Mavis Jukes

I grew up in New City, New York, and Princeton, New Jersey.  I loved everything to do with the West: especially saddles, old horseshoes, and boots with inlaid roses on the sides.  I have been a cowboy ever since I was a little kid—and I'm not talking fringy skirt. I'm talking woolly chaps and huge palomino horse that rears up on its hind legs, snorts, whinnies, and gallops across the plains in a thunderstorm when I'm out there chasing bad guys.  However, in my actual real life, I moved out West when I was eighteen but didn't buy a horse.  I have to admit it:  I've never had the cattle, only the hat. Total livestock count: one sheep. I studied sculpture, education, and law.  I've been an elementary school teacher and—thanks to Frances Foster—a children's writer. Frances started me off writing children's books, and I will be forever in her debt for that. 
 
I have lived on a small ranch in northern California for 32 years. I have two great stepsons and two great daughters.  For the past two years, I have been writing lyrics for country songs, fulfilling the not-so-secret dream I've had ever since my book No One is Going to Nashville was published in 1983.  Now that my kids are grown, I spend all of my spare time out on the high desert plains under the big skies with my husband, Bob, where we drive out on lonesome, two-rut roads to hunt for rocks, twisted wire, and rusty, shot-up buckets and cans. And to rustle up ideas and images: for books, songs, and artwork.  Bob is a sculptor who incorporates found objects in his work. I am his biggest fan, lifelong companion, and partner in the hunt. He's an art cowboy who wears J.B. Hill boots with stars on the tops and a Stetson with a bent brim.  I've been getting a lot of ideas and inspiration from Bob, beginning with No One is Going to Nashville and Like Jake and Me and continuing right on up through Smoke.  So, thanks, Bob!