Wild Horses of Alberta by Nancy M Bell

My latest novel Wild Horse Rescue released On September 21, 2018. You can click on the cover to learn more about it.

The inspiration for this story came from the wild horses of Alberta who mind their own business and struggle to survive like any wild animal. Unlike a 'wild' animal, the horses are considered 'feral' by the powers that be and therefore have no protection. In fact the Alberta government has a committee that decides when they decree there are too many. They can decide to initiate a 'cull' which means the horses are rounded up indiscriminately regardless of age or gender and sent to auction where most end up in the hands of the meat buyer. Some of the members on this supposedly impartial committee are the very people who will participate in the cull and benefit financially from the sale of the horses. Fences have been left unrepaired and gates open so the horses wander unto 'private' land, often lured by feed or salt block, although of course this is denied vehemently by the perpetrators.
Those horses are on crown land, land the people of Alberta supposedly have rights and access to. However during one cull a few years ago, the rancher with the cull permit locked access gates and refused entry to Alberta citizens. To make matters even more convoluted five people who were doing nothing more than observing were arrested and held for a number of hours and had to go to court to be proven blameless. The official stance is that the horses have no natural predators which of course if untrue and has been rebutted by advocacy groups. Help Alberta Wildies is a group of concerned citizens who advocate for the horses and bring their interests to the public forum. You can follow them on Facebook at Help Alberta Wildies. There are a number of photographers who routinely go out and take photos while watching over the horses. There have been recorded instances of foals being caught in deep snow and floundering, left by the herd. Young horses so covered in ticks they are anemic, attacks by cougars, wolves and coyotes on young, sick or older horses.

The wild horses in the western United States face similar challenges and their round up methods include chasing the horses (including young foals) by helicopter, insisting this is the best and most humane method. I can only IDIOTS! You can follow their story on Facebook at WIld in North Dakota and The Cloud Foundation.
I am not a bleeding heart city girl, I'm a horsewoman with many years of experience and I can say with no reserve that most of the official babble from both sides of the border is HOGWASH. That's the nicest word I could think of.

In Wild Horse Rescue, Laurel Rowan who fans of mine will remember from Laurel's Quest and the other books in the Cornwall Adventures, is back home in southern Alberta. Her Cornish friend Coll Tinne is visiting for the summer. The wild horses are under a cull order and Laurel refuses to allow the horses she so loves and admires to be denied their freedom and their very lives. So she sets out to find a way to help them. The stallion in the story is Coal, but he is inspired by the stallion known as White Spirit who lives with his band near Sundre, ALberta. I have moved the horses in my story from Sundre down to near Pincher Creek, Alberta. Although I don't believe there are any wild horses left in that area. There used to be wildies on the Suffield Military Base living quite in harmony with their surrounding. However the Alberta government in their infinite wisdom decided to remove them all, a lot of them went to slaughter, but some were bought by concerned citizens who fought to keep the bloodlines alive. There is a Suffield Mustang Association where they keep track of the horses and the breeding lines. When the horses were removed the government introduced elk to the area, now twenty years later they find the elk (who aren't indigenous to the area) are destroying the riparian areas by the water holes and the grazing. Now, they are talking about 'managing' the elk. Again, I say IDIOTS. Bureaucrats who don't understand the animals or the land listen to special interest groups who have their own agenda which has more to do with money than the environment or the animals well being.

The wildies are born wild, they live wild, they survive as they can, the weak fall and the fittest survive. They are as wild as any deer or moose. Hanging the 'feral' tag on them just makes the wildies easy pickings for the unscrupulous. I encourage you to take a look at the Help Alberta Wildies facebook page. There is another group called Wild Horses of Alberta Society, however they support the cull and also birth control for the mares, which I do not. Many of the ranchers would be very happy if the horses disappeared altogether and that will be a sad day for Alberta and the world.

Duane Starr is one of the photographers who follows the horses. The photos below are his work. PLease realize most of the images are taken with telescopic lens, the photographer is not near the horses. You can also see the damage logging has done as the horses graze in the mess of the clear cuts. And yet the government and ranchers claim the horses are destroying the landscape.

White Spirit

Darrel Glover also took some of the pictures and the black stallion in the snow is by Rick Price

Clear cut mess

This little guy is Kai when he was found, he was snowbound and freezing. Some riders found him and rescued him. He was severely under weight and covered in ticks. He survived but sadly before he was two he succumbed to colic. However, he was loved and cared for during his short life, so fie on the ones who said he should have been left to die, 'as nature intended'. I believe if he was 'meant to die' the riders wouldn't have found him. Perhaps little Kai was test of our compassion, courage and greatness of heart. In which case some people would have failed miserably. I bless Help Alberta Wildies for taking care of Kai and loving him.

Some of the wildies doing what they do to survive.

Time to Lighten Up (And Tell a Cat story)

Transport to Fort Providence residential school is only the beginning of their ordeal, for the teachers believe it is their sworn duty to “kill the Indian inside.” All attempts at escape are severely punished, but Yaotl and Sascho, along with two others, will try, undertaking a journey of 900 kilometers across the Northwest Territory. Like wild geese, brave hearts together, they are homeward bound.

Find Snow Goose and other historical novels @ these sites:

http://amzn.to/2jZPtIR

https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/fly-away-snow-goose-nits-it-ah-golika-xah-1

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/fly-away-snow-goose-canadian-historical-brides-collection-book-8-juliet-waldron/1127581811?ean=2940158604010

*******************************************************************************************************************************

Okay, this is a cat and cat "owner" story. I'm in  need of some relief from increasingly Dystopian reality. Maybe you are too.

We recently acquired a new cat. "Willeford" (who came up with that?!) is a used cat, so, as they say about cars, he's only new to us.  He arrived from a kill shelter in a nearby county, a nondescript gray tiger, eight years old and all busted up and weak on the back end.

Yes, not only is he an elder cat, but he's also a "busted" cat. When we first got him, he couldn't even uncurl his tail. He could take zero pressure from a hand gently stroking his hips without sinking to the ground. He's gaining strength after these months of happy release from the rescue cage in which we found him. Someone may have stepped on him, as he's one of those cats who imagines his people can see in the dark. I've narrowly avoided falling over or stepping on him quite a few times in the last months.

At our house, he's been able to run up and down stairs for therapy, to leap onto beds and chairs and cat furniture for cuddling and combing. His injuries no longer preclude his jumping onto the kitchen counter to demand a faucet water drink, or, his personal favorite, a glass filled to the brim with water set beside us on a desk or table for our convenience--at least that was the original plan.

Willeford has turned mostly into William, or Willy. When he's a real sweetie, it's WILL-YUM-YUM, or just YUM, for short. Cat names often start out grandly, but, I've found, quickly morph. We once had an elegant feisty black female named "Bast-Ra" but that eventually became what our youngest child could pronounce at the time, which was "Bap."  "Bap" it remained, even after he could say Mom's fancy original.

Willy came with more than a few unusual feline behaviors we've never coped with before. For one thing, at first he was super needy. I spent the first few hours he was home, lying in bed with him where he hugged and kissed and rolled all over me, all while purring and drooling like a mad kitty. He non-stop kneaded any body part he could reach. I stayed because I didn't want to leave him in such a state, so I was just a quiet cat mom for him until his anxiety wound down.

He spent the night with me and for most nights following, though I can't say either of us got much sleep, as he spent the time crawling all over me and purring. His favorite resting place, because I am a back sleeper, was on top of my face, chest down and with his cat "elbows" digging into my neck, so that eventually my throat would close. Then I'd  choke and have to push him away. I've tried all sorts of strategies to get him to accept other more acceptable (to me) sleeping positions, but it's literally taken months to get him sufficiently relaxed in order to do so. Now, we share a pillow, though I have to be firm in order to keep enough to accommodate my skull. Even now, sometimes, he'll wrap his kitty arms around my head and then drag the rest of his body close into a wrap-around. It's like a fur "face-hugger" and the mental image is not pleasant.

Big Feet

 Almost a year in and his behavior is slowly changing. Some time in the summer, he made a decision to decamp to some spot more distant, perhaps onto the foot of the bed, or into bed with my husband whose larger frame accommodates his weight and sharp elbows better. It gives us both a breather, although I have to admit to liking the creature comfort of a cat pressed against the torso on cold nights.

We have no idea what went on with his last human, but, as Willy'd arrived at the shelter starved and "from the streets,"we came to believe that his person had died and that he'd been summarily cast out to fend for himself. No wonder all the anxiety, poor guy!

Willy remains an early to bed type of cat. That is, initially, at 7:30, he started calling and then leading us toward the stairs, clear as anything saying "Time for bed."  My husband jokingly remarked that was the time when Jeopardy(c) ended, a classic bedtime for the senior senior. (Yes, I meant to say "senior" twice.)

He likes to play, but he's rough and isn't always careful with his claws or his teeth. At first my legs and arms were covered with scratches and puncture marks too from Sorry! OOPS! I-lost-my-head-for-a-minute bites. Our other (also crazy) cat really doesn't get him at all, and she gets scared and won't play chase as he would like, so now and then he bullies her because it's the single fun feline interaction he can get.

Sometimes I wonder if we should get another younger cat which could possibly break up their negative game by the addition of a third player. Another cat might provide  a playmate for the energetic Yum. Should we do it? But as every cat mom knows, #1 there's a husband problem to be solved even before the inter-cat relationships can be solved. 

Our family has managed as many as five kitties at a time and done a decent job, but we're not getting any younger or any richer, and taking proper care of animal companions requires funds as well as love/time. We're approaching the end of the trail here, and the last thing any elder pet "owner" wants to imagine is that their beloved friends will be cast onto the street as Willeford was.




 ~~Juliet Waldron

See All my novels:

https://www.kobo.com/us/en/search?Query=Juliet+Waldron

https://www.smashwords.com/books/search?query=Juliet+Waldron

http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B004HIX4GS

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/Juliet+Waldron?_requestid=1854149

The Esteemed Right Worshipful Prioress S.R.D. meets Willeford.

How to Design a Fictional Town or City by Connie Vines

Why would a writer design a fictional town or city?

Many writers use actual towns and cities in their fiction, but there are some writers who opt to create their own towns and cities. Stephen King is known for the fictional Maine towns he creates in his fiction. There are various reasons a writer might choose to create a fictional town or city rather than use a real location. The primary reason may be because the content of the story might not be flattering, and the writer, out of respect for the real communities, may create a fictional location to set the story. Fictional settings also require less research. If you're writing about a real place, readers familiar with that town or city will be critical of details that aren't exactly right. Creating a fictional town or city allows you a wider range of flexibility.

So, how does a writer create a fictional town or city that will convince readers they are visiting a real place?

The first step is obvious.  Find a name for your town or city. Come up with a name that sounds like the name of a town or city. Check maps to ensure the town doesn't exist in the state where you will set the story. If it does, your readers will assume you're writing about the actual town. You can use the name of a real town, just locate the town in a state other than where it exists. Consider names for your fictional setting that are similar in sound or spelling to real places.

I created Running Springs, Montana in my first Rodeo Romance in this manner.  Running Springs is a city in the mountains of southern California.  I placed my town in the Bitter Route Valley of Montana.  The larger towns were towns I visited so those details were familiar to anyone living Missoula.

Draw a map of your town or city. It doesn't have to be detailed, but a map will help you write about your town or city as if it's real. You will know what happens if you head east on Main Street or west on Third Avenue. You will know where your residential sections are, where the dangerous part of town is and what businesses are in town. These are details that will help you bring your fictional setting to life for your readers. 

Populate your fictional town with people that give the town character. Create the types of businesses you'd expect to find in a town of the same size and in the same part of the country as your fictional town. If your town is in a state like Wyoming or Montana, chances are good there will be a farm supply store, if not in your town, then at least a nearby town.

Base your fictional town or city on real places to help you gain your bearings and structure, but avoid using specific landmarks that will give away your model town or city. If a landmark is important to the plot of the story, create a similar fictional landmark.

Locate your fictional town or city near a recognizable real-life city to help give your readers an anchor that will make your fictional town or city seem more real to them. In my Fun & Sassy Fantasy Series my anchor cities are in southern California.  Each city is easily recognizable to my readers.
Sensory details are a must.  What flowers grow on the hillsides of the Montana mountains in the spring?  What does a tack and saddle shop smell like?  The sound of cowboy boots clicking on a weather-beaten stair case?  What does a belting hail storm feel like?

Don’t forget the regional foods and everyday expressions. 

Does you heroine reach for a can of soda, coke, or pop?  Sweetened or unsweetened ice tea?

Details count. 

After all your fictional town is a living element in your story.  Your fictional town has played a part in defining your hero or you heroine.

If the author is very skillful the reader will feel as if she/he has visited this fictional town, or believes this town is a real town. . .somewhere.

What is your take on fictional cities?

Happy Reading,

Connie


iTunes

Smashwords

Amazon.com