Hosting a Teddy Bear Picnic, by J.C. Kavanagh

The Twisted Climb - Darkness Descends
Short-listed for Best Young Adult Book 2018 at The Word Guild, Canada 

I've never been to a Teddy Bear picnic. In fact, I didn't know there was such a thing. But when imagination is rampant and your two granddaughters are visiting from Ottawa for a week - well then, everything and anything that is entertaining comes into play.

The imagination of a child is beautiful to behold. Unfettered, it is limitless. Witnessing the unfolding of ideas gives me great joy and is a powerful reminder to tap my own imagination when it comes to writing. The adventures that take place in the playground of your mind can be shifted to real life. Ask any child and they will show you how it's done.

So our Teddy Bear picnic adventure began with a dress code: stripes. Paddy, the name of our big teddy, was too big to carry so we carted him around in a stroller. He was dressed in a striped shirt too. A light lunch was prepared (PB&J wraps, granola bars, grapes) and we headed outside and took a walk through the trails on our property. We had to stop regularly to give the bears a 'drink' of water. Of course, the girls had to have a drink too. We pretended the bears could talk and we held silly conversations with them. I stepped back in time and became a silly kid too.

Their visit became a refresher course for me in the art of creative thinking.

Sometimes we have to pretend our minds have no boundaries.

Because imagination is not just for kids.

J.C. Kavanagh

The Twisted Climb - Darkness Descends (Book 2)
voted BEST Young Adult Book 2018, Critters Readers Poll and Best YA Book FINALIST at The Word Guild, Canada
AND
The Twisted Climb,
voted BEST Young Adult Book 2016, P&E Readers Poll

Novels for teens, young adults and adults young at heart

Email: author.j.c.kavanagh@gmail.com

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My Dream Vacation

With July and August come vacation season. For those parents working full-times jobs, these months offer the perfect time to get away from it all. The destinations vary: either trips to visit out-of-town family members, to a resort, or for the fortunate, an exotic locale. However, none of these match the imagination when it comes to a once-in-a-lifetime destination, the dream vacation.

So what is my dream vacation? Let me take the word “dream” literally. A couple of months back I had one of those vivid dreams that seem to last all night long, one that made me feel as if the waking world is the dream and no the other way around.

I boarded a jet from an unknown airport for a flight that lasted almost an entire day. The destination? A tiny island in the middle of a vast ocean; a place was so isolated that only a handful of people lived on it.

The island was remarkable. Cocooned by a light fog and a hushed isolation, it floated high in the southern seas, as if anchored in the mute white atmosphere. Surrounded by cold green waters, no trees grew on it. Besides a few humans, only penguin-like animals populated it. It was too distant to receive any type of radio or television signals.

But rather than dark, the island was a happy place. Despite a paucity of adults, the island was inhabited by many happy children who climbed its rocks and played on its beaches. Enormous whales floated about in the waters, constantly rising from the depths and snorting huge plumes of water.

It took me several minutes to get my bearings when I woke up, the dream being so life-like. I wandered through my quotidian duties that day but the dream did not leave me. When curiosity could no longer be contained, I checked a world map on the computer, searching for remote islands that may resemble the one in my dream.

Several possibilities emerged but were quickly dismissed. The Galapagos felt remote enough, but iguanas and giant tortoises did not appear in my dream. Several islands of the South Pacific – Bora Bora and Tonga -- appeared on the screen as possibilities, but my dream island was far from a tropical paradise.

I finally entered “the most remote island in the world” in Google search. The answer popped up immediately: Tristan da Cunha, an eight-mile-wide island in the middle of the South Atlantic, whose closest mainland city, Cape Town, South Africa, lay 1,743 miles away. I couldn’t say with certainty that it matched the one in my dreams, but similarities existed. The island, dominated by a rocky volcano, is devoid of trees. Low-lying mists create a secluded, hazy setting. Rockhopper penguins nest on its shores.

Tristan Da Cunha

Unlike my dream, no airstrip exists. However, fishing boats from South Africa visit eight times a year. A trip to Tristan da Cunha is an exercise in patience and planning. About eighty families live there permanently. There are neither cell phones nor home internet service, but as a gesture to the modern world, one lonely internet café exists. It seems that the island is a paradise for children. The entire island, with neither predators nor crime, is a vast playground for children, who live in complete freedom.

I would love to visit Tristan da Cunha. Is it the island of my dreams? Obviously, I can’t tell but I did gather one more scrap of evidence. It seems that whales and dolphins swim the seas around it. Certainly, it’s a place for a dream vacation.

Mohan Ashtakala is the author of "Karma Nation."  

www.mohanashtakala.com

He is published by Books We Love. 

www.bookswelove.com

The earth laughs in flowers (quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson) ...by Sheila Claydon

Click here for my books at Books We Love

I haven't had much time to write this year. Instead, sadly, I have been helping friends whose loved ones were very sick, and who have now passed away. It's been a time of sadness and several funerals but, as is always the way when someone dies, the tears have been intermingled with laughter as the good times are remembered. This was especially the case yesterday.

It was the first secular funeral I had attended so I didn't know what to expect. What I got was a day of joy. The music, which was special to the family and the deceased, was joyful, as were the very personal speeches. Nobody wore black. Instead the women were in bright dresses and the men relaxed and tieless, in shirtsleeves. The sun was warm, birds sang and it wasn't at all difficult to imagine the deceased nodding his approval, his wonderful smile wide as he saw all his family and friends together, laughing as they remembered.

And the lovely display of yellow and red family flowers, glowing like a pile of jewels on top of the coffin, made me think of the language of flowers. Red roses for passion,  red tulips for true love,  lilies and poppies for sympathy in death, pink roses and hydrangea for gratitude, iris for faith and hope, lily-of-the-valley for sweetness and purity, they carry so much symbolism. Cultures differ so much too. What might be right for one country can be wrong for another. And it's not just countries, it can even be local. In some places in the UK it is thought to be unlucky to bring bluebells into a house, whereas it is fine in other areas. Tree blossom is a no no too, as is giving anyone a single daffodil. They must always be given in bunches.  Flower lore is endless, as is the pleasure flowers bring.

My mother was a florist, so I grew up with flowers, and although by the time I was a teenager we lived in an apartment, the balcony was still full of flowers from spring through to winter, and her enthusiasm has not only rubbed off onto me, it increases with every year.  Nothing gives me more pleasure than walking around my own garden checking every new shoot, or deadheading blooms past their prime so that others can replace them. And I love the difference the seasons bring. In the early spring everything is either primrose yellow or white, then comes the blue and purple season followed by  shades of pink from the palest rose to the deepest cerise. Later the yellows return, but now mixed with orange and scarlet, then it's the evergreens and a tracery of bare branches as winter takes over...not for long though. In January the first snowdrops appear, as do the hellebores, better known as Christmas roses, and then the pink camellias start to bud.

















Loving flowers as I do is one of the reasons I wrote Bouquet of Thorns. To me, it was like going back in time to when my mother was alive and I sometimes used to help her when she had to build displays or decorate an hotel. One of my fondest and most exciting memories is helping carry boxes and pots of flowers aboard the  ocean liners that used to dock in the port city of Southampton where I was born. It was long before the days of the modern cruise ship and ocean voyages took weeks instead of days. It  was a real event for many travellers and those with wealthy friends were sent off with huge bouquets. Once my job was done I was sent down to the galley where chefs would pile a plate high with food,  and then later sent me home with boxes of chocolates or a special desert which I had to sneak out.

Now, so many years older, I have been a passenger on cruise liners to many parts of the world, but none of them, however grand, have had that old fashioned elegance and grandeur of the ships of my distant past. Happy memories, whether they are of people or of events are so precious, and if they are garlanded with the memory of flowers, then they are even more so.

Connections by Eileen Charbonneau

find my books at:  Eileen's page at BWL

Connections

Life is all about connections, isn’t it?  Family, friends, co-workers, fellow volunteers.  It’s said that writing is a lonely profession, but it can be one of deep and lasting connections.  With readers, of course.  There are creative readers just as there are creative writers.  They bring themselves to the experience and find untold (and unrealized by me!) beauty in my stories.  

I’ve belonged to many writers’ groups. I’m about to embark on another, born out of one of my writing classes. As with every path new and untrod, I’m a little trepidatious. Some of my past critique groups have worked out better than others.  But all have been helpful.

Some of my favorite writers--yes, sometimes we even dress up and dine together, 

like here at the fabulous Chez Josephine in New York City

Each participant of a writers’ group knows it will be her turn during the course of the session.  That usually does wonders for social skills-- like finding something nice or encouraging before getting to the bits that need work. 

People in writers’ groups have different tastes in reading. I love a critique partner who reads from several genres and is aware of the conventions of each.  I enjoy reading romance, so when I observe that a heroine is of the too-stupid-to-live variety that readers of the genre complain about, or a hero is cruel to women. children, or animals (a no-no within the conventions of the genre), I try to point these things out.  But I make sure I let a fellow writer know if I’m not familiar with the genre I’m remarking on, so she can take my ignorance into consideration!  But good writing is good writing, so I feel we all can help each other.

some of the members of our new writers group

Are you thinking of joining a writers' group?  Best of luck in making all your stories stronger!  My most important advice goes for all your social connections: don’t stay in any group that does not leave you feeling energized and eager to move your work (or life!) forward after each session together.

Holiday Reading

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When I travel, I like to read books set in the place I'm visiting. Before my trip to Malta this April, I took out an e-book from my local library, The Information Officer by Mark Mills. It helped me appreciate many of the sights I saw in this island nation in the Mediterranean Sea.

The novel takes place in the summer of 1942, when Malta was a British colony. Its strategic location 50 miles south of Italy made Malta a target for Hitler in WWII. During the novel, the Maltese are enduring daily bombings by Axis planes launched from Sicily.

In the capital city of Valletta, Malta, we visited the Lascaris War Rooms, underground headquarters for the Allies' defense of Malta. This strategy map shows little Malta below the bigger island of Sicily. Italy was under Mussolini's fascist rule in 1942 and part of the German Axis. 

The Information Officer is a detective novel. Our hero, Max, is, essentially, the British officer in charge of propaganda. His job is to boost the spirits of the Maltese civilians under continuous attack. Max investigates the murder of several women, whose deaths are being ignored by his superiors. Is there a cover-up? Are the murders an attempt to undermine Malta's resolve to sacrifice for the war? In addition to bombing the cities, Axis planes are sinking cargo ships bringing food and supplies and the residents of Malta are close to starvation.

Malta at War museum displays a Maltese citizen's daily rations for a fifteen day period during the siege. 

In the Malta at War Museum, my husband Will and I put on hardhats to explore an air raid shelter built during the siege. A character in The Information Officer commented that the Maltese had become creatures who lived half their lives underground. The tunnels included hospital and birth rooms for those who needed those services after the air raid whistle blew.

Birth room in the air raid shelter

The siege effectively ended in November 1942, after the Allies sent Malta 163 Spitfires for its defense. King George VI awarded the George Cross for bravery to the citizens of Malta. Each April, Malta commemorates the deaths of the 7,000 soldiers and civilians who died during the siege. Other countries, including Canada, still send flowers.

The novel also mentioned other aspects of Malta, which we encountered on our visit. The Dingli cliffs, the island's highest point, were used for signals during the war.

Hiking on the Dingli Cliffs

Maltese balconies, a characteristic style of  architecture, appear on houses across the island.

Many residents paint their Maltese balconies bright colours

And our hero, Max, took a short recreational break on Malta's smaller, more rural island of Gozo, as Will and I did with the mass of local tourists on Good Friday.

Sipping a cappuccino in the main square of Victoria (Ir-Rabat), the capital of Gozo 

                                   
If you're travelling this year, check out Books We Love's selection of novels set in lands around the world. BWL authors offer a variety of historical and contemporary stories set in the United States, Europe, Australia, every region of Canada and more.