One of My Favourite Hobbies by Nancy M Bell

To find more information for Nancy's books click on the cover

I have a few hobbies, anyone who knows me will know horses are a huge part of my life. They have been my sanity, my salvation and my love from a very young age. I also am involved in animal rescue and fostering for a Calgary animal rescue. But on top of that I love to do cross stitch. I have a pile of framed cross stitch projects as a result of the Covid winters. There's something so engrossing about matching the pattern to the threads and seeing the picture come to life in all that glorious colour. It takes my mind off any problems that may be occurring in my life or stresses that are so much a part of everyday life in this day and age. While my husband watches TV shows or sports I can sit happily and listen with one ear while still paying total attention to the project taking shape on my embroidery hoop. 

My subject matter is varied, sometimes Celtic knot patterns, horses, bunnies an tulips, some poppies and even a red dragon. Currently, I am almost finished with a fawn standing in tangled grasses under autumn trees. Once that is done I am hoping to embark on a huge project, much more complicated than what I've done before. It's a standing stone with a raven sitting on top which measures 21.64 inches by 28.57 inches and involves many colours that are very similar to each other. A challenge for sure.   Wish me luck!

This is the start of a Wysoki pattern  Frederick the Literate 

 

 

 

  

 

Transitions by Nancy M Bell

 

To learn more about Nancy's work click on the cover.

The shoulder seasons of the year, spring and fall. Times of transition. Now in the autumn of the year the trees burn gold against the blaze of Alberta blue sky, the fields glow buckskin under the skies dotted with round bales where summer is wrapped up for winter feed. The nights draw in as the light slowly but surely loses its battle with the dark. The moon flares silver in the sable sky while the constellations march across the heavens. Orion leads his hounds and the Pleiades dance to song of star fire. 

Here on the Canadian prairies the sweep of night is wide and deep, often the moon lingers in the morning sky, a white wisp against the strengthening blue, while the sun breaks free of the eastern horizon to flood the landscape with pure gold light, pushing back the last vestiges of the night.

Our lives follow the seasons in a much slower manner. Childhood and spring, youth and prime of life and summer, the slow mellow aging and autumn and then the final dark of the final transition and winter. Leaving this turn of the wheel to walk the starlit skies, the winter skies, the summer stars, our feet sure on the path of the Milky Way. Perhaps that is fanciful, but I truly feel the rhythms and the stages and rightness of it. Everything in its time. In my case, maiden, mother, crone, all in their own time and with their own lessons. Part of a chain that reaches into the far distant past and into the future.

Children carrying the blood of our past and our heritage just as I do and the ones who came before me.

Transitions, always changing, always moving. Sometimes fast, sometimes slow...but always moving. Carrying us with them.

Until next month, stay well,stay happy.    

Field of Ghosts by Nancy M Bell

 

To find more of Nancy's work please click on the cover.

After many many years of caring for horses I find that I am in possession of a field of ghosts. Emily aka Pikkasso Premiere crossed the Rainbow Bridge on Tuesday August 9, 2022. She was 22 years old and was born here. Today, in a field that once housed 6 horses and four cows, there is only Shady aka Shades of Ice, a TB mare who came to live her as Emily's companion after Max crossed the Rainbow Bridge. 

    When I look across the empty acres I feel the ghosts of those who lived here and have passed. I see them in the shimmer of heat over the grass, hear their voices in the whisper of the wind, in the laughter of the poplar leaves. Shady is doing well on her own which is a relief. Perhaps, she too, feels their presence and knows she is not alone. 

    Usually when a loved animal passes they are absent for a time before returning, but Emily hasn't left me. I feel her at my side as I'm walking, just as she always did in life. We took her last walk together and as always weak and crappy feeling as she was, she walked at my shoulder and trusted me to the last to do what was best.

    She contacted Potomac Horse Fever and declined very quickly.  Her kidneys failed and while the values did improve overnight while she was on high amount of fluids running IV and with her legs encased in ice boots to hopefully stop the possibility of laminitis (founder), she was in a huge amount of pain. She couldn't have pain meds as they would affect her kidneys which were only marginally beginning to work. Emily was mare who was full of piss and vinegar always, when we first got her to the vet she was literally leaning on me to stay on her feet, swaying and leaning on the wall. She stayed on her feet through sheer will. 

    Tuesday morning she stood with her head down, nose on the ground or leaning on my chest, eyes glazed over. The only times she would stir was when the spasms in her gut spiked. I stayed with her for an hour finalizing a decision I knew I had to make, but needed to be sure. Emily's actions and her body language told me without a doubt that she was ready to let go. Sometimes when you love something or someone so much, you have to make the choice to let them go. 

    We could have continued to treat her, but kidney injury is a long long road to recovery and in most likely hood that would not be anywhere near 100% recovery which could lead to other complications, even in the event she pulled through which was in no way a given.

    How could I ask her to go through that long corridor of pain when I couldn't promise her it would get better. The reality is we could have carried on for another few days, weeks or months and after all that the end result had a high probability of being the same. How could I ask her to endure that when she was telling me in the only ways she could that it was time to let go?

    And so we took our last walk together in this realm and I let her go, staying with her until her spirit left her body. 

    And now I look out over a field of ghosts. Tags (Tag n Passum), Laura (Laura's Miracle), Sue, the cow, Sunny (Pug's Escourt) (the mare) Emily's mom, Phil (Philosopher's Stone) her brother, Flash (MS Flashdance), Sam, Spook, Patches the pony, Sleeping Beauty the pony, Goat-the goat, Big Bird (Condor), Chance, Max, King, and now Emily.  

Until next month, be well, be  happy.

Emily, Phil and Big Bird photo by Michelle Kannenberg

Kayla's Cowboy, another Longview Romance by Nancy M Bell

 

To find out more about Nancy's books click on the cover above.

For any of you familiar with my Longview Romance series, you'll recall that Rob Chetwynd and Michelle Wilson were engaged. Or at least that's the impression Michelle had, not to mention all of Longview. So it was a shock when Rob came back from the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas married to someone else.  And that someone else was a dressage rider, not someone familiar with rodeo. Kayla Dunbarton had no idea of the hornet's nest she was going to encounter when she accompanied her new husband home to Longview, Alberta. 

Kayla's Cowboy tells the tale of how this wedding came to be and the events leading up to the nuptials. Not to mention the fall out afterwards.

Here's a short excerpt to tempt you. Kayla's first meeting with Rob which doesn't go so well:

She’d just finished taking the bridle apart and was dropping the bridoon bit and the curb into a pail of warm water when the curtained stall door opened a bit.

“Anybody here?” A male voice asked.

“Get out of there, Chetwynd,” another voice cautioned.

What the hell? Kayla pulled the door all the way open and fisted her hands on her hips. “What do you want?” she demanded. “Who the hell are you?”

“Aw, c’mon now, pretty lady. I was just wantin’ to say hello and admire your horse.” The tall cowboy pushed his hat back on his head and grinned down at her. His gaze swept her up and down, lingering on the swell of her breast below the gapping neck of her old sweatshirt.

“I asked what your name was,” she repeated. “And I don’t appreciate you just inviting yourself into my tack room. There was something interesting about the man, his jeans snugged against his lean hips, broad shoulders filling out his western shirt. There was some kind of advertising emblazoned all over the red shirt but she couldn’t make it all out. The cowboy just continued to grin at her in appreciation.

“I’m sorry, m’am. I’m Cody, Cody Butters and I apologize for my partner here, he’s a little short on manners.” The second man elbowed in front of his friend.

“Hell fire, man. She should know who I am,” the first man said belligerently.

Kayla’s temper flared and she glared over Cody’s shoulder at the cowboy. “I haven’t a clue who you are, and I could care less. Why don’t you go back under the rock you crawled out of?”

“He don’t mean no harm, m’am. He’s just a mite uncivilized, is all,” Cody intervened. This idiot, is Rob Chetwynd, the reigning Bull Riding Champion.”

“At your service,” Rob swept his hat off and made a deep bow.

Kayla sighed in exasperation. “What do you want? I have things to do.”

“Just wanted to say hello and say how much we enjoyed your riding,” Cody said with a meaningful glance at his friend.

“Actually, I wanted to see if your little behind was as cute out of the arena as in it,” Rob said, lifting one eyebrow.

“That’s enough.” Kayla grabbed a stable broom from the corner of the stall and smacked him with it. “Get out! Get out now, before I call security.”

“Now, now, there ain’t no call to do that.” Cody grabbed his friend by the back of his belt and started to drag him out of the stall.

“What’s going on here?” Anna demanded, coming to a halt with Wellington in tow.

“These two yahoos invited themselves into our tack room and made themselves very unwelcome,” Kayla told her, still brandishing the broom.

Cody turned and let go of Rob’s belt as Anna came up. “Man, that’s a nice piece of horse flesh,” he said, eyes running over the 17.3 hand gelding in appreciation.

“Yes, he is, and I’d thank you to not touch him and take your…companion…and leave.” Kayla glared at the two men. “Now.”

“Sorry, yeah. I gotta apologize for my friend here. He’s maybe had a bit too much celebratin’, if you catch my drift,” Cody said.

“That’s not excuse for being an ass,” Kayla shot back.

“Yes, m’am.” Cody ran his eyes over Wellington again, stopping when Anna stepped out from behind the big horse into his line of vision. Interest flashed across his face before he dragged Rob away.

“What was all that about?” Anna asked, her gaze on the red headed cowboy. “What did he say his name was?”

“Which one?” Kayla stripped the cooler off Wellington and picked up a brush from the tack box just inside the tack room door.

“The red headed one, not the other one,” Anna said folding the cooler up.

“I don’t know…Cam, Cale, Cody…maybe…why?” She glanced up from her work. “You can’t seriously be interested, can you?”

“Maybe,” Anna dragged the word out. “He seemed nice, I mean, nicer than his friend. And he sure filled out those jeans…” She winked at Kayla.

“Oh, you,” Kayla snorted. “You’d date the devil himself if he had a nice ass.”

Anna grinned. “Probably,” she agreed, chuckling.   

Working With An Editor by Nancy M Bell

 

To learn more about my upcoming release pictured above and my other books please click on the cover.

Do you need an editor? In a word ~ yes. Everyone needs an editor.

 

Why you need an editor.

As authors we know our story inside out, what may be blatantly obvious to us may not be so obvious to your reader.

We read what we ‘think’ we wrote not always what is actually on the page. It’s easy to skip over words like ‘the’, ‘a’ etc which may be missing from the text.

 

The difference between content edits and line/copy edits.

A content editor looks at the over- all structure of the story. Does it make sense; is it following the plot in the correct timeline; are facts correct; over use of words i.e. that, then, given names; passive voice vs active voice; does the plot move at a good pace or does it drag; does it make sense or are you confusing your reader; are the names of characters, places etc. consistent. The list goes on.

A copy/line editor looks at things on a more granular level. This is a check missing or reversed quotation marks, missing punctuation over all, formatting issues, grammar errors etc.

 

Choosing an editor.

If you are traditionally published the publishing house will assign you an editor, often two, one for contents and one for lines, this depends solely on the house and your experience. In this case you have little say in the choice of editor.

If you are self-publishing you will have to search out an editor for yourself. You can look at trade publications [like Quill and Quire in Canada or Writers Digest (US)] where you will find free-lance editors advertising for clients. If you are a member of your provincial guild there will be listings on their website- Writers Guild of Alberta. You can also look at The Writers Union of Canada site and there are numerous other places. You want to ask for references and titles of books they have edited, do your due diligence before committing yourself.

 

What if you hate your editor?

This is a two sided question as well. If you are with a traditional publisher your only recourse would be to contact the publisher and explain the problem. Depending on the house and the nature of your complaints, they may or may not be willing to mediate for you or assign a different editor.

If you are self-published and have entered into an agreement with a free-lance editor it may well depend on the agreement you signed or verbally agreed to. If there is no opt out clause, you can of course fire your editor but that may mean you have no way to get any monies already paid back. To protect myself when I free-lance I ask for half of the agreed fee up front with the remainder payable upon completion of the project to the author’s satisfaction.

 

Open Dialogue and Open Mind are key.

Your editor has your best interests at heart. They want to help you polish your work and show it in the best possible light. If you are a new unpublished author (and this has nothing to do with chronological age) be prepared to approach the experience with an open mind. You are not always going to like what the editor says. Remember, if you confuse your editor with aspects of your plot then you will also confuse your reader and the last thing you want is for them to put the book down and never buy anything else you’ve written.

Conversely, don’t be afraid to defend elements of the plot that may be essential to something that happens further on in the story, or in subsequent books if you’re writing a sequel. It is important to feel comfortable discussing things with your editor. At the end of the day it is your name on the cover.

 

Resolving Conflicts

This is hand and glove with what we just talked about. Keep a cool head and your temper under check. Flaming your editor is not conducive to a good working relationship. On the other hand, if you’ve not been careful with your choice you may find yourself with an editor who refuses to compromise.

In most cases the editor should explain why they think something should be different than what you’ve written. The editor should be familiar with the genre you’re working in and they will know the market much better than you, in most cases it will be in your best interest to listen to their advice. Very often compromises can be reached. If I encounter an empasse, I state my case and then let the author make the final call. There are always exceptions to the rule, of course.

The difference between a beta reader and an editor.

A beta reader is NOT an editor and should not be used as such. A beta reader is usually a friend or acquaintance who is willing to read your rough draft and offer comments or ask for clarifications in places where your plot may be weak or suffering from plot holes.

 

We’ve already discussed earlier what an editor is.

 

If you’re self-published ~ how much is too much dollar wise

 

This will depend on your budget of course, but be wary of paying thousands of dollars. The length of your work will help dictate the cost as well as the topic. Non-fiction will be more expensive as your editor will want to check your data and sources. 

Be sure you know what you’re paying for.

Know what you are agreeing to and set a mutually agreed upon timeframe for the completion of your project.

Until next month, stay well stay happy and keep writing.

To Write or Not to Write by Nancy M Bell

 

To explore more of Nancy's books click on the cover above. 

I'm working on another installment of the A Longview Romance series. Storm's Refuge was the first book, which was followed by Come Hell or High Water and A Longview Wedding. Michelle is the heroine in the first three books and her life is turned upside down when her supposed fiance comes home from the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas married to someone else. 

Rob Chetwynd, the fiance in question, has played a role in the first three books, but this time I'm sharing how the impromptu Vegas wedding comes about. Kayla's Cowboy is the title and is told from Kayla's POV. How she meets Rob and how their relationship progresses is certainly a work in progress.  

I'm struggling with how to bring these two disparate characters together. Kayla is an accomplished dressage rider who is at the NFR to give a demonstration of her sport. Her sponsors have arranged the whole thing and have sent another horse and rider pair along as well. Kayla and Anna split the duties with one of them doing the riding and the other providing the commentary on a rotating basis. This is all okay until Anna's horse, Arizona, gets cast in the stall and unable to perform, which puts added  pressure on Kayla and Wellington. 

Anna's a bit of a party animal and she brings Rob and his pal into Kayla's orbit. She thinks the cocky, but admittedly sexy, cowboy is an adrenaline junkie for getting on rough stock not to mention enraged bulls.  But, things take some twists and turns and she is thrown into his company more and more. Somehow, the cockiness wears off and a more vulnerable side of Rob comes to the forefront.

He confesses that, while he and Michelle have been friends forever, and everyone in Longview expects them to get married, Rob isn't in love with Michelle that way. His mother is pushing him to get on with it, and Michelle is certainly unaware of his reservations, added to the pressure is the fact his late father's dying wish was that Rob and Michelle get married and combine the Wilson and Chetwynd  ranches. Rob isn't ready to settle down with Michelle and he sure as hell isn't ready to quit the rodeo road.

That's it so far, now I've just got to figure out how Kayla agrees to marry him. She noticing the chinks in his armour and as a woman who was raised by her aunt after her parents died, she realizes how Rob's cocky facade is just a front to hide the face he's fighting his own demons. 

So, to write or not to write, the dreaded writers block. I keep turning my characters this way and that and trying to figure out how they fit together. <sigh> 

I know this dilemma should help me deal with the Covid isolation blues, but somehow it just doesn't seem to be working. I'm into Covid Winter x 2 and not liking it at all. Hopefully, either Kayla or Rob will cosy up with my muse and help me out here.

Until next month, happy writing. Stay warm, stay safe and stave off the dreaded writer's block.

Nancy