Author Sarah Burr (Nichols) reads from her book Friday afternoon for the Los Alamos Reporter. Photo by Maire O’Neill/losalamosreporter.com
Stop by Samizdat Bookstore at 174 Central Park Square at 1 p.m. for the Book Launch Party.
BY MAIRE O’NEILL
maire@losalamosreporter.com
When you sit down to interview Los Alamos author Sarah Burr (Nichols) you immediately sense her intelligence and humor and imagine her as being also very intelligent and funny as a child. The Los Alamos Reporter was not surprised to learn that Burr has been writing for as long as she can remember and that as a little girl, she would dictate stories to her mother. She believes she began writing “seriously” in 2006.
When you dig a little, you find out Burr lives in Los Alamos with her husband and two sons, 23 and 21, (when they are at home) as well as her parents and her two cats.
She has worked in IT at Los Alamos National Lab for 13 years, which seems like such an unusual day job for such a lighthearted author of diverse books.
“I love my job because my phone rings and I help someone. Mostly they’re very nice and I never know what the issue is when the phone rings, so I don’t get bored the way I had gotten bored in previous jobs,” she said. “It’s nice to be able to solve people’s problems and make their day if I fix them.”
Asked what was her inspiration for “Sunrise Psychiatric”, Burr said she didn’t know for a long time.
“It seemed like the idea just came to me fully-formed. Then I realized it was a song called Steal Smoked Fish, which is a weird name for a song, by a band called The Mountain Goats and it has a lot of things that are in this, like the line, ‘God Bless All Vampires Every Night’. The book is actually about a mental hospital for vampires. It has drug addicts in the song, The lead singer of the band usedto work as a psychiatic aide in a mental hospital,” she said.
Burr said it seemed pretty obvious to her that vampires would have mental issues.
She just finished writing the first draft of a book she is co-writing with a friend. It’s based on nursery rhymes. Burr says it has been really fun to write it with her friend. There are two main characters; Burr’s is Mary from “Mary Had A Little Lamb” and the other character is Jack from “Jack Be Nimble” and other Jack-related rhymes.
“I write the chapters from Mary’s point of view and she writes the chapters from Jack’s point of view. It’s always fun to see the chapters because we’re not really plotters and we didn’t decide what would happen before we started,” Burr said.
Stop by Samizdat Bookstore today, Nov. 7 at 1 p.m. for the Book Launch Party.
Below is a complete list of Burr’s published books:
Books for Children–Written Under the Name S.E. Burr:
Math Pirates series (5 books) shows characters using math in practical (and piratical) ways. It uses exciting stories to teach kids cool math concepts–
The Search for Pirate Pete
Making a Sail for a Pirate Ship
Pirate Provisions
Treasure Hunt
Dividing the Plunder
My Brother Came Early and My Sister Came Early are coloring books meant to prepare children for meeting their premature baby siblings.
The Funny Math Stories series (5 books) disguise tough math concepts in funny stories appropriate for elementary age kids–
1% Clean
Two Little Weeds
99 Bottles
Multiplying Letters
Half-Sized Cake
The Gobbled series (4 books) young adult contemporary novels–
Goblin Fruit
Goblin Girl
Goblin Winter
Goblin LiesAdult Books under the name Sarah Burr:
The Bridge to Nowhere – a ghost story set on and inspired by the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge near Taos.Sunrise Psychiatric