The Arts are Calling

https://books2read.com/The-Baganti-Attack

I find writing takes me in different directions. While novel writing is central, I have moved into other areas over the years. Screenplays and stage plays were next. I find them fun and fairly easy. More-or-less an outline of a story. Seeing them come to live was cool.

A few years ago I decided to try my hand ad music lyrics. Tricky for someone with no musical abilities. Several times I tried to collaborate with established musicians. Each time it never quite fit. Frankly, I needed to polish up my material. As well, I had to try and put myself in the shoes of the music writer. Hmm. It just didn’t seem to work. A musical friend suggested I simply learn an instrument. Been there. Failed at that. Piano? Nope. However, I wish it were possible. I tried guitar in my mid-fifties. Ouch. My fingers were not flexible enough.

My friend had tried to guide me through getting my head around the feel and rhythm of music.

He had patience but I was lost.

One morning my friend popped by for coffee with a suggestion. Give the ukulele a try.

My first thought was how would my fingers find their way around those tiny instruments. He mentioned that they came in different sizes.

I mulled the option and decided to dive in. Not literally. Ukuleles are made of wood. However, within a couple days I learned the basic four chords. I was quite easy. Next I played around with them. Soon enough I created my own little “tunes”. They were basic, but, they were mine. Quite fulfilling. I put writing songs aside and grew my list of chords. Within a week I could play Four Strong Winds, Let It Be, and a little CCR. Yippie. I have a successful start and a couple sore finger tips. I will wait a few months and begin putting music to my words.

Ukulele lesson time. Coffee cup at the ready. Yes, I know, that is not a ukulele I'm holding. it's a guitar-ukulele. I'll stick to four fun strings, thank you very much.

A Breath of Fresh Air by Victoria Chatham

Rough Winds

Primroses

Writers are always looking for ways to enhance the drama in their plots and the nuances of their characters. Just as we sometimes use the weather to create a mood or direct the way a scene goes, so we can make use of the seasons in our settings and in our characters’ moods. Never mind my characters, I know my mood definitely changes with the onset of spring but, after all my years living in Canada, I still miss an English springtime. My memories are of a gentle segue from the rough winds and rain of winter to the soft breezes and light showers of true spring, of standing on a hillside breathing in the fresh air under a clear blue sky and when the hedgerows began to green, of looking for the wildflowers that sheltered beneath them, snowdrops and crocuses, primroses and celandines. 

Do Shake the

Cheese Rolling

There are also all the events and activities the springtime weather shakes up. Much like those who long for the start of baseball in North America, competitors around the UK can take part in wellie wanging (how far can you throw a Wellington boot?), cheese rolling (chasing a 7-9 pound wheel of cheese down a 1-3 gradient hill), bog snorkelling and wife carrying. There are also the Tetbury woolsack races, guys carry a 60-pound sack and girls a 35-pound sack, which start in one of two pubs and are run up a 1-4 gradient hill. 

Darling Buds of May

May is also the time for Hawthorn, the 'haw' in this instance being an old word for hedge.

White Hawthorn

According to Celtic myth, hawthorn flowers are the most likely plant to harbour fairies which is why Hawthorn was never taken into the house. Its branches could be formed into garlands and hung on the door, or set into the ground outside the house to ward off evil spirits, illness, and death. The young leaves (known as bread and cheese) can be added to salads, along with dandelion greens and elderberry. The berries are well known for their anti-oxidant and heart health benefits. Add garlic for a super boost. Hawthorn once bloomed close to the beginning of the month and was known as the May-tree, the only British plant to be named for the month in which it blooms, but now blooms closer to the middle of the month.

Springtime sets the scene for the rest of the year. It is a time of renewal and hope and, who knows, it might bring ideas for a whole new set of characters and books, like my next Regency romance, coming in July.

A shocking betrayal by the man she has come to trust and begin to love, shatters Lady Olivia Darnley's new found happiness. Will Lord Peter Skeffington manage to overcome the rift between them that he has unwittingly caused? Will she accept not only his apology but also his proposal of marriage? Is there a future for this apparently mismatched pair?

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Photographs:

Cheese Rolling at Cooper's Hill courtesy of dailymail.uk 

Primroses, Hawthorn, from the author's library.

Paragraph Headings:

Quote from William Shakespeare's Sonnet #18

May 23rd

Just An Old Soul

To buy This book

Just An Old Soul

Do you know how often I’ve spooked people by stealing their thoughts? Where the very sentence forming in their minds comes out of my mouth? (My wife's, in particular). I have often visualized things I wanted and knew where to get them. Perfect example was the candle snuffer. Nobody seemed to stock them but suddenly I just knew to visit our local Value Village. My wife was not convinced. “You could probably wait a thousand years” she says “for something so obscure to be at any Value Village, let alone the one down the road”. Well she had to pick her chin up off the floor when I walked straight up to where it hung on the wall. Yup, I do that a lot, sometimes wondering if I was a magician or a mystic in a former life. Some have called me a shaman.

Former lives? Many of us believe in past lives. I do. The eerie feeling of seeing a picture, smelling a particular aroma or hearing a certain sound and visions or feelings of being there, done that, sometimes surface. The old déjà vu principle.

While researching my next book, tentatively entitled, "Agnes? Who The Eff Is Agnes?", I again trusted my intuition and walked into the local bookstore, knowing that the first book I touched would be invaluable. 'Past Life Regression' by Ursula Markham, a registered hypno-therapist from London. Some of her experiences have helped many people overcome some severe phobias or attitudes that aren't effective in their lives.

A couple of examples: a fifteen-year-old boy who wouldn't answer any questions was getting picked on by his schoolmate,s calling him stupid and simple, but his school marks showed otherwise. Ursula regressed him to find out that in his last lifetime he claimed to be an American pilot, shot down and captured by the Nazis in the Second World War. He would only give his name, rank and serial number and was killed during interrogation. This explained why the boy wouldn't answer any direct questions. She wrote to the American authorities and found out that pilot was indeed real and listed as missing-in-action at thirty-two years of age during the war. I need to add here that this was in the late sixties, so him finding this information would be impossible with no internet. She helped the boy overcome this fear and make his life better.

Ursula regressed an anorexic woman. In her past lifetime, she'd been a male gangster, who abused women, killed and beat up a lot of people, sold drugs; was a completely evil man. He eventually became a very rich and overweight person, dying of obesity.

Another strange case of a man claiming to dream of being in the navy. When he was regressed, he had accurate knowledge of how English navy ships operated in the 1600's. Information so accurate she recorded them.  This drew the interest of Lord Mountbatten and he played the recordings to naval experts, which reported back that not only was the information accurate, but that some of that knowledge had been lost.

How does one begin to rationalize this? They say we often come back to learn some lesson for our soul’s growth. I believe the soul is eternal and goes through much evolution before it ascends to another place, be that heaven, nirvana or the fourth dimension.  Others claim that the cells retain memory of our past lives or of our human existence. Yup, woo-woo stuff. Now if I could just predict the next set of lottery numbers…

See you next month (which might well be written on the beach in Hawaii!).

Sincerely

Frank Talaber

Email: twosoulmates@shaw.ca

Writer by soul. Words born within.

Karma, the seed. Paper, the medium. 

Pen, the muse. Novels, the fire.

Frank Talaber’s Writing Style? He usually responds with: Mix Dan Millman (Way of The Peaceful Warrior) with Charles De Lint (Moonheart) and throw in a mad scattering of Tom Robbins (Even Cowgirls Get The Blues).

PS: He’s better looking than Stephen King (Carrie, The Stand, It, The Shining) and his romantic stuff will have you gasping quicker than Robert James Waller (Bridges Of Madison County).

Or as is often said: You don’t have to be mad to be a writer, but it sure helps.

My Publishers Webpage:

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A Woman who Fights Against the Tide by Diane Scott Lewis

A young woman torn apart by war. My upcoming historical novel, Her Vanquished Land, (September release) explores the American Revolution from the Loyalists' side--the people who stayed loyal to King George III--as seen through the eyes of a young lady. The rebels, or revolutionaries, punished these Loyalists, confiscating their property, and in some cases even hanging them. No one was allowed to stay neutral. They had to pick a side.

Rowena Marsh lives an upper middle-class life in Easton, Pennsylvania, north of Philadelphia. Her father, a lawyer until chased from town by the rebels, is a staunch Loyalist. She believes what he does, that these rabble-rousers who want independence will never be able to win against the mighty British army.
Rowena is nearly eighteen, she has lost her mother to illness, and she's a tomboy, or hoyden in 18th century terms. She can't understand why her world is crumbling around her and wants to join in the fight.

Her brothers are serving in the British army, her irascible cousin sneaks off to clandestine meetings, and she feels she must do her part. Her life in constant danger, she follows her cousin to Philadelphia, a hotbed of rebel turmoil. But a mysterious Welshman, a cohort of her cousin, seems to be stalking her.

I got the idea to write of the Loyalists while researching my Canadian Brides novel, On a Stormy Primeval Shore.
But, I must admit, for an American it's not popular to write of the British side. How do I make my characters sympathetic? Giving Rowena confusion over which side is right as time goes on is one way to appeal to others.

Her Vanquished Land blurb:

In 1780, Loyalist Rowena Marsh insists on spying for the British during the American Revolution. As a girl, she must dress as a boy, plus endure devastation and murder as she decodes messages for a mysterious Welshman. The tide has turned in the rebels’ favor. General George Washington appears to be winning. The loyalists are bombarded by threats and lost battles. Rowena stays determined to aid the British cause and preserve her family as they’re chased from their Pennsylvania home.

She struggles with possible defeat and permanent exile, plus her growing love for the Welshman who may have little need for affection. Will the war destroy both their lives?

For further information on me and my books, please visit my website: www.dianescottlewis.org

 

Or perfuse my BWL author page: BWL

 

Diane Scott Lewis grew up in California, traveled the world with the navy, edited for magazines and an on-line publisher. She lives with her husband in Pennsylvania.