I find this hard to believe, but 2010 marks my fifth year as a contributor to the world of blogging. Although I’ve taken breaks now and then, I’ve kept this same site and design, and I like it, but …

I’ve been working hard behind the scenes on a few things, and I’d like to branch out a bit and have a site that can sort of grow with me. So if you’re one of those wonderful people who’ve stuck with me for years reading here or you have my blog linked in your sidebar, please update the link to:

www.heatherivester.com

For now, nothing will change except the address. It will still be a while before I figure out exactly what I want to do with my name as the site, but I do know I’d like young readers to feel comfortable reaching me … someday.

Although the novels I’m trying to write are still in bits and pieces, the characters are sitting on my desk looking annoyed with me when I ignore them. They want me to tell their stories, so I’m working on it. Along with everything else.

Here’s a quote I came across last week from the enigmatic Harper Lee, author of To Kill a Mockingbird.:

It’s absolutely essential that a writer know himself, for until he knows his abilities and limitations, his talents and problems, he will be unable to produce anything of real value …The writer must know for whom he writes, why he writes, and if his writing means what he means for it to say.

Writing is, in a way, a contest of knowing, of seeing the dream, of getting there, and of achieving what you set out to do. The simplest way to reach this goal is to simply say what you mean as clearly and precisely as you know how.

(from Mockingbird: A Portrait of Harper Lee, by Charles J. Shields).