Real Versus Imaginary

When I turned in the manuscript for Hooked on Murder my editor asked me if there was a bookstore in Tarzana that readers might think was the one in the book. I told her not to worry. There are two country clubs in Tarzana and it is where Brittany Spears came to shave her head, but there are no bookstores.

The other day a woman sent me an email and asked if I was going to post of photo of the charity afghan that appears in Hooked on Murder. I was sorry to disappoint her, but the afghan like the bookstore only exist in my imagination.

I began to think about Molly’s Tarzana versus the real deal. The street names are the same, but all the businesses are factitious. I took an adorable building I saw in Carmel and mentally moved it to Tarzana to become the Cottage Shoppe where lots of the action in Dead Men Don’t Crochet takes place. I do know exactly where it would be and am always a little disappointed when I see the lackluster building that is really in that spot.

I love the café and cupcake place I created and only wish they really existed. I’d be a good customer for sure.

The other day my son and I went for a walk in the nearby mountains. We always park at the end of a residential street and then walk into the Santa Monica Mountain Conservancy. Just before the street dead ends there is a driveway that hugs the curve of the mountain. In my Tarzana that driveway leads to the house where the murder in By Hook or Crook takes place. I have spent so much time imagining that house I expect to see it when I look down the long road. But there in no old two-story Spanish style house with a red tiled roof. The actual house is barely visible and not even on the same side of the driveway. And yet, in my mind I can see the dark wood floors and huge pots of mother-in-law tongue plants, the stairway to the second floor, and the bedroom with the victim sprawled in her bed.

I might change the house, but I would never touch the view we get from our walk. I couldn’t possibly better that in my imagination. Picture a valley ringed by mountains turning purple and gold as the sun slips behind them. Streets like red and white ribbons of light that cut through the areas of puff ball trees. All across the valley twinkling lights are coming on. Houses on the ridge below us, look like miniatures as does the car on the street in front of them.

I know the view well enough to know the tiny spot of blinding white lights belongs to the parking structure at Topanga Mall. And all the way across the valley and part way up the mountains on the other side, there is a line of orangish lights. They belong to the park in Porter Ranch where you get the same view I’m seeing but in reverse.

Behind us the dirt road and hillside melt into the low light and we hear the eerie cries of coyotes thinking about dinner. Time to go home.

Blooming Crochet

I got the copy edit of my third book, By Hook or Crook. So all work on book four stopped since I get too confused trying to juggle stories. Actually, it was just the writing part I discontinued. I did still keep working on the crochet items for the fourth book.

I have been playing with different yarn and pattern ideas and came up with a clue based on glow in the dark yarn. It’s made by Bernat and yes, it does really glow in the dark. The wrapper says that if you leave in the light for five minutes, it will glow for five minutes. I assume if you leave it longer, it will glow longer. In any case, in book four it glows longer.

I’m guessing everyone isn’t as excited about this yarn as I am since Joann’s doesn’t carry it, and Michael’s had it on closeout. The wrapper had a pattern for a kid’s hat. I’m using it for embellishments.

I used glow in the dark pink to made a rose. Even without the glow in the dark aspect, the yarn is satiny and the flower turned out quite pretty. In book four, flowers in the special yarn are going to be decoration on a pouch purse which Molly Pink finds because the flowers show up in the dark.

All my flower making wasn’t confined to clues. I was to take part in a book fair put on by my chapter of Romance Writers of America at the Encino Barnes & Noble. I wanted to wear something crocheted, but it was too warm for a scarf. So, the night before I made a nice big burnt orange flower. I attached a pin back to it and had a perfect visual reminder of my craft.

Crocheted flowers are really fun to make and cool to wear.I got the copy edit of my third book, By Hook or Crook. So all work on book four stopped since I get too confused trying to juggle stories. Actually, it was just the writing part I discontinued. I did still keep working on the crochet items for the fourth book.

I have been playing with different yarn and pattern ideas and came up with a clue based on glow in the dark yarn. It’s made by Bernat and yes, it does really glow in the dark. The wrapper says that if you leave in the light for five minutes, it will glow for five minutes. I assume if you leave it longer, it will glow longer. In any case, in book four it glows longer.

I’m guessing everyone isn’t as excited about this yarn as I am since Joann’s doesn’t carry it, and Michael’s had it on closeout. The wrapper had a pattern for a kid’s hat. I’m using it for embellishments.

I used glow in the dark pink to made a rose. Even without the glow in the dark aspect, the yarn is satiny and the flower turned out quite pretty. In book four, flowers in the special yarn are going to be decoration on a pouch purse which Molly Pink finds because the flowers show up in the dark.

All my flower making wasn’t confined to clues. I was to take part in a book fair put on by my chapter of Romance Writers of America at the Encino Barnes & Noble. I wanted to wear something crocheted, but it was too warm for a scarf. So, the night before I made a nice big burnt orange flower. I attached a pin back to it and had a perfect visual reminder of my craft.

Crocheted flowers are really fun to make and cool to wear.

Changes

Sometimes it’s good to break out of habit and do things differently. For Hooked on Murder, Dead Men Don’t Crochet and By Hook or Crook, my pattern of working has been pretty much the same. I would drink my morning coffee and handwrite on a yellow legal pad. Then sometime later I would type what I’d written into my computer.

It seemed to always take longer to type in what I’d written and I would end up continuing with the yellow pads, while trying to catch up with putting everything into the computer. It was easy to get the yellow sheets mixed up and there was the issue of reading my handwriting.

So, as I began my fourth book for now titled Murder and the Marshmallow Stitch, I thought I would cut out a step. No more yellow pads. I’d just go write to typing it in the computer. Sure that it would be faster, I tried working that way for a month. Usually I wait until I finish the first draft to read what I have, but this time, I started reading after completing three chapters.

I’m glad I didn’t wait. It was obvious when I read the fourth time I’d stopped in mid sentence and started the beginning over again that going right to the computer just wasn’t working. Oddly enough, it wasn’t faster either. When I work on the yellow pads, my pen can’t seem to move fast enough. Not so when it was my fingers on the keyboard.

So, this morning, I pulled out my pile of yellow pads and found a nice pen and started handwriting from where I’d left off typing.

So maybe it was good to try something different, but the old way worked better.

I had different experience with a crochet project I just started. I want to make a pair of wrist warmers. I happen to have very long arms and sleeves never cover my wrists, so aside from being cute, they seem useful. Generally crochet starts with a row of chain stitches, but this pattern mixes the row of chain stitches with the first row of double crochets. In essence you do the foundation chain stitches and the first row at the same time. They are called extended stitches and though I’ve seen them a few times before, it seems to be a new idea. I mentioned them to the leader of my crochet group and she had never heard of them.

At first the directions looked confusing. But as I did the first row, all of a sudden I understood what I was doing and it made perfect sense and was much easer than making the chains stitches and then doing the first row. Now I’m curious to see if I can change other patterns into using these extended stitches.

This time the new way might just change how I crochet from now on. I guess it’s good to have an open mind.