Lifescapes

New stuff

                                                             New book. I was one of the crowd yesterday at the launch party for Lone Star Sleuths--a big crowd, around 150 people, at the Alkek Library at Texas State University in San Marcos. Good Texas music, good food, and lots of people with books to sign. Lone Star Sleuths is an anthology of selections from the published work of mystery/crime writers, from Texas or writing about Texas. A piece of Rosemary Remembered is included, so China is now an "officially recognized" Texas sleuth. About 15 of the 30 authors were there. Good to see fellow writers Bill Crider and Mary Willis Walker, and many of the faculty from my former incarnation as a university administrator at TSU--called Southwest Texas, in my days there. The launch was held at the university because the anthology was hatched there (by editors Cunningham, Davis, and Newsom) and published by UT Press. Bill Crider and his wife took photos and posted a slide show on Flickr. If you couldn't come to the launch, you can see it here. Too bad, though: you missed the chippies and dippies.

Also new, at our house. A "roof-over" in blue steel panels, which meant that the roofers were tramping around overhead all day Thursday. We might have gone another few years without doing this, but last summer's torrential rains opened up a few seams, so it was a good idea to do it now. Of course, the last rain was in September, 2007, and it will probably never rain again. But just in case....

And best of all, a new uplink. I am now on satellite broadband. Yay! We've kept the dialup as a backup, but I can now load pics to this blog and surf around the Internet at a reasonable speed. One happy camper here. There are a few bugs to work out: can't get to my Google Desk Top Search via the satellite, have to go through the dialup. I'm learning, though, that there are some things that just never work exactly the way you want them to. You live with the work-around and stop whining. But if any of you have found a quick fix to this problem, please let me know.

Finished Wormwood (China Bayles #17) this week and will send it off to NY as soon as Bill has read it. Made several entries in the current journal project (An Extraordinary Year). Took Zach to the vet--his treatment for Cushings isn't going well, and we need to find an alternative. Fixed the fence and moved the cows and sheep to a new pasture. Pruned roses. Pruned more roses. Pruned still more roses.

And admired the daffodils.

Reading note: I would say that there exist a thousand unbreakable links between each of us and everything else . . . The farthest star and the mud at our feet are a family; and there is no decency or sense in honoring one thing, or a few things, and then closing the list. The pine tree, the leopard, the Platte River, and ourselves--we are at risk together, or we are on our way to a sustainable world together. We are each other's destiny.--Mary Oliver

Well, drat. My editor just emailed me with the news that the copy editor won’t be finished with the first-pass page proofs of The Tale of Briar Bank (the fifth Cottage Tale, in the Beatrix Potter series) until February 25, and that I have until March 13 to get them back. This turns the February and March work plan upside down. I was expecting Briar Bank this week and intended to finish it, then go on to wrap up the Wormwood manuscript. Why we still call this a “manuscript”—a piece of writing produced by hand, “manu-”—is a mystery to me, since most authors produce their books, as I do, on the computer. For the same reason, I suppose, that cars and paper and bed sheets and baby bottles are “manu-factured,” even though they’re made by machines. But language is a palimpsest, bearing the imprint of centuries of changing practice. I’m typing on an electronic keyboard and watching the words appear on a monitor, but I’m still “writing” and the electronic file I will email to my editor still, despite all logic, contains a “manuscript.”

Anyway, Wormwood is fairly clean and substantially finished, except for the last chapter and the resource notes. But in order to make sure that I’ve tidied up all the plot threads, I need to start at the beginning and read every sentence, revising where necessary. I can usually manage about twenty-five manuscript pages a day on this final pass, and since the book will finish out at some 275 pages, I’m looking at ten, maybe twelve days of work. So I think I’d better stop twiddling my thumbs and waiting for the arrival of Briar Bank. I’d better go straight to Wormwood and spend the next two weeks cleaning it up. By the time that project is finished and off to New York, Briar Bank will be here. And both books will be finished by the time I have to get seriously involved with the promotion of Nightshade.

And when I’m not doing that, I can work on All About Thyme and blog and do some Story Circle stuff. Dani Greer and I are developing a Story Circle listserv, so watch for that, all you SCN members. Paula and Linda and Peggy and Robin and I are working on the book review site. I am catering special meals for Zach, our elderly black Lab, who is on medication and doesn't want to eat.

Oh, and I am planning my next pair of socks, from the yarn my D-D-I-L got me for Christmas. Thanks, Sheryl! BTW, Bluebonnet Yarn Shoppe is a dangerous place, very, very seductive. Do not go there if your credit card is maxed out. I'm halfway down the ankle of Wild Paula's second Wild Sock. (Yes, Paula, I am conquering the dreaded Second-Sock Syndrome, although I don't dare declare victory until I've finished the heel and started on the gusset, with only the foot and toe to go.) But I am already dreaming of the next sock. Think I'll start with that luscious burgundy at the back of this pile. Yum.

What's not to love about a life that's full of books, friends, dogs, and socks!

Reading note. [By the time the second sock of a pair is finished], a knitter will have invested an average of twenty thousand stitches in the name of love and warm feet, knowing full well that the socks will wear out . . . And then--in a celebration of the knitter's art, a festivity of yarn, an homage to knitting in the round and needleworkers everywhere--the recipient will walk big honkin' holes in them. That's love. That's why socks are special.--Stephanie Pearl-McPhee

Snow in the Hill Country

No, not this year. This photo was taken on Valentine's Day, 2004, in our backyard. I look at it once a year, just to remind myself that snow can happen here--once in a blue moon. Sadly, the day it snowed, Bill and I were scheduled to do a noon book talk in a West Texas town, and had to leave this beautiful scene. By the time we got back, the sun was out and the snow was almost gone. But at least we have the photos.

If you're a Texan, or a fan of crime fiction set in Texas, here's a book you might be interested in: Lone Star Sleuths: An Anthology of Texas Crime Fiction. China and I are delighted to report that we're included in the collection, along with Nevada Barr, Walter Mosely, Jeff Abbott, Carolyn Hart, Steve Saylor, Bill Crider, and Mary Willis Walker. What's more, there's a party, on Saturday, February 3, from 2-5, in the Alkek Library, at Texas State University in San Marcos. Quite a few of the authors will be there to sign books, including me. If you're in the Central Texas area, stop in and say hi. Directions are here. And if you think San Marcos looks a lot like Pecan Springs--well, you might just be right!

Reading note. With mystery novels dominating national bestseller lists and the shelf space in local bookstores, talented writers are becoming attracted to the genre. The result has been a substantial improvement in the quality of crime fiction. Many of the genre's best novels no contain hallmarks of what is considered "literary" writing: well-developed characters, innovative and lyrical use of the language, and an intellectual reach that considers complex social and philosophical issues.--Bill Cunningham, Steven Davis, and Rollo Newsom, editors of Lone Star Sleuths.

First daff

First and perfect, this lovely King Alfred daffodil, blooming along the edge of the woodlot. There'll be lots of daffs this year, courtesy of last summer's rains. The tiny, wild blue-eyed grass is coming up, too, not a grass but a member of the Iris family. No blooms yet, but soon. Look around, there's a blue-eyed grass near you. But you'll have to look closely, because it's only a few inches tall--and despite the name, it may be white, pink, purple, even yellow. Also showing green this morning: the few rosettes of bluebonnets and the salvias, which I pruned back last fall and are now getting an early start on spring.

Bill has gone to Houston to see his mother and meet his niece's fiance, so I've had yesterday and today alone. With the dogs, of course. Zach's medication (for Cushings) hasn't had an effect yet, so I was up at 12, 2, and 4 to take him out (a chore usually shared with Bill). But we're hoping things will get better in a couple of weeks. My office is clean (glory!) and I spent yesterday afternoon sorting my yarn stash (halleluja!)--an enforced absence from the computer, because my email server was down. I'm getting email this morning but (annoyingly) can't send it. I've had to move all the outgoing into the "draft" file to keep it from clogging the incoming. (Good grief, what language. Where did we learn this vocabulary?) Frequent problems these days, it seems. I've learned to live with slow service, but not yet with no (or half) service. One of the disadvantages of living at the end of a road in rural Texas, where we don't even get mail delivery. But the advantages? So many I can't count, like the daffodils that will be along in the next few weeks of spring.

Reading note. People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth.--Thich Nhat Hanh

Wild socks

Fun socks. These are for Paula, my co-editor on the Story Circle Book Review website. I chose the colors by picking up colors from the multi yarn.  I love the way the heel worked out, multi twined with orange in a salt-pepper stitch. They're a bit on the wild side, but so is Paula, who blogs at redneckcrime.com. Working with her on the book review has been a blast. And that's the second big project. The first one was What Wildness Is This (the book we edited together a couple of years ago). A pair of socks is scant thanks for all the good times we've shared, most of them over the Internet. Isn't that wild, too?

I'm still not writing, but I'm working, working hard. Peggy and I have assembled some issues of All About Thyme so they'll be ready to go out every Monday. That's a huge job, but I enjoy it and never fail to learn something I didn't know in the process. I've been thinking, though, that maybe I should go to bi-weekly, instead of weekly, just to cut down on the workload. If you have an opinion on the topic, weigh in. I've also been putting the blog tour together (more on that toward the end of the month), finishing the notes and citations for the memoir. Oh, and cleaning the office--that perennial chore that I hate while I'm doing it and absolutely love when it's done.

The storm that caused the tornado devastation in the mid-states on Tuesday night went through here on Tuesday morning, dropping our temps by about 40 degrees. One brave daffodil is blooming--as soon as the wind drops, I'll go out and get her picture. I won't have many garden flowers this year (because the gardens were so badly damaged last summer), so I'll cherish every single one. Doesn't look like there'll be many wildflowers, either. No rain to speak of since September, so the bluebonnets will be sparse.

But that's the blessing of living in a place for a long time. I know that while there may be only a few flowers, they will be beautiful, and that when the rains come--next year or the year after--so will the bluebonnets. I know that the hummingbirds will arrive around the 15th of March, and that the Monarchs will be sailing north through our woods not long after. Paintbrush and blackfoot daisy and monarda, all in their time. I can wait.

Reading Note. Home is where we have a history.--Terry Tempest Williams

Conferencing

Pretty good team. Here, at the Story Circle conference (Stories from the Heart IV) are (from left) Robin Wittig, Linda Wisniewski, and Paula Yost, fellow editors of the Story Circle Book Review website. Robin, my daughter, is pitching in as editorial assistant.

The conference was enlightening, fun, and exhausting. I led workshops on personal mapping and personal dragons and chaired a panel on blogging. When Peggy gets time, she'll post the handouts for these workshops--I'll give you the URLs and you can check them out if you like. Robin and I had lots of time to talk--she's helping me out with my Book Club Friends project and other book stuff, as well as working on the SCBR site. Lovely to find something we want to do together.

Too warm here for February--82 yesterday afternoon, and humid, 70 this morning when the dogs and I went for our walk. The daffs are up and will be blooming in a few days. The elbow bush in the woods is putting out tentative leaves, the cattails are poking up sharp green spears, and yesterday in Austin, I saw a Japanese cherry in full bloom, its discarded petals like a blanket of pink pulled up over its bare roots. I probably won't get back to writing this week: I'm giving myself one more week to catch up on all the other writing-related stuff before I refocus on the writing. And the week after that, I'll be pruning roses. Where oh where did winter go?

Reading note. The writer should never be ashamed of staring. There is nothing that does not require [her] attention.--Flannery O'Connor