Click the link for a chance to win 1 of 4 copies of The Nut Hut!

Edited to announce: All 4 copies of The Nut Hut have been won! Thanks everyone for playing and sharing! The print version of this book is still available to purchase, and the eBook versions of all of my titles are always just a click away (links to the right of this page). Thanks again!


Click the link below for a 1-20 chance to win one of 4 trade paperback copies of The Nut Hut, my stand-alone novel. No purchase necessary, must be a US resident and over 18 to win, must have an Amazon account. How quickly the prizes are won depends on the volume of traffic- it could be fast, it could be slow. While you're there, check out my Tory Bauer mysteries, and if you're a knitter, my knitting books. Yes, this is pure promotion, but at least you might win something... smile emoticon. Have fun, and if you win, let me know! (Amazon is doing the choosing and shipping- I'm not involved in picking the winners).

Click here

The Nut Hut is now in print!

I am thrilled to announce that the book that I consider to be my best writing is finally in print! The Nut Hut, the story of an 18 year old's first week of work at a state-run institution in 1971, is now available for order as a trade paperback from Amazon (the Kindle, Nook, and other ePlatform versions are all still available).

I will say that even though this is my 12th title (6 mysteries, 5 knitting books, one mainstream novel), seeing a book in print for the first time never gets old. Ever. Especially for this one, given that I finished the first draft in January 2001.

The cover looks good on paper too!

It's a hefty tome for your $11.99!

Did I say I was thrilled? Giddy is more like it!

Attention KOBO readers!

KOBO is having a 4 day 30% off sale of select titles, including The Nut Hut! The promo code is TGIFSAVE30, and instructions for using the code are on the main page.

Here's the main page link.

This is the main page, announcing the sale. The Nut Hut isn't listed on that page (they're showing Romance, Mystery, and SF), but if you click on Browse Now, and look for the title, you'll find it. And you'll find it faster if you search titles Z-A.

Here's the sale page

And here's the direct link to The Nut Hut:

I'm very proud of this book, and thrilled for it to be included in this promotion.

A Bit of Publicity

The Sioux Falls Argus Leader did a nice article on South Dakota writers. I never know, after an interview, if I've said anything particularly stupid, but if I did this time, they left it out. I just wish they had asked for a current picture- this one is about five years old.

More praise for The Nut Hut

I'm overwhelmed. Seriously.



A sweeter, less caustic version of One Flew Over the 

Cuckoo’s Nest, the Nut Hut by Kathleen Taylor is the story of 

attendant Becky Decker’s first week in a mental institution 

during the early 1970’s. Still, the story retains a bite. The 

prose is velvety smooth, and the sharp characterizations 

make for a fast, unputdownable read. I recommend it highly, 

if only to remind those of us who are not impaired how 

blessed we really are. 

Libby Fischer Hellmann, author of A BITTER VEIL

The first reviews are in...

I'm still hyperventilating...

Early sales are doing well. Thank you, everyone!

I'm about to hyperventilate

I finished the first draft of this book in January, 2001. Today, it's officially on sale at Amazon, and at Barnes & Noble. Other eBook platform editions will be uploaded right after the first of the year.

I am so excited!!!!!!!

If your Kindle download came with no cover illustration, go to your Amazon account, click on Kindle, Click on Manage Device, Click on Purchases, and then to the right of The Nut Hut, click on Deliver To whichever device. The cover will download (the first few purchases didn't get the cover). It won't cost more, it's just an update.

In and out...

The MOBI file for The Nut Hut arrived, so most of my time has been taken up with proofing so it can be uploaded for sale.

I gotta say that this never, ever, gets old. (Ignore the rectangle- it's a glitch that will be removed.)

But I did take time over the weekend to make Santa Cookies with the Grandgirls. We couldn't find Nutter Butter cookies, but these oval ones worked just as well.

Frog Girl had the brilliant notion of standing the cookies upright between the lines on my cake rack so that the almond bark could set without getting squished. I recommend that method highly. And the cookies taste pretty good too.

We haven't tried these yet, and this photo was taken from the site, I hope we get a chance to make Snowflake Ballerinas too!

In the evening, I spend a couple of hours of TV time working on the Santa Tree Needlepoint. If I say so myself, it's going to be pretty cool.

More advance praise for The Nut Hut

I hope you're not tired of these, because I'm sure not...

Kathleen Taylor's brilliant novel "The Nut Hut" takes the reader on a harrowing trip inside a state institution for people with mental disabilities, circa 1971. Through young Becky Decker's baptism of fire -- her first week on the job -- we explore Byerley State Hospital with the eyes of an innocent. Our appreciation for the workers and the patients and their day-to-day dance of survival grows along with Becky's own. By the end, we're confident that she -- and we -- have a better understanding of them all. Highly recommended."
    --Steve Brewer, author of the Bubba Mabry mysteries

More advance praise for The Nut Hut

The Nut Hut is a chilling tale about the cold heart of state institutions. A smart, insightful novel, it’s full of more truths than any ten works of nonfiction and way more entertaining.

                Reed Farrel Coleman, three-time Shamus Award-winning author of Gun Church

Advance praise for The Nut Hut

The files are being formatted now, and The Nut Hut will be available for download soon.

In the meantime, here's some advance praise for the novel. I am seriously and thoroughly chuffed:

Kathleen Taylor is one of the best storytellers around. The Nut Hut is a total-immersion into the 1971 world of residential care for the mentally retarded. It is ruthlessly honest, but at the same time extraordinarily moving. A totally captivating novel that will draw you in and not let you out until the last page is read.

Denise Swanson--New York Times Bestselling Author of the Scumble River and Devereaux's Dime Store series

Drum roll please!

I am thrilled to unveil, finally, the cover of my mainstream novel, The Nut Hut. The copy edits have been incorporated and the files have been sent off for formatting. I don't have an exact release date yet, but I hope it will be available on all eBook platforms by the end of the year. I will, of course, keep you posted on the progress. I love love love this cover- it fits the tone of the book perfectly.

Here's the catalog copy: In late January, 1971, eighteen-year-old Becky Decker reported for her first day of work at Byerley State Hospital and School, a state-run institution spoken of mostly in whispers. She hoped to make friends, and to "make a difference" in her very first job. What she found during that week was a world of heartbreak and hope in a universe that no longer exists.

And an Author Note will read as follows: Though institutions like Byerley existed in every state, the transformation brought about by Title XIX and other federal programs changed that world forever. The institutional policies and procedures depicted herein are accurate as far as I can remember them, but Byerley itself and the story in this book are both works of fiction. Truth was willingly sacrificed in favor of the story. Any resemblance between the characters and persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

This book has had a long, strange journey, and I am very excited, eleven years after finishing the first draft, that it's finally going to be released. It's time for the Happy Writer Dance!

Done

Copy edits finished... on to Thanksgiving prep, and 4 or 5 kinds of fudge...

Drum roll, please... A Major Announcement

I'm not going to search back through the blog archives to find links, but I know that I've mentioned my unpublished mainstream novel. Several times. And I'm pretty sure that each time I mentioned it, I also declared that I thought it was my best work, but for whatever reason, it just never found a home.

After that first series of rejections I didn't actively search out publishers for the book, but I never gave up on it. Here and there over the last decade, a small publisher would ask to read the manuscript. I'd get my hopes up, only to receive another rejection.

So when a very nice eBook publisher expressed an interest in The Nut Hut, I didn't celebrate with champagne (or my latest Wine Crush: Moscato). I didn't rush off to tell family or friends. I didn't announce it here (or on Facebook). I just waited, expecting disappointment once again.

Imagine my surprise when my agent let me know that the very nice eBook publisher had offered a contract on the book!

Imagine my greater surprise when my agent mentioned that though the eBook publisher was very nice and quite reputable, if we published the book ourselves the same way we've been doing with the Tory Bauer Mysteries, we stood to make more money, with the added bonus of still controlling all of the rights should a mainstream publisher want to produce a dead tree version.

I thought about that for awhile, and then I did something that I've never done before... something I never expected to do: I thanked the nice eBook publisher for his contract offer, and then I turned it down.

I'll pause while you absorb that: I turned down a legit contract offer on a book that I had waited long and long to be published, a work that I consider to be my best writing. Instead, we're going to release the book ourselves.

I'm working with the exceptionally talented Kelly Brewer who is editing the book (she has already discovered that I have a Very Special Relationship with the comma), and though he's really really busy with paid gigs these days, I hope that Curtis Taylor can work his cover magic once again for me. We don't have a set release date, but I am hoping to have it all ready before the end of the year (after the final Tory Bauer Mystery, Foreign Body, is released). It'll be available across all eBook platforms, and it'll be text-to-speech and lending enabled. And if there is anywhere near enough interest, a print version is a real possibility.

Oh- and the story: The Nut Hut centers on an 18 year old girl's first week of work in a state-run institution. It's set in 1971, in a universe that most certainly existed. I worked in just such an institution at the same age, during the same time, but though the practices and procedures are true to life as it was back then, the story is not autobiographical.

I'm really, and I do mean REALLY, excited that this book will finally be published. And there is no doubt that I'll keep everyone posted on the progress!

Okay, now I'll open the Moscato. Cheers!