Tag: blogs

Work of Art 2:7

Dear Fiat:

Last week on Bravo’s Work of Art, the artists were given time to grab auto parts for your Fiat 500 and turn them into a work of art. Coincidentally, I received a packet in the mail advertising the Fiat 500. I believe this was a sign!

I decided to use bits and pieces of your sales material in my creation for the Follow Work of Art blog. Lindsey suggested that since we wouldn’t have access to Fiat car parts, we should do a sculptural piece inspired by a car or any part of a car. Mine is not a sculptural piece. It’s a fabric-and-paper-on-foam-board tribute to the Fiat 500. Here’s how it turned out:


“Hole in My Heart”

What may not be immediately apparent is that the center Fiat is actually a cut-out through which you can see cracked concrete. That, and the title, are meant to convey to you how my heart is still not over the loss of my Honda CR-V after it was totaled in April 2010. As I considered this challenge, I realized my most immediate connection to a car is: I DON’T HAVE ONE. In Houston! A city that’s just as car-centric as Los Angeles!

I figured I’d write you a letter and show you my tribute and promise you that if you give me a Fiat 500, I would blog about an adventure in it EVERY DAY FOR A YEAR! That’s advertising for you at the cost of a (reasonably priced!) car, which is probably a hundredth of a second of Super Bowl ad time.

I know what you’re thinking: We haven’t even given those Work of Art people a car, and who the hell are you anyway?

While it’s true that I don’t have the readership of some popular bloggers, let’s take a look at a few of them.

First, there’s dooce.com. Sure, Heather Armstrong has a ton of loyal readers, but she already does product endorsements. I’d be exclusive to Fiat! Also, she’s a mommy blogger. That means she has kids. She doesn’t need a Fiat 500, she needs a minivan or an SUV. If you gave her a Fiat, she’d probably just turn it into an apartment for her Mythical Bobcat.

Then there’s Hyperbole and A Half. When Allie Brosh posts, she gets like five thousand comments, but she blogs only every two months or so. I’m promising you 365 blog entries! Do the math: more blog for your buck.

Of course, The Bloggess also has a large readership, and Jenny Lawson would probably even promise to wear a wolf pelt while driving her free car. I don’t own a wolf pelt. I also don’t own a car. Jenny Lawson does. Enough said.

Finally, there’s The Pioneer Woman, who I don’t read. All I can say is: Look at her blog’s name! Free covered wagon? Yes! Free Fiat 500? I think not.

Clearly, in every way, I’m the more deserving recipient of a free will-blog-for car.

If you don’t agree, does one of your executives have his or her deceased aunt’s Oldsmobile taking up space in the garage? I’ll accept it in lieu of a Fiat 500, but I can’t promise that My Adventures in Aunt Susan’s Olds will have quite the appeal of My Adventures in a Fiat 500.

Sincerely,
Becky

Looking back


He smiles because it’s raining. Even the sun likes variety.

A little over a year ago (July 17, to be precise), I asked you what you wanted me to blog about. I went back and checked the list to see how I’m doing:

Dog pictures–check
Tim and Hanley–check
Hot weather–check
Pictures of things that are my favorite color–I could do more of this.
Guinness and Margot pictures–check
Houston photos and stories–check
Bike tour with photos–I’ll have to work on that one. I learned early that my neighborhood is not friendly to my three-wheeler. But I can probably take it and my camera to a better location.
Who would I cast in a Three Fortunes movie–That will take some thought. It’s more fun for me to know who you’d cast.
Photos of my bookshelves–There’ve been a few, usually as backdrops. I could do more.
Tales and photos of Craft Night–check (Even an appearance by Puterbaugh! And a spontaneous Lila Craft Night.)

I’d say my average so far is pretty good. I’m always open to new suggestions.

Button Sunday

I don’t know who’s responsible for this beautiful photo because I stole it from the Internet. In fact, blogging turned me into a photo thief, and I know I’m not the only one.

I chose this button because today is the fifth anniversary of Timothy J. Lambert’s LiveJournal. That date is important to me not just because it gave my writing partner more presence on the Internet. In the winter of 2004, we were finishing writing Timothy James Beck’s Someone Like You as well as Cochrane Lambert’s Three Fortunes in One Cookie. All my writing partners were proofreading SLY, Tim was adding his final chapters to 3F, and I was at loose ends. So, as I have many times, after a couple of weeks, I followed Tim’s example and started my own LiveJournal. It pretty much ended my time on message boards (just as message boards had once ended my time in chat rooms).

I have no idea how many blogs I was reading at the height of the blogging craze, but as bloggers have tapered off updating their blogs, my reading has fallen off. There are times I think about ending my LJ because it’s frequently difficult to come up with content, and I know that my readership, like everyone’s, is less than it used to be. (Hello, Facebook and Twitter.)

But then I think about how many interesting, funny, kind, quirky, and good people I’ve met through here. I consider all it’s taught me about HTML and formatting. It’s given me a forum to discuss art, photography, literature, and politics. It’s provided a means for family and longtime friends to keep up with what’s going on in my life (though I’ve never used it to discuss those things I want to keep private). It’s also given me a means to share news about one friend with many other friends–in a way that’s more fun to me than e-mail.

I’ve tried hard to keep it from ever being insulting or mean-spirited. I’ve enjoyed using it to share photographs as I try to become a better photographer.

And of course, it gives me a place to put everybody else’s photos after I steal them.

To get back to the reason for this post and the button, during these five years, I’ve never gotten tired of getting a glimpse at the world through Tim’s perspective, courtesy of his photos, his stories, his association with Scout’s Honor, and his art. So happy blog-iversay, Tim, and thank you.

Hump Day Happy

It always surprises me when people who know me in ways other than the Internet are skeptical about the time I spend online or the relationships I’ve formed here. Let’s assess this… Without the Internet, there would be no Timothy James Beck novels, or the relationships with the editors who bought THE DEAL and THREE FORTUNES, not to mention my two Coventry books. I met my writing partners on the Internet, and theirs are three of the most vital friendships in my life. I wouldn’t know Steve C or Ron–or know that Ron is my cousin a few times removed. I wouldn’t know Rhonda or Lindsey or Sugar. Tim wouldn’t be living in Houston, he’d have no Rex, the dogs he’s fostered wouldn’t have received his unique care before going to loving forever homes. He wouldn’t know The Big H!

Y’all wouldn’t be reading this. I wouldn’t know you or interact with people from all across the U.S. and the world. The many writers who have inspired me and become my friends and acquaintances would be just names on book covers. There would be no FOOL FOR LOVE with all its funny/sad/quirky/amazing stories.

For me, it’s a no-brainer. The Internet, with all its hazards (we all read about the scams and disappointments weekly–and I’ve had a few unpleasant experiences, too), provides a powerful means of connection.

So when I was up late working and housekeeping on Saturday night and into the pre-dawn hours of Sunday morning, it was fun to follow, with thousands of people across the globe, the Tweets from Heather and Jon Armstrong (dooce.com and blurbomat.com) while she was in labor with their second daughter. I don’t know them, I just read their blogs and have for years, which makes them part of my daily life in that unique Internet way.

During the months of her pregnancy, Dooce provided a monthly shot of her expanding tummy. One of the last ones, a self-mocking portrayal of her very pregnant self with a beer tucked into her waistband, a cigarette hanging from her lips, a bag of powdered doughnuts ready to be stuffed into her overly made-up face under badly teased hair, became her most recent masthead. It was her response to the small percentage of people from among her million readers who criticize her life and mothering choices, and it still cracks me up whenever I go to her site.

It awed me that when she posted a photo of her newborn on Twitter, it received sixteen THOUSAND views in no time flat. Then I was dumbfounded by how many people didn’t understand that the first “name” the two proud parents provided–Lil Donette–was a joke based on her pregnancy photo. With the Internet, you take the crazy with the good.

Welcome to the world Marlo Iris Armstrong, and thank you for making June 14 a reason to be happy.

If you, my LJ readers who I’m always grateful to connect with, would like some sweet happiness of your own, please comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25, and I’ll consult the happiness book for you.

 

 

Reading’s getting hotter

I was alerted by Shawn over at Everything and Nothing to this article in the New York Times telling us there’s been a reverse in a twenty-five-year decline in the number of people reading for pleasure. Since the publishing industry has been as hard-hit as any other recently–and no one’s offering writers a bailout, the bastards–it’s always good to hear anything encouraging.

I love readers, and related to that…

Linda over at Raven’s Range gave me permission to reprint a photo of her enjoying a book during a sunny break from a blast of snowy weather they had recently.

ETA 2022: Unfortunately, we lost Linda to illness a few years ago, and links to her blog and photos no longer work. She is so missed.

Linda’s promised to send me a photo of herself reading A Coventry Wedding as soon as she purchases a copy. I am SO LOVING the e-mail I’m getting. I’ve hit a bit of a writing slump. Not writer’s block, just writer’s dormancy. So getting positive feedback on the new novel is sort of a kick in the PJ bottoms. I felt the same upon reading a thoughtful review from Lawrence Schimel in the Lambda Book Report for When You Don’t See Me.

Did I mention that I love readers?

I’ve posted before on here, or maybe on MGH’s LJ, about the first book I remember reading, which was aptly titled Baby’s First Book. The cover illustration gave me my first glimmer of the concept of eternity. It’s a book the termites ate, and my mother later found a used copy to replace it. Little Golden Books, bless them, still publishes it, and I scored a copy for Miss Amelia because the cover baby reminds me so much of her:

And speaking of children reading, my sister wrote a book to give to her granddaughter Morgan at Christmas. Morgan’s aunt (Debby’s daughter Sarah) illustrated it. I don’t have a copy of the illustrated version, but I do have the story itself on my computer now, and I’m looking forward to reading it. You never know with kids if they’ll understand how special something like that is, but when Debby turned away from Morgan after giving her the book, Morgan suddenly hugged it tightly to her chest and closed her eyes. I didn’t get a shot of that, unfortunately, but I did get Morgan in the coolest jeans ever.

There’ll be more beautiful/cool children photos for a while, because I’m so crazy about them. And remember, if you have a photo of yourself reading my books, or ANY books, I’ll be delighted to post them on here as part of the Reading is Hot campaign. Even if the book you’re reading is one by Famous Author Rob Byrnes, although we’re still not sure who he paid off to steal our Lammy back in Aught Seven.

The Charm of Raggedy Chan and Camille Picott

Several years ago, some friends and I used to get together periodically to talk about wide-ranging topics. One night a new acquaintance joined us, a Houston public school teacher. The first TJB book had been bought by Kensington, and the teacher offered that she, too, was a writer with a novel–only her tone was apologetic because her book was self-published. My friend Denece, a great champion of women who reach for their dreams, told this writer that she should be PROUD. Not only had she shown the drive to write and finish a full-length novel, but taking a manuscript from its beginning to the rigors of marketing it is an amazing commitment of time, love, and energy.

I thought of that incident recently when mallory_blog talked about a book on her blog, Raggedy Chan by Camille Picott. What I know about children’s books and children’s book publishing you could fit inside a Barbie purse, but the title grabbed me, so I followed the links to Camille’s web site and blog. The more I learned about the book, the more I wanted to read it, so I ordered it from Lulu.


Copyright Camille Picott

I fell completely under the spell of Emma, her Auntie Gracie, and a Chinese princess who must disguise herself as Raggedy Chan and go on a quest to save her homeland. Camille, a fifth-generation Chinese American, says in the postscript to her book that she was “inspired by the trials endured by [her] Chinese family, and shaped by [her] own experience growing up as a half-Chinese girl, [to] put to paper a story over one hundred fifty years in the making.”

Since many of my friends have children and grandchildren who love to read, I thought you might like to get Camille’s book (I’ll include a link at the end of this post). Adults can enjoy the book, too, as I did. In A Coventry Christmas, one of the characters is a writer whose fictional ‘tween girls are used as models for dolls, and Camille is doing that in real life! If you’re interested in her limited edition doll, contact Camille at the address on this page of her web site.

Any of you who are writers, whether self-published or with publishing houses, might enjoy following Camille’s blog to see some of the creative ways she’s finding new readers for Raggedy Chan. I admire her so much.

Camille graciously answered a few questions for me to share with you.

Your bio at the end of Raggedy Chan says you began writing at age twelve. Do you still have any of your earliest stories?

My first novel was typed on an Apple IIe and saved on big floppy disks. It featured a group of runaway orphans who lived on an island, befriended wolves, and thwarted criminals. Unfortunately, that story has been lost.

I was at first surprised then charmed by the appearance of Paul Bunyan and Babe in Raggedy Chan. What made you blend that particular myth into Raggedy Chan’s story?

Paul Bunyan was actually a very late addition to the story. Before Paul Bunyan came along, I felt Raggedy Chan lacked an emotional connection to America. I was also concerned that much of what was “American” in the book was negative.

I wanted my book to have a character who represented everything that is wonderful about America. I also wanted to integrate American mythology/folklore into the story, to counter-balance my use of Chinese myth
and folklore. Paul Bunyan is an icon that embodies American landscape, American culture, and American myth. He allowed Raggedy Chan to develop a positive relationship with America.

Who do you see as the ideal audience for Raggedy Chan?

From a technical perspective, I believe Raggedy Chan is what is classified as an “early reader chapter book,” ideal for grades 4 to 6. Because the book features Asian characters and Asian myths, it also has appeal to Asians. (I never had books as a child that starred Asian characters.) But I have sold the book to people of all ages, from very young children to grandparents, and to people of all ethnicities. The immigration experience is something most Americans can relate to, even if that experience was endured by previous generations.

Joey Manfre’s illustrations are wonderful. Can you describe your collaborative process?

I was very fortunate to be very involved with the entire illustration process. Joey and I met through his wife, who tended bar in a restaurant where we both worked. Joey and I did a small project together about two years ago: I hired him to illustrate Nanobytes, my collection of flash fiction. (It’s available for free on my web site, camillepicott.com.)

I really enjoyed working with him. When I decided to have Raggedy Chan illustrated, there was no question that he was the artist I wanted to work with. We met once a week for the first few months, then two to three times a week as we got closer to our deadline. I went through the story and marked the areas where I wanted illustrations, along with one-sentence blurbs outlining the concept I thought I wanted to see, though this changed as Joey and I worked together and traded ideas. Joey got out his sketch book and drew preliminary character concepts. Every step of the illustration process was a true collaboration. Every week Joey showed me a few pictures he’d worked on. We’d discuss what we liked and what changes might make the picture better.

We never stopped working on a picture until we were both happy with it, even if that meant dozens of revisions. Sometimes Joey had to tweak his pictures to better fit the descriptions in my book. An example is Winged Dragon, who Joey originally made green. It was really important to me that Winged Dragon embody the “ice blue” description in the book, so he changed the picture. There were also times when I changed my text because I loved the way his picture looked. Winged Dragon originally had white eyes; but after Joey drew him with red eyes, and I saw how wonderful the illustration looked, I knew I had to change my text.

Do you plan to write more tales of Raggedy Chan, Emma, and Auntie Gracie?

I don’t know if I have any more Raggedy Chan stories to tell, but there are definitely more Emma and Auntie Gracie stories.


Copyright Camille Picott
Author Camille Picott with Raggedy Chan dolls.

You can find Camille’s book for purchase on her Lulu page.

Saturday, getting ready to write (or not)

I could do ten posts right now, I have so much going on in my head. Hopefully, I can remember them during the coming week for those times that I stare at the monitor with a duh look.

I have a new crush. Sometimes links to other blogs show up in my sidebar because I get these crushes, but they’re not ordinary crushes. I get crushes on people’s dogs (and occasionally, their cats). However, Jeffrey Ricker‘s name has been on the list for a while because he’s Jeffrey Ricker and I like him, then because he’s a writer (and a contributor to MOONLIGHT AND ROSES), and then because of his dog Dakota.

Recently, the Ricker household got a new addition which is when I got my new crush. I want to scoop her up and give her a million kisses. Jeffrey says Anya and Dakota are getting along fine, although so far, the cats are reserving judgment and can’t be enticed by her to play chase. I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before she wins them over.

For those of you who didn’t get Paws and Reflect: Exploring the Bond Between Gay Men and Their Dogs when it came out last November, you can pre-order the paperback now from amazon.com or your favorite bookseller and read essays, including Jeffrey’s, about the many gifts dogs bring to our lives.