Ellyn Oaksmith's Blog, page 15
May 24, 2014
"She was a romance junkie; one of the hopelessly optimistic souls in love with happy endings." —...
"She was a romance junkie; one of the hopelessly optimistic souls in love with happy endings." — from my upcoming book — Fifty Acts of Kindness.
Is It Summer Yet Blog Hop: Fun Books. Free stuff. (plus, for the hop duration, DIVINE MOVES is 99cents.)
CLICK the POSTER TO HOP
Welcome to Ellyn Oaksmith Books. If you go to EllynOaksmith and LIKE my fan page, you’ll be entered to win for ladies: a beach towel, a pack of blue and white paper straws, a summer reading journal, plus lemonaide. For dudes: an autographed paperback of Divine Moves and yes, a black umbrella because 1) I live in Seattle. 2) The book takes place in Seattle. 3) There’s one on the cover.
Here are my summer reading recommendations:
1) Okay, I’d have to be an idiot not to include my own. 
Yes, very egotistical but read the reviews. They are peppered with things like “Fun!” “Couldn’t put it down!” and “Laugh out loud!”
If that’s not a summer read then I don’t know anything. Well, according to my teens, I really don’t know anything but I do know about fun summer reads. I’ve written three. (Link to a preview of my third, Fifty Acts of Kindness.)
2) Now for something less self involved:
Ever since I read this book, I have shared it at books clubs when I was a guest author, on Facebook, to friends and basically whenever anyone already knew about my own books — I’d mention this one. It has over 1,500 reviews, mine is somewhere in there and all I can say is — read it.
3) This is a weird recommendation because 1) I haven’t read it. 2) It comes out today — so yes, I’ll get it. 3) The kindle book is priced around $10. Now here’s why it’s something you’d better get. This woman is an incredible writer. Reading her is like a masters degree in family dynamics, comedy and in her later books — history. Starting with her first book I am working my way through everything she’s ever published and she just keeps getting better and better.
It’s on my list.
Happy reading. Happy summer.
May 22, 2014
Setting: Where the Heart Feels at Home -- Guest Blog from Marilyn Brant
My husband and I in front of the Trevi Fountain in Rome.
Have you ever visited a place for the first time and felt as though you were finally at home?
That’s what it was like for me when I first set foot in Italy. And—more incredibly—it’s felt that way every time I’ve been fortunate enough to travel there. I’d expected the magic to wear off after a visit or two, due to familiarity or the added perspective of age, but it’s remained constant through the years…like my love of Renaissance art, Murano glass beads, or freshly made chocolate-orange gelato. (For the record, Festival del Gelato in Florence is my favorite gelateria in the world!)
Then again, maybe I’m biased because I’d daydreamed about taking a trip to the famous cities of Venice, Florence, and Rome ever since I was a little kid. Or possibly because our close family friends were native Sicilians. Or because my dad had spent a memorable summer working in that country before he met my mom, and I grew up hearing stories of Italy’s beauty. Or maybe it’s just because I really love ravioli, passionately sung music, Mediterranean shorelines, and pure southern European sunshine.
“Marilyn Brant’s A SUMMER IN EUROPE
is a wonderful tale that captivates readers
as Gwen, transformed by her surroundings,
undergoes a change of heart about life…
and love.” ~Doubleday Book Club
I poured my love and first impressions of Italy into a novel called A Summer in Europe(Kensington, 2011). The main character, Gwen, takes her first trip abroad with her eccentric aunt Bea and the elderly lady’s outspoken Sudoku & Mahjongg playing friends. The adventure opens Gwen’s eyes to the wonderful transformative power of travel and getting to see the world through a new lens at long last. It’s a happy story of a woman who’s on an inward journey as much as an outward one—though, of course, she doesn’t know that at first.
What’s always intriguing to me about travel is that, even when we know a trip has the power to change us, I don’t think it’s possible for us to truly recognize that change happening until we’re at least halfway through it. Or maybe even home again…
I remember being sixteen and an AFS exchange student in Brisbane, Australia. I couldn’t believe I’d been lucky enough to be chosen for this dream placement. (The residents often called it a “sun-burned” country, but I just called it “gorgeous,” especially with sites like the Sydney Opera House, the Gold Coast, the Great Barrier Reef, and real live koalas that I could hold…) I’d read the student-exchange materials with tremendous interest. All of those handouts and brochures that the organizers had sent us—not just about the host country, but also about the time we’d be spending with our host families and our host schools. We were cautioned that we would need to change and adapt to our new environment. That there would be a lot of information to process. That it would be a roller coaster of emotions.
And it was.
Somewhere in the middle of my summer (their winter) stay, I wrote in my trip journal that I was supposed to have changed from all of this, right? Hey, I’d entered into this journey being open to change. I’d expected it. So, why hadn’t it happened yet? I felt almost exactly the same as when I’d left home. To my own eye, I was still this mostly geeky, sort of awkward high-school girl who was good as school stuff and not entirely comfortable with much else. It was only in retrospect—some months after I gotten back—that I could see in hindsight that there had been changes all along. Some were subtle shifts in perception. Others were massive worldview transformations that, ultimately, ended up altering the course of my career path and my life.
“Gelato” Photo by Aaron Logan, courtesy
of Wikimedia/Creative Commons
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gelato.jpg
I think a strong setting—whether it’s in 3D right before our eyes or simply described on the page with heart and an acute attention to detail—has the power to affect as much change upon us and/or our protagonists as any other real-life person or fictional character could. It’s the very air we’re breathing. The sounds we’re hearing. The landmarks in our periphery. And the taste (oh, the delightful taste!) of our most unforgettable dessert.
What’s a setting that’s left a life-long impression upon you? A place that made you feel at home?
~~~
Marilyn Brant is a USA TODAY bestselling author of contemporary women’s fiction, romantic comedy, and mystery. She was named the Author of the Year (2013) by the Illinois Association of Teachers of English. She loves all things Jane Austen, has a passion for Sherlock Holmes, is a travel addict and a music junkie, and lives on chocolate and gelato. If you want to see pictures from her European travel adventures, she has a page on her website HERE. And, in her latest novel,The Road to You, her characters take a road trip down Historic Route 66, and she has photos HERE from that journey as well :) .
May 21, 2014
Something I read every single day...
Randy Pausch. Sound familiar? He wrote The Last Lecture when he knew he was dying of cancer. It was his last public lecture at Cornell University in 2007 and went viral on YouTube.
The below little snippet, literally marked with blood from when I cut my finger and didn’t want to waste time getting another Bandaid — is on my lamp, sticking out over my laptop. I read it every single day:
"The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people."
Paste and copy this into your own life. We all need to read this every day.
My second book: Divine Moves
Something I read every single day....
THE LAST LECTURE - FOLLOWING YOUR CHILDHOOD DREAMS
Recognize this guy? He wrote The Last Lecture when he knew he was dying of cancer. It was his last public lecture at Cornell University in 2007 and went viral on YouTube.
The below little snippet, literally marked with blood from when I cut my finger and didn’t want to waste time getting another Bandaid — is on my lamp, sticking out over my laptop. I read it every single day:
"The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people."
Paste and copy this into your own life. We all need to read this every day.
My second book: 
DIVINE MOVES
May 20, 2014
Girlfriends Book Blog Goes Patriotic -- Dead Ball
Judith Arnold
If you’ve studied American history, you’ve heard of the Battles of Lexington and Concord. In the centuries since those battles took place, another battle has simmered between Lexington and Concord over which
town can lay claim to the “shot heard ’round the world”—the first shot actually fired in the American Revolution. Lexington partisans claim that first shot was fired by the British soldiers on the Lexington Town Green. Concord partisans argue that what happened in Lexington was a massacre, not really a battle, because the colonial settlers did not fire back. According to this argument, the “shot heard ’round the world” was one fired by a member of the colonial militia at the Old North Bridge in Concord. The American Revolution began nearly 240 years ago, and the two towns have been fighting over which town can boast of being the “birthplace of American liberty” for almost as long.
I mention this because I live in a town very near Concord and Lexington, a town which played such a pivotal role in the American Revolution that when postal zip codes were being assigned in the 1960’s, my town won the coveted zip code “01776,” beating out both Lexington and Concord for that honor. So when I decided to set my new mystery, Dead Ball, in a small town west of Boston, I wanted to make the setting a town as fiercely devoted to its colonial heritage as the towns in this part of Massachusetts truly are.
(I wish I could say that the fictional town of Rockford, where Dead Ball takes place, was named after a great Revolutionary War hero, but the truth is, I named the town after Jim Rockford, the detective portrayed by James Garner in “The Rockford Files.” Jim Rockford is one of my heroes, even if his heroics don’t date back to the American Revolution.)
My editors loved the idea of setting Dead Ball in a colonial-era Massachusetts town, and they urged me to play up the Yankee Doodle Dandy setting as much as possible. In mystery series, the location is nearly as important as the plot. The plot might be the pretzel, but the location is the coating of salt crystals that give the pretzel its flavor.
So I salted the fictional town of Rockford with plenty of colonial references. The park where Lainie Lovett, Dead Ball’s sleuthing heroine, plays soccer is named Minuteman Field, and her rec-department team is dubbed the Colonielles. The main road through Rockford is Liberty Road, and the Mexican restaurant where Lainie and her friends retire for margaritas after their soccer practices is the Olde Towne Olé. (The French restaurant in town is the Partie de Thé, which is French for “Tea Party,” a nod to the Boston Tea Party.)The murder victim is found in a subdivision called Emerson Village.
I had a lot of fun creating Rockford, with its patriotic Revolutionary War spirit.Dead Ball is a murder mystery, but it’s also a comedy with gentle notes of satire. We proud citizens of colonial New England can laugh at ourselves even as we’re waving our flags and cheering the fife-and-drum corps who march in our town’s Fourth-of-July parades and perform at our Colonial musters every autumn.
The mystery Lainie solves belongs in Rockford. Lainie meets with the man who might become her next lover—or who might be the murderer—at the real Walden Pond, which is just a few miles from my house. We don’t take Walden Pond for granted in these parts, but we accept that our nation’s resplendent history coexists quite nicely with its present in this part of Massachusetts—and in the world of Dead Ball.
When Judith Arnold’s family moved to Massachusetts twenty-five years ago, her husband contemplated joining the town’s militia, which reenacts the Battle of Concord every year on Patriots Day. If he did that, he thought, Judith could be his “camp wench.” Much as she loves him, she decided she did not wish to be a wench, colonial or otherwise.
Judith’s current release, Dead Ball, has hit the Amazon Kindle bestseller lists. Along with the Kindle edition , Dead Ball is also available in a print edition at Amazon and Barnes & Noble , in a Nook edition, and at Kobo . You can visit her web site to learn about her independently published romances . For more information about her upcoming titles, discounts and deals, please sign up for her newsletter .
May 19, 2014
Anger. Writing. Comedy.
Link to my new book DIVINE MOVES
So I write comedic books. Or I try anyway. And my new, new manuscript, (not counting the manuscript I finished editing last week) Finding Nirvana, is my first YA book.
Okay, it’s not a book, right now it’s a 5 step stepsheet opening of a plot. And it’s funny but it’s very, very angry.
In the first scene a 16 year old girl is getting kicked out of the house for no other reason than her mother doesn’t want her stepfather getting upset. The girl is gay, although she doesn’t define herself that way.
What could possibly be funny about this you ask? Believe me I have asked myself. But the girl is smart and funny and much more resourceful than her mother. And unlike you, I know the basic plot. I know why I chose the title FINDING NIRVANA. It’s the band, not the place. And she does find it.
The interesting thing to me about writing teenagers is they don’t have adult filters. Since my mind doesn’t really have an adult filter when I write, it’s perfect. Oddly enough it’s taken me decades to come up with a plot that works for teens. I’ve meandered my way around 20 and 30 and 40 something women before this plot arrived.
My husband, when I said “Two girls, a love triangle and two proms,” did what he usually does when I tell him I’ve started a new book. He took a sip of his drink and told me it was great. After trying to understand my long meandering explanation during which I inevitably cry because it’s so meaningful to me, and funny, to me and such a long, long, long, slog, ahead for me. Notice a theme? Me. Me. Me?
He takes another sip and is interested. I think. Or he’s very good at faking it. Either way, it works.
Just thank yourself that you’re not married to a writer. We whine, we work short hours and act exhausted all the time and if you are married or involved with one — I’m sorry.
We think we’re funny but we’re just angry.
Happy Monday!
May 17, 2014
It happened on a fair June morning, as most horrible things do.
First from my new manuscript: Fifty Acts of Kindness.
(LINK to my current title: DIVINE MOVES)
CHAPTER ONE
“Revenge is sweet and not fattening.”
It happened on a fair June morning, as most horrible things do. Manhattan was misted with morning…
May 16, 2014
A great read. Happy Friday!
The Yokota Officers Club by Sarah BirdMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
Get ready for a lot of compliments because Sarah Bird is one of my favorite laugh-out-loud, knows her way around a funny scene and a great sentence kind of writer. This book takes things even further away from her Texas books, all the way to Japan with the narrator, a twenty-something visiting her family stationed in Japan with the Air Force during a college summer break.
What follows is a heart-breaking history of the US, Japan and one fragile family bound together by love, betrayal and loss. I cannot tell you how much I loved this novel. Some of the scenes still come back to me in vivid detail months after I read it. If you liked M*A*S*H, then this book has the same pathos, humor, crazy juxtopostion of the USA in another country doing things that do not even make sense and yet — change lives forever.
I loved it.
Here’s a link to my current title:
A great book.
The Yokota Officers Club by Sarah BirdMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
Get ready for a lot of compliments because Sarah Bird is one of my favorite laugh-out-loud, knows her way around a funny scene and a great sentence kind of writer. This book takes things even further away from her Texas books, all the way to Japan with the narrator, a twenty-something visiting her family stationed in Japan with the Air Force during a college summer break.
What follows is a heart-breaking history of the US, Japan and one fragile family bound together by love, betrayal and loss. I cannot tell you how much I loved this novel. Some of the scenes still come back to me in vivid detail months after I read it. If you liked M*A*S*H, then this book has the same pathos, humor, crazy juxtopostion of the USA in another country doing things that do not even make sense and yet -- change lives forever.
I loved it.
View all my reviews
