May!

Happy Beltane! I'm happy to see the arrival of May, though I do like April as well. May is my birth month so it's always held a special place in my heart.

~Marly

Crazy Days

My apologies, loyal readers, for being lax in my blogging of late. Unfortunately, it's only going to get worse before it gets better.

I'm in the middle of crunch time with school. The last day of classes is today, and final exams start next week. I'm also completing my ALWR this semester (Advanced Legal Writing Requirement, think of it like a law school thesis).

I'll do my best to pop in every week, but don't hold your breath.

Family Dinner

While writing THE VIOLIN, I used many of the traditions and activities from daily life with my family. Familial dinners in THE VIOLIN were a place of family communication, news exchange and happy conversation. It was easy to write these scenes because this sort of activity was a daily occurrence all the years I spent growing up at home.
Since we had no television because my dad thought it was a deleterious invention that stole our creativity and resourcefulness, dinner time became a major entertainment for us. Long after dinner was finished and the main course was cold, we would talk on and on. It was a chance to tell our parents what was happening in our lives and get them to help us solve problems we were confronting.
Occasionally, it was lecture time like the time my sister wrecked the family car and the time I went on a date with a boy I knew my dad disapproved of.
We found out things about the world and the universe. We talked politics, religion, etiquette, what color we wanted to paint our rooms--everything and anything.
When I married my high school sweetheart and moved to Texas, I asked my parents to record dinner conversations to keep me from being homesick. I have to laugh here because we used reel to reel tape recorders. I don't even know if anything like that exists anymore. The sound and speed weren't always consistent but that didn't matter to me.
Now, long after my parents have died and my sisters and I have moved away from home, I still have those tapes. A couple of them have been recorded on Cd's.
So I wonder, do families still have conversations around the dinner table? Do parents learn what their children are doing and what problems are coming up for them? Do children ask their parents about the things they wonder about or fear? Do families play board games or cards as an after dinner entertainment?
What are family dinners like at your house? How would you like them to be? What would you change about dinnertime? Do you have great mealtimes at your house? What makes them great?
I'm ready to listen to your views and your memories on dinner time conversations where you live.
All good things to you and yours in your corner of the universe.
Sarah McNeal
www.sarahmcneal.com

What a pretty description, doesn't it completely make the story?

I was having a positive conversation with a friend of mine about this old description in an as yet, woefully... foolishly? unfinished story that was started almost a year ago.

Con lifted her head, shifting the blonde bangs from her eyes. Her walk, she had down to a fine art. Even her mother could not fault it.

From behind, she appeared as a boy. Thick, platform Mary Jane shoes covered her feet, and were covered over by straight black suit pants of a boy’s cut. With that combination, Con looked as tall as many of the boys who walked the halls, and a little taller than some. That her blonde hair cropped up against the back of her head, and only a scant amount of fringe flopped over her eyes, was exactly the look she was going for. She knew she could dip her head and smile at any of the first year girls, and they in turn would smile, and blush, before finding their friends to talk about the very effeminate boy who had just flirted with them.

Con had met up with a Swedish student by the name of Kjell a little bit into her first year at uni. Brunette where she was blonde, Kjell’s walk was nothing like her own, for all that he was a member of the male species. His hair was tied back in a ponytail to the length of his shoulder blades.

‘Trying to impress the newbies?’

His deep voice made her smile, and look up into his kind green eyes.

‘Whatever would make you think that?’

‘The poets shirt. You always wear that when you’re trying to impress someone.'

It got me to thinking of other descriptions that I have used for characters over the last few years, and I was looking at a small book that I had stopped using until recently.

It's only large enough to jot disjointed ideas down in note form when I'm nowhere near a computer or completely in the mind track of doing something else, like sleeping, or being on rickety PT, or having a conversation with someone. But these were some I found, and some characters that I want recreate just based on the fractured descriptions.

Her usually bright eyes were bloodshot above high cheekbones.

Blonde hair that he'd forgotten to tie up that morning framed jaw line and compassionate blue eyes in a disheveled mess.

Chocolate brown eyes asked her a silent question as his dark fringe fell into his eyes, again.

The line of his nose and mouth were thinner, perfect for the look of distaste he pulled when he was displeased.

It seemed like she was only moving to stop herself from curling in a corner and crying the rims around her eyes even redder.

His eyes were watchful, even when his attention seemed to be elsewhere.

Letters From Home

The world is changing and I find myself having difficulty sometimes adjusting to the "new world." I have always loved getting letters and cards in the mail--you know--the real paper kind. There is something so special about the thought and contemplation that other person went to in order to send me that card or that letter. When we were young and in college, my husband and I wrote faithfully to one another almost every day. My letters often contained little momentos like pressed flowers and trinkets from gumball machines. He even wrote poetry--for real. My letters had sealing wax on the envelope and pressed into the wax would be little symbols of love like a double heart or a rose. These letters lifted my spirits especially when I was homesick.
I sent a friend a letter recently with special ink in sea blue and sealing wax on the envelope. Because of modern mechinery at the post office, the seal was snapped right off. It was very disappointing. Still, it was my handwriting. Remember when you could recognize the handwriting of your friends and family? Do you think that still happens?
It's great to get instant messages and email. I can even talk to my friend in Australia using a headset and my computer. But I miss handwritten letters, seeing the handing writing of the people I love and the time and effort that they put into "Real" letters.
Sarah McNeal
www.sarahmcneal.com

Drive by posting...

I'm in the midst of revising my futuristic fantasy, Psychic Chains, but I thought I'd do a drive by blog post and wish everyone a magical weekend! It's finally warming up here in my part of the world, and it looks like Spring is officially here!

~Marly

Exerpt from Chateau Despair by Linda Sole!

Linda Sole
www.lindasole.co.uk
Romance, saga, crime!

Coming soon to Red Rose Publishing
Chateau Despair/Linda Sole

A big WW11 saga!
FRANCE JANUARY 1921

Madame Fanchot watched in triumph as the child entered the world in a mess of slime and blood. However, her feeling was short-lived as she turned to its mother. She was dying. Her labour had been long and hard, and the months of carrying had taken their toll. No one would care what became of her or her child. She’d been foolish and careless and her behaviour had brought shame to her family. For herself, she could have little reason left to live, but Madame Fanchot knew that she feared for her child.

"Where is she?" The woman’s voice was barely more than a whisper. The blood drained out from between her thighs, sluggish and thick. Madame Fanchot gave up any attempt to staunch it. She believed nothing more could be done to help the woman, or perhaps she was either too indifferent or too ignorant to try to save her. "Let me see her…just once."

"She is beautiful, Madame," Madame Fanchot said. She laid the small bundle in the mother’s arms. The child was wrapped in nothing but the shawl the woman had been wearing when they’d found her wandering in the woods some hours earlier. "You have a lovely daughter."

"I want to call her Elena," the mother said. "Her name is Elen…"

The rattle of death caught in her throat, causing her head to fall back against the pillows.

"She has gone," a man said from the doorway. He spat on the floor of the filthy cottage. "So perish all such whores as they deserve."

"You are too harsh, Jean," his wife said. She took the squalling child from its mother and held it to her breast to quiet it. "How can you know who or what the poor woman was? She has scarcely spoken a word since we found her wandering."

"No decent woman would be alone in a wood in her condition," he muttered sourly. "If she came of good family they threw her out – and she isn’t wearing a wedding ring."

"That doesn’t mean she was a bad woman," Madame Fanchot gave the dead woman a pitying look. "What are we to do with her now?"

"I’ll bury her in the wood. I’ve no money to pay the priest for a proper burial for a stranger?"

"But shouldn’t we tell someone? Supposing someone comes looking for her or the child one day?"

"We never saw her."

"What of the child?" she cried in horror at his callous words.

"Get rid of it…" He growled deep in his throat . "I don’t mean kill it – take it to the church. Leave it near the altar. The priest will know what to do. It won’t be the first time he’s had to deal with an abandoned bastard I’ll swear. I don’t care what you do with it, just get it out of the house."

"The shawl is hers. Was there nothing else – no ring or trinket of any kind that might help them to trace who the child’s mother was?"

"Nothing," he muttered in a way that immediately told her he was lying. "Nothing at all."

She scowled at him. If he’d stolen something from the woman, he would likely keep it until he thought it was safe to sell. She would not receive the smallest part of his ill-gotten gains, even though she was the one who’d gone through the trouble of attending the woman.

"I’m going to take the child," she told him. She hated his brutality; she hated the poverty of her life. She wished she dared to leave him and take the child with her. It was impossible. Poor as her life is, it was still better than starving on the streets. "If you mean to bury the woman, Jean, be careful. If anyone sees you there could be trouble."

"No one will see," he shrugged. "No one ever comes to the woods these days. Not after what happened up at the chateau."

Madame Fanchot crossed herself as she hurried out into the bleakness of a cold winter evening. The chateau remained empty for the past five years, save from the crazy old woman that owned it. The last of her family, she had lived there alone, hardly seeing anyone since the tragedy. Madame Fanchot’s mind shied away from what had happened all those years ago.

Indeed, she did not truly know for sure what had happened at the chateau. She’d only heard the rumours, but it was certain three people were brutally murdered there.

Shivering, she ran all the way to the church. She looked about her, but could see no one. Hurriedly, she deposited her bundle behind the priest’s pulpit. He would surely see it there when he came to take evening confession.

Afraid and guilty for leaving the child, Madame Fanchot made the sign of the cross over her heart and then ran from the church hastily. In her anxiety to get away, Madame Fanchot failed to notice the figure sitting quietly in the shadows. Nor did she ever know what happened after she’d left, though there would be times over the years when she wondered what had become of the child. Times when she believed she knew…

(c) 2008 by Linda Sole. All Rights Reserved.