Kristina’s Blog
Kristina’s Blog
Painting the Pandemic
My last newsletter appeared here in February, that heady time we recognize now as the end of life as we knew it. Soon after I wrote the cheerful note about my 2018 book, From Here to Argentina: A Tango Love Story, I was off to Portland, Oregon for Valentango, the...
A Gift of Love
Love, romance, and tango shine a glittering light through this month that can be so dismal in northern latitudes. For the fourth year in a row, I plan to celebrate Valentine's Day (and my husband's birthday) dancing at Portland's Valentango 2020 festival. To share the...
If You’re Feeling Helpless
Among all the disasters and tragedies afflicting our world, the fires in Australia bring me to tears, my cherished memories of places half-a-world away now overlaid with videos of exploding eucalyptus forests, desperate firefighters, and animals with their paws burnt...
Giving Thanks for Independent Bookstores
In this time of political madness, nothing is more soothing to me than to take refuge in one of our Central Oregon independent bookstores. We're rich in this region with Roundabout Books in Bend's NW Crossing, Dudley's in downtown Bend, Herringbone in Redmond, and...
Tango and Beaches and Bears!
Write what you know is a sensible dictum; write what you want to find out is way more fun. The wild Pacific Coast of Vancouver Island first stirred my imagination when I was an undergrad in Bellingham, near the Canadian border. I finally got there a few...
Summer Dreams
Fiction writers, story weavers, dream for everyone. A person not allowed to dream gradually goes mad; a world without dreams would be unlivable. We need dreams of beauty and love and kindness, humor, excitement, and mystery––even nightmares––to thrive. As a writer, I...
Oregon High Summer
Here, in late July, each day's air is so clean, the sky so blue, I want to drink it––no big wildfires this season in our Oregon Cascades. (We knock wood when we say it, as though the superstition will save us when lightning storms come flashing through.) Even now, in...
Krayna’s Tiny Books Magic (in memory of Lucky)
My friend, Krayna Castelbaum, and I both write. I produce novels with hundreds of pages, Krayna, poems, sometimes only a few words, all the more precious for the books she makes to share them. With her own creative alchemy, Krayna transforms tea bags––yes, tea...
Sharing Stories
Virtual reality, algorithms, blockchain, metadata, going wide, artificial intelligence and machine learning––doesn't sound like the lineup for an authors' conference, does it? Maybe not ten years ago, or even five, but if you stand still, WHOOSH, you'll see the world...
©Copyright 2023 Kristina bak
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Artist and Author of From Here to Argentina: A Tango Love Story, Nowever and Cold Mirage.