren’t identical and are in fact from different eggs. My thoughts […]

Sand, Flower Petals, and Chalked Sidewalks

I’ve always loved touching things with my fingers. There’s an interesting grainy feel to sand, a wispy velvety texture to flower petals, an innocent silkiness to kitten fur. As a child I was drawn to an artesian well at our “Riverbank” swimming hole. A muddy clay rimmed the area where the fresh water flowed out […]

Oh, the Bubbaness of it all!

When I wrote BUBBA DONE IT, I broke one of the primary rules of the amateur sleuth trope. It was unthinkable really, except there wasn’t any way to proceed without telling whodunit in the first chapter. After all, my female sleuth, Baxley Powell, was just starting out in her police consultant role, just feeling her […]

You Don’t Get What You Don’t Pay For

In the course of real life, a saying I haven’t heard in a while cropped up: “You don’t get what you don’t pay for.” The context for this was in regard to a purchased item. Raise your hand if you’ve ever bought a knockoff brand of something and been dissatisfied. I have, but I’ve also […]

I Can’t See the Forest

I’ve been working on rough draft edits for what seems like months but is only a few weeks so far. Somewhere between reads five and ten, the book begins to feel more like individual words than sentences, paragraphs, scenes, and chapters. In other words, I focus on the trees but that means I can’t see […]

Planting a Flag and Love

By Maggie Toussaint In this most romantic month of the year some of us face a quandary. The person or pet we love with all our heart isn’t the typical greeting card kind of love or is no longer around. My feeling is that love is love. It’s putting yourself out there, risking the most […]

Let’s Talk about resolutions

Our Resolutions Every year when New Year’s rolls around, we are faced with the resolution question. Do we once again set a sky high goal and then let it slide as we get busy? Or do we take up the standard and seek something MORE for ourselves? What’s a person to do with all this […]

Let's Talk with Maggie Toussaint

Let’s Talk with Maggie Toussaint Archive

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