Where is Pewee Valley?

Small towns, , , , ,

For the newspaper announcement of our engagement, I wrote, “George Bierce Perrine III is from Pewee Valley, Kentucky, and  graduated from Transylvania College in Lexington, KY.”    My mother took one look at that sentence and asked, “Can’t we say he’s from Louisville?”  But all of that is true.   George is vaguely  related to the caustic writer Ambrose Bierce.  Transylvania is a small Christian Church school.  The name means across the wood and is in no way related to Dracula.

During the years George grew up, Pewee Valley was a charming and tiny town east of Louisville.  It’s still a charming town but Louisville now surrounds it.   His family lived in a lovely antebellum house on Maple Avenue, a street, as you would guess, with huge maple trees shading the yards.    Pewee Valley is best known for being the home of  Annie F. Johnston who wrote the Little Colonel books in the early 1900’s.

When I became a Perrine, I inherited a marvelous sister-in-law.  Diane is brilliant.  She graduated from Cornell and was a business executive for many years.  Now, she’s a well-known scholar and researcher, an expert in the underground railroad in Kentucky and surrounding states.  She’s also a popular speaker who gives programs about Kentucky country stores and other topics all around the state.

Diane had agreed to blog today on Pewee Valley, her memories of the town and her mother.   Unfortunately, I got sick and didn’t have time to set it up.  Diane Perrine Coon (google her–you’ll be impressed) will blog here next Tuesday.  I’m so pleased she’s agreed.

Sneeze, itch and sweat

Musings, , , ,

I’m not a gardener.  I enjoy the final outcome, either flowers or tomatoes but spending time outside makes me sneeze, itch and perspire.

On the other hand, I know there are people who find great joy in digging and growing.  I have a heroine in the third book of the Tales from Butternut Creek series who finds healing through gardening but I don’t understand why she would.  I’d love to hear from you about why you love gardening and your opinion on how digging and planting could heal that heroine.   Thank you.

Worst review ever?

Musings, , , ,

[This is embarrassing.  The post is supposed to be amusing.  Some readers have sent my notes about how sorry they are that someone gave me a bad review.  Not so!  I was attempting to write humor.  Please laugh.]

“This book does not disappoint.”    I read lots of reviews at on-line books stores.  Every time I see “Does not disappoint,” I wonder if there is less enthusiastic praise than that.  Yes, there are many worse reviews.  “This book made me throw up” is one I hope never to see.   Another is, “I hated this book so much I ground it up, made it into hamburgers, and poisoned my neighbors’ barking dog with it.”

But if you want to recommend a book, please find a way to express your  view in words that sound like a compliment.  When I read the “does-not-disappoint” comment on a review site, it brings to mind images and scenarios like these:

“When my table wobbled, I shoved this book under a leg.  It did not disappoint.”

“I used this book to kill an ant and it did not disappoint.”

“A friend recommended this book to cure my insomnia.  It did not disappoint.”

I mean, really, is this what you, as a reader, mean to suggest?   “It does not disappoint” is like using the old Texas saying “Reading this book was better than a poke in the eye.”  Not high praise.

Do you ever post a review?  Have you read any reviews that you thought were really good or bad?

The new face of Fabio

Holidays, Writing, , , , , ,

Here I am at a romance readers’ social February 25, 2012,  at the library in Pflugerville, TX.  Patrice Sarath stands on the left and April Kihlstrom on the right in her Regency gown.     Sadly, my eyes are closed.  Oddly, I seem to be doing something unspeakable to the cardboard figure of Fabio.   I really wasn’t.   I was holding him up so he wouldn’t fall over.

I can’t remember whose face the librarian had placed over Fabio’s.  Any one recognize him?

Hey–It’s Saturday!

Coming up, , , , , ,

The longer I blog, the more I realize the need to organize!  Because I’m dyslexic, organization is difficult for me, something I have to force on myself and my untidy mind.  I’ll blog about that later.

Here’s how I plan to organize the blog.   There will always be something new on Tuesday and Thursday.  Every week, I’ll blog and will also welcome a few guests.   However, if I don’t have a guest blogger, I’ll have a short article such as Philosophy from the Funnies or My Confessions.   On weekends, I’ll add a little extra.  Perhaps I’ll tell you what’s coming up or introduce a guest or tell you what’s new on my website or  just say, “Hi.  Glad you droppped by.”

And I am glad you dropped by and glad everytime you drop by.  Leave me a message.  I love to hear from you.  Ask me a question.  Maybe I’ll blog on it.  Leave your favorite church or family recipe.  I may choose it to put in my newsletter or the website.

Just because he’s so cute, here’s a picture of Scooter the Wonder Cat attacking an orange toy.

Small towns, A Rich Setting but How to Belong?

Guest blogger

Joining us today is Lyn Cote who writes wonderful inspirational about small towns.  Lyn, you’re on.

I love to write stories set in small towns. This is strange because it’s only in the last eight years that I’ve lived in a small town. I grew up near a big city in a suburb of nearly 90,000 and then raised my children in Iowa in a city of over 100,000.

Recently I uploaded the last book in my Northern Intrigue series onto Kindle. I wrote the romantic suspense series about a decade ago. I decided it was time to update them (technology changes so fast, doesn’t it?) and I like how I write now so wanted to add a little of “my now style.”

This series is set in a north woods tight knit rural community which I named, Steadfast. I have a curmudgeonly newspaper editor, a bitter old woman who causes as much trouble as she can for everyone and an unidentified baby, saved from a car just before it explodes. And that’s just in the first book, Winter’s Secret–Romance and mystery in a small Wisconsin town during a record-breaking snowy winter.”

To download a free copy, go to  http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/87068  and enter this code CT33W      You don’t have an ereader? Then you can download a PDF copy to read on your computer or print a copy for yourself. The coupon is only good Feb 23-24. Use it and pass it on to your friends! I set the series in Wisconsin because that is where I live now. And though I’ve lived in this small tourist town in the Lakeland area of far north of Wisconsin for eight years, I don’t really feel I’m a part of the town. Why? Because though my husband’s family spent time here and owned property here since WWII, I didn’t raise children here. I think that makes the difference. Somehow children knit a family into a community.

Do you think that’s true or not? And why is it true or false?”

If you’d like to get in touch with Lyn:    Twitter  @LynCote   OR   BooksbyLynCote.com

When I was born, my mother gave the dog away

Pets, , , ,

When I was born, my mother gave the dog away.

It was a Scottie but I  know nothing more about this dog.  I was very young at the time.   I have wondered, once I was old enough to understand, how my older brother and sister might have reacted to trading in a pet for a little sister.  I never asked.

After that, our family had few pets and none with fur.  My sister had a turtle named Tillie Mae Turtle and a parakeet named Budgie.   Neither were very cuddly and both died young.

It wasn’t until both my brother and sister had headed off to college that I got a cat.  It seems there existed a correlation between number of people in the house and having a pet.    With that cat, Hercules, I realized an important concept:  kids need pets.

In spite of fond memories to the contrary, childhood isn’t all running in the sunshine and going on family picnics.  There are some rough moments, some difficult adjustments which a child can’t or doesn’t want to share with parents or siblings or even friends.   But a pet, you can tell everything to a pet.  When a classmate says something hateful, a kid can cry into the fur.  When a kid is constantly chosen last for every team, a dog will lick the tears away.   When a child is sad, a pet listens and loves.

Oh, I know a pet means more work for parents, but I believe strongly that cat I got in middle school helped me get through high school.  I still remember his lying on my chest and purring when I needed a friend.    And I know allergies and living situations may make that impossible, but, if at all possible,  I believe children need pets to love and to love them.

What do you think?