Hi! It's late January, and near Chicago, where I live, it's freezing cold, in single digits. Winter is not my season. I am more of a not-so-hot summer or early fall type of girl. I have to admit, however, that the important things in my life that I did not plan on happened in the winter. Check this out:

I met my husband Vitaly on 02/02/2002 at 2 pm. We met for a late lunch and then watched The Royal Tenenbaums. The rabbi who married us said that considering the date, time, and the movie choice, it's bashert for sure.

We had our daughter Elanna on 01/15/2012. I had a wonderful pregnancy with her. My face glowed, my hair grew long, I did not show practically at all, and I had no morning sickness. I was 31 and incredibly happy and thankful that this gift just somehow came into my life after waiting so long.

Then she finally came, and it was busy, crazy, and wonderful. I thought nothing else this exciting will occur. Unless I have another baby, that is, but that was not happening. Life seemed predictable until …

I started writing on 02/26/2021. That came about unexpectedly. I liked reading, but I thought writing is nothing but hard work. Then the pandemic hit and did not have to commute to work anymore. What a girl to do with all that free time? Netflix and Prime, of course! Downton Abbey, here I come. At some point, the shows got a bit old, until I stumbled on Hornblower, a British naval miniseries with eight episodes, about twenty years old. And episodes three, five, and six blew me away to the point that I laid awake at night, thinking about them, inserting myself into the story, hanging out with this handsome fellow.

.

At some point,  I came up with a female heroine who just happens to have my black hair and green eyes but was much younger and single. And thus, the ship surgeon Ella Parker was born. Then on 02/26/2021, I had an epiphany about how the story about her would start, progress, and end. I ran to the computer, literally shaking. My husband ask what was going on, and I stammered, "I think I am supposed to write a book." He said, "Ok. That's probably better than watching another Netflix series." I wrote for three hours, feeling enormously happy. It's been almost a year, and I've been writing every day. I finished my first manuscript in three months. After discussing it with a few readers, I put it away and wrote A Girl with a Knife,.

A popular Russian song says "Nature has no bad weather" Life has no bad season. Even when it's freezing, and dark at 5 pm, and no vacation in sight, and you are over forty and think you know yourself and what you are capable of, there could be a surprise waiting around the corner. On 02/26/2022, exactly a year since I started writing, I am launching A Girl with a Knife to Amazon.