Her second took just one month, snuggling in bed last winter with her dogs, Snow, 8, and Kenzie, 5, to produce Maddison McQueen and the Cupcake Mystery .
Her second independently published book hits booksellers this month but Gordon-Smith and her inspiring fur babies are already up to book three in the Red Collie Mystery series, featuring Maddison and her red collie co-investigator, Ruby.
"My first one in 2019 — Lily and the Unicorn King — that took me six years to write so it has been a long time between that one and this."
Maddison McQueen and the Cupcake Mystery is set at the Wānaka A&P Show. Maddison and Ruby are tasked with investigating why Grandma’s cupcakes went missing from the home industry section.
Gordon-Smith is a marketing and public relations freelancer who writes for corporates, motor sports, and other outlets.
About 20 years ago she joined Romance Writers of New Zealand but found romance wasn’t her path.
"I couldn’t get past the first five chapters, really. I realised what I really enjoy is children’s fiction, and I still read children’s fiction all the time. That is where my heart is," she said.
She and her butcher husband Jeff do not have children, but they do very much love their fur babies, including their late collie Ruby, who died a few years ago from Addison’s Disease.
"Ruby — she was a black and white border collie who came with us from Auckland.
"She was the dog of my heart, in a way. She had . . . an auto immune disease where the pituitary gland is affected and you stop making cortisol and bloods go out of whack.
"She would follow you everywhere, was a sweetheart . . . The Ruby in the story is kind of a blend between two, between Kenzie and Ruby. There is a bit of Kenzie’s shrill barking and leaping around the Ruby’s steadiness and easiness to have around," she said.
Reflecting on the five years since 2019, when she published her Unicorn book, she felt her first book could have been better.
"I have learned a lot. The Unicorn was 55,000 words. The thing with the Collie books is I want to write something younger and faster and fun. I had lost the joy of writing fiction and thought if I wrote something in my home town for a kid who loved dogs, how could I go wrong?
"I created a character who is quite feisty and determined and completely obsessed with dogs.
"It was just enormously good fun to write."
One learning was that if she worked on the first three books in the Collie series together, she could cross check plots and set up sequels without writing herself into a corner.
"I found with the Unicorn I had created a world and I had to kind of stick with that world and make it big enough for a second world and it was quite challenging."
Another learning happened during the Covid-19 pandemic, when she set up the Kiwis Kid Book Store — an online business that has now been running for three years and has helped her understanding of the publishing industry.
She is glad she took the independent publishing road.
"If you write a book you believe in, how disheartening can it be to have it turned down by a publisher? It is a valid path. Everyone takes their own road . . . At heart we’re still all story tellers."
Recently, she took the first step to connecting with schools.
Goldfields Primary School in Cromwell has agreed she can take a free storytelling session for children at the end of March.
She is looking forward to honest feedback, what children might suggest happens next, and build her courage to continue.
"This is the year I test myself. I am hoping to publish three books this year."
