Emilie Richards's Blog, page 107

Somewhere Between Luck and Trust: What’s It All About?

Where Luck Meets Trust, Miracles Can Happen

Cristy Haviland served eight months in prison, giving birth behind bars to the child of the man who put her there and might yet destroy her. Now she’s free again, but what does that mean? As smart as she is, she has never learned to read. And that’s the least of her hurdles.

Georgia Ferguson, talented educator, receives a mysterious charm bracelet that may help her find the mother who abandoned her at birth. Does she want to follow the clues, and if she does, can reticent Georgia reach out for help along the way?

Both women are standing at a crossroads, a place when unlikely unions can be formed. A place where two very different women might bridge the gap between generations and education and together make tough choices.

Somewhere between the townships called Luck and Trust, at a mountain cabin known as the Goddess House, two very different women, may even, if they dare, find common ground and friendship.

***

For the next week I’d like to introduce you to my newest novel, Somewhere Between Luck and Trust, on sale on June 25th at your favorite bookstore. You’ll find more on my website, soon, as well. But I thought you deserved a sneak peek.

Did you wonder who the main continuing character of the second book in my Goddesses Anonymous series would be? I asked people on my Facebook Page to guess, and nobody came up with Georgia Ferguson. Do you remember Georgia from One Mountain Away? Georgia was the headmistress of the private school that Taylor Martin, Charlotte Hale’s daughter, had attended. Georgia and Charlotte didn’t see eye to eye on anything, and eventually Charlotte found a way to have Georgia removed from her position.

Years later, of course, Charlotte regretted this as well as many other things, but for Georgia the damage had been done. She left administration and went back to teaching, but years of education and experience were put on hold. I won’t tell you more because it might spoil One Mountain Away just a bit, but we can say that Georgia’s life was in flux when the first book ended.  And we didn’t know the half of it then.

Cristy Haviland, though? No, she won’t be familiar. When Somewhere Between Luck and Trust begins, Cristy’s life is about to change, too. And yes, it needs to. Cristy has three strikes against her already, yet she could be the girl next door. Sweet, pretty, talented. And so deeply troubled by a series of circumstances out of her control that she may never find her way again.

Two characters, unacquainted until now. How will they reach out to each other? And who will they meet along the way to help on their separate journeys?

Just a note on the title. Luck and Trust, where the fictional Goddess House resides, really exist. They are two neighboring townships in Madison County, NC, up Doggett Mountain from Asheville. How could I not set a book there?

Next blog, watch for a fabulous recipe for pasta e fagioli with shrimp, straight from the novel. I made it this week to test my version, and it’s now on our permanent list of yummy entrees to fix frequently.

How I Spend My Summer Vacation: The Joys of Chautauqua Institution

Some of you have asked about the place where I spend my summers, so today a photo essay.

Chautauqua Institution, in Chautauqua, NY,was founded in 1874 as the Chautauqua Lake Sunday School Assembly, an experiment in out-of-school learning. Although the Assembly was founded by Methodists, other denominations participated from the beginning. Now the Institution is an ecumenical and spiritual center for many faiths.

The website defines the essence this way: “The Chautauqua Institution is a not-for-profit, 750-acre educational center beside Chautauqua Lake in southwestern New York State, where approximately 7,500 persons are in residence on any day during a nine-week season, and a total of over 142,000 attend scheduled public events. Over 8,000 students enroll annually in the Chautauqua Summer Schools which offer courses in art, music, dance, theater, writing skills and a wide variety of special interests.”

My husband and I began visiting regularly in the early 1990s. We bought our cottage (circa 1895)  several years ago, a dream we hadn’t expected to come true. This past year we’ve done extensive renovations to bring her into the 21st century, and I’ll share photos of the finished product soon.

Meantime, though, here are a few photos of some of my favorite Chautauqua scenes. Chautauqua is a visual treat, and I’m delighted to share a bit with you.

Chautauqua has lots of different architectural styles, but the original Victorian era houses are some of the most charming. Here’s one not far from our cottage.

The bell in Miller Tower chimes four times each hour, and the tower is a welcome landmark to people returning for the summer. Steamboats used to dock here bringing passengers, but these days the lake itself is used primarily for recreation.

The Athenaeum Hotel has welcomed visitors since 1881. The Athenaeum was one of the first hotels to have electric lights, and Thomas Edison himself married the daughter of one of the Institution’s founders and was a frequent resident.

Chautauqua is such a busy place in the evenings, with concerts and other entertainment in the Amphitheater we rarely walk down to the lake to see the sunset, but one night last summer my husband captured this with his new camera. The end of a wonderful Chautauqua day.

Sunday Inspiration: Let Us Praise

A Father’s Day Prayer

Rev. Kirk Loadman-Copeland

Let us praise those fathers who have striven to balance the demands of work, marriage, and children with an honest awareness of both joy and sacrifice.

Let us praise those fathers who, lacking a good model for a father, have worked to become a good father.

Let us praise those fathers who by their own account were not always there for their children, but who continue to offer those children, now grown, their love and support.

Let us pray for those fathers who have been wounded by the neglect and hostility of their children.

Let us praise those fathers who, despite divorce, have remained in their children’s lives.

Let us praise those fathers whose children are adopted, and whose love and support has offered healing.

Let us praise those fathers who, as stepfathers, freely choose the obligation of fatherhood and earned their stepchildren’s love and respect.

Let us praise those fathers who have lost a child to death, and continue to hold the child in their heart.

Let us praise those men who have no children, but cherish the next generation as if they were their own.

Let us praise those men who have “fathered” us in their role as mentors and guides.

Let us praise those men who are about to become fathers; may they openly delight in their children.

And let us praise those fathers who have died, but live on in our memory and whose love continues to nurture us.

And How’s The Weather Treating You?

Our street during construction. The cars belong to our construction crew

Our street after the community decided to resurface it.

 

The Write Way: Writing Under Difficult Conditions. Can It Be Done?

“A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper.”  E. B. White

Right now I’m sitting in my study listening to a generator in the house about 10 yards behind me. The generator is for the benefit of the roofers who are pounding away outside my window. Not to be outdone, there’s a crew on the other side of our house digging up the road in preparation for a new one. And in the house itself?  Our electrician is going from upstairs to down repairing wallboard and painting, later to be joined by our plumber.

It’s a slow day in paradise.  In the past three weeks there have been as many as six workers in the house at a time, and not to be outdone, the house behind us is undergoing a total renovation, so even on weekends, a crew is there banging away.

All this and a deadline, too.

How do writers work under these conditions? I’m certainly not alone. I once visited a writer friend who was working under a plastic tarp in her study as a new roof went on over head. She, too, was on a deadline. Another friend–and I’m not making this up–was told after the sudden death of her husband that everyone at her publishing house was terribly sorry, but would she mind getting the book in on time anyway?

No problem, right?

There are difficult conditions and difficult conditions. House renovation is a good problem to have. The end of a happy marriage is not, and the two in no way equate. Yet sometimes a writer has to write, no matter what’s going on around her.

The last weeks have taught me a little about how to proceed in the midst of confusion.  If you’re not a writer, this may apply to you, as well. After all deadlines are a fact of life whether you’re submitting a novel, finishing a quilt for the local show, cleaning the house for a party, getting ready for a trip or a million other life events with endings attached.

List everything you need to do in the next few weeks. Don’t order by importance. “Finishing the book” can be sandwiched between “Buy milk” and “Take the dog to the vet.“
Next put the list in order, again not by importance. Start with the things you can actually do in the midst of chaos. End with the things you absolutely can’t.
Now put the “can do” list in order of importance. That’s what you should be working on now. Remember, even if the important things have been relegated to the bottom of the list, if you complete everything else, you’ll be able to dive in and complete the things that most matter the moment life settles down, and you won’t be as distracted.

Last week when it became clear to me that I wasn’t going to be able to write my new book for a while, I spent my days editing and formatting one I wrote years ago which I plan to publish as an ebook. Editing can be done in fits and starts. Creating a new work takes chunks of time and fewer interruptions. By finishing the ebook edits, I will no longer have that distraction once I can write.

Finally, here are a few other tips to help relieve the pressure.

Check the “need to do” list and delete anything that isn’t essential. Can you live without it for weeks or even forever? Then do so.
Enlist help. Ask supportive family members to pitch in, or hire people to do what you can’t manage so you can work non-stop when the opportunity presents itself.
Make a realistic plan for what to do if meeting the deadline is hopeless. Sometimes knowing you have an “if all else fails” plan  will make it easier to forge on.

Noise blocking headphones, a husband to run interference and errands, a sense of humor? They’ve all been invaluable for me.

Share your tips if you feel so inclined. Somebody will thank you for them.

 

Sunday Inspiration: Serenity

God, give us grace to accept with serenity

the things that cannot be changed,

Courage to change the things which should be changed,

and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.

Reinhold Niebuhr

There is such deep wisdom in this simple prayer.  Participants in Alcoholics Anonymous have used these words for many years to help them achieve sobriety, but they can help all of us cope with change and chaos in our lives.

Moments of serenity?  Moments to reconsider your path through life?  What a wonderful prayer to begin the process.

Renovating a Novel and a House: How Much is Too Much?

[image error]Here’s the original cover. The new one will be completely different. Stay tuned.

When built (or written) both the novel and the cottage were the best they could be for their era. They followed the conventions of their time. The house had a bath and a half, which by local standards was plenty. In Victorian times, nearby houses often had sinks in the bedrooms for daily bathing, and more bathrooms would have been unheard of.

The kitchen, too, was tiny. Cooking was simpler, few pots and pans were in residence; most likely fewer ingredients were used.

The Novel:

From Glowing Embers, on the other hand, has an abundance of everything. Words. Exclamation points. Introspection. Flashbacks. Points of view. Love scenes. By today’s standards, it moves a bit slow. Or, at least, it did before I began my work.

When I contemplated both renovations I began by taking stock of what I already had. I loved both in their former states, but I also saw that in order to live on, they had to be brought into the present day.

Head Hopping, Exclamation Points and Flashbacks:

For the book this has means a careful editing to remove unneccessary dialogue and more frequently unneccessary introspection. Exclamation points? Many fewer. Flashbacks? Since I love them all as they are, they will stay.

The most difficult change is point of view. Point of view simply means which character’s head we are in at any given moment. This novel is a romance, and originally the only point of view allowed was the heroine’s. Then authors began to sneak in the hero’s point of view, too. Finally authors began to include both points of view in the same scene, otherwise known as “head hopping.”

I haven’t head hopped in years, but when this book was written, along with my fellow writers, I certainly did. The reason? I knew my readers wanted to feel and understand both characters. What were they going through? What secrets were they keeping from each other?

These days I use multiple points of view in my novels, but the point of view characters only change when a scene break occurs or a new chapter begins. However my task now is not to completely rewrite an already satisfying novel, but to tweak the scenes where the head hopping occurs. Some head hopping must remain because it enriches this story. Some of it will disappear. Gone, too, will be some of the introspection, so that the book moves more quickly.  Gone, too, anything that bothered me.

The Pleasures of Change:

Both renovations are maddening, filled with choices, disappointments, and moments of surprise and delight.  But the freedom to make those choices and carry them through?  Priceless.

No matter how many times I bang my head against my newly shored-up and insulated walls, I know that both this cottage and this novel will be so much better for the effort.

Renovation photos and novel to debut soon.

Sunday Inspiration: Say YES!

[image error]This is going to sound crazy. Say yes to everything. Accept all offers. Go along with the plan. Support someone else’s dream. Say :yes”; “right”; “sure”; “I will”; “okay”; “of course”; “YES!” Cultivate all the ways you can imagine to express affirmation. When the answer to all questions is yes, you enter a new world, a world of action, possibility, and adventure… It is undoubtedly an exaggeration to suggest that we can say yes to everything that comes up, but we can all say yes to more than we normally do. Once you become aware that you can, you will see how often we use the technique of blocking in personal relationships simply out of habit. Turning this around can bring positive and unexpected results… Try substituting “yes and” for “yes but” — this will get the ball rolling. –Patricia Ryan Madson

Can you imagine what life would be like if you said YES! twice as much as you do now… or three times as much… or ten times as much?  It takes so much more courage to say YES! than to say no.  And it takes imagination to envision the possibilities that YES! can open for you.  Give it a try for a week and let me know what happens.

What Do Readers Think? I Really Want to Know.

I’ve been hoping to have more renovation photos for you to enjoy (?) this week. The workmen are finishing up, so it’s a slow morning here in Chautauqua, New York. We only have a plumber, electrician, wallboard guy and flooring guy cutting tile. I can almost hear the birds sing.

More photos will be up soon, but in the meantime? I thought I would ask YOU to blog with me. While writers are always asked questions about their books, their work habits, their creative inspiration, readers are usually only consulted if they’re lucky enough to be in a book group.

I’ve created a new blog category and named it “I Really Want to Know.” And I do want to know. I so often have questions for you as I’m writing, and I’d love your input. Today’s questions are a bit general, but I think they’re a good place to start. Please answer as many as you would like to under comments.

Never commented? Here are easy instructions.

Commenting is as easy as clicking on the word “comment,” under the title of this blog on the right. If you’re the first, the link will say “No Comment.” And when you click that link, it wil take you to a little box to add one.
You will be asked to fill in my last name, to help us avoid spam. Isn’t that a lot more fun than those impossible to decipher letters that some sites require? (If you don’t know my last name, you may be in the wrong place.)
Then comment away. Of course if someone else has already commented, it won’t say “No Comment,” will it? Just click on the link that says Comment (1), etc. instead.

I’m looking forward to finding out more about the readers who enjoy my blog, so let’s begin. And remember, there are no wrong answers.

What kinds of books do you most like to read? For example: Biographies. Romances. Novels set in England.  
What book do you have waiting to be read next on your nightstand, or reserved at your local library, or on your “to purchase” list?
What was the LAST book you read?
What do you most want to find in a novel?
What will make you close a book and never open it again?

So many questions and so little space here. I hope you’ll find this intriguing enough to let us know what you think. If you do, we’ll do it again.

Sunday Inspiration: “This is my home…”

“This Is My Song” (words by Lloyd Stone, to the tune of Finlandia)

This is my song, oh God of all the nations,

a song of peace for lands afar and mine.

This is my home, the country where my heart is;

here are my hopes, my dreams, my holy shrine;

but other hearts in other lands are beating

with hopes and dreams as true and high as mine

My country’s skies are bluer than the ocean,

and sunlight beams on clover leaf and pine.

But other lands have sunlight too and clover,

and skies are everywhere as blue as mine.

This is my song, thou God of all the nations;

a song of peace for their land and for mine.

On this Memorial Day holiday I  share a hymn I’ve sung many times in church.  This is My Song is sung by different denominations to remind us of all we share with others.  With all the tension and conflict in the world it’s so easy to forget that “other hearts in other lands are beating with hopes and dreams as true and high as mine.”

On this Memorial Day, we remember all who have sacrificed for our freedom in the United States, as well as those in other nations who have struggled for life and liberty.  Who will you remember and honor this Memorial Day?