Have you ever met someone who made you nod your head and say, yes? Or, who phrased the jumble of letters and words that form our language in such a way that you could not help but grin and smile?

Helena Hann-Basquiat, everyone’s favorite dilettante, made me nod, grin and laugh from the moment I met her. Remarkably, she met my nerdy persistence with enthusiasm. Though she may be right in that I simply decided we were going to be friends, what made me stick around her site was the way she made words come to life.

Since meeting her, her words have made me smile. They have made me cringe with trepidation, and flip electronic pages as fast as my mouse could click them in anticipation. Her words have frightened me, and they have made me cry.

And these are just the fictions she’s written since I’ve been a regular reader. When she turns her attention to the world around her, her words often leave me breathless – amused, heartbroken and breathless.

You want these words for yourself. Believe me, you do. You want to preorder her book, Memoirs of a Dilettante, Vol. One at Kickstarter.  Hers is a reachable goal, and dropping $5 to get the Memoirs e-pub AND two fantastic scary stories, will bring her that much closer.

Of course, if you are anything like me, and want a copy you can hold in your hands – or, better yet, have the scribbling of a Dilettante personalize that copy for you – then preordering through her Kickstarter campaign is the only way to do that.

Click here

Just do it. Support an indie author and click that link. Read what her Kickstarter has to say. You won’t regret it. Ever since I clicked that link on her Gravatar, I have not.

With a few strokes of a pen (or clacks of the keyboard), she paints characters so lifelike, so fragilely human, and so familiar, it’s easy to see yourself in them. I want them to succeed (or fail, as the case may be), and, as my ultimate test for a character, I want them to stick around my head so we can have a chat, maybe a drink or two.

Through her words, I see her world. She and Penny are as familiar to me as people I’ve known my entire life, because that’s how Helena invites you into her world. Some of the things you’ll witness there are raw. Some of them are painfully but beautifully honest and still others are downright silly and fantastic. And all of it will keep you captivated. Every last second. You’ll devour her words and in turn, they will devour you, spit you out and leave you satisfied they did.

As a final note, today on Twitter I recommended her to a new follower. I told him that Helena was an excellent, hilarious and terrifying writer. What did I mean by that? Why is Helena terrifying?

She creates people. She gives them flesh, and then, in some of her scarier work, as Jessica B. Bell, she rips that flesh from them and leaves them as ghosts to linger in our minds. Some are mournful deaths, some are justified but always the ghosts of her words remain. And this isn’t me being maudlin and Irish, folks, this is simply the truth as I see it. Helena’s work will haunt you in the best possible way.

Support her Kickstarter. Preorder the e-pub, the personalize package, the hard-copy – whatever you choose, you will help this dilettante, this indie author, get these beautiful , haunting, fabulous stories the attention they deserve.

PS: If all of that wasn’t enough to convince you, she has excellent – and I mean excellent – taste in music. Go on, click the Kickstarter link. You know you want to!

In other News

Quickly, head over to Marie Ann Bailey, blogger at 1WriteWay and a dear friend, and read her touching tribute to her beautiful tortie-tabby, Luisa. While you’re there, stick around. Marie is a wonderful person and a great writer.

Also, Charles E. Yallowitz, author of the Legends of Windemere Series is having a Twubs chat on Saturday, March 16 from 8-10, Eastern Standard Time. Head over to his site for more information, but just in case  you can’t, Just follow these instructions to join in the fun:

1. Go to Twubs Chat.
2. Log In through Twitter or Sign Up with Twubs Chat.
3. Search for the #windemerespeaks hashtag.
4. Join in the conversation.