It can get mighty crowded in that tree

Characters in Moon Tree Brothers

There are currently fourteen teachers. One is a rare Izzet, others are a Bengali Fairy, a Dwarf, an Apache Mountain Spirit, a water Spirit, a Sylph, a Wood Elf, and several mixes of Pixie, Fairies and Elves.

The Counselor is a Black Dragon man, with scales, wings, smoking nostrils and glowing eyes. The Forest Survival teacher has a secret which will play a part in book one.

It can get mighty crowded in that tree.

Twenty-four students, out of more than two hundred and forty students total, have a part in the first book in the series. Their heritage is as diverse as our country is: European, Ugandan, Japanese, Native American, and arabic, to name a few. But, the heroes of our story are three brothers.

 Twelve-year-old Austin is the youngest brother. He has a house fairy on his shoulder, but she has been dropped from book one and, I'm sure, appearing somewhere else.


Cody is the middle brother. At fourteen, he finds his powers difficult to control and immediately begins growing wing buds, but just cannot become an animal with wings. His first shift is to a worm; with wings.

Jesse is the eldest, at sixteen, and he is the scholar of the bunch. His favorite books is The Art of War and he is beginning training to be a General.

Austin, Cody and Jesse Vilness have accepted the invitation of Hino, Thunderer of the Iroquoise Nation, to live in the Realm of Yellowwood. They will receive an education and be schooled in battle tactics.

What they do not know, is that Hino suspects they are the "Saddest Brothers" fortold by the Katchina - a fire elemental named, Masaw, who will help to save their world.

There are currently fourteen teachers. One is a rare Izzet, others are a Bengali Fairy, a Dwarf, an Apache Mountain Spirit, a water Spirit, a Sylph, a Wood Elf, and several mixes of Pixie, Fairies and Elves.

The Counselor is a Black Dragon man, with scales, wings, smoking nostrils and glowing eyes. The Forest Survival teacher has a secret which will play a part in book one. 

Moon Tree Brothers Book Trailer

This is my Moon Tree Brothers book trailer. I would love to hear comments from my loyal, yet incredibly silent, following.

I have not been abducted by aliens!

As time goes by is one of my favorite British sitcoms, but in this context I am talking about life and the passage of time. It has become a time, in my life, where I am caring for an ill, and elderly mother.

She complains that the roles are reversed. She loves to instruct and she does not like playing the child to me, the mother. This is a role that is made even more difficult by the fact that she is OC.

It literally, took me sixty years to realize she was OC, because it was a normal state of my growing up. I thought every household balanced like ornaments when hanging them on the tree. Surely every one's mother cut up bits of papers in perfectly straight squares.

I was the weak one, who cannot cut a straight to save her life. Who finds it disturbing to have perfectly balanced anything on the mantle or coffee table. Don't ever look in my corners and expect perfect cleanliness either.

Caring for a mother who is in stage four heart failure and who has a tube in her gallbaldder can be very time consuming. I am fortunate to have a very understanding and supportive husband, who is often more patient than I am.

My mother, who has done more than I could even detail here for me, is worth every minute of that time, but I do miss being able to dedicate my time to my artwork. But, not to marketing it.

I have a website but find I am not updating it. So, I have decided to drop my website and use blogs instead, to both market my book and artwork.

This blog is already entitled my working title, "Moon Tree Brothers." This blog will remain a place to discuss writing and give you hints of my book.

With that said, I do so hope, I can take the time every couple of days to give you snippets of Moon Tree Brothers. Throw in descriptions, drawings, anything that you might find fun, without endangering my publishing possibilities.

So, a happy holidays to everyone from the gang in the Moon tree, who have come from all over the world to fight the Darkness together. My you have peace, joy and love in your hearts for life.

Outlining vs Writing by discovery

One of the blogs I follows is Miss Snark's First Victim.
AT: http://misssnarksfirstvictim.blogspot.com/ .
Apparently, she received some advice that her book would be better if she did a detailed outline first. Puul-Leaseeee! I appreciated her response, which was to tell her what is wrong with her book but do not tell her how she has to write it.

When I began Moon Tree Brother, I tried to force myself to outline. I tried graphs, index cards, organizational charts, standing on my head (not really, that would not be a pretty - or safe- sight). But, I tried.

What I discovered was that it did not work for me. What works for me is writing by discovery. I start to do research on one thing and bump into something that I just have to include in the book. It may not make the final cut, as my beloved Roma (gypsy) scene did not make it, but it keeps me going.

My manuscript for book one, Moon Tree Brothers, is winging it's way back home from my personal editor, my beautiful sixth grade teacher daughter, as I write. I cannot wait to get onto my final edit before sending it out. In the meantime, I am working on book two.

With a working title of Moon Tree Madness, I am having a blast. Things are getting crazy in the Moon Tree and I only slightly hyperventilate that I have no idea where this will end before I remember that I had no idea where book one would end for a very long time. It actually has had two different endings. This is a lot better than the twenty-seven different openings it has had.

The thing is, we each have our own process. I do not think my book would work near as well if I tried to force it into an outline I did before I had discovered all the wonderful things that happened along the way.

More power to you, if you outline. It's all about what works for you.

Web Page Update

I am in the home stretch, no really!!

I have completed twenty-six pages with graphics and twenty-two text only pages.

The only pages left to go are for my artwork. I know! I know! you are not supposed to put personal things on your writing web page. However, my artwork is my income and it's gotta stay on. I cannot afford a second page just for art.

The text only pages are so easy to do because I just copy the text off the graphic pages onto a template page. It worked better to finish the graphic pages and then go back and do the text only pages.

Also, learn CSS. I will be working on that before I do a total new site again. I do have it built into this site for constant updates. There are lots of things I have planned to keep the web page active and alive. And, I am forcing myself to do so by having a "last date updated" on each page.

So, keeping in mind that all the ART pages are not done, take a look and let me know what you think. I have to go to the library and run through a check, checking all the links but I think I have found the new major one that was wrong.

My site can be seen at:
S. A. VanVleck - author of the Moon Tree series - Home Page

I already had a domain of "VanVleckStudio.com" and my web server recommended keeping that domain for my art customers who might need something new. I also purchased SAVanVleck.com for my writing. I did not go with my proposed title of "Moon Tree Brothers" because it is a working title and a kind agent or editor might find a better one

Native American peace and harmony in Nature

I enjoy research and thought I would share some of the Native American mythology sites I have found in writing the Moon Tree Brothers.

Native American Myths, legends & stories; African-American folklore; French-Canadian folktales;Spanish-American folklore; and...

This is a great site which lists Native American Myths and Legends, as well as African, Cajun, French-Canadian, Dutch, Scandinavian and Spanish-American.


The thing I really like about it is the ease of use. Since I am still on dial-up, I avoid sites where I have to click on each item for even a hint of what it is about. This site lists the title and a sentence that gives you a good idea of what you will find in each story. How else would you know that "Coyote and Wishpoosh" was a story about How the Northwest coastal tribes were formed?


Native American Lore Index is an up and coming site for Native American Indian Lore and has a large listing of stories from many different tribe.

Myths and Legends for American Indian Youth has titles and short descriptions. You can find "Why Fart Man is more Powerful than Caribou Master," which sounds like the next possible super hero movie. My only problem here is that the red print on purple letters is very tough on the eyes.

I would like to finish with the Indian Legends site. Given that Moon Tree Brothers has its basis in the Native culture's message of "peace and harmony with nature," I love this site and would like to leave you with a quote from their index page.

• "While Native American culture has struggled to survive through centuries of displacement and assimilation, the stories and legends passed on from generation to generation refuse to die; this is perhaps due to their common, timeless message of peace and harmony with nature, which is now more relevant with each passing year."

Well said, "Indian Legends." Well said!