Cate Ellink's Blog, page 61

Wildlife Wednesday - deep diving whales

No idea what whale this is, but I think it's a whale :)Oh WOW! I just read this news article (here) that says scientists have been studying whales off California and have recorded a Cuvier's Beaked Whale diving to a depth of 3.2km. WOW! Just wow!

Imagine the water pressure at that depth? It says it's equivalent of 320 atmospheres.

And the longest dive lasted for 137 minutes - yep, over 2 hours!

That's some feat!

They recorded 1100 dives, with the average being 1.4km. That's a lot of diving.

This fascinates me. We don't really know much about the inhabitants of the ocean. But why would a whale dive that far? It would have to be chasing food, right? Big giant squid of the deep?

We have these whales around Australia, they know this because of strandings, not sightings. Here's some Aussie info on them.

They're about 8m long for females, up to 10m for males.

They like deep water and are rarely found in waters less than 1km deep (and after the diving info, this is understandable, any shallower would be boring for them :) ).

Oh, they eat mostly oceanic squid. And one found off Victoria had up to 500 individual squid in its stomach. That's a LOT of squid.

I wonder if they chase a big squid to those depths, or if there was a huge mass of squid down there that the whale went down to eat.

Nature is fascinating :)

Sunday Story - a couple of Scotts

I've been reading voraciously lately. And nothing was grabbing be by the throat and dragging me into the story. It was ho-hum. Some I even sped through without properly reading, others I stopped. I went to book club last month and didn't like either book I read. I was worrying about myself - what was wrong with me?

Then the last couple of nights, two Scotts happened to me. Jessica Scott and Kylie Scott. And I fell back in love with reading. In a huge, non-sleep kind of way!
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I forgot about Jessica Scott's release. It was when I was having a non-book-buying period (a long and painful thing for me) and I had it filed in the back of my mind to buy, but I hadn't done it. Then one of the Naughty Ninjas (thank you NN!) mentioned Carponti, the hero in one of her books and sub-character in others, and I had to buy it. Then I started reading. Oh, joy! Sheer joy. I was caught up in the world and the characters.

Back to You is a reconciliation story. We met Trent and Laura in earlier books. At the end of one of them (maybe Because of You), there's a cliff hanger about Trent and Laura's marriage which really shocked me. So I was keen to see what happened to them. Plus I like these guys - they're military, real, hurt heroes. The witty banter between the men is incredibly real. The friendships between the women are forged in understanding and empathy. The relationships between the couples are normal, real, not easy and believable.

In Back to You, Laura and Trent have two kids. I like kids, but in stories sometimes they don't work for me. In this story, they are beautiful. They're part of Trent finding family again and some of the scenes made my heart melt. And there's hamsters, and from facebook I know Jessica Scott has a love-hate relationship with her kids' hamsters, so the hamsters made me chuckle, always!

Jessica Scott is a soldier who writes about soldiers. You can't get more real than that!


And then Play came out early. A week early, I got an email to say my pre-order was ready. What a shock! What a thrill! I love Kylie Scott's writing and world building. Although I have to admit I loved Skin and Flesh more than Lick, I was still going to read Play. And do you know, Play might have just gone to the favourite of all of them.


Play is Mal, the drummer's, book. Mal is hilarious. One of those clowns who entertains to hide himself from others. He's strong, funny, pushy, bossy, and completely sweet about it.

Mal meets Anne when she's having a really crappy day and she doesn't know how she'll keep going. Anne is a giver, and Mal finds this out within moments...and starts to give to her.

This is gorgeous, hilarious, sweet, heart breaking, and totally believable. Anne and Mal are amazing together. She seems like a pushover, but Mal knows how to fire her up and man, when she lets fly at him, she holds nothing back. What she won't say to others, Mal cops, in bucket loads.

So, this one kept me up until 5 am. I intended to read a bit and put it down - but I should know by now I'm not good at that once a book gets a stranglehold, and this one caught me good!

One thing though, there was a LOT of licking in this book...yet the previous one was called Lick. That had me having my own private chuckle every time the word came along :) But aside from private chuckles, I nearly woke my hubby laughing out loud in places.

Kylie Scott has such a way with banter and witty lines, and snappy dialogue. Play is an absolute gem. I totally loved it.

And now...back to the rest of my TBR pile. I hope I can find some other gems...

Phallic Friday - M/M stories

M/M are male/male romance stories. There's a huge explosion of these in recent years ... and what I find strange about them, is that most often women write them. I've been reading a few because I keep hearing someone say, "this one was good". So I grab it, hoping it will be. Usually, I don't believe it. Not one word of it.

I had a thing many years ago when M/M sex was a complete turn on. I've no idea why, and nothing really happened to spark this, but it was a phase I went through. I was single, had money (must have been between horses!), and bought a few M/M porn videos (I told you it was a while ago!) to watch. This may seem strange, but as a single woman, watching another woman didn't do anything for me. I like men, so this M/M thing seemed to make sense to me. And heterosexual porn is all cunt shots designed for male viewing.

I've always steered away from writing M/M because I don't really understand men, or men's emotions, or men's needs and wants. Sure I could guess at it but I don't really know, so I've never felt compelled to write it. But holy guacamole, some of these women who write this stuff must never have seen M/M porn, men in action, or had anal sex and enjoyed it. It does my head in that they'd write M/M when they're clearly writing a female story with added penises.

Take this for example - these aren't direct quotes, just what I remember:

The problem with having gay sex was that everything took so long. You had to use lube, lots of lube, and then stretch the anus before you could penetrate.

You do? Okay, the lube helps, but you can have rough sex without it. You can use spit, which is always handy. And there's no need to use your fingers first. Sure you can, but it's not a prerequisite, anuses are muscles just like other openings. You can push in. And if you're into anal sex, your anus can anticipate and be relaxed and ready to accept.

Men who speak like women, sometimes with an added swearword to make him male. Like, "Oh, sweetie, I just love you so damn much." or "Come here and give me your big, hard cock, baby."

Men speak like this? No man I know does. Maybe I mix with wrong men but this sounds like women, soppy women. I don't believe these types of M/M dialogues.

The story arc is: one of the men always penetrates the other, then when they finally declare their love, he lets himself be penetrated.

Seriously? Their love is all about penetration? Would you have that as a resolution in a M/F book? I know we used to - when they got married and finally had sex - but haven't romance stories grown past that love before sex thing? And is all men's love based on sex? Surely there are emotions involved. Strong emotions - I've seen the fallout from broken relationships, it's not much different to my female friend's devastation.

The story arc is: one man is strong and tough, the other emotional. When the strong tough man breaks and cries, then they're totally in love, to live happily ever after.

Emotional awakening is not a bad character arc, but when it's men howling like a baby, I don't buy it. Strong men can be emotional and open up without howling. Does it need to be so obvious - and so obviously female?

Maybe I'm being deliberately snarky about it...but I can't recall a M/M written by a woman when I thought it was authentic, when I could believe the characters and the story and the sex. I've heard that M/M stories are written for women by women...by why? Why do you want the extra penises added on two characters who are clearly women (or at least one is)? Is it an escapism fantasy thing?

In May, there's a M/M book coming out written by a man. I'm looking forward to that. I want to see how he writes. And hopefully I won't have to delete this post, or eat my words (I am only a woman looking in on an all male world!)   :)

Wildlife Wednesday - Koel

Sorry for the view of this photo...but Koels are the most elusive bird I know. Have you seen one? Have you heard them mentioned? Know what they are?

They're the biggest secret in the bird world - but they're noisy buggers!

We had Koels around the home I grew up in, but I never knew what they were. They have a loud, distinctive call, but they're very difficult to spot.

I used to be in a wildlife rescue group, and one day I had to rescue and injured Koel. I thought I knew my birds, but I'd never seen one of these! It was a revelation. I had to look up my bird book to see what they were, who they were like, what they ate, how they lived. They're fascinating.

And around my home now are Koels. I hear them often but see them rarely. We have a awning thing (a frame with sarlon mesh stuff that comes off the house and protects us from the strong western summer sun) and twice a Koel has got stuck under the awning and I've assisted them on their way out - but didn't take a photo! Once I took a photo, but you couldn't recognise the mess as a bird (it wasn't a good shot!). And then the other week, I heard them and they had squawking young. It took a while but I scored this photo of one of the young ones.

Koels are large birds, bigger than a Currawong, and are related to cuckoos.

Now, this is how my bird book (Pizzey's A Field Guide to the Birds of Australia) describes the calls: Males utter a repeated far-carrying 'kooeel'. Also brisk rising 'quoy-quoy-quoy-quoy', falsetto 'quodel-quodel-quodel' or slightly mad rising 'weir-weir-weir-weir!' Females: shrill four-note brassy piping.

Once again, the Australian Museum website has great information, including this on breeding.

The Common Koel is a brood parasite, that is, it lays its eggs in the nests of other bird species. Common hosts are the Red Wattlebird, friarbirds, the Magpie-lark, and figbirds. A single egg is laid in the host's nest and once hatched the chick forces the other eggs and hatchlings out of the nest. When the chick leaves the nest it roosts in the outer branches of a tree, cheeping incessantly while the significantly smaller parents desperately search for sufficient food to satisfy the nagging youngster. This is a full-time job, as the young Koel will grow to nearly twice their size. Eventually, it migrates northwards, usually later than the adults, to return as a breeding bird the following spring.

Sunday Story - instalove

In a couple of the reviews for The Virginity Mission, it was said that it was "too instalove" for them. I've been thinking about that for a long time now. And I'm a bit worried because Deep Diving isn't a lot different.

I'm not really one for big conflict. I'm non-confrontational because I hate the stress and bother of conflict. I hate the churning nerves, the hurt, the horribleness. And this is true in my writing. I can't do big conflict. I can't even think of something that would be a huge conflict, let alone write it.

And with erotic romance, shouldn't it be instalust that turns into love? That's kind of what I thought The Virginity Mission was and what I think Deep Diving is.

But I guess if I can get an antagonistic beginning with an underlying sexual tension, then that ramps up the feelings and emotions, doesn't it? So I've been trying to think up a story where I could manage to do that. (I know, it's only taken 8 months of thinking!!)

But last night I think I might have cracked one. I think I might have a story beginning, where the hero and heroine don't like one another, then are at odds over their work, but all the while there's an underlying burning need to act on pheromones and bonk their brains out.

So...I know I wasn't starting anything new until I finished my old bits and pieces...but a woman's allowed to change her mind, huh?

So we'll see if this story works. I'd paste the start here if I could but it's only scribble on paper for now! Let's see i
f I can crank it out in a few months. Fingers crossed!

Phallic Friday - underage sex & peer pressure

I read a news article through the week, which of course I can't find now, that was discussing underage sex where a judge said that kids didn't realise that what they were doing was wrong (I think it was 13 year olds having sex).

And that may be true, but there's also the case that kids also don't know how to get out of tricky situations, especially about sex. Sometimes there isn't the openness at home to discuss these issues. Sometimes they're not confident enough to know they have the right to say 'no', or to enforce that.

In the age of cyber-sex, where 'sex' is easy because it's remote, I think it must be really unsettling to be a teenager where peer pressure and natural curiosity collide and there's an easy, non-messy way to experiment.

In my twenties and thirties, I worked with teenage girls as a group leader. We were all about empowering girls to be good leaders, giving them skills and confidence. They were aged 11 to 15 years, so they'd just started high school. One girl was a bit of a trouble-maker, but a fun one, so we got along okay. After she started high school, she went a bit weird. She was in a co-ed school, in the 'rougher' part of town.

I forget what happened but I ended up pulling her aside and she spilled all this stuff. The kid was twelve and some older boys were putting the hard word on her to have sex with them, or they'd tell the whole school she was frigid. She was terrified but backed into a corner.

And you know, they don't teach you what to do in these situations! I just had to wing it. And what the hell do you say in this situation? My brain was going a thousand to the dozen trying out all the scenarios and what I could do.

I questioned her a lot about how she felt. Hoping she'd come to a conclusion so I didn't have to tell her what to do - as I strongly suspected she needed to learn to work this out herself.

She hated the guys. They weren't attractive at all. She wasn't ready for sex. She didn't think her friends had been pressured. She wanted to tell them no, but didn't know how.

Phew! I was somewhere along the way to knowing what she wanted. She just needed a way to stop the bullying.

My Dad had always told me bullies were people who had never been stood up to before. I firmly believed this. He would have told me to slug them, but there were more than 1 boy, and by this stage I'd worked out that girls were never as tough as boys, especially boys in gangs (I did learn a few things in my misspent youth, and by moving out of the city!).

So, I looked her in the eye and said, "What would you really like to say to these guys?" She hemmed and hawed and couldn't say anything. So I held her shoulder and said, "You'd like to tell them to 'fuck off', wouldn't you?" She used that language, and I didn't (well, not then and not there), so it startled her.

"Yeah," she said. "But will that work?"

Crap? What was I to say? I went with the truth. "I don't know, but it's worth a try isn't it? Frigid's only a word, and it's better than having to have sex with them all." (and from our Q&A I knew having sex with them all was a bigger fear for her than being called frigid).

So, she went off. I fell in a heap of nerves.

Next week, the girl struts into our meeting like she's the Queen. So much confidence, so much happier, no longer bowed down by pressure. It was great to see... but I didn't know if it was because she'd had sex, or not, and it's not something you want to ask a 12 year old! She struts by and says, "Well, I did it," and grins.

Oh, right. That tells me a lot!

It took ages before I could get her alone and say, "what happened?" My heart was in my throat. I had visions of her parents coming down to kill me when she ended up pregnant or seriously ill. It's such an awful responsibility to give advice.

She grinned. "I told them to 'fuck off' and they've left me alone." She threw her arms around me. "Thank you."

It was such a simple solution. A part of her childhood that she's probably forgotten. But for me, it was excruciating. And such a relief to know that it worked out for her.

And today, when everything is at your fingertips, I wonder if girls have the time to stop and stress out before doing? I wonder if they have someone to talk to, sort out problems with, chat to about these issues?

Growing up is bloody hard and sometimes I think we've made it even more difficult.

Wildlife Wednesday - cuttlefish

 I love scuba diving and snorkelling, and my new book, Deep Diving, has quite a few scenes in it to share my passion.

One of my favourite creatures underwater is the Cuttlefish. And I don't think I put one in Deep Diving - oh, gosh, must check now!

Cuttlefish look a bit like squid or octopus but they're a bit boxier, more inquisitive and lots more fun.

The first time I fell in love with cuttlefish was when I was diving with friends on the south coast of NSW (when I lived inland) and this cuttlefish floated out to check us out. They kind of appear like on a wave as they undulate through the water. One of my friends is a dive instructor and all round unflappable - the kind of person you want to dive with! He took out his regulator (the air giver) and pulsed it near the cuttlefish. Seriously, you could see the cuttlefish writhe in pleasure. So he sat there, taking the occasional puff of air and shooting bubbles over this very appreciative cuttlie, who then hugged his forearm with his tentacles. It was the most magical thing. And right there, fell in love with cuttlefish.

I don't have any pictures of them underwater, just this small cuttlefish 'bone' washed up on teh beach. But the Australian Museum site has great pictures and a video. You can check it out here.

The cuttlefish 'bone' found on the beach is actually the internal shell of the cuttlefish.

Sunday Story - Burial Rites

I had the absolute pleasure of reading Burial Rites by Hannah Kent. I'd read a lot of accolades for this book, and often (in my mind) the book doesn't live up to it BUT in this case, Burial Rites deserves all the accolades and more.

The book is haunting, beautiful, poignant and terrible all at once. The story is so absorbing that I lost myself in it. I lost the magic of the words, the thrill of the gorgeous writing - because the story became engrossing and the view of Iceland enthralling.

I've read that Hannah Kent went to Iceland as an exchange student where she heard of the tale of the last woman executed in Iceland, Agnes Magnúsdóttir, and was captivated by it. And so began her study. Hannah Kent's love for Iceland, and her empathy for Agnes, truly shines through in the story.

Agnes is incredibly dignified and so accepting of her fate that it's very difficult not to fall in love with the character Hannah Kent has created.

I always get confused by a historical fiction based on fact because it is so easy to believe everything in the book. And reading the amount of research done for this novel, I'd like to believe every word as truth.

This is a beautiful book. Don't miss reading it.

Phallic Friday - Lust

The days are whipping by at the moment,as Friday has coming storming upon me, let me take the chance to introduce you to...

LUST OBJECTS

The Naughty Ninjas (a collaborative author blog of which I am a part)  have sourced some truly kooky things. You can find them here: http://www.naughtyninjas.net/the-daily-ninja/

There are normal things like t-shirts and underpants, but always with a twist - like the underpants come in a a little round tin, like lip balm! There's art - created while having sex, of course. And there are things that defy belief - like a pole dancer alarm clock!

So, treat yourself to a lust object. Even if you don't buy, they're certainly worth a look and a chuckle!!

And Rhyll 'the lady' Biest, one of my regular visitors and a Naughty Ninja, is the usual source of these objects and other strange phenomena!

Wildlife Wednesday - mangroves

I'm a huge fan of mangroves. Mangroves grow in the rivers and estauries of coastal Australia, but not where there's surf. There's a huge expanse of riverine areas in which mangroves can grow, but often they're knocked down to enhance the view for people, which usually leads to river degradation, erosion, and other problems. They're a vital part of the estuarine/riverine environment.

I grew up in Sydney, but we lived near a creek that ran into the Parramatta River. When I was a kid, there was still space to run around and it was safe to do that. So I spent a bit of time in the magical mangroves, getting my feet swallowed by stinking mud, climbing in the trees, racing around the space.

And my Dad's family are fishermen - not as for work, but for pleasure. And as I grew older and was allowed to go fishing, I learned that the mangroves were breeding and feeding grounds for fish.

Then in 1988, the bicentenary year for Australia, in my mangrove playground a giant park was created to preserve the mangroves and educate people about them (that wasn't the main aim, but for me it was the most important feature). I was at Uni, so I volunteered at the park as a sort of work experience. I learned so much about mangroves. I helped take kids on trips into the mangroves where we did bark rubbing, scooped the water with nets to find small fish. I helped in the education unit where we had fish tanks to show kids what grew in estuaries and mangroves - fish, shrimp, seahorses, hermit crabs, etc. - we had a touch table of sand and shells, sea urchins, mangrove seeds, leaves. It was a dream job. If you're in Sydney, pop into Bicentennial Park at Homebush Bay (oh, it's right near the RWA conference location!)

Then in 1988-89, I went to the Daintree and did some scientific work in the tropical magroves. Some of that work I included in The Virginity Mission. I loved it, but unlike Mac, I didn't get a job up there!

I'll share a bit of the strangeness of mangroves -
the seeds are round, fat disks that float and travel to new places on tidal movements, then they germinate and turn into a small seedling (like the picture), which try to take root and colonise another areathey grow in really salty conditions and the plants get rid of the salt by excreting it out the back of their leaves. Have a look next time, you might see white crystals, or if you're game, have a lick and taste the salt!plant roots need air to breathe, but mangroves spend a lot of time under water (as the tide comes in and goes out). Underneath mangrove plants, you'll often see little sticks poking up from the ground, these are called pneumatophores, and breathe for the plant, helping get oxygen to the rootsthere are different species of mangrove trees, but all can tolerate salty and water logged conditions in their own waytropical mangroves have amazing roots structures which can be like trees themselvesIf you want to know more about mangroves, try this website for MangroveWatch