Back again!

I'm back, after a long break! We have a new addition to our family who is keeping me very busy! I will be posting updates soon, along with information about a new editing venture I'm persuing. Happy writing!

The Secret Sense of Wildflower

Speaking of book trailers... Here's one I came across that I think works pretty well. It's for North Carolina author Susan Gabriel's latest novel, The Secret Sense of Wildflower, and features still photographs, quiet background music, and a voice over (I presume, the author). What makes this trailer interesting to me is that it also includes reviews at the end -- this is the first time I've seen that on a book trailer, and I think it helps persuade the viewer that this might be a good book to check out. What do you think?

The book trailer debate...

There is a lot of discussion right now (especially on Twitter) about whether or not book trailers work. Well, it depends what you mean by "work." Do they help sell books? Do they help raise an awareness of reading? How do you judge a successful book trailer?

In her excellent blog, Catherine, Caffeinated, indy author Catherine Ryan Howard discusses the value of book trailers. She gives two great examples of trailers from author Maria Semple's novel Where'd You Go Bernadatte -- one, a cutesy "this-is-what-the-book-is-about" cartoon that I found so annoying I couldn't finish watching! The other is a spoof, with Ms. Sempel trying out different (bad) pitches to various famous authors and Jeopardy! champions. It is funny, original, and really entertaining! I don't know if I'll buy the book -- I'm still not sure what it is about -- but the trailer definitely made her name stick in my head.

In my opinion, Ms. Sempel's second trailer was extremely successful. Because of it, she's featured on a popular blog, and now I'm mentioning it on my (albeit less well-known) blog, and maybe from this post, word of mouth will take her name and her novel a little farther into the blogosphere... It's gotten people talking, in other words!

But what about writers who don't have the luxury of expensive book trailers with cameo performances by famous actors? I think simple, thoughtful book trailers can also help get the word out. I discovered author Gillian Mawson on Twitter. She's written a nonfiction book called Guernsey Evacuees: The Forgotten Evacuees of the Second World War, soon to be published by The History Press. It has a lovely, evocative cover, and Ms. Mawson recently put out a book trailer on YouTube that has haunting music and sepia photo shots and is very compelling, especially if you're interested in World War II.

The "successful" trailers I've seen have left me with a lasting impression of the author and always a feeling of great optimism and expectation about what's to come in the book industry. And if you can generate excitement about reading, then you are helping all authors. While we may not be able to measure the success of book trailers in actual book sales, I believe that well-made trailers do have a positive impact on individual authors' careers in the long-term. What do you think?

My first "guest post"!

Just wanted to share the news that I have a guest post entitled "Permission to be Southern" on fellow writer Melinda McGuire's blog, "melindamcguirewriters." My essay is about being born in Scotland but growing up Southern and how it's affected my writing!

In her series, "Southern Creatives," Melinda features tons of interviews and essays with Southern writers, editors (like Erin Z. Bass, editor of Deep South Magazine), and all creative types. Check it out today!

Rich Fabric, an anthology of quilting

A quick shout out to fellow writer and blogger (and now editor!) Melinda McGuire, who has just released the paperback version of Rich Fabric: An Anthology. The Symbolism, Culture, and Tradition of Quilting. Melinda hand-picked the contributors to share their memories, photos, and quotations about the culture and history of quilting.

And, even better, all the profits go to support the Twighlight Wish Foundation, a non-profit charity that grants wishes to senior citizens who live below the poverty level.

In December, Melinda will be releasing an ebook version, which will also include music! What a great idea! So, stay tuned for more info... I hope to post an interview/guest post with Melinda in the coming months (if she has time!).

Short story corner...

My brain is a little worn out these days, so I'm posting a short story I wrote several years ago, based on a dream I had about a friend of mine belting out "Moon River" on a rooftop! If you're interested in reading any more of my stories, check out Rocky Road on smashwords.

"Moon River Balustrade"

Bill pushed a mug of beer over to Vera; some of it slopped onto the scratched table.

            “Drink this. You’ll feel better.”

            Vera took the mug and began chugging the beer like it was water in the Mohave Desert. Then she thumped it down and sat there staring straight ahead for several moments, a trail of beer dripping from one side of her mouth and down her chin as though a snail procession had passed across her face.

            “What am I going to do?” She fingered her wedding band and engagement ring, clicking them together like a set of nesting tables. The engagement ring was a glistening diamond with rubies surrounding it like cherries on a plate of meringue. Bill put out a hand.

            “It’s going to be okay. You’ll find something else.” He left his hand there, but she didn’t take it. After a while he brought it back onto his lap.

            “We just bought a boat.” Vera wiped the side of her mouth with her hand. “A bass trawler with room for 10 people. It’s even got a refrigerator.” She started crying again. “And Nathan just made the down payment on the lake house. We were going to move in this weekend.”

            Bill stared at his shoes, $7.99 on special at the Payless across the street from his apartment. One of the laces had snapped and he’d tied a knot to keep it together. The rubber was starting to wear away on one toe where he tapped his foot against the air conditioning vent at work to help keep him awake in the afternoons.

            “Nathan has a good job. You guys’ll be fine.” He tried to sound fatherly, but a lump came up in his throat whenever he said her husband’s name.          

Vera wiped her face with one of the cocktail napkins. Then she reached out her hand, and he put his in it, his heart palpitating. Her hand was warm and a little tough, like she’d worked in the red clay soil. He knew from gardening his small plot in the county that the clay had a way of sucking all of the moisture out of your skin and leaving it dried up like an autumn leaf.

            She only held his hand for a second. “Thanks, Bill. You’re a pal.” Then she let it go, and he felt the warmth where her hand had been, lingering as though a small animal had rested there.

            “Let’s get out of here.” She stood up. “I need some air.”

            Bill threw a $20 bill on the table and followed her, pushing stray chairs out of the way while she weaved between them like a garden snake.

            Outside was warm and humid, and the sun was just beginning to set. Vera hooked her arm through his.

            “Where are we going?”

            Vera sighed and looked around as though seeing Elm Street for the first time. “I’ll show you where we’re going. Come on.”

            She walked fast, leading him like a pet poodle. They reached a side street and she took an abrupt turn, nearly stepping on his foot. Bill started to sweat and wished he’d left his jacket in the car.

            At the parking deck, Vera jerked to a stop, and Bill bumped into her, catching a whiff of her Intrigue perfume; he’d smelled it at the Belk’s counter when he was trying to decide what to get her for her birthday. In the end, he’d picked an expensive pen set and a leather-bound journal. She’d sent him a thank-you card in the mail, signed, “Love Vera and Nathan.”

            Vera pushed open the heavy metal stair well door. It creaked, and Bill reached out to help her, and for a split-second he had his arm around her, all the blood in his body reaching the same spot at once.

            Inside the stairwell it was even hotter, and Bill paused to take off his jacket. Vera was already five steps ahead of him, holding onto the rail, her rings clanking against the metal. She looked upwards at the glass skylight, as though she was a spy in a James Bond movie. They always went to the roof in those movies; Bill never knew why because once up there, the only option was to kill or to jump. Neither seemed a good option to him.

            “Where are we going?” he asked, out of breath. He turned purple when he got too hot, and his bald head stood out like a beacon. He hoped it was dark by the time they got outside again.

            “Just keep going,” Vera yelled, now about 20 steps ahead of him.

            Bill heard another door opening, and when he looked up again, Vera was gone.

            “Vera?” He started to panic, imagining that she had disappeared, and he was really alone. “Vera?” He loosened the top buttons of his shirt. Blue and purple spots started to float in his eyes; his forehead felt cold. He sat down on a step and put his head between his knees.

            “Bill? What are you doing?” She was looking over the railing from the top landing. “Come on up here!”

            It was almost dark on the roof, the last rays of the sunset lingering on the sides of office buildings and in the steel trimmings of signs and antennas. Bill grasped the metal railing someone had thoughtfully stuck around the rooftop. People laughed down below, women who sounded like they were on a night out, perhaps an evening away from the boyfriends and husbands. He felt an ache at the thought of the husbands waiting, curled up one the couch, smiling as the other person came back that night, smelling of smoke and strawberry daiquiris and Coco Chanel, laughing and telling him how some guys had tried to dance with them, but they’d just ignored them and rolled their eyes.

            “Isn’t it beautiful out here?” Vera took a cigarette from her purse and lit up. The smoke swirled around her face like a cloud of mist, and Bill wanted to put his hand through it and dispel it.

            “Yeah, it’s nice. What made you think of this?”

            “I always come up here when I’m stressed.”

            “Oh.” He’d hoped this was her first time, a spur-of-the-moment kind of discovery.

            Vera sighed. “When I was a kid I wanted to be an opera singer.”

            “Really?” Bill wished he smoked, sometimes.

            “When I was about 8 or 9, I used to sing in the bathtub, and I didn’t care who heard me. Actually,” she took another drag, “it never occurred to me that anyone was listening. You know how it is when you’re a kid—the whole world revolves around you.”

            He nodded.

            “So, I was singing in the bathtub one day, just belting out Sesame Street songs and old Jean Kelly tunes that I’d seen on movies with my grandmother; I thought I was really good!”

            They laughed.

            “Then, from nowhere, I hear this voice in the hallway, shouting, ‘What is that awful noise? It sounds like a cat died!’ And I froze, like I’d been shot or something, you know?”

            Bill nodded.

            “Turns out it was my Auntie Delia. She was a piece of work. She wore fox furs with the heads still attached and used to tell me they were alive. I had nightmares about that for years!”

            Bill couldn’t help laughing. “So, what happened then?”

            Vera threw her cigarette over the edge of the roof, and Bill stared after it, hoping no one down below would catch fire.

            “I never sang again. I was so humiliated. It was like the spell had been broken.”

            They stood there, watching the sky turn red and dark, purple shoots streaming through it like Bill’s purple face.

            “That’s a shame,” he said. “You shouldn’t let anyone stop you from--”

            It was then that Vera broke into song. She just opened her mouth, and out came a powerful earthy voice that blanketed everything—the sky, the cars in the street below, and all the thoughts in Bill’s head.

            “Moon River…” she sang, and Bill watched her eyes getting shiny and her face muscles relax, and she looked for a moment like Ingrid Bergman, staring out into the sky with her arms at her sides in a dramatic role.

            After a while, people began to appear below them, hearing her perhaps from the street or from downstairs, getting into their cars and stopping in surprise. A small group had soon gathered, looking up at Vera singing.

            She got to the middle, “Moon river, wider than a mile ...” and the energy seemed to build, and Bill felt it in his chest and stomach, and suddenly someone from the back of the group joined Vera in a small trembly voice, “I'm crossin' you in style some day…” and everyone smiled and seemed to relax. It was like a relief valve in a tire had been loosened.

            Vera finished the song and stood there with her hands clasped in front of her, rather limp but happy looking.

            “That was wonderful,” Bill said. “You can sing any time for me.”

            She looked past him to the crowd, who slowly began to clap, like people becoming conscious. Then, one by one, they walked away, back to their cars, or wherever they’d come from. Vera started to shrink as each person walked away. When the last one had gone, she started crying.

            “I really thought it would make a difference,” she sobbed, holding onto the rail. “Wasn’t that stupid of me, thinking that something as silly as a song would make a difference?”

            Bill put his arms around her and brought her close to him. “It did. It really did.”

            But she was staring out over the rooftops, away from him, looking out at her future, the boat, the lake house, the ring on her finger glinting in the last strands of light that finally dissipated. And they were left in darkness.

6 unexpected Southern lit. recommendations

Another quickie post, as the past two weeks have been busy -- a friend in hospital, a sick kiddo... Hard to focus during tough times, don't you think?

Quirk Books had an interesting post the other day, "Six Unexpected Southern Literature Recommendations." While some authors weren't really unexpected to me -- come on, Eudora Welty, Flannery O'Connor, Walker Percy? Everyone's heard of them, right! Others I was less familiar with -- Jean Toomer, Harry Crews, and Natasha Trethewey. How about you? Please share your "unexpected" Southern favorites!

Roundup of new Southern writers...

Just a quickie post today...

Author and book reviewer Alle Wells has a great roundup of her new Southern favorites! Check out her guest column, "Romancing the South," on Bette Lee Crosby's website.

Mixing writing and music -- the way of the future?

If you happen to be near Dalton, Georgia, this Thursday (August 9th), be sure to stop by Chelsea's on Thornton at 5 pm to hear author Kimberly Brock, who wrote The River Witch, and musical act Grits & Soul for a special collaboration connecting Southern fiction and music.

I think it's a great idea to combine music and reading -- both books and songs tell stories, and both capture an audience and transport them to another place. Despite this fact, I've only come across a few authors who've taken advantage of a musical connection to help promote their work.

North Carolina author Lee Smith was working on her historical novel On Agate Hill, when friend and songwriter Alice Gerrard asked her to write the liner notes for a new CD she was working on. Gerrard's song "Agate Hill" so inspired Smith that the two teamed up for readings -- Smith read, and Gerrard and friends accompanied with music. The readings, in turn, inspired Gerrard's CD, The Road To Agate Hill. Listen to an interview with Lee on The State of Things.

Another NC author, Clyde Edgerton, often combines his love of music and writing. Several years ago, I went to hear him read from Lunch at the Piccadilly, where he played his guitar and sang funny songs that complemented the book. It was a great experience, the audience loved it, and the place was packed! Now, there's even a musical comedy inspired by his book called Lunch at the  Piccadilly, composed by Mike Craver and directed by Steve Umberger.

Songs, CDs, plays... What a great way to build a diverse reading audience! If you know of any other writer-music duos, please let share in the comments section!

Southern coal: take a trip back in time

When I was about 20, I had my first introduction to coal mining in the South. I took a camping trip with my parents along the Shenandoah Valley, to Luray Caverns and Big Meadows Campground. On the way back to North Carolina, we stopped to bike a trail that lead to the "ghost town" of Thurmond, WV, a former coal mining town. The town, of course, was deserted, apart from one tiny souvenir shop where I bought a train made out of coal for my boyfriend. There was rumor of a murder that had taken place in the old hotel -- something about money lost over gambling -- and as we climbed the hill to where the few remaining residents lived, the atmostphere grew eerier, and I imagined the ghosts of the town (and the 7 or so people still living there) watching us. We got out of there pretty quickly!

Needless to say, my impressions of coal mining are not pleasant -- a necessary, dirty, and dangerous job for people who have few options. While lots of nonfiction books explore coal mining, I had a hard time finding many Southern fiction books about it. Susan Tekulve of Spartanburg, SC, caught my attention -- she recently won the 2012 S.C. First Novel Competition (sponsored by the S.C. Arts Commission and Hub ity Press of Spartanburg) for her novel The Nipper. Her book follows the lives of a coal mining Italian immigrant family as they struggle to survive in a tiny Virginia town.

Gin Phillips, author of The Well and the Mine, tells a fictional tale of a real-life Alabama coal-mining town, Carbon Hill, in 1931. The novel begins with a shocking act of violence, as a baby is thrown into a family well. Publisher's Weekly describes the story: "A tight-knit miner's family struggles against poverty and racism in Phillips's evocative first novel, set in Depression-era Alabama."

Hazard, a novel by Gardiner Harris describes a mine disaster in Hazard, KY, and the repercussions that follow. A reviewer in The Washington Post writes that Harris used to work in Hazard, Ky., as the Eastern Kentucky bureau chief for the Louisville Courier-Journal. "His prize-winning reporting there was credited with helping pass laws that strengthened the state's mine-safety rules." The reviewer adds, "Harris understands the fatalism of miners who know their jobs can kill them."

Read more here: http://www.thestate.com/2012/07/29/2370112/southern-literatures-next-star.html#storylink=cpy