If you "get the word out," you let people know about something.
My friend Donna ran across another tee-shirt and got it for me: "Careful, or you'll end up in my novel." I wore it just yesterday!
Yesterday, I drove 484 miles from St. Louis to Chattanooga, Tennessee, where I am staying with one of my daughters. Today, I drove another 45 miles from there to visit my sister Ann and her daughter Amy. I had lots of traffic delays both days, but good visits with my family. This photo shows my sister and me. I'm holding their dog Ellie.
UPDATE: Yay!!! I finished all 417 pages on the last day of August 2022, so I feel great about my reading (even though I rated the book only 4 of 10, which I define as "Struggled to finish, but not worth it"). Too bad, since it had such great potential. I was an editor of two in-house publications once upon a time, and I could see how it could have been tightened up and made to feel less plodding ... through day by day ... and hour by hour ... and thought by thought. But I did accomplish my goal. So hurray for me!!!
It was a nothing day. Nothing exciting had happened at school, and nothing good was going to happen tonight with all the homework weighing down her backpack as she plodded along Wildwood Lane, heading home.
Eleven-year-old Lauren O’Neil vanished one sunny afternoon as she walked home from school. Six years later, her parents — Rachel and Dan — still tirelessly scour their Oregon hometown and beyond, always believing Lauren will be found. Then one day, the call comes.Lauren has been rescued from a secluded farm mere miles away, and her abductor has confessed. Yet her return is nothing like Rachel imagined. Though the revelations about what Lauren endured are shocking, most heartbreaking of all is to see the bright-eyed, assertive daughter she knew transformed into a wary, polite stranger.Lauren’s first instinct is to flee. For years she’s been told her parents forgot her; now she doubts the pieces of her life can ever fit together again. But Rachel refuses to lose her a second time. Little by little they must relearn what it means to be family, trusting that their bond is strong enough to guide them back to each other.
As the daughter of one of Turkey’s last Ottoman pashas, Selva could win the heart of any man in Ankara. Yet the spirited young beauty only has eyes for Rafael Alfandari, the handsome Jewish son of an esteemed court physician. In defiance of their families, they marry, fleeing to Paris to build a new life. But when the Nazis invade France and begin rounding up Jews, the exiled lovers will learn that nothing — not war, not politics, not even religion — can break the bonds of family. For after they learn that Selva is but one of their fellow citizens trapped in France, some brave Turkish diplomats hatch a plan to spirit the Alfandaris and hundreds of innocents, many of whom are Jewish, to safety. Together, they must traverse a war-torn continent, crossing enemy lines and risking everything in a desperate bid for freedom, from Ankara to Paris, Cairo, and Berlin.
From an online comment about this book:
The action takes place from 1933 to 1941, and the main characters are sisters Sabiha and Selva, who grew up in Istanbul as happy, well-educated, and beautiful blondes who want for nothing. Older sister Sabiha marries Macit, who works directly under President Inönü's Foreign Minister; they and their beautiful child live a charmed life enjoying all the advantages of their wealth and prominent standing. Yet Sabiha is too depressed to care, because she's ravaged by guilt at having had a hand in her younger sister Selva's decision to marry the Jewish man Rafael Alfandari. That is what led to the couple's complete ostracization and subsequent flight to southern France, where they found themselves hiding from Nazis.
UPDATE: Yay!!! I finished all 417 pages on the last day of August 2022, so I feel great about my reading (even though I rated the book only 4 of 10, which I define as "Struggled to finish, but not worth it"). Too bad, since it had such great potential. I was an editor of two in-house publications once upon a time, and I could see how it could have been tightened up and made to feel less plodding ... through day by day ... and hour by hour ... and thought by thought. But I did accomplish my goal. So hurray for me!!!================================================================
Millions of TV and film viewers know Sela Ward as the Emmy-winning star of the series Sisters and Once & Again. But before she became a successful actress, Sela was first and foremost a small-town girl, the daughter of a family that lived for generations in a Mississippi homestead they called "Homeward." It was there, within a tightly knit community of neighbors and kin, that Sela learned ways that would remain with her through life — humble virtues, like generosity, selflessness, and respect, that are "forged in the hearth of a loving home." Now she has woven together nostalgic reminiscences, stories from throughout her life and career, and lessons on drawing strength and wisdom from a simpler place and time, to give us a very special book on the challenge of raising a family, maintaining perspective, and carving away time for happiness amid the challenges of modern life.
September 1952 ~ Isaac Moore sat on the porch steps, stuffing the last bit of bread and jam into his mouth. Most days he walked home with his little sister, but today he was hungry, and he had run ahead. Ada should have been home by now.
Did you know that the ancient Romans left sixty days of winter out of their calendar, considering these two months a dead time of lurking terror and therefore better left unnamed? That they had a horror of even numbers, hence the tendency for months with an odd number of days? That robed and bearded druids from the Celts stand behind our New Year’s figure of Father Time? That if Thursday is Thor’s day, then Friday belongs to his faithful wife, Freya, queen of the Norse gods? That the name Easter may derive from the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring, Eostre, whose consort was a hare, our Easter Bunny?
Three streams of history created the Western calendar — first from the Sumerians, then from the Celtic and Germanic peoples in the North, and finally from Palestine with the rise of Christianity. Michael Judge teases out the contributions of each stream to the shape of the calendar, to the days and holidays, and to associated lore. In them, he finds glimpses of a way of seeing before the mechanical time of clocks, when the rhythms of man and woman matched those of earth and sky, and the sacred was born.
"I highly recommend this to anyone needing a laugh and a little sunshine in their day!" I ran across this recommendation as I was trying to decide which of the books on my friend Donna's Kindle I should read next. I could use a few laughs, so this is what I'm reading today.An uplifting and moving story of Lois and Tom’s relocation from London to a surprisingly quirky, rural hamlet. Tom falls off his mountain bike just days before they take ownership of Honeysuckle Cottage, leaving a pregnant Lois and her close friend to collect the keys to their new home. Finding her dream house fraught with unexpected problems, Lois becomes sick with worry that she should never have persuaded Tom to leave the city. But, as they settle, glitches with the cottage are resolved, and a wonderfully eclectic mix of friends, enemies, crooks, and eccentrics is revealed within this extraordinary community. Lois and Tom’s wedding and the birth of the baby happen in very quick succession, with a melodramatic twist as uninvited guests arrive at the home delivery.
Megan Sawyer is determined to farm year-round. So much so that she braves a December snowstorm to pitch her fresh greenhouse greens to Philadelphia chefs. And then she sees a stranger stranded on the side of the road. But this woman is no stranger; it’s Becca Fox, a love chemist (you read that right). She’s headed to her aunt’s house to sell her love potions at holiday events. Or so Becca thinks. Her sneaky aunt only invited Becca home to reunite her with her estranged father. It sounds noble and kind-hearted, until the man ends up dead.
Sunday Salon is hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz.Megan soon finds herself in the middle. She realizes Becca’s not the only one getting iced over. Megan’s own aunt, the famous mystery author, is dragged into the drama. Her novels implicate her, and she’s in trouble. Now it’s personal. Our Megan must follow a cryptic trail of literary clues, all while sifting through the victim’s sordid past. She gets closer to the truth as the murderer gets closer to her.
Retirement Can Be Murder: Every Wife Has A Story (A Baby Boomer Mystery Book 1) ~ by Susan Santangelo, 2009, cozy mystery, 214 pagesHere's an amazing weight-loss tip for all the women in America: an out-of-body experience makes you look thinner. Forget about vertical versus horizontal stripes. I'm telling you, an out-of-body occurrence does the trick.
This is the story of Carol Andrews and her beloved husband, Jim, who are members of the fastest growing demographic in history, the Baby Boomer generation. Carol dreads Jim's upcoming retirement more than a root canal without Novocain. She can't imagine anything worse than having an at-home husband with time on his hands and nothing to fill it except interfering in the day-to-day activities of their household and driving her crazy — until her plans to stall Jim's retirement result in Jim's being suspected of murdering his retirement coach.
"I don't know how I let you talk me into this," I said, huffing as I pulled my overnight bag up the marble stairs toward our third floor bedroom.
"Well, Carol," said my very best friend Nancy, "if you weren't such a nutcase about taking the elevator, we'd be in our room by now. I bet Claire and Mary Alice are already unpacked, lounging in their pajamas, and sipping a glass of cold chardonnay. While we're pulling suitcases up these damn stairs. And probably overstressing our hearts. Which could lead to a stroke. And death. Not the way I pictured spending our fortieth high school reunion."
Carol Andrews and her beloved husband, Jim, navigate their way along life's rocky highway toward their twilight years. Carol has no interest in her upcoming fortieth high school reunion. Her memories of days at Mount Saint Francis Academy are mixed, to put it mildly. But BFF Nancy convinces her to join the reunion planning committee, so she'll have some say in how the event is organized. All is going smoothly until the dead body of one of their classmates is found the night before the reunion — in Carol and Nancy's room!
