History

Posted on April 9, 2011 by A. Elizabeth West

These neat little guys are door hardware on the Mission San Xavier del Bac near Tucson, Arizona. More than 300 years old, this beautiful church is one of the only examples of authentic Spanish Colonial architecture in the country. It’s loaded with history. There’s plenty to think about. Who made this unique hardware and why choose a mouse and snake?

History presents writers with a plethora of opportunities for storylines, characters and subjects. You can change the outcome of a known event or make up a new one, fitting it into real-time happenings as an interesting distraction.

Numerous authors have plumbed the mines of history for stories. The focus can be as broad as simply setting a love story in medieval France, thus using the period as backdrop, or it can narrow in on a specific event, place or person.

If the period is the star, the characters will be much more influenced by it. In Jean Auel’s Earth’s Children series, the life of the young Cro-Magnon girl Ayla, her childhood with a Neanderthal tribe and her relationship with a Jondalar, a man of her own kind, plays out against the Ice Age in Europe.

Ayla and Jondalar travel extensively and meet many other peoples, learning such things as fishing for giant sturgeon and hunting mammoths. Along the way, they invent the atl-atl (a spear-throwing device), the needle and other important things.

Auel does more than just set the story in pre-history. Giving significant discoveries to her characters grounds them in the period much better than simply dressing them in skins and dropping them in front of a cave lion.

The narrow focus sometimes includes actual historical figures who share interaction with the main character. Usually if famous people are in the story, they’re not protagonists. Faye Kellerman’s book The Quality of Mercy is a notable exception.

She used William Shakespeare as a protagonist and we see plenty from his vantage point. Another POV character provides us with a window into life in Elizabeth I’s court, but the royal chamber is not as important as the people.

Research is incredibly important for historical fiction. There will be readers out there who know your subject and they will point out your errors. Auel’s extensive study of her Paleolithic setting makes the books a learning experience as much as entertainment.

I’ve been examining the Victorian era, mostly for miniatures, but there are a ton of interesting developments in the latter part of the nineteenth and early twentieth century that have great fictional potential. Take a look at your favorite period. What can you find there?

You can search history for little-known characters whose perspective on a world-changing event makes it fresh, or make one up. Alternatively, you can completely change the course of events and speculate what would have happened, say, if Hitler had won World War II, or if someone discovered the real identity of Jack the Ripper (already done to death, but give it a try if you dare).

Even an object or building can suggest something to you. What could I do with that mouse and snake door hardware? I have a few ideas already.

What’s your favorite historical period to read about? What makes it so appealing?

Gumball Wars

Posted on April 9, 2011 by A. Elizabeth West

It’s spring and all my pictures seem to be taking place outside. I’m tuned into that right now. I wish I could take beautiful pictures like my friend Sally. Her shots of her garden look like professional magazine photos.

Look at this. Just look at it.

No, it’s not an alien spore. It is a sweetgum seed pod, otherwise known as a gumball. Not the kind you chew, but the ones that jam their nasty spikes right into your bare foot as you shuffle along through the lovely green grass.

I bought my little house in 2002 and I was so happy I had two big trees in the front yard. I should have asked what kind of trees they were. When autumn comes, they morph into a lovely yellow mass of leaves (provided there’s been enough rain) and make a thick carpet that is easy to mulch with the mower. No raking necessary.

Not so in spring. Soon as the wind begins to blow, the dried pods drop to the ground in a bold attempt to propagate the tree. They stick to the grass and cannot be dislodged without vigorous raking, leaving one with blisters and aching muscles.

Here is how they look after you rake them.

They're plotting...I know they are.

Sweetgum trees cannot be persuaded by any means to stop this nonsense. A spray is rumored to work, but I called the guy who writes the farm column in the paper and he said it just isn’t feasible for trees that are already forty or so feet tall. I wish they were pine trees. Pine trees only drop needles and cones, and people who want mulch and craft supplies will offer to clean up my yard for free.

There are three advantages to having this madness visit me each spring. First, raking the dastardly things is good exercise. After a long winter cooped up and freezing, it feels amazing to get out there and footle around in the yard a bit.

Second, without the trees, the front of my house would be quite hot in the summer. If I let the bottom limbs grow out they hide me from the street, like long bangs over a shy girl’s face. The lawn under them doesn’t need much mowing due to lack of sunlight. I’d put a little table or lounge out there but I don’t put anything in the front yard I’d like to keep.

Third, mourning doves like to eat the tiny seeds that fall from the pods. The pinkish-grey birds flutter softly down to the driveway and peck away, stuffing themselves. Because they are dumbbirds, I have to shoo them out of the way to back the car out. They coo a mellow “Hoo-OO-ooh ooh ooh,” in the early evening and morning. I could hear them as I was weeding out back tonight.

So it’s not all bad. I need to get someone to take out the decaying limbs still jammed into the trees after the 2007 ice storm. Eventually the trees will have to come out, since their roots are destroying both my and my neighbor’s driveways. Hopefully by then I’ll have moved on and won’t have to deal with it. In the meantime I’ll enjoy the shade, the birds and the exercise and like Heidi in the city, pretend I can hear the whisper of the wind through the pines.

Flower Power

Posted on April 8, 2011 by A. Elizabeth West

This will be a short post, because I killed myself at work today. But every single file is put away, conflab it! Work is why I always have to post in the evening. I just haven’t had time to do it during the day and the Evil Internet Overlords HAVE BLOCKED ME FROM MY OWN BLOG.

See the pretty redbud flower! I had an appointment today in an older office building in my city, and when I parked I was right next to this purple loveliness. Spring is the only time I really like this place.

Here’s another picture of the redbuds, in contrast to the building’s windows, which are coated in something that reflects a pinkish gold. I stood in the street to get a picture of it. Lucky for me no cars came that way.

I get frustrated with flowers, although I really love them. So many don’t smell as pretty as they look, or don’t have a scent at all. Something as nice as a redbud should have a sweet aroma. They’re like people. The prettiest of them aren’t always as nice as they appear.

Mostly, though, flowers make me happy. There’s a PlayStation 3 game called Flower, which Certain Someone insisted I play. In the game, you are the wind and you have to blow over fields of tightly closed buds and open them with your touch. Each level gets more elaborate, accompanied by amazingly relaxing and lovely music. Oh, it was so great. I would get a PS3 just for this game.

I wanted to take a picture of the neighborhoods as I was driving, of the mingled colors budding out on trees and shrubs. The golden yellow of forsythia, the purple redbuds, a pinkish-white dogwood and palest glowing green of tree leaves poised to burst open. Traffic did not allow. I need to be where I can see natural beauty and have time to appreciate it.

Well, now that I’m officially dead, I think I’d like violets to grow in my honor. So don’t mow them down; let them take over the yard. Think of me when you step on a bee, ha ha.

What’s your favorite part of spring? Please share in the comments.

Eggscuse Me!

Posted on April 7, 2011 by A. Elizabeth West

Behold the humble egg. Yes, it’s green, because it came from an Araucana chicken. These South American birds lay yellow, green, blue and pink eggs. No, really. Here’s a picture I snagged off the Internet:

I used to raise these with an ex, and it was great fun gathering colored eggs of an evening. You had to have a mix of hens to get the different colors. The yellow ones were really cool-looking. Farm eggs from a chicken that spends its entire day outside eating grass and bugs taste ten times better than store eggs.

I was shuffling around the grocery store looking for something vaguely healthy ($6.50 for a bag of Gala apples? Really? I think NOT) and trying to avoid the cookie aisle. When I remembered I needed eggs, I got to thinking about how great they are.

How could something that comes out of a chicken’s ass taste so delicious and be so good for you?

Eggs are incredibly cheap protein, nutritious and infinitely versatile. They contain:

Vitamins A, B, and D—skin, eyes and bones
Selenium—vital mineral
Choline–good for your brain
Riboflavin (B2)— cell food
B12—nerves and blood cells need it
Lutein and zeaxanthin–keeps your eyes healthy

You can boil them, scramble them, fry them, bake them, devil them, put them in stuff, make decorations out of the shells (eggery is a well-respected craft).

My favorite way to eat eggs is scrambled. I make the fluffiest, cloud-like scrambled eggs you ever had. I don’t put cheese on them or dump veggies in them. That’s for omelets. The eggs must be whipped with milk and poured into a dry pan, then allowed to heat up slowly and lovingly teased back and forth with a spatula. Continuous turning and fluffing is the secret.

When they are almost finished, drain the liquid from the milk and gently scoop the little egg clouds onto the plate, where you may add a little salt and pepper. Careful, not too much. The flavor is delicate and the texture sublime. No flat puddles folded into a crusty mass like you get in a skeezy diner.

Second only to the poofy delight of scrambled would be poached. I have, in my entire life, found only two restaurants that can poach an egg to my satisfaction. The white cannot be runny or it is like eating—well, I won’t say it in case you’re eating. It must be firm, and the yolk still liquid. Cut up that egg with a spoon in a little bowl and enjoy its slippery, soupy goodness.

Deviled eggs are called that because they are the devil to make. No, I don’t think that’s right, but it’s how I feel. I love them and would eat them every day, but I hate making them. So I usually buy them from the grocery store deli.

Same with hard-boiled. For some reason I can’t boil an egg to save my life. I’ve tried everything—cookbooks, timers, hot to cold water, you name it. Save your advice. It won’t work. Again with the deli. Two hard-boiled hen fruits make a good lunch, cut up on a salad or eaten out of hand on the side.

As a poor college student and later as a poor adult with a crappy job, I ate (eat) a lot of eggs. Along with lentils, they’re one of the more economical and healthy foods you can buy. Hit the expired bakery rack for bread to toast and you’re cruising.

Do you like eggs? If so, what’s your favorite way to eat them? If you don’t like them, why not? Besides the chicken’s ass thing, of course.

Daylight Savings Must Die

Posted on April 6, 2011 by A. Elizabeth West

I tweaked a comic cover and made this poster last year at work to remind everyone to turn their clocks ahead for Daylight Savings Time. The only reason I got away with posting it was that my former boss wasn’t there that day. The woman had NO sense of humor. I thought this was one of the best posters I ever made.

I know I didn’t take this picture, but this was too good not to share. There are several reasons I believe Daylight Savings needs to stop.

1. The stupid sun won’t go down until later anyway.

The whole idea of Daylight Savings Time is to move an hour into the evening, so you can do more. Back in Ben Franklin’s time when this ridiculousness was conceived, when the sun went to bed, so did you. Now that the clock is an hour ahead we still have to get up in the dark. Unless I lived on a farm, why would I need to change my clocks for extra evening light when the days are already longer anyway? Manipulating my clock doesn’t have any effect on the sun.

2. How much energy does it save, really?

Daylight Savings means energy savings, because you don’t have to use as much electricity at night. Bull pucky. According to this National Geographic article, people are using MORE electricity, not less. It’s dark in the morning now. When they come home in the evening, they’ll run everything anyway because no one goes outside anymore even if it’s light. They’re too busy playing video games and watching Netflix and Internet porn.

3. Dealing with people in other time zones becomes funky.

Arizona, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, and the Northern Marianas Islands do not partake of Daylight Savings. Since business is global now, or at least nationwide, now you have to remember who does and doesn’t put the clock ahead and won’t answer the phone when you call, because they’re not up yet or they already went home.

It also messes you up if you’re dating someone who lives in a place that doesn’t participate. Now you’re two hours ahead of or behind your honey, instead of one. Too bad if he/she wants to chat and you’re already falling asleep in your cocoa.

4. It messes with your sleep.

Lose an hour, gain an hour. Which is worse? Doesn’t seem to matter. Many people are draggy after they change the clocks. More light later in the evening makes it harder to go to bed. Then it’s more difficult to get up. And how many of you have forgotten to reset the clock altogether and were late to work? Oh come on, you’ve done it. This is why I make the posters.

5. It’s a pain in the ass.

Counting my watch and both my phone handsets, I have eight clocks in my house that need to be reset. Thank God my computers and my cell phone do themselves.

Okay, I’m done whining now. Do you like Daylight Savings Time? Has it helped or hindered you? Sound off in the comments if you like. I promise I won’t hate you if you love it.

Cookbooks – Read ‘Em and Eat

Posted on April 5, 2011 by A. Elizabeth West

This is only one tier of this four-shelved cheapo baker’s rack I bought at ALDI. I have Betty Crocker, Better Homes and Gardens (seen here), assorted pamphlets and booklets ranging from a Gold Medal flour cookbook from 1910 to a recent issue of Reminisce with a delicious sausage and potato recipe. I have a Jack Benny Jello premium recipe pamphlet, a Riceland Rice one with a horribly racist cartoon of a little Chinese guy, and a really interesting one with all the foods from the Little House books. No, really.

Cookbooks are hugely popular. They get on the bestseller list. Whenever I go into the library, I see them on the New Arrivals shelf. Someone, somewhere will always need the perfect baked zucchini a la Parmesan for a fancy dinner, or Henry VIII’s Turkey Legs for their Tudor-themed party, or to know how to eat like a celebrity.

My cookbooks are a little slice of life from each era. Reading them is fascinating. The 1910 Gold Medal flour cookbook is very different from any of the others. It refers to things I’ve never heard of. I had to read it several times before I figured out what “forcemeat” was. (It is bits of leftover meat forced through a sieve to mince it for making meatballs or croquettes. The Victorians wasted nothing. Get your mind out of the gutter!)

Back then, they didn’t write recipes, or receipts as they were known, the way they do now. I searched for twenty agonizing minutes and I can’t remember where I put the book, so here is an example I found on the Internet:

POTATO SOUP.

Now this soup is made of left over meat and the bones of roasts, put them on in cold water and boil slowly; you may also add a little fresh meat; then dice some potatoes, strain the stock and return to the stove, put in the potatoes and some rice, boil until tender, then heat a little grease and fry onions until glazed, add a little flour, brown with onions in grease, then pour the soup into this hot mixture, and let it come to a boil. That is fine.

UM, OKAY YEAH. To modern people used to precise measurements and temperatures, this is nearly incomprehensible. Add cooking it on a wood stove and it gives you some idea of what being a housewife must have been like back then.

The Better Homes and Gardens series of illustrated cookbooks that came out in the 1960s and 1970s is an exercise in overdone excess. There was a book for everything— one on cooking for two, one for cheese, meat, fish, salad, and so on. I’ve found darn near all of them at the flea market.

Betty Crocker is the queen of the cookbooks. She’s been plying her kitchen magic since 1921 as a cheerful fictional mascot for the General Mills corporation. Yes, it’s true; Betty isn’t real. No worries. Her Dinner for Two, Pot Luck Meals and the ever-fabulous Cooky Book will still hold a revered place in family kitchens for years to come.

So far I’ve only cooked hasty pudding from The Little House Cookbook, rice cakes from the Riceland one and a fantabulous lasagna from some Italian thing that’s my fallback impressive dish. I suppose if I ever move I’ll have to cull some of them, but I’m not looking forward to it.

Many of the older books aren’t very healthy by today’s standards. Fried foods, Crisco, cheese and a ton of butter abound. Funny how we’re so much fatter now. Perhaps these recipes had more flavor, so we didn’t eat as much. Or, and I think this more likely, when we had time to cook our dinners and eat them sitting at the table, there was less mindless eating.

Food is what brings people together. It’s how people connect. Food is the ultimate icebreaker and the best way to get to know another culture. As a writer, you can use meals to show the closeness or strain of a family. You can show the fish-out-of-water traveler facing an exotic dish, or how capable his companion who knows what fork to use.

Have a favorite dinner scene from a book or movie? Do you enjoy collecting cookbooks yourself? Can’t stand to go near the kitchen? Feel free to share in the comments.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer – Conflict, conflict, conflict!

Posted on April 2, 2011 by A. Elizabeth West

Today’s random Saturday post concerns the Joss Whedon TV program Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the story of a young woman with a mission to kill the undead while still trying to have a life. If you’re a Buffy nerd, you may have noticed references to this show here and there in my posts, when I write example sentences. If not, I hope you’ll get my point here even if you’re not familiar with the example.*

I didn’t watch this show when it aired. Certain Someone made me catch up via Netflix and DVD and now I’m hooked. We watch together over the Internet since we’re long distance, and are up to Season 6. Although he’s seen all of them, I’m not finished yet so please no spoilers in the comments!

Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers. Yes, I took a picture of my TV!

Buffy is a lesson in story conflict. We start with a teenager in a new school, a handicap itself, who finds she has super strength and a destiny she must keep a total secret. Buffy’s not like other slayers; she doesn’t embrace her role. She wants boys and friends and proms. Instead, she has to kill the vampires and the demons drawn to the Hellmouth underneath Sunnydale, California, and save the world more times than she wants to remember.

External conflict in Buffy is, of course, monsters always trying to kill everybody. Each season boasts a Big Bad the group, known as the Scooby Gang, spends several episodes overcoming. Villains both horrifyingly evil and hilariously bumbling abound. If Buffy can’t beat them up, she has to ask for help. Like Harry Potter, she doesn’t like to put her friends in harm’s way, despite their eagerness to assist.

Internal conflict can come from wildly divergent character traits. There’s a name for a perfect character—Mary Sue. You’ll find her in both fanfiction and mainstream stories as well. She’s gorgeous, accomplished, flawless, tragic and boring.

Buffy may be beautiful, but she’s whiny and doesn’t communicate well. She ran away once. She’s insecure, stubborn and self-absorbed. But she’s an intensely loyal friend, and she truly cares about the people she’s trying to save. We relate to her because of her shortcomings and we admire her because she is really capable, even though she doesn’t think so. She gets in her own way all the time.

Just when things work out, something else happens. It’s a compressed micro-slice of life. We often have time to enjoy the good before the bad shows up. On TV, there’s no time for this. If Sunnydale were all sunshine and roses, we’d get bored and change the channel.

A character’s goal shouldn’t be too easy. But there’s another element engaging us, an essential one. The Scooby Gang is growing and changing. They’ve moved on from high school to college, to adult issues (losing a parent, taking care of a younger sibling, impending marriage). Personalities shift. Someone struggles with newfound power, another reveals a previously unsuspected (and shocking) soft side. They disagree. People leave.

Combined, the monsters and the emotional conflict make for an entertaining mix, spiked with comedy to lighten the mood here and there. You can’t help but tune in again to see what happens. Will Buffy and the Scooby Gang find a way to kill the demon? Can a love affair with a werewolf really work, and how? Is magic going to help this time? What if it doesn’t?

Keeping things static kills suspense. Buffy the Vampire Slayer doesn’t cop out and rely on fancy new monsters to liven things up. They’re pretty much the same every time. It’s the conflicts within and between the characters that move the stories along.

People are complex and surprising. Let your characters argue. Let them make bad decisions, stupid choices, big mistakes. And then help them find their own ways out of the messes you’ve made for them.

*Subliminal footnote: RENT IT….YOU KNOW YOU WANT TOOOOO…

Alice in My Room

Posted on April 2, 2011 by A. Elizabeth West

When changing after work this afternoon, I turned on the bedside lamp and noticed a cool effect. I have a green candle in a silver saucer-type holder on the dresser next to my bed. I put some glass beads I found outside around it. It looks pretty on the lavender cloth on the dresser’s top.

In front of my jewelry box and next to the candle I put a collection of Lewis Carroll’s greatest hits. The pink cover is gilded in spots, such as Alice’s hair and other highlights. A few of the glass beads had fallen off the saucer and caught the light. With the gilt cover of the book, they made a fanciful picture.

This is a bit staged, as I moved everything off that end of the dresser and scattered the beads around the book, playing with the light to get it just right. I think it looks like bubbles around the book.

Colors change in the light. In fact, without light colors don’t exist. That discovery astounded me and was my first encounter with the transient nature of the world. In a few moments, an ordinary pair of objects made a silly and childlike picture. The moments pass quickly, and they should be enjoyed and savored.

When you look at something and it looks like something else, how do you describe it? Like this?

I put the glass beads around the book, where they reflected the light in cool contrast to the warmth of Alice’s hair.

You can do this:

Cheshire hovers over the girl, surrounded by ethereally iridescent bubbles of gleam, with Humpty and the Rabbit guarding. Alice looks askance at the steam droplets, which have escaped from her kettle and are growing. Even in this place, how could this be normal? No one else is concerned. They haven’t noticed how golden the light has become, the herald of yet another change. She braces for yet another topsy-turvey physics lesson. Dear me, how tiresome.

Watch, see the light in the day, first thing in the morning, both sunlight and artificial. See how it changes things. Familiar becomes strange, ordinary sublime. Reality fades to fantasy and back again. See it, mark it, and use your best language to capture it. Let it change how you think about what you see.

Blogging from A-Z April Challenge 2011 Game Plan

Posted on March 30, 2011 by A. Elizabeth West

Time sure flies when you’re not having fun, eh? I look up from the weary toil and realize that the Blogging from A-Z April Challenge 2011 begins on Friday. Yipes!

I went to Arlee Bird’s site and discovered he has a game plan. I thought about this a couple of weeks ago but only in passing. Today I had a great idea for the challenge.

You might remember several posts back I said I wanted to post more pictures? A friend of mine from high school inspired me (thanks, David! He’s an actor!) by doing something very cool. He has been posting what he calls 365 Days of Pictures, a different picture each day that he took that day.

I think I will do this. This year’s theme will be Observation, and each picture will get a post regarding what drew me to take it, and what observations I have about it. Each photo will be of something that begins with that day’s letter. I feel strongly that this will sharpen that particular skill, which serves a writer well. I’ll probably do what I did last year and make Saturday’s posts very random. So be sure to check them out; they could be about anything!

A bit of a cheat, I know, but I might have to take some pictures ahead of time, thanks to my stupid work schedule. Never fear, I’ll make sure they’re relevant. And yes, I do believe a large purse will allow me to carry my camera with me more often.

Another thing I promise is to try and not make my entries so long. I get carried away sometimes, I know. But writing for wiseGEEK has helped me learn to make every word count. Also, time spent editing with William Brohaugh’s Write Tight book made me see how many extra words I use that aren’t needed. Peek into it here. Writing is learning and no one ever stops doing that.

This year I’ve added a couple of things to the page. I welcome comments on my posts, and I invite you to step over to the Terms and Conditions; Comment Policy Page (see link at top and left of this page) before leaving one. Also, there is an email subscribe thing at the bottom right, so you can sign up to receive an email whenever I post a new post, should your heart desire.

Check out the blog challenge and find some new blogs to follow. Last year there were some really neat ones, and this year there are over 700 entries. Thanks for visiting and I hope to see you back when the Challenge begins!