Vicki Lane's Blog, page 538

Hendersonville for Beginners

Last Saturday I visited the charming The Fountainhead Bookstore in Hendersonville, NC and had the pleasure of meeting some lovely readers including, to my surprise, a lady who had a copy of the French translation of Art's Blood ( Le Secret des Appalaches .) Her mother in Belgium had bought it and given it to her.

Later I took a few pictures around the town and found myself, as always, thinking of Merisi's  Vienna for Beginners.

Domes and spires and people scurrying here and there... We can't compete with Vienna in terms of architecture or fashion, I'm afraid, but our Carolina blue skies are second to none.

FAQ-Research

Q: What kind of research do you do for your books?

A:  Various kinds and a lot more than actually gets written into the book. I like to have a good background of what I'm writing about but I only use enough to make my stories seem plausible.

First, I visit the places I'm writing about. For the most part, everything I write about takes place in my neck of the woods  -- even on our farm. (Why, oh why didn't I think to set my series in some exotic locale? Then travel to said locale could be a tax write-off.)

But my travels are local -- to a tent revival (but not to a snake-handling church,) to the River Art District in Asheville, the casino in Cherokee, a Civil War era house in nearby Marshall, one of the few remaining drover's stands in Fairview, the Vance birthplace for a look at the clothing and house furnishings of times past. . .

For the forthcoming Under the Skin I took a thirty minute drive to Hot Springs and the Mountain Magnolia Inn, as well as the Hot Springs Spa. It really helps me to be in a place and get the feel of it before I write about it.
For Old Wounds and for The Day of Small Things, I spent some time in Cherokee, at the Museum and at a Southeastern tribes dance festival, talking to folks and buying some useful books for research. 

I also occasionally have helpful readers who share pictures and diaries -- like Inez and Odessa's diaries that really gave me a picture of life around here in the Thirties and Forties. 

There are also a number of helpful friends and acquaintances who will answer my questions -- several physicians and psychologists,  a pharmacist, our local dentist (a good friend and the original of Doc Adams in Signs in the Blood and in Old Wounds)  and my friend Kathy, the realtor who inspired Sallie Kate. Mechanics, lawyers, journalists, farm agents, law men -- I've got a little list.


I've found that folks are incredibly generous with their time and expertise when you say the magic words, "I'm working on a book and need to know..."

And there are folks around I can talk to and hear their memories. I have. too, my own memories of the old folks I knew thirty years ago and the things they told me about growing up in the mountains.

Really, most of my thirty-some years here in the mountains amounts to research. I just didn't know at the time that I'd eventually be writing about it.  I've used my experience on jury duty, things I overheard in the laundromat, the time I got a concealed carry permit, and lots more that I'll use eventually.

One thing I do at the beginning of each novel is to visit our county library (and sometimes the much larger library in Asheville) and skim through the newspapers of the time period I'll be writing about. The advertisements, as much as anything, give me a feel for the time, whether it's Little Sylvie's 1901 trip to Ransom where she talks about the things she sees in the store windows, or Red Bird's favorite nail polish or her trip to the S and S Cafeteria with Luther in the Thirties. I've also accumulated a nice little library of Appalachian related books and I list the ones that have been most helpful in the acknowledgment pages of each book.  Sometimes just the pictures are enough to give me a feel for the period. And there's Mr. Google -- almost anything I might want to know is there, including primary sources.  Between the world outside my door and the world of the Internet, plus a pretty lively imagination, I can set the scene fairly well. Because I'm not writing history, and since I made Marshall County a fictional place (albeit based on a real one,) I have a little leeway. I'm not aiming for infallible accuracy -- just a reasonable verisimilitude.  

A Little Walk

Of course the devastation that has hit Japan has been on my mind  -  Japan, Haiti, Chile, New Zealand - the names are like a tolling bell, a reminder that, in an instant, everything one loves can be swept away. A reminder to cherish what one has.
So yesterday I took a cautious little walk. 

A week ago I slipped on the basement stairs and twisted my knee (already in rather poor shape) so that I've been hobbling about like an even older lady than I already am.
At last -- many ibuprofen later -- the knee is more flexible and the weather is warmer and the ground hardly squishes at all and it's time to take a little walk and be thankful for the undisturbed beauty all around.
Click on the picture below to biggify and to see the captions. 

Strange and Silly Sunday

Every once in a while I receive a puzzling piece of spam that is, nonetheless, somehow poetic -- in a James Joycean sort of way.   This piece below is one such -- with a hint of T.S. Eliot.

I removed the URLS and changed the line breaks but otherwise, it's as received -- a piece of found poetry.
THE NOTHING OF THE PLACE

Of the baseball from replica, speaking.  Until designer to conceal replica, raferty went come to stand one - to - three women into an visit, and he didn't oiled accessory four breeches from the winder animal but windows.  There thought four among i, five of the bridal, and three as a jewelry.

Relic was the clean brand from in their watches doorway and made i to rich. And roughly, who were shading of?
A new ladies whispered with you. Svend angered of very through he has. Try he tightly name then?
Down company it posed  we were. 
In the japan replica came out his giddy rolex, but into her lab won't all new unit all an night. Debilitating the replica as no designer, he leaves i to help  i lose in this gown. I was breitling. Bulgari was up that black then. Tourneau hi the uneasy corner - observed watches.  Fake could be the very watches. 
The several motion, wishing on that shop of the davosa watches, could be the nothing of the place of the quiet hand of winder's Replica but world had of to ride arriving to the sights  now when cru labored his men. My donney of the most short bourke through watches answer? 
The rotary watches in a snow. The English major that I once was looks for meaning in these phrases -- who is Raferty and why one to three women? And what was the accessory he didn't oil?

And what about Svend?
For me, this piece conjures up elegant and mysterious women in designer gowns wearing expensive watches while a raffish Irishman and a dour Swede exchange enigmatic quips about the nothing of the place,
But I have to say that the donney of the most short bourke has me baffled.

What the ---?

This strange sight across the road from our chicken house caught my eye Thursday and for a minute, I was bumfuzzled  -- it looked metallic but where had it come from and who put it there and what in the world was it?

All at once I remembered a long ago episode (Amok Time) of Star Trek in which the non-emotional Mr. Spock is suddenly ... umm ... in a state of rut and must return to his home planet to find a Vulcan mate. 

Anyway, as I recall it (and this was a very long time ago,) there was a big ceremony when Spock came home and everyone carried  staffs with jingly things on them. Which is what the mystery thing reminded me of.


You all probably knew what it was at once or, at least before I got to the third paragraph.

Back last spring, it had pretty purple flowers . . . And by summer it was covered with round seed pods . . .
 When the seed pods dry, you can peel off the outer coat to find the seeds and the shiny interior membrane. 
Lunaria, Money Plant, and Honesty are some of its names.  But, at least in its final stages, I'm going to think of it as a Vulcan Jingly Thing Plant. (This last photo isn't mine.)
 

The Branches Are Roarin'

  After several days of rain, the water in the branches (streams) is running high  . . .
Our own little Wool Branch is burbling and gurgling its way down the mountain . . . Overflowing the waterfall's spillway, it finds a way around . . .
 Splashing and dashing in its eagerness to make its way to the French Broad River and be on its long  journey to the sea. 

This Table Was Not Made in a Factory

This table is one of my friend Josie's many pieces of folk art that I got a picture of before it was whisked away to California.  I find it completely adorable, especially those legs.
The top lifts off and on the inside of the apron, its maker has told its story. THIS TABLE WAS NOT MADE IN A FACTORY ~ IT WAS MADE BY FREDERICK A HEUSER IN ROCK HILL SC (?) FROM SECOND USE PINE  TEXTILE MACHINE CRATES ??? THAT HOLD IT TOGETHER ARE ??? BLACK GLASS ??  WALNUT PEGS ???

I couldn't make out the entire description -- the wood is rough and the writing is hard to read. There is a date - 1994.



The little table makes me think of the quilts of Gee's Bend -- making something marvelous out of leftovers. 

Sunrise and Beef Piquant

It was an ominous pre-dawn sky this morning -- suitable for the day I'd marked down to get our tax information together.
We're approaching the equinox -- the sun's almost in the middle of our due east view.
But that's not what I'm here to blog about. I want to tell you about a recipe that has stood the test of time. 

It's from The Gasparilla Cookbook -- produced by the Tampa Junior League back in 1961 and still in print.  It's the food of my childhood -- Southern, Spanish, Cuban, Italian, Greek. 

I got my first copy in 1962, the year before we got married, and it was my go-to cook book for a very long time. I wore that first copy out and got a replacement in '89 -- it's fairly stained and battered now. And the thing is, all these years later and the recipes are still terrific.
  Bef Piquant is a good thing to do with a cheap cut of meat -- add in the potatoes and carrots and you've got a meal.  I also served some buttered broccoli and a salad. After this was well underway, I realized, with something of a shock, there's no garlic in it. Another time, I may add a bit but honestly, it's awfully good just this way. 
The smell filled  the house for hours and when it was time to eat, I totally forgot to take a picture of the finished product. Oh, my, it was good.  The meat falls off the bone and is a big mouthful of flavor. 
Try it -- you'll see.



 Beef Piquant - in preparation


2 to 3 pounds chuck or round steak, at least 2 inches thick1 lemon2 tablespoons prepared yellow mustardSalt and pepper2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce2 teaspoons brown sugar3 generous dashes Tabasco sauce ( I used quite a lot (2 tablespoons, maybe) of Sriracha hot sauce instead for more heat)2 medium onions, sliced and sauteed in 2 tablespoons butter1 tablespoon capersOptional -- potatoes and carrots
Place steak in center of a large piece of heavy-duty aluminum foil  in a shallow pan. Rub both sides of steak with cut lemon. Spread both sides of steak with mustard.  Place under broiler and brown both sides. Remove from oven, salt and pepper, squeeze lemon juice over the steak. Sprinkle with Worcestershire, brown sugar, and Tabasco. Add capers and onions, which have been sauteed. You can add in  potatoes and carrots, if desired. Bring foil up to seal in an airtight package. Bake at 300 for 3 hours.

La Donna (Mother Nature) E Mobile

The cardinal is looking disgruntled. Small wonder -- he's sitting in a crab apple tree, surrounding by swelling pink buds, and the rain is turning to snow.
The slide show follows some of the weather fickle Mother Nature brought us Sunday and Monday.   

Patrick O'Brian Again

We watched the film "Master and Commander" again last night and once again I was seduced by the accuracy of detail, the wonderful acting, the beautiful score, and the faithfulness to the sense of the original books, if not to the plot line. 

I've mentioned before my fondness for O'Brian's 20 book Aubrey/Maturin series. I've read the books multiple time and listened to them  on CD read by the amazing Patrick Tull more times than you would believe. An O'Brian book is my default listening in the car at any time.
But don't take my word for it. In a cover-story in The New York Times Book Review published on January 6, 1991, Richard Snow called the Aubrey-Maturin books "the best historical novels ever written. On every page Mr. O'Brian reminds us with subtle artistry of the most important of all historical lessons: that times change but people don't, that the griefs and follies and victories of the men and women who were here before us are in fact the maps of our own lives."

And in a Washington Post article published August 2, 1992, Ken Ringle wrote, "The Aubrey/Maturin series far beyond any episodic chronicle, ebbs and flows with the timeless tide of character and the human heart."
It's as if the close observation of human nature, the dry wit, and the elegant prose of Jane Austen  had gone to sea during the Napoleonic Wars and I find something  new to admire with every re-reading/listening/watching.

Need I add,  highly recommended?

(Book cover illustration and sea battle painting by the renowned marine artist Geoff Hunt)