Rachel Neumeier's Blog, page 315

Describe your favorite novel in six words

Here is an entertaining post from Robert J Sawyer: Favorite books in six words

Yesterday on my Facebook wall, we played this game:

Describe the plot of your favorite book in exactly six words — but don’t say what it is, let us guess.

I described seven favorite books thusly. Here are the descriptions, along with the books’ titles

I like this one the best:

“Hen lays dinosaur egg; chaos ensues.”

Can you figure out which book this is? I would not have recognized it, but I do think I would have loved this as a child.

Here’s a link to Sawyer’s Facebook post, if you’d like to click through and read some of the many, many clever entries.

Here’s one I recognized instantly: Dennis Dickens — “Successful lunar revolt with computer assistance.”

I find this one evocative: Anthony Marchese — “Entrepreneur builds park, ignores chaos theory.” What would that be?

I’m not very good at this sort of thing, but how about — “Girl seeks mother; unfortunately, finds her.”

That six-word limit is a killer. I don’t see how to do this one with fewer than seven — “Cousins learn flying and magic, save homeland.” I mean, I’d hate to leave out either main character, so honestly, seven seems to be the best I can do.

I definitely admire people who are good at pithiness and one-liners. I expect people who can do this easily are also talented at coming up with one-sentence pitches for a book. And perhaps even, for that matter, with book titles.

What do editorial letters look like?

No long ago, this post by Misty Massey, or I should say a comment on that post, caught my eye because of this tidbit: “The commercial writing business is … deadening. Disheartening. It would be easier to go the route of self-flagellation than to sit down and read an editorial letter. They are often (usually?) brutal. Most writers have skin thicker than a turtle shell by the time the first book is ever sent to the printer. A lot of writers give up.”

This struck me at the time, as I said, because this has not been my experience at all. As evidence, I thought I would share a bit of my latest editorial letter, which arrived yesterday. This letter concerns The White Road of the Moon, incidentally, and it reflects my editor’s thoughts after her first read-through of the complete manuscript. I’m going to see what I can do to illustrate her editorial letter without (obviously) spoiling the book, which will come out, incidentally in the spring of 2017.

Now, before I provide details, I should add that no doubt editors vary somewhat in their skill at writing editorial letters, though I would be amazed if they don’t all start with something complimentary.

Perhaps more important, I expect writers vary quite a lot in their emotional state when they receive an editorial letter – it may be very difficult for particular writers to believe in praise, while they have no trouble believing in the weaknesses the letters go on to address. I would imagine that a writer prone to depression or anxiety, or a writer who had a history of poor support from family and friends, might be prone to reading the positive bit with an “As if!” feeling, and the part that highlights weaknesses with an “I can’t believe I’m such a terrible writer!” feeling.

Though I don’t know. Maybe some editors really do write brutal editorial letters. If so, they should cut it out and get my editors to show them how to do it better.

Okay, then, here goes with The Editorial Letter:

The complimentary introduction: This is where my editor says many nice things. Although I know this must be standard form for an editorial letter, but it is very very very important to me because I firmly believe every word. I am certain writers have an easier time with writing and revising if they are disposed to believe compliments. This section provides motivation and builds enthusiasm for the job ahead.

In this case, Michelle says, “It’s a deeply compelling story and I couldn’t wait to find out what was in store for Meridy. Particularly as the story reached its conclusion, I was turning the pages furiously. What a finale! So much action and suspense!”

I should add that I already heavily revised this manuscript on the advice of my agent, Caitlin, so the smooth build of action and suspense owes a lot to her. Anyway, Michelle goes into specifics about characters and aspects of the world that she loves, all of which is spoilery. Sorry.

Oh, I will say this much about the characters: There’s a dog. He is not a sweet little dog. He’s a wolfhound. First dog I ever put in my fiction, I think. I’m happy Michelle mentions how much she loves him.

Anyway, Michelle finishes up thus: “As usual, your story is so strong and your writing is so lovely that the manuscript is already in excellent shape. There are just a few areas that I’d like you to think about for the revision.”

This actually makes me laugh, because it’s followed by four single-spaced pages of detailed critique. After reading the letter several times, I see that some of these points are very summarizable, so let me summarize them:

The backstory: There is not enough. Michelle takes about a page to go into detail about how the important history of the world needs to be worked into the early part of the book and very much clarified.

I’m pleased to see this because I think I can do it pretty easily. I think what happened is, when I cut 100 pages or whatever it was, a lot of the clarification of backstory vanished, and because it was all clear to me and I remembered it as part of the story, I didn’t realize it was gone.

The magic intrinsic to the world: It is not clear enough. There are several important aspects to the magic and none of them are as clear as they need to be. For example, this world has priests, witches, and sorcerers, and so Michelle says, for example, “What does each of these do and how do their powers overlap? Can anyone be a priest or do you have to be a witch to qualify? What exactly is a sorcerer? Do you have to be witch to be a sorcerer?”

This aspect of the revision will be harder, because if any of it is fuzzy to me – and I find some of it is – I will have to figure the details out now. One thing that can happen is that sometimes I will start out with one tidbit clear in my head (you don’t need to be a witch before you can be a sorcerer), but then by the time the story is finished, I’m not sure that makes sense. Michelle posing a bunch of specific questions makes me realize that actually I am not sure about some details I thought were settled.

What I need to do now is reconsider many aspects of this world’s magic and decide *for sure* how to handle everything. And then make it all crystal clear and totally consistent. Obviously without infodumping long explanations about any of it, but working information into the story isn’t the hard part; figuring out the exact details of how everything fits together is the hard part.

Character relationships: Oh, this is the hard part for me! I can’t go into specifics because practically anything would be too spoilery, but I can say this: As soon as Michelle points out that the most important relationship arc (a friendship between two girls, incidentally, rather than a romance) is kind of flat, and describes how it might be strengthened, and how it ought to contribute to the protagonist’s overall character arc, I see that (a) she is dead right, and (b) exactly what needs to happen to fix the problem. But it is going to be hard! Please can I just go back to working in snippets about the history of the world?

Then there is a page and a half about smaller issues, many of which really have to do with one of the three main points above, and the rest which will be quick and easy to fix. And that’s all, though obviously I have summarized a lot.

Previous work, undertaken because of my agent’s feedback, involved cutting one main character and one important character and simplifying the plot — that was much harder. I am sure that contributes to Michelle’s editorial letter focusing mainly on just the three points above.

Time to do all this: preferably by mid-February. That’s a month. I think I can do this in a month or less, even though the spring semester has started so that takes some of my time. Something else that will require time: in addition to hovering over Kenya’s now-three-week-old puppy, entered Ish in his first Rally trial, so I would probably be wise to revise some of the exercises, especially the walk-around down, which Ish does not really, truly understand yet.

Also, I just bought a new youngster, Chloe, a seven-month-old girl who will, I hope, help turn around my astronomically horrible luck with breeding.

Chloe, formally known as Fox Creek Demeter, has (in no particular order) an impressive pedigree, very nice structure – I especially love her neck and shoulder – just about the darkest pigment I’ve ever seen in a Cavalier, nice dark eyes, and an unfortunate habit of SCREAMING WITH EXCITEMENT rather than merely barking like a normal dog. I rather hope that will at least mellow to a less piercing scream with time. She quite charmingly insists on sitting partly on my lap even if she has to share with my laptop. (This really is charming, even though she gets in the way.) She is the most physically fearless Cavalier I’ve met since Pippa was her age. I think by the time she actually is Pippa’s age, she will have taken over as Queen Of All She Surveys.

Most important of all, Chloe is completely unrelated to Kenya and her family, and has hopefully inherited from her mother and grandmother the ability to conceive decent litters and carry them all the way to term without *all the damned issues* that have made the past four – wait, five – years so difficult for me. Having puppies die: that is brutal. Believe me, editorial letters are nothing to it.

An “origin story” for David Bowie

Via tor.com, I see that that one of the stories in Neil Gaiman’s collection Trigger Warning is in a sense an “origin story” inspired by David Bowie. As a memorial, Gaiman has made the story — “The Return of the Thin White Duke” — available at his website. Here are the first couple of paragraphs:

He was the monarch of all he surveyed, even when he stood out on the palace balcony at night listening to reports and he glanced up into the sky at the bitter twinkling clusters and whorls of stars. He ruled the worlds. He had tried for so long to rule wisely, and well, and to be a good monarch, but it is hard to rule, and wisdom can be painful. And it is impossible, he had found, if you rule, to do only good, for you cannot build anything without tearing something down, and even he could not care about every life, every dream, every population of every world.

Bit by bit, moment by moment, death by little death, he ceased to care.

Wow, that’s kind of a depressing beginning. Since this is Gaiman, I trust that the story will be essentially uplifting rather than, or in addition to, being tragic. I haven’t read it yet, but I definitely want to.

Not all the paintings associated with the story seem to be illustrating the version linked above. Here are other paintings that accompany the Thin White Duke.

Element 117

Have you all heard that to name the recently discovered element 117 “Octarine” in honor of Terry Pratchett?

Octarine is being counted as ‘a mythological concept’ under IUPAC rules, which state that elements must be named after “a mythological concept or character; a mineral, or similar substance; a place or geographical region; a property of the element; or a scientist”. The Discworld stories are certainly stories about gods and heroes, and 70 million books surely count for something.

Kind of a snazzy proposal, even though as far as I know Pratchett had no particular interest in chemistry.

Also, it is a way more esthetically pleasing name than, get this, “Livermorium,” which is what poor element 116 got stuck with. This is after the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, which was involved in its discovery, but good heavens, no offense to what is doubtless a fine laboratory, but what a dreadful name.

Element 117 is interesting, actually. As I suppose elements are if you take a good look at them.

The linear accelerator at the GSI laboratory in Germany accelerated calcium ions to 10 percent the speed of light to create element 117 . . . Element 117’s existence gives scientists hope, however, that they are getting closer to discovering a rumored “island of stability” where nuclei with so-called magic numbers of protons and neutrons become long-lived. it says here in this Scientific American post.

Leading the way in confirming the existence of element 117 is GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt, Germany. Let me just note that “Helmholtzazine” is hardly better than “Livermorium.”

“Octarine” would be much better.

Literary, Upmarket, and Commercial Fiction

Here’s an infographic purporting to show in a nutshell the fundamental differences between Literary, Upmarket, and Commercial fiction.

I guess this is all well and good, but this particular element, which I’ve seen before, completely annoys me:

Upmarket fiction is character driven and has quality writing tackling commercial themes.

Commercial fiction is plot driven and there’s no need for quality writing, I guess, because that sure isn’t mentioned.

This seems a touch snobbish to me. My first issue with this infographic is the assumption that commercial fiction substitutes fast pace for good writing and thus that if the writing is good, the book is not commercial or “genre” fiction. Thus Station Eleven, which is clearly dystopian SF, is coopted into the “literary” category because heaven forbid something beautifully written should count as commercial or genre.

I also can’t help but think it says a lot that I’ve had manuscripts rejected by one editor as “too commercial for my imprint” and another as “too literary for my imprint.” I mean, same manuscript. Who exactly is defining “quality writing?”

The second thing I dislike about this categorization is that I, like many many other readers, particularly enjoy character-driven commercial fiction. Where is that in this infograpic, may I ask? The idea that SF, F, mysteries, thrillers, horror, historicals, and everything else generally referred to as “genre” fiction are intrinsically plot driven is not just an overstatement. It simply is not true.

Well, fine. Models are always simplified, I know, and an infographic is a model. But this still looks like a basic mischaracterization to me, and it’s annoying.

Recent Reading: Jinx’s Fire by Sage Blackwood

Sticking to the path won’t always take you where you need to go. So Jinx left it, and pushed his way through an elderberry thicket. He crept silently toward the edge of Bone Canyon. He hid in the shadow of a hemlock and looked across the steep cliffs of Bonesocket Island, and the high walls of the castle, and the spindly bridge of bones that climbed to the Bonemaster’s domain.

I’m a bit late to this party, because Jinx’s Fire came out last March. I picked it up when it came out, but put off actually opening it because I knew I wanted to go back and start again from the beginning. I was waiting for the proper intersection of time and mood, in other words, which finally happened over this past Christmas break. And I’m glad, because it’s such a delight to re-visit this world and everyone in it.

I don’t read all that much Middle Grade; a lot of it reads too young for me. But sometimes great charm in worldbuilding (those butter churns!) meets complex, interesting, unusual characterization and also beautiful style and then it can be magic. For me, Blackwood’s trilogy is right up there with the Middle Grade stories of Diana Wynne Jones, and I don’t say that very often.

Okay, so, I’m sure lots of you have already read the first two books, but let me see if I can do this without significant spoilers.

The first book of this MG trilogy, Jinx, is self-contained, but you may be aware that the second, Jinx’s Magic, is not. It feeds directly into the third book of the trilogy, Jinx’s Fire.

Because the third book is continuing the story established earlier, Jinx and the whole Urwald already face a clear threat, a complicated problem that needs to be solved before they have much chance of dealing with the threat, and a ton of relationships that need to be worked out among the various characters.

Well, there are three different threats, actually. At least three. And several different complicated problems. And, yes, a ton of complicated relationships.

Although the Bonemaster is one Seriously Creepy Villain – he’ll suck out your soul with a straw, you know, and stack up your bones criss-cross – in some ways the threat he poses is not as great as the more fundamental threat posed by possible invasion from outside the Urwald. I mean, the Bonemaster belongs to the Urwald. He’d hardly want to see the forest completely destroyed. That isn’t the case for outside invaders who see the forest as a great source of lumber, and valuable land once it’s cleared. So Jinx and Elfwyn and everyone sure have their job cut out for them.

Similarly, although the problem of getting Simon’s soul back is a big deal, the more serious problem is the gradual disappearance of the Urwald’s intrinsic magic, and in order to deal with either problem, Jinx, or someone, really needs to figure out how the Urwald’s magic actually works.

And all the way through, the characters have to grow up and/or work out their relationships; such a pleasure to spend time with them all.

Elfwyn really grew up in this story. She started out with such a typical fairy-tale problem: how to get rid of this annoying curse. Then Blackwood takes Elfwyn and her curse in such an unexpected direction. I love Elfwyn’s determination and her willingness to take responsibility for things and put herself in peril. Honestly, she seems like perhaps the most clear-sighted character in the whole trilogy. The relationship between Jinx and Elfwyn is really well done, though personally I don’t feel the trace of potential romance was actually necessary. The key relationship for me is the one between Jinx and Simon.

I think maybe I have a particular fondness for really well-drawn father figures, and Simon is possibly my favorite character in the trilogy. He is such a total jerk in some ways, especially at first, and then eventually does the right thing almost despite himself. He’s complicated – a little bit evil, but not really. He’s irascible and snappish and touchy and has a horrible relationship with his own father and keeps a zillion cats and oh yes is married to a sensible scholarly woman from another world. The relationship between Jinx and Simon is what hooked me in the first place and I loved seeing them together again in this book.

Jinx is grumpy and impatient in this book, and one does wonder how much of that attitude he learned from Simon and how much is just him. In some ways he’s been growing into himself over the course of this trilogy, becoming more confident. In other ways, he is resisting his own gifts as hard as he can. I will say, his persistent hesitation to use his particular brand of magic to deal with the invasion practically drove me mad. It’s not that I don’t get his hesitation, but I’d have been right there with everyone else shouting at him to go on and get it done. I do think Blackwood kind of elided the carnage we’d really see in that kind of situation, thus allowing Jinx to drag his feet a bit longer than I think was reasonable. On the other hand, this is a MG story, not a bloody tour through war and the brutality attendant on conquest, so probably it was a good idea to pass lightly over the less fairy-tale aspects of the invasion.

In the end, the resolution of the story solidly shuts the door on all the various threats facing the Urwald – or at least the urgent threats. Not quite the traditional happily-ever-after, the ending nevertheless brings the trilogy to a satisfying conclusion. Overall, an engrossing story involving characters who virtually step off the page, set in a beautifully drawn fairy-tale world. An excellent choice for an advanced MG reader or for an adult who enjoys really well-written MG stories, I think this trilogy is going to be collecting new fans of all ages for a long time to come.

Fantasy for Jane Austen Fans

Here’s a nice post from Barnes and Noble, about fantasy novels thought ought to appeal to readers who love Jane Austen.

I was pleasantly surprised, because usually bookseller posts seem to focus on new releases that the stores really want you to buy. They are thinly disguised ads, and it annoys me. But this post, by Kelly Anderson, almost seems to deliberate set out to identify quite old titles that are particular favorites of mine. Sorcery and Cecelia! What a wonderful choice.

The new title on this list is Sorcerer to the Crown, which I haven’t read but have on my TBR pile because I know a lot of you loved it.

I think the oldest is probably Sorcery and Cecelia.

There’s only one I hadn’t heard of, The Hanged Man, by P.N. Elrod. It sounds promising, though Elrod’s vampire novels were just okay for me. Has anybody tried this Victorian gaslamp fantasy?

Tolerable zero-carb foods for breakfast

Of course if you decide to switch for some time (or forever) to a zero-carb diet, the options are endless. On the other hand, who has the energy to track down a whole bunch of zero-carb ideas for breakfast? And I say that as a morning person who likes to cook and owns more than 100 cookbooks. *Even I* dislike dealing with a low- or no-carb breakfast. *All* my favorite breakfast foods are definitely heavy on the carbohydrates. Coconut chocolate-chip scones! Chocolate chip oatmeal pancakes! Over-easy eggs with, and this is the important part, cream biscuits!

Sigh. All those things have now been relegated to mere treats. Even the over-easy eggs. What’s the point of frying eggs over-easy if you’re not going to have biscuits to dip in the yolk?

On the other hand, I’ve learned to make a decent omelet.

On the other other hand, one does get tired of bothering with omelets. Here is an easy, quick alternative to an omelet that yields a breakfast that somehow seems more substantial and worth eating than mere scrambled eggs.

Breakfast “frittata” for one

2 eggs, beaten with a little water or milk

Some cooked, crumbled bacon or sausage, or diced ham, or whatever

Some diced cheese, such as sharp cheddar

A pinch of salt

A good pinch of pepper

Preheat the broiler.

Heat a little oil (or bacon drippings)over medium heat in a small skillet. Saute the bacon or whatever just enough to heat it up (or cook it if it’s not already cooked). Pour in the eggs. Do not stir. Scatter the cheese over the top. Don’t stir. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Let cook for a minute or two without stirring.

Take the skillet off the burner and put it under the broiler for a minute or two, until the top is set or as browned as you like it.

Slide the frittata onto a warmed plate, where it will look like a pretty credible breakfast even by itself.

Stuff to serve with this: obviously biscuits are out; that’s the whole point. But you could have fruit. Bananas and grapes are often considered bad news if you’re trying to cut carbs, but apples seem pretty safe for me, at least.

Other things that would go with this even though they aren’t specifically considered breakfast foods: creamed spinach or, if you’re an overachiever, spinach soufflé. Having an egg thing AND something else is one way to beat the feeling that you are on a deprivation diet, even though obviously you are.

Another possibility: A crustless quiche. For example, something like this:

Broccoli Quiche

3 C steamed broccoli florets or spinach

1 ½ C of shredded cheddar or other cheese

6 large eggs

½ C light cream

1 tsp freshly-ground pepper, or 1/2 tsp cayenne

1 tsp salt

Spread broccoli in a 9″ pie plate and sprinkle with the cheese. Beat together the eggs, cream, pepper or cayenne, and salt. Pour over the broccoli and cheese. Bake at 375 degrees for 35 minutes or so, until set in the middle.

A couple of things to keep in mind:

If you are going to try a high-protein, low- to no-carb diet, *do not go low-fat.* A high protein / low fat diet is exactly what nearly drove the Lewis and Clark expedition into fat starvation. A no-carb diet is *instead of* a low-fat diet, not something you try at the same time, despite decades of trained guilt about high-fat foods.

Also, when a product is made “reduced fat” or “low fat,” the stuff put in to replace the fat is generally some kind of carbohydrate. Using low-fat mayonnaise means you are probably consuming more carbs than you think, in order to avoid fat that is not harmful.

I think one of the best books out there about diet and low-fat vs low-carb diets and so on is Gary Taubes’ Why We Get Fat, which is why I posted about it a year or two ago.

Second, if a food item is wrapped in a tortilla or made with flax seed replacing wheat flour, or whatever, then it is probably not low-carb. Flattening out the bread does not make it low carb. All seeds and beans and so on contain a lot of carbohydrates, even if they are also high protein or high fat or both.

Of course you may personally find that beans and seeds don’t affect your weight as badly as wheat does. That seems to be true for me, and I sometimes use chickpea flour to make socca as a bread substitute. It just annoys me to have websites and other diet advice imply that these kinds of things are low-carb, when they clearly are high carb even if they are not wheat.

Socca would be fine for breakfast, I’m sure, but I usually make it for lunch or a snack. The trick to it not sticking is to follow the advice in the recipe linked in the paragraph above and get the well-oiled pan (I use a nonstick skillet and a generous amount of olive oil) absolutely blazing hot before you add the batter.

Recent Reading: A Taste of the Nightlife by Sarah Zettel

Okay, basically I have a hard time getting into Yet Another UF/Paranormal world. Not that I read all that many UF/Paranormal series, but enough, apparently, that I have no particular enthusiasm for another one.

And then sometimes one comes along that has a lot of recommendations by the right people* or is by an author I already know I like or has a particularly interesting-sounding description, and then the first couple of pages of the sample are especially appealing.

A Taste of the Nightlife was one of those. It’s the other book I’ve pulled out of my “Samples” folder so far this year.

This is a first-person UF that features vampires and warlocks and werewolves, one of those where vampires and so on have recently been legally declared to have the same rights as ordinary humans – nothing unexpected abou any of that. But the protagonist, Charlotte Caine, is a human woman who is the executive chef of a relatively new restaurant in New York. And Zettel really writes her as a chef, too. She’s got the attitude and the obsessiveness and the cooking chops, though none of this takes center stage so much as to turn this into a different kind of novel. But, mmm, the food descriptions! When Charlotte gets upset, she cooks up a storm. Cheese straws and artichoke dip, crostini with olive tapenade, couscous with chicken and grapes, pomegranate salad with wilted greens and a shallot vinaigrette.

Mmm.

As one might expect, the story involves a mysterious murder, vampire/human politics, and a choice of Really Hot Guys who both make their interest in Charlotte clear. Brendan Maddox is a warlock from a powerful family of warlocks, rich and handsome and so on. Anatole Sevarin is an old, powerful vampire who is rich and handsome and so on. No particular reason to fall for Charlotte, but of course they both do. All very typical.

On the other hand, I didn’t get bored reading this story. I was properly baffled by the mystery, and concerned about what Charlotte’s brother was up to, and I liked how the supporting characters were handled, especially Detective Linus O’Grady and Charlotte’s roommates. The potential romance(s) stayed potential, which seems appropriate given how much other stuff is going on in this book. And the writing is very good, with (I can’t help but notice) correct, smooth use of verb tenses, always so iffy in first person.

Overall, this is a clever story, well written and plotted, not deeply emotionally engaging, but solidly entertaining. It actually reads like a cross between a vampire UF and a cozy mystery, and in fact I suspect that readers who enjoy cozy mysteries would find this an appealing entry into the UF/paranormal genre. I don’t feel much urgency about grabbing the second book in the series right this minute, but I expect I will pick it up, because as it happens I do like cozy mysteries as well as UF, so there you go.

* You know who you are.

Lemon raspberry parfaits

So, the Meyer lemon tree at my parents’ house bore one (1) lemon, which has gradually been ripening for some time. Honestly, to do a good job with citrus, you ought to have a good, bright spotlight for it in the winter, which my parents don’t, so actually even one lemon is actually pretty good.

But what to do with a single Meyer lemon? Of course Meyer lemons are a cross between oranges and lemons, so the fruit are substantially bigger than regular lemons. Juicier, too. I decided a single Meyer lemon would do fine to make a recipe of lemon curd.

I used Marion Cunningham’s recipe from Fanny Farmer, the 1996 edition. It worked beautifully. Here it is if you would like to try it:

Lemon Curd

Grated zest of two lemons (or one Meyer lemon)

6-7 Tbsp fresh lemon juice (or the juice from one Meyer lemon, which was about 7 Tbsp)

1 stick butter, in pieces

1 C sugar

4 eggs

Combine the zest, juice, butter, and sugar in the top of a double boiler over hot but not boiling water. Stir occasionally as the butter melts. Meanwhile, beat the eggs in a separate bowl.

When the butter is melted, drizzle about 1/4 C of the hot lemon mixture into the eggs while you continue beating the eggs. Cunningham just says “spoon a little of the hot lemon mixture into the eggs,” so let me be specific: 1/4 C worked fine.

Now pour the eggs into the lemon mixture in the top of the double boiler, whisking constantly. Continue whisking until the lemon curd thickens. Cunningham warns that this can take up to 20 minutes. No doubt that’s true, but I found the curd was quite thick after ten minutes.

Remove from heat, pour into a cool dish, cool, and chill.

Now, frankly, this was very good and you can certainly eat it straight out of the bowl with a spoon, or eat it with pound cake or toast or whatever, but presuming you would like to do something fancier with it, you might make parfaits. Tall, narrow stemmed glasses are prettiest, but don’t let that stop you. Marion Cunningham suggests you layer the lemon curd just with sweetened whipped cream, which is fine, but yellow and white look pretty insipid together, so I made this:

Raspberry sauce makes such a difference to the appearance of the parfaits, and after all, raspberries and lemon go great together. Plus we have lots of raspberries in the freezer from last year. So actually we grew the raspberries AND the lemon. I guess if we had cows we could go all the way and make cream, too, but not likely.

Anyway, to make these, obviously you just beat a cup of chilled cream with 1/4 C of sugar until stiff. The raspberry sauce was made with a couple cups of frozen raspberries and sugar to taste; just cook until you have a nice puree and then chill.

To assemble, spoon first lemon curd and then whipped cream and then a little raspberry sauce into the stemmed glasses and repeat. There you go, elegant parfaits that, if not exactly quick what with making and chilling the lemon curd and raspberry sauce, can at least be made and assembled ahead of time.