Gail Ingis's Blog, page 4
October 17, 2019
That Dog-gone Kousa Dogwood
Kousa Dogwood in full bloom
A tree grows in Fairfield, in our backyard, taking over the garden, the house, and the patio. The Kousa Dogwood in bloom is gorgeous. In one month all the flowers turn brown and ripen into juicy berries with a bitter/astringent taste. The exterior of the berry is tough and bumpy and the only way to eat it is to suck out the fruit. A few years back, I decided to make some Kousa berry jam. I picked the berries after they ripened, mashed them and cooked them down with sugar in a saucepan until the jam was formed. After cooling, I poured the jam into mason jars and gave them to family members for Christmas.
The jam was pretty good, not delicious. The taste improved when blanketed on a cracker with a dollop of cream cheese. Despite my attempt, I didn’t think I could turn the Kousa jam-making into a side business. Perhaps the flavor would have improved by adding those tried and true Holiday ingredients: cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, orange citrus, and ginger. I was left with a special colander for making jam, and special jam jars, that I have since donated to all my friends and family to make their own jam. Speaking of jars – If you’re not a fan of jam, you can use those wonderful Mason jars for candy or sugared almonds, tie a ribbon around it and voilà, a lovely gift for any occasion.
Fruit
Meanwhile, we had a very fruitful Kousa Dogwood, I pruned the branches when the flowers began to brown to keep away as much fruit as possible. Alas, all that accomplished was to make the tree smaller so that the shade provided on our patio minimized. The job of collecting the fruit kept us busy picking it off the tree, and those that we missed, fell onto the lawn and patio, squishing under our feet and the lawnmower. It’s a shame the jam was not yummy, imagine making a buck from your fruit tree in your own backyard. And the birds didn’t like the fruit either, even though I read somewhere that birds love the fruit. Not the ones in our yard.
It’s been twenty years of this unwanted exercise just to enjoy the beauty of the short-lived flowers, and some shade on our patio. One day, I said to Tom, “Can we remove the tree?”
He gaped at me, his handsome face frozen in horror for a moment. “Are you sure?”
Without going into all the details, first, we trimmed all the branches. Then we cut them back, then we cut it down.
For you tree lovers, please don’t hate us, we moaned during the whole process. But we’re glad we cut the tree down because we now have more time to enjoy our backyard and our backs are thankful we won’t be doing all that extra stooping anymore.
October 10, 2019
COAST OF THE ALGARVE
Portugal Praia (beach)
I haven’t been to the French Rivera. I haven’t been to the cliffs of Amalfi. I have driven, toured and run the soft sparkly sand through my fingers at the Algarve. The Algarve is Praia eo Camilo (Lagos)150 kilometers/90 miles of coastline.
We drove to S. Vicente, the Cape Cod of Portugal, the most southern point, surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean.
It isn’t true if you’ve seen one beach, you’ve seen them all. They are all so different.
The Hawaiian personality of the thatched umbrellas was at the Falesia Praia, the picture below, and at no other.
We discovered all the beaches are topless, but not all the women were. No, you can’t see the ones that were topless. I don’t have them to share.
The path begins at the Nossa Senhora da Encarnação fort (GPS 37.09474, -8.46976), which is at the top of the steep hill leading to the left (east) side of the beach. The boardwalk extends for 570m to the car park at the top of the Algar Seco cliff (GPS 37.09332, -8.46556). A typical walk takes around 10 minutes but often takes much longer as the beautiful scenery is admired. The wooden path means that it is suitable for all and is perfect for less mobile visitors or families. At the base of the Algar, Seco cliffs is the Boneca Bar, a great setting for drinks and light meals.
Do note: The Carvoeiro Boardwalk does not extend down to the Algar Seco and to reach the base of the cliff a long flight of steps needs to be descended.
The town of Carvoeiro, where the stars reside, is a town known for entertaining kings and queens. You can find cafes at every turn. There were so many cafes, it was hard to choose.
carvoeiro-boardwalk-walk
Cafe Pine Cliffs Hotel, Algarve
We didn’t see any famous stars. The praia (the beach) was the star, with hills, cliffs, houses in the cliffs, sheer dropoffs, eloquent seascapes. Fishing boats right next to beach umbrellas, people at rest, children at play.
Custard tarts & and coffee (those tarts are outrageous) This pastéis de nata recipe makes as-close-to-authentic Portuguese custard tarts with a rich egg custard nestled in shatteringly crisp pastry. Tastes like home, even if you’re not from Portugal. If you live in Connecticut, buy these at Chaves Bakery in Bridgeport on Madison Ave.
Portuguese sundae, yum (atypical)
Coffee (above) is serious business in Portugal. Usually, espresso is served after every meal. After lunch at one of the cafes in Carvoeiro, we indulged. Decaf, brewed of course. We were horrified at our Tivoli Hotel in Villamoura, where they served Nescafe, a decaf espresso, not brewed. It wasn’t too bad. And that’s only b/c it was Nescafe. I tried another brand, not brewed, it tasted like bug spray smells.
Plowing through all these places gave us both infinite pleasure. Not once did we see rain.
Alfama, Portugal is Lisbon’s oldest district made famous for its tight winding corridors and for having been one of the few neighborhoods to survive the devastating earthquake of 1755. Photo by Laura Pastores from Westminster College. – See more at: http://www.semesteratsea.org/2013/10/...
The white sand beach and cliffs of the beach of Praia da Rocha soft and reflective. The waves broke against the rocks and splashed up sizzling in the sunlight with colors of the rainbow.
October 3, 2019
Indie Author Day Is Coming Soon.
On Saturday, October 12, libraries across North America (and the world) will be celebrating INDIE AUTHOR DAY. It’s the third annual event celebrating indie (self-published) authors in their home towns and cities. And it truly gets better every year!
I’ll be one of several indie authors giving a short talk at my local library on – The Norwalk Public Library, 1 Belden Avenue, Norwalk, Connecticut – reading from my new historical romance, THE UNFORGETTABLE MISS BALDWIN
Libraries across North America are planning programs to celebrate their local independent and self-published authors. Mine is Norwalk Public Library on Saturday, October 12 from 8:30 am – 5:00 pm. Please check your local library for the schedule. Over the past three years, hundreds of libraries across North America have taken part in coordinating events that have drawn thousands of authors and readers.
We’re hoping that this year will be even bigger and better! Here in Norwalk, more than 60 authors and other publishing professionals will be taking part. Authors are invited to speak or read an excerpt from their work. And of course, you’ll be able to buy books and get them signed by the author.
The fun starts at 10:30 am. Children’s authors will be reading in the Children’s section of the library.
If you’re looking to meet your favorite author(s), hear what they have to say, and enjoy talking to fellow readers, then Indie Author Day is for you!
Check out local events in your area by clicking HERE.
Click HERE to watch a short video about Indie Author Day.
September 26, 2019
Mangia! Mangia! Mangia!
I have a recipe for you today straight from Mrs. Maniscalco’s kitchen. About 70 years ago, I babysat for Mrs. Maniscalco’s grandson, Bennett. They lived above my parents’ variety store in Brooklyn. The one remark from her that stands out to me was, “Never skim off the fat, that’s where all the flavor comes from.” So, forget fat-free pasta sauce. I’m doing this from memory . . . and a little help from my Good Housekeeping Illustrated Cookbook.
I’d love for you to join my new facebook group – called GAIL INGIS AUTHOR RECIPE EXCHANGE AND MORE… I posted Mrs. Maniscalco’s tomato sauce recipe – on the group page – but I also included it here. I hope you’ll join me in this fun facebook group – we’ll swap recipes and share memories of favorite food celebrations and family gatherings. I’m planning a Holiday/Christmas Cookie Exchange in November! Can’t wait!
I have fun with food in my new Gilded Age Romance, THE UNFORGETTABLE MISS BALDWIN. My heroine, Allie Baldwin is a food connoisseur and enjoys good cooking like all of you do.
Here’s a taste from chapter 12: Allie poked at the duck l’orange, wild rice, and roasted vegetables, and to make sure no one would go hungry, also served was a platter of pasta covered in the thick brown sauce from the entree. Pasta, Allie’s favorite, not usually served at a formal dinner like this one, was a delightful treat. “Pass the sauce, please,” Allie requested, adding to the already drowning spaghetti. She twirled some onto her fork, using her tablespoon to catch any dangling pieces of pasta, and savored each bite.
The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin is available everywhere online: Amazon. Hooray! I hope you’ll check it out.
September 19, 2019
Author Claire Gem Interviews Gail Ingis
An interview by Claire Gem
Claire: Gail, what made you decide to set your historical romance in this particular time in our history?
Gail: I wanted my heroine to be feisty, to question the establishment–and in the 19th century it was a rigid one.
Claire: Well, Allie Baldwin certainly fits the role! But it’s not just the women’s vote Allie fights for. What else motivates her?
Gail: It was a time when women immigrants were leaving their homelands for a better life. Instead, they were working in deplorable conditions in factories and their children weren’t schooled. They had to work. Families lived in crowded tenements with so many others in the same situation.
Claire: Who helped inspire Allie’s cause?
Gail: Allie follows in the footsteps of Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton and so many others fighting for the votes for women, the fight for freedom, and the fight for the right to choose.
Claire: But she runs into the same kind of resistance they did, doesn’t she?
Gail: Most certainly. Allie had to fight her father, her brother, and even turn away from marriage to work for the vote.
Claire: What was one of Allie’s pet peeves?
Gail: She hated the corset. It was symbolic of the stranglehold on women.
Claire: Well your timing couldn’t be better, Gail! 2020 is the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment granting women the right to vote. Bravo!
~~~
A little more about the book:
Opposites attract in this gilded age historical romance when a young American suffragette eschews marriage until a handsome detective is hired to protect her from a dangerous stalker.
It’s not that she doesn’t want to marry…
Allie Baldwin is tired of writing about the latest fashions for the society column of her father’s newspaper, the New York Sentinel. Determined to write about important issues, Allie can’t help but defy danger at every turn. When she narrowly escapes a riot at a suffrage rally, Allie’s beleaguered parents enlist the services of a security agent—a dashing and debonair detective, with a knack for getting under Allie’s skin.
He’s not ready for marriage…
Peter Harrison is too busy running Harrison Detective Agency to bother with courtships and conjugality. He refuses to make the same mistakes his father made—marrying too young and forsaking family for work. But when a newspaper magnate hires him to protect his willful daughter—Peter is torn between his oath to bachelorhood and an alluring attraction to the ravishing redhead with a nose for trouble.
When a mysterious fire sparks her investigative instincts, can Allie stick to reporting the facts and restrain her flowering feelings for the handsome detective?
~~~Spunky Allie Baldwin wants to write about more significant issues in her father’s newspaper than the current fashion trends. Bottom line is, Allie is a suffragette who is far from shy and, defying her father, plunges headfirst into the fray of suffragette rallies. Worried for her safety, her parents hire a security guard to try to keep her out of trouble.
You can get your copy of The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin here, and find out more about Gail Ingis at her website.
Interviewer, Claire Gem is a multi-published, award-winning author of emotional romance—contemporary, paranormal, romantic suspense, and women’s fiction. She writes about strong, resilient women who won’t give up their quest for a happy-ever-after—and the men lucky enough to earn their love. No helpless, hapless heroines here. These spunky ladies redefine romance, on their terms.
Hearts Unloched
Claire Gem
Phantom Traces
Claire Gem
from: $18.49
A Taming Season
Claire Gem
Claire has a special of short stories up for preorder on Amazon: ENIGMATA: Eerie Bits, Book 1 – A Collection of Short Stories by Claire Gem. Leaves you wondering where, why and what. It certainly ignited my curiosity, and gave me goose bumps, the kind that chilled me deep in my imagination. Want a thrill? Order now, and they’ll be ready to read on 9/29.
September 5, 2019
Tenacious . . . Who Me? Why Not?
This blog is a revision and a reminder that The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin will be published a few days from today. I’m preparing a letter with the link to the Amazon review page that will post just after midnight for my ARC readers. There’s no point in posting the link here as it will only be active on the 10th at publication.
Launch day! Tuesday, September 10, 2019
My heroine, Allie Baldwin, in my historical romance, The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin, launching Tuesday, September 10th, has a passion – to help win the vote for women.
That’s not news, thirty-four years later women got the vote. But in 1886, a battle that had been going on for almost fifty years was denied over and over and over again.
As a reporter for the New York Sentinel, the newspaper her father owns, Allie is determined to do her part and attend a rally. Not any old rally, but one for suffrage, featuring many notable women speakers. She is willing to forego marriage to do her part securing votes for women. But her father not only disapproves of her going he also threatens not to print anything Allie writes pertaining to the rally. Her father’s objections don’t stop her. She concocts a disguise and makes her way to New York City Hall where more than a hundred women and men have gathered to listen to the suffragettes.
I would have done the same, but it would have been my mother arguing with me. She would have told me to stop this behavior, to grow up, and don’t think of hiding behind a cloak. “If you go,” she would have said, “I’ll find out and you’ll reap the consequences.”
My father, unlike Allie’s, was a dearheart, I could do no wrong in his eyes, and most of the time he couldn’t figure out why my mother was so strict with me. By the time I was born, the 19th Amendment had passed only fifteen years before, and women’s lives had indeed changed. I had a working mother, she was a jobber and bookkeeper. She wouldn’t have allowed me to go to a rally yet she benefited from women like Allie.
This is why we shouldn’t take the vote for granted. It is one of our most important rights, don’t you think so?
Votes for Women
Recently, tennis trailblazer, Billy Jean King spoke at the United States Tennis Open on opening night at the Billy Jean King National Tennis Center, Flushing Meadow, Corona Park, NY. She said, “In 1920, women got the right to vote, and while we’ve come a long way, there is still so much more to be done until we truly have equality for all.”
I hope there are many more Allie Baldwins’ out there, willing to keep working for equality in all arenas. I was lucky enough to have watched the original tennis match between Billy Jean King and Bobby Riggs on TV, along with a million others. We all cheered for Billy Jean, She changed the women’s world and gave us all new life. What’s really interesting about a story that takes place in 1973 is that all those issues have suddenly bubbled up again: “Equal pay, sexism, gender equality, sexual equality—all these things are live debates again,” screenwriter Simon Beaufoy told TheWrap’s Steve Pond in a video interview at the Toronto Film Festival.
My pin! Billie Jean changed scads of things, she’s like my Allie.
With the approach of the 100th Anniversary of Woman Suffrage – there will be many events around the country to celebrate and educate. Lockwood-Mathews Mansion Museum, Norwalk, CT is planning several, including Women in Office and the 19th Amendment celebration and talk by Connecticut’s Secretary of State, Denise W. Merrill on Sunday, Sept. 8, 2019, 2-4pm. For more information and to purchase tickets, click here. Secretary Merrill’s talk will be followed by a self-guided tour of the museum’s featured exhibition, From Corsets to Suffrage: Victorian Women Trailblazers, as well as tea and light refreshments.
Coincidently, I just had the most delightful visit from Sharon Pistilli, who is running with three other candidates to make the town where I live, Fairfield, even better. I will remember to vote on Tuesday, Nov 5, 2019, from 6am-8pm. It’s my right and my privilege.
The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin is available for pre-order on Amazon and iBooks, Kobo, Banes and Noble Nook. Order now and the book will appear in your e-reading device on launch day, Tuesday, Sept 10, 2019.
Read about the passionate, tenacious Allie Baldwin:
Opposites attract in this gilded age historical romance when a young American suffragette eschews marriage until a handsome detective is hired to protect her from a dangerous stalker.
September 3, 2019
Tenacious . . . Who Me?
My heroine, Allie Baldwin, in my historical romance, The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin, launching Tuesday, September 10th, has a passion – to help win the vote for women.
That’s not news, thirty-four years later women got the vote. But in 1886, a battle that had been going on for almost fifty years was denied over and over and over again.
As a reporter for the New York Sentinel, the newspaper her father owns, Allie is determined to do her part and attend a rally. Not just any old rally, but a suffrage rally featuring many notable women speakers. Doing her part to help secure the right to vote for women means the world to Allie. She is willing to forego marriage for her work. But she has her work cut out for her. Her father not only disapproves of her going, he threatens not to print anything Allie writes pertaining to the rally.
Allie is made of sterner stuff than that! Her father’s objections don’t stop her. She concots a disguise and makes her way to New York City Hall where more than a hundred women and men have gathered to listen to the suffragettes.
I would have done the same, but it would have been my mother arguing with me. She would have told me to stop this behavior, to grow up, and don’t think of hiding behind a cloak. “If you go,” she would have said, “I’ll find out and you’ll reap the consequences.”
My father was a dearheart, I could do no wrong in his eyes, and most of the time he couldn’t figure out why my mother was so strict with me.
In the 19th century fathers were strict, and mothers raised the children, cooked, did the wash, cleaned the house, and even chopped the wood for the baking oven.
By the time I was born, the nineteenth amendment had passed just fifteen years before, and women’s lives had indeed changed. I had a working mother, a mother who worked outside the home and made her own money. My mother wouldn’t have allowed me to go to a rally but she benefited from women like Allie.
This is why we shouldn’t take the vote for granted. It is one of our most important rights, don’t you think so?
Votes for Women
Recently, tennis trailblazer, Billy Jean King spoke at the United States Tennis Open on opening night at the Billy Jean King National Tennis Center, Flushing Meadow, Corona Park, NY. She said, “In 1920, women got the right to vote, and while we’ve come a long way, there is still so much more to be done until we truly have equality for all.”
I hope there are many more Allie Baldwin’s out there, willing to keep working for equality in all arenas.
“Battle of the Sexes” directors Jonathan Drayton and Valerie Faris had no fears about re-creating a 44-year-old stunt tennis match between Billie Jean King (played by Emma Stone) and unapologetic chauvinist Bobby Riggs (played by Steve Carell).“What’s really interesting about a story that takes place in 1973 is that all those issues have suddenly bubbled up again: equal pay, sexism, gender equality, sexual equality — all these things are live debates again,” screenwriter Simon Beaufoy told TheWrap’s Steve Pond in a video interview at the Toronto Film Festival.
My pin! Billie Jean changed scads of things, she’s like my Allie.
With the approach of the 100th Year Anniversary of Woman Suffrage – there will be many events around the country to celebrate and educate. Lockwood-Mathews Mansion in CT is planning several, including Women in Office and the 19th Amendment celebration and talk by CT’s Secretary of the State Denise W. Merrill on Sunday, Sept. 8, 2019, 2-4pm. For more information and to purchase tickets, click here. Secretary Merrill’s talk will be followed by a self-guided tour of the museum’s featured exhibition, From Corsets to Suffrage: Victorian Women Trailblazers, as well as tea and light refreshments.
Coincidently, I just had the most delightful visit from Sharon Pistilli, who is running with three other candidates to make the town where I live, Fairfield, even better. I will remember to vote on Tuesday, Nov 5, 2019, from 6am-8pm. It’s my right and my privilege.
The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin is available for pre-order on Amazon and iBooks, Kobo, Banes and Noble Nook. Order now and the book will appear in your e-reading device on launch day, Tuesday, Sept 10, 2019.
Read about the passionate, tenacious Allie Baldwin:
Opposites attract in this gilded age historical romance when a young American suffragette eschews marriage until a handsome detective is hired to protect her from a dangerous stalker.
September 2, 2019
Tenacious. Who me?
My heroine, Allie Baldwin, in my historical romance, The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin, launching Tuesday, September 10th, has a passion – to help win the vote for women.
That’s not news, thirty-four years later women got the vote. But in 1886, a battle that had been going on for almost fifty years was denied over and over and over again.
As a reporter for the New York Sentinel, the newspaper her father owns, Allie is determined to do her part and attend a rally. Not just any old rally, but a suffrage rally featuring many notable women speakers. Doing her part to help secure the right to vote for women means the world to Allie. She is willing to forego marriage for her work. But she has her work cut out for her. Her father not only disapproves of her going, he threatens not to print anything Allie writes pertaining to the rally.
Allie is made of sterner stuff than that! Her father’s objections don’t stop her. She concots a disguise and makes her way to New York City Hall where more than a hundred women and men have gathered to listen to the suffragettes.
I would have done the same, but it would have been my mother arguing with me. She would have told me to stop this behavior, to grow up, and don’t think of hiding behind a cloak. “If you go,” she would have said, “I’ll find out and you’ll reap the consequences.”
My father was a dearheart, I could do no wrong in his eyes, and most of the time he couldn’t figure out why my mother was so strict with me.
In the 19th century fathers were strict, and mothers raised the children, cooked, did the wash, cleaned the house, and even chopped the wood for the baking oven.
By the time I was born, the nineteenth amendment had passed just fifteen years before, and women’s lives had indeed changed. I had a working mother, a mother who worked outside the home and made her own money. My mother wouldn’t have allowed me to go to a rally but she benefited from women like Allie.
This is why we shouldn’t take the vote for granted. It is one of our most important rights, don’t you think so?
Votes for Women
Recently, tennis trailblazer, Billy Jean King spoke at the United States Tennis Open on opening night at the Billy Jean King National Tennis Center, Flushing Meadow, Corona Park, NY. She said, “In 1920, women got the right to vote, and while we’ve come a long way, there is still so much more to be done until we truly have equality for all.”
I hope there are many more Allie Baldwin’s out there, willing to keep working for equality in all arenas.
“Battle of the Sexes” directors Jonathan Drayton and Valerie Faris had no fears about re-creating a 44-year-old stunt tennis match between Billie Jean King (played by Emma Stone) and unapologetic chauvinist Bobby Riggs (played by Steve Carell).“What’s really interesting about a story that takes place in 1973 is that all those issues have suddenly bubbled up again: equal pay, sexism, gender equality, sexual equality — all these things are live debates again,” screenwriter Simon Beaufoy told TheWrap’s Steve Pond in a video interview at the Toronto Film Festival.
My pin! Billie Jean changed scads of things, she’s like my Allie.
With the approach of the 100th Year Anniversary of Woman Suffrage – there will be many events around the country to celebrate and educate. Lockwood-Mathews Mansion in CT is planning several, including Women in Office and the 19th Amendment celebration and talk by CT’s Secretary of the State Denise W. Merrill on Sunday, Sept. 8, 2019, 2-4pm. For more information and to purchase tickets, click here. Secretary Merrill’s talk will be followed by a self-guided tour of the museum’s featured exhibition, From Corsets to Suffrage: Victorian Women Trailblazers, as well as tea and light refreshments.
Coincidently, I just had the most delightful visit from Sharon Pistilli, who is running with three other candidates to make the town where I live, Fairfield, even better. I will remember to vote on Tuesday, Nov 5, 2019, from 6am-8pm. It’s my right and my privilege.
The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin is available for pre-order on Amazon and iBooks, Kobo, Banes and Noble Nook. Order now and the book will appear in your e-reading device on launch day, Tuesday, Sept 10, 2019.
Read about the passionate, tenacious Allie Baldwin:
Opposites attract in this gilded age historical romance when a young American suffragette eschews marriage until a handsome detective is hired to protect her from a dangerous stalker.
August 23, 2019
From Grammar Revolution to Writer’s Evolution
I’m thinking, I’m thinking
Now that my book is finally settled with KDP and Draft2Digital, and it’s up for PreOrder on all the retailers, Amazon, B&N, Apple, Kobo, everywhere, even Toliino, I’m seeking grammar lessons to begin writing book 2 in the Gilded Age Heiresses about Mia and the forensic sad face doctor, Robert MacDougall.
I never understood grammar in the third grade and I’m finally annoyed enough that I’m embarking on a new learning adventure, with Elizabeth O’Brien, an ambitious English teacher that has taken my email by storm (pardon the cliche). Elizabeth is present almost daily. I haven’t tossed her out the window, like Allie my heroine, who tossed out her billiard balls, and well, that’s because I really would like to finally understand how words work.
Editing, editing, editing
How can anyone be a writer if all they know is what a noun and a verb is, oops, are? I mean, I didn’t know the difference between an adverb and adjective when I began this journey, and if it’s not visual, forget it, I’m an artist after all. So, how have I written Indigo Sky in 2015 and now in 2019, The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin, The Gilded Age Heiresses? Here’s the scoop for the UMB story.
After the book was done, it was fine-toothed combed by the talented developmental editor, Sue Grimshaw, then copy edited and proofed by the brilliant Carmen Erickson of Book Editing Magic. I sent Carmen a question about one of her corrections and asked why that was important. Here’s the correspondence: “I accepted the change, but I wish I understood the difference between Peter smirked and held up his hand, directing it toward Drumple. OR what I had: Peter smirked and held his hand up, directing . . .” Here’s Carmen’s answer:
I don’t think what you had is wrong, per se, but “up” is considered an adverb here and is best placed after the verb “held” to modify it. The rest of the clause that follows also then modifies” hand,” so now it directly follows the noun it modifies. It’s just a cleaner application. However, if you left it as it was, no one would probably notice.
Now get this, I thought all adverbs modify a noun, huh? Then what’s an adjective? It’s so confusing. That why I ordered Elizabeth O’Brien’s book this morning with the hopes that grammar will become my friend and serve as a great mapping system when I write . . . anything. Uh, oh, there’s those elusive ellipsis. Hmm, maybe I should have used an em dash? Sigh . . .
And don’t holler at me that I forgot a comma somewhere, Grammarly didn’t help me with this post, and that probably the reason.
Enough–I’ll keep you posted.
August 22, 2019
The Grammar Revolution and Writing
i’m thinking, I’m thinking
Now that my book is finally settled with KDP and Draft2Digital, and up for PreOrder on all the retailers, Amazon, B&N, Apple, Kobo, everywhere, even Toliino, I’m seeking grammar lessons to begin writing book 2 in the Gilded Age Heiresses about Mia and that forensic sad face doctor, Robert MacDougall.
I never understood grammar in the third grade and I’m finally annoyed enough that I’m embarking on a new learning adventure. Elizabeth O’brien, an ambitious English teacher that has taken my email by storm. (pardon the cliche), is present weekly. I haven’t tossed her out the window, like Allie, my heroine tossed out her billiard balls, and well, that’s because I really would like to finally understand how words work.
Editing, editing, editing
How can anyone be a writer if all they know is what a noun and a verb is, oops, are? I mean, I didn’t know the difference between an adverb and adjective, and if it’s not a visual, forget it, I’m an artist after all. So, how have I written Indigo Sky in 2015 and now in 2019, The Unforgettable Miss Baldwin, the gilded age heiresses?
After the book was all edited by the brilliant editor, Carmen Erickson of Book Editing Magic, I sent her a question about one of her corrections and asked why that was important. Here’s the correspondence: “I accepted the change, but I wish I understood the difference between Peter smirked and held up his hand, directing it toward Drumple. OR what I had: Peter smirked and held his hand up, directing . . .” Here’s Carmen’s answer:
I don’t think what you had is wrong, per se, but “up” is considered an adverb here and is best placed after the verb “held” to modify it. The rest of the clause that follows also then modifies” hand,” so now it directly follows the noun it modifies. It’s just a cleaner application. However, if you left it as it was, no one would probably notice.
Now get this, I thought all adverbs modify a noun, huh? Then what’s an adjective? It’s so confusing. That why I ordered Elizabeth O’Brien’s book this morning with the hopes that grammar will become my friend and serve as a great mapping system when I write . . . anything. Uh, oh, there’s those elusive ellipsis. Hmm, maybe I should have used an em dash? Sigh . . .
And don’t holler at me that I forgot a comma somewhere, Grammarly didn’t help me with this post.
Enough, I’ll keep you posted.
