Thursday, October 14, 2021
Joined up writing...by Sheila Claydon
Wednesday, October 13, 2021
October Surprise by Eileen Charbonneau
Greetings, dear readers!
My October surprise is a sneak peek at my November 2021 release, Ursula's Inheritance. The third book in my American Civil War Brides series, it was a surprise to me, too! After publishing Book 2, Mercies of the Fallen, I thought I was finished with Ursula's story. But readers thought otherwise!
Mercies took place between the Battles of Antietam and Gettysburg. It ended just after the infamous New York City draft riots of July 1863. Readers wanted to know what happened next in the lives of Ursula and her Union officer Captain Rowan Buckley. Does he survive the war? Can she come out of hiding and clear her name? Will their young marriage born of desperate circumstances become a lasting union of souls? And what about the secrets still between them?
Did you know that this is how Louisa May Alcott's Little Women got written too? The first volume (1868) was a great success. But readers were eager for more. Alcott quickly completed a second volume in 1869. The two volumes were issued in 1880 as a single novel that has become our cherished classic.
I hope you'll enjoy what happens next in the story...The opening is from Rowan's viewpoint, and I hope you'll learn what a great dad he is becoming....
Chapter One, Ursula's Inheritance
April 1864, Gramercy Park, Manhattan
Even with the one eye the war had left him, Rowan Buckley knew the wee one pilfering from the garden was a girl, despite her trousers. He frowned at the canvas bag at her feet.
“So it is not a squirrel with an interest in our angelica, then?” he asked quietly.
The urchin turned, startled eyes narrowing. “Better me than an Irish thug!” she spat out.
The girl took advantage of his hesitation and his limited depth perception. She grabbed the sack and raced toward the iron garden gate. But after three hard years of soldiering, there was nothing wrong with Rowan’s reflexes. He caught up, took her wrist, and, when she resisted, her waist. She had a waist. So she was a little older than her small size had first impressed upon him.
“Please let me go, sir,” an even smaller voice came out of her.
“Am I ‘sir’ then, now that you’re caught?”
“You are a black Irish scoundrel to hold me against my will!”
She kicked him. Hard enough to throw off his stance. He maintained his temper and light grip as he steered her toward the tradesman’s door of Ursula’s house.
“You’ve nothing to fear from me, lass.” He sent her through the entrance with a nudge at her back. “Now hush up your caterwauling, the baby’s asleep.”
Jonathan was stretched out at the hearth, his stockinged foot rocking the cradle. His eyebrow arched.
“Company? The kettle’s on, my fine fellow.”
“Your fellow is a girl, and there’s nothing fine about her,” Rowan corrected, lifting the cap off his captive’s head. Fair-haired braids descended. “May I present our angelica and camomile thief?”
Jonathan smiled. “Ah. Mystery solved.”
The girl’s eyes fired. “I planted that garden!”
“Did you?” Jonathan asked in his most charming southern tone. “Fetch the young horticulturist a chair, brother.”
“She kicks,” Rowan warned.
The girl’s light brown eyes narrowed as she looked from one to the other. “You’re not brothers.”
“And you neglected to pay for your trousers,” Rowan observed, yanking off and reading the dry goods store tag. “The proprietor might want a word with you about that.”
“The proprietor is my father. His name is Selby, see?”
A rustling of nightclothes and Ursula stood in the back doorway. “Mr. Thomas Selby?”
Rowan saw something familiar in the girl’s trapped look, the tears stubbornly held back.
“You are so confusing! All of you!” she shouted, loud enough to startle wee Henry to wailing.
“Aw, there now then, fledgling,” Rowan soothed, lifting the baby from cradle and into his arms. “You’ve had enough of the lot of us, have you?”
Ursula kept her eyes fixed on the girl.
“What is your name?”
“Penina.”
She glanced in the sack, “Thank you, Penina. A little camomile is exactly what we need for our Henry’s teething gums. Take the rest home. Will you not join us for breakfast first?”
Rowan sighed. His wife had found another stray. He rubbed his sore shin, then fetched the frying pan. This little one might enjoy some of his oatcakes, he supposed.
Tuesday, October 12, 2021
Do You Need a Sensitivity Reader?
Monday, October 11, 2021
Oreos are Kosher. Who Knew? by Karla Stover
I will read anything. I have a particular weakness for ads in the backs of magazines. The NRA has a cigar club. Who knew? However, it was a crossword puzzle question that taught me that in 1997 Oreos became a kosher food. Nor did it tell me that the cookie's designs incorporate the Cross of Lorraine (carried by Knights Templar during the Crusades) and the 12 Templar Cross Pattees. Interesting, but not as interesting as when a man named Phil Sokolof "spent roughly $14 million campaigning against saturated foods, such as McDonald's French fries. Having survived a heart attack, he made it his life's mission to influence major food companies to remove saturated fats from popular foods." Imagine being part of a generation that never experienced the real deal.
It was Alexander McCall Smith's book, The Revolving Door of Life that introduced me to the Queen's and lord treasurers remembrancer (QLTR). In the book, one of the characters left a book in a railway locker and was told that in Scotland, at least, unclaimed items eventually will belong to the queen. I tried to research items the QLTR had 'inherited,' as it were, but the websites seemed only interested in Scottish estates. Nevermind. A friend gives me her old movie magazines and today I learned that Maybelline's Lash Sensational Sky High Waterproof Mascara contains bamboo fibers which are are supposed "to visibly lengthen fringe." I don't know what "lengthen fringe" means but bamboo in mascara seems a bit odd, not to mention dangerous if a flake gets in an eye. Half the ads on the same magazine page touted plant byproducts in their makeup: fruit enzymes, black vegan pigments, coconut, avocado or chia seed oils, etc. Do these horticultural claims really sell products?
And speaking of movie magazines. I now know Paris Hilton has a cooking show on Netflix. And here's an interesting quote: "Yacheron Constantin. The luxury Swiss watchmaker, worn by the late Princess Diana . . ." She wore an entire company? Who knew and, more importantly, how?
As I mentioned previously, I have been giving blood to replace units my brother needed for a cancer surgery. One of my pandemic book purchases was Roses of No Man's Land. It's about nursing soldiers during World War 1 and one of the diary entries quotes is about how the Americans taught the British about blood transfusions. It sounded like the needles were enormous but transfusions (if you could find a healthy volunteer) saved lives.
Something I read that really caught me off guard was that the #MeeToo movement isn't all that popular in parts of Europe. For example, French actress Catherine Deneuve and more than 100 well-known Frenchwomen signed a letter and sent it to a newspaper saying the movement "hampers the fine art of seduction in the workplace and repressed the sexual freedom of men who only tried to touch a knee, steal a kiss, or speak about pornographic matters at a business dinner, as well as the sexual freedom of women who might like it." I have to say, I see no problem with a little workplace flirting.
The humorist Jeanne Robertson advocated looking for the humorous in your day. I agree but I also try to find funky new facts. They contribute to my spices of life. So much to read; we haven't watched any network TV, except the news, in years.
Sunday, October 10, 2021
Ghosts
Ghosts
What else am I to write about in October? I watched “Casper” as a kid and the great TV show “Topper”. I loved “Medium” and “Ghost Whisperer”. If you bend the spectrum a little, shows like “Highlander” and “Forever”, which deal with immortals, could also be considered in this realm of otherworldliness.
I believe in ghosts and have gone on “haunted” cemetery tours, and “talked” with spirits on a Ouija Board. When I was maybe thirteen, I woke one night and swore I saw a ghost (or angel) at the foot of my bed. It may have been my sister, but considering I was on the top bunk, maybe not.
There was a favorite old road in Charleston, SC where we would go in high school to be on the lookout for ghosts said to haunt the swamps. (There were “sightings” which were probably just swamp gas.) I have come to realize that it was most likely a story invented by the guys because the area was very dark, very spooky and a very good place to take a girl on a Saturday night.
I’ve had ghosts appear in several of the books I’ve written, but they’re never malevolent or threatening because I don’t write horror. I can’t watch scary movies either, so my ghosts must be helpful in some way and not harmful.
My first pair of literary ghosts were Zeke and Lucky, two old prospectors in PROSPECTING FOR LOVE, a story that was such fun to write because in addition to the ghosts, the story is a time travel. That also puts it in another dimension, for who is to say whether the present as we know it is the only time plane currently evolving. In fact, perhaps our present is actually another person’s past, or future. Does that make us the ghosts to someone else’s existence? It can all get rather complicated.
Zeke and Lucky died in a mining accident 1870 and have been wandering around Peavine as ghosts until they can undo the accident that also killed their friend, Jesse Cole. When they spy Ellie, they realize the time has come because she looks exactly like Jesse’s girlfriend, Elizabeth. They can transport Ellie back to a time prior to the accident, but because she knows nothing of the 1870s, they must act as her guides and mentors to keep her out of trouble. PROSPECTING FOR LOVE is a light-hearted read and at times hilarious as Zeke and Lucky attempt to keep Ellie in line while trying to discover what went wrong the first time in history so they can prevent it from happening again.
I don’t always intentionally use ghosts as characters. In A GAME OF LOVE the ghost of an American Revolution era woman practically demanded that I tell her story. She made her presence known to my main character and no matter how much Megan didn’t want to believe in ghosts, and regardless of where I thought the story should go, Laurie McCluer was not about to be silenced. Megan leans more toward believing the ghost is trying to help her solve a mystery, but it creates friction between her and her childhood crush turned current love. Perhaps it’s because he’s a Boston detective who believes in physical evidence, not hazy green apparitions. Ghostly Laurie proved relentless and I finally had to let her story be told, which in the long run was really quite helpful.
If you like stories with ghosts but without the scares, I think you’ll enjoy A GAME OF LOVE (contemporary) and PROSPECTING FOR LOVE (historic time travel). They’re both available at https://bookswelove.net.
Also for the holiday season, Books We Love is having a give-away now through December 15. You can easily enter at https://bookswelove.net for a chance to win a free holiday eBook (my newest is included) and a chance to win an eBook reader. Books We Love knows how much you love books and we want to help spread the cheer.
Early
Best Wishes,
Barb
http://www.authorsden.com/barbarajbaldwin
https://bookswelove.net/baldwin-barbara/
Saturday, October 9, 2021
Writer's Block? Find a Friend to Write With! by Vanessa C. Hawkins
What did this $%@! just say?! |
It's true! And no, I didn't neglect my child, lock her beneath the stairs OR hire a nanny to take care of her with all my big author-made bucks... (heh... heh... *cough*) What I did do however, was ask my friend for a little bit of help.
Next to the toilet... for reading and when tissue is scarce! |
But as a result, I've had LOADS of people ask what it was like working with another author. What was it like to actually hear a voice in your head that was REAL and able to tell you when your writing was crap! What was it like to have someone as invested in something as you were that you could bounce ideas off of? Obviously, it was pretty good for a ton of reasons.
Sometimes she was the one holding the *squirtgun filled with pee* and sometimes it was me. |
Now that last one is a biggie. Because if you've ever written anything in your life, chances are you've encountered this block. It sucks! It more than sucks! And getting past it can make a nice, happy hobby/writing career into an ugly mess of paper, and dead words that you have no faith in. There are writer's who have given up! Cold turkey! They've been unable to shoulder the burden of their block and continue on and I don't blame them. Writing can be a very thankless hobby. But! Writing with another person can be fun, because at least then your not alone?
That's not true. Please sit with us! You can read a few pages! You can... wait, where are you going? |
I know there have been times where my co-author and I have been brainstorming and instead of doing any writing at all we just laugh at all the meaningless and hilarious stuff we'd like to insert into the plot. A few characters are hers to write, and a few belong to me, and it's a lark discussing how best to put them into awkward situations.
Always pick rock... nothing beats that! |
Tara: This makes it out to be that one of us sucks... Me: Leave me alone, I have low self-confidence! |
"But it gets there anyway," Crowley persevered.
"How?"
"It doesn't matter!"
Friday, October 8, 2021
Wedding Rings by J. S. Marlo
I welcomed a daughter-in-love last month. She is the love of my son’s life, and I couldn’t have picked a better woman for him.
After they got engaged last Christmas, my new daughter and I shared some interesting conversations about wedding rings. She’d read that the wedding ring is supposed to go first on your finger, then you slip the engagement ring back afterward, so she was wondering when or if she was supposed to switch her engagement ring to her right hand before putting it back to her left ring on top of her wedding ring.
I’ll admit staring a bit weirdly at her, only because I had never heard of wearing the wedding ring first. When I got married thirty-eight years ago, there was no Internet. New couples basically followed the traditions set by their parents/grandparents. My mother and my grandmothers wore their engagement rings next to their knuckles, then when they got married, their husbands slipped their wedding bands on top. There was no taking rings off or switching hands. It was simple and straightforward.
So, I did some research on the Internet about wedding rings, and stumbled on some very unusual ones along the way.
The first wedding rings are believed to date back to ancient Egypt, some 3,000 to 4,000 years ago. Egyptians wore their rings on the fourth finger of the left hand, believing that a vein from that finger led directly to the heart. The Romans call this the “vena amoris”, or “vein of love”.
The early Asian civilizations were certainly not as romantic as the Romans. Weddings were seen as a legal contract between a man and a woman, and the wedding rings were considered a physical representation of that binding contract. Therefore,
couples would seal their marriage with puzzle wedding rings which would immediately fall apart if they tried to remove them from their fingers.Wearing your wedding ring on the left hand is not a global tradition, mainly for one of these two reasons:
- The word left is derived from the Latin word meaning sinister. Therefore, wearing it on the left hand is considered unlucky or evil.
- In the Bible it was the practice to wear rings on the right hand, the hand of authority and power, completing the pledge of commitment.
This holds true in countries like Russia, Poland, Norway, Austria, Denmark, Latvia, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Spain, Portugal, Greece, and India.
Interestingly enough, in Sweden and Chile, it is not just brides-to-be that receive engagement rings, men wear them too.
In many cultures, it was traditional for only the woman to wear a wedding ring, but it changed during World War II. Many servicemen began wearing their wedding rings as a sign of commitment and as a way to remember their wives while stationed overseas.
As far as which ring should come first? My new daughter was right about most traditions favoring the wedding ring, but it is also not uncommon to stack them starting with the first one that was received. So, like me, she is wearing her wedding ring on top of her engagement ring.
Happy Reading & Stay Safe
JS
Wednesday, October 6, 2021
John Porter Bowman and The Haunted Mansion Book Shop by Eileen O'Finlan
One of my favorite spooky sites in Vermont is the Bowman Mausoleum in Cuttingsville across the street from what used to be The Haunted Mansion Book Shop.
When my grandparents were alive, my family traveled several times a year from our home in Massachusetts to their home in Vergennes, Vermont. On the way, we always stopped in Cuttingsville to check out the book shop and get a glimpse of the mysterious figure in the cemetery.
The figure is John Porter Bowman, or rather a statue of him. Bowman was a Vermonter who, in 1852, moved to Stony Creek, New York with his wife, Jennie where he became the wealthy owner of a tannery. The couple welcomed their first child, Addie, in 1854. Sadly, the baby died at only four months. Another daugher, Ella, was born in 1856. Ella died at age nineteen, followed within a year by Bowman's wife.
Having lost his entire family, the deeply grieving John Bowman moved back to Vermont where he purchased land in Cuttingsville, the town where he first learned the tanning trade. At Laurel Glen Cemetery he had a mausoleum built by over 100 skilled stonecutters. The bodies of his wife and two daughters were brought to Vermont and interred in the mausoleum in 1881. After that he had a mansion which he named Laurel Hall, built across the street so that he would be near his family and could visit them often. At the same time, he commissioned a statue of himself, dressed in a mourning cloak and carrying a mourning wreath. The statue was placed just outside the mausoleum's door. Grief is etched into the statues face as Mr. Bowman eternally mourns his family.
Tuesday, October 5, 2021
Writing a Historical Novel ~ Part 2 by Rosemary Morrise
To find more of Rosemary's work please click on the cover above.
Writing
a Historical Novel - Part Two.
Food
and Drink in The British Isles.
Beware
of Anachronisms.
I suspended belief when I began to
read a medieval novel set in England written by one of a famous publishing
house’s authors.
An armed Norman knight in full
armour with a shield on his back scaled a castle’s stone wall to rescue the
heroine locked in a turret. He is described climbing through a lancet window
(an impossible feat). The maiden welcomed him and asked him if he would like to
have a cup of coffee, and eggs and bacon with fried bread for breakfast.
My mind boggled! Coffee was not
imported to medieval England and, even if the beauty in distress had the means
to cook, she would not have served that food for breakfast.
What people ate in the past can be
a minefield of errors for me and other historical novelists. Prior to
Christopher Columbus’ return from the New World potatoes were not known in the
Old World. Novelists should never assume that because potato blight caused famine
in Ireland potatoes reached the British Isles before the late 1500’s.
An error in novels by American
novelists is often the assumption that, on the other side of the big pond, corn
means sweetcorn. It does not. The old corn markets were held to sell wheat.
Tomatoes, also introduced from the New
World were rare and, at first, considered poisonous. Later, people did not know
whether they should be eaten as a fruit or a vegetable.
Fresh fruit and vegetables were
eaten in season unless, for example, strawberries were grown in a hothouse
owned by a very wealthy person. Strawberries ripened at the end of May or in
June. If they were eaten at any other time of the year they would have been
preserved. I imagine a thrifty housewife serving them as a treat in winter.
When I write historical fiction, I
check and double check what my characters eat and drink. Once, I assumed
Camembert cheese was imported from France in the early nineteenth century and
described a character enjoying some in1813. I researched Camembert and found
out it was first made in 1790, and not produced in large quantities until the
1890’s.
There were no bars or boxes of
chocolates. At first it was served as a hot drink made with grated cacao
whisked with milk sugar and water or from cacao paste. Ladies drank it first
thing in the morning, and chocolate houses later supplanted by coffee houses,
were popular.
Eight of my novels are set in the
ever-popular Regency era, so I have included are a few notes from my research that
helped me avoid anachronisms.
“Vegetables are cheapest when they
come into full season. All vegetables are best if dressed as soon as gathered;
and are in greatest perfection before they begin to flower. Most articles for
pickling will be in their prime from July and August; but walnuts not later
than the middle of July; and mushrooms and white cabbage in September and
October.
Herbs should be gathered on a dry
day, and when the roots are completely cut off and perfectly well cleaned from
dust, etc., they should be divided into small bunches and dried very quick by
heat of a stove or in a Dutch oven before a common fire, rather than by the
heat of the sun, taking care they be not burnt When dry put them into bags and
hang them up in a dry place, or pound them and sift them through a hair sieve,
and keep them in bottles closely stopped. Sweet and savoury herbs are best in
fragrance from May to August, according to their kinds. The flavour and
fragrance of fresh herbs are much finer than those that are dried.”
http://bookswelove.net/authors/morris-rosemary
www.rosemarymorris.co.uk
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