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  • On Adverbs

    Adverbs are all over my drafts. And they serve a useful role there. Adverbs are my place holders as ideas rush out and my fingers can’t keep up with them on the keyboard. Later, when I’m editing, they remind me what I was thinking. “He reached clumsily for his keys” can be revised to “He fumbled for his keys.” Or, “She said gently” reminds me to make sure her dialogue makes that feeling clear.

    From my 1/1/12 post: "A Writer's New Year Confession – I Don't Hate Adverbs (Or Adjectives)"

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Some Light Reading

Work and family continue to keep me busy this month. So I thought I’d share some of my favorite posts from the blog. These aren’t necessarily the “reader favorites,” but I think they’re good glimpses at the various aspects of me. For newer readers who may not have seem them, I hope you’ll take a few minutes to check them out. And maybe long-time followers will enjoy a rerun or two. Read the full post »

Saturday Sundries 4

I’m at a wedding today. Somehow, my niece is old enough to embark on this journey, and yet I swear it was just last year that I became an aunt and was holding her newborn self. But today she’s a wonderful young woman on the first day of what I hope will be a lifetime of happiness and adventure with the man she loves.

So for today’s light fare we have the following offerings. Read the full post »

Book Review — Travels in Elysium

In April, I found an unexpected message in my email inbox. It was from Iridescent Press, which had been given my name as a potential reviewer for one of its upcoming releases, Travels in Elysium, by William Azuski. This became my introduction to NetGalley, a digital review service where “professional readers” (such as librarians, bloggers, booksellers, educators, and those in the media) can obtain free advance copies of forthcoming books from publishers for review.

I could hardly turn down such a request, and so I registered for NetGalley, downloaded the book onto my Kindle, and began reading.

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A metaphysical mystery set on the Aegean island of Santorini

It was the chance of a lifetime. A dream job in the southern Aegean. Apprentice to the great archaeologist Marcus Huxley, lifting a golden civilisation from the dead… Yet trading rural England for the scarred volcanic island of Santorini, 22‑year old Nicholas Pedrosa is about to blunder into an ancient mystery that will threaten his liberty, his life, even his most fundamental concepts of reality.

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Pay close attention to that description as metaphysical mystery. If you’re looking for something like “Indiana Jones and the Lost City of Atlantis,” you won’t find it here. In fact, you may need to keep a dictionary at hand for some of the vocabulary. The linguistic simplification forced by many American presses onto their writers is absent in this work. Comparisons in my mind ran to authors such as Umberto Eco and Gabriel García Márquez, not Ernest Hemingway. This is not a novel for the casual reader.

Like Eco and García Márquez, Azuski conjures a remarkable sense of an exotic place. The reader is immersed in the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and feel of Santorini under the military junta of the early 1970s and in the mystical reality that intersects with the mundane world. Main character and narrator, Nicholas Pedrosa, immediately finds himself caught up with people and events he doesn’t begin to understand. What happened to his predecessor? What is archaeologist Marcus Huxley really searching for? What is Atlantis? For that matter, what is reality?

Azuski combines aspects of mystery, philosophy, history, archaeology, and mythology in weaving the story. Nicholas Pedrosa spends much of the book searching for meaning and sense around him, and I often had a similar feeling of being “at sea” while reading the story. Some readers may take this as a weakness in the writing, but I suspect Azuski wanted exactly such a reaction from his audience. We are with “Nico” on his journey. We are meant to question not only what we read and what it means, but also our own preconceptions and ideas.

This is an original take on the Atlantis myth, and Azuski’s writing style complements the complexity of the various story lines. Descriptive passages at times match the pace of life in a place not fully in the modern world. But when that modern world intrudes, the writing shifts to meet it. His characters are complex and offer insights into the mysteries and ancient puzzles that surround them as they delve into a lost city—and into their own thoughts and beliefs.

Again, this book is not for those interested in a quick read or an adventurous romp through Atlantis. But if you enjoy literary fiction that makes you think, then I recommend Travels in Elysium. My best advice for reading it? Heed the words of archaeologist Marcus Huxley: ‘Trust no one. Believe no one. Question everything. Remember, there is nothing here you can take at face value… No — not even yourself.’

Travels in Elysium is now available in bookstores and with online retailers in both paper and electronic formats.

Some Blogs You May Not Have Seen

The small azalea bush by our front door is in full bloom.

As I’ve mentioned in a number of comments, life has gotten busy this month. So I’m going with something simple for today’s post—links to some blogs that you might not be familiar with and that you might like. These cover a variety of subjects, so I hope there’s something for everyone here. Ready? Let’s dive in. Read the full post »

A Real Opening For Meghan’s First Mystery

Those of you who read Meghan’s first story, “Meghan’s Brush with Forensic Archaeology,” know that it grew out of a “normal” post. When I started the post, I thought I would be doing something like I had before, where I wrote a haiku and talked about our “poetic archaeologist” as an example. But at the end of that post, I found myself writing a few lines of dialogue. And a story was born.

As I work on her new story, I’m also working on revisions to this one, fleshing it out into a longer version like “Buried Deeds.” So I’ve drafted a real opening scene. For now, the story starts like this. Read the full post »

Saturday Sundries 3

confusion (Microsoft clip art)

image credit: Microsoft clip art

Yesterday morning rolled around, and I still hadn’t come up with an idea for today’s post. The day job kept me busier than I have been recently, and, to be honest, my creativity is still wandering the universe and isn’t checking in with me very often. So this post is my version of “free writing,” in the sense of “free association.” Read the full post »

A Day In The Life Of Me — June 1980s — Realities Meet

By now, the conversations are predictable. Sometimes, it’s the woman shopping at the market. Today, it’s the curious man on the bus.

“So you’re American. What brings you to Honduras?”

“I’m a graduate student in archaeology, working with my advisor at his site.”

“How interesting. When are we being invaded?”

Read the full post »

Drawing A Blank For A Good Title — The Liebster Award

I was recently nominated by Lori’s Lane for the Liebster Award. Thank you, Lori! If you haven’t checked out her blog yet, I’ll wait while you do….

Aren’t you glad you did? Read the full post »

Onward

The beta comments on my latest draft of Summer at the Crossroads have arrived. My readers did a stellar job, as I expected. They read the manuscript thoroughly, enjoyed the concept, liked my writing style, and gave me great feedback.

image credit: Microsoft clip art

image credit: Microsoft clip art

Once the beta comments come in, a writer must decide which of them hit the mark and which can be ignored. The book is the writer’s vision and story, no one else’s. This is a good time to again ask the question, “Who am I writing for?” Read the full post »

My Favorite City

Forget politics. They have nothing to do with this post. This is just a day to share some photos of some lovely days spent having fun in Washington, DC. Read the full post »

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