Every year I rent a camp/house for a week in June as a reward for a full year of events. It's a week of writing, hiking, kayaking, and it's usually in the location (or one similar) to the novel I'm working on. This year's house is on a lake way Downeast Maine, almost as far as I can go without needing my passport. And my week starts tomorrow.

I asked Mona, my very first writing friend, to join me, and the two of us will explore in the evenings and write during the day.

I took this photo last year during my writing week. Different Maine lake this year, but same peaceful, quiet. Before I signed the lease, I looked up on the Maine Audubon website to see if loons nest on this year's lake and they do. So it felt like a nice place to be immersed in the setting of A Handful of Stars, my 2015 novel, but with a heart-full glance backward to Half A Chance.

The "stars" in the new book's title have two meanings. Stars in the sky, and a blueberry has a star on top. The Native Americans in Maine called them "starberries."