Ellen Fritz is a retired teacher and high school counselor. Over the years of teaching reading and English to students in grades seven through twelve before be-coming a counselor, she had the great opportunity to discuss numerous favorite books with students and also took their recom-mendations for her own reading. She finally found herself with the time to give life to the stories that have always been patiently waiting in her head for an audience. Ellen wrote Mira to appeal to those middle grade/teen readers that she found so inspiring through her career as an educator. I didn't start writing seriously until I retired and found myself with the time to spend a whole day in front of the computer. The ideas had been in my head for many years, but were undeveloped and unexplored. One day, several months after my teaching/counseling career ended, I sat down and started. Some days, the ideas, dialog, and characters flow from my brain and I can barely type fast enough. Other days, I have to walk away, occupy my mind with something else, and hash through what might happen, what might be said. But both days are valuable. While waiting for a publisher to accept my first book, I discovered that rejections were okay. While I want young people to read and enjoy my books, I realized that the writing was more for me. It's a joy to develop the characters and situations, and I can't foresee a time when I'll be ready for it to end.