Clare B. Dunkle
I was born Clare Buckalew in Fort Worth, Texas, and grew up in Denton, Texas, a city north of Dallas. I earned my B.A. in Russian with a minor in Latin from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. After graduating from Indiana University with a master's degree in library science, I came back to San Antonio to work when my husband, Joe, joined the engineering staff at Kelly Air Force Base. I earned tenure as the monographs cataloger at Trinity University's Coates Library from 1990 to 1999; then I left the library to homeschool my two daughters, Valerie and Elena. My family moved to Germany in 2000, and we lived for seven years in the Rheinland Pfalz region, not far from the old Roman city of Trier. We returned to San Antonio in the summer of 2007, when my younger daughter Elena began college. In 2012, now grandparents, Joe and I moved back to Germany, where we are once again enjoying the bike trails, wine fests, and amazing travel opportunities. We hope to live here at least through 2017.
“Kate had never in her life seen such frightful deformities, and the goblins had never seen such a hideous dress.”
“Forks are absurd, he scoffed. They insult your food. They make it think you're killing it twice.”
“Lively, intelligent, and quite immature, [Emily] usually burst out with exactly the comment that summed up the situation beautifully and therefore could never in politeness be said.”
“For how many generations now had his people been turning their backs on things? How long had they sat in their living rooms and watched other people die?”
“Mom actually said that?" Cassie's face shown with happiness. "She always hated my math!""Nah," Martin said. "She was just being that way for you. She thought it was what you needed to hear. If parents told us what they really think about stuff, we could figure them out like regular people.”
“Em, I am trying to have an important conversation!" shouted Seylin. "I will not change into a cat!”
“Don't fret. We'll just have to find something else you're good at besides killing people.”
“Kate felt very offended. 'I am not an elf,' she insisted. 'I'm an Englishwoman!”
“I had no fear of the stream's perils, and I listened with the greatest contentment to the quiet slap of water on rocks, the running whisper of the current, and the taps and creaks and croaks that rose with the mist around me. Overhead swing the glittering stars, and the bright moon shone down and lit the curling ripples of the water. At no time in my life had I been in greater danger from the elements, and yet if I learned that heaven is such as that night was, I should deem it a joy worth the dying.”
“Being a writer means crying over the sad parts, even though you already know it’s going to be okay.”