Alison DeLuca's Blog, page 27

Great Reading Spots

My mother was born near Dublin. Ever year, she scrimped and saved her small assistant lit professor salary so we could visit her parents. They lived in Sandycove, in an old house by the sea. It even had a name, Carrig-na-Chattan, which mean House by the Sea in Irish (go figure.)


My sister and I slept in our grandparents' room. There were two single, mismatched beds side by side, an old fireplace, and three large windows comprised of old, wavy glass held together, I believe, with lead.


One of those windows had a low seat inside. When I climbed in with a book and closed the curtains, it was the perfect reading spot. Ivy cascaded over the glass; in fact, several tendrils had forced their way right inside.


On a rainy day, it was like sitting in a Bathysphere. I would take my old, falling apart copy of The Youngest Girl in the Form or The Faraway Tree and read for hours.


I love my current house, but it just doesn't have a great reading spot. For one thing, my husband loves overhead lights, fixed right to the ceiling. They are trendy and attractive, but not cozy. We don't have a window seat or even enough book shelves.


Let's take a look at some gorgeous reading spots, just so I can drool:


Nice load of books and a lovely room, but I might need a cozier chair



Now that looks cozy.

And here is my window seat!

Insomnia

It happened again Saturday night, the shattering realization that I had woken up from a bad dream about an old boyfriend - don't ask - and I couldn't get back to sleep. The sheets were twisted around my legs, the air was sultry, and I could hear the rattles of my husbands snores. (Was very happy that it was him there, though, and not the boyfriend from the dream. )


At last I gave up. Articles on insomnia say that the best thing is to get out of bed and do something relaxing, like reading in a cozy chair.  So I scrambled downstairs. I managed to step on every single creaky board in the floor, too. 


Poured myself a glass of milk. Settled myself in the chair. Opened my book, Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway, and tried to read.


As good as that book was, my hazy brain couldn't fathom the complex plot and rapid-fire stream of consciousness that Harkaway uses. I disobeyed all common logic and wisdom and, yes, I opened up the computer. 


Forty minutes later, I told myself, "Hey, dumbass, it's time to get some sleep." I was pretty certain that my child would be waking me up early, since it was the weekend after all. Sleeping in is saved for the weekdays, when I have to drag her out of bed, with many a grumble. Why is that?


I took a calcium pill with the last of my milk and plodded up the steps. By this time the room had cooled down, and I was able to black out. 


Until the next morning, when someone was shaking my shoulder. "Get up and make me waffles, mommy!" Didn't I tell you?


Insomnia is a dreadful thing. It's a self-perpetuating condition, one that I treat at times with natural sleep aids. The pills laced with melatonin and chamomile probably don't really work, but I'll take that placebo effect over being up for several hours when I want to write AND be a mom the next day.


The milk and the calcium help too. So does the relaxing activity I suppose, although I have yet to find one that I can do in the throes of interrupted slumber. Maybe I should take up ceramics or just sort my recipes or something.


Meditation might help, but I'm just not good at quieting down my brain. I'll say to myself, "OK, now I have to think of nothing. Nothing, there's a weird word. No thing. Nada. Rien. Hey, remember that girl who sat next to me in 9th grade French class? She was cool. Wonder what she's doing now ..."


Yeah. Imagine that going on, except to the nth degree.


For me it's just easier and faster to pop the natural sleep aid if the milk doesn't work.

Updating the Reading List

I've made it through my summer reading list, and it's only July. Luckily there are loads of good books to add.


My friend just told me Gone Girl: A Novel by Gillian Flynn is really good. Apparently it has lots of twists and turns, and I always like that. So it's going on my list.


Since I have an upstairs book and a downstairs book, I'm also going to read The Last Guardian by Joan Hazel. I've been waiting for this one for quite some time, as I mentioned here, so I am excited to add it to my list.


How did I never find Nick Harkaway before? I just discovered Angelmaker and it is going right on my list. First, it features a guy called Spork. The setting is by the Thames, and it features a clockmaker. But the setting is modern and urban and gritty, LOVE it, and the writing is imaginative without being twee. 


I'm not usually a reader of books about crime investigation, but I loved Salt Bowl Death by Cypher Lx so much that I need more. So Darkest Before Dawn is on my list. The author works for law enforcement in Philadelphia, so I'm excited to see her take on the genre.
Cypher Lx. Girlfriend is cool.

This isn't in the reading category, but I really enjoyed the last interactive puzzle book I got from the Grabarchuk puzzle creators. So I want to try their most popular title, 100 Puzzle Quizzes. 


This should keep me going for a bit, and I'll be back to let you know my thoughts on the books. Until then, what are you reading? 

#$*%!

Yesterday I had my day all planned. I was going to take my kid to camp, come home, and write the start to Chapter 17 in The South Sea Bubble. I would have a healthy lunch, and go and collect the kid. We would both go to Costco and do a shopping trip, since I had COUPONS! (add sound of celestial choir singing.)


We would go home and I'd do a quick workout. My husband was supposed to be away for work, so once I got the kid in bed I could do some more work and complete an edit I'm doing for Ross Kitson, the author of Darkness Rising.


Yeah, none of that happened. Here's how the day went: 


Over coffee, hubby announced that he was going to cancel his business trip. 


Workers showed up early and began making loud noises with their machinery. I was expecting them at noon, so I had to run around and hide toys and folded laundry, to pretend I'm a real adult and have a clean house.


When I got back from camp, ready to write, the power went out. It came back on only when I was about to leave to pick up the child.


I never got that lunch, since I was busy with the workers and the laundry. I had a hot dog at Costco instead - you know, that 1.50 lunch that actually is my very favorite lunch. (I'm a cheap date.)


We shopped at Costco and it turned out, in the checkout line, that the coupons didn't start until the next day. Did I ever check the dates? NOPE


By the time I got home and stored all the stuff that I had bought anyway, since I certainly wasn't going to waste a trip to Costco, I had such a killer headache that I could only collapse limply on the sofa and watch Soul Surfer with my kid.


She did pretend to be surfing off the couch on a cushion while the film was going on, so there's that. It must have been fun, because she did it about a gafrillion times. 


That couch surfing saved what would have been a *#$* day.

I Love You, Grown Up Writers Who Act Like Grown Ups!

I have some strong feelings about bad reviews, which I shared with you here. Those reviews are a fact of every author's life, and a well-written bad review can actually give a writer a great deal of insight into her work. It's a new perspective from someone who just doesn't get your stuff, and it is very valuable.


Most writers deal with bad reviews very gracefully. They act like grown ups, in other words. They read the review and leave it as is, which is a great way to go, or they thank the reviewer for the added perspective.


These grown up writers do the right thing, and I Love Them. Or You, if you are one.


What these grown up writers who act like grown ups do NOT do is complain about the review, cry, whine, threaten the reviewer with a correspondingly bad review, and rant about it in public forums. 
Waaaaah!

Writers who do that are not acting like grown ups, and I do not love them.


Luckily, it doesn't happen very often. Writers are polite and pleasant for the most part. So when it does happen, when someone decides to act like a child in front of the entire universe, it blows up and everyone comes running to see the train wreck. 


I'm not going to mention the names involved, since the author of the review has decided to act like an Extra Mature Grown Up and not publicize this (even if doing so would further her career, since all observers sympathize with her.)


But I must offer this as a cautionary tale. And it is a chance to say it again - those of you who act like pleasant grown ups - I love and respect you.


That is all.

Losing Beauty by Johanna Garth

I've wanted to read this book for over a year now. Losing Beauty was on my Summer Reading List along with some other books, and I finally found time to get to it. And it was certainly worth the wait.


Persey is a girl who inspires confidences. When people look into her eyes they find themselves telling her everything - EVERYTHING - about themselves. This attracts several boys, primarily Aaron, who wants to put aside his high-school jock image and protect her.


Persey and Aaron get married and move to the city. There she meets Daniel Hartnett, who has a talent of his own. He knows the truth about people before they say a word to him, to the point that he can make any woman fall in love with him.


Of course, when Daniel meets Persey he finds that she is a complete surprise. He, like the others, falls in love with her.


This plot in the hands of a lesser writer could fall apart. What makes the book stand is the characters. Persey is beautiful, but she is also real. I liked her. She is honest and lacks confidence, and this makes her story all the more compelling.
Johanna Garth

And it is the same with the men she meets. Aaron is not a cardboard cutout high school athlete; Garth breathes life into him as well so he becomes a living, breathing person that I cared about.


As handsome and attractive as Daniel is, he is also human. The relationship between him and the married Persey is handled very delicately.


But the biggest tour de force is Haden, who is actually the lord of the underworld. He is ruthless, and he inhabits several different human bodies - and yet I even cared about what happened to him. Again, this tie-in with mythology could be hokey or forced with a lesser writer, but Garth handles it really well.


The thing is, Garth has discovered the secret of compelling writing. As I read Losing Beauty, I wanted to find out what what would happen next. I kept at the book one night until two AM, and I like my sleep.


I highly recommend this book for a great beach read.

Power Outage

Saturday evening we were out by the pool. It was an ungodly hot day, and the air still steamed even though it was nighttime. My kid and I played Otter in the water and my husband watched lazily from the side, beer in hand.
NOT our pool.

I began to notice that my kid was getting harder to see. I looked up, and the sky had turned a weird, greenish-black color. We realized that one doozey of a storm was about to erupt.


We rushed inside, leaving a trail of drips behind us. The sky got blacker and - twistier - and all of a sudden - it struck.


Wind slammed the house along with a deafening clap of thunder. Rain blasted the windows. The dark sky lit up with forks of lightning, and when they passed, the house stayed in darkness.


The power was out.


When you lose electricity, the house moans a defeated "Ahhhhhh" as it settles into silence. The storm had been so violent and fast-moving that the sun came back out.


Our reaction was one of disbelief when we looked out the windows. Everything had been blown down - chairs, umbrellas, tree limbs, our cool little fig tree... It was amazing how much damage had racked up in less than ten minutes.


Time to hunt for candles! I pulled out jars, old birthday candles, anything I could find. My husband and I told each other, for the fiftieth time, that it really was time to get a decent flashlight. 


We settled in the family room and played Uno by candlelight. Our kid won both games. Up to bed, since she was yawning by this time, and she insisted on sleeping with us in the deep darkness (can't blame her.)


Hub and I went out again to survey the wreckage. It was still hot, and I jumped back in the pool to cool off. He joined me and we swam in darkness lit only by the little reading lamp I usually keep by the bed.


The woods are "dark, and deep" and they have a lot of noises going on when there's a power outage, let me tell you. All kinds of things rustle around in there. Without AC units going or the hum of TV's, nature gets really loud, really fast. 


I was refreshed but creeped out. We dried off again and headed to bed.


And that's when it got HOT, and not in a good way. Keep in mind that 


a) I'm a menopausal woman and don't deal with heat well anyway
b) We had a kid in our bed who seems to heat up to lava temp whilst sleeping
and c)No AC, no fan


and you can perhaps imagine the misery. My husband fell asleep right away; I was not so lucky.
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I got up and went down to the basement. It was cool down there, but I could hardly sleep among the boxes. Plus, weren't there spiders and bugs down there? Yeah, not happening.


Ended up on the couch with open windows, gasping for a breeze. Eventually I did drift off.


For those who live without power in the heat, I salute you. My mom was pregnant in the summer - TWICE - in Arizona. In the sixties. Which means that there wasn't any AC happening in that house. And she had just moved from Ireland. How the hell did she manage that I'd like to know?


Because I couldn't even make it one night.

The Art of the Martini

I'm a sucker for a martini. Pour anything into one of those inconveniently shaped glasses, and all of a sudden we've got a party. Vodka is my liquor of choice, but there are many drinks you can make in a shaker and strain into a martini glass. 


Let's start with a vodka martini - I go for Grey Goose myself. Put some ice in a shaker and add a few drops of dry vermouth. Swirl those around and discard. Add more ice and a few shots of vodka.


Now, I like mine very dirty, so I pour some olive brine into that mix. Strain into a glass and add a few blue-cheese stuffed olives. Serve with some tasty nibbles, like dates wrapped in bacon. 


Make certain that really smooth lounge music is on the stereo, and don't forget to change into a muumuu! Or, lounge pajamas. 


For the Fourth of July, I made something called a Citrus Paradise. It was invented by an 8 year old, but we adults stole her recipe and heartlessly added vodka. 


Pour fresh lemonade (the kind you buy in the store that is NOT made from concentrate) into a blender. Add some freshly squeezed lime, lemon, orange, and a few shots of fresh orange juice (the kind that is like the lemonade.) Add 10 - 12 cubes of ice. Blend. 
Do NOT forget those Martini Fashions!

At this point the kids will want a glass of the concoction. Pour them some glasses (they get Red Solo Cups though) and bogart the rest for yourself. 


Add a shot of vodka to each of the martini glasses you will be serving up. Fill with blender mix and stir.  It's a nice touch to plop a lemon or lime slice on the rim.


Oh the refreshment of that drink on a hot summer's day!


I'm also a big fan of expresso martinis. Those suckers are a bit tricky. You need to start with cold, brewed expresso. 


Chill the martini glasses with ice while you mix the drinks. Just plop some cubes in those babies and get ready to shake.


Pour a shot of vodka, a shot of Kahlua, and a shot of cold expresso for each drink into the mixer with ice. 


If you like your martini sweeter, you can add a shot of simple syrup (sugar water) and / or creme de cacao.


Shake for at least ten seconds. That will give you a nice bit of froth on the top of the drink. 
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Pour into the chilled glasses, and you can float some expresso beans on the top of the froth. If they are chocolate covered expresso beans, then you will have my whole attention. 


One warning with that drink: serve enough of them, and the crowd turns into a bunch of wide awake, "lively" people. Not that it's a bad thing, but you might want to change the music to tropical lounge or Bond Themes to keep up.

The Quiet Girl

She doesn't attract a lot of attention. Her friends are funny and get loads of laughs. People don't notice the one in the corner, at the end of the table.


She goes to college. Others win awards for brilliance and attract huge crowds of friends. She goes out, is social, but somehow she fades into the background.


Through junior and senior year, into real life where she gets a job, she wishes that she was more vibrant, more alive. That she could tell a story or a joke and make the whole room listen. That when she walked into a party, everyone would stop and look and be happy that she arrived. But when she speaks, somehow people don't hear her soft voice.


People like her, but they say that she is "very quiet." And so she is. She discovers that it is best if she holds back, is the audience, allows others to have center stage.


And as life continues, the quiet girl keeps observing. It's second nature to her to watch a conversation on a train between a pair of lovers. To see a family have a squabble after church. She sees how two people have a long chat at a party, but she also sees how the talk is filled with undertones and hidden meanings. 


She sees how one gesture can convey an entire range of emotions. How one sentence can destroy a mood. And how very often people say too much when they don't intend to.


The quiet girl writes stories. The conversations and interactions she watched her entire life now flow onto the page. She is able to create characters that live and breathe because she has been an observer for so long. 


She begins to suspect that her silence, her ability to blend into the background, is something else. She has an extra layer of protective coloring that allows her to watch what happens. And since she is so nondescript, no one realizes that she is there.


Perhaps, after all, this silence is a gift.

Cool Science Stuff

Truth really is stranger than fiction. Teleportation, the "God Particle," and quantum computers are the stuff of scifi, but if you read the news they are more real than you think.


Now, I am not very bright when it comes to science. In fact, I failed Chemistry (the only class I couldn't crack) and didn't even attempt physics. Still, I love science in principal, even if I can't understand it, and I like to celebrate cool stuff that scientists do.


Number one today has to be the discovery of the "God Particle" or boson, aka a new subatomic particle. How cool is this? It's the glue, the stuff that makes atoms clump together into stars and planets. Without it, the universe would be a soup of particles whizzing around at the speed of light. 


Here's a cool science fact: The tidal forces of the Moon don't just affect the ocean. They also affect dry land, which can rise and fall as much as 21 inches.


They're getting closer to that quantum computer, too - a group of Harvard scientists were able to create quantum bits and store information on them for two seconds. Now, two seconds doesn't sound like a lot to a clueless geek like me. But that is six orders of magnitude greater than the previous time stored, which makes this a huge breakthrough. 


Which means that my Crown Phoenix typewriter could be a reality soon.


We can't beam anyone up yet, but it is possible to teleport information using quantum entanglement. I don't know what that means, but it's pretty darn cool. The real world applications are huge - transporting medical info through skin, for example. And this year scientists at A*STAR worked on an actual tractor beam, using something called a Bessel beam that actually pushes particles towards a light source.


So, I may not be able to understand it, but I am a big scifi fan. And all of this stuff is pretty darn cool.