Thursday, June 25, 2015

Foxes, Horses, and a Runaway Girl by Mikki Sadil


(Young Adult author Mikki Sadil brings her Civil War historical to Books We Love, and joins us on the Insider Blog)

http://amzn.com/B00VCP5POI
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Hello, I’m Mikki Sadil, a relatively new author with Books We Love. Jude told me to write something about myself, to allow all of you to get to know me. So here goes.I was born on a ranch in Texas, raised with Quarter Horses and Long Horn cattle, dogs, cats, and many unspecified animals, mostly wild. I was on the back of a horse…in front of my mom or dad or a ranch hand…from the time I was 6 months old, and was given my own Quarter Pony on my second birthday. On my fifth birthday, I was give a small .22 rifle and taught to shoot. As you may have guessed by now, horses and animals of all kinds have been a mainstay of my life…uh, .22’s, not so much.
My dad was in the service, and when I was 8 years old, he was deployed overseas and my mother and I went with him. That lasted about 2 years, then he was sent back to the US and we traveled all over this country.
When I was 10 years old, he was stationed in Washington, D.C, and we lived in a boarding house in Rock Creek, Maryland. One of his officers had a Civil War-type home ( read that as mansion) in another part of Maryland, with acres and acres of land. He also had horses…the Thoroughbreds that were used in Fox Hunts. Oh yes, Fox Hunts were real! This officer invited my father and me to take part in a Fox Hunt on a Sunday, and I was thrilled. I was not an English rider, but had had a few lessons in an English saddle so I could sit it pretty well.
That morning, there were about 40 people at this man’s home, all with their Thoroughbreds, and all of the adults dressed to the hilt in “fox hunting” clothing. Me? Well, I had on Western riding boots, jeans, and a long-sleeved shirt…not exactly dressed to the teeth for this event. My dad was far more presentable, as he had been in the Cavalry all his life ( before they turned the horses into tanks and military jeeps), so he had the proper boots and jodhpurs. I wouldn’t be caught dead riding a horse in such “sissified” attire, especially in a saddle that barely sat on the back of the horse.
Needless to say, the other adults were not exactly pleased to have a “child” riding with them, but as time went on, and I jumped the fences and went over the downed tree logs and splashed through the brooks as well as any of them, I was temporarily accepted. Temporarily being the key word.
The Fox Hunt was exactly as you’ve seen in movies or read about in books. We had a Hunt Master with a horn; we had a pack of beautiful hunt dogs, barking and straining at their leashes, eager to be let loose. There were broken fences and upright fences to jump over. There were the tree logs we had to guide our horse over or around, and there were the many brooks and streams to be splashed through. We started out, and rode for a while. It was a beautiful day, sun streaming down, gentle breeze blowing. The horses were gorgeous, coats shining in the sun, ears pricked forward, and the dogs were just being dogs.
Then…the Hunt Master let out a blast on his horn, the dogs were turned loose, and pandemonium began. Horses, horses everywhere. No longer was there any rhyme or reason for where one was riding, who you were riding beside. From a gentle canter it was now a full-out gallop, following the dogs. The dogs: yapping, barking, chasing each other, running as fast as they could. The scent of FOX was in the air. It was all I could do to stay in the saddle and handle this huge monster of a horse who was at least twice as big as my Quarter Horse, and twice as hard-headed. He was after the dogs, after the fox, and totally unresponsive to my pull on the reins.
Then, another different blast from the Hunt Master. Horses were reined in, slowed down. I looked ahead, and saw twenty dogs barking and trying unsuccessfully to climb up a tree. On a lower branch, a bit of orangy-red hung down: the FOX had been treed.
The woman next to me leaned closer, and asked if I’d ever seen how they killed the FOX? WHAT? KILL the FOX? My dad didn’t tell me that part of what a Fox Hunt was all about. I just looked at her, speechless. Suddenly, I realized all the horses were quiet. They were pacing forward at a walk. Only the dogs were still making a racket.
Oh NO! Kill the FOX? Not today! I gathered myself in the saddle, swung my crop against my horse’s side, and dug my spurs in. He jumped forward like he’d been stung by a swarm of bees. Yelling at the top of my voice, I headed straight for the dogs, the tree, and the FOX! The dogs quieted down for just a moment. They saw this huge horse and screaming “something” headed straight for them , and they scattered to the wind. The fox jumped down, and disappeared in an instant.
This Fox Hunt was so over.
My father and I were never invited to a Fox Hunt again.

You can find my books at Books We Love.


Wednesday, June 24, 2015

Rewrite a Novel or let it Die? by Diane Scott Lewis



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Years ago I read a novel called Desiree and became interested in Napoleon, especially in his exile on the strange island of St. Helena. I started to research this exile and found numerous resources at the Library of Congress (in those Dark Ages days before the internet). One resource would lead me to another, one book published at the very time, 1817, Napoleon was on the island (1815-1821). The description of the odd landscape, flora and fauna of St. Helena, a remote volcanic atoll in the South Atlantic fascinated me.
Approach to St. Helena
I’d lived on Guam for a few years, so understood the isolation of an island in the middle of nowhere.

A story formed in my head, and my alternate-history novel began to take shape. What if Napoleon met a woman on St. Helena, and rallied to escape his exile?  I worked for years on this book, even corresponding with a Napoleonic scholar who had visited the island four times. I read dairies of Napoleon’s servants who’d accompanied him there, plus information from his English captors who held him prisoner under the strictest of circumstances.

I wanted to humanize this much-written about man, without bending the facts too far—other than the escape of course!

I finally sold the book to a small on-line press and was thrilled. Until I saw the price they put on my ebook. As an unknown author, few would pay that inflated price, so the book languished.

I was so enamored of my own research, that to salvage some of it, I wrote a short novel that took place on St. Helena, A Savage Exile, in which I added vampires to the mix.



Next year my contract with the other publisher will be up, and I’m dying to rewrite the original book and present it to my current publisher. But now my ideas have changed. I want to replace my heroine with another, older, smarter woman, change the dynamics, and shorten this very long book. I have misgivings about the rewrites. Should I forget about it? It seems I’m constantly rehashing this story, but then again all those years of research going to waste!
St. Helena map, 1815

We’ll see how the summer goes, as I’m working on a time-travel at the moment. I might electronically drag out that dusty tome and hack away and see what happens. (in fact, I’ve already started).



For more information about my books, please visit my website:
http://www.dianescottlewis.org




Tuesday, June 23, 2015

Part Two . . . To Quire by Victoria Chatham




In my last post I looked at the development of the fountain pen. In this post I’m addressing another part of the writing experience equation – paper. Where would we be without either?

We have the Chinese to thank for the art of paper making, possibly even 200 years earlier than the recorded 105 BC. Ts’ai Lun, an official at the Imperial Court so history tells us, became fascinated with the nests of wasps and bees. Inspired by their industry, he pounded mulberry bark into a sheet, let it dry and then wrote on it. This first experiment was improved with the addition of rags, hemp and old fishing nets a ll soaked together in water, the fibers then beaten into a pulp and strained through a cloth sieve onto a drying frame. Court officials were now able to discard the heavy and unwieldy bamboo strips or expensive silk previously used for writing. With the invention of woodblock printing circa 600 AD it was no wonder that by 740 AD China had its first printed newspaper.

Paper was used not only for writing, but also wrapping and padding, toilet paper and tea bags. Have you ever wondered how long paper money has been around?  The government of the Song Dynasty was the first to issue it. The earliest piece of paper, inscribed with a map and found at Fangmatan in Gansu province, dates from 179-41 BC while the earliest recorded woodblock printed book was the Diamond Sutra (Perfection of Wisdom) of 868 CE found at Dunhuang. The British Library states ‘it is the earliest complete survival of a dated printed book’.

The art of papermaking was a closely kept secret but it was inevitable that along with spices, jade, lapis lazuli and the lucrative silk that gave the route its name, knowledge of paper   made its way along the Silk Road. In 8th century Samarkand a water-mill was first used in the paper making process, a process that was repeated across the Arabic world and then medieval Europe. Modern papermaking began in earnest in the 19th century with the invention of the Fourdrinier machine, capable of producing rolls rather than sheets of paper. In 1844 inventors Charles Fenerty, a Canadian and F.G. Keller, a German, developed a machine that used wood pulp and forever changed the face of papermaking.

Paper is produced in many weights and sizes. We are all familiar with letter, legal, ledger and tabloid sizes. Some of these sizes have names such as Post, Crown and Double Demy. Imperial UK sizes include Antiquarian and Grand Eagle. The old adage ‘against the grain’ comes from the paper making industry for, if paper is folded against its grain, it can crack along the fold. The heavier the paper the more cracking will occur. A ream is 500 sheets of paper and a quire 1/20th of that, or 25 sheets of paper.

The word paper is commonly considered to derive from the papyrus plant, used by the Ancient Egyptians. The pith of the plant is processed quite differently and produces a heavier type of paper. Animal skins have been used throughout the centuries as a writing medium. Vellum is produced from calfskin, the very best being produced from unborn or stillborn animals. Today quality vellum is hard to find and expensive but is still produced in the UK by the family business of William Cowley of Newport Pagnell, Buckinghamshire. Established in 1870 they still use traditional methods passed down by word of mouth and use skills that are virtually unchanged for 2000 years. Parchment is a term for skins prepared from other animals such as horses, cows, deer and pigs. Today there is a form of vellum made from plasticized cotton.

One of the reasons I love old books is the paper they are printed on. As Helene Hanff writes in 84 Charing Cross Road, ‘I’m almost afraid to handle such soft vellum and heavy cream colored pages. Being used to the dead-white paper and stiff cardboardy covers of American books, I never knew a book could be such a joy to the touch’. The most expensive book I ever purchased for myself was an illustrated edition of Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows. The grain in the paper is definitely a joy to touch.

I still like to have quality writing paper to hand, for those occasions when I actually take pen to paper for a letter at Christmas or a thank-you note. At one time I had my own design embossed letterhead notepaper but that was before the advent of the computer when letter writing was still fashionable and mail arrived twice daily Monday to Friday and on Saturday mornings.

In spite of technology, paper is still a big part of our lives. From official documents to brown grocery bags and parking or speeding tickets, it is not likely to go away any time soon. How does paper feature in your life? Do you like your magazines from the store, or online? Or both? The next time you handle a piece of paper, give some thought as to how it reached you. You may be surprised.

For more about Victoria and her books go to:


www.bookswelove.com/chatham.php
www.victoriachatham.webs.com
www.amazon.com/author/victoriachatham
www.facebook.com/AuthorVictoriaChatham

Sunday, June 21, 2015

I'm remembering Daddy On Father's Day By Sandy Semerad


 A Message in the Roses
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What do Dads want on Father’s Day?
The number one answer, according to a recent survey, is spending time with family and loved ones. Number two is clothing. Beer is number three.
This survey may not be scientific, but I agree with the number one answer. I wish I could have spent more time with my Dad.
As a child, I was afraid of monsters and would often sneak into my parents’ bed at night. After I fell asleep, Daddy would carry me back to my bed. One time he didn’t.
That was the night he died. I was seven.
The next morning, I found Mama crying in the living room. Our house was full of people. Many of them were crying also.
“Where’s Daddy,” I asked Mother.
“He’s gone away,” she said.
Daddy looked handsome in the shiny casket, but asleep. I didn’t understand he wouldn’t wake up. He died of a heart attack, I was told.
Before Daddy died, he’d complained of a backache, and I remember he came home early one afternoon to rest his back. Mama told me not to bother him.
But I couldn’t resist. I sat on his bed and chattered away, as he puffed on a cigarette. I can still see his pack of Camels on the bed stand.
Daddy rarely came home early. He worked most of the time. He wanted to give us the so-called finer things in life: a large brick home, a fishing pond, a swimming pool, tennis courts and our own merry-go-round.
Friends from Geneva, Alabama who knew Daddy, called him--Ira Hodges--an entrepreneur. He owned Hodges hardware in the heart of town, but before he married Mama and moved to Geneva, he was a Texas wildcatter--an oilman.
One of my Geneva friends, John Savage, who as a teen worked with Daddy, said he thought Daddy seemed too big for a small town.
But Daddy loved Geneva, Mama said. He’d often give credit on a handshake, and he helped many people in need.
Daddy once repaired the broken windows in a family’s house for free. “It was freezing and we couldn’t afford to pay,” the father of the family told me.
Many years after Daddy passed, I spotted a strange figure, wandering around our house. I froze in fear. Mama wasn’t home at the time.
I called police before I realized the man wasn’t a stranger at all. He used to work for Daddy, but had since moved away from the area. He didn’t know Daddy had died, he said.
“Whenever I needed work, Mr. Ira would always give me some,” the man said.
I’ve told my daughters and granddaughter this story and other stories about Daddy. I want them to know he was compassionate. He helped people and gave generously of his time and money. I only wish he could have shared more of his time with us.
I’ve missed not having him in our lives, and on this Father’s Day, I wanted to pay tribute to him. #Father’sDay.
To find out more, go here: www.sandysemerad.com







 Hurricane House

 Sex, Love & Murder

Saturday, June 20, 2015

THE TRAIL OF TEARS BY GINGER SIMPSON #history #nativeamericans

Greed begets nothing good...

http://questgarden.com/
I'm an fan of western historicals, and some of the research I've done for books of that genre bring tears to my eyes.  The TV westerns always portray the native americans as the "bad" guys, but can we not claim the injustices we heaped upon them?

The Trail of Tears is a sad testament of the greed displayed against Native Americans in the 1800s.  In order to achieve land and build states, the Native American tribes were forced to leave the lands they occupied, and moved against their will.  Although those who wanted to stay were allowed to remain and assimilate into society, there is no doubt they were not treated well as white men didn't look favorably upon those with red skin.

Oklahoma, not yet formed was the home of the Choctaw Nation, later named Indian Territory. The government's aim to achieve their personal goal was to relocate Native Americans to the west.  The Indian Removal At of 1830 allowed President Andrew Jackson to enact treaties allowing the removal of all tribes living east of the Mississippi.  For the most part, the removal of the Choctaw was peaceful, but those who resisted were eventually forced to leave if they didn't wish to assimilate into society.
The Creek refused to move, but in good faith, signed a treaty in March 1832 to surrender a large portion of their land as long as the remaining lands were afforded protection.  The US failed to deliver, and in 1837, the military forcibly removed the tribe without benefit of a treaty this time.
The Chickasaw realized they had no other alternative, and and signed a treaty in 1832 to include their protection until their move. The Chickasaws were forced to move earlier than expected as a result of white settlers.  The war department refused to intercede.
A small group of Seminoles signed a relocation treaty, but the majority of the tribe rebuked the agreement.. After resulting in what is known as the Second and Third Seminole Wars, those who survived were paid to move west.. 
www.seerandolphcounty.com
In 1833, the Treaty of New Echota provided two years for the Cherokees in the state of Georgia to move west or face a forced exit.. By the deadline, only a small number of Cherokees had migrated westward and sixteen thousand remained steadfast on their land. As a result, the US sent seven thousand soldiers to enforce the treaty, not even giving the tribe time to gather their belongings.  The escorted march westward became known as the Trail of Tears because four thousand people died along the way.
The thousand-mile march began In the winter of 1838, many Cherokeecovered only with skimpy clothing, most on feet without shoes/moccasins.  Beginning in Red Clay, Tennessee, the tribe crossed Tennessee and Kentucky, never allowed to step foot into any towns or villages because of the fear of disease.  Having to bypass these places added miles to their journey, but when they finally arrived at the Ohio River in Southern Illinois around December 3, 1838, they were subjected to a dollar per person toll to use Berry's Ferry.  The traditional charge was twelve cents per head, and the Indians were not allowed to cross until all others were served.  During their wait, as many of the tribe as possible sought shelter under "Mantle Rock," a  bluff on the Kentucky side of the river.  While huddled together, many died from exposure. Several Cherokee were murdered by locals.
The marchers reached southern Illinois on December 26.  An agent for the detachment wrote, "There is the coldest weather in Illinois I ever experienced anywhere.  The streams are all frozen over...  We are compelled to cut through the ice to get water... It snows here every two or three days...we are now camped in Mississippi swamp 4 miles from the river, and there is no possible chance of crossing the river... We have only traveled sixty-five miles in the last month, including the time spent at this place, which has been about three weeks.  It is unknown when we shall cross the river...."
"I fought through the War Between the States and have seen many men shot, but the Cherokee Removal was the cruelest work I ever knew.".
—- Georgia soldier who participated in the removal
The Trail of Tears
Historical information for the blog was gleaned from Wikipedia, including the map above.  Other photographs have been given attribution.

Friday, June 19, 2015

Why Modern Technology Hates Suspense Writers by Stuart R. West



For my just released book, Ghosts of Gannaway, I did an awful lot of research (emphasis on the “awful”). I uncovered more about the 1930’s and mining than any one person should know. Now, I’m the type of writer who likes to jump right in and let the characters run wild. Once I set them up, they pretty much chart their own course and fate. So the uncustomary preparatory research made me antsy. But thanks to the miracle of “Mr. Google,” the research wasn’t nearly as bad as it could’ve been.

Which made me wonder how writers managed to research during the pre-internet era. Good ol’-fashioned phone calling and pavement pounding, that’s how.

Writers are spoiled nowadays with the convenience and luxury of computers and the internet.  When I was in college (back in the ‘80’s, a decade not known for much other than big hair and even bigger shoulder pads), I pounded away on my portable electric typewriter, a then state-of-the-art contraption. Armed with a bottle of white-out at my elbow, it was slow, frustrating going.  I couldn’t imagine writing a novel on a typewriter, wouldn’t have the patience. Just a couple of weeks ago, I found out my daughter had never used a typewriter. To my horror, she didn’t even know how to return the carriage. And I’m really beginning to sound like a grumpy ol’ coot, aren’t I? (“You kids get outta’ my yard!”)

But even with the ease of computers, progress isn’t always a good thing for writers. Especially suspense writers.

Sure, I’m able to research with a few clicks of a button. But since my research over the past several years has included poison, witchcraft, black magic, animal tranquilizers, human sedatives, cults, hate churches, designer guns, lock-picking, serial killers, toxic gases, and other thriller staples, I’m sure I’ve raised a few governmental eyes. Probably on a couple of “To Be Watched” lists. Before the internet, writers could more easily maintain anonymity. A double-edged sword.

And since I like to wallow in suspense and thrillers, the advent of cell phones has made it tough. It’s hard to strand characters in perilous situations when they can just make a call. Characters in my books have the worst phone service providers ever; lots of dropped calls and fading batteries. Like Clark Kent, I miss phone booths. Hitchcock loved ‘em and for good reason. 

Then there’re all the electronic eyes everywhere! Security cameras, traffic cams, satellites looking at who knows what. Pity the poor fictional criminal; it’s next to impossible to pull off a nefarious deed these days without being witnessed.

Don’t even get me going on the state of forensics now. A crook practically has to hermetically seal himself in a plastic bag to pull off a successful murder. I envy the thriller writers of yesteryear, when the bad guys could perpetrate their crime, then boom, off to the Caribbean. 

I can’t keep up with the technological advances. I wrote a thriller a year ago, one I thought was relatively “cutting edge.” But, recently, a writer took me to task for having my anti-hero using a flip phone. “That’s so, like, five years ago,” she said. So I texted her back (painstakingly tap-tap-tapping three times per each letter on my flip-phone), Oh, yeah?

Progress. Bah! (“You kids call that a haircut?”)

What say you, other writers? How about it readers? Has progress helped or hindered what you write and read?

Ghosts of Gannaway, a decades spanning ghost story by Stuart R. West, from Books We Love Publishing is out now at the special sale price of .99! That's a whole lotta research for under a buck!

Click here for Amazon.


Stuart R. West's blog: Twisted Tales From Tornado Alley
Twitter: @StuartRWest

 




Thursday, June 18, 2015

Something a Little Different by Nancy M Bell

Welcome to my day on the Books We Love Blog! So nice to see you all back. Rather than ramble on about something that is important to me, I thought I would share something a little different this month. I love to write poetry, the way the words sing and how they evoke emotions and even the memory of certain scents. With that in mind, I thought I would post a few poems from my dusty dusty poetry vault. I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on my thoughts. LOL

Nostalgia

Bittersweet; nibbling at the toes of my subconscious
Memories of long past summer days
Evoked by the essence of green cut hay
A myriad of days
Wrapped up in the rustle of ripening wheat

Shimmering moonlight
Freeing the ghosts locked away in memory
Sending them shouting and galloping once again
Through the now silent dark
Plunging me back into half-forgotten dreams
And half-remembered loves

Sweet moon shadowed innocence of youth.


This poem was inspired by memories of riding with my friends when I was in my late teens and early twenties. I can still see it as clear as day, the blue June sky, the belly deep waving grasses, the smell of hot earth and dry grass sharp on the breeze. My horse strong and smooth between my knees, the lovely smell of clean horse and sweat. His coat silky under my hands, our thoughts as one, horse and rider. As if somehow we could capture a moment and freeze it in time, holding it forever in our hearts and minds.

Yesterday’s Last Day

This is the last day of yesterday
It can be no other way
Every other day will be tomorrow
Where joy will not be borrowed

I am closing the door on sadness
Offering myself forgiveness
No more misty dreaming of the past
I’m seeking a promise that will last

No walking with memory’s guidebook in hand
Revisiting places we played on the strand
With somehow tomorrow drifting away
Until I’m caught forever in the last day of yesterday

So now I’m searching through the clouds for tomorrow
Ignoring the beaconing sighs of yesterday’s sorrow
I’m leaving behind this lonely madness
And closing the door on sadness.


This one was about the angst of letting go of a relationship that has gone up in flames, but somehow I kept sifting the ashes through my fingers until I realized there wasn't really anything to hang on to anymore. I was in my late teens when I wrote this one.

Memories from a Honeymoon
May 1977

I remember green English fields and coal fires
Rain and Jubilee banners
Pigeons in Trafalgar Square
Walking through Hyde Park in the sun
Feeling the presence of ghosts from the past

And then Paris, City of flowers and bridges
Notre Dame rising from the stones
As if it has always been there
Inside the candles shining in the dark

I remember a pink rosebush in a park
Near the Eiffel Tower and more pigeons
Walking on the Champs Elysie in the rain
Sitting a little café with a café au lait
That cost a buck a cup
Crepes with strawberry jam from a street vendor

Zurich’s mountains and lake
A white swan in the river at dawn
And a hotel that was closed
Red roofs and cobble streets
Alpine flowers on the slopes and sweet mountain air

Amsterdam, city of canals
Dam Square and more pigeons
The Red Light District and a hungry alley cat
Walking along the Prinsengrache and Damrack
McDonald’s at last
Shopping the bustling streets
Wheels of cheese and fish markets
French fries with mayonnaise
And more rain

And over it all the glow of everlasting love.


This one is pretty self-explanatory. Memories of our honeymoon. Europe on a shoe string. Hard to believe it was 38 years ago.

Touchstone

We are linked by love
You and I
You have been my steadfast friend
My anchor in the stormy seas
My safe rock on which to stand
And survey my uncertainties

The sharer of my secrets
The keeper of the wings of my spirit
You have given so much
And asked so little
Touchstone of my soul
Transcending even the distance of death.

This is a tribute to my first horse, Brandy. He kept me sane through my teenage and early twenties. I wrote this right after he died. His name was Brandy, Brandance Kaine.


Secretariat

You were bred to win
And born to race
While still a colt you left
Your rolling Meadow fields
Forever

Destined to show that dreams
Can still come true
The essence of power and beauty
Running for love of it
Running for yourself
Honestly and truly

The sun was your spotlight
You were the ruler
The world your minions
Like your daddy’s name a Bold Ruler
And like your momma’s truly Something Royal

And now each time we see a flaming chestnut
The world looks again hoping that it’s you
Knowing that it never will be again.


This is appropriate seeing as American Pharaoh won the Triple Crown. I wrote this after Secretariat won in 1973. The first horse since 1948 when Citation won.


Winter Morning

Snow silvered branches spread against the pearl velvet of the sky
Bare trunks a dark slash against the white-blue snow
The frosty filigreed branches glow with illumination
The pale light gathered and thrown upwards by the fields they guard
The Goddess is holding her breath
There is no colour on this palette
Only shades of silver pewter
The pale blue-white of snow and shadow
And the stark black wounds of the trees
Stitching the earth to the sky.

This is just a small vignette of a winter morning that enchanted me.

Okay, only one more. I promise!

Just Shy of Eighty-Two

You were just one day shy
Of eighty-two years old
The day you went missing
Really, just one hour shy

The night closed in
And you drifted away from us
You left the face we knew on your pillow
Taking the part that was You
Where we couldn’t follow

You chose to leave in solitude
Sending your lover to catch a bus
Alone, your great bear heart settled into rest
Your great bear spirit free from its cage

Where I sat in the dark car outside a Tim Horton’s
Stopping briefly in my mad rush to reach you
I knew I was too late
Even before my cell phone split the silence
As we passed the Barrie Racetrack

You are still here in the blood of your children
And your children’s children
In your daughter’s eyes you are a hero
The hero has just gone on a new quest
There is an empty place at our banquet table


Mom and Dad 1956


Daddy

This was written when my dad died in 2008. No matter how old we get, we will always be our parent's children.

Well, I hope I haven't bored you all to death! Looking forward to hearing your thoughts and comments. Until next month!

Wednesday, June 17, 2015

Casting Your Characters - Gemini with Janet Lane Walters #Astrology #BooksWeLove

http://amzn.com/B00WHHYP96
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This cover is for The Gemini Sagittarius Connection due to be released soon. She is a single mother Gemini with twin sons who has no desire for another husband. Her nursing career brings her face to face with a Sagittarius doctor who believes he had the perfect marriage. His wife's death has left him as one of the hospital's most eligible bachelors.

I am currently working on a second book this time with a Gemini hero and doctor who has given up the practice of medicine to become a writer. His love interest returns to town after eleven years. She is a Cancer Pediatric Nurse Practitioner who he hurt in the past/


We've all heard that Gemini is the sign of the twins and that these people have trouble making up their minds. Not really true. Here are some tips if you want to give your character a Gemini Sun, Rising Sign or Moon.

Gemini sun and this is the inner nature of the character. Geminis are ruled by Mercury, This means communication. Geminis are sympathetic, affectionate. Home and children mean a lot to them. One of the problems they have is being easily influenced by people who are kind to them. Geminis are intuitive and are good investigators. They can act quickly in an emergency. Another problem is that they can be changeable. They are also inquisitive and love diversity.

Rising Sign- the face shown to the world. Ambition often rules. They are curious and given to investigations and experiments. With this sign rising they are capable of two pursuits at the same time, even to having two careers and the drive to succeed in both. They can be idealistic, perceptive and imaginative. A love of pleasure can set them on a tangent. They can be restless and high strung. They are great talkers.

Moon -- The emotional nature. This side of a Gemini shows an agreeable, warm-hearted persom except they are reserved about personal and domestic matters. They gain pleasure from books. With a Gemini Moon, the character would dislike quarreling and warefare. They are also changeable. A real problem can be caused by being drawn into embarrassing or difficult situations.


http://wwweclecticwriter.blogspot.com  

Tuesday, June 16, 2015

You Had to be There - A Summer Memory by Roseanne Dowell

Summer is a magical time in the life of a child and it was no less for me. I’ve always loved summer, especially in the fifties when I was young and carefree. It was a time of happiness and
contentment.  Secure in the love of my family, I enjoyed the summer days and nights.  We spent the days riding bikes, playing kick the can, hide and seek, baseball, and tag.  It’s so clear in my mind, it could have been yesterday instead of fifty plus years ago. 
My memories go back to warm summer days in Cleveland, Ohio.  Days spent waiting anxiously for my father to come home from work.  At the first sign of nice weather, my mother brought out the picnic basket. Every day in the nice weather, she packed it and had it ready to go.
While Dad washed up, we packed the car and before you knew it, we were on our way to our special place, Lagoon, named for the small lake nearby, Actually more like a pond.. The name sounded spooky, probably because in 1954 the movie Creature From the Black Lagoon was so popular. Not that I ever saw it, I didn't and still don’t care to. Spooky movies and I don’t get along.
We jumped out of the car and immediately begin gathering kindling while Mom and Dad brought the picnic basket and cooler to the table. No charcoal for us, wood was free and plentiful. After picking up the smaller twigs, we ran towards the woods looking for larger branches to use for firewood and. long skinny sticks for roasting marshmallows after dinner. Mom crumpled up old newspaper and started the fire and let Dad relax. She added the larger wood as the fire started smoldering.
My brothers, sisters, and I bickered and competed to see who could break the larger dead branches we had gathered. Holding the branch with one hand, we  jumped on it. Naturally, my brothers, being older and bigger, won. My sisters and I broke the smaller ones.  We held each end and cracked them across our knees. Even now I can hear the snap as the brittle branches splintered. Mom and Dad laughed at our antics unless we got too rough. Once the fire settled down to hot coals, my parents cooked, and we played.
Not far from our table and near the bridle path stood an old tree  with a crooked branch big enough to sit on . We called it our horse tree.  My sisters and I climbed the tree and watched the world while my brothers played baseball.  Sometimes we made up stories about the people who drove by. Riders often came down the path next to us, and we jumped down from our loft, talked to them, and petted the horses. That was before my fear of horses.
 Three or four of us could fit on that thick old limb, and we thought we were so high up that no one could see us At least we thought they couldn't. Far up to a child is a lot different than to an adult. . We often sat up there until dinnertime.  After dinner, we usually went for a walk by the lake with our parents or our brothers. We weren't allowed to go alone until we got older
On Wednesdays and weekends,my aunt, uncle, and cousins came on the picnic with us. We had some great baseball games  with ten kids and four adults. We played out in the dusty old field, screaming “go to third, or run home” and shouting “catch it, throw it home” jumping up and down as our team scored a run or someone in the field caught the ball.  Being the second youngest of six kids I didn't hit the ball very far, but the adults made allowances for us younger kids. They let the ball roll past them if we managed to hit it. But there was fierce competition between us kids and even my brothers didn't give us a break. After the game, our parents relaxed or played horseshoes.
While they visited with each other, we were allowed to go almost anywhere as long as the older boys were with us.  One of my favorite memories is going for walks up a long hill. At the end of the road, an old house stood surrounded by trees and covered in ivy. Dirty windows stared at us from their ivy-covered facade. An overgrown yard hid the sidewalk. The house looked spooky, probably abandoned, but we didn't know that then.
My brothers told us a witch lived there so we couldn't get too close. We slowed down the closer we got to the house. A little more than halfway up, one of my brothers yelled, "she's coming" or "there she is." We raced back down the hill like our lives depended on it. At the bottom, we stopped out of breath and laughed, thinking we outran her.
No matter how scared we were, we  begged to go back. I think we hoped to see her one day. Of course, neither my sisters or I ever saw her. Thinking back, I'm sure no one lived there, but even as a child I had a wild imaginatIon. Not that I was the only one, my sisters and cousin imagined the same thing. 
When we got a little older, my sisters, our cousin, and I were allowed to wander by off by ourselves. We even conjured up enough courage to go up the hill alone. Not that we ever made it all the way up. It never failed one or the other of us  thought we saw someone moving in the window or our brothers sneaked up out of the woods and scared the daylights out of us. As usual we ran like the devil was chasing us. After we caught our breaths, we took after the boys, never quite quick enough to catch them. 
I miss those days.  Many of the people are gone now, but the memory remains of that simpler time. A time when all we had to worry about was doing our chores, picnics, gathering sticks for kindling, playing and pretending. It was a time when fun, imaginations, and love abounded, and summer days were magical.
We went back to Lagoon several years ago for a family reunion. The tree still stands, but the witch's house, alas, was gone. We told our children and grandchildren these tales. They listened politely, smiling and nodding, but they didn't find the humor or magic in the story as we did. 
I guess you had to be there

Roseanne's books can be found at Amazon


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