Leslie Keller Books

Last night I attended a local group for writers and the speaker talked about social media.  Today I registered for a one day workshop which has an hour and a half dedicated to social media.  My Yahoo Groups discuss social media regularly. Everywhere you look someone wants to discuss social media. Now, I am too. Obviously, I blog.  I post to Facebook and I intend (truly, I do) to Tweet, Instagram, Google+ and Pin. The problem is I barely have time to keep up with my blog and Facebook, let alone all the other social media. There are programs which will help you post to multiple sources at one time. Hootsuite and Sproutsocial are just two of the options available. You can write one post and have it go out to all of your social media for a monthly fee. Depending on your free time and funds, managing one entry is significantly easier than keeping up with the many ways to communicate with your fan base. However, you can also start small and work up. I would suggest Facebook, as a mini

In honor of Halloween I thought this would be appropriate. I came across this sign in the Minneapolis airport and had to take a picture.  I wish I had bought it for my office because there are days when I can absolutely relate to how satisfied the wicked witch may have felt when she sent her monkeys out. I'm afraid I do not know who is responsible for the saying. Happy trails, Leslie

In my last post I talked about the discovery of my breast cancer. In this follow up post I want to write about what happened afterwards. Just short of thirteen years ago, I found a lump in my breast. It took me nine months to have the lump removed and in that time it had doubled in size. To say the diagnosis was shocking is putting it mildly. No one expects to hear the words, "You have cancer". When I went through my experience I didn't want to talk about it. I didn't tell my family or my friends what it was really like. I sugar coated the chemo treatments and didn't tell them how sick I was afterwards or how the mouth sores made it difficult to eat. I didn't tell them how afraid I was or how alone I felt. I didn't want them to worry. I realize now how much of a mistake that was. I should have let them comfort me and I needed to share what was happening to me. In June of 2003, after I had finished my chemo and radiation and my hair was starting to gr

In keeping with my theme for this month I'm blogging about breast cancer and my own story.  February of 2002 I was working in Toronto for extended periods of time and had a pain in my breast. I could feel something that felt about the size of a vitamin.  At least that's how I remember the way it felt. Home for a period I had a mammogram and the doctor said I should have a biopsy.  Before I could deal with that I had other health issues.  Swelling in my legs sent me to my family doctor, who after rounds of blood work and urinalysis sent me to a kidney specialist.  Diagnosed with minimal change disease, a disease of the kidneys, I was put on major doses of steroids for months. I did visit a plastic surgeon to discuss a biopsy but he wanted to perform a surgical biopsy and I felt a needle biopsy would have been the appropriate place to start. So I ignored the lump trying to deal with the kidney disease. I experienced a benign tumor in the same breast years before - so why should

If you write with more than one character in your storyline, it's necessary to remember all the little details which makes that person or persons unique.  Even if you have only one human character in the majority of the manuscript, as in Life of Pi  and the movie Cast Away (Tom Hanks and his soccer ball) you still need to keep track of who that character is. For today's discussion we'll imagine you have more than one person dancing through your pages.  If you plan to have a character that is more than one dimensional you'll need to keep track of what makes that person special.  If your work is to be read by a book club for example, what would the readers say about the characters?  Would they say they liked that she only drank sweet iced tea or that she dressed only in pink?  Would the readers remember that on page thirty-nine the character had a fear or spiders but on page one hundred she picked one up to set it outside?  You don't want the second situation to be

Just a few pictures of the Lighting of Times Square Pink event held by EBeauty on October 1, 2014. I was thrilled to be able to participate in this historic event.  I can't wait for next year!  For more information about the organization go to www.ebeauty.com. Happy trails, Leslie

Here we are again in October and breast cancer awareness month.  My family has been touched by this disease on four occasions.  My sister, Beth who left us in January as the result of years of chemotherapy treatment for her breast cancer which metastasized into her brain. Myself, now a twelve year survivor.  My sister-in-law, Carolyn a two time survivor and my youngest sister, Laura who is a three year survivor. It is my dream that no one else will lose a family member to this very curable disease. Early detection is imperative and we need to continue make advances in the treatment. One of eight women will be diagnosed with this disease - your mother, your sister, your wife, your daughter, your best friend. This year for the first time the non-profit which my brother, Mark and Carolyn founded - EBeauty, held both the turning pink of Washington, DC and New York's Times Square.  These events serve to raise awareness and funds. The New York event is historic in that it has never b