Kathleen Buckley's Blog, page 9

Halloween and Dia de los Muertos in New Mexico

Halloween in New Mexico is a little different. For one thing, art is in the air and water here. You can’t avoid it, and it’s catching. I have never done much decorating for Halloween, and previously limited myself to handing out enough candy to trick-or-treaters to delight dentists for months to come.
Since moving to Albuquerque, I’ve gone a little crazy. My personal best, Halloween division, was dressing a 5 foot tall, almost anatomically correct plastic skeleton for Halloween. We got it at Costco, and three considerations struck me: 1) this is the Southwest, 2) Halloween comes immediately before Día de los Muertos, and 3) this articulated, posable skeleton was just slightly shorter than the average Conquistador. You can see where this is going. So I dressed him  in a 16th century linen shirt, trunk hose (a/k/a pumpkin pants), a matching jerkin, and black velvet flat cap, and sat him in a rustic wooden arm chair, right in front of the door, with sword. Much more elegant than a warty witch on a broomstick or an inflatable plastic pumpkin. 

This year, one of our local supermarkets has an articulated, five foot (stretched out full length, I assume) plastic stegosaurus skeleton in their Halloween aisle. It’s already come down in price. I’m hoping that if it’s there the day after Halloween, it will be more steeply discounted yet. My housemate has already bought a large, hairy spider—No! not a real one!—which we will position on the porch overhang. Let me be honest, here: I will be the one on the ladder. 
Halloween is followed by Dia de los Muertos, the Day of the Dead, which celebrates loved ones who have died. And “celebrates” is an appropriate word: this is not a morbid or even solemn festival. Tradition calls for the construction of an ofrenda (offering), a sort of altar. According to Remezcla at http://remezcla.com/features/culture/how-to-build-your-own-altar-ofrenda/, while the ofrenda may contain all kinds of things—a photograph and some object of significance to the person (like a baseball for a baseball player or a toy for a child), it should also contain things that “represent the four elements: fire (candles), wind (papel picado), earth (food), and water.” Sugar skulls, marigolds and incense are also traditional.
My housemate and I set up an ofrenda on the sideboard every year. We drape it with lace panels, hang a string of papel picado and often little LED lights, and put out photographs of deceased family members, interspersed with little pumpkins, autumn flowers, candy or other treats they liked, water, and battery-operated candles. We also include symbols of heroes: a model space shuttle, a miniature fireman’s helmet and a police car for first responders, pictures of people we admire who have died within the past year.

The traditional food is pan de muerto, bread of the dead. It’s a slightly sweet Mexican bread, made in a round loaf, with dough formed into “bones” crossed on top. The supermarket where we buy a loaf or two every year sells them in a couple of different sizes, “medium bread of death” and “large bread of death”, and they’re covered in very vividly colored sugar. Last year we got the deep purple ones, rather than the Dayglo pink or yellow-orange.    
Dia de los Muertos is actually celebrated over several days, from October 31 to November 2. Here in Albuquerque, the Open Space Visitor Center puts up an ofrenda honoring deceased “Heroes of the Environment”, the South Valley neighborhood holds a Dia de los Muertos Celebration and Marigold Parade, and the National Hispanic Cultural Center is holding an exhibition, community offrenda and screening of the Disney/Pixar movie, Coco. And those are just a few of the activities.

Travel in New Mexico

For my holiday mailing several years ago, I intended to do lyrics based on the Bonny Banks of Loch Lomond (Ye’ll tak’ the high road and I’ll tak’ the low road/And I’ll be in Taos afore ye …, which would actually have some relevance, because there is a High Road to Taos, and I’ve been lost on it. On the low road, too.    
For Thanksgiving that year, a friend and I were driving up to her stepson and stepdaughter-in-law’s new home in Truchas, New Mexico. Truchas is an old town in the mountains about half-way between Santa Fé and Taos, so it’s about 90 miles from Albuquerque. We hadn’t been off the beaten track much in north central New Mexico, and one tends to forget that not everything is right off the freeway, as it would be in the I-5 corridor. 
Our host had emailed directions, which seemed straightforward. Take exit such-and-such, and when you pass Chimayó, turn onto Highway and-so-forth. Except he omitted to mention that you have to take the turn-off TO Chimayó and pass the actual town, rather than passing the turn-off, though he did remember to warn us of the possible presence of loose dogs and horses in Truchas. So we drove on through some beautiful scenery and the road became less and less a main road.
Eventually we came to a town called Cundiyo, the pavement ended and the road became more of a lane. Old adobe houses sat at odd angles to it: here the side of a house, there the corner. Not a person was stirring. It was like the first five minutes of a horror film, right before the zombies show up. 
We drove on, and pavement resumed. We drove through a town with no name a few miles on. No open business in sight, no human presence detectable. By then I was expecting to see plague victims stretched lifeless by the side of the road. Or black helicopters. Having moved to New Mexico from the I-5 corridor, I’m not used to seeing towns with no sign of life either human or mercantile.
Finally we came to a crossroad with the state route number we were looking for. After that, it was easy to find Truchas, although we overshot the turn-off to our friends’ house and made an unintended detour that took us onto a narrow, muddy road (it had begun to rain and then snow). We seemed to be heading into more mountains. Fortunately, while we were turning around (the truck has 4-wheel drive, which my friend actually got to use), an old pickup truck coming from the other direction stopped to see if we needed help. The driver and passenger were able to tell us where we’d gone wrong, and we made it to our destination.
Perhaps I should also mention one oddity about New Mexico. The highway or road name on the sign is not necessarily the same that’s shown on your map, or on the online directions. Sometimes the signage will give both. Sometimes not. That’s why we missed the correct turn. Intuition is important when driving in this state, and mine was not working that day.

The Magic of New Mexico, Part I

Over the 4th of July weekend in 2009 I took a University of New Mexico Continuing Education excursion to the Mescalero Apache ceremonial near Ruidoso for the girls’ puberty ceremony. The whole thing takes 12 days to perform and years for the girls’ families to prepare for, but four days of it were scheduled to coincide with the annual ceremonial at which the Mountain Gods dance.
            There was a midway, of course, with “fair”-type food to buy and souvenirs, umbrellas (for the sun), jewelry and art, and an open space where traditional dances and songs were performed all day, with bleachers and room to set up folding camp chairs around the edge.  Apaches and Native Americans had come from all over. People camped in tents set up outside the meeting grounds. The families of the girls going through the ritual prepared mammoth amounts of food to feed anyone who showed up at meal time. Fry bread, always. Other stuff, sometimes traditional, sometimes not. What appeared to be green beans cooked in some kind of broth, salad, meat cooked in sauce (which was excellent).
            When we arrived on the 4th, there didn’t seem to be a lot of people in attendance, though more drifted in throughout the afternoon. Since it’s up in the mountains, it wasn’t as blazingly hot as it might have been, and even so, when the wind died down, it must have been nearly 90o. Evening came on and they built the bonfire around which the four Mountain Gods would dance. Night fell, and the Gods began to dance: several different sets of Mountain Gods, doing a succession of dances which relate an important Apache myth. There are four sets of Gods because there are sixteen dances, and each group does four, so the groups have time to recuperate before they’re on again. The dancing continues until 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning. 
           The moon, almost full, came up, and on the other side of the mountain range, which seemed to rise right on the other side of the highway, flashes of light began. We initially thought it was fireworks. Instead it was lightning beyond the range, far enough away that we didn’t hear thunder.  While the Mountain Gods danced, the four girls were in a teepee at the edge of the dancing ground, its opening facing east. The girls were carrying on their own ceremonies, dancing and singing under the supervision of medicine men.  When we left at about 10:00 p.m., I think we were all surprised to find that suddenly there were two or three times as many spectators as there had been earlier. They must have drifted in like fog, to fill the bleachers and set up their own chairs around the field.
            The moon, lightning, fire and social dancing (with a great ring of spectators dancing around the edge, circling the Mountain Gods) will stick in my mind for a long time. But the best memory is of a young Apache woman in fatigues, first watching in a dignified manner, then dancing in place while chatting with a friend, and finally, as darkness came down, joining the dance line when someone lent her a dance shawl.  The Apaches have a high regard for their warriors; at the entrance to the grounds, military flags flew with the U.S. flag. In the Apaches’ casino, Inn of the Mountain Gods, a few miles away, a plaque (a big one) lists all the Apache veterans who have died while serving, from U.S. Cavalry Indian scouts to losses in Iraq.
            When we got out to the highway about half a mile from the ceremonial grounds, we found it had poured.  But not on the ceremonial. Not a drop.

Some days I think I'd rather trim a quill pen

Anyone who knows me knows I am not a computer geek. However, I am generally on civil terms with my computer. It lets me type fiction and the occasional letter, email, blog post or book review, and enables me to buy stuff: old spinning wheel parts, books, medieval-style buttons, clothing, imitation musk flavoring for 16th century biscotti.
My printer and I do not have a cordial relationship. I’m on my third in ten years. Admittedly, the first was bought, along with the computer, when I moved to Albuquerque. My Seattle computer was pretty old, as was the printer, and it didn’t make sense to bring it with me. The Pod I rented was full. I had no room in the car (the PT Cruiser was filled with clothing, things I’d been using until I actually walked out the door, and a 40 inch by 19 inch stained glass panel, among other things).
The second was purchased when the first died after about four years—needless to say, right before I needed to print some handouts with color pictures of 16th century clothing. I will say for it that it had printed one book-length manuscript, and very nicely, too.
I liked that second printer. Granted, it was big and heavy, but it printed well, and it was multi-function. It produced a couple of book-length manuscripts. It also scanned, faxed and printed photographs, and it offered to give me a massage and a permanent wave, but I declined. Which may be why several months ago it began to spray ink in a random manner. I messed around with it, following directions I found online and on YouTube, and it sort of stopped. That is, it would fling ink around only intermittently.
Then it stopped printing black ink.  No, it wasn’t because that cartridge was empty; this printer would refuse to print at all, in any color, if one cartridge was empty. But that was all right. Some people may have wondered why I was printing letters and address labels in red or green. That’s why. 
Finally, one day as the paper began to feed I heard what sounded like SNAP! CRACKLE! POP! And it stopped feeding. Clearing the jam did no good. Neither did turning it off. Restarting the computer—because sometimes that seems to have magical properties—did not make it stop claiming to be jammed. As I had researched fixing the ink problem online, I already knew that sending it for repair would cost more than a new printer.
Enter Printer #3.  It was inexpensive, got as good reviews as any other printer sold on Amazon, and was favorably rated on a site that rates printers.
I liked it … for the first couple of months. Specifically, until the first time it jammed. The manual was no help, as the illustrations were so lacking in detail it was impossible to figure out what you were supposed to do. YouTube showed the jam-clearing procedure clearly but only for a jam where the sheet was easily accessible, either from the top or from the bottom, with the paper tray removed. My sheet had vanished into the printer’s bowels and was not visible anywhere. Forty minutes later, it was unjammed. Something I did caused the paper to move enough that I was finally able to get hold of it.
Since then, I’ve also cleared a paper jam by pulling a sheet out from the bottom. What the instructions don’t tell you is that you will probably not be able to do it without tilting the printer’s front end up, holding it up with your head, and pulling the paper out with both hands. Good thing it’s lightweight.
I’m not optimistic about this printer’s life expectancy.  Thank goodness manuscripts are now submitted by email.

My English Love Affair

No, sorry, not an actual love affair in England or with an Englishman, but as I write historical romances set in England (with forays into Scotland), you have to expect a romance-style title.
I visited England in the 1970s—twice. Everything I knew about England came from reading English novels—and 99% of it was true. The only thing that had changed was that it was no longer possible to stash one’s baggage in the Left Luggage office at the train station. Because of bombs, you know.
The taxis were still the old, black ones you see in movies from the 1940s.
London’s tube stations had wonderful posters on the walls, and one of the tube stations we used had escalators with sides and treads of varnished wood—and they were fast! Like something out of a Harry Potter book. The last one was replaced several years ago.
Fish and chips were not generic: they came in different varieties: plaice and chips, sole and chips, haddock and chips, etc., and all of them delicious.
Using an English pay phone required manual dexterity and split-second timing.
The medieval kitchen at Arundel Castle gave me  new insight into what it meant to prepare a medieval meal.
In the British Museum cafeteria, the tea was hot and strong and the cups were lined up, all of them with milk in them, before the tea was poured. 
Ladies like Miss Marple actually existed (presumably minus the crime-solving) aboard the Flying Scotsman, where we shared a compartment (just like in the old movies) with three white-haired Scots ladies in tweed suits who were going home after a shopping trip. They were amused to see us gaping at the old towers that seem to be sprinkled all over the Borders.
The cheese sandwiches on Brit Rail were identical to American cheese sandwiches, but it was possible to buy shortbread, which made up for it.   
And I loved every minute of all of it … well, no, not the severe head cold I suffered toward the end of the trip. Though it did reveal that if you asked for cough syrup at the apothecary, what you got was a brown liquid that tasted like mare sweat. I couldn’t drink it but it worked anyway. It scared my body into cutting back on both coughing and phlegm, lest I attempt another dose.
I’m sure much has changed, some of it for the better (the phones, maybe?).  But I’m glad I experienced England while it still resembled the England of Dorothy Sayers, Marjory Allingham, Agatha Christie, John Dickson Carr, Manning Coles and others; it gave me an even greater appreciation of the English mystery novel.

N.N. Light's Book Heaven

Lots of fun for readers:
Summertime is here and before you head out to the pool or beach to catch some sunshine, check out this a-m-a-z-i-n-g giveaway hosted by N. N. Light’s Book Heaven. Win bestselling and award-winning books not to mention a tote bag filled with goodies, perfect for heading out to the beach. Enter to win below and good luck!  Beach Blanket Book Giveaway: http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/92db775014/? Literary Giveaway Portal:  https://www.nnlightsbookheaven.com/literary-giveaway-portal

Most Secret: a romance of the Jacobite Rebellion

Most Secret
My second historical romance, Most Secret, will be released on May 28, 2018. It’s set in late summer of 1745, when the Young Pretender is gathering his army in Scotland. 
I’ve visited Scotland. I liked it and the people, though I am dubious about haggis. I visited Culloden. I sympathize with the Jacobites for a whole menu of reasons. The choice of George I, approximately number 50 in line for the British throne on Queen Anne’s death, was not popular even with all the English. There are many novels out there told from the Jacobite point of view, with Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series (which I love) at the head of the list. I thought it was time someone reported from the other side. But Most Secret is not a serious study of England’s preparation for the Scottish invasion. In fact, it’s more humorous than not.
Excerpt below:
“Forgive me for accosting you in the street, but there were reasons I could not call upon you at your home. Quite apart from the impropriety of a strange man visiting an unmarried lady,” he added.“Are you a strange man?” The question popped out before she could stop it; something about him made her want to smile.“So I’m told. May I carry your basket so I appear to have a legitimate reason to walk with you?”“You can’t simply go up to a respectable female and…and…” Words failed her.“Yes, I can. Besides, we were introduced by Lady Montfort.”“Were we? I don’t recall it.” She would have. This outrageous creature was quite unlike the punctilious men she was accustomed to meet.He smiled. “Alex Gordon, at your service. I am not surprised you have forgotten my presence as well as my name, considering the crush of guests at that affair—and so ill-assorted, too—”“Were you one of them?” She failed to suppress a smile, for the Montforts’ invitations tended to be rather indiscriminate, and Lady Montfort did have some very odd relatives.
Most Secret  is available from Amazon:   https://www.amazon.com/Most-Secret-Kathleen-Buckley-ebook/dp/B07CKTJ5T4/ref=sr_1_11?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1527168217&sr=1-11&keywords=Most+Secret


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HELP ME CELEBRATE!

My first historical romance novel, An Unsuitable Duchess, has been nominated for InD’tale Magazine’s  2018 RONE Award in the 17thcentury to Regency historical category. Voting takes place May 14 to 20, 2018; you must be registered on www.indtale.com in order to vote. Once you register, you must click the verification link sent to you via email. 
Help me celebrate! Enter for a chance to win a copy of An Unsuitable Duchess on Amazon (https://giveaway.amazon.com/p/df54b8969abf28c5for the Kindle version). There will be a chance to win a copy of the paperback version which I’ll post as soon as that contest goes live.

PUTTING AUTHENTIC DETAIL IN HISTORICAL NOVELS

A writer friend uses the term “barnyard” to describe what W.S. Gilbert (of Gilbert and Sullivan) called “… corroborative detail, intended to give artistic verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative.” Don’t give your reader a passive, one dimensional picture of animals standing in the barnyard. Give them a sense of the smell, the flies buzzing around, the cows chewing their cud, the chickens scratching the dirt and pecking at bugs. It’s easy to do, if you’ve spent any time around barns, cows, and chickens, isn’t it?
What if you have no experience of living on a farm but still need to describe one?
Over the years, I’ve read a lot of historical novels and romance novels set in other periods. Since beginning to write historical romance myself, I’ve become an enthusiast (in the 18th century sense) about doing research. It’s not enough to know that ladies wore long dresses.  You can give the generic Regency novel description of the heroine’s gown: high-waisted, short, puffed sleeves, low at the bodice, a flounce around the hem. You can skip mentioning what she wears to go walking, or what her shoes, reticule, shawl and hat look like, if you wish.  It’s a little bare-bones but you can scrape by. 
But “Sir Marmaduke strode down the street” with no description of his surroundings is disappointing. If he’s going to his club, where is it located? What does he see and smell? Horse droppings, probably, if it’s a warm day, perhaps the aroma of chocolate from a chocolate house. Does he hear street vendors crying their wares? Pass a confectionery shop? What's in the window? Hint: in the 18th century, it won't be fudge or peanut brittle. How far is it to his club? If he‘s oblivious to his surroundings because he’s on his way to challenge Sir Ecklemore, the reader should still be aware of what Sir Marmaduke doesn’t notice.
Can you simply make stuff up? Many years ago, at Bouchercon, the big mystery convention, a woman asked why she couldn’t “make up” a gun for her character. Well, heck, no! Would you “make up” a car? The real thing is available and more convincing than that loosely-described thing you invented to save effort.  So why do it, when you can get it right with even minimal research?

Now, thanks to the Internet and Google, it’s easy to do enough research to get the authentic touches that provide gritty realism. No, you probably won’t be able to pinpoint a confectioner or wig shop on High Holborn in 1745, but you will know what one looked like, both inside and out, and what they sold. The hard part of research now is not getting access to material. It’s realizing that you don’t know how an 18th century city lighted its streets (if it did!) or how people ate before everything became available all year, thanks to modern transportation.  
My published novel, An Unsuitable Duchess, and the one I recently completed, are set in 1740s England, so I have a trove of references specific to that era. However, there’s plenty of information available online for virtually any period in the last ten centuries or so.
What do you need to know in order to bring your setting alive and make it believable to the reader?
Clothing and hair styles: what do your characters wear? This is easy. From the Renaissance on, people who could afford portraits, had them painted. In some countries and eras, “genre paintings” (i.e., pictures of peasant weddings, market place scenes and the like) were popular.
Google Images: You will fall face-down on your keyboard before you exhaust Google Images. You’ll have to sift through things that are not relevant but it’s well worthwhile. If you Googled “American Civil War portraits” you would get many photographs as well as actual portraits, the invention of the camera having made portrait photography an option.  Search “American portraits 1860--1865” and you get fewer military photos and more painted portraits (and more women and children).
Pinterest: Good for period clothing and too many other things to list. Caveat: some pinners are careless about dating and attributing their Pins. I usually rely only on posts with a link back to a museum website, or some authoritative blog. All right, a little compulsive.  Also, bear in mind that a source from your period is preferable to someone’s possibly hypothetical or inaccurate recreated garment or coiffure.
Location: What kind of house do your characters live in? What is the countryside like? What do they see in the streets? How far is Pall Mall from St. Paul’s?

London & Environs Maps and Views: http://mapco.net/london.htm
More old maps of London: https://londonist.com/london/oldmaps
National Library of Scotland (includes some of Great Britain): http://maps.nls.uk/geo/find/#  A little hard to navigate but a useful source.
The London Guide (ca. 1782)  Addresses of major buildings and government offices ("Guy's Hospital, Southwark"), descriptions of major buildings and sights, coach fares and watermen's rates (which were set by law). Available as a print-on-demand book.

Remarks on London: Being an Exact Survey of the Cities of London and Westminster ... by William Stow (1722) Some of the same information as The London Guide but includes a street directory ("New Leg Court, in Peter Street, W[estminster]"), list of post offices, churches and times of services, market towns and fairs, and the days stage coaches and carriers to various towns leave from which inns. Available as a print-on-demand book.
A Trip from St. James’s to the Royal Exchange (1744) Satirical essays. Available as a print-on-demand book.
Google Earth can also be useful.
Again, Google Images: Period landscape paintings, etchings, drawings and photographs of buildings, many of them done in your story’s time period (depending on when it is, of course). Toward the end of the 19th century, London urban renewed out of existence a number of buildings dating to the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries (the houses on Wych Street and several coaching inns, among other structures). Thanks to the relatively new art of photography, we have a record of them.    
Word usage:
Online Etymology Dictionary:  http://www.etymonline.com/ Look up a word or phrase to find its earliest occurrence. The first use of “sexy” occurred in 1905, but it was not used to mean “sexually attractive” until 1923. And “arsonist” was not a word until 1864, although “arson” dates to the 1670’s.   
N. Bailey’s Universal Etymological Dictionary (1721). Some words have changed their meanings in the last 300 years. Available as a print-on-demand book.
Miscellaneous useful material: How do they travel? What do they eat? How do they address characters with titles? What do they read? What plays do they see? What’s happening in their world (apart from their all-consuming romance)?  Correct forms of address (English; everything you need to know about how to address a nobleman/noblewoman and their various offpring): http://www.hmsrichmond.org/avast/titles12.html
Internet Library of Early Journals, a digital library of 18th and 19th century journals contains several British publications, such as The Gentleman’s Magazine: http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/ilej/
There are other sources for newspapers and magazines but they tend to be hit-or-miss. Search on Google for publications for the location and century you want.
Google Books: Many books that would be impossible to find in print are available for free on Google Books. Search Google for the topic you want—“1745 rebellion” for example. If you want to see what your characters should be eating, Google Books includes a variety of early printed cookbooks. Don’t overlook the popular fiction of your period.
Reenactment/living history groups: These can be a useful resource.  So can various other groups, like the ones which enjoy black powder shooting (i.e., flintlock pistols and muskets). It would be embarrassing to have your hero fire a flintlock repeatedly without having to reload after each shot.
Wikipedia: Wikipedia excels as a resource for sources. Use the list of references at the end of each article. Most of the articles are probably right about basic facts (“In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue …”) but it’s best to go to the source material.
There are some things you won’t be able to find out, or not without investing a great deal of time. I never learned what the inside of a small 18th century schooner looked like. I found out that a small one would have two masts and how it would be rigged, that it would have a crew of five or six, and what they ate, but only a couple of rough plans of the below-deck area—and one of those plans was obviously mis-labelled. So I studied pictures of the living quarters of other kinds of 18th and 19th century sailing ships, and pieced together a description from those.

Finally, for enjoyable and informative reading, I recommend Medieval Underpants and Other Blunders: A Writer’s (and Editor’s) Guide to Keeping Historical Fiction Free of Anachronisms, Errors and Myths, by Susanne Alleyn. The cringe-worthy examples she cites (cigars in medieval England? Really?) serve as a reminder about the importance of checking our facts.  

Giveaway sweepstakes for my novel, An Unsuitable Duchess

For a chance at winning a free e-book of my novel, An Unsuitable Duchess, visit the Amazon giveaway site: https://giveaway.amazon.com/p/cdc558e89e780194

Best summed up as:

London, 1740. A scientifically-minded young lady. Elegant drawing rooms. Dens of vice. A cynical duke. What could possibly go wrong?