Ute Carbone's Blog, page 4

T is for Theater #AZBlogChallenge

Stephanie, the heroine of my sweet romance, Searching for Superman, works at the Rialto--an old regional theater that's being restored. The theater plays an important part in the story. Below is how it is first introduced, early in the book after Stephanie's sister enlists her help in getting a Cinderella character for daughter Sophie's birthday party.  Stephanie considered what to do on the two block walk back to work. She hadn’t the foggiest idea where she could find Cinderella on short notice. A lot of people, Liz included, figured that because Stephanie worked in a theater she had her finger on the pulse of every entertainment venue in upstate New York. Nothing could have been further from the truth. In the first place, the Rialto hadn’t had its
grand reopening. And in the second, she was not the theater director.

She was Conrad Finch’s assistant and her job consisted of answering phones and e-mail, sorting the bills, and bringing Conrad soy vanilla lattes from Starbucks. Like the one she was trying not to spill as she walked.

That is not to say that she didn’t love the Rialto. It was the oldest theater in the Capitol district, though like the rest of the city of Schenectady, it was struggling to make a comeback. Conrad Finch
was nothing if not passionate about making this happen, and Stephanie was proud he’d chosen her to help him. Conrad had a strong vision of someday, when the theater would attract name acts and Broadway road revivals. They would host a regional theater group and maybe they would even show the Metropolitan Opera live on screen as they had in a similar theater in New England last year.

Stephanie could almost see it. Though today, with the cold March wind sweeping stray paper to the curb in front of the marquee,the place looked downright shabby, like a garish old woman who​ had
insisted on one too many face-lifts.
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S is for Ship #A-Z blog challenge

The Sweet Lenora series has at it's heart the lifelong love of a clipper ship captain and a shipbuilder's daughter. The two of them have a love of the sea and sailing in common--and all of the books contain some aspect of this. In Sweet Auralie, Lenora and Anton, married ten years, have lost a child. Anton believes that Lenora's grief can be soothed by reminding her of her passion for sailing.  We went to the docks, noisy with sailors coming in and out of the taverns and houses of ill repute. It was an unsavory place at any hour, made more so by the covering of night. “Trust me,” Anton said, as he handed me into our skiff.

“You mean to take me to Willow? What have you in mind, to kidnap me finally after all these years?”

Anton took up the oars. “It has been nearly two years since we sailed. I fear you have forgotten her.”

I knew he felt most alive when we were heeled into the wind. He said nothing as we climbed aboard, the rigging creaking in the wind as the ship swayed. We’d awoken the ghosts that resided here, though perhaps they were not ghosts, rather the memories Anton recounted for me as we stood upon the deck.  “Do you remember the day we first sailed into Shanghai port? You stood at the rail like one enchanted.”

“Aye.” I looked to the night sky blanketing us. “I remember, too, how you taught me to navigate by the stars.”

“You were an able student, Lenora. It is no surprise, you were born to sail. If I can give you anything that might ease your mind, it is but this, to stand upon the deck again and feel the roll of waves under your feet. You and I, we are made for the taste of salt, for the wind.”

I took his words to heart and I put my arms about him and kissed him for having reminded me what I had forgotten.

“There is more,” he said as we broke the kiss. He took me by the hand and led me to our quarter. It had
changed not an iota since I last stepped aboard and the memories became very real indeed. There was the bed upon which Anton and I had slept and loved. I thought for a moment he meant to lead me to
it, to remind of how often we found each other in this place, how often the fire between us had been sparked and fanned into a conflagration. And, oh, how I remembered. The fine hard muscles of his shoulders under my fingers and the ship rocking us, the way he would cry out my name. We had grown distant in this since Robert took ill. The hurt of his death had drained me of my passion, and so
night after night I had lain with Anton by my side, feeling so far away from the love he gave that I might as well have lain upon the moon.

“We have spent many a happy night here, you and I,” he said, still clutching my hand in his.

“We will again.” I closed my eyes and told myself to be fearless, to love my man full and whole, he deserved no less. I kissed him soundly and we stood lost in one another for a moment.

He stroked my face then went to the chest that stood next to the desk. Out of it, he pulled a paper, scrolled and fastened with a ribbon. He removed the ribbon and unrolled the document and motioned for me to join him. “Here is the other part of my reason for wanting to sail to New England and soon.” 

I knew what it was, though I had not seen it since before we had sailed the first time to Shanghai. “The blueprint for Sweet Lenora.” I ran my fingers along the lines I had taken such care to draw so long ago. more A-Z Challenge More about The Sweet Lenora Series

R is for Rum #A-Z Challenge

It seems to me you can't write a book about sailing the high seas in the 19th century without at least some mention of run. Anton Boudreaux, captain of the Sweet Lenora, did keep a store of it onboard. Which lead to some confusion as to his cook, Rupert's condition, before the truth--and a villain--was revealed.  Maurice’s face was white in the light of the candle he held, his thin body shivering to the marrow. Seeing him in such a state made me forget my anger. “It’s Cook,” he said. “You must come.”

Lenora made her way to the door and I bid her stay behind, but she was a stubborn lass and would have none of it. Maurice led the way to the galley and there we found Rupert lying face down on
the table. I thought at the first that he had gotten into the store of rum that was under his watch. The man was known to have a taste for it, but he never drank to the point of incapacity and the thought that he had both angered and surprised me. Then he raised his head. Lenora gasped and I feared for a moment she would faint, for the cook’s face was a hideous sight. The skin along one cheek puckered, angry red streaks running rivulets from his eye to his neck like tears.

“Get me a cloth and fresh water,” Lenora said. I might have known it would take more to shake my girl and for this I was sore glad.

Maurice ran to do as she asked. Rupert flinched as I drew near and I knew he was not in control of his senses. “What has happened?” I demanded.

“Accident.” The word hissed from Rupert’s throat.

Maurice returned and Lenora took the wet cloth and held it to the cook’s face. She was tender at the task, but poor Rupert blacked out from the pain of it nonetheless.

“What happened?” I demanded again, this time of the cabin boy.

“’Twas the soup. Cook fell into it. Boiling, it was.”

Lenora wrapped a dry cloth over the wound.

“How, pray tell,” I asked, “does a cook fall face first into a pot of soup?”

“I can’t say, sir.”

I took Maurice by the shoulders and attempted to shake the sense back into him. “You can’t say, or won’t say? I need the truth, boy.”

Lenora stepped forward. “Anton, please.”

“I need the truth,” I repeated. I’ll admit I did not like that she had stepped into the affair.

She turned to the boy. “If you know what happened, Maurice, you must say.”

“I have told you. He fell into the soup.”

I grumbled, ready to throttle him again. Then Lenora said, “You and I both know cooks don’t fall
into the soup unless they are sore drunk. And I don’t believe that to be the case.” Maurice stared at my wife, seeming uncertain that he had heard about drunkenness from the mouth of a lady, and I had to
suppress a grin. Lenora stood her ground. “So Cook was drunk, then?” 

Maurice looked at his shoes. “No, ma’am.”

I stared at the boy. He blinked up at me and whispered, “’Twas no accident. Mr. Abercrombie dunked Cook’s head into the boiling pot."
More A-Z Challenge More on The Sweet Lenora Series

Q is for Queen #A-Z Challenge

I have two books with the word queen in the title. The P-Town Queen is the name of a boat that plays an important role in that story. The Sausage Queen is a person, Mandy Minhouser, the main character and tour guide through the quirky world that is the small town of Kassenburg. Her "title" was given to her by her son, five- year- old Sammy, who drew a rather provocative picture of his mother. A picture that raised eyebrows and a summons for Mandy and husband Randy to the school psychologist's office.   The school system works fast in matters of questionable drawings by five-year-olds. It didn’t help I was a known garden hat poser, and Randy’s borrowing of Ricky’s cruiser had become common knowledge. Mrs. Seuss called the following Monday to say the school psychologist, Mr. Helprin, wanted to see me and Randy the following day.

So on Tuesday, Randy and I made a second trip to the principal’s office. “We might get detention this time,” said Randy.

We didn’t. Mrs. Seuss said the barest of hellos and led us down the hall to the psychologist’s office.
Mr. Helprin was a tall skinny man with stick-up hair who bounced on his heels. Sammy was playing with play dough in one corner of the bright little office, which had a kid-size table, a rug area, and a ton of toys. Dolls mostly, but also blocks and crayons and drawing paper.

Sammy looked up from his play dough kneading and held up a long cigar-shaped blue piece. “Look. A sausage.”

Mr. Helprin began bouncing as though on a trampoline. He grabbed Sammy’s picture from his desk and tacked it to an art easel. He should have labeled it exhibit A in the “demented parents raise
demented child” trial.

“Sammy, would you come over here and tell Mother and Father what you told me about your drawing, please?” 

Sam stood by his picture like the proud exhibitor of a major work of art. “Just as you told me,” said Mr. Helprin.

“Once upon a time,” Sammy began. Randy’s stories, it seemed, had taken root. “Big Bill had a really big sausage. And then Big Bill died, and Mommy gave head and was the sausage queen.” 

I started to laugh. I laughed so hard I had to sit down on the rug. Mr. Helprin  bounced harder.

“You may be excused, Sam,” said Mr. Helprin. And Sammy, who’d begun giggling, went off with a finger wave. I couldn’t say see you later. I was laughing so hard I’d begun to cry.

“Sausage is an interesting euphemism,” said Mr. Helprin.

I snorted. “Euphemism,” I said to Randy. “Bill’s Big and Tasty.”

“Oh crap,” said Randy who had joined me on the carpet, “Big Bill’s euphemism.”

“I hardly think this is a laughing matter,” said Mr. Helprin. “He’s talking about head. He’s talking about sausage.” Mr. Helprin drew imaginary quotation marks around “head” and “sausage,” which I found hysterical.

“Stop,” I said. “You’re killing me.”

“Your son is talking about head and about tasty big sausage.”

“You’re not from around here, are you?” said Randy once he’d regained his capacity to speak.

“I hardly see how where I’m from has any bearing.”

I’d managed to compose myself enough to stand up and walk over to exhibit A. “This,” I pointed to the crooked boxes in Sammy’s picture, “is Bill Ludowski’s sausage factory. Bill’s Big and Tasty, available at your local market.” I started laughing again. “God, that innuendo hasn’t been funny in a long time.”

“Sausage factory?” Mr. Helprin stopped bouncing and started looking confused.

“As in Italian hot and sweet. As in kielbasa,” said Randy.

“This,” I pointed to the stick figure, “is me eating a sausage. I am wearing a crown, because somewhere along the line Sammy decided I was the sausage queen.”

“Why?” asked Mr. Helprin.

“Because when Big Bill died, he bequeathed the factory to my grandmother and made me CEO. In other words, the head of sausage.

Mr. Helprin had a sheepish grin on his face. “So that…” he said pointing to the giant penis.

“Sometimes,” said Randy, “a sausage is just a sausage" More A-Z Challenge More on Confessions of the Sausage Queen

P is for Penguin #A-Z challenge

My latest book, Georgette Alden Starts Over written under my pen name, Annie Hoff, has a penguin on the cover. Penguins add some comic relief and a bit of a challenge to this romantic comedy. Here's the first introduction to them--a scene where the title character, Georgette, meets up with an old director, Kent Markham, to ask a favor. Seems he has a favor to ask as well.... Kent lived in a high rise for the elderly a few blocks from Georgette’s building. He answered the door wearing florescent green yoga pants and a matching shirt that looked like a pajama top without buttons. His feet were bare, long toes with cracked yellow nails topping off long feet at the base of spindly legs that gave him a sort of aging Big Bird look. Georgette made a mental note to get
a pedicure and soon. 

“Come in, dear Georgette. Do come in!” Kent put a gnarled hand on Georgette’s elbow and led her through his hall to a small and barely furnished room with a futon to one side and a yoga mat on the other. “Last time I saw you, you were just a slip of a girl.” Kent put both hands to Georgette’s shoulders and held her out at arm’s length. “And now? You are a magnificent and mature woman.”

Georgette didn’t particularly like the word mature, especially since it came out of the mouth of a man who had matured beyond all expectation.

“So.” Kent clapped his hands together and bowed at her before gesturing to the futon. “Won’t you sit
down? I have some delightful oolong tea. I will fetch us each up a cup.”

“Delightful,” repeated Georgette as she watched his skinny frame disappear into the kitchen area.

He called back to her, “How long has it been since we’ve worked together?” 

“A few years? Quite a few,” Georgette answered.

The only response this time was a clanging noise. Kent probably hadn’t heard her and besides, it was awkward holding a conversation through two rooms. Georgette put a hand to either side of her on the futon’s velvet cover. It was soft, but who knew what hid inside the nap. She put her hands on her lap.
Kent came back with two steaming cups of greenish tea and handed her one. Instead of sitting beside her, he sat Indian style on the yoga mat. He raised his cup to salute her and she took a sip of strong and bitter tea.

Kent was looking at her in a way that Georgette was sure could be described as ogling. Yes, he was most definitely ogling. She remembered something else about Kent Markham—he had tried to seduce every actress on Our Time Tomorrow. He had succeeded more than once with some of the women, who thought sleeping with the director would help their careers. It hadn’t helped to get them anything but a roll in the hay with Kent. Georgette had known as much from the start. She hadn’t let him seduce her then and she was certainly not about to let him seduce her now.

“I’m happy to shoot the commercial spots if you’ll do me a small favor.” Kent smiled at her. She wondered if he still had his own teeth.

“Favor? What kind of favor?”

“A personal favor.” Great. Here it comes. Georgette took another sip of bitter tea. “Help me free the
penguins.”

The tea spurted out of Georgette’s mouth, sprinkling her blue linen blouse. At least she’d chosen a
washable fabric. Kent was spry for an octogenarian. He was in the kitchen and back two seconds later with a handful of paper towels.

Georgette dabbed at the spots. “Did you say penguins?” It had occurred to Georgette, in the brief
moment Kent was in the kitchen, that penguins might be some sort of quaint euphemism connected to his ogling.

“Yes,” Kent said, taking the paper towels and going to deposit them in the kitchen, “from the Bronx Zoo.”

Kent came back and plopped down on the yoga mat.

“Excuse me for asking, but why would you want to take penguins from the Bronx Zoo?”

“Why?” Kent jumped up again and began pacing. “Because penguins are sentient beings and they deserve better than to be confined in enclosures! Don’t be fooled by how comfortable those enclosures may look. A prison is a prison.”

Georgette blinked. Kent’s impassioned speech left her speechless.

“How would you like to spend your life in an enclosure?”

Georgette tried to remember the penguin enclosure at the zoo. She had only a vague recollection, but animal cruelty did not come to mind when she thought about it. How horrible could it be to be fed, watered, and sheltered with your nearest and dearest? Georgette noted the crazed look in Kent’s eyes and knew he wouldn’t share her point of view.

More A-Z Challenges More about Georgette Alden

O is for Old

In Sweet Auralie, the last book of the Sweet Lenora series, Lenora wants to uncover the truth about her father's death ten years earlier. She goes to visit Mr. Eldridge, who worked as a master carpenter in the shipyard owned by her family. He's an old man now, long retired.  The Eldridges lived in a small cottage near the harbor, weathered and a bit shabby; a few of the clapboards had come loose and needed to be nailed down. The garden, while still lush and green
on this September morn, was overrun. Still, the place had a welcoming feel, perhaps because it reminded me of our little cottage in San Francisco as it had been when Anton and I first moved into it.

Mr. Eldridge answered my knock. It had been ten years since I had seen him last, and these years showed upon his face, which was more leathery than I remembered it and his hair, which was flecked
in grey. Still, his eyes were warm and there was a sparkle in them.

“Miss Lenora, well, aren’t you a sight. You’ve grown into a fine lady, looks like to me.”

I felt my cheeks heat at the compliment, as though I were still a child of five. “It is good to see you, Mr. Eldridge.”

“I remember you as a mere spit of a girl, running about the shipyard.”

“Getting underfoot, I would imagine.” 

“Nay. You were always a curious one, and smart as a whip.” 

Mr. Eldridge ushered me into the parlor, where a tabby cat lay curled on one of the two chairs set by the unlit fireplace. He shooed the cat and offered me the chair. “Where’s my manners? I have tea. I’ll go fetch it.” 

The cat eyed me suspiciously as her owner went to the kitchen and returned a few moments later balancing two cups in his hands. “Oh, me. I forgot to ask. Cream and sugar?” 

“Black is fine.”

“I do apologize. I’m a bit discombobulated of late,” he said, handing me the cup with the slow sort of care usually reserved for a raw egg. “I’ve been a poor housekeep since my Mary passed on.” 

I had a vague memory of Mrs. Eldridge, a round and jolly woman. As a child, I imagined I would have liked her for a grandmother. “I’m so sorry for your loss.”

Mr. Eldridge brushed the air as he sat in the chair opposite, the cat winding about his shins. “ ‘Tis five years, now. I’ve gotten used to being alone, though not a day goes by I don’t think of her. The realities of living to ripe old age.” He took a sip of his tea and looked at me. “If I may be so bold, I don’t imagine you came by to reminisce with an old man.”

His directness startled me and I took a sip of my tea to cover it. “Actually, I look to reopen the shipyard. I remember how great a carpenter you were, I thought perhaps—”.

He waved his hand again to stop my pretty speech. “I hear tell the shipyard is being sold, now that John Brewer has died.”

“The shipyard belongs, at least in part, to me, Mr. Eldridge. The primary reason I have come back to Salem is to reclaim it. I hope to build another super clipper, like Sweet Lenora, only sleeker along the line of her hull and deeper, so she can cut the waves all the faster.”

“Ah, Sweet Lenora, now there was a ship.” He smiled and gazed out the window as though she were still at anchor in the harbor. “We spent a deal of time fashioning her. Mr. Brewer wanted the prow pointed sharp as knife. She was a beauty.” He looked again to me. “I heard she was fired. Pity to destroy such a ship.”

“Yes, it was a shame. I watched her burn. ‘Twas a sad day. It is why I am resolved to build another.”

“You will build her? No offense, Miss Lenora, but you—”

“Are but a woman?” I finished for him. “I was not underfoot for naught, sir. You’ll recall I spent many a day by your side. I redrafted Lenora’s blueprint. I kept her dimensions in my head.” I smiled at him. “And I even went so far as to marry her captain.”

He nodded. “Ah, yes. The captain. He has gained a reputation.” From the way he said it, I knew Anton aroused in him an unfounded suspicion. No doubt rumors had flown about the town. I would do my best to dispel them, here and now
.
“My husband is the finest, most honorable man I have ever known, Mr. Eldridge, and I have been lucky to have the acquaintance of many a fine man, so I believe myself to be a fair judge.”

Mr. Eldridge cleared his throat. “Yes, I imagine you would think so. Would you care for more tea?”

I was not so quick to let it go. “You seem to have more to say upon the subject.”

He examined his cup for a moment. “’Tis nothing, Miss Lenora. You remind me of your father, is all. He was a fine man, I would not have stayed in his employ for so many years were it otherwise. He always believed the best of everyone and, in some ways, this can be a fault, for it blinded him to...” He stopped and took a deep swallow of tea. 

“I know of my uncle’s business, Mr. Eldridge. I am no longer a child, I understand the world better than you may imagine.” 

“Then I advise you be careful, Miss Lenora. Your father, and even your uncle, got themselves tangled into a net. I fear it drowned them both.”

“How do you mean, drowned them?”

Mr. Eldridge shook his head. “I have spoken out of turn. It is a bad habit of the old, they forget their place.”

And still, I would not let it go. “You must tell me. I swear on my life, on my child’s life, I would not use your words against you.”

He swallowed deep, as though to gain his courage. “I should not spread rumor, and particularly not of something that happened so long ago. It’s been ten years, has it not?”

A feeling of dread crept over me. “Since my father’s accident.”

“’Twas no accident,” he whispered. “I’m not the only one around these parts who believe it weren’t.”


More A-Z Challenge More on Sweet Auralie

N is for Name #A-Z Challenge

I've always been fascinated by names, maybe because I have an odd one that's  hard to figure out how to pronounce (it's ooh-tah).  Naming characters has always been fun for me. And in the P-Town Queen, I had a little extra fun. Marco, on the run from a mob boss, does not want to use his real name when he applies for a job. Thinking  fast, he remembers where he first saw  the beautiful Nikki, his potential future boss. H'd been sitting on a bench near the town wharf…. ​I found Fishy’s without a whole lot of trouble and asked the girl at the cash register about the job. I had turned from wondering about Dr. Silva to wondering what kind of research you did at a t-shirt hut.
“Hey, Fish,” shouted the girl to a blonde guy squatting over a box of
snorkels, “you hiring an assistant?”
“Research assistant,” I said, when Fish stopped diving into the box
so he could look me over.
“You want Nick Silva.” Fish pointed to an “Employees Only” sign
taped onto a metal door.
I went through the door and there, in the corner of the room, was a metal desk and sitting on the desk was the redhead from the pier. I couldn’t have been more surprised if it had been Fat Phil sitting there. My stomach did a loop-di-loop, like I was in the sixth grade and just found out the popular girl had the locker next to mine. I told myself to quit being a dumb ass. I had
exactly two cents rubbing together in the pocket of my only pair of pants.
She was talking to the guy from the pier. The younger one that looked like her. She caught me in her gorgeous brown eyes, blinked a few times, and asked if she could help me. “Yeah, yes,” I said. “I’m here about the research. The assistant. Job. Research assistant.”
“Find me an office and they will come,” the guy said.
To which the redhead gave him a look that might have killed him.
“And how is it that job applicants magically appear?” she asked him.
“The flyer,” I said. “At Ella’s Place.”
“Flyer at Ella’s Place?” The redhead turned the killer stare at me.
“They weren’t. She didn’t. They were under the counter. I saw. I was. I really need the job.” I took a deep breath. “So if you tell Dr. Silva. I’m available. For an interview.” Jesus, Mary, and Joe, it was lucky that drool didn’t come running out of my mouth.
The guy put a hand on my shoulder and said, real quiet, “She is Dr. Silva,” which really made me feel like a friggin’ idiot.
“Nick Silva? She’s Nick Silva?”
“N-i-k, as in Nicola,” the guy said.
“It’s a mistake. My mistake. I’m mistaken. Sorry.”
“She makes people nervous. But she’s not so tough. I’m her brother, I ought to know. Billy.” He held out his hand.
“I do not make people nervous,” Nik Silva said.
“Ask her about Rusty’s boat.”
Nik sighed. “There is no job. Mr.…?”
And here’s where things got dicey. In giving myself a new identity I forgot to give me a new name. Any self-respecting witness protection program will give you a new name and I sure as hell didn’t want to use the old one. Nikki Silva was kind of staring at me again and my pulse rate was up around two hundred, so I spit out the first thing came into my head.
“Parker. Parker Bench.” I wished, right after I said it, that I could have taken it back. I wished I’d have come up with something, anything, else: Jerry Lewis or Phillip Morris or Captain Crunch. Just about anything would have been better than Parker Bench.
Nikki raised her eyebrows. “Parker Bench?”
“It’s a family name,” I said, having to come up with some reason, quick, why I had such a dumb moniker.
“Well, like I said, Mr. Bench—”
“Call me Parker,” I said, feeling I might as well get into it. And, to tell the truth, the new name did kind of calm me down a little.

More A-Z Challenges More about The P-Town Queen

M is for Mother #A-Z Challenge

Beanie, the main character in Blueberry Truth, want nothing more than to have a family and be a mother. But she and her husband Mac are having trouble conceiving.  The scene below is Beanie's account of their first meeting with an infertility specialist.  ​The coffee table in Dr. Milletti’s waiting room is spread with books and pamphlets with titles shouting at you: “Get Pregnant Now!” and “You Can Do It Too!” I feel like I’m at a pregnancy pep rally. While I wait for Mac to get here, I entertain myself by making up cheers. “We’ve got ovulation! Go insemination!” I’m amusing myself enough to smirk, which is a lot better than concentrating on the slipknots being tied and untied in my stomach. Comfortable enough, the room has nice plushy chairs and a big window with a healthy spider plant, but I might as well be in a walk-in freezer. Smirking also works to keep my teeth from chattering.
I’m not sure what I expected, but I think I’d pictured Dr. Dowdy, some elderly gentleman who’ll take you by the hand and say things like “there, there, now.” Dr. call-me-John Milletti doesn’t look any older than Mac. He wears little gold posts in his ears. And he has a beard. A well-trimmed beard, true, but it makes him look like the psychologist at St. Luke’s, the crazy one who comes in once a month, observes the kids for two minutes, and comes up with a bullshit behavior modification plan we can’t possibly follow and wouldn’t work if we did. Prejudgment is unfair, I’ll grant you, but my first impression does little to make me comfortable in an already uncomfortable situation.
Dr. Milletti asks if we’ve finished the questionnaires, and Mac and I hand them in. “Like handing in homework.” I’m trying too hard to ease the tension.
“There will be quite a bit of homework,” says Dr. Milletti, and though he’s joking, it does nothing to help matters. Then he gets down to business. He goes over lists of causes, reviews the tests we’ll need to take, and outlines possible treatment. The words sperm, ovaries, and intercourse uttered any number of times. The words love, caring, and tenderness unspoken.
More A-Z challenge More about Blueberry Truth

L is for Lake #A-Z Challenge

The Tender Bonds is a more serious book that looks at family relationships and the things that bond us together. The setting is a small upstate New York town called Bensonville, which exists only in my imagination. A few miles out of town, nestled into the foothills of the Adirondacks, is a small lakeside community. Babylon Lake becomes a central part of the story as the scene where main character Patty's life has changed and will change again. Here is a first introduction to the place. 

​
​Back at the beach, I skipped rocks over the smooth, glass surface of water. I tried to remember if my father had ever brought me here and I couldn’t. But I could imagine it—the smell of hot dogs grilling on a charcoal fire, kids shouting and splashing in the water, the hot midsummer sun baking the sand. If my mother and I had stayed, I might have come here often. I might have swum in the mirrored water out to the dock, might have sunned myself there. Had my father been in my life, and I in his, things might have turned out differently. It did no good, this speculation. My father, who could have come for me, never had.
I got back into the car, my aim to drive around the small lake. I passed a camp store, still boarded up, at the edge of the camp city. Farther down, where the lake came to a small point,
there was an old amusement park, also closed. Farther still, at the crest of a hill overlooking the water, I came to a paint-chipped sign that read Babylon Hotel. I drove up the hilly dirt road, my car stumbling over rocks, until I was face to face with an ancient house that looked as though it had been transplanted from some small, starved-off plantation in the south. There were pillars, four of them, all too big for the façade, holding up the porch roof. On the roof, a neon sign buzzed like a misplaced antenna. I sat parked in the gravel drive, contemplating the closed sign hung on the door and the Miller beer sign in the window. I had never been here before, and yet there was something so familiar about the place I could feel it move through me. I was so wrapped in this thought that I didn’t hear the other car pull in, didn’t notice at all until there was a tapping on the driver’s side window. I startled to see a burly man, nose reddened, hair nearly depleted. His sausage fingers knocked against the window again.
“Can I help you out with something?” he asked when I rolled the window down.
“No. No you can’t.” I rolled the window shut and drove off, leaving the man standing in the drive of my father’s favorite watering hole.
Thundering down the roadway towards town, driving faster than was prudent, I passed the sign marking Shore Drive. Somewhere down that road had lived the Pearson family. Was Will Pearson still living here?
Curiosity got the best of me and I turned the car around. Shore Drive was a dirt road, the houses on it all but hidden by pines. Long drives with mailboxes indicated their locations. I drove along reading the names on the boxes and stopped when I came to the one marked Pearson. I turned up the long drive, which circled back to a Cape Cod-style house nestled in the pine grove. There was no car in the drive. In the side yard, a swing set stood rusting in the spring mud. Beyond this, the lake glistened and hovered through the trees. I listened for something, anything that would indicate some sort of life here. I imagined children laughing, but none materialized, just the swings moving back and forth, empty and creaking in the breeze.
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More A-Z Challenge More about The Tender Bonds

K is for Kassenburg #A-Z blog challenge

Kassenburg is the imaginary town in which my comedy, Confessions of the Sausage Queen is set. It's a typical small town tucked away in the western part of New York State, somewhere near Buffalo. I wanted a town that would also be a character of sorts, a small place where people accept one another's quirks and occasionally get on one another's nerves. The main character, Mandy, acts as both narrator and tour guide as she takes you through her story. 
The story begins with a funeral. Big Bill Ludowski , owner of the town's largest enterprise, Big Bill's Sausage, has died and is about to have a grand sendoff. Below is a scene from the funeral.
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We were late, of course, given the unfortunate circumstances I’ve already told to you. We missed the wake entirely. But the funeral could not start without a reverend. Which is why, when Sweet Sue looked over her shoulder toward the hearse’s open passenger door, she said, “Ah hell.”
Reverend Coney Hitchcock had climbed out of the hearse, taken off his shoes and socks, and climbed into the fountain.
Finster’s has a fountain. It was built by a semi-famous sculptor from Boston. Wally’s grandfather, George, had it commissioned. It is a massive thing, three marble basins with water flowing tier to tier. On either side of the bottom two basins sit splashing marble cherubs. In the center of the top fountain a cherub raises a golden scepter from whence the water spouts. Finster’s fountain is the largest statuary in Kassenburg. The giant chicken atop the Cluck and Chuck on the arterial ranks a distant and undistinguished second.
Coney Hitchcock had taken off his shoes and socks and was wading among the angels. Sweet Sue said, “Ah hell,” from the doorway, turned to Wally, grabbed the paper bag and told her son he’d better get the reverend out of there.
“Me?” Wally relinquished the bag.
“You’re the funeral director,” Sweet Sue said.
Funeral director or no, Wally was in no condition to confront the good reverend. It was a good thing, considering the circumstance, Gran took matters into her own hands. She wobbled down the stairs
to the fountain. I wobbled out after her.
Coney looked up from his wade. “Why Lila Rose. Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?” He stood with his hands folded in reverend-like fashion and smiled in a manner befitting a marble cherub.
“Reverend,” I ventured. Quietly, because I’ve heard people who live on imaginary love boats get perturbed by loud voices.
“Lila,” said the reverend, also quietly, “I’ve got terrible news.”
Gran stepped to the edge of the fountain at the reverend’s beckoning and the reverend waded over to her and bent close. “I’m afraid I’ve died,” he whispered. “And, I hate to be the bearer of worse news, but I’m afraid you’ve died too.” Reverend Coney blinked under his thick spectacles. He put a hand to Gran’s shoulder. “You’ve got an angel with you.”
“Angel?” Gran craned her neck. “Where?”
“Shush! Right behind you.”
Gran did a full turn. I almost followed suit. It was said the reverend heard voices and who’s to say where hallucinations come from?
“You mean Mandy?” Gran asked.
“You know her name?” The reverend sounded impressed by Lila’s familiarity. “Why Lila, how long you been dead for?”
“That’s no angel. That’s my own Mandy. You baptized her. Don’t you remember?”
The reverend shook his head as thought trying to jar thoughts loose. “Mandy? Veronica and Howie’s little girl? Little Mandy Minhouser?” The reverend climbed out of the fountain and honed in for closer inspection. His breath smelled of wintergreen mint, which was a good thing considering. “Why I’ll be. Mandy Minhouser.” He patted me on the head. “I’ll bet you get mistaken for an angel all the time.”
Have I mentioned the reverend was quite charming? More A-Z Challenge More about Confessions of the Sausage Queen