Netflix The Crown – the Duke of Windsor and Wallis Simpson

7 February, 2017 by ES Ivy

I was surprised at first that there was so much about the Duke of Windsor in the Netflix series’ The Crown, since the crown is mainly about the reign of Queen Elizabeth II. The abdication of King Edward VIII happened long before Queen Elizabeth II came to the throne. However, a lot of things that happened early in the reign of Queen Elizabeth II were caused by the crisis when her uncle abdicated. Knowing a bit more about the history of how a former king became the Duke of Windsor might give you a new understanding of the treatment of his story in Netflix The Crown.

The Duke of Windsor and Wallis Simpson

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Cleaner Fish – More Information than You Thought You Wanted to Know

19 February, 2014 by ES Ivy

As I mention in last weeks post about fish cleaning stations, I didn’t intend to do any research for the Miri Attwater series. So when I did start doing some research, I wasn’t doing it like I would if I had been writing a non-fiction book about marine biology. I wasn’t taking a lot of detailed notes with page numbers and cross-referencing. I wasn’t double checking to see if information I got in one source could be confirmed by other sources. I wasn’t looking at a lot of original sources – meaning I wasn’t reading scientific research articles in marine biology journals. Because I know from my text book writing and editing work that there is lots of misinformation in science books and text books, and it gets copied when writers don’t go back to original sources. Writing a really well researched science book takes time – a lot of it. And it helps if you’re an expert in the field.

Really, my first goal for my research was to look at pretty pictures so I could make the underwater scenes in the book more real to the reader.

I probably shouldn’t have been surprised that the more I saw, the more amazed I became by the diversity of marine life. …

Fish Cleaning Station – Yes, fish cleaning stations like in Miri Attwater and All That Glitters really exist

12 February, 2014 by ES Ivy

A dragon wrasse being cleaned by Rainbow cleaner wrasses on a reef in Hawaii. By Brocken Inaglory (Own work) via Wikimedia Commons;

When I started writing the Miri Attwater books, I wasn’t planning on doing any research. They were fantasy, after all. I could make up anything I wanted. But when I started writing the underwater scenes, they felt flat and dim. They didn’t have the vividness I remembered from my snorkeling trips. It seemed like a great excuse to do some research! So I started watching movies about ocean life….

At the blog of Newbery book author Kirby Larson: my first guest post!

31 January, 2014 by ES Ivy

I was so honored to do my first ever guest post at the blog of Kirby Larson. Kirby is the author of the beautiful Newbery book, Hattie Big Sky, that won a well deserved Newbery Honor Award in 2007. It’s a story of a pioneer girl in the early 1900s in the style of my favorite Laura Ingalls Wilder book. I’ve given it many times as a gift and highly recommend it as a great read!

If you’re curious about a peek into some of how the Miri Attwater series came about, and how a fantasy book came to involve science, you can read my guest blog post at Kirby’s Lane.

Octopus Vs. Shark

29 January, 2014 by ES Ivy

A young reader got to wondering about who would win in a fight, a shark or a puma? I did tons of research on sharks for the Miri Attwater series, but I don’t remember coming across that particular information. But I can’t resist a good research topic.

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