By Danielle Childers

Do publishers and editors read books they didn’t publish?  You betcha!  After all, we’re in this industry because we love good books. We’re such reading harlots. So I have no shame in presenting you with A Library Trollop’s Reading Recommendations!

I’m absolutely obsessed with retro fiction right now.  The stunning covers. The world events. The vintage feel. When I pick up these books it’s like they whisper “I’ve lived.  Read my wisdom. Experience my days.” And lately I’ve been reading new books about old summers.

I am super late to the party to read Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter (Harper Perennial). ButI was so excited that I purchased it in hardback. A luxury when you have to fund my reading habit.  A story within a story. A movie within a novel. The azure coast of Itlay. The 1960s.  An actress. An innkeeper. The filming of Cleopatra.  “The only thing we have is the story we tell.”

Yes.  It was beautiful. The writing. The imagery. The book.  Yes, this is literary fiction of a sort, but as a former librarian, I am bone tired of the limited genres we have to describe books that are just…more.  It’s vintage fiction. It’s retro-glam fiction.  It’s geographic fiction. It’s gently epic and strangely modern. It’s amazing. Read it. But don’t read it as a guilty pleasure. Read it like clever and cultured book that it is. Read it with a touch of awe and leave your critique behind. Just…enjoy it.

Still on a high from Beautiful Ruins, I discovered (because books simply happen to me, for me.) Palisades Park by Alan Brennert (St. Martin’s Press). An Amusement Park. The 1930s.  It’s like The Great Gatsby gone wild but brighter, and the grit is not hidden by the glitz.  A book full of dreams from back when safety nets did not exist. Complete with frozen lemonades and the warmth of day that lingers in the asphalt.  It’s something you only notice as a child, I think. But it’s magic. I read it on my Kindle with a fan blowing in my face and the sun shining. Yes. Read it. Now. Read it and reflect on the happiest summers that were magical because you lived and breathed thirty years of summer at an amusement park. You didn’t? Well sometimes I can’t separate books from my life.

Now, when I’m feeling really sentimental or have found a book I know I’m going to love so much, I always turn to some old, faithful book friends. I like to read them and introduce them to their new book friends. They won’t sit beside each other on my shelves unless they have the good luck to be written by authors who are alphabetically compatible, but when I glance over their spines, I’ll know they’re related.

So, it felt completely natural after these thoughtful, retro books, to pull out The Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood (Harper Perennial). Don’t judge me. I feel very protective about this book, and I can’t explain it. I have a soft spot for Rebecca Wells because she can tell a great southern story spanning decades that will have you tasting pecans, dissolving in the summer heat with your friends, and sounding just like my Great Aunt Sherry. And it’s a great, mostly light hearted finale to this summer reading list.

There you have it. Three absolutely perfect summer retro reads. Where the time is just as much of a character as the beaches as the roller coasters, as the people.  Read Palisades Park and make lemonade. Beautiful Ruins should be read after watching Cleopatra.  And the Ya-Ya’s?  Just make a shoofly pie and drink the lemonade mentioned above. Sugar is sugar, and there’s just enough salt in the pie to enhance the tartness of the lemons.

Happy reading.

Bell Bridge Books presents these fabulous summer reading titles for only $1.99 on Amazon Kindle Today! 

My puppy is an almost 14 year old black Lab. In other words, she’s very old for her breed. Her muzzle is graying, and she’s creaky all over. But she chows down her “puppy supper” twice a day like she’s been starved for weeks on end, and begs for treats all day. When my parents ask me why I’m not letting her go yet, I tell them when she stops eating, I’ll know it’s time. So far, she’s a piglet, so therefore she’s still happy.

One thing that she’s always done: When she bows, which is her way of asking for a snack, I’ll stand up and she whacks me on the back of my leg in a “HURRY UP, MOM” way. She’s almost knocked me over a few times, but it still makes me grin.

What does this have to do with anything, you’re probably asking yourselves and me right about now.

It’s about habits. Things that we do every single day that we might not even realize about ourselves. I finally realized that I couldn’t start the day until I brushed my teeth. Couldn’t start writing until I thoroughly washed my hands. And couldn’t sit down at my desk until I was in my favorite PJ’s. Then had to brush and wash again.Which makes no sense because I’m a horrible house cleaner otherwise.

Habits. They’re either good for you, or goofy as hell. Mine are goofy, and I know it. But I can’t start my day without them. And I’ll be devastated when the the day comes that my dog doesn’t push me any longer. It’s her habit. And she’s good at it.

And I can’t even begin to write until I’ve brushed, washed, brushed, washed. I’m a whackjob by any standard.

Do you have habits you have to maintain to start your day? Or is it seriously just me? 

Trish will send either a print copy or e-book of her latest novel, Nothing But Trouble (Bell Bridge Books, May 2013) to one  person, drawn at random among today’s comments.

This is not my sticky note.  But it COULD be my sticky note.  I need this sticky note.

I hate to pay bills.  Why?  (No, that’s not rhetorical.  That’s a real question. Why?!)

It’s not that hard.  It’s not rocket science.  I’m lucky enough to have a budget and stable income to fund the budget. (I remind myself every day of this luxury.) Everything is set up online. It’s a little typing and some clicking.  How hard can that be?

And yet . . . I will avoid it.  This makes me feel lazy.

But then I realized, fictional characters do a lot of things, but they don’t actually pay bills unless paying bills gives a character a clue that her husband is cheating or planning her demise.  Or the stack of unopened bills is a clue that the character is in financial difficulty and will be forced to pull one last bank job.  But we don’t see fictional characters sitting down to pay bills very often.  Nope.  No fictional characters have to check expense accounts for a husband who travels internationally against an American Express bill.  And you know why?  PAYING BILLS IS BORING.

Obviously, I’m not alone in my avoidance of bill paying.  I take comfort in that and feel marginally less lazy. I didn’t invent the boring game that is “fiscal responsibility.” Putting round pegs in round holes isn’t a great challenge.  If it were, writers would be waxing poetic about paying bills.  Novels would contain scenes of great bill paying conflict and challenge.  They don’t.

It’s official.  Paying bills is boring.  Now, at least.  The early years were a challenge.  Those were the square peg, round hole years. I almost remember those years fondly.  When I first left home, when I first got married, paying the bills was exciting.  Whose names would go in the hat to get paid?  Would we be eating anything but tuna until the next payday?  Could we see a movie?  Was this week finally the week we’d get to eat out?  Oh, then it was game.  (A life and death game, but there was an uncertainty in the outcome that kept me on my toes and out of stores.) I felt like I’d won the lottery when we had more than two dimes and a dollar to rub together after paying rent, utilities, food and putting gas in the car.

Today I’m happily in the crowd of folks who made it from the shoestring budget of a newlywed to a budget which supports eating out as an inalienable human right. I don’t want to go backward! But I am searching for a way to make me grab the stack of bills and go wild right on schedule twice a month.  Maybe if I asked my husband to glue candy to the bills before he put them in the drawer?  OPEN ONLY WHEN THE BILL IS PAID.

Speaking of budgets, did you know you could get a great deal a BIG DEAL on three Bell Bridge books this week at Amazon?  SIGN OFF (mystery with romantic elements) by Patricia McLinn, OUT OF HER DEPTH (mystery with romance) by Brenda Hiatt, and A DOG NAMED SLUGGER (memoir of life with a service dog) by Leigh Brill.  Each of these is just $ 1.99 at Amazon this week!  Go now!

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=39c_1368515756

I also had a homemade movie hubby shot a couple weeks ago, which I like to call the “The Tale of Nutsy.”  Unfortunately I’m technologically challenged, and can only get the movie to show up here as a picture:

Hubby was working in the yard and came in to get me because a baby squirrel was out there and wouldn’t leave him alone.  It was running across his feet and following him everywhere (especially when he ‘chirped’ at it), even coming up on the porch and sitting beside him.  He ended up giving it water out of a bottle cap and hand-feeding it Cheerios.  The Internet says when baby squirrels get separated too early from their mother, that they will seek the help of humans.

The website also said that it’s a myth that the mother will reject the baby if humans have touched it, and that they’ll come back for it when given the chance.  So we’d go in the house for a while, only to go out and find Nutsy sunning himself on the top step .  It would perch on hubby’s shoe and run up his pant leg.  I came up with the brilliant idea of having him take it across the street to the parking in front of the house, because there were a lot of squirrels there.  Just then it perched on John’s shoe again, so my manly guy was tiptoeing across the street with this squirrel on his toe (to avoid stepping on its tail.)  When hubby gently dislodged him the squirrel sat there for a while before starting to play around a large maple.  When it got on the other side of the tree, I urged hubby to come back while it wasn’t looking.  John got about ten yards away when the baby saw him and started *squealing*.  It was bizarre.  It took a while but the baby squirrel ended up back at our house on our step again, back to the water and Cheerio meal.

The last we saw of him he was under the porch step (and safe from predators).  By dark  he was gone.  We hope Mama Squirrel finally came to his rescue.

And finally–just because this is my new favorite song, I bring you a little Pink:

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I don’t think you can be a romance writer–or reader–and not listen to this song and imagine all sorts of wonderful reunited lover plots!

Which was your favorite video?  Do you have anyone you’d like to see hooked up to the electromonitors in the first clip???? <evil laugh>

If you’re a “Mad Men” fan and you haven’t caught up with the latest episode yet, you might want to skip this post for now.  It’s an excellent episode, and you really should watch it deliciously unfold.

Unlike the book the woman who sat beside me during gymnastics class was reading on Saturday.  She’s watching her daughter, I’m watching my granddaughters, and we’ve both brought our usual reading material.  Mine has pictures.  I flip through Better Homes and Gardens or Country Living because I can easily scan recipes and rec room remodels while I watch exuberant girls flipping through their skills, flying through their childhood faster than I can say, “Freeze!  Just for a moment.”  My bench buddy isn’t scanning.  She’s engrossed in her novel.  Never looks up.  She’s actually moving her lips as she reads. 

Okay, confession time.  I spy on readers.  When I’m sitting in an airport or a waiting room, any public place where people read, I give a silent cheer for the novel reader, and I try to get a look at the cover.  Once—on a plane—it was actually a book of mine.  I would love to catch someone moving her lips while she was reading one of my novels.

But no such luck last Saturday.  The lady was devouring what has lately come to be known as “mommy porn.”  I’m, well, nonplussed.  It seems such an odd environment to be reading that stuff with such intensity.  Second confession:  I haven’t read the books.  I’ve read a teaser (as it were) or two thinking I should find out why the books are so popular, but I can’t spare the time for a whole book that’s that poorly written.  And it does bother me when I see the TV ad that refers to it as “a steamy romance.”  I love Romance.  I know Romance.  And you, book with the gray cover, are no Romance.

Which brings me to Sunday night and “Mad Men,” which is no Romance, either.  It’s a period piece—can we call we that already?—and at it’s best it invites us to take a hard look at said period even as we enjoy a little nostalgia.  There’s such depth of character, and the man who has recreated himself, deluded himself into thinking he’s killed his original tortured self, was exquisitely developed in Sunday’s episode.  It’s really well-written.  You watch handsome Don Draper take his mistress from one of his regular liaisons through scene after scene of increasingly unpleasant manipulation, and you realize that this character you’ve rooted for most of the time, at times sympathized with, often drooled over, is over the course of this hour making you feel queasier and queasier.  Toward the end of the episode when his mistress stands up to him (there’s no physical abuse, by the way) you cheer for her.  It’s his turn to be nonplussed.  Game over.  He has no more control.  The whole dominance-submission deal in the bedroom is a foil for what’s going on in Don Draper’s business life.  And he’s losing control there, too.

And that’s the difference between porn and real story.  Pornography serves to titillate.  Real story plums the depth of human nature and the breadth of the human experience—including sex, absolutely—through character.

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not in favor of censorship.  I’m sure pornography has its place.  But poorly written porn?  I just hate to see it at the top of bestseller lists.  That must mean people are reading it, giving it their precious time.  So many good books, so little time.

I’ve wanted to broach this subject for some time, but I needed the right excuse.  So thank you, gymnastics mom and Don Draper.  I hope we’ve opened a floodgate.  What are your thoughts?

After you tell us, check this out:

Hot off the press from Bell Bridge books, you can read the prolog at Amazon or find a little more detail at my website.  WHAT THE HEART KNOWS was names a “Tom 5 Romance of the Year” by both Library Journal and BookPage, and it’s a personal favorite of mine.

Eleven months ago our first granddaughter arrived. This is Lona Pearl. (That’s a dog she’s molesting.) And here she is with her parents. Sigh. I adore her with the kind of ridiculous passion generally found in grandmothers and crazed zealots. I enjoy every minute I spend with her: teething, colic, hiccups, peekaboo, doesn’t matter. It’s all good.

Then on Saturday, tadah!! my daughter gave birth to Kyah Rose. She’s teeny and perfect and cute as a bug. So wonderful.

But true to my nature I HAVE to worry about something, so I’ve decided to fixate on how best to divide my time between them. Time, you see, is not really my friend. I tend to fill it up with too much stuff. This weekend, for instance, I competed in a horseshow, rushed home, kicked off my spurs and raced to the hospital to welcome Kyah into the world. The next morning I was up at five to do chores so I could get in a couple more minutes with daughter and baby before driving five hours to attend Son One’s graduation from med school.

Somewhere along the way this kind of schedule has become the norm for me. What’s that about? And how am I going to find time to properly spoil my grandchildren when my feet are all over town?
And another concern: How does one help cousins bond? I saw a plaque that said, “Grandma’s house, where cousins become friends.” I so want that for these two little buttons. I never knew my cousins and neither my parents nor my in-laws had much interest in grandparenting. So advice is much appreciated. Were you close to your cousins? If so what kind of activities made that possible? And what sort of fond memories do you have of your grandparents? I’m fully prepared to steal any ideas that will make my grandbabies love me.

“I love that the lesbians have an underground bunker.”

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me.  I can’t talk on the phone while wearing a scarf.”

“Male window washers should wear kilts.”

“I really like firm marshmallows and the smell of lumber.

“No. His face was eaten by a wiener dog.”

“She’s trying to catch a bird in her office.  She’ll call me back.”

“You know I want to be Amish.”

“I can shave your cat’s butt.”

“She says you can’t kill a snake with wine.  She tried.”

“Did you see that the vibrators are right next to the hearing aids?”

“Do you have a baby pig in your house?”

“She thought there were ants in the phone line, but it was just cat pee.”

“If it’s wet and it’s not yours, don’t touch it.”

“It’s difficult to pee slowly and not make any noise.”

“I don’t know if I have enough alcohol at my house for that.”

“Does she have to fact check the sex?”

We are an extremely professional bunch.  I promise.  But. . .sometimes the conversations make for an interesting day.  Which of the above is your favorite out of context gem?

And did you know that Deborah Smith’s THE CROSSROADS CAFE is only $ 1.99 at Amazon this month!  Go get yourself a copy.

While there everything I saw, touched and ate served as research.  And I noticed a lot of differences between the French and the tourists.  First, I have to say that Paris during high season is a nightmare.  SO many people, and all rushing around and pushing and shoving and waiting in lines, and well, I’m surprised the locals even mixed with all that madness, but they were there, and they were easy to pick out.

While you could spot a tourist a mile away in tennis shoes and sweatshirt, the French dress well.  Most especially I noticed the men like to wear the slim-fitted suit, clean, polished leather shoes (narrow with longer toes; loved that) and were well-groomed.  Metro-sexual, at its finest.  Everyone wears a stylish scarf, including the men.  Most male tourists did not wear scarves; they should pick up some pointers.  The French women walked about in heels of all heights that made me cringe just to imagine the pain their feet must be in.  And the most amazing sight was all the women in business clothes, nice skirt and jacket, on bikes, riding to work amongst the harrowing tangle of rush-hour traffic.  Literally taking their lives in their hands, and looking so stylish while doing it.

The French eat for a long time.  While we tend to inhale our food in America, you can easily spend an hour or two over a nice, simple French meal of meat, potatoes and lots of bread.  And don’t wait for the check.  You have to ask for it in Paris.  And another cool thing they do? They slash your credit card right there at the table; it never leaves your sight.  Loved that.

The French have a few national holidays, and who would have thought May 1st was so big that all the stores are closed, save for flower shops?  It was our last day there and we’d planned to hit a museum and then do some last minute shopping.  Museums were closed as well as all shops, save touristy stands.  The Red Cross sold lily of the valley on street corners, and, well, we looked for protests and did actually find a few people wandering about with signs, but no big gangbusting riots.  Sigh…   (Pic above was taken outside Notre Dame.  Yes, spring was there.  Most of the time.)

The French do bidets.  We had a rather strange garden hose version in our bathroom.  Go figure.  I just let that thing stay where it was.  The idea of testing it out was more daunting than the actual test may have been.

The French do natural foods.  They don’t put a lot of preservatives in their foods, even the packaged stuff, and they regulate chemicals and additives well.  So my body was kind of happy with the food, even though I dropped my no sugar policy and consumed massive quantities of macarons and hot chocolate.  Didn’t gain a pound.  Must have been all that walking.  I’m also putting a notch in the ‘purer ingredients’ column, which I believe doesn’t bother my system the way chemical-laden ingredients do.

The French don’t all speak English.  And even though you would think the biggest tourist town in the world would at least have some English speaking people on staff in the most touristy of stores and sites, think again.  I was relieved to have a few French words to hand, so I got by.  But trust me, if you don’t speak their language, they are not going to go out of their way to try and speak yours.  But with some attempt at their language, and maybe a few helpful hand gestures, they will meet you halfway, and the whole experience can be a little fun.

The French like their old buildings.  But most of those old buildings were not originally designed with bathrooms.  Warning: the public bathrooms in this town are few and far between.  And when a building does boast one, you often wind down old medieval stone stairs into a dark hallway, and then share one or two stalls with both sexes (and they are usually not cleaned too often, either).  I was with a group of 3 other women.  Trust me, you don’t want to get in our way when one of us needs to find one of those rare bathrooms.  ;-)   (Pic above taken in the Catacombs; no bathrooms there.)

The French will take a look at a fully-loaded subway car that’s come to a stop (and no passengers have gotten off to make room) and decide “We can fit 3 or 4 or 12 more people on that packed car”.  And then they do it.  I’m so over closeness and all the strange smells you experience during the Metro ride.  Ugg.

What surprised me most is how alike the French are to us.  The most common accessory in a French person’s arsenal?  The cell phone.  Walking down the street, standing on the corner, sitting in the restaurant or in the Metro, they were all gabbing into their phones.  Annoying.  Just like we Americans.  ;-)

So where are you planning to vacation this summer, or have you been lately?  What was the most surprising difference or similarity to you about their locals?

Michele

Her house is immaculate. She’s afraid of spiders and snakes. Though her cooking skills are limited (she’s just not that interested) she makes great mac ‘n’ cheese. An incredible seamstress, she made many clothes for me and for herself. In terms of entertainment, she’s an aficionado of old movies and loves to watch HGTV. To me, she passed on her love of reading, which meant she was always up for a trip to the library. And you could always count on her to go shopping for a new outfit for a special occasion.

Now that I’m a mom, I wonder what list like above my sons would make for me? Here’s what I hope they’d say:

Mom is unfazed by a messy house filled with guys and guy-stuff. She’s always willing to deliver a forgotten lunch or something else left behind. She makes great mac ‘n’ cheese…and cookies too! She’s always willing to play personal shopper for us and come home with something we need for a special occasion. Although we don’t love reading as much as she does, if we express an interest in something she’ll go all out for anything Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones.

What defines your mom? If you are a mom, what do you think your kids would say about you?

We have our share of winter weather in Iowa, but about mid-March it’s usually become a distant memory.  As a matter of fact, I start getting complacent mid-February.  It’s almost March, I tell myself.  I don’t care what happens, March is spring.  We go on spring break the second week in March every year, and often people back home are having weather in the sixties and seventies.

But not this year.  So when I came back from vacation I hunkered down.  Surely the next week would be better.  And then the next.  March had roared in like a lion.  It roared out the same way.  None of this lamb sh**.  Okay, though.  Once March was over, so was winter.

Wrong again.  April held very few nice days, lots of gale force winds and more rain than I recall in the last few years.  The old cup of positive had me thankful that we were replenishing the soil moisture levels after last year’s drought.  (Hey, I own farmland!)

But snow in May?  Really?  Really???  Having to tell kids on Monday and Tuesday to be sure and not wear those shorts and flip flops the rest of the week because we were going to get a winter storm?  That’s crazy talk.  And this is what crazy looks like in my neck of the woods today:

Of course we have the standard parents who refused to go to the attic to get their kids’ winter coats/hats/boots (#whatthehell???) because apparently the effort is beyond them.  And on the way to school today I saw the standard Middle Schooler walking to school in shorts, short sleeve shirt and flip flops.  That brought a smile, because you just know not all the sidewalks are going to be shoveled.  Ah.  Sometimes karma is just too sweet

Are you getting bizarre weather this year?  Any words of encouragement for someone who had to don *snowboots* for safety patrol duty today???