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A Very Human Question
Bella Santini in the Land of Everlasting Change follows a fourteen-year-old girl who enters a magical fairy realm and discovers that her mysterious connection to its magic may reveal a hidden truth about her identity. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
Bella Santini was born from my own experience of feeling different as a child. I was highly sensitive and deeply aware of the emotions around me, but I did not always understand what I was sensing or where I belonged. I wanted to create a character who carried some of that same uncertainty.
Fantasy gave me a beautiful way to explore those feelings. Bella begins the story believing she knows who she is and what her world is, even though she has never felt completely at home in it. Then she enters a place where everything she understands about herself begins to shift. The magic is part of the adventure, but underneath it is a very human question: What happens when you discover that the things that made you feel different might actually be part of who you are?
That became the heart of the Land of Everlasting Change. Bella is entering a magical world, but she is also entering a deeper understanding of herself.
Bella enters the fairy realm almost by accident. What did you want her unexpected journey to represent?
Life rarely announces the experiences that are going to change us. We can be moving through an ordinary day and suddenly find ourselves somewhere we never expected to be, emotionally or literally. Bella does not choose a grand quest. She falls into one.
I wanted that unexpected journey to reflect the experience of growing up, particularly during the tween and early teen years. The world begins changing around you, relationships change, your awareness of yourself changes, and suddenly the rules that once made sense do not seem quite as certain.
The Land of Everlasting Change makes that experience visible. Bella cannot control everything that happens around her, but she can learn to understand what she feels, make choices about how she responds, and discover what those choices reveal about her. For me, that is where courage begins.
Yelimoon Fairy School adds a magical-school element to the story. What was most exciting about creating the school and its magical curriculum?
Yelimoon was tremendous fun to create because it grew out of a real place that captured my imagination. I lived in Cheltenham, England, and often admired the beautiful buildings of Cheltenham College. Their historic architecture became the visual inspiration for Yelimoon Fairy School. I loved taking something that existed in the real world and imagining what might be happening behind those walls if they belonged to a school for fairies.
From there, I could let my imagination run free. I created magical classes, unusual teachers, creatures, friendships, mistakes, and all the delightful complications that happen when young people are learning abilities they do not yet know how to control. What interested me most, though, was that Bella could not simply master a spell and suddenly master herself. She has to experiment, make mistakes, become frustrated, try again, and learn whom she can trust. Yelimoon teaches magic, but the experiences Bella has there teach her about herself. That is one of the things I love about writing fantasy for young readers. You can give a child an extraordinary world while still speaking to something very real in their life.
What can readers expect from Bella’s continuing adventures in the Land of Everlasting Change?
Bella’s world continues to grow, and so do the challenges she faces. Each adventure explores another layer of growing up through fantasy, friendship, difficult choices, misunderstandings, consequences, and, of course, magic.
In Troll War, Bella begins discovering that understanding another person requires looking beyond what we have been told about them. In Princess Bella Visits the Dragon’s Lair, her choices become increasingly important, and she learns that even well-intentioned decisions can have consequences. As the series continues, the world expands further, and Bella’s understanding of herself becomes more complex.
There are larger mysteries unfolding as well, including questions about Bella’s connection to this world and where she truly belongs. I want readers to have the pleasure of following an ongoing fantasy adventure while growing alongside Bella. She does not become fearless or suddenly have everything figured out. She becomes more capable of listening to herself, understanding others, making choices, and meeting change when it arrives. That, to me, is a much more interesting kind of magic.
Author Links: GoodReads | Amazon
When Bella follows a trail of glowing lights into the woods, she’s suddenly swept into the Land of Everlasting Change, a magical realm where nothing stays the same for long and courage is tested in unexpected ways. Taken to a mysterious fairy school, Bella must face a series of magical trials that challenge not just her abilities but also her confidence, her choices, and her belief in herself.
As Bella navigates strange rules, powerful fairies, and friendships that test her heart, she begins to discover that real strength isn’t about being fearless, it’s about learning how to stand steady when things feel uncertain.
Bella Santini in the Land of Everlasting Change is the first book in a heartfelt middle-grade fantasy series about resilience, identity, and finding courage from within. It’s a story for sensitive readers, children who have felt out of place, and anyone learning how to trust themselves in a world that keeps changing.
Perfect for middle-grade readers who love magical worlds, brave heroines, and emotionally meaningful adventures.
Good Intentions
Glee the Christmas Goblin follows a group of mischievous goblins who set out to save Christmas after Santa’s elves hide the children’s presents, discovering the joy of giving along the way. What draws you to write children’s literature?
Jones: Children’s stories are often where our earliest ideas about courage, kindness, and identity begin. Before children can explain those values, they can already recognize them in the characters they love.
Olivo: We wanted to create a story that encourages positive behavior without using threats, shame, or fear. Glee is mischievous, imperfect, and still learning, which makes his growth more meaningful. Children do not need perfect heroes. They need heroes who show them that making a mistake does not define you, but what you choose to do next can.
The elves hide the presents because they’re tired of watching children receive gifts. What inspired this unusual twist on the traditional Christmas story?
Olivo: We began with a question: What if the people responsible for giving Christmas presents became convinced that children had forgotten how to give? That allowed us to reverse the traditional roles. The elves, usually seen as Christmas heroes, create the problem because their disappointment leads them to make the wrong choice. Meanwhile, the goblins, who are expected to take and cause trouble, become the unlikely characters capable of putting things right. That reversal reflects something we deeply believe: people are more complex than the labels placed on them. Good intentions can still lead to poor decisions, and someone with an imperfect past can choose to do something extraordinary. In our story, Christmas is not saved by the characters who appear to be the best. It is saved by those willing to change.
How did you develop the personalities and relationships among Glee and the other goblins?
Jones: We approached the goblins as a group of imperfect friends rather than as a collection of moral examples. They have different instincts, fears, strengths, and definitions of what it means to do the right thing. Those differences naturally create humor and conflict, but they also make the group stronger. Glee became the emotional center because he is caught between the goblin he has always been and the person he is discovering he can become. His friends challenge that transformation in different ways. Some encourage him, some question him, and others would be perfectly happy returning to ordinary goblin mischief. Their relationships reflect a lesson we wanted to explore honestly: change rarely happens in isolation. The people around us can resist our growth, complicate it, or help make it possible. Friendship does not require everyone to be the same. It asks them to keep choosing one another while they learn how to become better.
If Glee could return for another adventure, what kind of Christmas or holiday trouble might he find himself in?
Olivo: Glee would probably learn the right lesson and then apply it in the most spectacularly wrong way. Perhaps he decides that if giving brings joy, the answer is to give everyone everything they could possibly want.
Jones: Soon, the workshop is empty, the sleigh is dangerously overloaded, and Christmas has become complete chaos. Glee would then have to discover that generosity is not measured by how much we give, but by how carefully we understand what another person truly needs. That feels like the heart of any future Glee adventure: a well-intentioned mistake, plenty of goblin-sized chaos, and a deeper lesson hidden somewhere inside the trouble.
Author Links: Facebook | Website | Instagram | YouTube | TikTok
The Power of Authenticity: Find Your Own Superpowers, Purpose, and Path to Success
Michelle Chappel’s The Power of Authenticity: Find Your Own Superpowers, Purpose, and Path to Success is a hands-on personal-growth book built around a playful but serious idea: each person has a distinctive combination of strengths, interests, instincts, and creative abilities that Chappel calls “superpowers.” Rather than treating purpose as one perfect career or a single grand talent, she introduces the idea of a “Constellation Calling,” where several gifts and passions combine to form a life that feels genuinely yours. The book develops that idea through 42 short chapters divided into five parts, moving from identifying the forces that keep people disconnected from themselves to discovering their strengths and putting those strengths into action. Chappel brings an unusual résumé to the subject. She’s a Princeton-trained cognitive psychologist who left academia to pursue music, and her own journey from professor to singer-songwriter, coach, and consultant becomes one of the book’s central case studies.
What gives the book its personality is the way Chappel mixes psychology, pop culture, music, memoir, and coaching exercises. Jungian ideas such as the persona, shadow, and “golden shadow” sit alongside Superman, Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz, Iron Man, Batman, Star Wars, and Barbie. The superhero language could easily have been just decoration, but Chappel uses it as an organizing metaphor for the whole process: understand your origin story, recognize the abilities you’ve hidden, confront your personal “kryptonite,” and learn to use your strengths more deliberately. Part 3, for example, looks at family roles and social expectations as masks that can obscure a person’s deeper identity, while Part 4 asks readers to pay close attention to what comes naturally, what creates curiosity, what makes time disappear, and what they loved before other people’s expectations took over. The recurring songs, reflection questions, creativity projects, and chapter-end lessons make the book feel less like something you simply read and more like a course you participate in.
The strongest material comes from Chappel’s stories about students and coaching clients. Again and again, someone who has been living according to an inherited definition of success notices a neglected ability and begins experimenting with it. Those discoveries don’t always lead to dramatic career changes. Chappel is refreshingly open to the idea that a calling can be expressed through a hobby, volunteer work, creative project, or side pursuit while a perfectly serviceable job pays the bills. One young photographer, for instance, chooses to keep photography as a serious pursuit outside her stable career. That flexibility makes the book’s central argument more useful. Its message isn’t simply “follow your dream.” It’s closer to “pay attention to what repeatedly gives you energy, develop those abilities, and find practical places for them in your life.” The later chapters extend that idea into resilience, failure, grief, intuition, confidence, and community, emphasizing that becoming more authentic is an ongoing practice.
I’d recommend The Power of Authenticity to people who feel competent on paper but strangely disconnected from the life they’ve built, especially anyone reconsidering a career, returning to an old creative interest, recovering from burnout, or wondering why a conventionally successful path doesn’t feel especially satisfying. It would also work well for readers who enjoy doing exercises and journaling, since Chappel repeatedly asks you to stop, reflect, experiment, and revisit what you’ve learned. Her conversational voice is energetic, personal, and sometimes deliberately goofy, which fits a book that wants self-discovery to feel lively. By the end, her argument has widened beyond career satisfaction: she sees authenticity as a way of becoming more whole, forming stronger communities, and contributing something distinctly your own. The final invitation is essentially to keep noticing what calls to you, keep developing it, and accept that the answer may evolve as you do.
Pages: 224 | ISBN : 978-1963667431
Fundamental Pillars of Life
A Poetic Wandering is a reflective collection spanning four decades in which you explore memory, family, Kansas history, travel, nature, faith, humor, and the experiences that shape a life. What role has poetry played in helping you process emotions, develop self-awareness, and make sense of your experiences?
Growing up as an only child, I wasn’t able to compare life experiences or receive guidance from a sibling. There were times I felt lonely, times I felt life was unfair, times when anger reared its ugly head. Writing became a means to document and work through some of life’s instabilities. The process eventually created opportunities for stronger self-confidence and self-esteem.
How has becoming a parent—and later reflecting on family across generations—influenced your poetry?
As one ages, we realize more and more the true importance of faith, family, and friends. I was truly blessed to grow up with parents who believed in these tenets. As parents, my wife and I tried to instill these beliefs in our own children. Sharing these fundamental pillars of life through family generations only makes sense.
Your collection moves comfortably between serious subjects and humorous poems about aging, grilling, toilet paper, and everyday life. Why is humor important to the overall balance of the book?
Poetry should be reflective at times, entertaining at times. I want readers to understand what I am sharing without having to dissect obscure, remote, or hidden meanings. Regarding humor…didn’t Ficino say “Humor Is the Spice of Life.”
What do you hope readers—especially parents, grandparents, travelers, and people reflecting on their own lives—take away from A Poetic Wandering?
I hope that by sharing my thoughts and experiences, it may help others to BE POETIC themselves.
Author Links: Website
Beyond the Sky’s Edge
In Beyond Sky’s Edge, by Pat Wahler, readers are transported to the year 1912 to follow the transformative journey of eighteen-year-old Olivia “Livvie” Newcomb. Living in St. Louis under the thumb of her protective and traditional parents, Livvie chafes against the societal expectation that she marry her childhood friend, Leonard Wyatt. Her world is cracked open during a trip to Kansas City, where she experiences the exhilarating freedom of a tethered hot air balloon ride. This brief taste of the heavens ignites an obsession with aviation, a passion further fueled by the real-life exploits of female pilots like Harriet Quimby and Katherine Stinson. When her family is suddenly plunged into financial ruin and social disgrace after her father is unjustly dismissed from his drafting job, Livvie decides to take her destiny into her own hands.
The novel is a beautifully paced historical coming-of-age story that masterfully contrasts the restrictive domestic spheres of the early twentieth century with the expansive, untamed arena of early aviation. Wahler excels at capturing the sensory details of the era, from the oppressive summer heat of St. Louis and the rustle of restrictive petticoats to the oil-scented, wind-whipped thrill of the airfield. At its heart, the book is less about the technicalities of flying and more about a young woman’s struggle for self-determination. Livvie is a compelling protagonist whose stubbornness and vulnerability make her intensely relatable as she navigates parental disapproval, a bittersweet falling out with a well-meaning but betraying suitor, and her own physical battles with vertigo.
Wahler gracefully charts Livvie’s transition from a sheltered daughter to the pragmatic head of her household. After selling a precious family heirloom to fund her secret flight lessons at Kinloch Field, Livvie begins to see the true cost of independence. The emotional weight of her father’s subsequent illness and death, paired with her mother’s descent into grief, forces Livvie to grow up quickly. She begins to view her headstrong nature not as a rebellion, but as a necessary tool for her family’s survival. Her training under the quiet, scarred mechanic Jake Fleming serves as a crucible, teaching her that “flying takes courage” and that she must “respect the power you hold in your hands.” Through this mentorship and her growing friendship with Katherine Stinson, Livvie finds a community of trailblazers who refuse to let the earth hold them down.
Beyond Sky’s Edge is an inspiring and emotionally resonant novel that celebrates the resilience of the female spirit. It vividly captures the dawn of aviation when flight was a dangerous, poetic adventure, and women had to fight for every inch of sky. By the time Livvie finally takes the controls for her first solo flight, fans of historical fiction will find themselves thoroughly swept up in her triumph. Wahler has crafted a rich historical narrative that reminds us how stepping into the unknown, though terrifying, is often the only way to truly find ourselves.
Pages: 368 | ASIN : B0HCT5WY7Z
The Old Road
The Old Road, by Jimmy D. Whitt, is a portal fantasy with its boots planted firmly in Appalachian soil. Pete begins as a young man from coal country who has already made a few bad choices and isn’t sure what comes next. Then an ordinary walk past an abandoned mine drops him into the Below, a vast underground world of Goblins, Kobolds, Elves, Dwarves, ruined civilizations, strange creatures, and a force simply called the Power. Whitt gets the adventure moving quickly, but the real hook is Pete himself. He carries the hollers, his mother, his humor, his regrets, and his way of looking at people into every strange encounter. Even when the world around him becomes increasingly fantastic, Pete remains recognizably the same kid who started out wondering whether his life was going anywhere.
The Below is built through discovery, and that makes exploring it with Pete a lot of fun. Glowing moss, enormous caverns, ancient roads, bags of holding, glyph-powered tools, underground settlements, strange mounts, lost cities, and competing peoples arrive as things Pete has to understand if he wants to stay alive. The Power gives the story a satisfying progression-fantasy engine, rewarding experience, intent, will, and hard-earned Milestones, but Whitt connects that system directly to character. Pete becomes more capable because he’s learning to pay attention, work, endure, and make better choices. His training under Keres turns those ideas into the backbone of the book. Their relationship grows from wary necessity into trust and affection, with Keres’s relentless lessons in observation and survival becoming as important to Pete’s development as any supernatural ability.
As the story opens up, The Old Road becomes more than a journey through an exotic underground world. Pete’s arrival intersects with missing scouts, mysterious gateways, Elven activity, old abuses of the Power, institutional politics, and dangers that increasingly suggest his presence in the Below matters. Brannick and Lirissa broaden the cast without stealing the story away from Pete, while Pete’s eventual entry into Scout training gives him something he has rarely had before: a place where effort, discipline, friendship, and ability might actually lead somewhere. Whitt also keeps Pete’s sense of humor alive through all of it. His Earthbound comparisons, awkward reactions, running commentary, and occasional inability to leave well enough alone give the book an easy conversational energy even when assassins, political maneuvering, and ancient threats begin closing in.
What stays with me most is the way The Old Road treats transformation as a series of choices. Pete gains extraordinary abilities, but the more important change is that he begins taking responsibility for what kind of person he’ll become. That gives the book’s adventure real emotional weight and makes its cliffhanger ending feel like the opening part of a much larger story. Whitt has created a fantasy world with plenty to explore, but he’s also given readers a protagonist worth following down every dark passage ahead. The Old Road turns an Appalachian kid’s search for a future into a gripping journey through another world, and makes every hard-won step feel like it matters.
Pages: 183 | ASIN : B0DS2Q2PR4
Viaje de Autodescubrimiento
El regalo especial de Áloe Vera sigue a una pequeña planta que, al compararse con las coloridas flores de su jardín, emprende un dulce viaje de autodescubrimiento hasta comprender que su mayor regalo siempre estuvo en su interior. ¿Qué la inspiró a convertir una planta de aloe vera en la protagonista de una historia sobre autoestima y aceptación personal?
La inspiración nació de algo muy sencillo y cercano a mí: el jardín y la manera en que los niños, al igual que las plantas, crecen a su propio ritmo.
El aloe vera no es necesariamente la planta más colorida ni la que primero llama la atención en un jardín. No tiene los pétalos brillantes de una flor, pero posee algo extraordinario en su interior. Esa idea me pareció una metáfora hermosa para hablar con los niños sobre la autoestima, la identidad y el valor personal.
Como madre, abuela y educadora, he visto cuán temprano los niños comienzan a compararse con los demás. Quería crear una historia que les recordara que no necesitan parecerse a nadie más para tener valor. A veces aquello que nos hace diferentes es precisamente lo que algún día se convierte en nuestro regalo más especial.
¿Por qué decidió mostrar el descubrimiento del valor de Áloe a través de la ayuda que brinda a los animales del jardín?
Quería que Áloe descubriera su valor a través de la experiencia, no porque alguien simplemente le dijera que era especial.
A medida que puede ayudar a los animales del jardín, comienza a comprender que aquello que antes veía como una diferencia tiene un propósito. Para mí era importante mostrar que nuestros dones adquieren un significado aún mayor cuando podemos utilizarlos con bondad y para ayudar a los demás.
Los animales también hacen que ese descubrimiento sea mucho más accesible para los niños pequeños. Cada encuentro permite que el mensaje se revele poco a poco, de una manera natural y afectuosa.
Al final, Áloe no tiene que transformarse en otra cosa. Sigue siendo exactamente quien siempre fue; lo que cambia es la manera en que logra verse a sí misma.
¿Cómo trabajó el equilibrio entre el mensaje educativo del libro y la necesidad de mantener la historia divertida y accesible para los niños pequeños?
Siempre quise que El regalo especial de Áloe Vera fuera, ante todo, una historia que los niños disfrutaran.
Mi formación como educadora influye naturalmente en mi escritura, pero no quería que el libro se sintiera como una lección. El aprendizaje debía surgir de la historia, de los personajes, de las emociones y de las experiencias de Áloe.
Por eso utilicé un jardín lleno de vida, animales, pequeños momentos de descubrimiento y situaciones que los niños pueden comprender fácilmente. Los conceptos de identidad, autoestima, empatía y propósito están presentes, pero se encuentran integrados dentro de la aventura.
Creo profundamente que los niños pueden explorar ideas importantes cuando les damos historias que les permitan sentirlas antes de tener que explicarlas.
También me encanta que la conversación pueda continuar después de terminar el libro. Un padre, maestro o cuidador puede preguntar: “¿Cuál crees que es tu regalo especial?” y, de pronto, una historia se convierte en una oportunidad para que el niño piense sobre quién es.
Las estaciones y los cambios del jardín refuerzan de manera muy bonita el mensaje de la historia. ¿Qué importancia tenía para usted incluir ese elemento?
Era muy importante porque el jardín representa crecimiento.
En la naturaleza, nada florece todo el tiempo ni todo crece de la misma manera. Hay temporadas de cambio, de espera, de crecimiento y finalmente de descubrimiento. Quería que el mundo alrededor de Áloe reflejara también su transformación interior.
Los niños están creciendo constantemente, aunque ese crecimiento no siempre sea visible. Sus intereses cambian, desarrollan nuevas habilidades y comienzan poco a poco a descubrir quiénes son.
Las estaciones me permitieron transmitir ese mensaje de una manera muy orgánica: no tenemos que apresurarnos para florecer ni compararnos con alguien que se encuentra en una etapa diferente.
Cada niño tiene su propio tiempo, su propia manera de crecer y algo especial esperando ser descubierto.
Enlaces del autor: GoodReads | Website | Amazon
Un conmovedor libro ilustrado sobre la autoestima, el amor propio, la resiliencia y la magia de la naturaleza.Cuando Áloe Vera observa el jardín, ve flores radiantes y pétalos de todos los colores. A su lado, ella se siente sencilla y espinosa. Nadie parece notarla… hasta que un caluroso día de verano trae quemaduras de sol, raspones y picazón, y Áloe descubre que posee un regalo muy especial.
Al compartir el poder sanador de su gel con sus amigos del jardín, comprende una gran verdad:
aquello que la hace diferente también puede convertirse en su mayor fortaleza.
El regalo especial de Áloe Vera es un hermoso libro ilustrado que inspira a los niños a fortalecer la autoestima, el amor propio, la confianza en sí mismos y la inteligencia emocional. A través de una historia tierna y esperanzadora, los pequeños descubrirán que todos tenemos dones únicos y que la verdadera belleza nace de nuestro interior.
