WRITING ABOUT TRADITION OF MAGIC

Writing about a tradition of magic

By PAT MICHAELS

The Orange County Register

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Costa Mesa's Jamie Martinez Wood is all excited that her new book will be coming out in June. She is the author of six previous volumes, but this is the first published by a major publisher, Random House. It's also her first effort at fiction. Jamie, who sandwiches her literary work between being a housewife and mother of two, was born and raised in Orange County. From her youth, she tells me, she was fascinated by the interest of the Hispanic community in magic, superstition and even witchcraft. And she was enchanted with just writing. As a child, she'd penned her own tomes, one of which was titled "The Runaway Hamburger." However, it was when she went to work as an assistant to a literary agent that her authorship began to flower. At night at home, she began working on articles, books and even a screenplay. In 1998 Jamie turned out her first published volume. It was titled "The Wicca Cookbook." The book takes readers through recipes of ancient paganism, witchcraft and spell-binding. It was a success. But even as "The Wicca Cookbook" was hitting bookstores, Jamie had turned out another volume titled the "Hispanic Baby Name Book," which not only offered suggestions on baby names such as Xochil, Andres and Esmeralda, but also told their history. There was so much interest, though, in the spell-binding "Wicca Cookbook" that Jamie followed it with volumes titled "The Teen Spell Book," "The Wicca Herbal" and "The Enchanted Diary." One of the volumes of which Jamie is most proud, however, had nothing to do with witchcraft. It was titled "Latino Writers and Journalists," which she says "is a landmark textbook to be used in high school or college literature classes." It tells the stories of some 150 famous Latino writers and journalists. For Jamie, it sparked numerous appearances at Hispanic events and on university campuses where Jamie tells the stories she found. Now, Jamie is anxiously awaiting the turnout of her next volume, which she feels is sure to be big. Says Jamie: "It's my first published work of fiction and for me, it's very exciting." What's the new book about? It's about three Latino girls who each have a supernatural gift. It's titled "Rogelia's House of Magic."

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If you would like a press kit, please send request to maito:Jamie@jamiewood.com