C. (Comment, never msg).’s Comments (group member since Jan 30, 2014)

C. (Comment, never msg).’s comments from the Gentle SPECTRUMS group.

Very happy about Izzy. Looking forward to knowing how old and what kind she is in e-mail.

I remember that burn treatments and survival are juxtaposed with Marianne's adventure recollections. Don't worry. They continue to be wonderful stories after the monastery from whence she came. I think she is from Germany. After reading those stories, I hope you and even Shirin understand why I am impressed Andrew Davidson researched and wove together ALL OF THAT in a novel. It is usually one culture per novel, with exception of the wonderful Katherine Neville.

A reminder that with Shirin finished, we can be very specific and hold real conversations here. I would appreciate the reminder of what you are seeing and where the character is going. I am happy to finally see that you are on page 225!

It would have to be. Maggie wrote straight off about a woman dying while wolves bite her. I skimmed and another page started the same way with another victim. It is horrifying and unnecessary for fiction. There is no doubt this was what Kerri hated. I am grateful Maggie showed what kind of book it was so I do not read those. Sell pile! I have certainly been watching for your e-mail reply, dear Kerri.

Shirin & Kerri, I'd like to wait to do this when you are both available to make notes and chat every day. Barring surprises like relatives visiting, please let me know when your internet and time are available to commit to constant conversation. We truly feel like we are reading together if someone has written everytime we log in and perhaps replied the same day once in a while, too. :)

On a separate note, I said I had three "Shiver" books in first editions, hoping that one of my favourite authors in "The Raven Boy's" series was similarly good and exciting in others. Kerri said she disliked the first novel because it was implausible and disgusting, in terms of being attracted to a canine. I wish that were all it was, Kerri and can't believe you didn't cite the extreme violence.

I checked the first couple of pages and was disgusted. They described how girls felt getting attacked by wolves, a murdered person and a person watching! I put all three hardcovers in our library to sell to people when we invite customers. I will not read about violence, attack, or suffering. We know Maggie has way better work than that.

For when you are both available to talk and write reading notes daily, I want you to know my copy of "The Dream Thief" is here.

Kerri, oh my. If you had e-mailed, you would have had our prayers through this instantly. We are glad to have good news and pray for Izzy now. I didn't know she is a girl and don't think you have used her pronoun before. Give her a hug and kiss for me, please! I hope Kammie is cuddling her too. Love, Carolyn & family.

I have never watched "The Amazing Race", which I got the impression was a travelling version of "Survivor"; being dared to do unpleasant things for prize money. I was glad Canada's beautiful land was shown to the world 9 years ago but did not watch this edition either, until last week. I caught reruns of the final two shows of a recent season and was pleasantly surprised.

This is not news to many folks: it is not about disgusting or gruelling dares. Participants are challenged to a wide variety of skills that give everyone a chance to excel. They pieced together agricultural irrigation pipes, heli-skied, assembled oversized deck chairs, and sought elves with uniquely coloured candycanes.

Before they reach these challenges, competitors receive or earn clues that they need to decipher. This has the flavour of mystery-solving for me, which had me interested in at least peeking at the introduction of the new season tonight.

I discovered "The Amazing Race Canada" is setting off in my home city and apparently the host's province too: Winnipeg, Manitoba! I have to tune in. If friends want to see our city, this is an original way to tour! I am sure it can be downloaded anywhere in the world; if you are resourceful and don't wait for your service to carry it. Go, Winnipeg, go!

🍁 Thank you, Kerri & Leeanne! Happy Canada Day to the two of you, too! I love that you found a maple leaf gif to add to the pictoral delight of our unifying message.

Leeanne, I asked in your Scotland status update if it is grade 11 you finished, or if you have graduated from highschool! These are great achievements and you must be excited to dance around this summer! Fewer memories are as poignant and happy as when we weer kids getting out of school! Love, your friend, Carolyn.

Gentle Spectrums is a versatile Canadian lounge for worldwide friends, that has been here for a decade. From all of us in this group, to the Goodreads community: HAPPY CANADA DAY TO YOU!!! Yours truly, Carolyn & the Gentle Spectrums members.

Shirin, we have heard what you disliked. Since you are far in the novel, how about some parts you do like? :)

The last subject in "Raven Boys" is everyone telling us where there are ley lines near their city. I imagine it is a short look on the internet like it was for me. :) I hope my mail order comes through soon, otherwise I would buy the other Maggie Stiefvater books I want from somewhere else.

The English company "Awesome Books" and Canadian customs, who lately only allow $20.00 CDN without charging tax to pick up mail, are troublesome. They should do better, with low postage and merchandise other countries benefit from.

Yes, Kerri, I think flying through books is part of what makes Shirin's sensations unmemorable and bland. Good idea Shirin, to read something you love (or TV or a film). However, read one at a time slowly. It is like being unable to see the countryside on a train. Maybe what is outside the window will be beautiful to witness.

Shirin, you confessed not liking any books. It sounds like moving away from war, political drama will be helpful. If a miracle of surviving injuries seemed boring and a woman living for 100s of years; the roadblock is not the book. ;) If you overload the tongue with a strong spice, it masks how delicious the next food is.

Was Marianne was invited to be a professional scribe as a child, or was it a little copying as early training? I had fun watching for clues about whether Marianne was from the past or had personality confusion. On one hand, it is only in our lifetime now that spiritual matters like energy healing and past lives have STOPPED being called "crazy" by anyone with the ability to THINK creatively! At the time of reading, I think we agree the answer doesn't matter as long as the protagonist is cheered up and given encouragement to live.

Does anyone feel worse about burns whether it could have been avoided or not? I don't think so but am mulling your suggestion. A good point that a dirty source of income contrasts with Marianne's moral one. My feeling that I wrote a week or two ago, is contrasting a job focused on looks, with the miracle of breathing no matter how he looks or feels. I winced when he hoped the cap or mask he was receiving would hide damaged skin. How terrible to make them transparent!

It is odd no location is given that I remember. Yes, Canada covers hospitalization and medication there. Where he goes after is the point and thankfully, Marianne supplied a home. Please remind me, did she check herself in and have the say to leave when she was ready to?

Thank you for reminding me that statues have a different name. It is like a moth's "coccon" is more famous than a butterfly's "chrysalis", taught by Leeanne. A large nursery among milkweed is outside our office window this year and five chrysalises are presently in their new, green stage! I saw most of those caterpillars walk and begin making them!

Oddly, Kerri, staggering authors and styles based on moods keeps my appreciation high but you seem to binge successfully. Did that change this winter? Could that be why you enjoyed books less than you expected to enjoy, or was it flying through stories that made them feel lacklustre?

I feel good that I am catching up to you. It is never a contest but when you see a friend has finished 100 books in June, you wonder what they are doing with their time, or yourself with yours, haha. I will slow down and read "The Stand". Ron & I want to watch the movies. We need to do nice things together and this is not the season we watch TV. Your friend, Carolyn.

Kerri is reading. She is helping her Aunt move to a new house and is not updating her progress. She will be available soon. Shirin, I am not suggesting a break. I am helping you "cleanse the palate" and look at things in a fresh way. Do you know the expression? When people test wine, they eat something plain in between wine flavours, so that the tongue is ready to neutrally start new and does not have old tastes left on it.

True readers and intellectuals like us do not need blunt stimuli to enjoy the depth of a story. Don't look for queens, wars. Shift perspective of the adventure and intrigue to watch for. Andrew Davidson & I come from a province where there are no common attractions like oceans or mountains. If people ask "What is there to look at in Manitoba?" we know where to find LITTLE oasises of beauty. See these patches of wildflowers over here, or how nothing disturbs the smooth, far skyline. Meet these birds who do not nest anywhere else in the world. And this my friend, is true modernly as well as historically. You don't need the historical fiction gimmick either. We just want to go where Marianna's & (what is his name?) action is!

What I found amazing is that this woman meets (what is his name) in the hospital and says she has known him for hundreds of hers. She says she can prove it. Meanwhile, we are watching to someone figure out how to live without a human-looking face or body and he is actually using modern jokes to let us know what something very horrible is like. I love both timelines.

In the past, I was amazed to learn how books were handwritten by people very skilled and careful with their caligraphy! Aren't you? We learn all about Germany, I think Japan and Iceland, and one crazy place you will discover. :) My approach is "Don't EXPECT a book to be anything. Let the author tell YOU how his or her story goes and ride along".

I am glad you are open to trying. If you must read something different tonight, do it, then see you again in a day or two. Believe me, this is not my kind of novel at al. My clean palate, blank expectations allowed me to absorb something original.

I too found it hard to like the protagonist (what is his name?) and Marianna at first, which I think is the point. However, his very unique, painful situation was engagingly told because humour is an unexpected survival tool.

Once Marianna takes us to the past, I found a lot of enchantment and action there. Maybe you are too used to fantasy wars and murderers? Maybe you are reading other books simultaneously and not letting yourself absorb one very different book by itself? Kerri's opinion will be interesting to shed light on how people who don't know Manitoba humour will react to this narrator.

What impressed me is that Andrew Davidson did not only write about one ancient timeline. Can you imagine the work it took to research and depict such amazing detail into multiple cultures? At 44% perhaps you have not gone to many places yet. There is one to which no one expects anyone to go and I think you will find that original and fun!

Marigold's ascension was two years ago, on June 21. She is a Mother and our Daughter, only 11.5 years-old. The real cheering up would be to save them in the first place and have them in physical life with us. Yes, knowing she is by our side unseen and that we will see her in the afterlife too, helps a little.

It helps too that friends acknowledge our pain and support us through this period of missing our babies so much. Here is to you, my baby Marigold, from Momma, Dad, and your three kids!

On this day, she couldn't get enough air and the vets I phoned had no answers. "Energy Healing" by Donna Eden had arrived but I had learned the "Kit" summary. I traced Marigold's kidney meridian and other, creative basics. She was active, eating, jumping, playing outside, and her kidneys were voiding urine.

I wish I had known that in serious illness, we trace 3 companion meridians too and flush them. The circulation meridian is among them. Marigold was not circulating enough red blood cells. It seems wrong to lose a life that was strong and awake. We looked at each other in bed late on this night, I tried CPR, and she went to Heaven.

It will take time to lose the trauma. God could have urged that book sooner, or not added these health challenges at all and let our whole family enjoy long lives together. Please do that with Marigold's remaining 3 kids. ~Love, Carolyn & Ron~.

Thank you, Shirin. Please tell us which places near your home have ley lines. This is a little assignment it is fun to do. :)

My review is here, girls! https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I do take that as a compliment. My moan? Strolling by these well-written reviews with an empty 'like button' click. I put work into them and that darned button has prevailed for 11 years, longer at my blog. I don't mean a single review here and there. Clicking through 6 of my written pieces suggests nothing noteworthy in the bunch and is frustrating to me. I composed 6 last night in an admirable variety.

💖 Thank you for everything Kerri: your beautifully written words in e-mail and this here. Message #45 has the article link you wanted to read, about fighting to keep Marigold & her newborns, who were born in our room and never saw any shelter, nor did their Mom. The pregnant youngster was scooped up from a horse racing ranch and given to me in a parking lot. I smile at every time I pass it.

Some of the lives were short but they are the happiest of our rich, beautiful family. May the remaining three lives live very long, together at home with us. May we all do at least as well in age and health as Spirit, Thumbelina, and McCartney. May we all continue onwards together with all the love, health, and happiness we need.

My childhood friend helped me order, after I spent a week fighting to refresh & open each page, click each button, and adjust each total. I went through it again to pare down to 28 books. They are very good ones and I only lost Donna Eden's EFT Healing one at $6.30 CDN + the new 1.66 each. There is much more healing for me to learn and absorb quickly. You know why x 2.

When McCartney was alive, she offered to quickly buy me "Four Paws, Five Directions". She said she would happily do this again on good deals she finds, that I would not spend myself just yet. My order of really good material, "Dream Thieves", "Call Down The Hawk", and mystery volumes I have sought for years is coming. The best plus side is that she & her husband are finally coming to see our home in 2 weeks. Ron & I are excited to have fresh friends over to enjoy.

I'll come back here for a good talk, when you and Shirin add anything and reply. Novels 3 & 4 are available anytime at Amazon.ca for $14.00 CDN and I have a gift certificate.

I am sorry about a country that does not feel respected, Shirin. I know your family wants to be free and I am here for you. Our families are waiting for the world to catch-up on the rights and respect of animals, not only human mammals. You are right that some people wanted money, or did not treat children well and you wondered why they volunteered for it. My Mom & her Siblings spent time in foster care and called it hell, in Canada too. The two girls & two boys returned to one of their biological parents each. They got to know their Brothers over time but were not close with them.

You are right, Kerri. Having a loving place to go would avoid being a pornography actor (I meant to correct "star" from my post, forgot, and we kept saying it - sorry).

Mom stayed with family friends for long periods of time and they were friends for life. They are mentioned in the copy of the tribute I mailed you. Her first close friend when she finished high school and moved bravely to Manitoba, is the artist. It is her husband who just ascended to join her at 96 years-old.

This book is going to be lovely. The best advice is to stop imagining what it will be like, or hoping it will be a certain kind of story. "The Gargoyle" is complete original. Let the bizarre, injured storyteller tell you what his life is like in his current situation. The obvious contradiction is that someone who surived on earning money with a beautiful body, now doesn't look as human as he is comfortable feeling. Even surviving death, he is badly burned. He must wonder if it was better to die and I think, would need a therapist and loving family & friends, to tell him he is worth it.

Try to catch this now, Shirin. There is humour everywhere and I recognize it as Manitoba humour! Have you read any of Stephen King's stories? I kept thinking I should recommend this to him if there were a way, because it reminded me of how he could joke and relate to our modern world, in the middle of a nightmare. This poor protagonist tries to survive, Shirin, by jokingly telling us there is a word for having to amputate the male organ! Oh gosh, the basic life understanding that poor injured man is trying to get used to. I Maybe it will help that what looks annoying in a second language, is a man trying not to cry and scream, by using the humour of my people. :)

Kerri & Shirin, yes, there is a lot about the book copying room of professional scribe nuns and many other places. Because historical fiction is not new to the two of you, I wonder if you already know that books used to be copied by handwriting. This was new to me, even though the printing press goes far back, I think. The best thing about "The Gargoyle" for me is the other places travelled as well. And seeing someone survive an injury we pray never happens to anyone we know and show us how they live with it.

Like you, Shirin, I would not read it if the story were just about this. A bigger world builds and one place amazed and amused me because no one expects that. :-) You ladies lead but this gave me a chance to answer and encourage you. Go fast past the introductory chapters if they bore you and get into the lands of intrigue and colour.

😹 This really is funny, Kerri and the same vet webpage has a video I should share too, about marketing cat videos for all businesses. The Mexican story was e-mailed me to me about 15 years ago and I switched e-mail addresses many times, before using webmail. It was downloaded to PC folders I might have saved but it would take a long time to look.

The story is great because it goes on about building the Mexican's business with a fleet of boats and all he asks in response to it is "What would I do with that money". Eventually, the businessman says he could buy a small house in the country, retire, and just fish for pleasure or do whatever he loves. The crux is that this was what he was already doing, without much money.

It is my story. Ron's in-laws and co-workers think it is terrible to be a homemaker, instead of making equal bucks as him some way. I didn't, even when I busted my ass, or worked at the same company. Money is not the #1 key. I told Ron that, at a stressful time when he had no smiles or pleasantries, which are what really make a home life.