Parlez Moi Blog

An eAuthor's February Update

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 16:10:00 +0000

After the hectic book buying frenzy of December and January I was pretty worried about what February would bring. It is true that the I-got-a-Kindle-for-Christmas frenzy has definitely calmed down but I can't complain. February's numbers won't match January but they are still really good – a lot better than I ever expected. This new increase in book royalties is making me a little dizzy and, while I'm not sufficiently confident to think it will last indefinitely, I'm going to try to make the best of it while it lasts.

One of the thing every aspiring author dreams of is the day when they can live on their book income and devote their time to writing. Of course learning to manage that is something we never think about. This isn't the 1920s in Paris and none of us are Hemingway (no kidding). I remember the first time I read A Moveable Feast, Hemingway's brilliant essays on his early years in Paris. Oh how I longed for that life. Getting up early and walking to my little writing room or favorite cafe. Writing for hours completely absorbed in whatever I was writing over a café créme and brioche. Celebrating when the day's writing was accomplished with a demi blond and an order or two of oysters. Spending the afternoon strolling around the Louvre with Fitzgerald or browsing books at Sylvia Beach's Shakespeare & Company. Then going home to a devoted spouse and spending the evening at 27 Rue de Fleurs with Gertrude Stein or hanging out at one of the Montmatre cafes with Ezra Pound and James Joyce. Sigh.

The reality is more like getting up early and grabbing a quick shower while the coffee drips. Checking email and Facebook while drinking coffee and wolfing down a bowl of hot, wheat-free cereal. Checking book stats on Amazon and making the rounds of the review sites and book promotion sites in between answering phone calls. Updating web sites, answering emails, responding to PMs, posting to internet readers' forums. Plugging in Kindle so it can recharge. Taking a break to heat up some leftover soup and eating that while reviewing most recent writing. Turning off phone's ringer and settling in to write for a few hours, resisting the urge to check email again or see what's new on Facebook and Amazon Discussion Groups. Finally transferring the day's writing to my Kindle so I can read it there later. Running to the market, post office, and/or package store. Quick dinner. Do some cleaning up and general housekeeping. Read day's work on Kindle. Go to bed. The glamour is shattering.

But it's good. It's very good all things considered. I tend to alternate writing days with work days because I still need to do work for clients. But at least I'm making progress on the writing projects instead of waiting for the weekend to work on them.

Depraved Heart, my latest novel, is with an editor/proof-reader. He tells me he thinks it is very good. All the charts have been drawn and the photographs taken for The Mermaid's Garden Shawl knitting booklet – now I just have to write it. And I'm on the sixth story for The Whiskey Bottle in the Wall collection of Marienstadt stories. Plus I have 2 novellas waiting for me to have time for them. These are all good things. When I want some entertainment I play around with additionals drafts of the covers. That is the most relaxing part of my job.

So we are a few days away from March and February has been sufficiently successful with book sales that I'm encouraged that maybe I really am a writer. I keep working at it and that's all that matters.

Thanks for reading.

Writers on Writing: Kate Avery Ellison

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:30:00 +0000

Books That Inspired Me: Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

I was recently inspired by Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life, a lyrical, snarky, and laugh-out-loud hilarious book about the trials (and joys) of writing. The title is inspired by some advice Lamott’s father gave her brother as he struggled over a school report on birds. He’d put off the report until the last minute, and when crunch time came he panicked over the size of the project. Their father calmly told him, “Just take it bird by bird.” And that is how Lamott suggests we approach our writing when it threatens to overwhelm us. Bird by bird.

Lamott is like a wise, sassy, self-deprecating friend who puts an arm around your shoulders and tells you tale after tale of her own mishaps before assuring you that it’s all going to be okay—all the great authors have been there and done that, whether it’s jealousy, writer’s block, or a really terrible first draft. “I know some very great writers, writers you love who write beautifully and have made a great deal of money,” Lamott writes. “And not one of them sits down routinely feeling wildly enthusiastic and confident. Not one of them writes elegant first drafts. All right, one of them does, but we do not like her very much.”

The book is full of sound writing advice, pithy quotes, and giggle-inducing stories. I didn’t expect to find myself cackling with laughter while reading a book on writing, but Anne Lamott is a very funny woman. Her writing is so full of grace and light too, and when I finished the book I felt like I’d been given a shot of confidence.

As a young and fairly new author, I am slowly learning about myself and my way of breathing life into my stories. Bird by Bird showed me that I’m not alone in my struggles or my joys.

If you read one book about writing this year, let it be Bird by Bird.

____

Kate Avery Ellison enjoys tweeting, blogging, and watching TV, and in her spare time she writes fantasy and young adult fiction. Wait, reverse that. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her adorably geeky husband and two spoiled cats.

For more by Kate Avery Ellison, check out The Curse Girl, a twisty, re-imagined version of Beauty and the Beast in a modern-day alternate universe and Once Upon a Beanstalk, a snark-filled collection of fairy tale mash-ups. You can also visit her at her blog.

Writers on Writing: A New Series About to Begin

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 19:49:00 +0000

Last year I ran a series on this blog called For/From Indie Authors. It was pretty successful and a lot of people said they got good exposure from it. So I decided to try a new one. This is called Writers on Writing: The Book That Inspired Me. I'll post at least 2 entries a week on a first come/first served basis and I'll notify you when yours is posted. Here is what I am looking for:

Looking for essays from 250 to 500 words on books that writers find inspirational – it can be either a work of fiction or a book about writing or anything else. Tell a little something about the book, what impressed you about it, and how it has influenced you as a writer. You may include a brief 2-3 sentence biography and up to three links to your books, web site, blog, and/or author's page. Please email to inquiry at parlezmoipress dot com, Subject: Writers on Writing.
Please make sure your text is properly edited and proofread because it will appear exactly as you send it. The blog owner retains the right to publish or not publish all entries.

You may also include a photo of yourself (please keep it under 500px wide in JPEG, PNG or GIF format) and an image for the book you are writing about.

Thanks!

The Marienstadt Stories: Moving Right Along

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 18:09:00 +0000

Back in October when I got the idea to write The Reluctant Belsnickel of Opelt's Wood I had no idea it would turn into the project it has! I had such a good time writing it, and received such positive feedback on it, that I decided to write a second story that would include some of the same characters and the same setting. This resulted in a rather hilarious little story I called “Peeper Baumgratz and the Sister's Snowplow.” I let a couple friends read it and they said, “That's a riot, keep going.” So I am.

One of the most common complaints I get in reviews of my existing novelettes is that they should be longer. I struggle with this because on the one hand I think they are as long as they needed to be and if I made them longer they would have gotten dull and people would have complained about too much “filler.” On the other hand it is nice to think that people want to read more of your writing – every writer loves that. So, when a few reviews for Reluctant Belsnickel said it needed to be longer, I thought maybe not longer – maybe more. One of my favorite parts of writing fiction is creating a world – the world of a lake Erie waterfront town in the 60s, the world of a Massachusetts mill town and an abandoned convent in Maine, the world of a lavish estate on an island off the coast of New England. So, since I had already created the world of Marienstadt and Opelt's Wood, I decided to keep going with more stories.

This is sort of interesting because it is not at all like writing a novel. Each story stands alone but they have the commonality of place and characters. I've never written this way before but I'm really finding it both fascinating and challenging. As more stories emerge I have to go back and massage the existing ones but that's part of the fun, seeing who can show up where and what reinforces something already written or inspires something new.

One of the most interesting things to explore is the whole issue of secrets. As my readers know, I LOVE characters with secrets. To me they are the most exciting to develop. Oliver, in Reluctant Belsnickel, has a secret that forms the basis of that story. Then I wrote two more stories about secrets and now I'm working on another one. It occurs to me that in small communities where generations of people have known each other well, secrets are often important to the continuing social progression. People keep secrets for the good of the society. Then, as time goes by, and society shifts in its understanding secrets come to light and are either shocking or enlightening or both.

So, at present, I have the following stories in various stages of development, in addition to the Reluctant Belsnickel:

The Whiskey Bottle in the Wall: In which Titus Winter, the great-grandson of one of Marienstadt's most prominent businessmen, discovers the truth about his infamous ancestor thanks to a note found in a bottle hidden in the wall of the Town Hall.
Peeper Baumgratz and the Sister's Snowplow: In which Chief of Police Henry Werner, with the help of Oliver Eberstark, hunts down a renegade and devises a plan to teach him a lesson.
The Confession of Genny Franck: In which Father Nicholas Bauer is told the story of a secret one of the town's oldest residents has kept for 75 years.
The Day the Viaduct Blew Down: In which Titus's former-barnstormer Great-uncle Mathias confesses to a stunt he was forbidden to perform but did anyway.
The Great Dumpling War: In which Gretchen Fritz's Sunday afternoon quilting bee becomes a hotbed of dissent over the proper way to make dumplings.
A Long Day's Journey into Light: In which Henry, Oliver and others spend a bitter winter night searching for Titus's elderly father causing Henry to recall a secret he has kept for the love of his life.

I have a few more ideas, too. This is a big challenge but also a huge amount of fun. What more can a writer ask for?

Thanks for reading.

#SampleSunday: A Love Scene from "Each Angel Burns"

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 00:18:00 +0000

Each Angel Burns received a fabulous review at Boomers & Books Blog, so here is this Sunday's Sample:

Kathleen Valentine's prose is like warm chocolate drizzled slowly over a still warm cake...
it first warms the brain and then pours itself gently over the heart where it can
then saturate into the soul. Suddenly without realizing it you are addicted,
begging for more sensual sweetness.
- posted to Facebook by author Maureen McDermott Gill, January Moon

This tender love scene comes late in the story when two of the main characters, both mature, fall in love. The setting is an old convent on the coast in Maine that is being converted to a sculpture studio. From Each Angel Burns:

Silver light from a full Snow Moon rising out of the Atlantic just beyond Owl’s Head sweeps across the frigid black waters like a trail of angel’s wings and shimmers through the frozen night. On a Maine night in February when the snow glistens like shattered diamonds, red foxes in their plush winter coats gather under the brittle raspberry bushes tumbling over granite outcrops and watch the sky. Snowy owls soar between towering spikes of Douglas fir and swoop down through the moonlight to snatch a wayward mouse. Clumps of dusty blue juniper berries chatter against each other in the harsh night breeze. Timber wolves, lean and hard, in the deepest part of winter, trail up hillsides through stands of blue spruce in search of big-eyed white-tailed deer stripping away the bark of birch and silver maple trees. The deer scent the wolves and stand silent and watchful then turn and leap off like ballerinas, their plume-like tails raised in alarm.

And if the solar winds have stirred far off in the velvety night then showers of light—gold and violet, rose and green—paint the sky. But on an icy February night in Maine few brave the cold to see them as they dance and flicker over the waves below, over the scattered stones of a crumbling garden wall, over the bent frozen stems of lilies called Persian Priests in an old garden. The quiet thunder of the aurora lends music to the pristine night as moonlight sweeps through a window of antique glass diamond panes set in lead. In that room those priests charged with the care of the souls of virgin nuns pledged to silence and constant prayer took their rest away from the burdensome responsibility of so much virtue.

But this Snow Moon bears witness to a sacrament of a different kind. For on this night the room is graced with two lovers entwined. No longer young, these lovers drift in grateful awe that life has not forgotten them but brought them together at this time when they had thought such possibility long gone—a gift for the young, not for two who have traveled this far down life’s road.

They rarely speak when melted into one another. Words have lost meaning. He covers her and warms her and shelters her from everything that is not his love for her. She takes him in and creates safe harbor from all he braves in the world. Her desire for him takes his breath away. His cherishing of her comforts her heart. She places her hands on his face and lifts it just enough so he can see hers and see how they glitter with the gratitude she feels for him. He kisses her and sinks into her like warm silvery rain on pungent earth. They are long past the age of creating a new life. Instead they have created renewed life, each for the other.

The night deepens and grows ever more silent as they flow together in that most ancient form of worship. Oh God, they breathe, over and over. Oh God.

And God smiles and answers, yes.
__________________________
Available in paperback and also for Kindle...

Who Would You Cast?

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 15:47:00 +0000

Sharon Tillotson, author of The Storyteller, wrote a wonderful review of my novel Each Angel Burns for the Boomers and Books Blog. I'm very happy that she liked the book as much a she did, what author isn't thrilled by happy readers? In the review she wrote that she thought the book would make a good movie and that made me think who would be the best actors for the main roles.

Actually, a couple of my friends and I have talked about this a few times. I can never cast my characters because, to me, they are so real but I'm always interested to know who others imaging in the parts. The three lead characters of Each Angel Burns are all in their early fifties. Gabe is a big, rugged sweetheart of a guy -- not handsome but good and reliable and a skilled woodworker. The part of Maggie would be a plum role for any 50-something actress, I think. She is beautiful and elegant, vulnerable in the beginning but a lot tougher than she thought she was as time goes on. Father Peter is the one I simply cannot think of anyone for. He is very handsome and charming but also a genuine mystic who lives in his own world.

Actually, the one character in the story that I can envision is Gabe's father Mick, who, in my mind, was always pretty Clint Eastwood-ish, tall, rangy, basically easy-going but tough as nails at the same time. So, of course, I'd love to know if anyone has suggestions what they are. In the mean time here is Sharon's Review:

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A beautiful read..., February 17, 2012

Sharon Tillotson - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)

This review is from: Each Angel Burns (Kindle Edition)

I was pretty sure from what I'd seen about this book on various reader threads that I was going to enjoy it, so I saved it to begin reading on a flight from Canada to Australia. That turned out to be both a blessing and a curse. Each Angel Burns had me from the very first page. Though it was wonderful to occupy the twenty three or so hours in the air in this way, I also found myself turning the reading light on when I should have been sleeping. Sleep is important when flying half-way around the world to a different hemisphere, an adjustment to one's internal clock and a radical difference in season and temperature. Sleep is the one important thing one can do to lessen the shock to the body. I knew this. But did I have the good sense to just shut my Kindle and rest? Nope.

Still, upon arrival in Ozz, the book got me through the next hours of getting back on kilter and was just perfect to read in the sunshine on a chaise with my feet up. The lack of sleep also gave me an excuse to get out of a few Christmas chores - and still more time reading as I `rested'.

The story itself was absorbing, but it was the good writing that had me so entranced. I am partial to `literary fiction', and this book fit the bill. Dialogue was superb, descriptions skillful and lovely. The characters were colorful and interesting, ranging from an artist to a carpenter to a priest; the types of folks one would love to have in their circle of friends. And then there was Zeke, one of the most adorable and endearing dogs it has ever been my pleasure to meet.

I enjoyed the mature way in which the characters developed. Maggie, a truly unique, gifted hero, was somewhat vulnerable at the beginning of the story, but her grounded yet spirited nature came through as she struggled to regain herself from years of living with an unpredictable and controlling husband. She cuts off her hair in an act of rebellion as she tries to extricate herself from her marriage. Peter the Priest was drawn so real as to wonder if the author (an unabashed Catholic) knew someone just like him. And Gabe - well, who wouldn't want him for a friend?

It was a reasonably large cast of characters, some charming, some steadfast, some not so much, as it is in good stories, and each were well defined and real. The Arm Pit was a fabulous watering hole, the old Abbey one of the most scrumptious settings I have ever encountered.

I am not going to go into the storyline as this is a book to be savored and the story took twists and turns which revealed would spoil it for the reader. I will say I found the love story exquisite.

There were a few things I did not like about the book. Though always appropriate to the occasion, I felt there was too much profanity. A few such words sprinkled in here and there would have made more of a statement for my tastes. Punctuation could have been better edited, particularly in dialogue, and occasionally, especially as I was reading the book on a Kindle, a line break would have helped in a transition of time and place. There was a loose thread that never got satisfactorily knotted up.

Still, the quality of the writing and the storyline itself make Each Angel Burns one of those books that had I not converted pretty much exclusively to digital reading, would reside proudly on my bookshelf and never been loaned except to those I knew would return it. I may still buy a paper copy to add to my small collection of such books.

One of the best things I can say about a book is that it could/should be made into a fabulous movie, and this is one of those. Steven Spielberg, are you listening? Or better still, how about Clint Eastwood?

4 stars, a high rating for this reviewer.

And the Winner Is!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 18:28:00 +0000

The winner of the Book Lovin Babes Blog Hop on MY blog is Joan Maholtz. She will receive 2 lbs. of yummy chocolate covered strawberries and cordials from Nuts.com. And, as a special thank you, all of the entrants on my blog have been sent a Smashwords coupon for a free copy, in their choice of digital format, of "The Old Mermaid's Tale." Thanks to all who played!!!

The Valentine Blog Hop is over!

I'm part of a Valentine's Day Blog Hop sponsored by Book Luvin’ Babes blogsite where readers come together with their favorite authors. Visit 25 author websites to discover fun prizes and great stories.

My collection of short stories, My Last Romance and other passions is available in eitherpaperback or for Kindle. It contains eight love stories about all kinds of people, from all ages and walks of life who discover the wonder of falling in love!

As a prize for visiting my blog page I'm offering two full pounds of yummy, delicious treats from Nuts.com (formerly NutsOnLine.com). The winner will receive one pound of their Pastel Chocolate Strawberries (whole strawberries coated in milk chocolate and covered with strawberry couveture) and one pound of their Chocolate-Covered Cordials (in your choice of rum, blackberry brandy, amaretto, cherry, raspberry or pomegranate). Shipping address must be within the USA.

Happy Valentine's Day from All My Lovers

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 16:36:00 +0000

I never actually meant for this to happen but I seem to have acquired a lot of lovers over the years. Because I was born with the name Valentine I suppose I have always taken it for granted and Valentine's Day itself has never seemed particularly special. But this morning I received an email from a friend in Cambodia and he mentioned that he rather liked having a real Valentine to write to on Valentine's Day. I thought that was rather sweet. He also said he thought it was appropriate that someone named Valentine should write such fine romance.

The thing is I don't think of myself as a “romance writer.” I admit I write love stories, among other kinds of stories, and,consequently, I've accumulated rather a lot of lovers over the years. So, in honor of Valentine's Day, I had some of my lovers make a Valentine to post here. Please excuse Zeke but he insisted that he loves Maggie every bit as much as Gabe does and he loves Gabe every bit as much as Maggie does (he also loves everybody else even though he hasn't met them.)

Right now I am in the midst of writing another story that involves a pair of lovers and, as I always do, I'm falling in love with them. For me it is the beautiful, aching, tender vulnerability that people open themselves to when they love someone and let that someone love them back. It is a difficult thing to write about but that is what makes the writing of it so seductive.

So today on Valentine's Day my lovers and I wish you love and tenderness and joy. Happy Valentine's Day.

Thanks for reading.

#SampleSunday: Free Books, Win Chocolate - Be My Valentine!

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 23:06:00 +0000

In honor of Valentine's Day, my collection of eight very romantic short stories, My Last Romance & other passions, is free for Kindle Sunday, Monday and Tuesday of this week. Plus don't forget to register to win two pounds of Nuts.com yummy chocolates in the Valentine Blog Hop. Just click here and you can register to win and be entered to win jewelry and gift cards from Book Lovin Babes!

Product Description

The perfect Valentine for your Valentine: Eight stories with a common theme---the wonder of finding love---sweep the reader into sensuous worlds where ordinary people discover, or rediscover, love. Foolish love, forbidden love, married love---even murderous love, each story is a seductive jewel populated with characters that seem like someone we could know---or someone we could be. Each of the stories in this collection is an exquisitely rendered portrait of people from a broad range of ages each proving that passion and love are eternal, regardless of life's far-ranging challenges.

My Last Romance - Back in the day Silvio Santini was the hottest dance band leader in the South and Ruby was the voice that drove the men wild. It's a lot of years later when Ruby chances upon a vintage copy of their biggest hit. Memories come flooding out and with them comes a stunning revelation.
Asa - When you are over eighty and have loved the same man all your life it doesn't do to dwell over-much on the measures you had to take to keep him yours.
Damian - She was an artist, he was a fisherman. Together they were magic, regardless of the cost.
Danse Avec Moi - She loves her sophisticated husband for his elegance and charm. Then he takes her back to his bayou home and teaches her how to dance.
The Haven - She never planned to fall in love with her husband's childhood hero. She could never have believed how loving him would alter all of their lives.
Waiting for Lindy - On a rainy, wind-swept Cape Cod night, a shopkeeper waits for his lover spending the time talking with his son about life, loss, and the mysteries of love.
Flynnie and Babe - Whenever Babe needed a shoulder to cry on Flynnie's was right there. It took her long enough to realized that Flynnie was right there, too.
Treat Yourself To The Best - Fifi just doesn't get it. She spent her entire life running away from home and now her adorable young husband just can't get enough of going back there.

Meetings with Remarkable Writers: Skye Alexander

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 18:30:00 +0000

The other day I got an email from my friend Skye Alexander who used to live here in Gloucester but has since moved to Kerrville, Texas. Last summer she told me she was writing a book about the myth and lore of mermaids and she asked if she could use a quote or two from my mermaid books. Naturally, being a writer, hence eager for publicity, I said “yes” and told her to take her pick. In her email Skye attached the image, it will be in her new book. I am so thrilled with how beautiful it is I am nearly speechless.

I've known Skye for close to 20 years. We met when I first moved to Gloucester and she and 2 other friends were discussing forming a small publishing company. At the time they were thinking about publishing erotica but the project didn't quite work out and Skye moved on. She then formed a partnership with writers Kate Flora and Susan Oleksiw to create Level Best Books, which publishes an annual anthology of crime fiction by New England writers. Over the years the editorial staff has changed but they are still going strong. To date I have had three stories published in their anthologies.

Skye, however, has published far beyond any one genre. I am continually stunned by her output and her versatility. She is best known for her metaphysical books particularly as an astrologer. Recently she has published a number of books on meditation, health, home improvement, clutter control (which I should commit to memory), and other contemporary issues. I recently bought her book Angels Among Us which includes some astonishing photography of angelic-appearing apparitions including one that I was a part of. What struck me as I read Skye's commentary in the beginning of the book was the depth of knowledge and scholarship that went in to the creation of it. This is not your light'n'fluffy angel book, this has depth and substance.

One of the joys of being a writer is having the opportunity to commune with other writers, to exchange ideas, and to share how we think. Whenever I have the opportunity to talk with Skye I'm continually amazed by her range on interests – from angels to erotica, from tarot cards to baseball. I've always believed that one of the best parts of being a writer is that it gives you an excuse to pursue the study of subjects you might be chagrined to study otherwise. After all, writers need to know about all kins of things in order to write.

After seeing Skye's beautiful angel book I am even more excited to see her mermaid books which is scheduled to be released this spring.

In addition to writing Skye also paints, you can see some of her work on her web site. She also makes a mean apple pie.

So, as always, I'm thrilled to be included in one of Skye's projects. She is one of the most fully creative people I know. I'll be sure to let you know when her mermaid book is released and, in the mean time, check out her other books. I'm lucky to have her as a friend and we are all lucky to have her as a writer.

Thanks for reading.

Reviews from the Heart

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 01:03:00 +0000

A wonderful review on a book blog for The Old Mermaid's Tale!

Reviews from the Heart: A MUST READ: THE OLD MERMAID'S TALE by KATHLEEN V...: I have read several short stories by Kathleen Valentine, and I have enjoyed all of them. This is the first full length novel of hers that I have read, though. When an author is successful as a short story writer, I always wonder whether they can sustain that level of writing in a full length book. It is with great joy that I found that Kathleen Valentine is a wonderful success at both. In fact, this book will definitely be on my top books read in 2012 list. I was discussing the book with a friend, and we both agreed that this is not your typical romance book. In fact, we both felt that it is not really a romance book at all, but is instead a captivating love story. Being one of the best love stories that I have ever read, I cannot imagine a lot of other books overcoming it. Read the rest...

#SampleSunday: Guy Falls in Love - or something from "Waiting for Lindy"

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 02:58:00 +0000

Continuing with a selection of samples from My Last Romance and other passions, what could be a more perfect Valentine than this collection of eight love stories? On February 12, 13, 14 this collection will be free for Kindle. It is also available in a lovely little paperback and at $10.20 it's not much more expensive than a card and packed with romance! And don't forget to enter our Valentine Blog Hop and register for prizes -- candy, jewelry and Amazon Gift Cards!
____________________________
Waiting for Lindy is one of eight stories in My Last Romance and other passions. In this Guy, a 50-something widower has given up fishing and open a tourist shop in a small town on Cape Cod. He's reconciled to his lonely life until a lovely woman walks through his door:

The big question is what does a woman like her see in an old fart like him anyway? It’s his favorite question to torment himself with ever since the day she first walked into his shop and knocked him off his feet.

The first time—well, that was easy to understand. It was Spring and the air smelled like desire. She was indulging herself in a weekend getaway—meandering down the street in a loose white shirt that fluttered in the sea breeze. And those kind of strategically tight and faded jeans that made men glad to be alive. He noticed her first when she stood looking in the window of the batik shop across the street. He must have been impressed—he spilled iced tea down the front of his pants and was swabbing idiotically when she entered his shop. She looked at him sideways, smiled slightly, tossed her hair. Of course she tossed her hair—she had to have. Well, even if she didn’t, in his mind she tossed her hair and that was good enough for him.

"Pretty clumsy," he mumbled, "grown man and still spilling things all over myself."

She laughed but it was a sweet laugh. She was the sort of woman who knew how men reacted to her and loved them for it. He tried not to be too obvious watching her as she moved around the shop picking up seashells and turning them over, tracing the swirls of a nautilus shell with her finger, holding bits of coral up to the light. The breeze wafting through the harbor-side door carried the scent of jasmine and lilacs and female warmth to him—made him light-headed and giddy. When she reached up to tap the bronze wind chimes above the window the sunlight seeped through her blouse and the silhouette beneath made his knees weak. Girls like that, he thought, girls like that should be locked up—but thank God that they weren’t.

He was dying to say something witty. He was damn clever when no one important was around—down at the Legion hall he had a reputation for his quick comebacks. Right now his tongue was being a traitorous bastard.

"Is this your shop?" she asked turning toward him.

"Yeah." He swallowed and tossed the tea-soaked tissues toward the waste basket. Naturally he missed. "I quit fishing when my wife got sick a few years back. After she passed away I opened this place—never felt much like fishing again." Well, that sounded pathetic—now she’d think he was a love-lorn old fool.

"That’s too bad," she said.

"Oh, it’s been a good enough living—lots of tourists these days."

She smiled softly. "No, I meant it was too bad about your wife."

"Oh." Christ. "Well, that was awhile ago. Are you on vacation?"

"Sort of—yes." She picked up a curtain of mussel shells and held it up to the light. "I live in Arlington. Woke up with Spring fever this morning and just called in sick and got in the car." She turned toward him. Her eyes were teasing. "Sometimes you just have to do something crazy, y’know?"

Up close he realized she wasn’t as young as he had thought—late thirties maybe. Possibly forty. And the Spring fever was contagious. The fever was rushing through him and pounding in his head. Pounding in a lot of places.

"Like that?" he asked as she toyed with the shells hanging from a long, slim piece of driftwood strung with fishing line. "The Wampanoags make those. They’re good in windows—give you a little privacy, make a nice sound when the wind blows, and turn the sunlight blue."

"Wampanoags?" She tilted an eyebrow—she was damn good at that.

"Local Native tribe," he said relieved they were finally talking about something that didn’t make him sound like a moron. "‘Course these days they make more money with their casinos than crafts. Interesting people. I like hearing their dune lore stories."

She smiled as she put the screen on the counter and opened her handbag. "Dune lore? What’s dune lore?"

"Sorry," he said finally managing to smile back at her, "I don’t tell dune lore stories on company time. You have to be out in the dunes after dark for them to get the effect, y’know?" What the hell, he thought, there’s no fool like an old fool and he’d been down this road before.

She lifted an eyebrow—she could kill a man with that eyebrow. "That so?" The rest of the conversation was hazy after that eyebrow trick but the point was he had wound up offering to take her for beer and cuyhoags and a walk in the dunes that evening. Her name was Lindy which had a lovely lilting sound on his tongue.

He knew she was just looking for adventure. Well, he thought, if she was looking for adventure he wasn’t above letting her use him for that purpose. He’d misused himself for worse purposes. Read the rest....

"The Old Mermaid's Tale" and I thank you so much for your beautiful words...

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 01:50:00 +0000

In the past couple of months The Old Mermaid's Tale has gotten some incredible reviews on Amazon. I appreciate these so much!

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the most beautiful stories I have ever read. A MUST READ!, February 3, 2012

Lyn Meadows (Danville, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Old Mermaid's Tale (Paperback)

I have read several short stories by Kathleen Valentine, and I have enjoyed all of them. This is the first full length novel of hers that I have read, though. When an author is successful as a short story writer, I always wonder whether they can sustain that level of writing in a full length book. It is with great joy that I found that Kathleen Valentine is a wonderful success at both. In fact, this book will definitely be on my top books read in 2012 list. I was discussing the book with a friend, and we both agreed that this is not your typical romance book. In fact, we both felt that it is not really a romance book at all, but is instead a captivating love story. Being one of the best love stories that I have ever read, I cannot imagine a lot of other books overcoming it.

The characters in this book are superbly developed. Each one has a uniqueness that draws you into their lives and sweeps you along the story line. In fact, I cannot even pick out a favorite character from the book as I loved each and every one of them. The book is set in the 1960's along Lake Erie and focuses on one city where the majority of the residents are connected to the Great Lakes maritime trade. With the combination of her wonderful characters and the beautifully written prose in the book, Ms. Valentine not only makes her love story compelling, but makes the world of these people come alive for the reader. Here are a couple of my favorite quotes:

"You can write down your dreams, make pictures of stars but that does not preserve the magic. Nothing captures those gorgeous glimmers of eternity. Yet love, like dreams and starlight, returns again and again in defiance of fears and foolishness"

"Perhaps, I think, it is our longing, and our willingness to see beauty in the most humble of places, that makes us so irresistible to God. "

I am now a steadfast fan of Ms. Valentine and look forward to reading more from her. If they are all as good as this one, I am certainly in for a treat.

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5.0 out of 5 stars engaging. emotional., January 25, 2012

Anonymous - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Old Mermaid's Tale (Kindle Edition)

After reading two prior works by this author, the subject matter of the Great Lakes greatly interested me due to growing up near Lake Superior. The author engages the reader and pulls at heart strings as you come to empathize with each character. I couldnt put the book down.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Blissful, January 22, 2012

Dolores Sierra - See all my reviews

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This review is from: The Old Mermaid's Tale (Paperback)

I didn't want this book to end. I loved the characters, the stories, the history, the mythology, the story. Engrossing, absorbing, enchanting and lovely.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Loved it, January 3, 2012

clueless - See all my reviews

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Wonderful book I did not want to put it down, very interesting it made me want to visit the town. Great love story.

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5.0 out of 5 stars A tale that captures the heart, December 29, 2011

Kiwi Tricia (Converse, San Antonio, TX) - See all my reviews

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The Old Mermaid's Tale by Kathleen Valentine is more than just a beautiful story that continues to capture my heart and imagination. After the first reading on Kindle, I was completely drawn into the characters, their time and the locale. I have read it again and again and finally jotted down dates, people's ages to know and understand them better, place names and the names of lost ships as told by the seamen in their tales about the Great Lakes to start web searches. Clair is of my era and could relate to her wanting `more than this' out of life. It is Baptiste though who is truly the unforgettable man but alas he is a fiction - I would still dearly like to know though who his book cover and video images are modeled on! As an aside, I am pretty sure I caught a reference in Each Angel Burns to Baptiste and his mother a scultor often called Madame L'perdue because her son ran away to sea and she never heard from him again. Anyway, the end result was hours spent reading about the Great Lakes, the waterfront towns, the cultural and economic changes over the past fifty-two years, Native American legends, and the very real shipwrecks. Web images of the 1960's through old photos and postcards were a delight to `visit' Lake Erie of a time now past. It is a unique book that generates that much follow-up interest in me. I have `worn out' my Kindle version from re-reading the story so many times and frequently play Ms. Valentine's video on her blog for The Old Mermaid's Tale featuring the song `Parlez-moi d'Amour' sung by Charlelie Couture. I now understand what other reviewers to include authors mean by the many layers to Ms. Valentine's writing. In fact, I have just ordered a printed copy to keep with my very favorite books because this tale has so enthralled me.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful, compelling writing, December 28, 2011

D. E. Taylor (Walnut Creek, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)

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This review is from: The Old Mermaid's Tale (Kindle Edition)

There are two outstanding elements of this novel. The one that makes it most worth your time is the writing. This writer has managed to capture the essence of those quiet moments we all have, the compelling ones when you are sitting somewhere and what feels like a life-altering truth in all its simplicity explodes inside your being so profoundly you suddenly feel as if you have grasped the whole purpose of our existence if only for a moment. There are several of these in this novel, poetically written, and they alone are worth reading it for. The second reason to read this novel is the depth of the human characters which she has drawn so realistically you feel as if you have lived your life amongst them. One particular character has stayed with me long after reading- that of Baptiste. He is the man Clair falls in love with, the first great love of her life, perhaps the greatest as we don't get to see her whole life here (and something more is alluded to at the end.) Baptiste is a tortured soul, and as such he is compassionate and sensitive- and wise beyond his 42 years. He is generous and respectful, and wants more for Clair than she wants for herself. I was thrilled with how the author dealt with "twenty years later" because I can competely relate to where Clair was and believe I would've wanted the same. The men in this book- every last one- are portrayed with more heart and sensitivity than novels or the media typically portray men, which is a refreshing change. Clair does come across naive and annoying at times but she is young and can be forgiven her ignorance. Really, this book is excellent and anyone looking for a novel with heart should pick it up. It will surprise you! As a writer I read constantly and I only review the books that intrigue me. This one is worth your time.

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5.0 out of 5 stars You will not want to put this book down, December 28, 2011

Constance L. Slack - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Old Mermaid's Tale (Kindle Edition)

Having received a gift card for my Kindle as a Christmas gift, I was looking for a good sized novel, not just a short story, that would intrigue me so much that I would want to finish the book during my Christmas break, making that story a part of my Christmas 2011 memories. "The Old Mermaids Tale" exactly fits the bill. Even though I am only half way through the story, I am so engrossed in the story and the characters that I had to write my review while still in suspense of the ending. Due to her youth (the story begins when Clair is finishing high school and leaving home to go to college) there is much that Clair does not understand about herself and the world beyond the Ohio farmland where she was raised. Clair is different from her peers in that she feels drawn to making life choices based on an inner need to explore the unknown rather than make the same choices of her contemporaries, who are following the expected path of marrying someone from her home area and living the same lives as those around her in the farmlands. She is strangely compelled to experience the lives of fishermen and others whose livelihoods depend on the sea, and chooses to attend a college located near the northern edge of Lake Erie. Although the college has rules about coeds staying away from the lake front, Clair finds a tourist area coin-operated telescope that allows her to begin her exploration of this forbidden area from a distance. One day, during one her telescopic travels of the lake front area, she discovers a large painted mermaid with an inviting smile on the side of a building. Just as mermaids of lore drive sailors to explore the seas, Clair follows the lure of this painted mermaid and finds a way to personally explore the lake shore area and experience the lives of these people who live under the watchful eye of the painted mermaid. Reading about Clair's experiences as she enters this unknown world and meets the people who live there is fascinating. The book is well written and the author has the descriptive ability to enable the reader to envision the characters in the story that Clair meets and become just as caught up as Clair in their lives. Since my journey through the first half of this book has kept me so intrigued that I wanted to write a review before even finishing the story, I feel that "The Old Mermaid's Tale will not disappoint. I sense a promise that the remainder of this story and Clair's experiences with the people of the lake shore will keep me fascinated until the end, and that this book will leave a lasting impression of a story well told.

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5.0 out of 5 stars I felt I was living this book as I read it, December 14, 2011

AmeliaAT "Apostrophistica" (Pennsylvania, Endless Mountains) - See all my reviews

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I loved this book. It was a coming-of-age story of a young woman in the early sixties. Kathleen Valentine evokes so well all of the changes that the character, Clair, goes through in the years between preparing to leave her home for college and returning about five years later. She gives a nuanced view of the characters, even ones who don't have a lot of "page time," such as Clair's mother.

This book captures echoes of the love and loss that we all experience in our lives to such a degree that it felt real to me. I felt like I was reading about people whom I had known and grown up around. I became emotionally absorbed in the story.

Kathleen Valentine's writing is often subtle, saying a lot in very few words (the reference to "the Fitz" towards the end of the book had all kinds of implications for the reader that it couldn't for the characters -- yet), and many passages are beautiful.

It's hard to sum up this book in a review, except to say that it far exceeded my expectations and I know I will read it again.

Vintage Photos of Hammond Castle

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 19:35:00 +0000

Today Hammond Castle posted a portfolio of vintage photographs of the castle on their Facebook page. They are wonderful old pictures though no date is given. I've spent a lot of time there.I've attended concerts and a dance. I shot some of the photos for The Mermaid Shawl there and the scene in The Old Mermaid's Tale when Baptiste takes Clair to a Christmas Eve dance was set in the "Winter Castle" which I modeled on Hammond Castle. Below are a few of the photos but to see the rest go to their Facebook page.

Below is the atrium where Baptiste takes her and tells her that he wishes he could give it to her.

Thanks for reading.

10,000 Books In January

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:57:00 +0000

Never in my wildest dreams, when I began publishing ebooks, did I ever think I would sell 10,000 books in a year! So selling that many in a month just takes my breath away. I had read that all predictions indicated that ebook sales would skyrocket after Christmas 2011 because over 4 million e-readers had been shipped as Christmas gifts and I suspect quite a few of them came with gift cards. Beginning Christmas Eve I saw the sales figures climbing. November and December had been good sales months anyway but on Christmas Eve the sales figures went ZOOM!

My custom is to check my sales figures every morning and then try to ignore them for the rest of the day but when I logged on Saturday morning and saw how close they were to 10,000 I admit I spent much of the day checking and re-checking until about 4:00pm when they hit the magic number – 10,000. That is over 16 titles but the title far in the lead is The Crazy Old Lady in the Attic. Still it is fascinating to me to see what other books are doing well. They top five sellers of my books are:

The Crazy Old Lady In The Attic: a 15k word novelette that is listed under both horror and psychological thriller. There are people who have taken issue with those categories but I tend to think they are people who are accustomed to reading more gruesome and brutal horror stories. To me the story's horror is in the gradual, slow realization that Mattie comes to as she uncovers secrets from her past. By the end her sense of her history is completely shaken by the realization that what she thought was a cute, funny comfort was, in fact, something cruel and unimaginable. As a lifelong fan of Shirley Jackson and Henry James that is the kind of horror I aimed for in writing that story.
Ghosts of a Beach Town in Winter: a 20k words novella it is a ghost story set in the off-season in a beach town. I thought this a very dark, disturbing story as I worked on it. Neither of the two main characters are very stable people. Layla is a lost soul trying to be what her husband wants her to be and Joel, her husband, has aspirations as an author but it may well be he wants to be an author more than he wants to actually write.
The Old Mermaid's Tale: a 132k word novel that is, I think, my best published work so far. It is a complex 1960s era coming-of-age tale about a young woman who longs for romance but who is fascinated by the dark side of the seaport in which she lives. It has received very, very good reviews so far which makes me happy. Baptiste, the man she finally loves, seems to capture a lot of hearts.
Arthur's Story: A Love Story: this 12k word novelette has really picked up a lot of sales in the past month which is gratifying because I think it is a very warm, tender, uplifting story with a feel-good ending. I hope more people find it and enjoy it. Arthur himself is hard not to love.
Each Angel Burns and The Reluctant Belsnickel of Opelts' Wood are tied for fifth. The former is a 123k word novel and the latter a 23k word novella. Each Angel Burns has garnered a fair share of controversy because of the combination of strong religious themes and strong (though not explicit) sexuality. The Belsnickel story is a warm, charming story about a wounded man who finds his way back into the world through an ancient cultural tradition.

So, these are the books that contribute most to the 10,000 sales. I also have a bunch of knitting booklets, my cookbook/memoir, and some anthologies all of which had enough sales to make them worthwhile.

This is an exciting time to be an independent author. I have no idea how long the e-book market will stay brisk but with hand-held devices selling at the rate of a million a week the future looks promising. I am just grateful and thrilled.

As always, thanks for reading!

#SampleSunday: Danse Avec Moi from "My Last Romance"

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 00:55:00 +0000

This is a fragment from the short story Danse Avec Moi from my short story collection, My Last Romance and other passions. It is the featured book for my participation in Book Lovin' Babes Valentine's Blog Hop. Click the link to register for the prizes!

Danse Avec Moi

Jean-Luc has powerful arms. He is not a large man but every bit of him is steely and intense. Just now his arm around my waist crushes me against him and the pressure of his thighs against mine are determined and single-minded. I gasp for breath and he tilts his head back to look at me with those ice blue eyes. He whips me around effortlessly and smiles. I am not a small woman but when he holds me like this I am a child, a rag doll, a puppet on the strings of his private rhythms.

His face is inches above mine and I can smell the intoxicating fragrance of him—a mixture of pine boughs and leather, wine and fresh air. He looks as though he is going to kiss me. It is a maddening habit of his that he will let his mouth come so close to mine that I burn for its touch—then he pulls back and looks at me teasing. The one thing he knows—more than any truth on this earth—is how much I yearn for him.

He tightens his grip on me and turns again, carrying me with him. He throws back his head and laughs with the turn. It is so hot here. He doesn’t seem to notice the heat but I am not accustomed to these steamy tropic-like nights. I find the air thick and suffocating.

The music stops. My feet return to the ground. He steadies me then guides me to the open door. Outside lanterns hang in the giant pin oak trees creating dozens of little moons orbited by thousands of tiny night creatures.

Old women sit on the porch fanning themselves with dried palmetto leaves, chattering in the exotic staccato of this beguiling music they speak. I have only heard this language since coming here with Jean-Luc. Now that I am his wife he can bring me with him to visit his family and the people he has loved all his life. During all the years we lived together in the Northern city that is our home his rare trips home were solitary ones. Whether his family knew that he shared his life and his bed with a woman I did not know but now that we wear matching rings I am welcome among them. To me this is an unimaginable world.

When he walked into my office and my life years ago I could not have envisioned this elegant, reserved man with his portfolio of sophisticated illustrations and softly accented voice in this remote and torrid swamp land.

In the shadows of the night he takes my face in his hands and kisses me as no one else in the world can kiss me. His kisses stir rivers in me that I never knew I possessed before him.

"Ah, Bebe," he whispers brushing aside my hair and letting his breath cool my ear. "You are so exquisite." And he kisses me breathless.

The old women stop rocking and there is tittering. Jean-Luc releases me saying he will get us wine. I lean back against the wall gulping sweet night air and he strides along the porch flirting with the old women in the odd music of their language. They laugh and slap his legs and backside with their fans. I watch his solid, compact body in fine white shirt and tan trousers until he disappears into the room filled with heat and light and laughter. No one from our world, from the publishing house where I spend my days surrounded by technology and academics, from the design studio where he creates as ably with PC and stylus as with pen and ink, would imagine him in this environment. Read the rest....

Thanks for reading.

The Windy City Author (now in Maine) Sends Kind Words...

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 15:26:00 +0000

Maureen McDermott Gill, formerly of Chicago but now living in Maine, is the author of an excellent police thriller, January Moon, and an avid blogger with two excellent blogs, Tides & Currents and The Windy City Author...in New England. Yesterday she posted a lovely and generous plug for my forthcoming novel Depraved Heart. She and her husband Al, who is an excellent book critic, are beta-reading the manuscript and this is what she had to say:

...books, obviously, deserve to be savored... and one of them is Kathleen Valentine's third novel, "Depraved Heart," which I'm reading as a beta reader. She's hitting it out of the park with this one. My husband read it before I could start it; he enjoyed her two other books, "The Old Mermaid's Tale" and "Each Angel Burns," but said he thinks "Depraved Heart" may be her best yet.

Kathleen's lyricism blows me away, as well as her strong story telling skills. I think "Depraved Heart" is an outstanding achievement.

I have other friends who write great stories (my friend Nicole Daines Gibeaut comes to mind) and I've learned wonderful things from each of them, but Kathleen is teaching me something special about focus and discipline. She's been laying it on me pretty thick... chiding my ass for spending too much time on Facebook and not enough time writing fiction. I'm very flattered that she thinks I'm a gifted writer -- which is part of the reason she rides my butt (and we're going to talk more about that in another post!). Today, though, I want to direct your attention to Kathleen.

Kathleen's Kindle sales are soaring and I can't think of a writer who deserves success more than Kathleen. Last summer she decided to hunker down and get very, very serious about finishing "Depraved Heart" while also devoting herself to promoting herself as a writer.

Kathleen's as gifted with short stories as she is with full length novels. In a blog post she wrote this past Wednesday, January 25th, Kathleen describes how she's unbundled some of her short stories from their prior book formatting and sold them separately and how that has proven very successful; those short stories have driven sales for all of her books. Kathleen's determination to focus on her career as a writer, eschewing almost all other distractions, coupled with her talents as a writer and keen business acumen have all come together. In her post on Wednesday, Kathleen wrote that so far in this month alone (3 weeks!) she's seen over 9,000 books fly "off the digital shelves...."

I spoke with Kathleen last week and we discussed in more detail how her shorts have enjoyed explosive sales and those sales continually beget more sales. I have at least twenty short stories in various states of completion -- some have been in my files for thirty years and I never even showed them to anyone. Now I'm eyeing them like possible buried treasure.

Kathleen Valentine is going to be one of those highly successful indies who prove indies are a mighty force to be reckoned with -- gifted writers who not only write beautifully but have also mastered the business end of the deal and found clever ways to market multiple talents.

Thanks, Maureen! Now get to work on that next book!!!

The Crazy Old Lady [Commentary Version]

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 19:26:00 +0000

You know how a lot of DVDs come with a Bonus Feature called the Commentary version? I love those things. Sometimes I love them more than the movie. I have learned a lot about process and creative innovation from them and about how really creative people think. I have a couple of DVDs that have such excellent commentary versions on them (“Legends of the Fall” and “The Usual Suspects” come to mind) that I re-watch the commentary from time to time just to jump start ideas of my own.

Since the runaway success of my little novelette The Crazy Old Lady in the Attic I have had a lot of reviews from readers which say they wish it was longer. Of course those words are always music to a writer's ears but I do understand that the difference between what a writer writes and what a reader reads is sometimes vast. I am one of those writers who is constantly striving to keep my story interesting and moving forward. Especially if the story contains an element of suspense, you don't want to lose the momentum. I remember when I was writing The Old Mermaid's Tale there was one scene I worked on for WEEKS! I wrote it over and over and over trying to make it tight and clean and gorgeous (for those who have read the book it is the one where Clair asks Baptiste to dance with her in the little beach bar.) Anyway, after sweating blood over that scene, and shedding no small amount of tears, I gave that whole section of the book to one of my beta- readers. She was giving me feedback and I asked her about that scene. She replied, “Oh, yeah, that was a sweet moment.” I was flabbergasted because, of course, to me it represented weeks of toil. But the reader was correct, it was just a moment to her.

So, thinking about the reactions to The Crazy Old Lady in the Attic, I thought wouldn't it be interesting to do a “Commentary Version?” I would let the story stand as it but then go through it and insert my own commentary – either in italics or in indented text – telling what I was thinking at that point and why I wrote it the way I did. In fact, it might even be interesting to add some “deleted scenes”, too. I know I wrote a rather sweet love scene between Mattie and Stan their first night in Boston but then cut it because I felt it broke the momentum. I also wrote a much more lengthy version of Mattie's first meeting with Trent in which she remembered him and her feelings about him when she was in high school.

Would such a thing have appeal? I don't know but I think I'm going to give it a try and see what happens.

One thing I know is that I have learned an awful lot from those DVD commentaries. I especially love it when they talk about having to improvise on the spur of the moment or improvisations that work their way into the script by accident. It reminds me of a film project some classmates were working on when we were back in college. It was a student film with a pretty lame script, I was just an observer, and one of the actors had a very, dry, witty sense of humor. He kept injecting dialog that was so good the guy who wrote the script kept adding them for subsequent shoots. However they always feel flat and at one point the director said, “You know the ad libs just aren't as funny when you write them down.” No kidding.

Writing is a mysterious process. Sometimes I labor over a few simple sentences and sometimes I start typing and the words come pouring out in such a cascade my fingers can barely keep up. You never know what will happen. This week I have been giving myself a lot more time to write. Now that the royalties from my books are lightening the burden of earning a living I want to take writing books as seriously as I have always taken my design business. I love both of them but it's nice to have the freedom to chose what you will work on next.

Well, I’ve learned a lot from my readers' comments and I'm taking those to heart. I have 2 more short stories that are about murders and I want to work on them, flesh them out, build on them and let them blossom into something larger if I can. And I'm going to work on a new version of The Crazy Old Lady in the Attic [Bonus Features] which includes commentary and deleted scenes. you never know what might happen....

Thanks for reading.

What's An INFP Good For?

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 16:50:00 +0000

Thanks to a discussion on an internet discussion board last night, I wound up taking a Myers-Briggs Personality Test and discovered I am an INFP. Below is what they had to say about INFPs. I guess I pretty much agree with that... it's certainly sounds like me. I think it is kind of interesting that 2 of the quotes used in the analysis below are from 2 of my favorite books, Moby Dick and The Velveteen Rabbit. I've always said that the moral of The Old Mermaid's Tale, if there is one, is the same as that of The Velveteen Rabbit -- and heaven knows that book owes plenty to Moby Dick:

Introverted iNtuitive Feeling Perceiving
by Joe Butt

Profile: INFP
Revision: 3.0
Date of Revision: 26 Feb 2005

"I remember the first albatross I ever saw. ... At intervals, it arched forth its vast archangel wings, as if to embrace some holy ark. Wondrous flutterings and throbbings shook it. Though bodily unharmed, it uttered cries, as some king's ghost in super natural distress. Through its inexpressible, strange eyes, methought I peeped to secrets not below the heavens. As Abraham before the angels, I bowed myself..." --(Herman Melville, Moby Dick)

INFPs never seem to lose their sense of wonder. One might say they see life through rose-colored glasses. It's as though they live at the edge of a looking-glass world where mundane objects come to life, where flora and fauna take on near-human qualities.

INFP children often exhibit this in a 'Calvin and Hobbes' fashion, switching from reality to fantasy and back again. With few exceptions, it is the NF child who readily develops imaginary playmates (as with Anne of Green Gables's "bookcase girlfriend"--her own reflection) and whose stuffed animals come to life like the Velveteen Rabbit and the Skin Horse:

"...Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand..." (the Skin Horse)

INFPs have the ability to see good in almost anyone or anything. Even for the most unlovable the INFP is wont to have pity.

Rest you, my enemy,
Slain without fault,
Life smacks but tastelessly
Lacking your salt!
Stuck in a bog whence naught
May catapult me,
Come from the grave, long-sought,
Come and insult me!
--(Steven Vincent Benet, Elegy for an Enemy)

Their extreme depth of feeling is often hidden, even from themselves, until circumstances evoke an impassioned response:

"I say, Queequeg! Why don't you speak? It's I--Ishmael." But all remained still as before. ... Something must have happened. Apoplexy!
... And running up after me, she caught me as I was again trying to force open the door. ... "Have to burst it open," said I, and was running down the entry a little, for a good start, when the landlady caught me, again vowing I should not break down her premises; but I tore from her, and with a sudden bodily rush dashed myself full against the mark.--(Melville, Moby Dick)

Of course, not all of life is rosy, and INFPs are not exempt from the same disappointments and frustrations common to humanity. As INTPs tend to have a sense of failed competence, INFPs struggle with the issue of their own ethical perfection, e.g., perfo rmance of duty for the greater cause. An INFP friend describes the inner conflict as not good versus bad, but on a grand scale,Good vs. Evil. Luke Skywalker in Star Wars depicts this conflict in his struggle between the two sides of "The Force." Although the dark side must be reckoned with, the INFP believes that good ultimately triumphs.

Some INFPs have a gift for taking technical information and putting it into layman's terms. Brendan Kehoe's Zen and the Art of the Internet is one example of this "de-jargoning" talent in action.

Functional Analysis:

Introverted Feeling

INFPs live primarily in a rich inner world of introverted Feeling. Being inward-turning, the natural attraction is away from world and toward essence and ideal. This introversion of dominant Feeling, receiving its data from extraverted intuition, must be the source of the quixotic nature of these usually gentle beings. Feeling is caught in the approach- avoidance bind between concern both for people and for All Creatures Great and Small, and a psycho-magnetic repulsion from the same. The "object," be it homo sapiens or a mere representation of an organism, is valued only to the degree that the object contains some measure of the inner Essence or greater Good. Doing a good deed, for example, may provide intrinsic satisfaction which is only secondary to the greater good of striking a blow against Man's Inhumanity to Mankind.

Extraverted iNtuition

Extraverted intuition faces outward, greeting the world on behalf of Feeling. What the observer usually sees is creativity with implied good will. Intuition spawns this type's philosophical bent and strengthens pattern perception. It combines as auxiliary with introverted Feeling and gives rise to unusual skill in both character development and fluency with language--a sound basis for the development of literary facility. If INTPs aspire to word mechanics, INFPs would be verbal artists.

Introverted Sensing

Sensing is introverted and often invisible. This stealth function in the third position gives INFPs a natural inclination toward absent- mindedness and other-worldliness, however, Feeling's strong people awareness provides a balancing, mitigating effect. This introverted Sensing is somewhat categorical, a subdued version of SJ sensing. In the third position, however, it is easily overridden by the stronger functions.

Extraverted Thinking

The INFP may turn to inferior extraverted Thinking for help in focusing on externals and for closure. INFPs can even masquerade in their ESTJ business suit, but not without expending considerable energy. The inferior, problematic nature of Extraverted Thinking is its lack of context and proportion. Single impersonal facts may loom large or attain higher priority than more salient principles which are all but overlooked.

Famous INFPs:

Homer
Virgil
Mary, mother of Jesus
St. John, the beloved disciple
St. Luke; physician, disciple, author
William Shakespeare, bard of Avon
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (Evangeline)
A. A. Milne (Winnie the Pooh)
Laura Ingalls Wilder (Little House on the Prairie)
Helen Keller, deaf and blind author
Carl Rogers, reflective psychologist, counselor
Fred Rogers (Mister Rogers' Neighborhood)
Dick Clark (American Bandstand)
Donna Reed, actor (It's a Wonderful Life)
Jacqueline Kennedy Onasis
Neil Diamond, vocalist
Tom Brokaw, news anchor
James Herriot (All Creatures Great and Small)
Annie Dillard (Pilgrim at Tinker Creek)
James Taylor, vocalist
Julia Roberts, actor (Conspiracy Theory, Pretty Woman)
Scott Bakula (Quantum Leap)
Terri Gross (PBS's "Fresh Air")
Amy Tan (author of The Joy-Luck Club, The Kitchen God's Wife)
John F. Kennedy, Jr.
Lisa Kudrow ("Phoebe" of Friends)
Fred Savage ("The Wonder Years")

Fictional INFPs:

Anne (Anne of Green Gables)
Calvin (Calvin and Hobbes)
Deanna Troi (Star Trek - The Next Generation)
Wesley Crusher (Star Trek - The Next Generation)
Doctor Julian Bashir (Star Trek: Deep Space 9)
Bastian (The Neverending Story)
E.T.: the ExtraTerrestrial
Doug Funny, Doug cartoons
Tommy, Rug Rats cartoons
Rocko, Rocko's Modern Life cartoons

On to Plan B...

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 22:05:00 +0000

One of the first things you learn when you get into the wild,wild world of indie publishing is that indie marketing is going to make you crazy. There simply are not enough hours in the day for all the things that you want to try and, no matter how much you do, there is no absolute assurance that any of that will work. The old rules are passé and the new rules change daily. But you need to remember two things: 1. indie publishing is a marathon, not a sprint and 2. the best way to promote your work is to make more of it -- every book you write and publish should promote the rest of your books.

A little over a year ago I had the idea to bundle together 8 short stories that I just happened to have around and sell them as a collection called love, murder, etc. Though it got favorable reviews from the people who read it the collection just never took off. Some months back I took one of the stories in that collection and published it as a stand-alone novella, Arthur's Story: A Love Story. I offered it for 99 cents and sales have been, if not spectacular, a whole lot better than they were for the collection. They are picking up and I'm happy.

So then I took out 2 stories from the "murder" section of that book -- Home-made Pie and Sausage and Killing Julie Morris. Both of them are chilling stories about revenge so I bundled them together and offered them for 99 cents, too, and the same thing happened -- sales weren't stunning but they were much, much better. So, it seemed that the logical thing to do was offer the other stories in the book in smaller lots. Today I just finished work on Mardi Gras Was Over: Three Love Stories and it is now on Amazon.

I have 2 more stories from this group to go.

I also finished drawing the charts for the next knitting instruction book the Mermaid's Garden Shawl and hope to have it on Amazon by next week.

Kindle sales have been wonderful. I'm so impressed and I want to keep this going. Over 9,000 of my books have flown off the digital shelves so far this month and I could not be more surprised or happy. So I am continuing to write and knit and design and promote. It is a full-time job but, at present, it seems to be worth it. I have 2 Amazon Select promotions coming in February. I'll keep you posted.

Thanks for reading.

Guest Blog from Ray: Some Fall Adventures

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 15:33:00 +0000

Another guest blog from our buddy photographer Ray Beimel in St. Marys, Pennsylvania:

In October this past year, I did some travelling in south central Pennsylvania on a lovely fall weekend. These are some of the interesting things I saw. In 1997 the Travelling Circus hiked the Appalachian Trail from Old Forge State Forest Picnic Area to Pine Grove Furnace State Park. In doing the necessary car switch, we went past the South Mountain Restoration Center. A huge building loomed out of the foggy rain and I always wanted to go back for a better look. This finally happened. Originally built as a tuberculosis sanitarium in the 1940’s it is little used today. There is a large campus with lots of buildings, some of which are in use. The biggest one was the hospital.

The day I was there I could see no activity whatever. There were two cars parked nearby and not a soul to be seen. It was kind of spooky actually and probably much more so at night.

Away from the big building was another one that once was a protectarium for children who were exposed to tuberculosis. This closed in the 1980’s and has been dormant (nice word for rotting away) ever since. Apparently the roof leaks. If you could get inside, it would be some interesting ruins. There is a website of pictures of the place in its ruined state. It’s kind of sad actually. A large well built building that serves no useful purpose any longer is never a happy sight. The grounds are still well kept.

My next stop was Caledonia State Park. I have camped there many times but I never did any hiking there except for that cold rainy day when the Circus came by on our way to Quarry Gap Shelter. We did over 12 miles that day with rain the whole time. That happened to us a lot. Thaddeus Stevens, a well known abolitionist and Congressman had an iron furnace there until Jubal Early came and destroyed everything on his way to the battle of Gettysburg. The Park has an interpretive trail that takes you past a number of sites associated with the furnace. This is the mill race that brought the waters of Conococheague Creek to the water wheel at the furnace. It was carpeted with pine needles and made for pleasant hiking on a nice fall day.

After some looking around there, I went over to the Michaux State Forest. I wanted to get a picture of the walls of the Hessian Barn that we passed so often while hiking the Appalachian Trail with Chris’ Backpacking Classes. The trail has been rerouted away from it and there is a nice little parking area adjacent now. However, there are no interpretive markers in place yet.

I had a notion to come back at night to take some pictures of it lit by flashbulbs but that will have to wait for another time. From there is it just a short drive to Pine Grove Furnace State Park. As luck would have it, this was the weekend of the Furnace Festival. Always a sucker for festival going, I spent a few hours wandering around to see what was going on.

There was the obligatory blacksmith but the authenticity was disturbed by his talking on a cell phone. Keen eyed pedants (like me) would also note that he was working with mild steel and not wrought iron. But of course, since no one makes wrought iron today, he and others of his trade have little choice. There also some charcoal making going on at a much reduced scale compared to historic times. Being a collier had to suck. You did a lot of manual labor to create the pile then got dirty covering it in mud and leaves. Then you had to keep an eye on the thing for days which meant you were camped out in a rude shack and didn’t get a lot of sleep because you dare not let too much air get in because that would start a fire. And you were surrounded by smoke the whole time.

Most of the rest of the festival was the usual mix of demonstrations, craft booths, food sellers and such. One display had alpaca, the somewhat calmer cousin of the llama.

There was a display of old tools there and I saw this little girl trying to do something with a bellows. After a few fruitless tries she gave it up as bad business.

I always feel sorry for the entertainers hired for such events. This poor fellow has an audience of four and two of them are more interested in rassling around on hay bales. The real draw at festivals of this sort are the trailers like below. It is not really a furnace festival without your chocolate covered bananas and your hot sausage sandwiches.

There were other mildly interesting sights. The Ironmaster’s Hostel was refurbished and they were holding open house. It looked a cut above most of the hostels I have seen. There was kettle corn and funnel cake and bottled water and baskets and cute stuff and a lady selling semi-good “art” photos. I tried to talk shop with her but I discovered she was getting her prints made at Walmart, didn’t have Photoshop, didn’t have a printer, didn’t cut her own mats, and wasn’t selling anything.

After a few hours and another visit to the Appalachian Trail museum to see the decent docent I met there before (she was not on duty) I wandered back to the car. I saw this in passing. I had never encountered recycling cans lettered this way. I thought I knew what commingle meant. It was something I tried to do with a girl back in high school and got slapped for my efforts. Not sure what it means in this context. There were lots of people carrying aluminum things around and putting them in the hole but I saw not one person carrying any commingle.

The next day I was in Gettysburg on my birthday. I spent little time on the battlefield and lots of time seeking out the real tourist draws there these days, ghost tours. Look forward to a rant coming your way soon. Meanwhile, I am wishing all a happy and prosperous New Year. Ray

#SampleSunday: Lacy Dove's Revenge from "My Last Romance"

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 22:49:00 +0000

Valentine's Day is coming and what could be a more perfect Valentine than this collection of eight love stories? On February 12, 13, 14 this collection will be free for Kindle. It is also available in a lovely little paperback and at $10.20 it's not much more expensive than a card and packed with romance!
____________________________
Ruby was a chanteuse with Silvio Santini and the Silver Saints back in the day. In this excerpt she reminisces about the way things used to be. From "My Last Romance" in My Last Romance and other passions.

I watch the kids today with their confused morality and their predictable sexuality and I feel sorry for them. Everything is accepted and nothing is fun. Look at them! Jogging along in the hot sun, sweat pouring off of them. Look at their faces! Do they look happy? Nobody in my day would dream of jogging. We danced. We mambo-ed and we cha-cha-ed and fox trotted all night long. We tangoed and tangled and drank and kissed and felt each other up and never wanted to stop. Look at these girls—thin as teenage boys! Like little pretend men.

Women in my time had chests—the bigger the better—straining against lace brassieres and bouncing under whisper thin silk blouses. We had hips a man could get ideas about and we knew how to use them, too. I could change the course of a man’s life just by turning around in my pink charmeuse evening dress—the one with the cute V dipping all the way down. And then there was that gold tissue faille that was so low in back and so artfully draped in front that men would stare at me and say, "Darlin’, what do you have on under that?"

I’d tilt my eyebrow the way I’d practiced in the mirror—maybe a thousand times—and say, all innocence, "Why, rose-scented talcum powder, sugar. What else?"

Oh, we were women alright. A man could have just about anything he wanted, he just had to figure out what it took to get it. He had to work a little bit. Talk sweet. Make you tingle. The other day I was listening to this relationship expert on the radio. Relationship expert? My lord. She said that she "advocates a mutually beneficial relationship with latitude for individual development." What the hell is that? No wonder these poor girls go running down the streets in this ridiculous heat! It’s a genuine wonder they aren’t screaming.

I say you are either going with a fellow or you aren’t. And God help him if he doesn’t treat you right. I remember this one girl—Lacy Dove Chaldefonte from Sweetwater, Georgia. Whew. She was five feet eight inches and one hundred and fifty pounds of creamy pink, orange-blossom scented female. She drove them crazy with her big doe eyes and mile long legs. There was this one fellow—a trumpet player from one of those Cuban rhumba bands everyone was so crazy about then. Let me tell you he got one look at Lacy Dove in a white sequined halter dress dancing the samba and thought he’d go blind or get seasick from all that glitter and motion. You could see the smoke rising from his bright pink satin trousers.

He and Lacy Dove took up together. That’s what we said back then—"took up together". We knew the same words the kids know today—we just had naughty imaginations and didn’t need to spell everything out. We didn’t have to fuck because we could make the earth move.

That’s another thing today. People just love to be honest, have you noticed? They say something that would get their mouths soaped good and then say, "I’m just being honest." I say honesty is for the unimaginative.

For awhile Lacy Dove and her trumpet player did just fine. They’d come staggering into the club in the middle of the afternoon still sleepy-eyed and love-weary, hands all over each other. She loved to show off all the little silky unmentionables he bought her. He liked her to do strip-teases for him in his hotel room between sets and he spent tons on the kinds of things he liked to watch her peel off. Then the rumors started about him and this red-headed waitress from another club. Lacy just marched right into that club, grabbed that girl by the hair and slapped her silly till the poor thing admitted they’d been carrying-on. That was all it took.

Lacy had it all planned that night. She waited until they got back to his room and she wasted no time getting him undressed and on the bed. Then she started her strip.... First she undid her Midnight Fantasy stockings, one at a time and rolled them down the length of those never-ending legs of hers. She knew what he wanted. She leaned over within a kiss’s distance of his face and tied first one wrist and then the other to the bedposts with those stockings. That guy thought he was in for a grand evening—so excited he was shaking like a wet dog. And she took her time wriggling out of her candy pink silk slip. She teased him with it—drawing it nice and slow across his thighs and belly. She had him squirming something awful. She let it puddle down on the part of his anatomy that was fixing to burst. She did the same with her ribbon-trimmed 36DD brassiere and her rosebud embellished garter belt letting the dumb bastard shiver in anticipation. Finally she turned her back to him and ran her hands over her backside as plump and luscious as a sun-ripened peach as she wiggled out of her spider-web thin panties. Turning to face him—letting him have one last gander at that heavenly body—she licked her lips with her pretty pink tongue. Then she leaned over and took his cigarettes and lighter from the night stand. She gave him her best come-hither gaze as she touched the blue flame to the tip of her cigarette. Then with a sweet smile she dropped the lighter into the silky pile in his lap, picked up her coat, turned and sauntered out closing the room door on his shrieks.

Oh, now don’t get all upset. The trumpet player thrashed around enough to put out the flames and escaped with only minor burns to the former Pride of Havana. Lacy Dove moved to San Antonio and married a roughneck who made it big in the oil-boom of the Seventies. The last I saw of her she was on the cover of Southern Living in front of the gazebo she had just had built in her garden for one of her daughters’ Coming Out parties.

Well, not every girl that got cheated on was as crazy as Lacy Dove. But we were bad and sex was dirty and it was all a lot of fun.

Thanks for reading.

'Pritneer' Time to get to Work...

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 15:22:00 +0000

I have been hard at work lately on my cycle of Marienstadt stories and I am loving this. After I wrote The Reluctant Belsnickel of Opelt's Wood I was so in enthralled with creating the town of Marienstadt and its quirky, peculiar and yet oh-so familiar characters that I wanted to keep going. I absolutely loved several of the characters in that story. Father Nick was someone I wanted to spend more time with and Gretchen Fritz and her Calico Cuckoo Fabrics & Quilting Supplies shop just begged for further exploration. I loved so many of the townspeople, especially Andy and Annie Kneidl who own the sausage store, and Bob and Mandy Herzing who own the Maple Sugar Shack. And, of course, I was completely in love with Oliver and was in no way ready to be done with him. So I decided to keep on writing.

I sat down and sketched out a list of stories I wanted to try writing about all within the town of Marienstadt and with many of the same characters making appearances. Some of the stories would be funny, some sad, some romantic, some spooky. Each should stand on its own as a story but all will share settings, characters, etc. As I have been working on this more and more stories keep popping into my head.

I finished the first draft of one of them last week. It is a sad story and I found it hard to write but it is also an important story about something that really happened back during the Depression. I called it “The Confession of Genny Franck.” In it Father Nick gets called to visit 103 year old Genny Franck, the great-grandmother of Trish Ritter (from the Belsnickel story). Genny tells Father Nick that she has a story to tell him and then she'll let him decide if he wants to give her absolution or not. I'll admit I had a terrible time while I was writing it because there is so much pain in it but I think the ending is beautiful and uplifting so perhaps it is worth it.

I needed a complete change from that so I started a second story which I am calling “Peeper Baumgratz and the Sister's Snow-Plow” and I've never had this much fun writing anything in my life. I'm sitting here laughing as I write about a Marienstadt “character” who gets in trouble with the law and high-tails it to a hideout in the woods. Chief of Police Henry Werner, a gorgeously handsome but troubled man, recruits his old friend Oliver Eberstark to go into the woods and hunt for Peeper. Nobody should have this much fun writing.

There are several more stories on my list including one about a competition between two of Marienstadt's oldest families over how to make a proper dumpling and a saga about Jubal Winter, one of the town's earliest, and most mysterious, residents. This story is based in a story handed down in my own family.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to call the completed collection The Whiskey Bottle in the Wall: Marienstadt Stories. Trying to capture the true flavor and sense of the place in which I grew up is more challenging and yet more fun than I would have imagined. While writing the other day I remembered how my Dad and many of the other local people used the word “pritneer” - a word I've never heard used anywhere else. He would say, “it's pritneer dark out” or “the tomatoes are pritneer ready to be picked”. The word means “almost” and is probably a corruption of “pretty nearly” but in my mind it is such a local word.

This morning I read a post on the St. Marys Facebook page about the way dump-trucks loaded with cinders would come out after a snowfall and 2 guys with shovel would stand in the back and spread cinders on the roads to make them less slippery. I remember that so well as well as how many kids had tiny black lumps in their knees from falling and skinning them and getting cinders under the skin that never left.

It surprises me how memory works – the smells, the flavors, the sounds, the feel of what it meant to be a kid in a small Pennsylvania Dutch town in the fifties and sixties. Writing about it is pure joy – even with its sadnesses and shames.

Thanks for reading.

Guest Blog: Ray's Best Hike in Penn's Woods

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 17:46:00 +0000

Our good buddy Ray Beimel in Pennsylvania sent this for today's blog:

The Best Hike In Penn’s Woods

For being a populous eastern state, much of Pennsylvania is still wooded and wild. This makes for a lot of good hiking trails. I have walked many of them with my fine traveling companions Brad and Chris. This is the story about our most recent hike on the best of all possible trails. I am speaking of the Falls Trail in Rickett’s Glen State Park. It is in the northwest corner of Luzerne County, north of Bloomsburg, west of Wilkes Barre, just in case you want to go there.

I first hiked it in 1996. Chris got there in July 2011 and liked it so much that he thought we really needed to get Brad there. Thus our November trip took us to Luzerne County. Chris had reservations at a campground about a half hour away from the park. I got there just a few minutes after he did. We got the RV set up and just as the welcome mats were put out, Brad showed up. We set out from three diverse places over a hundred miles away and over 130 miles apart and still managed to meet within a half hour of each other. We are good that way. Here’s our campsite on the frosty Saturday morning.

Friday night we had a nice dinner of Brad’s chili, my salad, and of course, beer. I won’t bore you with the details of the inevitable Cinch tournament that night. In the morning Brad made French toast and then we were off to the park for an all day hike.

It was a sunny day but not all that warm. We were wearing hiking boots, carrying packs, and using trekking poles. We walked past a ranger in his truck and after a cursory nod, he looked at our feet. The trail is steep, muddy, and can be dangerous and the park strongly recommends good footgear. I guess we passed. Of course, even this little bit of inspection brought out a minor rant from me. It went something like this.

“Bleep. What’s with that ranger? Couldn't he see that we were very serious well-equipped hikers? Hell, I was probably hiking this trail when he was still in high school. Bleep. Where does he get off checking us out? Bleep bleep." My anti-authoritarian rants never cease to amuse the guys. They try really hard to keep me away from rangers. There was severe flooding there recently and much of the trail had been rebuilt with that last week judging from the fresh gravel and the Bobcat tracks that were still obvious.

This is what is called a “lollipop” trail. That means you hike up the “stick”, loop around, and come back down the stick. It is flat to start with easy hiking in a forest of virgin hemlocks. Then you have a choice of taking the high road or the low road. Unlike in

Scotland

, taking the high road gets you there faster.

The two trails converge just below the first of the falls. From there it is alternately flat and steep. And it is very very scenic if you find waterfalls pleasing to look at. And who among us does not like looking at waterfalls? There are 22 of them on this hike, hog heaven for the falls enthusiast. Given the recent rains, they were all running quite nicely full. In a dry summer the flow is somewhat less than that provided by a Super Soaker. In winter only registered ice climbers are allowed in the gorge.

As we passed each falls, Chris or I would take a picture. I was packing the beater camera so my stuff was not wall hanger worthy. I also shot some video so I can hear the falls when I want to. There are three falls on the “stick” part of the trail. Just before we got to Waters Meet where the two glens come together, we passed a number of stacked rock cairns.

While we made some pictures, a couple of guys came up and asked what that was about. They would not know me as a historian who deals strictly with facts so I gave rein to my inner storyteller. I explained that there had been some serious flooding in the area recently and there was a small group of New Age believers who felt that the erection of such cairns, the burning of incense, and the chanting of the proper incantations would keep the stream from flooding in the future. I explained it was quite a colorful ceremony and that dozens took part with even more looking on because the culmination of the ceremony was a young couple conjugating in the stream. The guy’s response to this pack of preposterous lies was “really?”

There is a wooden map at Water’s Meet and this picture might make it more clear about what the trail is about.

The trail is in red. The falls are all named. I wonder who Murray Reynolds was. You might expect Indian names like Oneida and Mohawk, but not Sheldon Reynolds. We decided to take the left fork so we would be going uphill on the steeper side. The highest waterfall, Ganoga, is on this side. It is 94 feet high. So if the creek falls 94 feet the trail must rise 94 feet. The trail is narrow, rocky, and wet in many places. We were happy to have the trekking poles. Only a very few were using them. Since it was later in the season and a bit on the chilly side, we didn’t see the kind of hikers you will find in summer. I have seen Gucci loafers, gold slippers like old female urbanites wear, Chuck Taylors, flip flops, Doc Martens, even barefoot. Evacuating an injured person out of the glens has to be a real chore. For my part, I would let the ravens and buzzards clean the carcass and then pack out the bones in spring. Well, you know I don’t really mean that but I am sure that the chore is difficult enough to require a designated curser, hundreds of feet of rope, a Stokes litter, and a Coast Guard Boatswain's Mate to accomplish.

Brad took a picture of Chris and me in front of a falls. You can see how we were dressed and geared. I think one might guess we had hiked a bit. Or as Bill Eppright might put it, we looked like we had true crust.

Given that it was sunny there were a fair number of other hikers on the trail. Many of them seemed to be students from nearby Bloomsburg University. There were also many Asians, mostly Koreans. We saw their vehicles and it looked like a Republic of Korea Marine Corps veteran’s group with spouses. Some of those ladies were doing some fast paced hiking. Of course, it is easier to get 100 pounds up the hill than it is to get 240 pounds up the hill.

Dogs too. And small children. We saw one way too cute little girl, couldn’t have been more than four, gamely ascending Glen Leigh. She was all in pink and I have no idea how she was going to deal with the big rock steps ahead of her. I suspect the pink would be replaced by mud before she got to the top.

The other side of the gorge was sunlit and there was enough colorful foliage to make for some pretty scenes. Chris found one near the top. Once at the top, the trail across is mostly flat. Still, it is not a good place for very large people as the photo below will show.

This is the aptly named Midway Crevasse. Just a short way down the train we found a very large flat rock just off the trail. We settled in for lunch. Brad made a bowl of Rachael Ray’s tuna with artichoke hearts, celery, Greek seasoning, black olives, and olive oil all wrapped up in a tortilla. As I am wont to say, it was tasty stuff. And the traditional bag of spice drops for dessert. You might ask, what about the Little Debbie Nutty Bars. Of course we had some of those. They take on the character of emergency rations and if there is no emergency, we eat them.

After lunch we played a game of Cinch. It was fun to watch how the passing hikers dealt with seeing us there. Most walked by with just a furtive glance. Some gave us friendly greetings which we returned. Despite it looking like there was a scenic vista (there wasn’t) only one couple came over to see what they could see. I believe Chris won the card game.

From there it was largely downhill into Glen Leigh. This gorge is narrower and there are several bridges, none of which I bothered to make a picture of.

It’s all downhill to Water’s Meet and on a couple of occasions I was very happy to have the poles to keep me upright. Toward the end of the hike I photographed the guys on top of one of the Reynolds waterfalls.

Arguably, this is the most photogenic one with an aesthetic marred only by the two guys standing at the top.

Back at the campground we had a hearty dinner of goop mélange followed by more cards and lots of conversation. In the morning Brad made his legendary pretty and yet tasty omelets and then it was time for the obligatory group shot.

Chris’ RV is a Winnebago Minnie Winnie. We decided that we will refer to it as the Tin Can instead.

I cannot speak too highly of this hike. If you are wandering about Penn’s Woods and looking for a natural site you won’t find anywhere else, you can do no better than Rickett’s Glen State Park. And just to connect my favorite hike with my favorite Civil War site, Rickett was an artillery captain in the Army of the Potomac whose men held off a Confederate charge by whacking the Rebs about the head and shoulders with rammers and other implements. They have a fine monument on Cemetery Hill under the watchful eye of General Hancock’s equestrian statue.

Speaking of which, the next story to come will be an extended rant about a famous American battlefield being encroached upon by forces of evil commercialism. Do I speak of Walmart’s desire to build on the Chancellorsville battlefield? No. Perhaps I am thinking of the suburban sprawl encroaching on Bull Run Battlefield? No. I refer to the Ghost Tours that have become omnipresent in Gettysburg.

Until then, be safe, enjoy. Ray

Davenport Dialogues: Laugh, Cry, Hate, Love...

noreply@blogger.com (Kathleen Valentine) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 14:56:00 +0000

The beautiful and generous Hawaiian author of Shark Dialogues, Kiana Davenport, has written a blog post on her favorite books of 2011 and included my The Old Mermaid's Tale as one of them. In it she writes:

Valentine's writing is so sensuous and graphic, it resurrects the lusty, maritime smells and tastes of that bygone era. Clair is initially swept off her feet by the dashing seaman, Pio, but finds a deeper love in Baptiste, the hypnotic Breton, a seaman and musician of tragic, aching vulnerability who harbors a dark secret from his past. While exploring this complex and doomed love, the author transports us to other eras: shipwrecks on the Great Lakes, Native American legends come alive, the boomtown years of prosperity in these slowly fading waterfront towns. There are scenes where the book's depth approaches the Biblical, the epiphanic, as her characters contemplate the meaning of love, and of existence. The writing is on an epic scale such as Fielding and Melville. A nourishing novel, a great journey. I loved it.

You can read the entire post here:

DAVENPORT DIALOGUES: LAUGH, CRY, HATE, LOVE...: Hello World. We writers constantly shortchange ourselves. We seldom read for pure enjoyment or to escape daily tedium. Instead we ' res...