Susan Abel Sullivan's Blog, page 4

Cleo vs Me: Author/Character Smackdown!

Authors of first-person point-of-view novels are often accused of writing Mary Jane novels, that is, the protagonist is really the author in disguise (or maybe not so disguised). 
So just how similar am I to Cleo Tidwell, the star of my Cleo Tidwell paranormal mystery books?  

Well, let's see . . . 
Cleo lives in a Victorian home in Allister, Alabama.  I live in a Victorian home in Anniston, Alabama, but we do NOT have any black velvet paintings--haunted or otherwise--in the house.

Cleo is on her third marriage.  I've been married to the same man for 25 years.

Cleo lives next door to her sister, Molly, who has four girls.  I have a sister who isn't named Molly who has four girls who doesn't live next door to me.  Although it would be totally awesome if she did.


Cleo's husband is the director of bands at Allister State University.  I think my hubs played trumpet in 6th grade band. After that he took up football, although he was part of a musical folk group in high school and college and he plays guitar.  Readers often ask me if Bertram is based on my hubs.  The answer is a resounding NO. Writing about my husband is just too personal. He and Bertram share a couple of personality traits, but otherwise, he's nothing like Bertram.

Cleo is a collegiate majorette coach.  I was a majorette in high school and taught twirling lessons in high school and college, and more recently was the choreographer for my high school alumni majorette line. 

So is Cleo me?  Not really, although I do think of her as a hyped-up alter ego of myself in the same way that Batman is Bruce Wayne's alter ego, but we're really not the same person. My publisher did an uncanny job with finding a model for my book covers who looks an awful lot like a younger me, especially The  Weredog Whisperer cover.  Compare the book cover above with this picture of myself from a few years ago.  Someone even asked me if I posed for the cover! How flattering!

The Perils of a Dog Named Goober

Goober, also known as Goobs or The Goobster My dog Goober is, well, a big ole goober.  He's also a big galoot.  He an endearing dog with a very bad habit: he tends to eat what he chews up.  This habit nearly cost him his life last February when one of his dog toys got stuck between his stomach and intestines nearly perforating his bowel and requiring two extensive and expensive surgeries and a week in the animal hospital.  


And now he's back in the hospital again, having surgery for another obstruction.  And dang it, he was doing so good after recovering from the last surgery.  We threw out all of his old toys and only gave him Kong and Nylabone as per our vet's directions.  And even some of those are not Goober proof, so we had to toss some of those toys, too.  


Turns out he got blocked by twigs and leaves from the yard this time.  There's just never a dull moment with the Goobster around!!!


On another note, the eBook of my novel Haunted Housewives is half off at my publisher's website the rest of the month. Here's the scoop:


Now through Halloween,  SPECTER SPECTACULAR: 13 GHOSTLY TALES and HAUNTED HOUSEWIVES OF ALLISTER ALABAMA, first in the Cleo Tidwell Paranormal Mystery series by Susan Abel Sullivan, ebooks are 50% off when bought through the WWP website. (Use sale code HAUNTED at checkout.)
And our final Halloween bonus!
The witchy and funny GLAMOUR by Andrea Janes will be free to download from Amazon Kindle on Halloween day.

It's a Bird, it's a Plane, it's a Spaceship?

What if you rented a ritzy beach house for spring break only to discover upon arrival that you'd been booked into this funky spaceship house?


Well that's part of the premise of my 2nd Cleo Tidwell paranormal mystery novel THE WEREDOG WHISPERER.  The inspiration behind the flying saucer house in my book is this super cool spaceship house at Pensacola Beach, Florida.  I grew up in Gulf Breeze, Florida--the town you drive through to get to Pensacola Beach--and have fond memories of that flying saucer house from childhood.


Last weekend I was home for a high school alumni marching band reunion in Gulf Breeze and thought I'd stop by the spaceship house and snap a few photos.  My fictional town of Sugar Sand Beach, Florida is a composite of Pensacola Beach and Panama City Beach.  

So like the Paul Bunyan statue found in Bangor, Maine and Stephen King's novel IT, I now have my own wacky landmark that's both in a novel and a real place.  Check out the slideshow below for more real-life spaceship house photos, as well as Pensacola Beach!  What a great place to grow up!

Chicks with Sticks

First of all, what's a chick with a stick? Why, a baton twirler, of course!  


My paranormal-mystery solving protagonist, Cleo Tidwell, is a majorette coach for the Allister State University Marching Band.  I drew inspiration from my three years as high school majorette captain and choreographer, as well as private baton-twirling teacher and coach in high school, and later, at the Frankfort, Kentucky YMCA when I was the Fitness & Aquatics Director there back in the early 90s.  


Most recently, I sorta got to follow in Cleo's footsteps when my high school decided to host its first ever alumni marching band at homecoming. Elected majorette choreographer, I went to work on designing two original twirling routines and was very pleasantly surprised to discover that my muscle memory for twirling was still strong and that I was only a little rusty.  But after a few hours of practicing, it started coming back just like riding the proverbial bicycle.  And I couldn't help but think, "Wow, this is what Cleo Tidwell does every week for her college majorette line during football season."


In less than two weeks, an alumni band as big as the marching band when I was in high school will gather and play/perform at the Gulf Breeze High School homecoming.  I'm super excited about getting to twirl again after all these years with gals I went to high school with.  I also think it's totally awesome that we range in age from 48-54.  I can't even imagine my grandmothers doing something like this when they were in their 50s. People are a lot more youthful these days. 


I've embedded links to videos of our alumni twirling routines.  If you ever wonder what this writer does when she's not writing...well now you know!
  

Tater Love

I'm in love with a sweet potato.

It came as a complete surprise. I bought the tater as food. It was one of those wrapped-in-plastic, microwaveable sweet potatoes.  I waited too long to bake it and it began to sprout.  Now normally I would just toss out a sprouting potato, but something about this little tater made me place it in a cup of water and set it on the kitchen windowsill.  

And it grew.

And grew.  

And it's still growing.  It has a network of white, delicate roots and beautiful purple vines with green heart-shaped leaves.  

And I talk to it.  

Now you have to understand that every plant I've ever had up to this moment has died from neglect. It's not that I hate plants.  I just don't care enough about them to keep one as a responsibility.  

But there's something about this little sweet potato that's different.  I'm really not sure what it is; could just be chemistry. Like my chem professor said in college, attraction is all about chemistry.  Well, if that's true then Yamela and I (yes, I named my tater Yamela, or Yammy, for short) have chemistry in spades.  While the dogs drive me crazy with their wild Indian antics and the cats throw up on my hard wood floors, Yamela calms me down with her quiet, undemanding energy.  

She really brightens my day.  I actually enjoy washing dishes now because I get to spend time with Yammy.  I'm also trying to grow her stunted cousin, Tate, but it's just not the same.  

Yammy is just my little "sweet" potato. 
Or I'm totally cuckoo. Take your pick.

SAVE FERRETS???

I found this t-shirt at the thrift store last week.  Having been a ferret owner in the past, the t-shirt's graphic jumped out at me. But I was puzzled.  Save Ferrets? Huh?  And why was the ferret wearing clothes?  


I put the shirt in my cart just for the coolness factor, still puzzling over what the heck it meant.  The hubs lurked up from behind--something he's notorious for doing when we're thrifting--and I showed him the shirt.  "Why is the ferret wearing CLOTHES?" i don't get it."


The hubs smiled.  "Save Ferrets.  Save Ferris."  


Light-bulb moment!  Of course, the ferret is wearing an outfit just like Ferris Bueller from the movie FERRIS BEULLER'S DAY OFF.  Too funny!  I wanted to smack my head and go, "D'oh!" like Homer Simpson.  After all, Ferris Bueller is one of my favorite movies.  I can't believe I didn't make the connection.  


But hey, it made the hubs feel good that he got one up on me.  And I got a cool shirt.  You can't ask for more than that. 

My First TV Appearance: TV 24's East Alabama Today with host Carl Brady

Authors as a bunch tend to be intraverted camera shy individuals who would rather write than speak in public, but I'm the exception to the rule having grown up with a family of performers on my dad's side of the family.  So it was a total thrill to get to make a guest appearance on TV 24's East Alabama Today with host Carl Brady to talk about my writing and books.  


I'm quite comfortable in front of a TV or movie camera or on stage, having performed in my first dance recital when I was four-years old and going on to perform with the Auburn Entertainers Dance Team in college, CAST Theatre in Anniston, and from teaching group fitness classes for the past 28 years.  I even had occasion to sing one of my own songs--"A Night at the Drive-in" at a Barnes and Noble in Manchester, New Hampshire during a Writers' Slam a few years ago.  And yes, I had back-up singers.  

So if you have 25 minutes or so, pull up a chair and maybe some popcorn and a cold drink and enjoy some insider info on what makes me and my books tick.  


Correction: during the interview I mention that my paternal grandfather was a Methodist minister.  That's a little verbal boo-boo I made "in the moment."  It was actually my great-granddad.  I knew y'all would want to know that. ;-)

Life Imitates Art and Vice Versa

Luna (3-month old Border Collie mix) In my latest novel, The Weredog Whisperer, the Tidwells adopt a white pit bull terrier from the animal shelter and name her Luna. Luna is bitten by a weredog while on vacation with her new family down in Sugar Sand Beach, Florida and transforms into a teenaged girl during the full moon.  Which would technically make her a were-daughter rather than a weredog.  

My own dog, Moxie, a white with brindled spots American Staffordshire Terrier (aka American Pit Bull Terrier) inspired the character of Luna both in appearance and behavior.  We adopted her from the Humane Society of Elmore County back in 2007 and she's been a fantastic dog.  

This past weekend, my intuition told me to stop at that same animal shelter.  This is how we acquire our companion animals--they either show up at our door (literally) or I get this gut feeling, gut knowing, intuition, psychic hotline flash and "find" the animal that is supposed to come live with us.  Some people mistakenly think that I "collect" animals and want to take in any cat, dog, reptile, etc that is stray or needs to be rehomed.  But no. I'm very picky and it's all about gut feeling.  It has to be "the right" animal.  It's one of those "I know it when I see it" things.  

I've had that gut feeling for several weeks now that another animal was coming to live with us.  But I had no idea what species of animal. I knew we couldn't take on another cat.  When we have more than 3 cats in the house, one or more get upset and the pissing contests begin.  I love my critters, but I also love living like a human being and not in a giant animal toilet.  So we have a moratorium on cats until attrition does its thing and we're down to only two cats total.  

So I'm wandering through the shelter asking each animal, "Are you the one?"  I'd seen almost every animal (including a fawn!) when I got to the last pen of dogs.  And there she was...Luna! I knew it immediately.  And when I picked her up, I said, "Hi Luna," and she licked my face.

The hubs and I, however, were on a mission to deliver a clothes dryer to Montgomery, and then had to drive up to Birmingham to get his car that had been left overnight for repairs when the left wheel axle broke on his way home.  So we didn't adopt Luna.  I also wanted to test my psychic hotline and see if it really was a intuition or just me being OCD.

I slept on it and woke up still thinking about Luna.  Usually if someone says, "You want a dog?" I emphatically say, "NO!"  But there was something about Luna.  And even though she's a different breed from Luna in The Weredog Whisperer, she's almost an all-white dog.  Only her ears are black and two little spots above her nose and on her toes.  It's rare to find all white dogs that aren't Spitz or Great Pyrenees or albino.  

 I emailed the shelter on Sunday, even though they were closed, to inquire about Luna.  She wasn't listed on their website and I thought maybe someone had adopted her in the half hour before they'd closed on Saturday.

But guess what? Another family had adopted Luna and then had BROUGHT HER BACK to the shelter because--get this--Luna chewed on their little girl's hair. [Don't even get me started on that!] And we had just happened to stop by on an impromptu visit right after she'd been returned. 

Monday afternoon I couldn't stand it anymore.  Luna was pulling me to her like a giant magnet!  I drove down to Wetumpka to pick up my new dog. She is the best puppy I have ever have.  And I don't even like puppies; you can ask my husband.  Oh, I like puppies, I just don't like taking CARE of a puppy. It's like having a baby, a lot of work.

But Luna is the smartest, most affectionate, well behaved puppy I have ever had. Granted, I've only had 3 puppies in my life, but they were all challenges. So either I've gotten older and wiser or Luna is the perfect fit.

I'll go with the latter.

So life imitates art and art imitates life. Moxie inspired Luna and Luna inspired Luna.  And that's how we roll at Casa Sullivan.

Dark Shadows: Past and Present

Dark Shadows: then (1966-1971) and now (2012) I watched Tim Burton's Dark Shadows for the second time last night at home on DVD and I have to say I liked it much better than when I saw it in the theater two years ago.  The reason? I knew it was a spoof the second go-round. 

I grew up mesmerized by the original Dark Shadows gothic soap opera as a kid from 1966-1971.  The soap played the paranormal element as dead serious, to pardon a pun.  And since the time period was the late sixties/early seventies, there was no spoofing the culture because we were all living that culture.

Fast forward to 2012. 

As a fan of Tim Burton's work, I was looking forward to the premiere of his version of Dark Shadows starring Johnny Depp and Michelle Pfeiffer.  I'd enjoyed Dan Curtis's 1991 Dark Shadows mini-series and was hoping that Burton would revive the original gothic atmosphere and storyline. 

So I was a good bit disappointed to discover my beloved Dark Shadows was being spoofed, although there are several great comedic moments in the film.

AND the writers had taken liberties with the original story--some needed and some just plain baffling.  Overall, I felt the film was just okay, neither good nor bad.

However, when I found it on DVD in the bargain bin for five bucks, I decided to give it a whirl again. Sometimes I actually like movies better on the second viewing. Plus it would be a great addition to my Dark Shadows collection, including the original soap that I faithfully taped off the TV years ago, the feature film from 1970--House of Dark Shadows--several "The Best of Dark Shadows" videos, and the mini-series on DVD. 

And I was right. Now that I knew it was supposed to be a comedy, I could sit back and enjoy the clever spoofing. One of the things that irked me about the original story is that Barnabas Collins is released from his 200 year imprisonment by Willie Loomis, and yet despite the huge changes in culture during that time, he manages to find modern clothes, speak in a modern manner, although a bit stiffly, and doesn't seem amazed or befuddled by modern technology like cars, electricity, phones, or modern culture and fashion. As a writer, that really bothered me. However, being that D.S. was a soap that relied totally on indoor sets and each new set was expensive to create, the producers/writers decided to skip the transition between Barnabas being released and his reintroduction to modern society. 

However, Tim Burton's film has delightful fun with Barnabas' interaction with the new world he finds himself in. McDonald's golden arches are the sign of Mistopheles (Satan), being stoned is a means of execution rather than being high on drugs, and a teenager wearing a short dress in 1971 is mistaken for a prostitute. 

As for the story changes, since the original writers of DS the soap were literally making it up as they went along--in fact, the whole vampire storyline was contrived as a ratings booster and was only supposed to last for two weeks--in hindsight the characters of Maggie Evans and Victoria Winters should have been combined into one as they are in the 2012 movie. 

Some of the other story changes aren't satisfying to a die-hard DS fan, though.  Roger Collins then was an uptight, arrogant, prissy bore. Roger Collins now is a womanizing, thieving sleaze.  David Collins then was a spoiled rich-kid brat. David Collins now is a sympathetic boy who sees his mother's ghost.  Caroline Stoddard then was a responsible young woman with lots of friends in Collinsport. Caroline Stoddard now is an obnoxious fifteen-year old who was bitten by a werewolf in her crib (huh????)  Willie Loomis then was a lowlife petty thief who becomes a lovable, sympathetic human servant to Barnabas. Willie Loomis now is a rather disgusting looking alcoholic family servant. 

However, Michelle Pfeiffer's Elizabeth Collins Stoddard is quite interesting and fun to watch and Helena Bonham Carter does a wonderful job of impersonating the amazing Grayson Hall as Dr. Julia Hoffman.  Dr. Hoffman was one of my favorite characters in the original show. 

So, how do I rate Dark Shadows 2012 now? As a spoof and comedy, it's 4 out of 5 stars.  I do hope, though, that someone will one day attempt to film a version that's closer to the original story and atmosphere.  Either way, there's something about Dark Shadows that makes us want to keep revisiting it.

Regional Talk Show Guest: EAST ALABAMA TODAY with Carl Brady

If my dad were still alive, he'd have gotten a big kick out of my adventures today. Carl Brady of WEAC TV24 interviewed me this morning on EAST ALABAMA TODAY.

My dad was no stranger to television having graduated from the University of Alabama with a Broadcasting degree.  When I was a kid, he directed training films for the Air Force at Maxwell AFB, and every year he volunteered as a cameraman for The March of Dimes telethon in Montgomery. He met many stars over the years, but the one who impressed him the most was Bob Denver who played the lovable goof Gilligan on Gilligan's Island.  He said Denver was down to earth and personable and joked around with the crew during commercial breaks.  I accompanied my dad to the telethon when I was seven or eight and got to meet Johnny Whitaker who played Jody on FAMILY AFFAIR.

EAST ALABAMA TODAY can be seen online at www.tv24.com. Click on the "On Demand" tab at the top of the Home Page. A list of shows will pop up. Select East Alabama Today.  The shows are listed by date, so today's taping should be the most recent one and should be online within the next week (and possibly by this weekend)!

I talk about the local flavor in my Cleo Tidwell Paranormal Mysteries, how I came to be a writer, and what I learned at the Odyssey Speculative Fiction Writing Workshop that made me get fiction sales instead of rejections.

If you're in the East Alabama area, the show will air the week of July 21 on the following days/times:

Tuesday 7/22: 5:30 pm

Wednesday 7/23 5:30 pm

Thursday 6:30 am & 5:30 pm

Friday 2:30 pm

I did make one little error during the interview and told Carl that my grandfather on my dad's side had been a Methodist minister. Actually, it was my great-grandfather.  What can I say? I'm just glad I didn't say anything off color and outrageous (it's been known to happen).

I'm also thrilled to say that I've been invited to TV24's Oxford studio to conduct research on my next Cleo Tidwell novel TOP VAMPIRE CHEF. There's nothing like verisimilitude to anchor fiction--especially speculative fiction--to reality.