In the six short stories collected in Thinking Out Loud, Karen N. Drake provides a glimpse at the inner workings of the mind. With vivid imagery, humor, and a remarkable understanding of the inner voice, Drake introduces readers to the private thoughts of an Asian grandmother, a teenage runaway, a worried military mom, a vengeful peeping tom, and even an inanimate object-- a stop sign. Honest, inventive and insightful, Drake's writing creates a lush and intimate vision of characters familiar and relevant to all.

Karen Drake's Please Be Quiet humorously examines the most negative aspect of apartment life -- noisy neighbors. In this children's story, Herman is plagued each night by neighbors who sing, dance, cry and bark. Despite Herman's polite requests for quiet, the disturbances persist until Herman gives his neighbors a taste of their own medicine. This book teaches compromise and respect for mutual space. The simple vocabulary and sentence structure emphasizes directions and sound words. An added touch is the vivid illustrations by Aaron C. Jones.