Tag: novel

Where’m I At?

Where have I been, you ask? Or maybe you don’t.

I’ll tell you anyway.

Two things: it’s summer. Ergo, lots of distractions. And it’s a summer in which we have been inundated with rain, unholy amounts of it, at least TWICE in quick succession, followed by the kind of damage that, when you drive around and look at the piles of ruined furniture, flooring, personal keepsakes and essential necessary things like furnaces and laundry appliances stacked at curbs, makes your jaw drop.

Image from CBC by Evan Mitsui on the Weather Network

Just Lucky

Was my writing haven in the basement touched? No, and I thank St. Catharines’s topography for that. And probably more that a smidgen of good luck – around the corner on Bunting and not very far away, there were piles at the curbs.

We’re due for another rain storm today. People are nervous. May the infrastructure hold this time.

Writer’s Cramp in My Future

The other reason I’ve been inactive here is that I’m working on the sequel to ‘The Cottages at the Cape – Margie’s Summer Getaway’. Roaring away at it to meet the release deadline (one I set myself, so I can’t bitch about it), which means it needs to be submitted even sooner to be evaluated by Amazon, which means the writing part has to be finished even SOONER, so I can edit and do necessary corrections and re-writes. That’s how it is when you self-publish.

I know, I know. My choice. I’ll shut up now.

Oh! Just one more thing. Remember seio nage from ‘The Cottages..’? Think tomo nage. Think feckless clueless Russian lunatic assassins. Think Kapow!!

THE WE’RE STILL HERE BOOK CLUB

Volume One – Elbows Up by Jeff Richardson

In ‘The We’re Still Here Book Club – Volume One: Elbows Up’, people of the Niagara Region of Canada, (and many other regions of the country) see themselves and can well imagine thinking and behaving almost exactly as these book club members do. In the face of the outlandish, irrational and offensive rhetoric from an old man in the country south of us, can it be a surprise that at least one old lady takes a stand – however innocuous?

It’s what ensues after Audrey takes a stand that takes this book from a light-hearted ironic romp (trad Canadian!) to a clear-eyed unromantic deep dive into one possible outcome – an outcome that only a few short years ago would have been too insane to even conceptualize.  

Congrats to Jeff Richardson for managing both sides of this story with comedic skill, great story-telling and historical chops. He has a deft kindly touch with small-town characterizations and pretensions, and being a small-town girl by origin, I appreciated every bit of that! I can’t say I couldn’t put the book down, because that would be stretching the truth – I did have to make supper and do dishes and visit the loo.