Jessica Knauss's Blog, page 69
April 10, 2011
Six Sentence Sunday: Sail To Italy
Thanks to everyone who commented last week! To get some resolution on the pink kitchen sponge, look at this page. Scroll to the bottom of the post to avoid other spoilers.
Here are some silly sentences from my upcoming YA adventure, Sail To Italy.
In this scene, Princess Noreena confronts the man she believes killed her father, then realizes that the culprit was someone else important in her life, whom she never suspected.
* * *
It all hit her like a herd of stampeding horses. First, the realization that she had never liked Repual, anyway, and then the horrible truth: that he had wanted her father dead.She started to cry. "Oh, don't cry. Did you ever look at that man? How could a good guy be so vastly ugly?"
* * *
Sail To Italy is available for purchase in a Kindle edition as of April 18. Look for the sequel, Sail From Italy, April 19, or wait for the bargain bundle deal, April 20.
When you comment here, indicate whether you would like to participate in a drawing for a "free" pdf of both books in the delightful Sailing Italy series. "Free" is in quotes because I hope the winner will take a few minutes of her/his valuable time to put a review on Amazon or Goodreads. Drawing takes place April 20.
Note: this book is not for you if you're boring or unwonderful in any way.
Here are some silly sentences from my upcoming YA adventure, Sail To Italy.
In this scene, Princess Noreena confronts the man she believes killed her father, then realizes that the culprit was someone else important in her life, whom she never suspected.
* * *
It all hit her like a herd of stampeding horses. First, the realization that she had never liked Repual, anyway, and then the horrible truth: that he had wanted her father dead.She started to cry. "Oh, don't cry. Did you ever look at that man? How could a good guy be so vastly ugly?"
* * *
Sail To Italy is available for purchase in a Kindle edition as of April 18. Look for the sequel, Sail From Italy, April 19, or wait for the bargain bundle deal, April 20.
When you comment here, indicate whether you would like to participate in a drawing for a "free" pdf of both books in the delightful Sailing Italy series. "Free" is in quotes because I hope the winner will take a few minutes of her/his valuable time to put a review on Amazon or Goodreads. Drawing takes place April 20.
Note: this book is not for you if you're boring or unwonderful in any way.
April 7, 2011
Ron Knight's 100th Blog
In honor of his 100th blog post, author Ron Knight has decided to help independent authors even more than he already does and showcase a bunch of us. I'm there! Check me out! Thanks so much to Ron!
www.upauthors.com/blog
www.upauthors.com/blog
April 5, 2011
Now Published in Six Sentences
The nice folks at Six Sentences surprised me this morning by publishing my little (of course it's little -- it has to be six sentences!) piece about what writers dream about. Check it out here. Don't forget to check the "six-tacular" box at the bottom of the story.
The inspiration for this is pretty clear. I will say that I first wrote it as more of a stream-of-consciousness with no real punctuation and all one sentence, something I had to change in order to aspire to being published in Six Sentences.
I hope "The Writer's Wet Nap Dream" shows readers why writers do what we do. Enjoy!
The inspiration for this is pretty clear. I will say that I first wrote it as more of a stream-of-consciousness with no real punctuation and all one sentence, something I had to change in order to aspire to being published in Six Sentences.
I hope "The Writer's Wet Nap Dream" shows readers why writers do what we do. Enjoy!
April 4, 2011
Remembering and Unremembering Laura Ingalls Wilder: The Wilder Life by Wendy McClure
She thought to herself, "This is now."She was glad that the cozy house, and Pa and Ma and the firelight and the music, were now. They could not be forgotten, she thought, because now is now. It can never be a long time ago.
When, at eight or nine years of age, I first read these sentences from the end of Little House in the Big Woods, I was confused. Well, but that now is definitely a long time ago, now, I thought. But it wasn't long ago at all, because there I was, experiencing it, exactly the same now evoked in the book. So this Laura Ingalls Wilder was right, it could never be forgotten. Somehow, she had magically opened up a portal, a direct line between her childhood and her future readers. This strange and profound connection to people I'd never known, places I'd never been, and things that, in some cases, never existed (I found out later), were the track that kept me reading all the way through the series and beyond to the books of diaries and letters Laura never intended for an audience. Although I've gone on to do a lot more reading, I've always carried a little of Laura with me, in ways I never considered before I read The Wilder Life by Wendy McClure.
The book is a memoir of McClure's rediscovery of the series as an adult after a personal tragedy. She gets obsessed with trying to somehow recapture that long-ago life in some way, any way she can. In the process she goes on an epic journey, always learning and developing insights along the way. No crazy idea, whether it's churning her own butter or camping on a farm in Illinois, fails to spark some kind of connection with the ever-expanding and lost world Laura writes about so lovingly. McClure masterfully sorts out her personal reactions to the book and compares "fact" with "fiction" to allow the reader to come to his/her own conclusions.
Topics addressed include:
• The hybrid nature of the books. Are they fiction? Are they autobiography? How can we reconcile the Laura we know from the books with the mysterious Laura who experienced all that and so much more?
• The people who know the books only through the TV series and how their expectations from the historical sites differ. Is the world of the TV series less valid than that of the books?
• The prototypes for ways of being feminine presented in the books. These are especially important to consider, as they influence girls at a formative moment in their development. Do you sympathize with Mary? With Nellie Oleson? Is Laura a "tomboy"? (I completely agree with McClure when she decides that Laura is not a tomboy, just a girl whose femininity encompasses an explorer's spirit and some rugged chores. We girls can do anything, like Laura!)
• The complicated political issues at stake in the West at the time, which is mostly played out when we discover that the Ingalls were one of many squatters on land that was clearly meant for Native Americans and only opened to homesteaders a few years after the Ingallses left.
• The views of Native Americans, which, whether positive or negative, are incomplete in the books, mainly because they're told from a child's perspective, and that child was never to experience Native American culture firsthand, even as an adult.
• The wide-ranging interpretations people put on the books, often to serve their own world views. The prevailing one is that the Ingalls' life was a "simple" one of self-sufficiency. As the homesteading issue shows, times were never "simpler," at least not in the last two millennia, and as McClure points out, the Ingalls relied on technology, like trains and conveniences like stores whenever they were available. Especially entertaining is the story about the serial killers who operated near the Little House on the Prairie -- were they more innocent times?
• The hotly contested role of Rose Wilder Lane in the creation of the books, and in her life in general.
• The way Farmer Boy fits or doesn't fit into the series.
• The way the series peters out, so disappointing for young readers, and so much more understandable for adults. By visiting some of Laura's home sites that don't appear in the children's series, McClure comes to a better understanding of where the story really goes.
• That incredible sense of identification readers seem to come away with so often. Is the reader actually Laura? Who is Laura, anyway?
Possibly the best feature of the Little House series is Laura Ingalls Wilder's talent for observation accompanied by wonder. McClure learned from the best. Her writing transmits a similar finely-observed reality colored with wonder and more often than not, joy. The book jacket claims that it's "hilarious," but my laughter was more about recognition: whenever she has a Laura geek moment or discusses the way the books impacted her as a child, I think, yes, I had exactly the same reaction myself. Of course, McClure is also a writer and an editor who studied in Iowa City, so we have more than one common frame of reference. But the beautiful writing and great research, executed under the aegis of unflagging enthusiasm, will pull you along, too.
And hooray for McClure's partner, Chris, who read the books for her sake, and had the good sense to wake up in the middle of a potentially deadly hail and thunderstorm in DeSmet, only to show concern for the crops. (Would the Ingalls ever see a wheat crop that didn't fail?)
I just happened to have "rediscovered" the Little House books at the end of 2010, when my mother mailed them to me in an effort to clear out the house. I hadn't even thought of looking at what Laura stuff there might be on the internet, and because this book includes so much information in such a fun way, now I never have to. The Wilder Life couldn't have come at a better time for me, and I think it's also appropriate for Americans in general as we face ever-worsening economic hardships. The Wilder Life reminds us all that normal people, like the Ingalls -- like us -- can make it work under the worst conditions.
The Wilder Life will be released on April 14. Click on the ad to pre-order the hardback. For Kindle, click here: The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie
April 3, 2011
Six Sentence Sunday: Creative Participation Edition
How encouraging! I got the nicest comments yet last Sunday on the opener to Tree/House. Thanks so much, everybody! I really appreciate it.
As promised, this is the Tree/House excerpt that can be gross, but only if you want it to be! Please comment with an opinion as to what's really going on here. I'll re-post the suggestions that keep my blog PG. I might even add them to the Amazon descriptions if appropriate. (I've already had some suggestions from readers that are too scandalous.) And as always, check out the other participants here.
In this scene, if Emma wants to get home from college, she has to ride with her nasty Shakespeare professor (Franklin, whose cedar coffin we saw last week), who has invited her to see a new property he's invested in.
* * *
As he placed her bags in the trunk, Emma quickly rifled through the contents of that mysterious, innocent-looking briefcase. On the bottom was a heavy, very dry book of Shakespeare criticism Emma knew only too well from her light-and-dark project, and her hand jerked away at its touch. There was also a collected sonnets and ten really sharp pencils (ouch!) held together by a rubber band. The dust from their erasers was getting all over three silk ties in varying shades of red and a day planner. Emma felt something wet and cold under the ties. It was a pink kitchen sponge.
* * *
And don't forget to treat yourself or the reader in your life to Tree/House in paperback or Kindle!
As promised, this is the Tree/House excerpt that can be gross, but only if you want it to be! Please comment with an opinion as to what's really going on here. I'll re-post the suggestions that keep my blog PG. I might even add them to the Amazon descriptions if appropriate. (I've already had some suggestions from readers that are too scandalous.) And as always, check out the other participants here.
In this scene, if Emma wants to get home from college, she has to ride with her nasty Shakespeare professor (Franklin, whose cedar coffin we saw last week), who has invited her to see a new property he's invested in.
* * *
As he placed her bags in the trunk, Emma quickly rifled through the contents of that mysterious, innocent-looking briefcase. On the bottom was a heavy, very dry book of Shakespeare criticism Emma knew only too well from her light-and-dark project, and her hand jerked away at its touch. There was also a collected sonnets and ten really sharp pencils (ouch!) held together by a rubber band. The dust from their erasers was getting all over three silk ties in varying shades of red and a day planner. Emma felt something wet and cold under the ties. It was a pink kitchen sponge.
* * *
And don't forget to treat yourself or the reader in your life to Tree/House in paperback or Kindle!
March 31, 2011
Writer? Yes. Famous?
Today I'd like to unpack the title of my blog. I think we can all agree that I am a writer. All I have to do in order to call myself a writer is write. Granted, my first year of being a full-time writer, I mostly just dreamed about my historical novel without a clue as to how it would ever get written. But I have written articles and fiction (many of which are linked at the Good Reading page to your left), not to mention a lot of words on this blog, so, that half of the title is a given.
Now on to "famous." I'm not actually famous. Gasp! I explained this designation in my first post as more or less a delusion from my childhood. I was famous in my own mind when I declared myself as such for the reasons in the post, but mostly because everyone I knew, knew that I wrote. To me, a famous writer is the kind of person you can ask anyone on the street about and get a decent response, along the lines of "Everyone knows who she is! Jessica Knauss is the author of Tree/House, many short stories, and the silly YA series Sailing Italy."Back when I called myself a famous writer, you could have gotten a similar answer from any of the several adults who knew me, therefore, I was famous. And the blog title has its own kind of validity, independent of how my career goes from here.
But lingering behind "famous" is its partner, "rich." If "rich" is a requirement for "famous," then I definitely am not now and may never be. I'm not getting paid much at all for my writing (copies of the magazines I appear in, sometimes a five dollar honorarium I prize like a pot of gold). My husband recently got a raise, so we can breathe just a little easier, but it's not enough to go back to Pennsylvania and get our furniture and books, so I still feel pretty poor. I couldn't afford to go to Oregon to meet my amazing fans. We had to save up for a trip to the Spanish restaurant, for goodness sake. We hunch over to eat because we decided the one table we could afford worked best as a computer desk (what a relief that was!). We choose Crunchy Oat Squares instead of Life cereal. I'm grateful for the deliciously nutritious Crunchy Oat Squares, because some people can't even afford them, but I hope I'm making the point that we are not rich.
"Rich" lingers around "famous" because people figure that if everyone knows who you are, then someone must be paying you a lot of money. This is true in enough of the cases I've seen to convince me that if I can ever get people on the street to recognize my name, I'll already have several bestsellers and movie deals.
Bestsellers and movie deals are not easy to come by, just to clarify.
I wanted to point out that I'm not famous for the sake of people who click over here from other countries, like Moldova and Ghana, using the keywords "famous writer." Sorry folks. I really appreciate your clicks! You can say you knew me when.
Now on to "famous." I'm not actually famous. Gasp! I explained this designation in my first post as more or less a delusion from my childhood. I was famous in my own mind when I declared myself as such for the reasons in the post, but mostly because everyone I knew, knew that I wrote. To me, a famous writer is the kind of person you can ask anyone on the street about and get a decent response, along the lines of "Everyone knows who she is! Jessica Knauss is the author of Tree/House, many short stories, and the silly YA series Sailing Italy."Back when I called myself a famous writer, you could have gotten a similar answer from any of the several adults who knew me, therefore, I was famous. And the blog title has its own kind of validity, independent of how my career goes from here.
But lingering behind "famous" is its partner, "rich." If "rich" is a requirement for "famous," then I definitely am not now and may never be. I'm not getting paid much at all for my writing (copies of the magazines I appear in, sometimes a five dollar honorarium I prize like a pot of gold). My husband recently got a raise, so we can breathe just a little easier, but it's not enough to go back to Pennsylvania and get our furniture and books, so I still feel pretty poor. I couldn't afford to go to Oregon to meet my amazing fans. We had to save up for a trip to the Spanish restaurant, for goodness sake. We hunch over to eat because we decided the one table we could afford worked best as a computer desk (what a relief that was!). We choose Crunchy Oat Squares instead of Life cereal. I'm grateful for the deliciously nutritious Crunchy Oat Squares, because some people can't even afford them, but I hope I'm making the point that we are not rich.
"Rich" lingers around "famous" because people figure that if everyone knows who you are, then someone must be paying you a lot of money. This is true in enough of the cases I've seen to convince me that if I can ever get people on the street to recognize my name, I'll already have several bestsellers and movie deals.
Bestsellers and movie deals are not easy to come by, just to clarify.
I wanted to point out that I'm not famous for the sake of people who click over here from other countries, like Moldova and Ghana, using the keywords "famous writer." Sorry folks. I really appreciate your clicks! You can say you knew me when.
March 28, 2011
Sail To Italy Excerpt Trailer and Release Date Info
For your viewing pleasure, a trailer/excerpt from Sail To Italy. This conversation takes place in the first chapter, when Princess Noreena is desperate to find the man she thinks killed her father, Giovanni Redicci. Lucky Pirate Pierre is there to help her... for a price. The excerpt should give a sense of how silly and fun this thing is going to be. Watch here. Noreena really should be younger and have black hair, and Pierre should be a bit more piratey, but these were the best stand-ins the Lego actor's guild could provide.
You can finally see for yourself how silly it all is on April 18. Sail To Italy will become available that day, just in time for Easter presents. It will cost only 99 cents (they won't let me make it any cheaper). And then the news gets even better! Sail To Italy has an even more exciting and more romantic sequel, Sail From Italy, in which all the main characters get to take a (not terribly glamourous) trip to Spain. Sail From Italy will be available April 19, and again, cost only 99 cents. You never had such inexpensive fun.
The grand finale release will be a combined Sail To Italy and Sail From Italy, April 20, for the low price of only $1.49, so if you can wait, this is your bargain option. Two epic adventures for happy, carefree reading, all for less than the price of a cup of coffee. Too generous? Perhaps. It's all because I love my readers.
Here's the cover of Sail From Italy, for your preview pleasure.
You can finally see for yourself how silly it all is on April 18. Sail To Italy will become available that day, just in time for Easter presents. It will cost only 99 cents (they won't let me make it any cheaper). And then the news gets even better! Sail To Italy has an even more exciting and more romantic sequel, Sail From Italy, in which all the main characters get to take a (not terribly glamourous) trip to Spain. Sail From Italy will be available April 19, and again, cost only 99 cents. You never had such inexpensive fun.
The grand finale release will be a combined Sail To Italy and Sail From Italy, April 20, for the low price of only $1.49, so if you can wait, this is your bargain option. Two epic adventures for happy, carefree reading, all for less than the price of a cup of coffee. Too generous? Perhaps. It's all because I love my readers.
Here's the cover of Sail From Italy, for your preview pleasure.
March 27, 2011
Six Sentence Sunday 4
I may have made a mistake with my last six sentences, unintentionally grossing everyone out with some of the scariest imagery in the entire book. I recently decided the rotting corpse dream is the central image of the book, but in my interpretation, it represents Emma getting ready to leave her dull, dead past behind and start to really live -- to experience rebirth, in a way. I've decided to try to redeem Tree/House this week and start at the beginning. Nothing comes before these six sentences, although you'll notice the theme of death already! Someone should write at least a term paper on this...
* * *
The funeral procession Emma had always imagined involved slow pallbearers winding through narrow streets, drizzle, and many women in black cloaks choking back their grief. She had planned in great detail the way Franklin's cedar coffin would slide into the ground and the way the moist earth would sound as it fell on top. She would carry white lilies and her grandmother would be there to support her should she faint. Maybe she would carry smelling salts. After that, her plans ended abruptly because what does one do after a funeral, after all.
The true funeral had involved only Franklin's mother, the servants, and Emma, without lilies.
* * *
Check out the other wonderful participants' excerpts here. Next Sunday, the excerpt that can be gross... if you want it to be...
* * *
The funeral procession Emma had always imagined involved slow pallbearers winding through narrow streets, drizzle, and many women in black cloaks choking back their grief. She had planned in great detail the way Franklin's cedar coffin would slide into the ground and the way the moist earth would sound as it fell on top. She would carry white lilies and her grandmother would be there to support her should she faint. Maybe she would carry smelling salts. After that, her plans ended abruptly because what does one do after a funeral, after all.
The true funeral had involved only Franklin's mother, the servants, and Emma, without lilies.
* * *
Check out the other wonderful participants' excerpts here. Next Sunday, the excerpt that can be gross... if you want it to be...
March 25, 2011
Author Pages
Today is the day the Secret Society of Literary Divas of St. Helens, Oregon will meet about Tree/House! Enjoy, ladies! I would join you if I could!
I recently created an author fan page for myself at Facebook (which you can like simply by clicking on the Facebook box on the left of your screen!) which I don't consider a success because only one person other than me is a fan. I'm not sure how to get more fans other than giving away prizes, which I can't afford, but that's okay. I'm happy to remain a regular networking writer with friends instead of fans on Facebook.
But, now I've created an author page on Amazon.com, and I have to say, it's really cool. It has nice pictures of little me, a couple of videos (I hope to post more soon), a never-before-seen, friendly autobiography, a blog feed, and all my books available at Amazon on one page. That's right, it will list Sail To Italy right there when its released! There's even space for listing events, if I ever get to do a reading or signing or anything else. I hope the page is welcoming and encourages readers to contact me if that's what they want. Goodness knows, I exist as an author to give the readers what they want. So tell me what you want, and I'll do my best for you. Enjoy the author page, which I'll update whenever appropriate.
I recently created an author fan page for myself at Facebook (which you can like simply by clicking on the Facebook box on the left of your screen!) which I don't consider a success because only one person other than me is a fan. I'm not sure how to get more fans other than giving away prizes, which I can't afford, but that's okay. I'm happy to remain a regular networking writer with friends instead of fans on Facebook.
But, now I've created an author page on Amazon.com, and I have to say, it's really cool. It has nice pictures of little me, a couple of videos (I hope to post more soon), a never-before-seen, friendly autobiography, a blog feed, and all my books available at Amazon on one page. That's right, it will list Sail To Italy right there when its released! There's even space for listing events, if I ever get to do a reading or signing or anything else. I hope the page is welcoming and encourages readers to contact me if that's what they want. Goodness knows, I exist as an author to give the readers what they want. So tell me what you want, and I'll do my best for you. Enjoy the author page, which I'll update whenever appropriate.
March 23, 2011
Happy Rhinos
These are a couple of happy rhinos, the sister pair at the Phoenix zoo. They're happy because they have each other, and, appropriately, because I'm getting a rhinoceros story published not once, but twice!I'm talking about the tale of the shrinking rhinoceros, a microfiction I've mentioned before. I wrote it upon having a dream in Pennsylvania, and have been confounded that I haven't been able to find a home for it. So now, it's found not one home, but two, through the virtue of editing and retitling. One version is called "A Business Venture in Glue," and the other "Rhinoceros Crash." Both are coming out soon. More information to come! Also look forward to excerpts of yet more versions of the "Rhinoceros Crash."
