Friday, April 23, 2021

Even I Get Gumpy Sometimes

 All I can say is that I’m glad I don’t live in Seattle.  

We’d been having warm sunny days that were more like summer than spring and then bam, the temperature dropped twenty degrees and the sky turned gloomy and flat, which mirrors my mood. The clouds are useless in that they aren’t even giving us some much needed late season rain.

I don’t think all the coffee in the world would help either.

I worked on BUT KNOT FOR ME.  It wasn’t a great writing day, but not horrible either.  I tried reading something someone else wrote and it put me in a worse mood. I don’t like to disparage other writers so I won’t give the author’s name or the title, but it’s written in diary form and the whole premise is that this woman is seeing a man she thinks is a billionaire, but he seems to have to leave all the time with no explanation. How about she never bothered to check him out on the Internet.  She had his name.  I mean really.  There was a big yacht in the story.  She could have checked that out.  But no, she just sat their waiting for him with no idea where those billions came from.  Didn’t they ever talk about anything?  I finished it, thinking either it was going to turn out like a version of Pretty Woman, where he was using her when he was in town, would start to move on, but realize that he loved her they’d go off into the sunset or it would turn out that he wasn’t rich, but was actually the captain of the yacht - there was a hint about that once - and they’d go off into the sunset.  Turned out he was the captain of the boat, and the author tried to explain away everything that had made it seem like he was a billionaire, but never why the character just didn’t check the Internet.  They sort of went off into the sunset, but the ending felt flat to me.  I won’t even go into the fact that there wasn’t really a relationship with these two. It seemed just about sex.  

I quickly opened another book on my Kindle.  This one is about a woman who time travels and sees her mother who died when she was a child. It was on a special deal with Amazon or Bookbub and reminded me of a scene in “”When Peggy Sue Got Married.”  She has somehow been transported back in time to when she was a teenager and goes home after school. Her home and life with nothing like mine, but somehow it always takes  me back to when I was in high school and makes me nostalgic for my family who are all gone now.  Going back in time fascinates me.  I have such clear memories of my childhood. Helping my mother do the laundry with a wringer machine in the dark basement.The way my father’s coat smelled of the cold when he came home.  How I was always so glad to go home even though where we were living at the time was considered a slum by people I babysat for.  The guy used to make a joke every time he took me home, saying he had to hurry before they tore my building down. It was eventually torn down, but turned out to be a treasure trove of brass door handles with interesting designs etched into them, and special tiles around the fireplaces.  It had been built as a hotel for the 1893 World’s Fair, which explained why all the rooms were similar sized, even the kitchen.  

Just thinking about that book and my memories has finally managed to get me out of my bad mood, even though it is still Seattle gray.  You can’t even tell that it’s evening or where the sun is in the sky. The day just keeps getting dimmer.

3 comments:

Linda Osborn said...

I am trying to get my head around your schedule of books coming out--seems to be confusing, and taking a long time !!

1. When will we see the new series you started in Chicago?
2. Next crochet book--you have dropped some interesting hints about this one !
3. Next knitting retreat ?

I do want to have all of these in paper--I don't like Kindle very well. Besides, one of the kids made off with my husbands very nice Kindle when he died !! I would have to buy another. I started with paperbacks when I first "discovered" your work, but now I just get the hardback as soon as it comes out.
Are all of these books under contract for several more editions? I have about 27 by Joanne Fluke, 23 by Carolyn Haines, 27 from Donna Andrews, etc. Monica Ferris discussed a final book she was writing, but it has never been published.

Your work always gets me involved, you know there are certain characters I really relate to !!

Betty Hechtman said...

Linda, the first of the new Writer for Hire series, Murder Ink came out in February.

One for the Hooks is the next Crochet mystery and comes out in August.

I am writing But Knot for Me which is the next Yarn Retreat book and I imagine it will come out in the early fall.

I have a contract for two more Writer for Hire books. I'm not sure about the future of the other two series.

I hope that makes it clearer. I wasn't a fan of e-books either, but have gotten hooked on them lately. I also have a Kindle app on my phone, which is is nice because I always have it with me.

Linda O. Johnston said...

It's always fun to read other authors' stuff, especially if it helps to get us in a writing mood ourselves. But I agree about the weather. Overcast is okay if it leads to rain in L.A., but that doesn't happen very often. On the other hand, I'm not looking forward to the heat later in the week.