Marian Allen's Blog, page 396

Faces, Food, Flattery, and Me All Over

Oh, me, oh, my, what fun!

Okay, have you ever had one of those days when you just really really need a kind word? Maybe more than a kind word? Maybe an extravagantly kind word? Then, ladies and gentlemen, I invite you to visit Emergency Compliment. If that doesn’t make you feel better, click the “I still feel crappy” link to get another hit. You can even submit your own, to spread the joy.

Now, did you ever watch one of those cop shows where the victim sits down with a police sketch artist or computer artist and produces a recognizable sketch of the perp? And did you ever wonder how well you’d do in a similar situation? Head over to Flash Face and find out. If you’re a writer, you can even use it to make sketches of your characters.

Do you love cooking, eating, reading about food, and making fun of people who are so busy being snobby about food, they don’t know what it actually tastes like? Then Ida Floreak’s Floreakeats is the blog for you. It’s funny and lovely and does not include tweezers to place every sprout just so on the plate.

Several people have been kind enough to do interviews of me lately, and I don’t think I linked to all of them in blog posts, although they’re all on my Reviews and Interviews page. Here are the five most recent, anyway:

By Adrianna Joleigh at Author A. Joleigh

By Etta Jean at Etta Jean Fantasy

By Rachel Desilits at Examiner.com

By Cairn Rodrigues at Askew Questions

By Erin Eymard at Bookworm’s Fancy

Thanks, folks! I do so love it when people let me talk.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character tries to make an identity sketch of a chef he or she saw at a public event so he or she can find the chef to compliment the food at the event.

MA

A Dishy Little Project

I have not given up on knitting, I’ve just had other things to post about. I’ve done a couple of collars and now I’m starting on a new project.

Dishcloths. Did you know you can knit or crochet dishcloths? Well, you can. A friend gave me a dishcloth she knitted, and it works really really well. Now, you may think, “What’s to work? It ain’t some kinda complex engine; it’s a cloth. For, you know, washing dishes.”

That shows what you know. The knit ones are sturdy, scrubby, and all kinds of nice.

My mother knits them with fancy yarn-overs and on the diagonal, but you know me: easy peasy and never mind the pattern. So I just got a skein of worsted-weight cotton and went at it. I cast on about 40 stitches and knitted until I felt like I’d knitted enough and cast off. Looks kind of like a map, doesn’t it?

Some time I might get ambitious and try knitting on the diagonal.

Or maybe not.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character decides to make something by hand that is cheap enough to buy ready-made. Why? What’s the result?

MA

#6WSC Super or Superfluous?

It isn’t necessary. It serves no purpose. Or it does serve a purpose, but the purpose could have been served more simply.

And how simply is “simply”? Do windows really need elaborate facings? Do they need facings at all? Do they need curtains? Do they need glass? Do we need windows?

Ornamentation. Does making something fancier than it needs to be a good thing or a bad thing? An act of generosity or of vanity? Or does “ornamental” make you think of flowers, shrubs, trees?

Write a 6-word story on your own blog (or, if you don’t have your own blog, in the comments here). Use a picture to help illustrate or illuminate your story. Post a link to your story in the comments, so we can come visit and read and discover one another.

Later in the day, or maybe tomorrow, I’ll update this post with my own story (assuming I can come up with one!).

The next challenge will be one week from today, June 26, on the blog of the lovely and talented Marion Driessen, and the next will be here two weeks from today, on July 3.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: Write that 6 Word Story!

MA

Leftunders

What the heck are leftunders? Well, you know that food that you cook but don’t eat all up are called leftovers. So what do you call food that you start to cook but have to put away before the cooking is done?

Leftunders.

The night before last, I was happily cooking supper when a thunderstorm blew up. That’s okay: I’m not afeared of thunderstorms, as long as I’m not out in them and they’re not too close and not too noisy.

Then the power went out.

It was only out for an hour, but that was long enough for us to get hungry and eat cold sammiches.

So I put the leftunders away.

Last night, I got them out again and finished them up.

I couldn’t decide if I wanted to roast the half-boiled potatoes and make nice crispy-on-the-outside, creamy-on-the-inside English roast potatoes, or if I wanted to finish cooking them, drain them, add crazy amounts of vegan margarine and shake the stuffing out of them. So I did some of each.

I fried onion, mushrooms, and slivered almonds in some olive oil, added some (canned) green beans and Mrs. Dash onion and herb seasoning.

A couple of cherry tomatoes made a surprise special guest cameo appearance.

And that, children, is what vegetarians eat when they’re being vegetarians.

I’m posting today at Fatal Foodies on the subject to non-soggy tomato pie.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A power outage causes an inconvenience.

MA

Pushing And Shoving

Jane

I keep trying to get my pal Jane Peyton to come on here and push her book, but she hasn’t done it yet, so I’ll just go ahead and do it my own self. Ha!

The book is WHEN PUSH COMES TO SHOVE, book 1 of a projected series called Callie London’s Vampire Adventures. It takes place all over Louisville, my home town, which added a layer of enjoyment to the humor and action. This is the kind of book I love to read with a map in hand (except that, in this case, I already have one in my head), so I can soak up the local color (not to mention the local liquor) along with the characters.

Here’s the blurb:

In Vampire parlance, Pushing is what Folk do when they need to get a drink and don’t want to leave behind any incriminating evidence. They just make their new friend forget they were ever there. What? ME a vampire? No way!

But what if every human one runs across seems to have been Pushed in some way? And not a soul of them is up to any good? Which of the Folk is responsible, and what can this possibly be leading to?

Callie London is certain there’s Something Bad Going On! If only she can figure it out fast enough to keep herself and her vampire girlfriends from getting themselves killed. Callie never dreams she is about to become privy to an ancient Vampire Secret. Shhh! No one can ever know! Soon she and her friends are fang deep in bewildering vampire politics.

It’s the Kentucky Derby, and everyone knows that in Louisville, Kentucky, anything can happen at Derby time. Even though it’s spring, events begin to snowball. Callie’s adventures start with fireworks and tumble into exciting horse races at Churchill Downs, several assassination attempts, and a hair-raising cruise aboard the Belle of Louisville steamboat.

And When Push Comes to Shove, where will it all end? Take the adventure with Callie and find out!

~ * ~

Buy it! $3.99!

What do the reviews say? “Lovely stuff: funny, chilling, adventurous, complex, and thoroughly satisfying.” (I said that.)

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: Make a list of iconic places or landmarks where you live and think of adventures that would be appropriate there. Or inappropriate, if that’s the kind of thing you like.

MA

 

#SampleSunday Knockabout

Katya wants me to post an excerpt from SIDESHOW IN THE CENTER RING. There aren’t any cats in it, but the natives of the planet Marner are somewhat catlike in that they’re covered in fur and have slight muzzles.

So here is a fight scene for Katya.

SIDESHOW IN THE CENTER RING – excerptKnockabout

by Marian Allen

I heard Budhi shout, “Claim!” Then his hand clamped on my wrist.

I tried to shake him off, then to twist out of his grasp.

“What are you doing?”

“I claim you, in the name of the Empress. You don’t have any papers, do you? And you walked in here of your own free will, didn’t you?”

“I’ve got my passport, and I’m walking out.”

“No.”

The broker threw an arm around my neck. I stomped at his instep, but he spread his legs and tightened his choke hold. I pulled at the hair on his arm, taking out fistfuls of it. My luck, he was shedding.

“Stop it!” he said.

I punched backwards over my shoulder with my free fist, and felt it connect smack on the beezer. He sneezed blood all over the back of my head, but he didn’t let go.

I reached up and grabbed his arm, then dropped–dead weight, and quite a bit of it, on that one point. Budhi flipped over, as nice as you please. It had been years since I’d done any street fighting; it was gratifying to know I hadn’t lost the touch.

Budhi was fast, though. He tucked and rolled when he fell and, before I could get to my knees, he was up. He knocked me flat again, and knelt on the small of my back.

As I kicked and twisted and tried to heave myself up or push myself forward, he wrapped something around my wrists, and pulled it tight.

He slapped my head, and I felt a line of needles rake my scalp. He held his hand down near my eyes, so I could see my blood and hair on his claws. “See what you made me do?” he said. “Now, are you going to be still, or do you want me to get rough?”

I whimpered and moaned, “Oh, don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me!”

He pulled in his claws and got up. When both his hands were occupied with his chestpack, I groaned and turned on my side, facing him.

I drew up my legs, as if my stomach hurt (which it did, come to that), and kicked. I caught him in the right knee.

He fell back on his bottom with a yowl of pain.

I scrabbled to my feet and ran.

My hands were tied, and the door to the street was closed and blocked; blocked by the gray man with the black stripes and the knife.

Budhi howled something I didn’t understand. I turned my head enough to keep both of the men in view. Budhi sat where I had left him, both hands on his hurt knee, blood seeping from his nose and flecking the hair of his face and chest. Beyond him, people clustered at the windows and crowded out of the doorway, not involved, but curious.

“I’m leaving,” I said. “Stand aside.”

The man blocking my way drew back his lips in a smile, showing canines as sharp as broken glass. “I’ve been trying to catch up to you,” he said casually, as if I weren’t fighting for my life.

Budhi got to his feet. “Is this who you meant? Following us? Why didn’t you say it was a Shar?”

“Do you have any claim on this woman?” the gray man asked.

“She came in here with me of her own free will. She doesn’t have any papers. I claim her, yes.”

“And how do you know she doesn’t have any papers? Did she tell you so?”

“Another one of the Terran tourists told me. He gave me her picture and paid me to enslave her.”

“A what?” I said. “Do what? Whoa! Wait a minute!”

“Let him speak,” said the “Shar.” He turned me around and guided me closer to Budhi. Wounded, bound, trapped, and needing to know more, I went.

The people from the Exchange seemed satisfied that all was proceeding properly, and milled back through the door and away from the windows. Good of them to be concerned.

Budhi said, “I was supposed to bring her and her papers back to him at the Hilton.”

“Who?” I asked. “Who told you to do this? Who paid you?” But, of course, I knew.

“Mem Moran. The same Terran who bought Tiph.”

Now there was a happy thought: Slave of the Sleaze God. Not that Darryl would have had any pleasure out of me; it would have been something like the little Spartan boy who hid a fox inside his tunic and then found out why his best friends would have advised against it.

~ * ~

You can find more about SIDESHOW IN THE CENTER RING by clicking this link, including buy links and the entire first chapter.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: Someone tries to force a character to do something he or she doesn’t want to do. REALLY doesn’t want to do.

MA

#Caturday Cat Cures Car

Mom was mad yesterday because she didn’t have her car. I like it when the car’s in the shop. If Mom has a car, she just goes away in it. Or, worse than that, takes me to the vet in it! But she was worried, so I did some cat magic and fixed it. Mom thinks Mr. Merritt fixed it, but it was really me. You believe that, don’t you?

It didn’t make much difference, Mom not having a car, anyway. Charlie took her places she needed to go, and sometimes friends. Mom has too many friends.

One of the places one of her friends took her was to the funeral home to see her friend who died. Actually, she went to see another friend, who is the sister of the one who died (Shirley). She said there were lots of people there, and lots of pictures of Shirley when she was younger. They made Mom remember her friend during all the time she knew her, even things she had forgotten. For some reason, that made Mom feel better. People are odd, aren’t they?

Mom is also feeling happy because she got a thing she calls a “residual” from a story she sold to Marion Zimmer Bradley’s SWORD & SORCERESS XXII. It looked like a little piece of paper to me, but Mom seemed very pleased. I didn’t like that story; it doesn’t have any cats in it.

Mom’s going to read this post when she gets up and say, “Oh, Katya, you did not fix my car! I know you would, if you could, but you don’t have magic powers! It was the ABS, whatever that is, and Mr. Merritt fixed it and reset the computer so the lights calmed down.”

Well, Mom, if I don’t have magic powers, how do I disappear so you can’t find me anywhere, and then walk right out of the place you just searched? If I don’t have magic powers, how can I go through you when you’re trying to keep me out (or in)? How do I always know when you need extra snuggles and extra-loud purrs? And those are only some of my special abilities!

Mom says grandma told her that grandma had a visitor the other evening: A RACCOON! It was on her storm door grill, looking in and acting not afraid of her and her two cats, and trying to find a way INSIDE! Mom thinks it might have been somebody’s pet, turned out to fend for itself in the wild. Mom says people do that to their animals sometimes. I think she’s just trying to scare me. Nobody would be that mean! Would they?

A WRITING PROMPT FOR COMPANION ANIMALS: (Not just cats, because some of my readers are dogs and rats and birds.) A companion animal does something special and magical for a human animal.

KG

The Car Is Dead, Jim

Of course, I’m a writer, dammit, not a mechanic. And the car is only mostly dead.

See, the Buick was getting old, so Charlie and I bought it from Mom, and Mom bought a new used car, which we don’t want to talk about in case we take it to court. The case, not the car.

So I’ve been driving the Buick. And the brake lights started shining, which is never a good thing. So I took it in to my local guy. Local guy checked the brakes, fixed what needed fixing, and told me not to worry about the lights. These are the yellow lights that say Anti-Lock and Trac Off.

And I drove and I drove and I drove and I drove, and more lights came on: Service Engine Soon and BRAKE. So we took it in to Charlie’s not-so-local guy. He replaced the front brakes and shocks springs and fixed the lights.

And the lights came back on. Not, fortunately, the horrible and terrifying RED BRAKE LIGHT, but the moderately disquieting yellow ones.

So I took it back. And he fixed the lights and the tie rod end, which was worn to a frazzle.

And the lights are back on. Still not BRAKE, but Low Tire and, in red, Security. Now, as any Star Trek fan will tell you, Red + Security = Trouble. So we took the car back in. And our guy has had it all day and hasn’t called us, and I have a low and sorrowful feeling that the Buick has hopped the twig.

Neither Charlie nor I relish the thought of looking for another car. But I sure ain’t pushing the damn thing everywhere.

Anybody got a Healing Potion for a Buick?

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character faces the end of his or her means of transportation.

MA

The Why of the Sad

I wrote a sad 6-word story yesterday. I’m feeling very sad. The story was kind of true. A friend of mine died the other day. The club we were both long-time members of put together a “We Care” package for her, with each of us bringing things we thought she’d enjoy. The member who delivered the package said we all chose well, and our friend was delighted. Of course, our friend is the sort of person who found the joy in just about anything.

So I don’t really have the regret that I didn’t let her know how much she meant to me, but I do so hate it that she’s gone. The world is poorer for her absence, although it’s richer for her having been here.

And I looked in the paper for my friend’s obituary and found an obituary for another lady I know not well but by name. I’m getting to be of that age; this will happen more and more often.

I know that on another day, the transitory nature of life will make me aware of the delicious brightness of every moment.

Right now, though, I’m sad.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character loses a friend who is not bosom-buddies close, but close enough to leave a hole in your character’s life.

MA

#6WSC Regret

My beautiful sister from The Netherlands, Marion Driessen (The DuTchess) has the 6-Word Story Challenge this week. If you join the challenge, hop over to her blog and leave a link to your blog, where you’ve posted your story.

Here’s mine:

Regret

She would’ve loved these flowers yesterday.

.

.

Hop over to Figments of a DuTchess and post a link to your own 6-word story.

MA