Sat, Nov 21 2009
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Published October 15, 2009 11:48 am - Twelve lucky students at Red Cross Elementary ate lunch with one of their favorite “spooky” writers on Monday. Rand meets with fans By LISA SIMPSON STRANGE Glasgow Daily Times GLASGOW — Twelve lucky students at Red Cross Elementary ate lunch with one of their favorite “spooky” writers on Monday.
Author Johnathan Rand, 44, of Topinabee, Mich., visited with students and teachers at the school during a seven-week book tour he is conducting through the state. The creator of the series “American Chillers,” “Michigan Chillers,” “The Adventure Club” and “Freddie Fernortner — Fearless First Grader” has been writing children’s books for 10 years, he said. Rand is a pseudonym used by Christopher Knight, who has written 66 books so far. His first book, “Mayhem on Mackinac Island,” was self-published in March 2000. Knight said writing wasn’t his first career choice. He wanted to get a job working with animals or outdoors. While attending college, he began working at a radio station where he wrote news stories and commercials and discovered that he loved writing. He worked in radio for 15 years before becoming a successful author of books for children and young adults. Knight doesn’t have children of his own, but he and his wife, Deirdre, have three dogs at home, all labradors rescued from the animal shelter, Lily Munster, Scooby-Boo and Spooky Dude. “They’re our babies,” he said. The author spends an average of 200 days a year traveling to schools in different states. He continues to write books on the road, completing 10 to 12 books a year, he said. “I wouldn’t be able to do it without my laptop, that’s for sure,” he said. Knight’s current tour will end just before the holidays. He will spend the rest of the month in Kentucky then travel to Virginia and California before finishing up. “I’ll make it home just before Thanksgiving,” he said. Knight said he loves to travel and that his wife gets to join him on the road sometimes, but when school ends each spring, so do the trips. “I like the travel aspect of it, but in the summertime we don’t travel at all. I kind of hit the brakes right at the end of the school year and we stay the entire summer at our home in northern Michigan, which is like Mayberry R.F.D.,” he said. But during the school year, Knight says he visits about 200 schools in his travels. The students at Red Cross earned the honor of eating with the author Monday through their own writings. The children each wrote a letter and school librarian Amy Shipley picked the best ones. 
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