D.R. Graham's Blog, page 5
March 19, 2014
CBC Cancels Arctic Air: What Happened to Their Mandate?
I’m a huge fan of the CBC. In addition to the news, I watch Heartland, The Rick Mercer Report, 22 Minutes, The Nature of Things, Doc Zone, Dragons’ Den, Steven and Chris, and Arctic Air. I even buy products at the CBC store and proudly wear my retro tees around town.
I grew up watching and learning from such CBC shows as The Nature of Things, The Beachcombers, The Friendly Giant, Mr. Dressup, and Degrassi Junior High. One reason I continue to choose to support CBC programming, despite all the other options, is because I still find it entertaining and informative. The other reason is that I am proud of Canada and I believe it’s important to celebrate all the things that make us quintessentially Canadian.
I looked up the mandate of the CBC and found: ..the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, as the national public broadcaster, should provide radio and television services incorporating a wide range of programming that informs, enlightens and entertains; …the programming provided by the Corporation should:
be predominantly and distinctively Canadian,
reflect Canada and its regions to national and regional audiences, while serving the special needs of those regions,
actively contribute to the flow and exchange of cultural expression,
be in English and in French, reflecting the different needs and circumstances of each official language community, including the particular needs and circumstances of English and French linguistic minorities,
strive to be of equivalent quality in English and French,
contribute to shared national consciousness and identity,
be made available throughout Canada by the most appropriate and efficient means and as resources become available for the purpose, and
reflect the multicultural and multiracial nature of Canada.
So, why was Arctic Air cancelled? Last I checked, they were getting one million viewers in a busy and competitive TV market, which indicates to me that its ratings and popularity were not the issue. If the story lines were getting too formulaic there is no need to cancel the show, just bring in new writers to mix it up. There are a lot of reasons it might not have been working, but maybe the Federal Government simply doesn’t value the spirit of the CBC’s mandate.
I was born in Yukon and seeing both the beauty of the North and the diversity of its people represented in the show was refreshing and likely translated into a positive impact for underrepresented aboriginal youth and tourism to the region. Whether you liked Arctic Air or not, it fell perfectly within the CBC’s mandate. It is distinctively Canadian, contributes to the national identity, and reflects the multicultural nature of Canada.
It’s too bad that these types of decisions are obviously made for financial reasons. If the CBC doesn’t make programs that reflect our diversity who will?
Bobby Martin played by Adam Beach
Caitlin Janvier played by Tanaya Beatty
Connor Hossa played by West Tomelden
Bruce Ward played by Nathaniel Arcand
All photos are via http://www.cbc.ca/arcticair/
March 14, 2014
Is Technology The Sh*t Or Just Sh*t?
While vacationing recently, I was lounging poolside engrossed in my iPad next to my husband who was also busy using his iPad. A woman who had been drinking in the hot tub staggered up to us and slurred, “Come on people, turn off the electronic devices. You’re on holiday, relax. Loosen up. Live a little. Have some fun.” Then she teetered away to get another drink.
Via Mankind Wake Up: Facebook
There are plenty of articles circulating about how electronic devices are mindless brain sucks breeding a generation of young people who won’t know how to communicate or interact with each other. One photo I saw (ironically, on social media) was a split screen of a group of kids one hundred years ago playing a ball game on the street juxtaposed with a group of children sitting on the couch wired into electronic devices. The caption on the top image where the children were playing: This is life. The caption on the bottom image where the children were fixated on their screens: This is sh*t.
That judgment is oversimplified and not fair. Nobody knows simply by viewing a snapshot what those children in the modern photo were doing on their electronic devices. Maybe the youngest one was solving digital puzzles. If she had been actually manipulating wood carved puzzle pieces as children did one hundred years ago, would that have been a more legitimate form of play?
Maybe the middle child was creating digital music on her laptop. If she had been sitting near the fireplace practicing her violin as they did one hundred years ago, would that have been a more acceptable form of musicality?
Maybe the oldest child was reading The Chronicles of Narnia on his screen. If he had been curled up on the couch reading a thick paper bound book as they did one hundred years ago, would anybody have called what he was doing sh*t?
It’s true, children should experience a balance of physical activity, creative play, and interaction with peers and nature. Are we to assume that because we see them playing on an electronic device that they didn’t just return from an invigorating game of hide-and-seek outside, or swimming, or a play date? Are we to assume that just because a snapshot is taken of a child on an electronic device that the child is chronically sedentary? Are we to assume that the child is playing a violent or mindless video game that will lead to anti-social tendencies and aggression?
The moment when the tipsy woman from the hot tub shared her social commentary with us, my husband was charting out our sight-seeing plan for the following day. He uses Apps to coordinate our train and boat schedules, pre-buy our tickets to tourist sites, check reviews for off-the-beaten-path restaurants, and map our routes. I was reading Dear Life by Alice Munro.
If I had been reading the Nobel Prize winning author’s critically acclaimed collection of short stories from a paper back book rather than a digital book, or if my husband had paper maps and tourist guides spread out on the table, would we have garnered the same critical judgement? I doubt it.
For a living I communicate and interact with people. Sometimes I like to have a break from that. My idea of a relaxing vacation includes reading a good book or two, editing and sharing the photographs I take, experiencing the culture of the place I’m visiting, and video calling with my family back home. All of these things are possible with the use of one electronic device. Sitting in a hot tub drinking all day with a bunch of strangers is obviously someone else’s idea of a relaxing vacation, but that doesn’t mean that what I do to relax is sh*t.
March 9, 2014
February 25, 2014
Cover Reveal: DELIVER ME by Kate Jarvik Birch
DELIVER ME by Kate Jarvik Birch, coming April 15th, 2014 from Bloomsbury Spark.
One People. One Union. One Future.
Wynne’s entire life is dictated by the Union: the clothes she wears, the books she reads, even the genes she inherited. And like every other girl in the Union, Wynne dreams of being chosen as a Carrier on her 16th birthday—one of the elite selected to carry the future generation within her womb. Wynne and her best friend Odessa are certain they will both make the cut, but when Odessa is chosen and whisked off to a life of privilege, Wynne is left behind to work as an assistant, delivering babies for the Union.
As Odessa slips deeper and deeper into the role of Carrier, Wynne begins to see the Union for what it really is: a society that criminalizes the notion of love, and forbids words like mother and family.
For the first time in her life, Wynne is faced with a choice: submit to the will of the Union, or find a way to escape and save Odessa before she is lost forever.
Kate Jarvik Birch is a visual artist and writer living in Salt Lake City, Utah with her husband and three kids. She wrote her first novel in fourth grade. The main character was suspiciously similar to herself and the love interest bore quite a strong resemblance to the boy she had a crush on. As an adult, her essays and short stories have been published in Isotope: A Journal of Literary Nature and Science Writing, Saint Ann’s Review, Scissors and Spackle and Indiana Review. Her first play, (a man enters), co-written with Elaine Jarvik, was produced in 2011 by Salt Lake Acting Co.
Kate’s debut novel, DELIVER ME, comes out April 15th from Bloomsbury Spark. PERFECTED will be released July 1st from Entangled Teen.
Goodreads |Website | Twitter | Facebook
Giveaway
Enter the giveaway below to win an electronic copy of DELIVER ME from Bloomsbury Spark as well as a $20 Amazon gift card!
February 20, 2014
Join the Graham Crackers: D.R Graham’s Author Street Team
Street Team members for D.R. Graham will be eligible to receive Advanced Reading Copies (ARCs) and free swag for upcoming Young Adult and New Adult novels.
Join now and be the first to know about insider announcements, author appearances, publisher promotions, fun contests, and exclusive giveaways. Also, ask questions about books, characters, and writing.
Click to join the Graham Crackers: D.R. Graham’s Street Team
February 5, 2014
Free Therapy
They say the best things in life are free. They also say you get what you pay for. I’m not sure which to believe, but what I do know is that some of the most valuable tidbits of counselling advice I give clients are free and surprisingly simple.
Sure, professional counselling services can help you build communication and relationship skills, guide you through a process of self-awareness and therapeutic healing, or encourage you to achieve your goals. I’m an advocate of therapy, obviously. However, there is a huge percentage of the population who either can’t afford private counselling, or feel too proud or embarrassed to access the services.
Good news: there are a few secrets to mental health and emotional well-being that are free and accessible to everyone. They will all seem overly simple when you first read them, but that’s the point. Sometimes the solutions to life’s problems are simple.
1) Eat well. Mental and emotional health are linked to physical health. The most fundamental way to maintain the proper functioning of every system, organ, and cell in the body is proper nutrition. Bodies that have an abundance of nutrients are more resilient to stress and recover more quickly from traumatic events. Bodies that are deficient in nutrients become overwhelmed, breakdown at the weakest point, and can develop disease and mental health symptoms.
New clients come in all the time with depression or severe panic attacks and one of the first things we talk about is nutrition. Ninety percent of them are not eating enough, or aren’t eating nutrient dense food. If you are going through a stressful time in your life eating healthfully might be the last thing you feel like doing, but it is a vital part of emotional recovery and mental health.
2) Be active. Physical activity and spending time in nature both heal the mind as much as the body. Exercise is the easiest way to hit both of these birds with one stone. Before the non-athletic types roll their eyes, please note that this activity doesn’t have to be a rigorous competitive sport. Simply going for a stroll and sitting on a bench next to a pond will produce an immune boosting effect.
Soak up some oxygen and Vitamin D. Everything that is good for the cells of your body will improve your mental and emotional health as well. Movement is also the fastest way to shut off the fight or flight anxiety response that is triggered by stress. For most stress related symptoms, a brisk twenty-minute walk will do as much for you as a session in my office.
3) Express Yourself. Yes, talking it out with a neutral, non-judgemental, trained person is one of the benefits of counselling. If you can’t afford counselling and you don’t want to burden your friends with all your stress, write it down. Journaling doesn’t cost anything and it’s cathartic. If you’re worried about privacy, type it into a computer document and delete it once you’re done. The purpose is to get it out of your system. If you don’t like writing try some other expressive outlet such as music, art, or woodworking.
4) Breathe. The simplest free strategy is also the most valuable one. The body and the mind are designed to seek a state of balance and will heal themselves if we let them do their thing. The problem is that most of us continually add new stress and don’t slow down long enough to let the immune system and homeostasis checks catch up.
Breathing provides a moment of reflection to gain perspective and determine what’s important. Deep breathing floods the blood with oxygen, which is vital to the survival of every cell in the body. Breathing also signals the nervous system to turn off the stress response and all the unpleasant symptoms of anxiety.
I can hear some of you laughing sardonically and scoffing. “Yeah, Danielle, organic apples and wild blueberries aren’t going to do me any good when I’m prying my school phobic child’s fingers from the door frame every morning.” Or, “Good one, lady, walking around in a grassy field and taking deep breaths isn’t going to save my crumbling marriage.”
You’re right, these simple and free steps are not going to solve all of the issues and problems that bring people to counselling. They will, however, provide the necessary foundation for healing. Being healthy makes a person strong and resilient. Living pure and simple provides the opportunity for clarity. If you use these simple suggestions as a starting point, you will feel stronger and all the other issues will be easier to tackle.
February 1, 2014
Cover Reveal! Finding Mr. Darcy: High School Edition
Sixteen-year-old Liza Johnson takes fangirl to a whole new level of crazy when she decides to take dating advice from her literary hero: Jane Austen.
With the help of her best friends, Liza sheds her ancient-speak and complete Austen wardrobe for something a bit more modern in an attempt at finding her very own Mr. Darcy.
Enter Will, the new kid and Liza’s Darcy incarnate. Add her BFF’s ex to mix and the sexy Brit who kisses with an accent, and Liza is in trouble.
So, what’s a girl to do? Without her mom to go to relationship advice, Liza turns to the only person she can truly trust with matters of the heart via her mother’s copy of COMPLETED WORKS OF JANE AUSTEN.
It’s too bad Austen’s heroines have never played Spin the Bottle or Seven Minutes in Heaven. Liza’s determined to find her true Austen-esque happy ending, but if she can’t trust herself instead of books, she just might end up in her own tragic love story.
Add Finding Mr. Darcy: High School Edition by Erin Butler to Goodreads
Erin Butler lives in upstate New York where winter is her arch nemesis. She prefers to spend her time indoors reading and writing, but ventures out for chocolate, sunshine, and to perform her librarian duties. She lives with her very understanding husband, a stepson, and doggie BFF, Maxie. Erin is the author of BLOOD HEX, a YA paranormal novel, and the forthcoming contemporary romance titles, HOW WE LIVED and FINDING MR. DARCY: HIGH SCHOOL EDITION.
@ErinButler
January 8, 2014
Are you ready for change?
Ah, it’s a new year. A lot of people are starting fresh and setting goals for creating a new body, a new relationship, or a whole new lifestyle. Sadly, we all know the gyms and yoga studios and diet group meetings will only be packed for the month of January before trickling back to the regular core group of members. It happens every year.
Resolutions are often good intentions backed up with maybe a month or two of genuine effort. Why bother? Sometimes setting a resolution can be the incentive that motivates someone into action and change. More likely, people will change when they are ready. The question to ask yourself is, are you ready?
Maybe you made a resolution to be a better spouse. That’s nice, but are you really ready to improve your relationship? Do you know how hard you have to work? Are you prepared to learn how to become a better communicator? Can you shift away from competitiveness with your spouse into cooperation? How willing are you to become less selfish?
How about resolutions to spend more quality time with your friends and family? Sweet, but intending to spend more time with them doesn’t do any good if you never get around to it. Are you ready to listen more, care more, give unconditionally more, compliment genuinely more, and criticize less? Hosting more dinners and attending more parties is not all there is to spending more quality time with your loved ones. Do you know what they need and want or do you assume it’s the same as what you need and want?
Did anybody resolve to be a better parent? Being a parent is a very difficult career and the job description is constantly changing. Are you willing to give yourself a break since the hours are grueling, it’s messy, there is no compensation other than a job well done, you can’t quit, there are no promotions, and all of the training is on the job without a supervisor? Do you have a support network in place? Are you armed with extreme patience, stellar negotiating skills, and spidey senses that will allow you to see dangerous situations behind you and prevent them before they happen? Can you accept that you are human and sometimes you can’t do it perfectly and that’s okay?
Let’s say you are ready for the resolutions you made, do you have time in your hectic schedule to do all the things that you have established as important? If you were taught that busy is the opposite of lazy and having a lot to do is a sign of success, can you shift your values so that being busy watching a butterfly land on a blade of grass, listening to your child tell a story, or doing nothing other than listening to your inner voice is as important as signing twenty contracts at work?
Whether you like to make resolutions as a way to light a fire under the seat of your pants or you think resolutions are empty promises that lead to ultimate failure and self loathing, the bottom line is that we could all stand to grow and improve over the upcoming year. The key is to know exactly what we want to change, what we need in order to make that change, and to give ourselves the time and space necessary to do it. We will all have different goals and different things will motivate us to work toward those goals. Are you ready to take action?
Happy New Year.
December 19, 2013
Our break from the snow and frigid temperatures…
Grand Turk, Turks and Caicos
Grand Turk, Turks and Caicos
Grand Turk, Turks and Caicos
Grand Turk
Half Moon Cay, Bahamas
San Juan, Peurto Rico
San Juan, Peurto Rico
South Beach Miami, Florida
South Beach Miami, Florida
Tropical Rain Forest Peurto Rico
Half Moon Cay, Bahamas
St. Thomas US Virgin Islands
St. Thomas US Virgin Islands
November 11, 2013
Entangled Publishing’s Embrace New Adult Launch
Entangled Embrace is Entangled’s New Adult line, launching today with three fantastic books! If you are looking for something new and mesmerizing, embrace the endless possibilities that this brand new Entangled Publishing new adult line offers!
Trouble Comes Knocking by Mary Duncanson
A girl who can’t forget…
Twenty-two-year-old Lucy Carver is like Sherlock Holmes in ballet flats, but her eidetic memory is more albatross than asset, and something she usually keeps hidden. When she notices that something’s amiss at her dead-end job, she jumps at the chance to finally use her ability for good. That is, until, a man is murdered, and she becomes the target of the killer.
A detective on his first case…
Detective Eli Reyes is overbearing, pompous, way too hot for Lucy’s own good, and seems as determined to ruin her relationship with her boyfriend, John, as finding the murderer. He brings Lucy in on the case, thinking she can help him get to the truth, only to cut her loose when he realizes he’s gotten far more than he ever bargained for.
A past that won’t go away…
When memories from her childhood invade her present, Lucy discovers a mystery bigger than she could have imagined. With the killer still after her, and Eli nowhere to be found, she takes things into her own hands, determined to expose the truth no matter what—before trouble comes knocking…again.
Amazon | B&N | Kobo | Goodreads
Hushed by Kelley York
Eighteen-year-old Archer couldn’t protect his best friend, Vivian, from what happened when they were kids, so he’s never stopped trying to protect her from everything else. It doesn’t matter that Vivian only uses him when hopping from one toxic relationship to another. Archer is always there, waiting to be noticed.
Then along comes Evan, the only person who’s ever cared about Archer without a single string attached. The harder he falls for Evan, the more Archer sees Vivian for the manipulative hot-mess she really is.
But Viv has her hooks in deep, and when she finds out about the murders Archer’s committed and his relationship with Evan, she threatens to turn him in if she doesn’t get what she wants…
And what she wants is Evan’s death, and for Archer to forfeit his last chance at redemption.
Amazon | B&N | Kobo | Goodreads
Definitely, Maybe in Love by Ophelia London
Her theory of attraction is about to get a new angle…
Spring Honeycutt wants two things: to ace her sustainable living thesis and to save the environment. Both seem hopelessly unobtainable until her college professor suggests that with a new angle, her paper could be published. Spring swears she’ll do whatever it takes to ensure that happens.
Whatever it takes, however, means forming a partnership with the very hot, very privileged, very conceited Henry Knightly.
Henry is Spring’s only hope at publication, but he’s also the über-rich son of a land developer and cash-strapped Spring’s polar opposite—though she can’t help being attracted to the way he pushes her buttons, both politically and physically. Spring finds there’s more to Henry than his old money and argyle sweaters…but can she drop the loud-and-proud act long enough to let him in? Suddenly, choosing between what she wants and what she needs puts Spring at odds with everything she believes in.
Definitely, Maybe in Love is a modern take on Pride and Prejudice that proves true love is worth risking a little pride.
Amazon | B&N | Kobo | Goodreads
Giveaway
To celebrate the launch of the new line, Entangled Embrace is giving away a Kindle Fire, an iPod Shuffle, and a $25 B&N Giftcard!
link to rafflecopter: http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/1cb554185/
