Serials and Scenarios - A Bigger Life

The Book: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1576839958


The Author: http://www.annettesmithbooks.com/


The Review:

I was completely sucked into Joel Carpenter's story. Annette Smith's A Bigger Life male perspective point-of-view novel is raw, honest, real and heartbreaking.

I almost felt like I was reading over Joel's shoulder as he wrote in his diary. Visual without sweeping literary words, descriptions and complex sentence structure. Powerful characterization and deeply spiritual, but not exactly pretty. Instead it is a picture of flawed people doing the best they can when life is not what they expected it would be.

A Bigger Life reminded me of secular novels such as About a Boy and She's Come Undone -- the stories that compel you to devour the book to find out if the hero/heroine will overcome the odds against him/her.

Huge complex weavings of the high and low points of Joel Carpenter's life, the lives of his friends, the knitting of hearts together and painful unravelings. Through it all are a few people, flawed and honest about it, who love him enough to reach out with the love of Jesus.

You want cookie cutter anything, then you might not like A Bigger Life. The people don't behave like "good" Christians. A book more about love than doctrine. It's also a book more about story than mechanics. But if you like your fiction to make you think, cry, and wonder about the fragility of life and love, then you'll find it here.




Interview pending for tomorrow...

Scary and Sensational - Two A.M. Thoughts

My prayers for, and my sorrow reaches toward the hundreds for their loss in yesterday’s massacre. I can’t begin to imagine what the families must be feeling.

Another tragedy. Hundreds -- no thousands -- of people in varying degrees of devastation – this senseless act reaches beyond families and friends and wraps the tentacles of fear around the entire nation.

We want someone to blame. Order demands it – our logical and orderly minds require something to cling to, to wrap around.

Most people blame God.

I understand that.

I also understand that our lives are whipping past us at the speed of light. Noise fills nearly every minute. News of tragedies layer like wallpaper, lining the shells we erect to protect ourselves. Most people wrestle with the realities of life and death during the two a.m. moments of awareness that wake us, terrify us and shake our fragile worlds.

What happens when I die? Who am I? What should I be doing? What’s the point? Why bother?

The 9-11 events that still resonate through me are the stories of heroism, survivors who were aware of divine intervention, the odd events that protected some. I am a Pollyanna. Faith is easy for me. Faith in Jesus, believing He is all that He claims, is simple. But maybe that isn’t Pollyannaish at all. Maybe that’s because I know Jesus intimately, I know His heart. And because I know His heart, I know His Father’s. I am certain that those who died in the 9-11 attack and those who died yesterday were given God’s loving attention, just as the survivors were. And maybe in the shocked seconds of clarity His love broke through the fragile shell of ignorance, disbelief, fear, or intelligence and it saved some souls.

Birth -- death – certainty in each life. Do you have some two a.m. questions that are nagging at you right now in the shocked silence of tragedy?

Scribbles and Scrambles - Too Funny

A sense of humor must be as individual as fingerprints.

I recently read a newspaper column where the columnist sang the praises of Lucille Ball and her zany humor. This guy considers Lucille the Queen Bee of funny. I’m going to admit to the world -- possibly igniting a riot of rage full including rotten, airborne vegetables -- and well you get the general idea…bad things may happen when I admit this.

Lucy leaves me mildly amused at best.
Get it out…let me help. “Boo! Hiss! You stink!”
I can’t help it. I’ve watched Lucy. I’ve even laughed at Lucy, but she just doesn’t do it for me.

While I’m attacking American Institutions…I don’t like “Love Is…” or “Marmaduke” or “Family Circus.” I detest “Nancy” and “Blondie” annoys me.

I do have Dilbert strips stuck on my refrigerator. I’ve purchased Far Side t-shirts, and Calvin and Hobbes books. Not all of them leave me rolling on the floor, but the ones that do become instant laugh-pump primers and put me in the laughing mood.

I love Dilbert’s Wally. “Robotman” had a series on Fleshy the hairless cat that almost always killed me.

I appreciate clever plays on words and twisted thoughts, and some great physical humor.

Three Stooges – some, but it gets too painful.

Just give me a great tumble so I can savor it. Movies…ahhh. Some day I’d love to get a DVD of hilarious moments in cinema. It would include the Ruperick scenes from “Dirty, Rotten Scoundrels” the taxi incidents, the ride up the escalator and the raccoon hug scene from “Elf.” I’d include the scream scene from “Elizabethtown” and all the dirt bike trips from “Nacho Libre.” The DVD wouldn’t be complete without one-line snippets from “Napoleon Dynamite,” “What About Bob?” and “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” “The Three Amigos.” Mockumentaries?…oh, now you’re talking.

I’m just getting started. What would you include in your Best Highlights of Humor DVD?

Serials and Scenarios - Brandilyn Collins - Pointed (gulp)

So what does it feel like to be threatened by one of the leading Christian suspense writers? Scary. If anything happens to me...well I think you might know the first place to look.

My questions in red her threats (I mean answers) in blue.



Fiction character you would most like to be or most identify with and why?

Snoopy. He’s cool. Although he never got a manuscript accepted, so maybe I’d better rethink this one…



If you could ask any person, living or dead, a random question -- what question would you ask of whom?

How about a question my son asked me when he was five: “How do dogs get any privacy?”



Some out there in writing land have strange rituals. Share yours.

I talk to myself and my characters. Although for a novelist, this is actually quite normal.

Scary, isn’t it.



Pick one…..Pink iguana, purple cow, periwinkle giraffe. Which one and why? Can be negative or positive.

Iguanas are ugly in any color. A purple cow’s too common. (Well, there IS a poem about one.) A periwinkle giraffe would be way cool.



Favorite turn of phrase or word picture, in literature or movie.


“I do not know how the suns and worlds are turned. I only see how men will plague themselves.” Mephistopheles, in Goethe’s Faust.

What a perfect description of Satan. I used this phrase in Coral Moon.



If you were assured of writing a best-seller, what genre would it be? Give us a sliver of information, a characteristic or glimpse of a scene.

Seatbelt Suspense, of course.

As for a glimpse—uh-uh. Then I’d have to kill you.



What period of history intrigues you the most?

Now. Although I suppose now’s not history. It’s, well…now. Although now will be history tomorrow. So how about if I write about now tomorrow? Only tomorrow, now will still be now…

Oh, dear. I have just got my knickers in a twist.



What makes you feel alive?

A heartbeat’s a good start.



How does something worm its way into your heart? Through tears, truth, humor or other?

I’m still stuck on the “worm into the heart” visual.

Hm. Could be an interesting way to kill somebody off …



Favorite season and why?

Summer. In Coeur d’Alene, Idaho.

Why? It’s paradise.


Superhero you most admire and why?

My husband, for reasons too numerous to list.



Super power you'd love to borrow for awhile?

Flying. I’ve done this in my dreams a few times. It’s awesome.



Favorite chore

Is this a trick question?



Anything you'd do but don't because of fear of pain? What is it? Ex. Bungee jumping, sky diving, running with scissors.

I will never snowmobile again. I will never snowmobile again. I will never snowmobile again. I will never…



Grammatical pet peeve…sound off.

All the folks who say “For you and I.” Everybody does this now. Agh! Even writers. Even preachers and teachers and speakers—people who oughtta know better.

Societal pet peeve…sound off.

Poor customer service.

Thanks Brandilyn. Happy Friday the 13th, everyone.

Serials and Scenarios - Coral Moon

Appropriately, the author interview will post tomorrow, Friday the 13th. Could it get any better for the queen of seatbelt suspense...wait til you see her answers. shudder. Buckle up and check out Coral Moon.

The book link is: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0310252245

Brandilyn Collins is the bestselling author of Violet Dawn, Web Of Lies, Dead of Night, Stain of Guilt, Brink of Death, and Eyes of Elisha just to name a few.Brandilyn and her family divide their time between the California Bay Area and Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.She also maintains an informative blog called Forensics and Faith where she daily dispenses wisdom on writing, life, and the Christian book industry.

Review:

Kanner Lake....don't really want to visit, but I sure am enjoying reading about the place. Sounds beautiful, homey, like a slice of traditional America....except for the murders.

Nothing like a little murder to totally twist a sweet little tourist spot into a mutated pretzel of doom.

At least poor Paige gets to sit this one out. Well kind of. She's at least got other things to think about than the body she found in her hot tub. Hint...a certain handsome.

Oops don't want to spoil the story.

Bottom line, if you love Collins stuff, you'll find much to like in Coral Moon. This is her best yet. Plenty of gruesome and twisted creepiness to keep the suspense fans whipping through the pages, and lots of down home sweet and charming characters. Most of them anyway.

Well done. Quick read. Great story. Might want to read it in the full on sunshine. After dark...trust me, you don't want to go there.

Scribbles and Scrambles - Going, Going, Gone...

Is it dead?

chiv·al·ry (sh v l-r )
n. pl. chiv·al·ries
1. The medieval system, principles, and customs of knighthood.
2.
a. The qualities idealized by knighthood, such as bravery, courtesy, honor, and gallantry toward women.
b. A manifestation of any of these qualities.
3. A group of knights or gallant gentlemen.
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/chivalry

A few recent incidents have morphed into a monster sized question.

I’ve mentioned the whole cell phone in the public restroom thing before. Ewww.

Apparently, cell phone etiquette is not being taught. I suppose text-messaging “socially acceptable cell phone usage” tips is out of the question. Verizon, Qwest, Sprint – feel free to use my idea.

My co-worker shared her frustration over standing in line at a department store counter as a woman tried to return an item while multi-tasking by talking on her cell phone. The cashier had to interrupt her conversation four times before the woman exploded, hung-up, dealt with the transaction and stormed from the store.

Hmmm. The weighty word “hello” comes to mind.

I hate to judge, but I often overhear cell phone conversations. Generally they resemble something like this.

“Hey.”

“Yeah, I’m bored.”

“Did you see American Idol?”

“*#%*$! Me too. I can’t believe it.”

Now that we have the Bluetooth technology with ear pieces, communication has hit a new level.

Have you carried on a conversation with someone who is talking to the voice in his or her head yet? That’s fun. Something to look forward to.

This morning I practiced a bit of reverse chivalry – it was either that or becoming one with the carpet. Three healthy, seemingly in their right mind and moderately intelligent young men filled a hallway as they walked toward me. Kind of like a football offensive line. I ducked into a doorway. Maybe they were practicing for the annual running of the bulls’ festival. Or I might have donned my invisibility cloak instead of my jacket this morning. I was a little fuzzy when I left the house.

Sigh.

Okay, so which is a dying art? Chivalry, courtesy or common sense?

Scribbles and Scrambles - Holiday Snippets

For the want of anything of value – let me ramble on about nothing. Maybe something will gel, fall out and bounce off the floor. Then if it does, I can pick it up and run with it.

Conversations yesterday with my fabulous family and friends netted some tiny fragments of ideas that could be twisted and misaligned into possible entertaining anecdotes for your perusal.

The idea for a deaconess cart was brought up at church – it quickly went downhill from there and now the entire deaconess committee is hoping to get a golf cart aka the deac-mobil to transport communion supplies back and forth. Yes, I agree. This is a sad picture of American Christianity. But did that stop me from participating in the banter? And I am not going to enter the debate or conversation regarding the title – deaconess. Let me just say that our denomination does not use pom-poms or lead cheers.

Speaking of gluttony – served with three full meals yesterday. And as my insane F and F are wont to do, we found a different twist on the whole “a starving child in a ____________ (insert third-world country here) would love to have what’s on your plate” guilt trip. One location served a tweak on the traditional ham…corned beef. A teen person left a chunk on her plate. Her father said. “Hey, there’s a starving Irishman who’d love to have that.” (Said person was Irish – so it’s okay to share – no comments about unfair comments).

Finally, conversation turned serious and even a little sinister as a cousin shared a recent hunt for art. His hair-stylist has great paintings on his walls. Cousin asked where they’d come from. The stylist looked both ways, leaned in close, and whispered. “I’ll tell you sometime.”

Weeks – maybe even months (I wasn’t paying close enough attention to the real details) my cousin received a cryptic phone call. “This is Agent X, (okay, it was really the stylist’s name – but it was still weird) meet me at the unmarked warehouse on the waterfront. Park in the alley, walk around front.” They found the unmarked building and a man standing outside, he held six different leashed of six dogs who were in various stages of doing their doggy duty. The guy jerked his head toward the building…so they entered.

My cousin left with some sweet deals on original art, and the instructions to tell no one the location of the building.

Hey, I warned you.

If I don’t get targeted by Agent X – I’ll be seeing you around.