Another Backlist Book Available

Another backlist book will be released in digital format (Kindle, Nook, and others).

THE MEDICINE MAN can be pre-ordered now from amazon.com and Barnes & Noble. It will be available September 15, 2011.

Once Upon A Time...

...there was teacher named Mrs. Isenhour. She taught the 1st Grade at Rockwell School in Rockwell NC. This was a long, long time ago, and I have the picture to prove it.

Now I ask you, were we not adorable? (Click on the photo to see it full size.) Little did I know, when I stood between Victor and Tommy on the first row--in what was easily the ugliest dress I owned, with the one pocket stuffed full of who-knows-what--that I would one day be the school nurse at that same school. Needless to say, I never thought I'd be a romance writer. (A WHAT?)

And what a quirky thing one's memory can be. Some of these children, I remember well. Some, I remember their faces, but not their names. Some--even though I know who they are--I have no memory of their having been in my same class that year, when clearly they were because they're right there in the photograph. I remember a lot of personality traits, whom I liked and whom I didn't, who was a bully, who cried all the time, who colored beautifully, who ate paste, who couldn't read no matter what, who got smacked on the legs for talking in the reading circle (a-hem).

Some of them are dead now. Some became teachers like Mrs. Isenhour, some became nurses, secretaries, business men, a banker, farmers, textile workers, housewives. Some went to Vietnam.

Anyway, I found this yesterday--I'd been looking for it for YEARS--and I thought I'd share it with you. Truth be told, I miss The Good Old Days...

even with the ugly dress.

Another book added to those now available in digital format, a Civil War historical, THE BARTERED BRIDE, set in Rowan County, North Carolina. It is available in Kindle and Nook formats.

Five Backlist Digital Releases

Google Alert and Facebook Friend, Lynn Mershon Calvin, tell me I will have five backlist books in the Barnes & Noble Nook eBook format released on July 15, 2011 -- available for pre-ordering now.

HARRIGAN'S BRIDE is a Civil War historical set in Virginia and North Carolina. One of my very nice readers named her little girl after the heroine in this book. Both the heroine and I were truly honored -- we got pictures and everything. (THE BRIDE FAIR, which has a Salisbury NC setting, is part of the Blogger Bundle Volume V collection -- see the column on the right. THE PRISONER, also with a Salisbury NC setting, hasn't been released in digital format.)

MEGGIE'S BABY and MOTHER TO BE are from the Navajo "Family Blessing" series.

THE LONG WAY HOME and LITTLE DARLING are from the Fort Bragg series. Another very nice reader once wrote to advise me that she was going out with a Fort Bragg paratrooper -- something she would NEVER have done if she hadn't read these books -- the 82nd Airborne owes me more than it knows. Besides that, influencing somebody's dating choices, even inadvertently, is a HUGE responsibility. Read LITTLE DARLING first. And be careful who you go out with, paratrooper or not.

I haven't heard yet whether the books be available in digital formats elsewhere--but then I didn't hear about the Nook thing either. Google Alert and real live person, Lynn, very helpfully found it for me. (Thanks, Lynn.)

If you haven't read them, I hope you'll consider doing so. If you have, I hope you'll consider doing so again.

UPDATE: These books are now available for pre-ordering on amazon.com in the Kindle format.

Interesting Find--A Maid's Memories of Biltmore House

My late sister-in-law once knew a woman who had worked as a maid in the Biltmore House in Asheville. I believe she was in her 90s at the time my sister-in-law knew her.

I recently happened upon a piece of notebook paper where my sister-in-law had written down what the woman had told her. There's no mention of the ocean blue walls but it looks as if the rest of what she said about the furniture was accurate:

"...Servant's Bedrooms--At any one time 80 servants might be employed at Biltmore, where they lived near their work stations in separate halls according to sex and "rank." The bedrooms along the corridor represented the private quarters for female members of the staff--cooks, house maids, and scullery maids. The rooms were airy and comfortable with split-seat chairs, chestnut dressers and wardrobes, and iron beds and washstands holding monogrammed chamber sets (pitcher, washbowl, chamber pot, slop bucket).

Service dress depended on the job and the time of day. The maids wore pink uniforms with white collars and cuffs in the AM and black with white trim in the PM. A cook's helper wore a red-checked pinafore and a dust cap..."

I've read that George Vanderbilt didn't like to actually see the staff, regardless of what they were wearing--hence the narrow passageway between the walls in the family's part of the house--sort of like a hall within a hall. I've also read this about one of our first ladies, only staff had to scurry to the nearest room and close the door when she came and went. (One can only assume that good servants will know their place, so of course they wouldn't mind.) (Yes, I'm rolling my eyes.)

It's been quite a few years since I've been on the Biltmore House tour -- and that was a Christmastime bus tour with my BFF, Jo. I never saw so many Christmas trees in my life. The time before that, my son was five. I distinctly remember him reaching across a velvet robe and giving a rare and, I expect, priceless world globe a big spin. The guard standing there probably does, too. I also expect that the globe was subsequently set farther back or removed altogether, once they understood what a temptation such things are to little boys, velvet rope or no velvet rope.

Maybe I should go to Biltmore again. To tell you the truth, though, while stunningly beautiful and worthy of being the backdrop for a number of movies, the experience always makes me feel sad. The place isn't in ruins, and yet it is--if that makes sense.

Might be a book in it, though....

Bulletin From The Antique Pickers

You may remember when I told you about the DH and our antiques restorer neighbor being at Cline's Antiques on Hwy. 49 the same time as members of a film crew buying props for a new movie about to be filmed somewhere in the state. Which was quite enough information for him and not NEARLY enough for me.

So he has returned from his latest trip to Cline's with this intelligence: The name of the movie starts with the letter "A".

This is good to know, I guess. Not particularly helpful, but still.

If any of you happen to hear about a movie being made here with a title that begins with an "A," do let me know. Or maybe not. The only other tidbit the DH had to report was that they plan to burn all the props they bought in a big pile--with a baby crib in the middle of it. Doesn't really sound like my kind of movie.

Til next time...

UPDATE: I think I've found out the name of the movie. It's ARTEMIS.

(It does start with the letter "A," doesn't it? Now to find out what it's about...

MEMORIAL DAY 2011

The flag is out in remembrance of those in my family and in yours who died for this country. Rest In Peace. You are not forgotten.

The 2011 Cheryl Reavis Backyard Flower Tour

I'm going to show you how Mammaw Rose's roses and irises are doing this year.

This one is a surprise. It must have gotten left behind when my legacy iris bulbs were moved from the shade to full sun a few years ago. And this year it was big enough to bloom. Nice color, don't you think?

And these are Mammaw Rose's antique roses. The tall ones in the back were transplanted -- a volunteer sprout that was growing around the original bush. The ones in the forefront I rooted from a cutting. (I've told you before how surprised I was --I didn't know I could "root.")

This iris reminds me of pineapple sherbet. The one that reminds me of peach ice cream hasn't bloomed yet. (I don't know. Maybe I do have a cold dessert fixation.)

Here is an assortment of her irises:

And isn't this one something:

One of the rooted roses:

And a mixed bouquet of cuttings from around the yard. That's a white peony, the only one blooming at the moment. It's a surprise, too, one that missed the big Peony Relocation from shade to sunlight. It had a flower anyway, shady place or not. Heard about that "Bloom where you're planted" thing, I guess.

I hope you're blooming where you're planted.

Till next time...

P.S.

I forgot to tell you that the DH went "antique picking" earlier this week. Why is this of note? Well, there were several people at his favorite haunt (Cline's on US Hwy. 49), who were buying. AND, according to the Cline Helpers, they had a very large budget. Which they apparently needed because they were buying props for a movie.

The DH didn't ask what movie, of course -- or anything else for that matter. I don't think anybody on the premises did. (It's really true. Men are not as curious as we are.) In any event, this is at least as interesting to me as when a crew came to O. O. Rufty's in Salisbury to buy props for The Color Purple.

(I wonder what movie?)

(The DH is sure he didn't see any movie stars.)

So What's New?

I'm pretty sure you've noticed, as I have, that one is constantly either having to get something in a row:

OR...

Something in gear:

Sometimes one has to do both. That would be the case here at the moment. Why, you may wonder? Because I've been offered a contract for two books, historicals this time around.

So how am I doing? Okay, I think. The ducks are behaving as well as ducks are able and the gears are on the high side of rusty but turning. I think we're getting there. I'm at least in the "emotional zones" of the characters, which means they've gotten the cobwebs out of their hair, the dust beaten out of their costumes, and they are up and around and breathing. Now comes the hard part: What am I going to do to them? HOW am I going to run them up a tree and then throw rocks at them? (To quote a writer whose face and kind mentoring I remember well but whose name, regretfully, I do not.) It's very helpful advice if you want to be a genre writer. The problem, of course, is that it's hard. I know this comes as a surprise to many, but it is, especially if you want to use the writing style I use: Logical, Linear, Lean -- and still put the reader firmly into a "And then what happened?" mindset . No, really. It's hard. Hard, hard, HARD. I know this because I wouldn't stagger around the house looking like Munch's "The Scream" if it wasn't.

So. I'll give you progress reports, and here's the first:

I'm a couple of pages into Chapter Two of Not Yet Titled Book Number One.

Until next time...