For Sharlene Martin, here’s the fun part about being a literary agent: “I wake up every morning, and my job is to make dreams come true.”
That said, Martin won’t wave a magic wand to get an author’s book published, no matter how good it is. In fact, she expects a lot of Cinderella-esque legwork – the kind the princess undertook before her transformation – from every writer she represents. Publishing, she believes, is as much about commerce as it is about art.
A scant month ago, Martin left the Los Angeles-based offices of Martin Literary Management in the hands of staff and opened a satellite office here on the island.

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BHS senior Colin Gremse wasn’t able to attend this past weekend’s awards ceremony for the 2008 Washington State High School Photography competition.
So he got a little surprise on Monday morning.
“When I walked into class, the teacher handed me a bottle with my photo on it,” he said.
The vessel in question was a bottle of Jones grape soda, one of 100,000 to be wrapped in Gremse’s winning digital photo entry, “Swingset.”

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The famous, much loved and enjoyed Bainbridge Island garden of David Lewis and George Little is in its last season at the current site. Internationally known Little and Lewis are embarking on a new set of adventures. They’ll still design and install gardens and will continue to create their art consisting of sculptures, mirrors and paintings. This talented team is creating a smaller garden and gallery at a new Bainbridge Island location.

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Well timed with pride festivals and parades slated around Puget Sound upcoming, Seattle-based film director Drew Emery is coming to the Lynwood Theater with his film “Inlaws and Outlaws” this weekend.
The film’s been described repeatedly as “honest and heartfelt,” and also as a look into the “heart of love” in reviews ranging from the Seattle Times to Variety. It made its first big splash at the Seattle International Film Festival a few years ago and continues to pick up momentum.
Its premise — What do you get when you fall in love? — immediately conjures that Elvis Costello and Burt Bacharach duo on the “Austin Powers International Man of Mystery” soundtrack. While its structure — a true stories project — reminds me a lot of the confessions room from reality shows like “The Real World.”

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Celebrating its 10th anniversary, Port Ochard’s Academy of Dance will be presenting a special annual performance recital titled “Back to the Future” with shows at 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. June 14 at the South Kitsap High School auditorium, 425 Mitchell Ave. in Port Orchard. In honor of the company’s 10 years in business, students will be performing resurrected favorites. Info: www.myacademyofdance.com or call Jennifer (360) 710-1752.

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Denver playwright Josh Hartwell’s slice of life drama, “Contrived Ending,” is an intimate look at the crisis of the 20-something generation in today’s world, through the vehicle of a “Clerks” meets “Empire Records” at the movie theater type of comedy.

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The Bremerton Community Theater’s latest production, which hit the boards this weekend, makes clear that it’s often best to leave work at the office.
Especially when it’s the morning of your daughter’s wedding day and your “work” just happens to take the form of a sexily dressed, kinky little flapper girl who’s invisible to everyone else, but only has eyes for you, so to speak. Thus is the complicated situation that a successful British advertising agent named Timothy Westerby (played by the well apt Charlie Birdsell) finds himself in after bumping his head in the Ray Cooney farce “There Goes the Bride.”

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Concert listings for Kitsap County, starting Thursday, June 12.

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There are people who do some of the most important work in the world, despite meager salaries and an often thanklessness and emotionally stressful work environment, all for the love of it.
They’re called teachers.
So it’s good to see that two retired Northwest art teachers are getting a bit of due appreciation and enjoying their time in the sun at local art galleries this month.

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For more than 30 years, Mike Lawson was an engineer at the Bremerton Naval Shipyard, working his way up to the highest civilian rank in the nuclear engineering program.
Now, he writes books at Tully’s.

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