Monday, August 8, 2016

Ken and Anne Hicks work magic with this new kid's (or adults) book Stone Faces




Where do ideas come from?

Anne and I have loved visiting the beach together for as long as we have known each other (around 47 years).


One of the reasons we enjoy it is the unexpected nature of the beach. Twice a day the tide comes in and the tide goes out, depositing and rearranging shells, driftwood, beach glass, stones and stone on the shore. We walk the edges of the water for miles and find all sorts of things to admire. A walk after a powerful storm is especially fun.




For the last fifteen years or so, we have visited the beaches of Cape Cod, which have a wonderful selection of stones with an amazing variety of shapes, colors and textures. At one point, we even made some necklaces and sculpture with the stones and sold those items at several shops on Cape Cod. 



We also began to look more closely at the stones themselves and saw pictures in the stones. Sometimes the images suggested faces of people or animals. Sometimes they were seascapes or landscapes. As we became more and more interested, we began to photograph the stones and we have displayed the photographs in libraries on Cape Cod and have published a book called Picture Stones that is available on the iTunes bookstore.

 


One day during our stroll, we saw a stone that immediately struck as having the shape of man laughing. 



 The name “Mr. Happy Man” came to mind. Soon afterward, a story began to take shape in our minds of a young girl named Alice who finds such a stone on the beach and learns that the stone can talk (as can his stone friends).  These stones help Alice learn about herself and survive a difficult time in her life when her parents are getting a divorce.  The name of the book is Stone Faces and it is has been published by MuseItUp Publishing in digital format and paper.



So where do ideas for our books come from? They can come from anywhere and everywhere.

Here are some links to purchase:



 If you would like to learn more about our books:



2 comments:

  1. This looks very interesting! What a wonderful idea. Thank you for sharing!

    Stacey

    ReplyDelete