Marian Allen's Blog, page 371

Jezebel and Kizzy, My Two New BFFs

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Jezebel and Kizzy are bloggers. That’s like saying Bill Robinson and Shirley Temple liked to flap their feet.

Each of them made me laugh so hard this week I nearly hurt myself. Now I’d like to pass the pain along to you.

In this post, Jezebel and her posse decide to recreate recipes from the ’50s. In case you weren’t around then, allow me to tell you that the recipes tended to feature jello, tuna, mayonnaise, and olives — SOMETIMES IN THE SAME DISH. And so Jezebel gives us THE TASTE TEST FROM HELL.

Kizzy, meanwhile, outrages my sensibilities with a (surely) fictional exchange between an obvious user and a co-worker who is clearly fed up with it. Ladies and gentlemen, LOST CAT.

Meanwhile, I’m preparing to hit Nashville, Indiana, for Books N Brew. I’ll be selling (I hope) the SAGE trilogy and SIDESHOW IN THE CENTER RING. If you can’t make the event, you can click on this link and go to a page of all my books with links to buy and to read sample chapters.

You’re welcome!

 

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The Geese of Spring

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The geese were having a right old rave-up the other day. Beautiful!

http://www.marianallen.com/pics//Geese.mp4I’m ready for spring, aren’t you?

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: What’s your favorite sign of spring? What’s your main character’s favorite sign?

MA

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Noodles. What’s Better Than Noodles? Noodles AND EGGS!

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I’m crazy about noodles. All kinds. I like ‘em homemade and I like ‘em Ramen. As long as they’re noodley, I love ‘em.

I never had Ramen in college. Never heard of it back then. But I’ve made up for it since.

Luckily, Charlie is also crazy about noodles. He’s the one who introduced me to Ramen. In fact, the first time I went to a writing seminar after we were married, I called home and one of the kids said, “I wish you would come home,” and I was all, “Awwww, you miss me,” and she was all, “No, Dad got a deal on Ramen and that’s all we’ve had to eat since you left.”

Another lucky thing is that Charlie likes broth and I like substance, so I get most of the noodles and he gets most of the broth.

We’re different in that I like my noodles long and he likes his short. So, when he makes noodles, he breaks them up. I don’t. He’s like, “Why don’t you break them up?” and I’m like, “Because it’s easy to cut yours up after they’re cooked, but it would take a real long time to tie mine together if I broke ‘em up first.”

My Delicious Noodles

So I made some the other day (long) and took a notion for an egg. So I poached an egg while the Ramen was cooking. Then I pulled out the noodles and put them in a super little bowl and put the poached egg on top. Salt, pepper, and butter. OH, that was good!

The only thing I did wrong was eat it with a fork instead of with chopsticks. But I was SO HUNGRY and it smelled SO GOOD, it’s a wonder I didn’t dig into it with my bare hands.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: Two people like the same thing in different ways. How do they deal with it?

MA

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Beer. Did I Say Beer? I Meant BEEEEEEEEEEEER!!!

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As I told ‘em at church the other day, the only thing I like better than a beer is a shot and a beer.

Last Friday, I met Jane and we had lunch at The Irish Rover with, of course, beer. Here we are. And here is my beer.

On the way out, I snapped a picture of the sign. A couple of folks were standing around, and I said, “I’m taking this picture so I’ll remember what I drank.” The lady said, “Which one did you have?” I said, “All of ‘em.”

That was a lie. Can you guess which one I had? If you can guess which one I had, I’ll put your name into a drawing to win a copy of MARDI GRAS MURDER, with my story, “Mr. Sugar vs. the Cake Thief” in it.

And MORE Beer!

So you can imagine my delight in being part of BOOKS N BREW, the first (I hope annual) author’s fair to be held at Big Woods Brewery in Nashville, Indiana! If I can’t sell books to a bunch of soaks, I’m hanging it up.

If you’re in the area, c’mon in. I’ll be drinking signing books.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: What kind of beer does your main character like best? Dark? Light and sharp? Other people’s?

MA

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Word Choice and Use Mean Heavy Thinkin’

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Word Choice and Use

Poet, editor, essayist John Ciardi lists ways a word means:

A word is a feeling. – We choose words for the feeling they convey. You choose the word you hope will trigger the response you want.A word involves the muscles – How does the word feel in your mouth and on your face when you say it? There will be an echo of that feel in the reader’s mind. “Splat” and “Thud”, “Dear” and “Love” not only sound different, they feel different.A word is a history – knowing the histories of words and phrases can help you choose the word you want. In fact, it can help you be correct. Ex: Does my hero feel pity or compassion? My thesaurus says the words mean the same, but my dictionary tells me that “pity” derives from the word “piety” and that “compassion” derives from the word “suffer.” It makes a difference. If it only makes a difference to you, it will still show up in the book’s general tone.A word is a picture – Take pity and compassion again. Now that you know their roots, they create different pictures in your mind: Someone showing sorrow for another’s pain because it’s the decent thing to do as opposed to someone showing sorrow for another’s pain because he feels their suffering.

Finally, consider Figurative Language. Whether or not you use it and how you use it, affects tone. The two forms of figurative language are:

imagined similarities: metaphors (identifies one thing with another: “He’s a dirty rat.” “He’s crabgrass on the lawn of my life.” “He’s a serpent, hissing and striking at anyone who comes near him.”) Similes (uses “like,” “as,” or “as if”: “The car looked like a pile of junk on wheels.” “The car was as battered-looking as a boxer after one too many rounds.” “The car looked as if it had escaped from the metal compressor with only seconds to spare.”) Allusions (a reference to something else: “Glendas.” “ancient yellow beasts” – Sphinx, who killed you if you failed to solve its riddle.)suggestive associations: one word is linked with another (golden/youth, happiness, wealth; or bird/freedom)

Don’t try to force figurative language. If it comes hard for you, maybe it isn’t part of your voice. Word choice and use should grow naturally out of your voice, your material and your treatment of the material. They should be appropriate to your subject and, if you have a theme, they should be appropriate to your theme.

Remember this quote from Mark Twain:

The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter–it’s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.
- Letter to George Bainton, 10/15/1888

True, that.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: Look around and pick a common object. Try different ways to describe it, giving a potential reader different feelings about it through your word choice and use.

MA

 

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Dog Star on SampleSunday

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“Dog Star” is a story I wrote for the Southern Indiana Writers’ anthology NOVEL INGREDIENTS, where every story was accompanied by a recipe. It was inspired by the very real recipezine WORLD WIDE RECIPES from Joe Barkson. In fact, the story also appeared serially in the recipezine, which made me very happy.

I subsequently included it in my collection LONNIE, ME AND THE HOUND OF HELL.

Dog Star – excerpt

by Marian Allen

I’ll begin with the dogs–in medias Rex, as it were. There were two of us–three, if you count Sparkle–four, if you count the puppy–but there were two of us on the scene.

Direct your attention, if you will, to Fiona. Cairn Terrier, twenty pounds of dark intensity, muscles and nerves of steel, wrapped in yards of gray shag. Observe her gleaming eyeteeth, her glittering eye. Do not attempt to extract that plastic action figurine from between her paws. She is not cuddling it, and she will not welcome your intervention. Fiona is my elder by three years, and I am five.

My name is Cyrano. I am, to an observable degree, Irish Setter. To her credit, Fiona, who is pedigreed and papered, purchased from a licensed breeder, has never made me feel my unmapped lineage.

The third dog in this adventure, the one we’ve never met, is a black Labrador retriever called Sparkle. Sparkle is the editor of “Sparkle’s Bark,” a newsletter to which I subscribe over the World Wide Woof. Every night, she sends out an issue filled with jokes, tips, and recipes.

Here’s my favorite of Sparkle’s recipes: Find a human who’s eating a sandwich–road workers, construction workers, or kids are best–and sit where they can see you. Don’t make a sound or a move, just watch them eat. If desired, cock your head and prick up your ears if they look at you, or you may move your eyes or your head to follow the sandwich as it moves to and from the human’s mouth. Before the sandwich is half gone, the human will either give you a piece of the sandwich or, ideally, remove one slice of bread and toss it to you.

I have personally tried this recipe many times, and I have never known it to fail.

So, when we found the Thing in the woods, it was only natural that I appealed to Sparkle for advice.

~*~

Only 99 cents, folksies!

Read about it and sample it.
Buy it from iTunes.
Buy it for the Kindle at Amazon.
Buy it for the Nook.
Buy it in other electronic formats at Smashwords.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character finds a Thing in the woods.

MA

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Caturday With Katya and a Schnauzer Named Lily

The post Katya Graymalkin here.

Mom goes out without me all the time, which is sort of okay. I don’t want to go out anywhere, but I don’t want MOM to go out anywhere, either. But, whether I like it or not, she goes out.

The other day, she took Granny to a doctor and, when she got out of the car, she saw this:

What do you think that is? If you read the title of this post, you know what it is. It’s a miniature Schnauzer. Her owner was with her, and he said her name is Lily. Mom said Lily was so sweet and friendly! Mom came home with tiny little pawprints on her pants legs, but she said she didn’t care.

Here is a picture of Lily near Mom’s feet, so you can see how tiny Lily is; I think she’s smaller than I am! Mom said Lily was lively, but she didn’t bark. Meanwhile, Lily’s brother and sister, in the truck nearby, were barking their brains out.

Mom said she would have brought Lily home, if she could have. I don’t think that would have been a good idea. I would like it that she didn’t bark, and I would like it that she was smaller than I am, but I wouldn’t like it that she’s lively and playful, or that Mom would pay attention to her when she ought to be paying all her attention to me!

I think Mom and my friend, Jane, used to have a Schnauzer. He was some kind of terrier, anyway. His name was Gus. I’ll bet Jane has lots of stories even Mom doesn’t know about Gus.

Lily’s daddy showed Mom the other dogs, who barked and jumped and scared Mom, even though they’re so little. That’s Lily in her daddy’s hand, her brother under the daddy’s other hand, and a black and tan sister back between them.

If you want to know more about Schnauzers, go to the American Kennel Club’s Miniature Schnauzer page. Their picture isn’t one quarter as cute as Lily, I have to say. If you don’t have a cat and want to rescue a miniature Schnauzer, go to this rescue page and maybe you can give one a forever home. (I hope my mom isn’t reading this!)

A WRITING PROMPT FOR ANIMALS: Your mom or dad brings home a rescued animal.

KG

The post

Great New Book By A Great New Writer

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Looking for a great new book to read? Have I got a recommendation for you!

It’s called THE LIFE AND DEATH (BUT MOSTLY THE DEATH) OF ERICA FLYNN, and it’s by Sara Marian. She happens to be my #4 Daughter, but that isn’t why I’m touting the book. I love the book, is what!

Erica Flynn never expected to die in a car crash just minutes after a fight with her husband, Dominic. But then, a modern, down-to-earth skeptic like Erica never expected to end up in an afterlife somewhere between Greek mythology and quantum theory gone haywire. Despite the allure of the Underworld and a happy reunion with her deceased Uncle Jeff, Erica can’t rest in peace until she resolves her fight with Dominic.

Just when it looks like haunting a medium might give her a chance, Hades–ruler of the capitol city of the Underworld–forbids her to make contact with the Upper World again. Against all advice (which is how Erica usually does things), she pits herself against Hades and faces the treacherous road back to the Land of the Living, determined to make things right.

Sound good? Well, you’re right — it is good!

I was there when Sara first started working on this book. I heard chunks of it as they were written. I had the pleasure of listening to her talk through story problems, and the pleasure of watching her solve the problems and tackle some pretty hairy rewrites.

Her wonderful life partner, Zakary Kendall, did the artwork for the cover, and T. Lee Harris did the cover design.

The book just went up on Kindle, and I bought a copy. The print version is available at CreateSpace, and will be in print on Amazon, you know, Real Soon Now. I’m getting it in print, too.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: What would your character move heaven and earth to come back from the dead to do?

MA

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Is It Spring Yet? Please Let It Be Spring

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I am so ready for spring. Or maybe not. In the depth of winter, I always long for spring. But, around here, spring means kabooming thunderstorms and tornado watches/warnings, which always seem to come in the middle of the night.

On the other hand, tornado watches/warnings mean storm parties, like the one depicted below. Mom and our next-door daughter and her husband and son come down to our basement, and we have snacks and play games or read books.

Spring Means Storm Parties

Storm parties started when next-door grandson was wee, and we didn’t want to scare him. So we didn’t say we were sheltering from a deadly natural disaster, we said we were having a storm party. We had special toys that only got played with during storm parties.

So I suppose, all in all, I really am ready for spring, storms and all (but please no storms please please no terrible storms please).

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: During a natural disaster or threat of one, a character takes shelter with someone else.

MA

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Quick Meal And Oh So Delicious

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Charlie and I were hungry, so I made this quick meal.

MY QUICK MEAL

I boiled some shells (pasta shells, smart alek!). While they were cooking, I heated some garlic-infused olive oil and fried some mushrooms, then tossed in some chopped fresh baby spinach. We had some salsa dip left over (salsa plus cream cheese), so I stirred that in and added the cooked, drained pasta.

MAN, it was good! And quick? It took about 20 minutes, tops. Even if we hadn’t had the leftover dip, I could have made some within the same time frame. Even if we hadn’t had the ingredients for that, I have some homemade pesto in the freezer that I could have used instead. Even if I didn’t have that, I had some canned tomatoes. I had lots of stuff I could have used instead. It’s, you know, pasta and stuff!

So the next time you’re looking for a quick meal, remember: as long as you have some pasta and some leftovers, you’re in business!

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character is in a hurry. Why?

MA

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