Author: the outside lane

Happy. That about covers it.
books, Cozy Cat Press, Destinee Faith Miller Mystery, Lane is Writing

Things You Know

the outside lane

The thing about writing is that you never really know what you know, or what you don’t know until you start trying to put it down on paper.  I think the funniest thing is finding out what you do know.  What bits and pieces of information have settled into the grooves of your brain, collecting dust for years until you suddenly you find yourself recollecting it in the heat of the writing moment.  I was having some of those moments last night.

I tore up nearly 20 pages of work to revamp my opening last night, only to realize it isn’t my opening at all.  It’s somewhere closer to the middle.  I had to rewrite a lot of Telling with some Showing.  I can say, “Bobbie’s mother-in-law thought she dressed poorly,” and that tells you something.  Or, I can say, “Margaret Clayton eyed Bobbie’s get-up with an expression of fearful disgust that I only ever saw when my mother was cleaning out Rusty’s pockets before doing laundry. And even then, there was some fondness in her eyes.  Mrs. Clayton?  I had a feeling Bobbie could trade in her Target for Talbot’s and the only softening in her future mother-in-law’s gaze would be for the brand tag sewn into her shirt back.”  That shows you a lot of things.

If I just tell you something, you have to trust my word and that’s that.  But if I show you the picture of something, you are allowed to infer and draw your own conclusions.  If I do it properly, you enjoy it more.  If I do it properly, I’ve given you a wider view of the character’s world.  If I don’t do it properly, you just get a lot of strawberry scented elegance, and I do try to avoid that.

And that’s why I had to tear up 20 pages.  I spent 20 pages telling you things I should have shown you.  That’s good, though.  I mean, you need to know just why Mushroom and Cockatoo made Bobbie cry, and how that came to be, or else when it comes time to start pointing fingers at murderers, you aren’t going to care.

 

books, Counting Blessings, Cozy Cat Press, Destinee Faith Miller Mystery

The Boston Book Festival and Me. Mostly Me.

the outside lane

Meet me at the Boston Book Festival on October 19, 2013. Look for her and TIARA TROUBLE at the Cozy Cat Press booth.
Meet me at the Boston Book Festival on October 19, 2013. Look for her and TIARA TROUBLE at the Cozy Cat Press booth.

 

I am very excited to announce that TIARA TROUBLE and I will be at the Boston Book Festival at Copley Square in Boston, Massachusetts on October 19, 2013.

I’ve never been to Boston, so I am doubly excited to visit.  And triple-y excited to get to see Boston in October!  Trees!  Colors!  Harbors that taste like tea!

Most, I am excited to start promoting TIARA TROUBLE.  I can’t wait for you to get your hands on a copy, and let me know what you think of Destinee and her Dolls, Tishelle and her Divas, and the mystery murderer and his/her motives.

For information on attending the festival, visit the website at www.bostonbookfest.org.

books, Lane is Reading, Reviews

Romance in Review: THE RELUCTANT BRIDE, by Beverly Eikli

the outside lane

Growing up, I spent many, many happy hours going through the novels on my grandmother’s bookshelf.  Her two literary passions were True Crime and Romance, and I read them all–covertly.  My mother preferred that I not read romance.

To this day, my favorite of the stories was a book called THE CHADWICK RING, by Julia Jeffries.   It was absolutely a guilty pleasure with an innocent, intelligent heroine struggling to find her place in a man’s world. When I signed up to read THE RELUCTANT BRIDE for Beverly Eikli’s book tour, I was just hoping to enjoy her latest romance novel.  I was not expecting to be swept up into the giggly, giddy delight I used to feel when I would sneak another historical romance out of Grandma’s bookshelf–but I did!

THE RELUCTANT BRIDE has everything a romance novel should.  You have your damsel in distress, your strapping-but-scarred hero, a rogue, a marriage of convenience, misunderstandings and drama, with the additional interest and intrigue of espionage and family secrets that threaten to ruin everything–seriously, if you like romance, this one will have you squirming happily.  Eikli has a wonderful command of the narrative, and she builds a fully fleshed reality for her characters.  I think she’s written a novel that will stand against the best of them, and it is as memorable as the one that has stuck with me since I was about 10 years old.

Scroll to read an excerpt below Beverly’s bio, a find out how to win a gift card giveaway from Beverly.

I’m giving this one 4.5 out of 5 stars.

Beverley Eikli and her Rhodesian Ridgeback, Homer.
Beverley Eikli and her Rhodesian Ridgeback, Homer.

About Beverly:

Beverley Eikli is the author of eight historical romances published by Pan Macmillan Momentum, Robert Hale, Ellora’s Cave and Total-e-Bound. Recently she won UK Women’s Fiction publisher Choc-Lit’s Search for an Australian Star competition with her suspenseful, spy-based Regency Romance The Reluctant Bride.

She’s been shortlisted twice for a Romance Readers of Australia Award in the Favourite Historical category — in 2011 for  A Little Deception, and in 2012 for her racy Regency Romp, Rake’s Honour, written under her Beverley Oakley pseudonym.

Beverley wrote her first romance when she was seventeen. However, drowning the heroine on the last page was, she discovered, not in the spirit of the genre so her romance-writing career ground to a halt and she became a journalist.

After throwing in her job on South Australia’s metropolitan daily The Advertiser to manage a luxury safari lodge in the Okavango Delta, in Botswana, Beverley discovered a new world of romance and adventure in a thatched cottage in the middle of a mopane forest with the handsome Norwegian bush pilot she met around a camp fire.

Eighteen years later, after exploring the world in the back of Cessna 404s and CASA 212s as an airborne geophysical survey operator during low-level sorties over the French Guyanese jungle and Greenland’s ice cap, Beverley is back in Australia teaching in the Department of Professional Writing & Editing at Victoria University, as well as teaching Short Courses for the Centre of Adult Education and Macedon Ranges Further Education.

She writes Regency Historical Intrigue as Beverley Eikli and erotic historicals as Beverley Oakley.

Beverley won the Choc Lit Search for an Australian Star competition with The Reluctant Bride.

Shortlisted for the 2012 Australian Romance Readers Award for her novel Rake’s Honour

Finalist in the 2011 Australian Romance Readers Awards for her novel A Little Deception.

An excerpt from THE RELUCTANT BRIDE

Angus and Emily, newly married, have just been visited unexpectedly by Angus’s brother and his unsuitable consort. Emily, embarrassed by her highly pregnant state and knowing it will cause gossip amongst Angus’s family, reacts in this scene to her husband’s apologies for the situation Emily has just confronted.

With deliberate care Emily set down the plates once more and turned to look at her husband through narrowed eyes.

‘For contaminating me with a lady of dubious repute? But Angus, how much worse a contaminant would I have been had you not married me?’ She patted her swollen belly. ‘You’d be apologising to your brother. A fallen woman—’

‘Don’t speak like that.’ His wide-set eyes burned with undeserved defence of her. ‘Men’s impulses can be ungovernable, but ladies do not suffer such … urges … You were … taken advantage of.’

Emily stared at him. She sucked in a long, quavering breath as her simmering anger came finally to the boil. Is that what he believed? That she was insensible to passion? And that was a good thing?

‘What would you say if I told you that my impulses were every bit as ungovernable as Jack’s?’ She could barely control her anger sufficiently to speak. For days she had forced her feelings into the background, using the same emotional device against her unwanted husband as she had when her father insulted her, shutting out the hurt by erecting a barrier as impenetrable as steel.

Now, feeling surged through her, blackening her vision and causing her to sway. She put her hand on the back of the sofa to steady herself.

Angus stood awkwardly by the door, as if unsure whether to move closer to support her, or beat a tactful retreat.

Emily glared at him. ‘What if I told you that I was so consumed by passion in Jack’s arms I would not have heeded the Blessed Virgin Mary cautioning me against the temptations of the flesh?’ She tried to regulate her breathing, but the rage was clawing its way further up her body, threatening to make her its puppet. She, who never lost her temper. ‘I loved Jack. I was his slave in passion, every bit as culpable as he. If you are so concerned for virtue, spare your condemnation of innocent Miss Galway. You need only cast your eyes upon your wife to be singed by my sin. There! I have confessed my true nature. Whatever you thought of me before, you cannot but think worse of me now.’ She registered the horror in his eyes and was glad for it. Much better that she banish any pretence between them.

She’d never expressed anger as poisonous as this. At first it frightened her, then it sent exhilaration pulsing through her. Her love for Jack had been cut off at the root. Now hatred filled her veins, making her feel alive again. ‘And so you know, I care nothing for your opinion,’ she added.

She managed to remain upright, though her vision came in waves. She could feel her strength leaving her, but she had to spit out the truth so he’d have no illusions as to the kind of woman he’d married. A woman no good man deserved.

‘You married me because you needed a wife. I married you so I could keep my child. We made a contract. My body is yours to do with as you please, but that is all you will ever have. My thoughts, my feelings, my love will be forever out of bounds to you.’

GIVEAWAY
Beverley will award a $20 Amazon or Barnes & Noble Gift Card to one randomly drawn commenter during the tour.
the more times you comment on the tour, the better your chances of winning!
Advice, Counting Blessings, Explaining the Strange Behavior, Friends of Mine, Howling Sea Lane, Inside Lane, Lancient History, Religion, Women

What I Would Tell a Daughter About Selfies

the outside lane

Since I’m getting emails and PMs about the girl side of things, I’ll address the girl side of things here.

So, I used to teach Sunday School for 6th Grade girls.  When I took on the responsibility, I thought I was going to be–I don’t know what I thought I was going to be teaching, but it was NOT sex.  I started reading through the lesson book, and halfway through BLAMMO sex/pregnancy/abortion.  Uh…

I worried about a few things:

  1. I would accidentally warp these children.
  2. I would say something that would make concerned parents take up pitchforks against me.
  3. That the church hadn’t thoroughly vetted my thoughts on sex/pregnancy/abortion before handing their 12 year old girls over to me.
  4. What if one of the girls had been bad-touched, or was already sexually active and I said something that made her feel like a monster?

I worried most about the pitchforks.

At the time, I was single, had never been married, had no children of my own, and  hadn’t been all the way around the block, so-to-speak.  I had been bad-touched and was sensitive to that, and I had ducked down some of the block’s back alleys.  I knew enough to be dangerous.

I knew enough to know that anything I said, could and would affect these girls for a long time, and I didn’t want to hurt any of them, and I didn’t want my words haunting them in regard to choices they might make in the future.  We all do stupid things sooner or later.  I wanted my words to be building blocks for them, not stumbling blocks.

So…I didn’t talk specifically about sex/pregnancy/abortion.  I talked about choices, redemption and the Proverbs 31 Woman.

Because here’s how I feel:  My job as an adult guiding children (or now, as a parent) is to help them learn to navigate rough waters by teaching them to reason, think, and adjust course.  My job isn’t to give them marching orders (as a parent, my job is definitely giving marching orders along with instruction on the how and why.)

So, first I wanted those girls to know that they had autonomy, and they got to choose their futures.  I wanted them to understand that good choices led to better futures, and good choices were things like eating well (I tried to touch on eating disorders because you never know), getting good exercise (because healthy bodies help promote healthy minds), doing your homework and reading for pleasure (because intelligent, educated women have a better chance to make good choices), working toward a goals in small increments (a good test, a good report card, honor roll, head of the class, etc.), and having a hobby or something fun to do, just for the love of it (because well-rounded women have their own interests.)  And, I told them to make good friends because good friends are the best things in life, and good friends will keep you out of trouble.  I have excellent friends, by the way.

Next, I wanted those girls to know that if they slipped up somewhere, it wasn’t the end of the world.  Get a bad grade?  Study harder/ask for help/do better next time.  Hurt someone’s feelings?  Apologize/learn from your mistake/don’t do it again.  Eat a whole cake by yourself?  Oof/see above.

And I told them that when they were focused on proper nutrition, their health, their studies, their hobbies, their goals, and their friendships, everything else would fall into place.  When they were well-rounded people, they would attract the right kinds of attention.  Predators are afraid of self-confident girls.  Losers don’t try to smack around Margaret Thatcher or Hillary Clinton.  No one crosses Wonder Woman–and no one ever tries to butt grab her, no matter how hot her pants are.

Then, I told them that wanting to have sex, or having sex didn’t make you a bad person.  (Pitchforks!)  I told them that purposefully hurting other people was what made a bad person.  I read them the definition of the Proverbs 31 Woman, and asked them, first, if she seemed pretty awesome.  She’s got her own house, runs a staff, dabbles in real estate, has a garden, has a fabulous wardrobe, people respect and like her… Sounds pretty good to me.  I asked them if that was a woman who seemed focused on her looks, her hair, her boyfriend, or her popularity, and I asked them to consider what it would take to have your own home/business/amazing closet.

We talked about the choices you need to make to be a spectacular, independent woman, and we talked about what might set you off course.  I told them that is why they should wait to have sex.  Because they had dreams, and plans, and goals, and wanted houses, and cars, and jobs, and careers, and having a baby before you were ready would mean putting all that on hold, or putting it aside all together.  And, I told them that an STI can really slow you down, or kill you, too.

I wanted them to understand I wasn’t trying to protect their chastity.  I was trying to teach them how to protect their ability to make choices.  Having sex too soon can rob you of your autonomy, and rob you of choices. (Then I quit teaching Sunday School because I was mentally exhausted.  I went and taught Adult Singles, thinking that because I was one, it would be easier.  Ha!)

That’s what I would tell my own daughter, repeatedly.  And when the hormones kicked in and she couldn’t hear me through the throbbing in her loins, there would be that little voice in the back of her head saying, “Guh!  I know Harry Styles is so hot!  But I don’t want to be just his back-up singer.  I want my own band!  And he can fall in love with me because I am so awesome and independent, not just because I’m fawning all over him.”

I know that because that’s what kept me off the tour buses I got invited onto.

I didn’t need AIDs or a baby.

So, when it came down to selfies, I would ask my daughter why she wanted to take them, and if they helped her further her goals/dreams/aspirations.  If they didn’t, I’d ask her what she thought they did do.  We’d talk about it, and if she didn’t come the right conclusions, I’d take away her access to cameras and stuff some cotton in my ears to muffle the wailing.  Because I’d still be the parent and you don’t let a kid drive on the wrong side of the street just because it seems like a good idea to them.

 

 

A Day in the Life, Explaining the Strange Behavior, Howling Sea Lane, Women

Sarcasm, Slut Shaming, and Teenage Girls

the outside lane

I read a little article this morning and it made me very sad for girls.  You know, it’s hard enough to navigate junior high and high school, navigate puberty, sex, and sexuality among your peers.  It’s even worse when you have grown women sneering at you from the vantage of 30+ years of experience in relationships.  Do you remember 13?  13 was a beast, y’all.

This mother was addressing little girls who post provocative selfies on Facebook, noting that while her little girl notices the background of their frilly bedrooms, her teenaged sons notice that they aren’t wearing bras.  Clearly, I am paraphrasing, but this mother asks these girls to please put themselves away so that her boys (and other boys) don’t get the wrong idea about them–she strongly, and facetiously suggests that the girls want the boys to think about their brains, not their bodies, and tells them that once a boy has seen a girl body, that’s all he’ll ever see*.

The tone is full of sarcasm and shame, and the message is clear: You are responsible for my son’s attitudes toward women**.

Can we agree on something?  Your daughter’s picture of herself in a bra isn’t going to brain damage my son, or turn him into a raging sex maniac***.  If he hasn’t already been brain damaged by walking through the mall with me, your 15-year-old’s selfie isn’t going to break what Adriana Lima and the other VIctoria’s Secret Angels have left untouched.

And let’s agree on something else:  Your daughter isn’t responsible for my son’s thoughts.  Your daughter isn’t responsible for my son’s sexuality.  Your daughter isn’t responsible for how my son thinks about, talks about, or treats women.

I am.

I am, and his father is.

We, his parents, are responsible for teaching him about respect.  We are responsible for teaching him to respect your daughter, whether she’s waving her nalgas in his face, or wearing a burka.  We are responsible for teaching him that no matter how a girl is dressed, posed, or primped, she is a human being, and she is to be treated like a person, not a collection of parts.  We are responsible.  I hold us responsible, not your daughter.

Not the media.

Not Hugh Hefner.

Not Pat Robertson.

Not Anna Wintour.

Not Miley Cyrus.

Not Facebook.

Certainly not the Discovery Channel.

I am responsible for talking to my son about what it means to look at a beautiful girl and see a person, not a chew toy.

I am responsible for talking to my son about how just because something is offered, doesn’t mean he needs to dip his wick into it.

I am responsible for making sure my son understands the difference between mutually respectful sexual relationships, and being a douchebag.

I am responsible for making sure my son knows to treat your daughter with compassion, empathy, and consideration.

I am responsible for making sure my son understands that even when a girl is showing him her breasts, she might be trying to show him her heart–and it is my job to make sure he understands how to know the difference and how to handle it.

I have a lot of work to do because sex and sexuality are complex.  I’ve been married for nearly 10 years, in a committed, monogamous relationship for nearly 12, have been interacting romantically since I was 15-years-old, and I am still figuring it out.  I still don’t know everything.  I’m still surprised by things.  Why would I expect a teenage girl to know what I know?  Why would I scorn a child who is trying to figure it out?  Why would I condescend to someone who not only has to go through puberty, but also has to go through puberty with the internet sitting right there?

More, why would I expect a child to understand all the nuances of provocative behavior?  There is a vast gulf between what it means in the head of a child who is showing you her bra, and a grown woman doing the same thing.  There is a collection of experience, education, and learned understanding that happens when I flash you–a kiddo doesn’t have that.  She might think she knows what it means to titillate, but she can’t possibly begin to know.  She’s just playing house. She’s just modeling behavior she’s been told is appropriate as she walks through the mall.

Why would I try to make her ashamed?

I wouldn’t.

Because I’m too busy raising my son.

When she comes over to my house, I am going to treat your daughter with respect.  If she’s got her bits out on Facebook, I might ask you if you’re aware because that’s what concerned parents and Chris Hansen do.  I’m going to make you aware so that you can protect your daughter from predators, but I’m not going to call out your daughter in front of the world to embarrass her into putting on a one-piece.  I won’t bully your child.

I’m going to make you one more promise, and I want you to hold me to it:  I’m not going to call any of your daughters little tramps or question their morality because I’m going to remember that puberty turns girls into little sex maniacs, too.  Boys aren’t the only ones whose brains go on holiday between 13 and 23.  I might question your parenting if Little Miss shows up at my door in a tube top and hot pants, but I am going to remember back to when I was Little Miss.

Let’s be good to our kids, and to each other’s kids.  And let’s be good to each other.

 

*This attitude irritates the bejeezus out of me.  It suggests that boys are too stupid to separate BOOBIES from anything else.  While there are certainly a bunch of morons who can’t see the forest for the trees, it’s an intellect issue, not a gender issue.  Plenty of women out there who can’t get past that hot chick’s glorious hips to see that she got her job through hard work.

**Meanwhile, after calling out girls for posing in towels, she has posted several pictures of her sons in various states of undress, flexing on the beach.  Because if you post beautiful, half-naked pictures of your toned, tanned, attractive children for public consumption on the world wide web it is okay.  That’s art.  But if you post beautiful, half-naked pictures of yourself on your own private Facebook page, that is not okay.  That’s dirty.  Or, am I misunderstanding?

***Puberty will do that whether, or not he ever sees a nipple.  Trust.