Writers and Authors

Want to throw yourself into the holiday season this year? Get in the festive mood this these Christmas reads:

Trying hard to stay awake, on Christmas Eve, a little girl begins to wonder what Santa might bring her--- and just how he gets all around the world to deliver all of those present in one night? Maybe it's not always reindeer. Wouldn't it be cool if he used a rocket, an airplane, or even skis sometimes? Or maybe he gets there different ways each year? While she's waiting to see what Santa puts under the tree for Christmas morning, she starts to dream of how he will cross the miles.....

Freelance journalist, Olanma Obinze, just landed the interview of a lifetime. She didn’t like the commercialism of Christmas, so the trip to Dubai was the perfect destination and it was happening at the perfect time. She’d get to escape the Christmas hoopla; and the big paycheck once the article was sold would ensure she didn't have to go crawling back to her father for money.

Abayomi Rice was in charge of scheduling interviews for his grandfather, but would only grant Olanma's request if she accepted his ultimatum—a trip half way across the world to Cape Town, South Africa.

Olanma wasn’t falling for the charm of a recovering playboy and a rich one at that. But with her plans going up in smoke before her eyes, Olanma must decide whether to give in to the ultimatum or leave empty handed. Who said it was the season to be merry?

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Unwrap the gifts of tradition from cultures around the globe in this illustrated Christmastime storybook as Daniel discovers what the true meaning of Christmas is all about!

Ideal for ages 6-8, children will be drawn to the read aloud-friendly format and the brightly colored, brushstroke illustrations. Teachers, parents, grandparents, librarians, and catechists will find this book an entertainingly educational way to illuminate the faith which celebrates the birth of Jesus in many ways.

Secret Santa Squirrels is a delightful look at the answer to "Just How does Santa deliver 60,000 presents a second, In 31 hours, without going completely around the bend?"

The answer? "Well the answer is magic reindeer poo and Santa's little squirrel friends too!"

Marge Wilson was a happily married woman. She was madly in love with her husband Ted, and they had been blessed with two children, daughter Chris and son Sam. But as happy as Marge and Ted were together, they had a seemingly unsolvable relationship problem with daughter Chris, a maverick of a girl growing up if there ever was one. She was now a young adult who was promiscuous and not ashamed of it. She caused her parents many embarrassing moments, never caring what they thought about her lifestyle. On the other hand, Sam was a bright young man who was forging ahead with a bright future in the technical world of computers.

It was a foggy and rainy night that triggered an event that changed all their lives forever. They suffered a family tragedy that dramatically brought a whole new perspective to each of their lives. Perhaps it was this event that helped start a change for the better with Chris’ lifestyle, or perhaps it was a traumatic health issue that eventually received her attention, or perhaps it was mostly due to the influence of her great friend.

This story takes the reader on a bumpy ride of tragedy, trauma, romance, and intrigue in a foreign country, before the unexpected ending takes you where you weren’t expecting to go. The story will keep you spellbound to the very end.

Consider the “flâneur.”

This French word when it first came into use in the 16^th and 17^th century meant something like “stroller” but came to connote the idleness of a “loafer.” In the 1860s, poet Charles Baudelaire found a literary use for this expression.

The following quote is borrowed from Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flâneur):

“To be away from home and yet to feel oneself everywhere at home; to see the world, to be at the centre of the world, and yet to remain hidden from the world—impartial natures which the tongue can but clumsily define. The spectator is a prince who everywhere rejoices in his incognito.”

Flaubert, author of Madame Bovary and a contemporary of Baudelaire, appropriated this idea of the flâneur to invent what became the modern way of telling a story. Get rid of the omniscient, moralizing, pedantic voice that had heretofore narrated novels. Push instead an incognito loafer into the crowd of your story. Hidden from the scrutiny of other characters, not really a character himself (or herself) but more a “noticing” consciousness, this loafer looks left and looks right and reports on the doings of others, occasionally commenting.

How is this flâneur useful to writers today?

Distance. It gives us distance.

With a flâneur narrating, you can remove the noticing consciousness from your point of view character and push out into the world, noticing what’s there and reporting to the reader with occasional commentary. This can be done with a word, a well place adverb, maybe an adjectival phrase that belongs to an observer more artful and wised up than your pitifully limited character. It can also take the form of scoping out the panoramic view of the situation before retreating into the foxhole of the anxious character’s immediate needs and desires.

Three examples:

Consider Joyce Carol Oates story, “ID”: “It made her feel stupid. Not that she was stupid. It was just that sometimes her thoughts were as snarled as her hair, her eyes leaking tears behind her dark-purple-tinted glasses—pre-scription lenses—so that she couldn’t see what the hell the teacher was scribbling on the board, not even the shape of it.”

At first glance, you would say this subjective third person narration comes straight from Lisette, a middle school girl from a dysfunctional family. But look more closely. What is the likelihood that “her thoughts were as snarled as her hair” or “eyes leaking tears” are observations coming from Lisette? I would contend, there is a flâneur at work. This flâneur walks into this classroom with Lisette, stands beside Lisette, and lends a more artful depth to observations than Lisette herself would believably make. This is what I call an imbedded flâneur.

Another example. Consider Willa Cather’s Death Comes For The Archbishop. Describing the ”hostile” country between Albuquerque and Taos, Cather tells us: “A European could scarcely imagine such hardships. The old countries were worn to the shape of human life… But in the alkali deserts the water holes were poisonous, and the vegetation offered nothing to a starving man. Everything was dry, prickly, sharp; Spanish bayonet, juniper, greasewood, cactus; the lizard, the rattlesnake,--and man made cruel by a cruel life. Those early missionaries threw themselves naked upon the hard heart of a country that was calculated to try the endurance of giants.” Our French born protagonist, Father Latour, has lived in this country, survived its cruelty. But is this the voice of an aging priest? Or is it a loafer wrenched from the crowds of Europe to drift incognito through the American southwest landscape, commissioned by Cather to observe, report and comment?

Once I understood that a flâneur would give me the distance I needed to tell my story without being trapped in my character’s foxhole, I switched the POV in my novel, Better You Go Home, from third person to first person and never looked back. The flâneur allowed me to turn away from my character as needed. Consider: “When it comes to sorting out identity, it’s the memories we don’t have in common that define us. One of my father’s persistent memories, one he told me about in any case, was of waking in the loft above the stalls at night filled with dread. When the heavy duvet would slip off and he’d wake up to the freezing cold, the first thing he’d do would be to listen for the “angel” breathing of his little Magda. If he heard that, he’d then listen for the familiar snorting of the mare in the stalls. If he heard that he knew the world was in order...”

Adopt a flâneur. It will set you free.

Scott Driscoll, an award-winning instructor, holds an MFA from the University of Washington and has been teaching creative writing for the University of Washington Extension for seventeen years.

About the book:

Chico Lenoch wonders why his Czech father refuses to contact family left behind the Iron Curtain. After discovering letters revealing the existence of a half-sister, he travels to the Czech Republic to find his forgotten sister and unearth the secrets his father has buried all these years. Chico’s quest is complicated by his urgent need for a donor kidney. Might his sister be a candidate?

www.scott-driscoll.com

Today's Christmas Wish List is for Romance reads. Here's a few ideas for books from the romance genre:

He had great hopes of becoming a legend...

Geoffrey de Servian showed excellent promise of becoming a first-rate knight until one day he falls off a horse, leaving him physically and mentally broken. His ambition of becoming a celebrated knight is shattered, and he is left a shadow of the man he once was. But the fall was not an accident as everyone implies, and he sets out to find the culprit that dared to ruin his dream. In the meantime, he must find work and shelter, laying low until the opportunity arises, and he can meet his nemesis face to face.

She only wanted to lead a simple life...

Finally, Widow Karina can enjoy a modicum level of success. Her abusive husband is long dead, and her scented candles are slowly starting to sell. Unfortunately life as a female merchant is not easy, especially when the guild master is harassing her. But her fortune turns when an attractive stranger arrives at her door, looking for work. He offers protection from the guild master, and she takes him on. Only there is one problem -- this remarkable stranger is different from any man that she's ever known. And even more dangerous, he threatens to rip apart the steel cage that surrounds her heart, making her yearn for the impossible.

Then just as they are drawn together, the king's daughter appears in town, desperately seeking help. With passion and desire simmering just below the surface, Geoffrey and Karina must put aside their feelings for one another, and serve the princess in their own separate ways. And while Geoffrey possesses the mind and heart of a knight, is it enough to save the princess and win over the woman he loves?

When Julia said I do to her husband three years ago, she thought it would last forever. But when she finds herself in a dead-end marriage and in love with her best friend's boyfriend, she begins to question those relationships and everything she once believed in. As Julia contemplates the biggest decision of her life, will she choose to walk away . . . or will she surrender her fears and let herself fall?

Racing horses and racing hearts; it’s all part of the Stoddard dynasty. Evan Stoddard inherited an age-old farm in the heart of Kentucky horse country. He’s a winner in many respects: along with a winning smile, he is a winner with horses and with love. His best trophy is his beautiful wife, Suzanne. However, his winning ways will be upturned with the arrival of a new horse, War Monger, and a female jockey named Ginger, who sends every man on the farm into a tailspin, and sends Evan's marriage into a downward spiral.

Tom Christmas is Evan’s trainer and right-hand man. When Ginger lays eyes on Tom, she finds him very much to her liking and hotly pursues him. They gallop headlong into a wild, passionate relationship. Suzanne, however, believes Evan is having an affair with Ginger, and leaves him. Evan desperately needs to find his winning ways again.

This spell binding and inspiring novel weaves deception, cultures and the intrigue of love for a romantic journey that spans two continents and challenges the cornerstone of faith. When Feranmi's parents decide it's time for their daughter to get married, they have the perfect man for the job. Is being single a crime? Why will her parents not let this rest? When she was ready to get married she'll do the picking. Her parents are coming to the U.S for a visit, so she comes up with the perfect plan to deceive them into believing she is in a committed relationship. Luckily, Alex an old friend, is willing to play the part but on one condition....

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