Lance Greenfield's Blog, page 53
January 10, 2017
Sally’s Cafe and Bookstore Author Update – Hugh W. Roberts, Yecheilyah Ysrayl and Bette A. Stevens
All three of these book descriptions and their reviews draw me in. I loved Tales of the Unexpected (with memorable the sillhouettes and music at the beginning and end), and those stories are inspiring for writers; spawning new stories in the same style.
The American historical connections attract me to the other two.
I hope I can find time to unbury all three of them sometime from my gigantic tbr mountain.
Smorgasbord - Variety is the spice of life
Welcome to the first of the bookstore author updates this week. To start us off is my own review of Glimpses, the short story collection by Hugh W. Roberts. Glimpses has been sat on my desk since before Christmas and I have been dipping in and out in the last couple of weeks enjoying the 28 stories. Some I have read before on Hugh’s blog but nevertheless there is always something new to discover in each of the tales.
About the book
After publishing some of his short stories on his blog, Hugh W. Roberts, who suffers from dyslexia, received numerous requests to publish his short stories in a book. Here, at last, are 28 short stories that will take your mind on a rollercoaster of a ride into worlds that conceal unexpected twists and turns.
‘Glimpses’ allows the reader a peek into the lives of everyday people who are…
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January 6, 2017
Publication #review of Sister Sister by Sue Fortin (@suefortin1) @HarperImpulse @TheRomaniacs
I have to say that this review, and others that I spotted on Goodreads, makes me REALLY want to read this book. I mean, not just add it to my tbr mountain: I need to make it float to the top so that I pick it up next.
This is a fantastic review and I hope that the book lives up to the expectations that have now been set.
Blurb.
Alice: Beautiful, kind, manipulative, liar.
Clare: Intelligent, loyal, paranoid, jealous.
Clare thinks Alice is a manipulative liar who is trying to steal her life.
Alice thinks Clare is jealous of her long-lost return and place in their family.
One of them is telling the truth. The other is a maniac.
Two sisters. One truth.
What does TWG think?
How on Earth do I review this book?! There have only been a couple of books that have completely taken over my mind whilst reading them (in a headfunk, fabulous kind of way); until now. Sue Fortin’s new release, ‘Sister Sister’ has become the latest book to leave me questioning EVERYTHING, including my name.
What would you do if a family member had just…vanished? ‘We will be back’ they said. Now, unless there was a million car back log on the M25 and all flights were cancelled indefinitely, you would pretty much expect…
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January 5, 2017
The Incident of the Grenada Omelette
Exactly seventeen years ago to the day, just a few days after the turn of the millennium, my wife, Joy and I were preparing to fly back from a most wonderful holiday on the of Grenada.
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Grenada Tree
It came about because my mother sadly passed away in early 1999 and bequeathed me some money. She’d known that she was about to die, when she told me that she would be leaving me enough cash to either pay a small chunk off my mortgage or to go on the holiday of a lifetime. Naturally, I chose the latter and booked an all-inclusive Caribbean holiday at the Spice Island Beach resort.
We had a fantastic time and were waited on hand and foot. Three months prior to our visit, there had been a tremendous storm in the area which had washed away much of the beach and blown down many of the trees. So the guests were privileged to be invited to plant a new, young tree on the beach. You can see Joy and I labouring away in the photograph.
At midnight on 31st December 1999, I took my shoes and socks off, and stood in the shallows of the bay, wearing my kilt and raising a glass of whisky to the memory of my Mum. The guests and staff joined the toast.
Earlier, we’d had a ten course gala dinner which was too much for some of the guests, including Joy, as the story of the omelette relates. I hope that it makes you chuckle out loud (COL). I have duplicated it here, but you can also find it along with a few other amusing stories and my pathetic attempts at peotry, on my Titbits page.
Top Notch Omelette
“Oo dare to order plain omelette from zee keetchen of zee greatest chef in zee ‘ole Caribbean?!” yelled Jean-Paul at the terrified Grenadian waiter, waving his hot spatula inches from the poor boy’s nose.
“Twenty years of ‘ard graft in zee ‘ottest restaurants in Paree so I can prepare zee best New Year Gala Dinner menu ever seen in zees ‘emisphere, to be insulted by some reech American touriste!”
Five days later, most of the guests had departed and Jean-Paul sat chatting to the friendly, unassuming British couple who remained.
“No, no. Please. I like to ‘ear zee feedback,” insisted Jean-Paul.
“Well, it might please your guests if you could mix your haute cuisine with some laid-back Caribbean,” suggested the gentleman, tentatively. “For example, my wife resorted to just a plain omelette on New Year’s Eve.”
“Ah! YOU are zee geelty wan!” exclaimed Jean-Paul, leaping to his feet, waggling his finger threateningly in the direction of the terrified lady’s face.
January 2, 2017
Big parkrun Milestone
Lance’s 1000 km shirt
Since I posted this photo on my Facebook page yesterday, I have had such wonderful reaction that I thought it worth publishing in my blog. Please feel free to re-blog and share it in any other way you see fit through your own social media channels. I am very proud of my achievement. So proud, that I had my Andover parkrun shirt customised for the occasion.
My running friends agree that, in many ways, the 200 parkrun milestone is greater than those for which we are awarded t-shirts (50, 100, 250, 500). It represents ONE THOUSAND KILOMETRES in the park!
Andover New Year parkrun was my 200th. That is 1000 km in the park!
I celebrated by running my 201st parkrun with many of my Andover friends at Salisbury.
My next target is to run my 250th on my birthday on 16th December 2017.
The Big Bash Competition 2017
Re-blogged from Sacha Black’s Blog.
View original post here.
My Introduction
Wishing all my fellow bloggers a very happy, and above all, healthy, new year.
I went to my first Annual Bloggers Bash in 2016. It was an exciting event and it was a brilliant place to meet a diverse and very interesting set of people: new friends!
The theme is excellent and so appropriate. I’ve made lots of new connections in 2016 through following the super blogs of others and through picking up a few followers of my own blog. A new wave of friends came around the Annual Bloggers Bash 2016.
This competition inspires me: Lance feels another Coach Tour coming on!
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GOOOOOOOODMORNING bloggisphere… It’s the start of another year, and what a year it’s going to be. I have a little tickle in my tummy about 2017, and it’s screaming sparkle and glitter.
I know I shouldn’t shout, but I’m excited, what can I say? I expect all you drunkards have raging hangovers. But clear that ethanol fog blogettes, I have a super exciting announcement… and no… I haven’t published my book… not yet anyway.
The Bloggers Bash already has a venue, and now, drum roll, please…
It has a competition too.
This year we want the awards to be even bigger and better than last year, so we are fundraising in the form of a blog post competition. To be clear, Geoffle, Ali, and Hugh are not taking any backhanders here; there are no luscious Maldivian committee getaways planned, (sadly).
ALL PROCEEDS GO TOWARDS THE BASH.
The Bloggers Bash Blog Post Competition 2017
Why: Each year the bash grows in popularity. That means we need bigger venues and better events and unfortunately that means the cost goes up too. We’re running a blog post competition to fundraise for the event, the more we raise, the better the Bash awards will be. So share this comp and get all your friends involved.
Theme: Connections. The Blogger’s Bash is all about connecting people. Each year we bring together dozens of bloggers who have made friends online but are yet to meet off screen. That moment of joy, the hug, the smile, there’s nothing like that moment of connection as true friends pull each other into a hug for the first time. It’s why we started the bash and why we continue to run it. So this year, the bash blog post competition is all about connections. Interpret that as you will.
Word Count: 400- 600 words. Pictures, videos, and artwork, can all be used in blog posts but the minimum word count is 400.
Deadline: The competition runs from January 1st to 23:59 GMT on March 1st. Entries will no longer be counted from 12:01 am on the 2nd March.
Judges: The Committee – Geoffle, Ali, Hugh and yours truly, Sacha.
What the judges are looking for: Your entries can be about anything as long as they are clearly connected to the theme. You could post videos, pictures, a short story or even paintings. If you decide on a picture based entry, the judges still want to see some words to go along with your submission (400 is the minimum). Tell us a story whether that be in words or pictures or otherwise, engage us, interpret the theme and make your blog post surprising or quirky. What does the theme mean to you?
Minor spelling and grammar mistakes won’t mark you down but do make sure you proofread your entries so that it’s easy for us to read and understand your posts.
The Cost: £5 entry – all proceeds go to funding the bash, payment accepted through PayPal only, at the bottom of the p.ost
The Prize: – The prizes will keep growing, the more entries we get, the higher the prizes go.
1st Place –
£50 Amazon Voucher
1000 word critique from Esther Newton
1x Author or website logo from Axil Hammer Designs
1x Twitter Starter Kit from Suzie Speaks
1x Copy of The Emotion Thesaurus by Angela Ackerman
1x Enforced selfie (if you attend the bash) with the committee for publicity
1x Beta read from Icy Sedgwick
1x Custom made Cover, complete with text (title, author’s name and back of book blurb), for a CreateSpace Paperback (and an eBook version) – worth US$ 60 see Chris’s Page
1x 90 second Book Promo Trailer worth US$ 70, see Chris’s Page
(NOTE: Licensed images and soundtrack to be provided by winner)
2nd Place –
£30 Amazon Voucher
1x Enforced selfie (if you attend the bash) with the committee for publicity
3rd Place –
£20 Amazon Voucher
1x Enforced selfie (if you attend the bash) with the committee for publicity
There will be a Winners post on this blog, announcing the competition winners that will share the links to your winning entries.
IMPORTANT – How to submit: Post your blog post on your blog and then drop an email to annualbloggersbash@yahoo.co.uk with the following information:
The link to your blog post
The word count of all the words (excluding the title) in your post
Your name
Your Twitter Handle
The identification number on your PayPal payment.
Use the email subject title: BB Blog Post Competition
THE CAPITALISED SMALL PRINT – MUST READ THIS SECTION OR FACE DOOM, ETERNAL SHAME AND EXPULSION FROM THE COMPETITION:
Only entries sent by email to annualbloggersbash@yahoo.co.uk will be entered into the competition.
Only one entry per person is allowed. Anybody found to have entered the competition more than once will be disqualified.
Immediate family members of the committee judging panel, Sacha Black, Geoffle Pard, Ali Isaac and Hugh W. Roberts, are not eligible to enter.
The competition closes at 23:59 GMT on Wednesday 1st March 2017. Entries received after this date will not be included.
The blog post must be a minimum of 400 words and a maximum of 600 but can include: pictures, videos, and artwork.
The competition is only open to adults aged 18 and over.
Winners must agree to have their full name and blog post published on my blog.
No alternative prizes are available.
The committee’s decision will be final, and no correspondence will be entered into.
By entering the competition, you agree to abide by these rules.
Big Up Your Blog – My Facebook Group Launch!
This is a splendid idea. The more bloggers who share and promote, the better.
I’ve been looking forward to today…
I am officially launching my Facebook page – BIG UP YOUR BLOG – and anyone who who has a blog is welcome to join!
As with many things, I only realised the power of Facebook groups a few months ago. I’d been a member of one or two for about a year, only really participating in one, and then after some inspiration I joined a few more, and then a few more, and BOOM! My connections increased massively. I’m still only in less than ten, but I decided to start my own as I have found that there are a number of groups that prevent bloggers from sharing their own links and social media accounts with each other, which almost defeats the idea of being in a group to begin with.
However, instead of it being a constant free-for-all, which usually only attracts link…
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7 for 2017 – My Goals for the Year
I like to share the resolutions or goals of fellow bloggers, especially fellow runners and even more especially if they are from my home Fair City of Perth.
I have one that I didn’t list, but was brought back into my mind by this blog post: to complete my 250th parkrun in 2017.
It’s that time of year again. If you’ve been with me for a while then you’ll know I don’t hold with all that “new year, new me” stuff as I believe that pinning all your hopes for change on one particular day (a day when, let’s face it, many aren’t feeling at their best!) is doomed to failure. If there’s something you want to change, change it now. If there’s something you want to achieve, start taking steps towards it straight away. Why wait? Too many people try to make massive and unsustainable changes on the 1st of January then feel miserable when they fail. Surely it’s better to change one small thing at a time or develop habits that have already been created than to try and completely reinvent yourself? So rather than resolutions, I prefer to set myself goals – things I would like to achieve over the…
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Getting Harder
Everybody I know could relate to this and would have at least one relative who has been, or is going thorugh, the same.
“Doc, I just want to die.”
I nodded my head sympathetically. At a certain age, all patients say that. She was in her 90’s….
“I am so tired of hurting.”
She groaned and worked her way through her usual litany of aches and pains starting at her head and working all of the way down to her toes. She had pain medicine she could take for the arthritis so I knew that wasn’t really the issue. Not all of it, at least.
“I pray every day that the Lord just takes me away.”
She’d had a gentleman friend at the center. For a few months she positively glowed. He sent her roses for Valentine’s Day, bought treats for her little dog, left her love notes, told her she was beautiful. Never mind that he was twenty years younger than she was.
At that age, what does twenty years mean? Nothing…
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December 31, 2016
2017 New Year Resolutions
I failed to fulfil all of my 2016 New Year Resolutions.
I wanted to write another novel. I started three but floundered to such an extent that I finished none of them.
Maintaining my weight between 80 an 84 kg can be considered as success if I am allowed to round to the nearest integer. My maximum weight was 84.3, so I did it!
Much as I wished for more than 500 followers on my blog, I have only reached 368. I shall continue to aspire for more than 500 in 2017.
Success! If I start after January, then all of my parkruns were completed in less than 27:30, which was my goal.
So now we move on to 2017. Here is my new list and I am aiming for 100% success rate this year.
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Do you think I’ll be successful?
Share your resolutions, if you’ve made any.
December 30, 2016
Review: The Book of Human Skin
The Book of Human Skin by Michelle Lovric My rating: 4 of 5 stars Difficult to put out of my mind Michelle Lovric has obviously put a huge effort into the research that she weaves into a carpet upo…
Source: Review: The Book of Human Skin
