Jen Gilroy's Blog, page 10

A Wedding, an Anniversary and a Tale of Two Cakes

Last week, Tech Guy and I marked our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. Over the years, we’d often thought about what our Silver anniversary would be like, a quarter-century milestone that then seemed very far away.

Yet, of all the scenarios we considered, we never imagined a twenty-fifth anniversary under Covid-lockdown with restaurants closed to in-person dining, and socializing with others beyond our household restricted outside and banned indoors.

Even before our anniversary day dawned cool and rainy, we’d decided that our celebration, like so many other things over the past sixteen months, would be put on hold. However, Tech Guy still planned a lovely surprise.

He knows I like chocolate cake.

He also remembers that on what was otherwise a wonderful wedding day, our cake got squashed in transit from the bakery to the reception venue so had to be strategically placed to conceal damage to each layer and a visible tilt to one side.

In addition, the vibrant frosting didn’t match the more subdued shades we’d chosen to coordinate with our wedding colours.

Over the years, that cake became a funny memory of our special day. We always said, though, that for our twenty-fifth anniversary we’d have a party with a new version of the cake we’d wanted all those years ago.

Owing to Covid, a party was out.

English Rose is finishing her last year of high school (online) so didn’t have time to make us a cake. Although I like to bake, I have a repetitive strain injury (RSI) in my elbow/forearm so am currently banned from baking and various other things.

Undeterred, Tech Guy ordered a small cake from our local grocery’s in-store bakery.

He requested a chocolate cake with white icing. He also asked for small pastel pink and lilac flowers with pale green leaves and the rest of the frosting in white.

And while we got some of those things, our anniversary cake had eerie similarities to the one twenty-five years before.

Owing to a problem with the cake’s layers, it tilted to one side just as our wedding cake did.

The frosting also bore minimal relation to the requested colours, including green piping around the base that English Rose likened to mushy peas, often eaten with British fish and chips.

However, as we plan a delayed Silver anniversary celebration, including a little trip this autumn, we’re also looking further ahead.

We hope that there are still Pearl, Ruby and Golden anniversaries to come—and many more chances for cake in between, including (post-pandemic) made by the friend who crafted the gorgeous cake for the party to celebrate my first book, The Cottage at Firefly Lake.

And despite all that has been hard and gone wrong in the past twenty-five years, beginning and ending with cake, other things have gone right and we’ve made our way through difficulties as a team.

Although it wasn’t the Silver anniversary we once imagined, Tech Guy and I marked it together. For that, and so much more, I’m grateful.

Change of seasons, change of clothes

Twice each year, in spring and autumn, I go through my wardrobe and have a major clear-out.

I take the previous season’s clothes out of the closet and replace them with those stored out-of-season in my cedar chest.

I also try on clothing to see it still fits or is in style and, as I pack a bag for a local charity shop, I note new items to shop for.

Enter the pandemic…

The last time I wore anything that could remotely be considered stylish was at a “Local Author Showcase” at my local library in late February 2020. In my jersey dress, heels (remember those?) and (I hoped) artfully tied scarf, I strove to be both ‘casual chic’ and approachable.

Although I don’t know if I succeeded, I remember what I wore because it was my last outing in what I now think of as the “before time.”

Since then, and apart from forays to the grocery store, bank, dentist and walking Floppy Ears, I’ve been at home in sweatpants (joggers), T-shirts and slippers.

As such, a central tenet of my seasonal fashion transition, letting go of items I haven’t worn in over a year, no longer applies. If I took that approach now, more than half my wardrobe would be going to charity and I’d have nothing to wear when more “normal” life finally resumes.

Similarly, and because clothing has only been sold online for much of the last year, I haven’t been able to browse fashion in brick and mortar stores or do my favourite thrift shopping either.

What’s a fashionista to do?

After unseasonable late-May snow, last weekend I finally transferred all my winter and autumn clothing into the cedar chest for summer storage to assess again in late-September.

All my spring and summer clothing is now in the closet to be assessed as and when I wear it.

However, when walking Floppy Ears one evening this week, I spotted the now unusual sight of a woman in full makeup, heels, floaty summer dress and very “artfully tied” scarf indeed.

While I wondered where she was going (restaurants, theatres and cinemas haven’t yet reopened here), maybe she wasn’t going anywhere special. Maybe she’d dressed up to feel good about herself at a time when all of us need every little boost we can get.

The fashionista in me was impressed and resolved to follow in her stylish footsteps.

For pandemic-weary me, though, my slippers are comfy and most of my makeup has expired and needs to be replaced.

Still, my ice cream patterned flip-flops are a start because they coordinate with my summer yoga pants.

And given that a friend accidentally sent all the tops she planned to wear this summer to the local clothing recycling bin, I’ve been reminded it’s important not to rush into new things or make any sudden changes…

 

 

Want to be one of the first to find out the title for my Harlequin Heartwarming western romance? I’m sharing it in my June newsletter, out next week.

One newsletter subscriber will also receive a signed paperback of Summer at the French Olive Grove, a new summery romantic read from my friend Sophie Claire.
If you aren’t already signed up, subscribe to my newsletter here.

 

Velcro dog: The pandemic’s impact on my fur baby

Floppy Ears, my much-loved rescue dog and “author assistant,” has been a happy part of our family since April 2017.

However, after fifteen months of pandemic, including multiple lockdowns, stay-at-home orders, mask-wearing and avoiding others when out and about, as life has changed for everyone, Floppy Ears has changed too.

From happy hound

Pre-pandemic, Floppy Ears was a friend to all, greeting other dogs and people with a wagging tail and happy vocal “hello.”

She was crate trained and had progressed to staying home alone for several hours outside her crate without chewing books, shoes or stray toothbrushes.

To Velcro dog

In recent months, however, and although still a loving family pet, our sweet Beagle-Walker Hound has become increasingly distrustful of both strangers and other dogs.

She hides behind me and growls when her now neighbourhood nemesis, a Chocolate Labrador, has the temerity (from her point of view) to be in the same vicinity on a walk.

She also growls at her reflection in the glass doors of a bookcase, not realizing it’s her own face looking back at her.

And with Tech Guy, English Rose and I at home almost twenty-four seven, Floppy Ears can’t relax unless she knows where each of us is at all times.

She stays especially near me and, on the rare occasions when I go out without her, she keeps watch by a window waiting for me to return.

If she mistakenly assumes she’s been left home alone, she voices her angst with mournful hound dog howls until I remind her I’m still nearby.

Reassurance…and retraining

Since Floppy Ears came to live with us, after being found in a small-town dump with no collar, tags or microchip, we’ve guessed at her history from anxious behaviours; for example, her inexplicable fear of dark-coloured pickup trucks and SUVs.

The pandemic, though, has meant she’s become much more anxious and we now have what’s called a “Velcro dog,” one who needs to be close to their owners at all times.

Since we’re far from alone in this situation and, as post-vaccine, “normal life” finally beckons, there are multiple specialists offering tips for pandemic-traumatized dogs like ours.

When we’re finally allowed to socialize outside our own household, Floppy Ears will have supervised play dates with a trusted canine friend.

On walks, we’ll gradually desensitize her to people and other dogs, and once again work on leaving her home alone for short periods.

The Chocolate Labrador, though, may be her enemy for life.

Dogs have strong associative and episodic memory, and Mr. Chocolate Labrador lunged and growled at Floppy Ears first.

As such, and as long as they live near each other, when I spot him exiting his front door, or hear the telltale jingle of a collar from half a block away, I’ll close our living room blind or redirect our walk.

Like with teenagers, some battles aren’t worth fighting!

From bookish child to bookish adult—But did my peers follow the path they were on at age nine?

[image error]I’ve never been to a school reunion, am only still in contact with one high school friend and, until recently, my school days were firmly in my rear-view mirror.

However, several weeks ago when going through an album of school mementos, I found old report cards and a yearbook from when I was nine.

And as I sat on my bedroom floor, over a thousand miles away from the small school I attended from Kindergarten (Reception) to Grade Four, memories came flooding back of teachers, people and classrooms long forgotten.

At nine and in Fourth Grade, the yearbook entry described me as being “very interested in reading—a real bookworm”—something that could as easily be said about me now as then.

As a curious writer, I wondered if any of my long-ago classmates were similar as adults to who they were back then. Thanks to Google, more than half of those twenty-six students were easy to find.

The boy who liked “operating his train set” and building models is today an urban transportation planner. The sports fan’s Twitter bio references favourite teams, although he now mentions being a season-ticket holder. And the math whizz is a senior executive in accounting and finance.

The girl who wanted to be a swimming champion didn’t realize that dream but nevertheless competed at a high level. And the classmate whose yearbook entry said he “likes the outdoors” is now a small-business owner who promotes that same ethos on his company’s website.

The wonderful librarian who introduced me to still-favourite books like The Witch of Blackbird Pond was quoted as saying that “authors are budding in all the classrooms.”

While at the time that might have been wishful thinking, it’s turned out to be surprisingly apt.

Today, myself included, there are three published authors from my Grade Four class alone, spanning fiction and non-fiction, as well as scripts for screen and stage and articles for national and international magazines.

[image error]And while I’ve come a long way from that nine-year-old girl, and the school I once attended has been closed for many years, it was there that I consciously became a storyteller with a teacher noting in my report card:

“She is learning to spell the words she needs to express her ideas in written form… [and her] stories are improving steadily as she makes good use of sentence structure and descriptive wording.”

As for mathematics?

That same report said I “seem[ed] to have difficulty when something different or unusual is presented—geometry, estimation, large numbers, etc.”

Although mathematics continues to be a challenge, luckily I married an expert. For almost twenty-five years, Tech Guy has been “on call” when anything “different or unusual” is presented and I’m grateful, although never more so than this year when English Rose has studied physics, as well as calculus, vectors and advanced functions!

Creativity in the time of Covid

My blog post this week has a fresh look and feel because it’s the first from my new website. Not only am I delighted to have a site that is pretty, uplifting, and helps showcase my writing, it’s also functional, and easy to navigate and maintain. 

A grateful shout-out to Mary Jayne Baker of Fully Booked Author Services for doing such a stellar job and cheerfully solving various problems along the way.

My new website has been a much–needed creative boost because here in Ontario, Canada we’re in a third Covid wave, and under a strict lockdown and stay-at-home order.

In recent weeks, I’ve chatted with several author friends about the challenges of staying creative during this time of Covid. From those conversations, common struggles emerged. 

Historical research

For those who write historical fiction, the prolonged closure of libraries, archives and museums has made it difficult, if not impossible, to consult primary sources. 

It’s also meant a lack of what I call “serendipitous moments,” unexpectedly finding something that sparks a new idea or direction. 

Contemporary life 

As a traditionally published author, I’ve followed guidance from editors and my literary agent to not include the pandemic in my contemporary stories.

As such, and although my western romance for Harlequin Heartwarming is set in the present day, it doesn’t include Covid-19 so in that sense offers a reading escape from current reality. 

However, as a writer of contemporary stories, lockdown means I’m missing another kind of “serendipitous moment”—conversations overheard in shops and on public transit, people watching in cafés, and checking out the new season’s fashions in “real life” to help make my characters believable. 

Creativity in the everyday 

Before the pandemic, I hadn’t realized how much the daily interactions I once considered ordinary spark story inspiration. 

My weekly ballet class and how it benefits my mind, as well as body. Browsing in a library or bookstore. An impromptu chat with a neighbour. A day trip outside my small town. Spotting someone wearing an interesting piece of jewellery or fun pair of socks. 

All these things lead to the “what if?” questions from which fiction springs. 

The solution to creative doldrums? 

Since a quiet night in with Netflix has now become every night, I’ve decided that I need to (metaphorically) shake things up. 

As she shared on Twitter, my British/Canadian author friend Laura Tapper organized an individual, stay-at-home writing retreat and she’s inspired me to do the same. 

Whilst the beauties of England’s North Norfolk coast aren’t on my doorstep, as the weather gets warmer I can organize a day out for myself with writing prompts and other creative activities to help me see my “own backyard” with fresh eyes. 

I’ve bought a seasonal day access pass to Ontario’s provincial parks to walk Floppy Ears in the park near our home, and I check webcams to ‘visit’ some of my happy places (like North Norfolk) further afield.

I’m also making a conscious effort to find the positives. 

My family and are I still safe and well and, after over a year at home with Tech Guy and English Rose in close proximity almost twenty-four/seven, I have new “insights” on family dynamics that can’t help but influence my fiction. 

Happy writing news

Another creative boost I’m thrilled to announce is that I’ve signed with a literary agent for women’s fiction and am excited about working with Kiran Kataria of Keane Kataria Literary Agency to develop my writing career in a second genre.

For my romance titles, including western romance for Harlequin Heartwarming, I continue to be represented by Dawn Dowdle of Blue Ridge Literary Agency.

Moving to a new website

Dear blog readers,

Since I’m in the midst of moving to a new website and, correspondingly, a new means of blog posting and delivery, I haven’t written a blog this week. I’ll return with a new post on 30 April, 2021.

I’m excited about sharing my beautiful new website with you, as well as having a better and more functional system for my blog.

As many of you know, I also have a monthly newsletter where I share subscriber-first book news, exclusive giveaways and more.

It’s hosted and delivered via a different platform than my website and has a different subscription process. If you haven’t already done so and would like to become a newsletter subscriber, sign up here.

Thanks for your interest and continued support. 

Jen x

Celebrating chocolate…and my readers

If you follow my Facebook author page, you know that I usually post there daily.

It’s a happy place and virtual front porch where I chat with readers about things that bring us together including pets, books, food, family and community life.

Last week, I asked my American followers about popular chocolate bars in the United States because in the Montana-set, western romance I’m writing for Harlequin Heartwarming, the hero keeps a chocolate stash in his desk drawer.

At a time when the closed Canadian-American border means I can’t visit the U.S., I wanted to make sure, in a sentence at most, to reference brands that would resonate with American readers.

Given the vagaries of Facebook’s algorithm, and that with any post I only reach a small proportion of page followers, I hoped for a handful of answers.

Instead, I reached 389 people, had 63 post engagements and got numerous helpful comments about not only popular chocolate bars but also:

Pictures of favourite candy bars;Preferred ways to store and eat chocolate;Web links to additional information;Touching family anecdotes;An offer to mail me chocolate which I sadly had to decline owing to pandemic-related postal disruption;Private messages with market research data about chocolate preferences amongst U.S. consumers.

Although Snickers was a clear favourite, answers to what I expected to be an ordinary question gave me so much more than book research.

Chocoholics

Clearly, my American readers love chocolate, but what I also learned is that many Canadians have favourite chocolates that are only available in the United States.

One of the unexpected effects of the pandemic and absence of cross-border travel has been the inability of Canadians to stock up on special American sweet treats.

Community

While there are many things that divide us, there are many more things that unite us, chocolate being one.

And although some of the brands of chocolate mentioned were new to me, one favourite crosses international borders.

The Kit Kat, a chocolate-covered wafer bar, is popular in Canada, the UK, and the United States and brings a community of chocolate lovers together. 

Kindness and helping others

The overwhelming response to my question underscored something my grandma always told me, namely that given the opportunity most people want to be kind and help others.

My books are premised on that way of seeing the world so it was wonderful to see kindness and helpfulness on social media too, a sphere where currently such things can seem in short supply.

My Montana western romance 

Finally, why I asked the question in the first place…

My hero now has a desk drawer stuffed with chocolate including Snickers, Mounds, Three Musketeers, Baby Ruth, Milky Way, Hershey’s, Kit Kat, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Dove, Ghirardelli and more.

And instead of being a passing reference, his chocolate horde is now part of his character as suggested by several author friends who commented on the post.

It’s also something the heroine teases the hero about and helps show the growing relationship and love between them.

Celebrating chocolate…and my readers

Thanks to my lovely readers who in celebrating chocolate not only helped make my book better but also made me smile.

For those of you celebrating Easter this weekend, enjoy this yummy, chocolaty time!

And if you don’t already follow my Facebook author page, join the fun here.

“You’ve Got a Friend”

The popular song, “You’ve Got a Friend,” written by Carole King and first recorded in 1971, has been on my mind lately.

Owing to stresses in both my family and writing spheres, I’ve needed friends more than ever in the past few weeks—and just when I needed them most, those friends came through for me.

Writing friends

I often say that without trusted writing friends, I doubt I’d still be writing for publication.

These are the people who regularly talk me off the metaphorical writing ledge and who have been there for me through the ups and downs of this rollercoaster career.

They’ve held my hand both in person and virtually as I’ve faced hard professional issues.

They’ve also listened when I needed them to and offered sound advice, along with cake, biscuits, tea and, on occasion, wine.

In the past two weeks, I sent a writing SOS to two of those friends and although they were both on deadline with their own books within a couple of hours I’d heard back and got understanding and practical advice, including offers of further help if I needed it.

To quote one friend, whose email included the helpful reminder “try not to panic,” I indeed wasn’t panicking and could see a solution to what, in the end, isn’t as big a problem as I’d feared.

Friends for life

I’ve also had issues in my life beyond writing and once again, a friend was there to console, commiserate and care.

This particular friend has been part of my life for almost thirty years and although we don’t speak or email often, she has a knack of sensing when something isn’t right (always from thousands of miles away) and calling when I need her.

We’ve never talked about my writing and I don’t know if she’s read any of my books but that doesn’t matter because our friendship is based on who we are as women, not author me. And because she knows me better than almost anyone else, whenever we speak we pick up where we left off as if no time has passed.

So, in my life issues too, I had someone telling me not to panic and giving me understanding, hope and practical advice.

The best and worst of times

In both writing and life, I’m grateful for the friends who have not only have seen me at my best, but who are also there during the tough times—those seemingly endless stretches of grimness that, for many of us, have been a feature of this pandemic year.

Especially after reading news articles about how the pandemic has changed friendships (largely negatively), I’m even more grateful for my deeper friendships that have not only endured but strengthened through difficulties.

As for my “life friend” who’s not part of my writing world?

She’s someone who doesn’t hesitate to face down bears
(real ones we encountered on a long-ago camping trip in the Rocky Mountains), bullies (too many to count), and whose bravery in seizing life and overcoming challenges that would have destroyed most people not only inspires me but is also part of every fictional heroine I write.

And as we talked last week, my friend mentioned that her latest rescue dog is called “Shadow,” the name of the hero’s dog in my first book, The Cottage at Firefly Lake.

Sometimes life has more curious coincidences than fiction…

Listen to that Carole King classic, find “You’ve Got a Friend” on YouTube here.

Moving adventures

From 2015 until now, much of my life has been spent in some form of transit—moving from England to Canada, several moves related to my elderly cousin both before and after her passing, and moving things from my late mother’s home across Canada.

Tech Guy has moved too—following English Rose and I from England to our home in small-town Canada and then to an apartment in Toronto where he lived during the working week to be near his job.

In the past two weeks, he’s moved again, giving up that Toronto apartment because for the foreseeable future he’s able to work full-time from home.

Happily, for the first time in almost six years, my little family is now living under the same roof all the time. And for the first time in nine years, we’re also only responsible for one dwelling, the one we live in.

Having moved so many times, I can’t say that it has become easier or less stressful.

And because I’m a homebody at heart, living in a continuous state of chaos with, at one point, personal belongings scattered between two Canadian provinces and the UK, gave me a constant sense of being adrift in both myself, as well as geography.

However, now that the moving is done (oh glorious day!), we’re in an ongoing ‘sorting’ phase.

Because the pandemic and successive lockdowns have made it difficult (or in certain instances impossible) to undertake some planned home renovations, dispose of items to charity or sell them, we have two lockers at a local storage facility, a temporary holding space until we return to whatever the ‘new normal’ becomes.

While it’s not surprising that ‘finding home’ is a recurring theme in my fiction, just as I was congratulating myself on reaching the end of my moving adventures, I remembered that pandemic-permitting, English Rose may leave our small town to pursue post-secondary studies this autumn. 

Perhaps I haven’t seen the last of a U-Haul van in the driveway…

A bonus post for writers

Along with other authors,  I recently contributed to “Lockdown Writing,” a post by British romance novelist Emma Bennet.

From changes in the both publishing landscape and writing habits, to motivation, patience, flexibility, and more, the pandemic has altered many aspects of the writing life. For example, I’m now using a scented candle to help delineate my writing time and, hopefully, reduce domestic interruptions. 

Check out our experiences and tips here.

 

New book news & paperbacks of “A Wish in Irish Falls”

While much of the writing life is like any other job with daily tasks, deadlines and a variety of projects big and small, there are also special moments to celebrate.

I have two of those to share with you this week—news about a new book and the paperback release of A Wish in Irish Falls.  

New book news—I’m a Harlequin Heartwarming author

As you may have seen in my recent newsletter or on social media, I’ve just signed a contract to write a story for Harlequin Books Heartwarming series. 

With “uplifting romances where the bonds of friendship, family, and community unite,” the Heartwarming line is a great fit for my writing and I’m thrilled to be working with my new editor there.

My first book for Heartwarming is a sweet western romance set in Montana and will likely be out in e-book and paperback in early 2022.

What’s new about my writing for Harlequin Heartwarming?

It has a western setting so think ranch life, campfires, cowboy culture, horses, and a big western sky.

The book will be a bit shorter too, circa 70,000 words instead of 90,000 and with a lower sensuality level—hugs and kisses only.

What will stay the same?

As in my Firefly Lake trilogy and Wishing Tree books, my Montana book is a sweet, feel-good story with small-town charm and features relationships between family, friends and pets alongside a central romance.

How does this new book relate to my own life?

I’m a prairie girl at heart who grew up in Western Canada so some of my earliest memories are of visiting small western towns in ranch country, much like the one my dad came from.

Almost as soon as I could walk, I had a pair of cowboy boots and hat, although as a girly girl I usually wore them with pink dresses and a sparkly necklace from the dressing-up box.  

Pickup trucks are part of my DNA (although having one of my own as an adult is still on the bucket list!), along with a childhood spent playing in barn haylofts and climbing  straw stacks–here I am at age eight with my mom joining in. 

I’ve also had many wonderful vacations in Montana, colloquially known as “Big Sky Country,” and one of my happy places is driving along a rural western road at sunset in summer, the land stretching to the horizon as far as I can see—small in the world but with a sense of limitless possibilities.

I hope you’ll join me on my “Montana adventure,” and I’m excited about sharing more of this new book with you as the months go on.

The paperback of A Wish in Irish Falls is here

If you’ve been waiting for the paperback of my second Wishing Tree book, A Wish in Irish Falls, it came out at the end of January, much earlier than expected.

Get a copy on Amazon here (look for “paperback” on the book’s Amazon landing page).

A Wish in Irish Falls is also available on Kindle and is free with Kindle Unlimited.

“[An] emotional story filled with loss, hope, and learning to start over again. My heart was hooked right from the very start. Jen Gilroy creates a small town you never want to leave!”

~Goodreads reviewer~

If you’re a library user, I’d also appreciate it if you could ask your local library to buy a copy of A Wish in Irish Falls for their collection. It’s an easy way to support authors, me included, and helps us reach new readers.

And if you don’t already receive my monthly newsletter with subscriber-first news, book sales, exclusive giveaways and more, sign-up with your email address here. 

Thank you for being part of my life and writing journey.