About

Amy Holt

I was born third in a family that allowed my strangeness to look normal. I grew up in a poor, but happy home. A year out of high school, I married a wonderful man who treats me like a queen. We have two very smart boys. I “retired” from working as a full-time mom when my youngest graduated high school. Now, I write 5 days a weeks, and my dog, Ranger, makes sure I get plenty of exercise. That makes me the most boring person you’ve read about in years, maybe ever.

The good news is sometimes boring people write about people who do really cool things. Levi Anders, Mathew with one ‘t’ Christensen, and Lily are someone my favorite and most exciting people I know – even though they aren’t real. You can meet them and read about their adventures in my stories.

 

Why I Write

I was informed that I absolutely have to share on this page why I started writing or something catastrophic might happen. Since I don’t want to be responsible for the zombie apocalypse, I’ll share.

Several years back, I developed some health problems that made sitting a in recliner feel like work. I learned that sitting in a recliner all day only sounds like fun if you don’t really have to do it. Actually, it never sounded like fun to me. Riding bikes, playing catch or hiking sounded like fun, even vacuuming or laundry sounded like more fun than sitting in a recliner all day. After months of sitting, well, more like laying, I was crazy with boredom.

Boredom can make you do things that are completely out of character; for me, that was writing. Why in the world would I want to write a story? I didn’t even enjoy reading. I’m dyslexic.

It was incredibly difficult for me to learn to read. The simple sight words that everyone else learned overnight got mixed up in my mind. Words like “went” and “when” or “then” and “there” were harder to decode than ancient hieroglyphics. Reading meant carefully deciphering each word on the page, hoping I could make sense of the individual words when I finished the sentence. More often than not, I had to reread multiple times to understand what I read. It’s enough to make anyone’s brain hurt.

The catalyst for me writing was a dictionary sitting on the floor by my recliner. In my state of extreme boredom, I picked it up and flipped through the pages. Some of the words seemed to jump off the page. I loved the way they sounded and looked. Those words began creating a story. Moire and Corona became last names. Hypha was the little town in the story. I listened to this story play out in my head until I had to write it down. It sounds crazy–even to me–that something so ordinary as a dictionary can change the way you view the world.

It didn’t make me instantly good at reading or spelling. What this experience did was unceremoniously dumped a drive to share my stories. At first, I didn’t even want that drive because it came with the need to do tons and tons of work and study. Simply being able to read and write doesn’t cut it if you want to write well — and if it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well. I’ve studied and practiced writing almost everyday for over ten years, and I still have many things to learn.

I have no doubt that my desire to write and any ability that I have is a gift from Heavenly Father to help me not go completely crazy. My hope is that my stories will do two things – encourage reading, especially with reluctant readers and be exciting wholesome entertainment.

 

 

A Tomboy Princess

I came between Mathew and Peter in the one and a half dozen kids my mom claimed. My dad called me Princess since I was the only girl, which led my brothers to believe they should serve me and bow to my every whim. Not really, but I might not have had to beat them up so many times if they had.

 

 

Random facts about Amy Holt

My Dictionary/Thesaurus app is my favorite. When you spell as poorly as I do, sometimes spell check can’t figure out what you’re trying to say. In those cases, I use the thesaurus to look up a similar word that I can actually spell and then I search among the answers for the word I really want.

I like to skip, but usually I just walk because–a grown lady skipping; it just looks weird. But if I think no one’s paying attention, I skip.

I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve taken the vacuum apart to clean or fix it.

I like having a clean, organized house. That doesn’t mean my house is either clean or organized. I’m just saying I like it when it is.