Works by
Catherine Friend
(Writer)

Children

• My Head is Full of Colors (1994)
  Maria awakes one morning to find her normally spiky brown hair replaced by all the colors of the rainbow. Her head is full of colors, and on this day she draws and paints like never before. The following morning Maria awakes to find her head full of books. They tell her about faraway places, creepy spiders, and rockets that fly to the moon. And it isn’t long before her head is full of animals and then people. But one day something unexpected happens: Maria awakes to find her head is full of—nothing. Or maybe there is something after all.
  
  Kiki’s colorful watercolors wonderfully capture the joy and anticipation of Maria’s early morning surprises.  Ages 4-8

• The Sawfin Stickleback: A Very Fishy Story (1994) with Dan Yaccarino, Illustrator
  People still talk about the time my little brother Mark caught the gigantic sawfin stickleback—the biggest, meanest, and scariest fish to ever live in Amber Lake. It all began the first time he came ice fishing with me and Grandpa. The fishing was pretty slow that day, and our bobbers weren’t even getting nibbles until a dark shape swam beneath the ice...
  
  This humorous fish story, brilliantly illustrated by Dan Yaccarino’s bold, graphic art, will keep young readers on the edge of their seats wondering if—and how—Mark will land the sawfin stickleback. Ages 4-8

• The Perfect Nest (2007) with John Manders, Illustrator
  Jack the cat is building the perfect nest. It’s bound to attract the perfect chicken, who will lay the perfect egg, which will make the perfect omelet. And sure enough, a chicken shows up ("¡Caramba!) but so do a duck ("Sacre bleu!") and a goose (“Great balls of fire!”). Feathers get ruffled—and Jack gets much more than breakfast—in a funny tale rich in details with a sweet final twist.

Eddie the Raccoon Series (2004)
(See Brand New Readers for more information.)

• Eddie the Raccoon with  Wong Herbert Yee, Illustrator
  Four short stories, for kids just learning to read, show the trouble a raccoon can get himself into on a farm. The eight-sentences stories were inspired by naughty raccoons visiting the author’s farm, Rising Moon Farm.  Ages 4-8

• Eddie and Little Skunk

• Eddie Digs a Hole

• Eddie in a Jam

• No Eggs for Eddie

Ruby the Sheep Series (2000)
Ruby is a young sheep who is great at getting into trouble, but not so good at getting out of it. Children will laugh along with Ruby in this collection of four very short stories for beginning readers inspired by the author’s life with sheep. (None of her sheep are as naughty as Ruby, however!) 

• Funny Ruby with Rachel Merriman, Illustrator
  Four stories about the antics of a silly sheep named Ruby as she picks flowers, jumps, eats hay, and plays with a friend. Ages 4-8

• Ruby Is Hungry

• Silly Ruby with Rachel Merriman, Illustrator
  Four stories about the antics of a silly sheep named Ruby as she plays in the dirt, eats a cow's corn, makes too much noise, and knocks apples from a tree.

Fiction (Adult)

• The Spanish Pearl (2007 release)
  When Kate Vincent and her partner travel to Spain, Kate is accidentally transported back in time...way back in time...to 1085. What does a woman like Kate do in a world of no antibiotics, no feminism, no Diet Coke? She denies it as long as possible, then sets her mind to getting home. Tricky with her now useless twenty-first century skills.
  
  Things don't go well. Kate is captured by a band of mercenary soldiers and becomes an unwitting pawn in the violent conflict between the Catholic kings and the Islamic Moors. In her struggle to stay alive and return to the future, Kate must flee exotic harems, filthy dungeons, and treacherous Moorish courts. But when a sword-brandishing woman with an astonishing secret sweeps into Kate's life, Kate is suddenly torn between two women, and between two centuries.
  
  The Spanish Pearl is an epic adventure spiced with humor, lust, and danger—a story with surprising twists that will capture your imagination just as Kate's dilemma captures your heart.

• The Crown of Valencia (November 2007 release)
  "Not to be coy, but I can’t tell you much about The Crown of Valencia without revealing spoilers from The Spanish Pearl. Just know that once again, Kate Vincent finds herself in a mess, both romantically and time travel-wise. Romance, betrayal, intrigue, disobedient children, and religious fanaticism pack this tense conclusion to the epic adventure begun in The Spanish Pearl." -- Catherine Friend

Non-fiction

• Hit by a Farm: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Barn (2006) -- Finalist 2006 Lambda Literary Award for Biography (Lesbian)
  Farms have fences. People have boundaries. Mine began crumbling the day I knelt behind a male sheep, reached between his legs, and squeezed his testicles. This took place one blustery November day when I joined other shepherd-wannabees for a class on the basics of raising sheep. I was there with my partner Melissa, the woman I’d lived with for twelve years, because we were going to start a farm .
  
  When self-confessed “urban bookworm” Catherine Friend’s partner of twelve years decides she wants to fulfill her lifelong dream of owning a farm, Catherine agrees. What ensues is a crash course in both living off and with the land that ultimately allows Catherine to help fulfill Melissa’s dreams while not losing sight of her own.
  
  Hit by a Farm is a hilarious recounting of Catherine and Melissa’s trials of “getting back to the land.” It is also a coming-of (middle)-age story of a woman trying to cross the divide between who she is and who she wants to be, and the story of a couple who say “goodbye city life” — and learn more than they ever bargained for about love, land, and yes, sheep sex.

• The Compassionate Carnivore (2008 release)