With the holidays coming up, I have a dread of all the food. Yep. You read that right. If you know me, you know that rarely turn down a meal. But when the holidays come up, I have a problem with seeing so much food. It’s like mental overload. I’ll fix a plate but nothing will taste good. Maybe deep inside I can’t make up my mind, so my taste buds shut down.
Weird, isn’t it? If it only would do that all the time. Well, at least until I dropped several (a lot) pounds.
I do know I hate eating at buffets or at big functions where the food has been sitting out long enough to become room temperature. Hate that. Yuck! Plus I can’t tell you how often I’ve seen kids play in the food. *shiver*
A fast pace, well-written book encourages me to write. I get excited and want my books to be just as fun to read.
A book that doesn’t satisfy frightens me; I’m afraid I’ll pick up their bad habits. So, I quit reading and pass it on to the used book store or delete it off my e-reader.
Glacier from boatMount McKinley seen from lodgeMassive amounts of spruces.Another glacier seen from train
Hubby and I visited Alaska in August. Here are a few pictures we took.
What all did we do there? EVERYTHING! We went whitewater rafting (no, I didn’t fall in the water surprisingly) and sorry no picture of that. They had pictures to buy but I wasn’t in a one. Though you could see some of my hair hiding behind the good-looking guide. No, I didn’t have my arms wrapped around his neck, holding on for dear life. But I was hunkered down low enough to stop myself from falling in. It was so much fun! The scenery was breathtaking. Will I do it again? HELL, NO! The wet suit made me look and feel like the Michelin man. Click here if you want to see a picture of him (The Michelin man, not the guide. HA!) – remember, no picture of me in that suit. Thank you, God, for small favors. Pun intended.
During our seven days there, we rode on a train twice, bus several times, van, plane, raft, and boat. Crazy, heh? I call it my plane, train and automobile and boat trip.
Closer to the glacier (top one)Yes, a grizzlyA plane similar to the one I crawled in and out of.SO WORTH IT!Yet another glacier!
One of the most exciting parts of the trip was flying in a small (and I mean tiny) plane around McKinley. It was so beautiful and mind-boggling.
I guess I’ll put more pictures on Facebook to share. I forget how many I took. Over 300 during the whole trip.
So beautiful. We even went 90 miles (end of the road) into the Wilderness on a school bus. Going in we were too fascinated by the wild life and scenery, and it felt like it didn’t take no time. But on the way back, they changed to a “new” bus that nearly shook my brains out. Geez! Everyone was saying, “Huh? Another bear? Forget about it! We want our comfy bed and cushioned chairs, let us get to civilization!” Speaking of civilized, out in the Wilderness, they had places we could stop to use the facilities, rather neat, but gross. They were commodes with holes in the ground. (Made me think of my grandparents’ house when I was a kid.) What can you say? It was the WIL-DER-NESS!
My hubby is in love (with the state). Being the sweet loving supportive wife that I am, I said, “Yes, dear. You can go and live in Alaska . . . if you work throughout the summer.” HA! He knew sending money back home was implied.
We met very few people who actually lived there. Most were from other states. They said they could make enough in the summer (May thru September) to live off the rest of the year. One couple was going to live in Hawaii during the winter months. Whoa!
Anyway, hubby is already planning another trip (I ain’t going). I told him I would be happy to plan a trip to Montana (he wants to go there sooo bad) but me and Alaska have broken up. Beautiful place, but it takes too freaking long to get there.
Funny thing is I want to go to Australia and that’s a doozy. We’ll see.
Oh, speaking of plane. Flying back wasn’t bad. We left at 1:30 a.m. Yep, that was in the morning. We didn’t arrive home until 5:00 p.m. Sure a 3 hrs difference but that’s still 13 hrs.
Flying up there was the pits. A storm hit Dallas-Fort Worth before we landed and we were one of the last planes to arrive. Our connecting flight was cancelled. They lined us up for a direct but didn’t leave until 6 p.m. and that was after arriving there at 8 a.m. that morning. So it took us from 6 a.m. to 10:30 p.m. to arrive in Anchorage.
Anchorage was a pretty city. One thing about the whole time there, my sinuses didn’t bother me one time. It was great breathing fresh, clean, cool, dry air.
I had a great time and met some nice people (hi, Judi and Jerry). Great vacation. That’s the way to do it.
Usually, I do cover reveals here, but Romance Magicians are having a special September blogfest with giveaways. So go over there. You might win something like a book, gift card, or even a Kindle Fire. Cool, heh?
When I was on vacation in Alaska, I received a sweet email from my former editor at HarperCollins. Back in 2011, Wendy Lee had offered me my first (and the second one too) contract with Avon, and we stayed in touch after she left. In the email, she wanted to check on my mailing address as she planned to send her newest book. I was thrilled. During the time we worked together I knew we thought a lot alike and liked the same things about books. She was so easy to work with, and I was certain anything she wrote, I would enjoy.
Her newest book is ACROSS A GREEN OCEAN and coming out February 2015. I’m not sure if the cover on her ARC (advance reading copy) will be on the final one (that’s why it’s not shown here). [updated 1/18/15 – it is! Check it out at Amazon. Click here!] The cover is beautiful, soothing even. Looks like a painting of pastels, blending of greens and blues. It’s a photo of a young man fishing off a pier with mountains in the background and the sun reflected in the water, all hazy and soft. As soon as I reached home, I started reading it. The book was exactly what I needed to read.
For the last few months, I’ve been dissatisfied with the books I normally read. There were a couple I enjoyed, but I felt I was in a rut. I’m a big romance reader and rarely stray from them except when friends insist I read a book.
A couple years ago, Wendy had told me a little of what her book was about, and I was intrigued.
Believe it or not, I’m a big lover of reading about family dynamics. Lots of romance novels delve into how family react to each other. Even my books touch on it, especially the last novel, CIRCLE OF DECEPTION.
Wendy’s ACROSS A GREEN OCEAN is about the Tang family and how they each cope with the death of their father/husband and more. The story is written in third person, present tense. Funny thing is I read a couple chapters before I even noticed it. The style is easy to read and pulls you in quickly.
I think each character had something I could relate to: the mother worrying about her children, and if she could’ve done things differently so the siblings could be closer; the daughter who had done all the right things, but now realizes they weren’t making her happy; and the son. Ah, the son. He’s running away from himself even before his dad passed away.
So much of it fascinated me. The way they reacted to and thought about neighbors, friends, family and co-workers. How the parents wanted to live the American dream, yet didn’t feel comfortable with it. And when the son makes the big decision to go to China to meet his father’s old friend, I read faster to find out what he would learn about his father, and how he handled being in a country where he looked like he belonged but didn’t. All of it pushing me to rush to the end to see what happened next.
I’m not Asian, nor have I visited a country that spoke a language other than my own, yet I know how it feels to be out of my element in a crowd and lose a loved one.
See, my father died the Saturday before I received the book. He’d been having health problems, but his death was sudden. In fact, I was still in Alaska at the time. So as I read, the book allowed me to compare my reactions to my dad’s death as the characters dealt with theirs. Death will do that. Make you look inside and hunt for answers to questions you never knew you had.
As you can tell, I’m not a reviewer. I’m an author and reader. But this book has so much to offer and I wanted to let others know. I highly recommend it to anyone. Just remember it is not a romance. I will point out the ending was perfect for the book. I was satisfied and that’s saying a lot.
With the holidays coming up, I have a dread of all the food. Yep. You read that right. If you know me, you know that rarely turn down a meal. But when the holidays come up, I have a problem with seeing so much food. It’s like mental overload. I’ll fix a plate but nothing will taste good. Maybe deep inside I can’t make up my mind, so my taste buds shut down.
Carla Swafford, Author 