Vicki Lane's Blog, page 550

The Rains Came...

On Sunday night the clouds began to roll in from the west... Monday morning's sunrise was hidden in the mist... And for two days we were cloud-cloaked, enjoying the gentle rains....
 Till on Tuesday afternoon the clouds gathered themselves up and began to move away. Very little of Autumn's glory remains, save a few bright torches burning on the mountainside.
 

Little Joys

Living in a county where this is a headline in our weekly paper . . . Living on a road where I can stop the car slap in the middle to take a picture . . .
Meeting a stray vole on the pathway to our porch . . . and seeing the flames of volunteer Burning Bushes springing up in unexpected places . . .

From the Farm

Our chickens have been on strike -- well actually they're moulting and not laying. This happens at least once a year and I don't begrudge then their rest. But it means we're only getting one or two eggs a day and have had to supplement with store-bought. 

I buy only eggs from  'cage-free, humanely raised' chickens but even so, look at the difference in these yolks! The store-bought version is a pale shadow of the Real Thing from our chickens.
 
But though we're almost out of eggs, the milk is flowing! Behold! Homemade butter, courtesy of Justin and Claui (and, of course, Marigold.) And lovely milk with a bit of top cream. (Some has already been skimmed to make butter.)

I'm so proud of those young uns!

Fading Glory

The Burning Bush is still aflame Against the ash-gray  trees. An oak flings its gold against the sky. . .A young beech clings to yellow leaves . . . But across the river, on wooded slopes,The colors fade and die.

Great Grand Parents

William Benjamin NorthcuttBorn just after the War Between the StatesInto red clay Reconstruction Alabama.A farmer and a farmer's son.When he was twenty-two he married,Red-headed, eighteen year old Lucy Camella GlennAnd they moved from Forest Home to Evergreen.
Just over a year and their first child was bornMy mother's father, Victor Huborn,Who told me, how when he was youngHis mother took him and his brothers and sisters(John and Lillie Belle, William and Lallah)To visit her parents -- almost a day's drive away.
Coming back at twilight , drowsy children wrapped in quilts ,A storm came up and the creek they had to crossWas running high and wild."The mules didn't want to cross it,"The old man told me, leaning forward, his eyes ablaze,"But that girl, she slapped the lines across their rumps and called out,And we all got home that night."
Eighty some years ago and the memory was so freshThat I could see my great-grandmother -- 'that girl,'Determined to get her brood home safeAnd out of the wet Alabama woods.

Lucy Camella died when my grandfather was twelve --
And widowed William, no time to grieve
with six young children and a crop in the fields,
Married a  handy cousin. 
Minnie Lula Northcutt Northcutt
Gave him two more children.
But my grandfather, still grieving
Left home.

 

Elizabeth's View

"The three big windows framed what could have been a delicate Japanese ink drawing -- all muted colors and simple lines, with hazy mountaintops poking through the low-lying fog like islands in a pale gray sea of mist." (from Art's Blood, p.411)
Our eastern view -- always changing, always gorgeous. In the morning the mist rises up from the river to produce lovely ephemeral scenes.
Being fortunate enough to live where I do, how could I not write about it? Elizabeth's house and farm are based on our house and farm -- 'write what you know,' they often say. And I have enough to remember already, with all these characters and pasts I've created; it's comforting to have to remember only (so far) that Elizabeth's house differs from ours in just two particulars. For one thing, Elizabeth has a mirror by her kitchen door (Signs in the Blood, p. 11).

Hey, it was my first book and I hadn't known that it's considered cliched and amateurish to describe a character by having him or her look in a mirror. Sorry. The other difference is that Elizabeth's sofas are still denim-covered whereas our denim-covered sofas were trashed by the dogs and have been replaced by leather. But then we have six dogs while Elizabeth, a saner woman than I, has only three.
This is a re-post from January 7, 2008.  Alas, I have only three dogs now. 

November Sights

Wild persimmons -- awaiting a passing possum or raccoon -- if they haven't been well frosted, they'll pucker your mouth for sure.
Oakleaf hydrangea leaves -- rich color and texture. Three squirrel nests -- a rural apartment building?   Note the penthouse.
And rolls of hay -- better than money in the bank at this time of year.

HOMEGROWN

In the 35 years we've lived in the area, Asheville has gone from a virtual food wasteland to a foodie's paradise. There are so many great places to eat that I only wish I had the time and money to enjoy them all.

But HOMEGROWN  is really special. Its focus is local, seasonal, affordable food and Claui, who works there, has been tantalizing me with descriptions of the specials of the day. 
  Miki Kilpatrick, one of the owners, describes HOMEGROWN as "slow food right quick." HomeGrown, she says, will offer as many local foods as possible on the menu. "We're going to try to hit a 90 percent bench mark, and do lots of canning and preserving to get us through the winter with local food," she says. "We're really trying to make it our mission to make local food affordable and convenient." 
Though that sounds like no small feat, Miki says, "I grew up on a farm in Madison County putting up vegetables for the winter. That was just a part of life then." 
That farm is just around the mountain from us. We've known Miki all her life and are so proud of what she's doing. I had the delicious  Lamb Wrap  -- Local lamb (East Fork Farm) with Fresh Arugula (Bountiful Cities Project), Goat Cheese (Looking Glass Creamery) & Pickled Heirloom Tomatoes (Long Valley Organics).The extensive menu offers many choices, entrees (a tempting chicken pot pie,) sandwiches, (including a duck taco that really sounded intriguing,) salads, and, I was pleased to note,  fabulous tomato-basil soup (tomatoes & basil from Wool Branch Farm)  -- Wool Branch Farm is us -- Justin and Claui supplied those tomatoes and that basil -- oh, the pride.It's a cheerful, casual restaurant and the food came out in surprisingly quick time. I only regret I didn't take a picture of it -- alas, it looked and smelled too good to do anything but dive right in!

Forty-seven Years!

That's how long we've been married. We were high school sweethearts and, after three years of 'going steady,'  married while he was in the Marine Corps and I was still in college.
Good grief -- the mind boggles.   We have been incredibly blessed in our life ... and we'll celebrate this morning with the traditional Eggs Benedict and champagne. (The evening feast will have to wait till tomorrow as I have a class to teach tonight.)
Thank you, John, with all my heart, for all the years! The road goes ever on . . .
And for the other nice news -- of which I spoke yesterday -- check out this ! 

FAQ - Query

Don't know why this didn't post as I thought I'd scheduled it but I got distracted this morning by some nice news and then I had to go report for jury duty . . . any way, here's the Monday post, better late than never. Watch this space tomorrow for the nice news.

One Q that I get very F is "Who's your agent?"

My incredible agent, she who had the good taste to see a future for Elizabeth Goodweather, is Ann Collette with the Rees Literary Agency. She likes literary, mystery, thrillers, suspense, vampire, and women's fiction; in non-fiction, she prefers true crime, narrative non-fiction, military and war, work to do with race and class, and work set in or about Southeast Asia.  

No high fantasy (elves and such), sci-fi, YA or children's books. Ann prefers email queries.  Send a terse query (What's a query? See HERE.) and the first 10 pages of your book in the body of the email; like most agents, Ann doesn't open attachments from people she doesn't know. 
 Ann can be reached at Agent10702@aol.com .

And it goes without saying but I'll say it anyway – NEVER QUERY AN AGENT WITHOUT A FINISHED MANUSCRIPT – PROOFREAD AND READY TO SEND IN FULL.