Haunting Danielle | Bobbi Ann Johnson Holmes

To say 2014 has been a challenge for my husband and me would be an understatement. We spent most of the summer dealing with Don’s knee infection which involved emergency surgery and six week of in-home IV treatment—three times a day administered by yours truly.

Just when Don was able to start enjoying life again we went to visit our daughter and her family in their new Sacramento home only to cut our trip short when my mother-in-law, Doris, was hospitalized. After two weeks in the hospital, and two surgeries, Doris passed away in intensive care, while Don held one of her hands and I held the other.

In spite of the fact Doris was 86, her death came as an unexpected shock to us. Her father had made it to just a few months shy of his 100th birthday and the day before her death we were told she’d be released from the hospital in a few days and that physically she was doing well.

Doris lived in a little house on our property, and my mother (also 86) lives with us. Mom took Doris’ death especially hard—losing a lifelong friend from her own generation, whom she shared so many memories.

In the midst of planning Doris’ memorial service and settling her estate, I was diagnosed with stage two breast cancer. I’m having surgery the first part of December.

One thing I am reminded of through all of this is what a wonderful—seriously—truly remarkable—family I’ve been blessed with. Not just our two amazing adult children and their supportive and loving spouses, and our two grandchildren, but my mother, sister and all the extended family—like Don’s cousins on the Talbot side of the family, who are always there when we need them.

Doris’s memorial service proved to be a love fest as we were surrounded by friends and family, many of whom came a long way to be by our side—from Texas, Missouri, Montana, Oregon and California.

I will get through the breast cancer—not just because I’ve already been through cancer twice and lived to tell the tale (malignant olfactory nerve in 1978 and thyroid cancer in 2005) but because I’ve the love and support of such an amazing family. Plus, I’m stubborn as hell. Just ask Don.

In preparing for my battle I’m making a radical change to my diet, focusing on foods cancer hates and eliminating foods cancer loves—like sugar—from my diet. I’ll be working with doctors I trust to fight this battle, while at the home front doing all I can to starve those little bastard cancer cells.

This morning for breakfast I had a tossed green salad, Alaskan salmon, humus, cucumber slices and almonds. Was quite yummy.

I am also getting back to writing Haunting Danielle, Book 3 (with my alter ego Anna J. McIntyre) while working on my treadmill desk (which I am doing right now). I took several weeks off, but now time to get back to writing and taking care of myself. I’d hoped to release Haunting Danielle, Book 3 January 1, 2015, but now I am shooting for sometime in January 2015.

If anyone can recommend some proven books on cancer fighting foods, please share!

At the end of May I received two comments on my blog in response to my post “Instead of a treadmill desk – a jogging trampoline!” I intended to respond but life got in the way. My husband came down with a mystery infection and then had emergency surgery the first week in June. He came home after almost a week in the hospital and had to undergo six weeks of in-home IV treatment, with me playing nurse.

Things are sort of getting back to normal around here. Sort of.

Don hasn’t been back to his office, but he’s off the IV and now going to physical therapy about three times a week. In spite of his pain and fatigue he’s getting some work done (he is a real estate broker), but that means he’s moved into my home office and we are sharing a desk. I bought one of those little devices that hook up two computers to the same monitor and keyboard, so both of our desktop computers are on my roll top desk.

I don’t use my desktop computer much these days—and prior to Don getting sick, I used to put my laptop on the desk’s keyboard drawer when I wasn’t standing on the trampoline typing.

When Don came home from the hospital the trampoline got shoved aside. I’ve just recently set it up again, yet I’m not using it at the level I was before, for one thing Don and I are still sharing the office, and when I write I can’t do it with anyone in the room. This means I often retreat to the living room couch with my laptop, to find solitude necessary for me to write. Fortunately it is swimming weather, so the pool gives me a daily work out.

As for my writing, yesterday I sent my latest book off to the editor—Haunting Danielle. I normally write fiction under my pen name, Anna J. McIntyre and non-fiction under my real name. But Haunting Danielle is a little different from my other McIntyre books, so I was trying to decide if I wanted to publish under my real name—or the pen name I normally use for fiction.

I decided to publish the book under both names. Why? you ask. It will let my McIntyre readers know the book has a slightly different flavor from my other titles under that name, yet like the McIntyre books it is character driven.

One of my greatest marketing failings as an independent author is creating a series that doesn’t neatly fall under a specific genre. I did this with my McIntyre’s Coulson Series—and now I’ve done it again with Haunting Danielle. I’m trying to pin it down–a ghost story, paranormal mystery, with a splash of romance and maybe a bit on the cozy side. There’s no graphic sex in this one—and while many of my readers insist McIntyre romances are on the clean and sweet side, some reviewers claim there is too much graphic sex in my books. Go figure.

Haunting Danielle is the first book in a new series by the same name. Look for its eBook release on September 1, 2014.