Show & Tell Friday: July 12, 2013

Well, it’s starting to look as if I may only be posting “Friday Show & Tell” editions for a while. Here is the reason for my inability to write:

She’s a cute little 8 week-old time-stealer, isn’t she?

Please forgive my absence. I’ll be back to fighting weight eventually.


A few things to share:

1.) Fireflies in the Garden

My husband and I realized the other night when we were awake in the wee hours that we’ve got some free movie channels on DISH. We started watching Fireflies in the Garden–which stars Ryan Reynolds, Julia Roberts, Emily Watson, Hayden Panettiere, Willem Dafoe and more–and were immediately hooked. It’s the story of Michael (Reynolds), a novelist  who returns to his childhood home for a celebration, but when a tragedy occurs instead, he’s forced to remember what it was like to grow up, and all that that process entailed: dealing with a difficult, writer father, his beloved mother, and so much more. The actor who plays young Michael (Cayden Boyd) is especially powerful. The title is taken from a Robert Frost poem, so points for that.

I love independent films, mostly because of their similarities to great novels: they can cross genres, span the generations, and take the time to pause in the simple moments without needing bang and flash. Fireflies in the Garden does all this: At times heartbreaking, at others downright hilarious, it’s worth checking out.

Take a look at the movie trailer here.


2.) SIBA Book Award Winners

SIBA (Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance) has announced its winners for the 2013 book awards, and there’s a whole list of great books from which to choose to add to your summer reading list. (Sadly, Keowee Valley didn’t make the cut. But thanks so much to all of you who voted for it!) The list includes novels, children’s books, Young Adult novels, poetry, nonfiction, and even a cookbook.

I’m particularly excited about reading Stand Up That Mountain: The Battle to Save One

Small Community in the Wilderness Along the Appalachian Trail, by Jay Erskine Leutze, which the SIBA web site says is ”the true story of a North Carolina outdoorsman who teams up with his Appalachian ‘mountain people’ neighbors to save treasured land from being destroyed.”

Check the entire list out here.
 

3.) Easy Ice Cream Cake

One of my best friends taught me how to make this crazy-easy ice cream cake. I just made if for the 4th of July. It’s easy to serve, easy to freeze, will feed a crowd, satisfies absolutely everyone, and is just plain scrumptious. My mouth’s watering just thinking about it. Here’s the recipe:

Ice Cream Cake

Ingredients:
2 big boxes of ice cream sandwiches
Cool Whip (or, if you want to be fancy, make real whipped cream)
A bunch of your favorite candy bars
11 x 13 glass casserole dish (or, any other dish that can go in the freezer)
Seriously. That’s it.

Directions:
Open one box of ice cream sandwiches. Place the sandwiches so that they fill the bottom of the dish. (You may need to cut a few to fill it up.) Mash ‘em down a bit with your hands. Lick your hands. (Okay, wash your hands.) Spread half of the whipped cream over the top, then open the other box of ice cream sandwiches and make another layer: sandwiches, whipped cream … you get the picture. Next, crush up the candy bars (I use Heath Bars, but the options are endless) and sprinkle liberally over the top. Freeze for at least 1 to 4 hours before serving.

That’s it. It ridiculous how good this cake is, especially on a hot summer night.
Real Simple magazine has a little bit more complicated recipe (using real whipped cream made with confectioner’s sugar and less ice cream sandwiches) that’s worth checking out.

Enjoy!

Show & Tell Friday: The 4th of July Edition

Happy Pre-4th of July, all!

The 4th of July, or Independence Day, is my second-favorite holiday of the year. I’ve loved the 4th since I was a kid, mostly because of what we did: headed up into the foothills to my family’s lake house, spending the week swimming, waterskiing, tubing, grilling out, hiking, camping, shooting fireworks, playing cards, building bonfires, and basically getting into trouble.

There was the year it rained the entire week, breaking all kinds of rain records. The water rose over the dock, and caused wood scorpions to emerge from beneath. We swam anyway. This was the same year our parents gave in and took us to the movies in the closest real town. One of the Batman movies was playing. The theatre flooded.

Then, there was the year we sunk our neighbor’s paddleboat. Not too much of a big deal, except the neighbors hadn’t given us permission to take it and the lake’s over 60 feet deep not too far out from our dock.

What about the year my father and friends told us a ghost story so gruesome (we were in elementary school), that some of the boys cried for days. Days. Hint: it involved a bloody tree trunk, a dead teenager named Fred, and an ax.

There were trips to the hospital (not so fun) broken-down boats, sliding rocks, midnight skinny dipping rendezvous in the middle of the lake, lightning storms, and more. One year, my friend Charley and I double-skied in the driving rain, slaloming behind my Dad’s boat. Our dads were the only people in it, wearing towels wrapped around their heads like turbans.

It was heaven.

Now, as a grown-up, I still love the 4th for those many memories, and the new ones I make at the lake with family and friends. But as a history buff–and now historical novelist–I love it for what the day means, and has meant for my country and for me as an American.

If I’m not careful, I could wax poetic about the founding of our country and all the incredibly gifted, inspired, flawed and fantastic men and women who made it possible. But I won’t. Perhaps that subject’s for a future essay, because–from all those months researching the time period of Keowee Valley, especially–I certainly have thoughts about our Founding, and where we’ve come as a country since. What I do know is that no matter how we fuss and fight among ourselves and our own political factions, we remain the world’s most incredible experiment in self-government. And this 4th of July, we’ll only be 243 years old.

So keep an eye on us. We’re still growing.

* Some fun 4th of July stuff to share:

1.) John Adams

John Adams, the second president of the very young United States, is one of my favorite American presidents and probably my favorite Founding Father. It also helps that his wife, Abigail, has got to be the coolest Founding Mother. And, we (the American people) happen to have more personal correspondence between the two of them than any of the other Founders. There’s no substitute for reading personal correspondence when studying history. You get it straight from the horse’s mouth.

Anyway, two Adams-based works you’ve got to check out this summer: 1) John Adams, the biography by the venerable (and Pulitzer Prize and Medal of Honor winner) David McCullough. Here, Adams comes to life–and so does his time–with stunning clarity. McCullough tells a story, and it’s wonderful. A must for anyone interested in learning about the reality of our country’s founding (and not just what the talking heads on TV and radio tend to spout). The book was a NYT bestseller and won the Pulitzer Prize. And, 2) John Adams, the HBO miniseries, developed from the book. It stars Paul Giamatti as Adams, the incomparable Laura Linney as Abigail, Paul Dillane as Thomas Jefferson and Tom Wilkinson as Benjamin Franklin. It won dozens upon dozens of awards, including Emmys, Golden Globes and SAG Awards for Giamatti and Linney as John and Abigail.

I own the miniseries (thanks, sister!), and I try to watch it around this time of year. For me, it’s like watching It’s a Wonderful Life at Christmas.

2.) If you’re into the more militaristic aspects of that fateful year of Independence, you’ve got

to check out David McCullough’s 1776. More than John Adams, which concentrates mostly on Adams himself and how he came to be the man he was alongside our burgeoning country, 1776 centers on that year, on General Washington, on battles and troop movements, and the political and sometimes cultural realities. It’s utterly fascinating. It was a national bestseller, and won another Pulitzer Prize.

Moving on from McCullough …

3.) Birchwood Book and Author Fair

Ever visited the Blue Ridge Mountains of Upstate South Carolina, and gorgeous Table Rock State Park? Well, here’s your chance–and the opportunity to make a literary side trip, too. On Sunday, August 11 from 2 – 5 p.m., the Birchwood Center for Arts and Folklife will be hosting a Book and Author Fair at the Lodge at Table Rock State Park. There’ll be a chance to meet and talk with authors, hear readings from their books/novels, to buy books and to get your books signed. I’ll be there signing and talking about Keowee Valley, which is set in the surrounding areas! Other authors will include George Singleton, Dori Sanders, Susan Tekulve, Dot Jackson and more.

4.) Last, some quotes about Independence Day, democracy, and more, just to get you in the spirit:

“Democracy is the only system that persists in asking the powers that be whether they are the powers that ought to be.” ~ Sydney J. Harris

“Our political institutions work remarkably well. They are designed to clang against each other. The noise is democracy at work.” ~ Michael Novak

“A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman thinks of the next generation.” ~James Freeman Clarke

“He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from opposition; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach himself.”  ~ Thomas Paine

“There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.”  ~ William J. Clinton

“You have to love a nation that celebrates its independence every July 4, not with a parade of guns, tanks, and soldiers who file by the White House in a show of strength and muscle, but with family picnics where kids throw Frisbees, the potato salad gets iffy, and the flies die from happiness.  You may think you have overeaten, but it is patriotism.”  ~ Erma Bombeck

“Freedom is nothing but a chance to be better.”  ~ Albert Camus

Have a wonderful 4th of July, everyone. Let freedom ring!

Show & Tell Friday: Summer Solstice Edition

Hey, all! I'm posting this here and at my author website a wee bit early. This is the fault of baby brain: if I waited until tomorrow, I'd never remember.

Today is the Summer Solstice: the longest day of the year, the official first day of summer  and, as it so happens, my husband’s birthday!

Oh, how I love the summer. Sunday was the first night I’d noticed the lightning bugs. I’m sure they’d been around already, but we’ve got an infant in the house, and so some things have lately gone unnoticed. We tried to get our 3 year-old to catch them with us, attempted to explain just how cool these little glowing creatures are, that they mean summer and freedom and magic–but she just wasn’t into it. Oh, my broken heart. But she’ll get it one day.

Some good stuff to share:

1.) Native Eyewear is sponsoring a contest called the “Locals Only Project,” where viewers can vote for the best outdoor town. Native Eyewear will travel to that town and make it the centerpiece of their next catalog. My town, Brevard, NC, is up this year! And we are truly lucky and blessed to live where we do: in the Blue Ridge Mountains, at the foot of Pisgah National Forest, with the best mountain biking track and hiking trails East of the Mississippi.

Check us out and vote here.

2.) Last night I pulled a movie from our DVD library that I haven’t watched in a long time. Called True Women, it was a CBS miniseries in the ’90s starring Angelina Jolie, Dana Delany, and Annabeth Gish, and based on the novel by Janice Woods Windle. I’d picked the DVD up in some pile of “for sale” stuff a while back. Set over five decades, starting in 1830s Georgia and Texas, against the backdrop of the Indian Removal (Trail of Tears), the Alamo and Texas independence, the wars with the Comanches, and eventually the Civil War and women’s suffrage, it’s full of capital-D Drama.

Parts of it are overly-sentimental–mostly the over-the-top Southern accents, which only Gish really gets right–but it’s a rousing adventure and a story of three very independent Southern women in a wild and dangerous time. The relationships between Delany’s and Gish’s character (they play sisters), and between Delany and her character’s husband (played by veteran Western actor Powers Boothe) is lovely and real.

Check it out: an escapist adventure for a few hot summer nights! (And I bet you could get it for free from your local library.)

3.) Speaking of libraries–very cool places to be in the summer–here’s the list of the latest books I’ve checked out. (All novels.) They’re sitting on my bedside table and the side table where I feed my baby. I’m optimistic I’ll make it through all of them in time to check out more for July, especially considering the wee hours and I have grown quite friendly:

Ashenden by Elizabeth Wilhide
Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter
The Casual Vacany by J.K. Rowling

I’ve got to admit: I’m a chronic re-reader. I just finished re-reading Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness, and Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff. And, I recently gulped down Susanna Kearsley’s newest, The Firebird, as soon as Amazon.com delivered it to my door earlier this week. More on that soon!

4.) In my CD player: (And, yes, I still have a CD player) I’m currently listening to new albums by two camp buddies of mine (read: friends I worked with for years at a camp in the NC mountains): Bradley Carter’s The Real Job (CD jacket designed by another camp buddy and talented artist, A.J. Power) and Shannon Whitworth’s High Tide.

Quite a bit of talent comes out of the NC mountains. Check them all out when you have a chance. And I’ll write more later about all these books and this great music, here and at my blog. No guarantees on when (she types as the infant cries from the bassinet), but it’ll come.

Happy Summer Solstice to everyone!

Keowee Valley Wins Award

Hi folks,

I just found out that Keowee Valley has been honored with a 2013 HOLT Medallion Award of Merit by the Virginia Romance Writers!

This is a particularly cool honor, not only because the VA Romance Writers are such a large and venerable organization, but because it’s only one of the few dedicated to published writers of romantic fiction. Past and present winners include bestselling authors like Karen White, Sherrilyn Kenyon, and many more. I’m thrilled and thankful that the judges enjoyed Keowee Valley!

Check out all the winners here.

Show & Tell Friday: Coming Back

Slowly but surely, I’m emerging from the cave of Newbornland. My newest daughter is now 38 days old. Everyone in my house except for my 3 year-old–including myself, my husband, and our dog–is exhausted. The 3 year-old is fueled by some energy source we can’t find. We’ve looked for it.

We are happy and sleepy. And we have no idea what day it is.

Oh, yes–Friday! I’ve got some things to share that popped up while I was in Newbornland:

 

1.) The Girls of Atomic City: the Untold Story of the Women Who Helped Win WWII

I may have already mentioned this, but I can’t wait to read this book! It’s all about the young women who were recruited to work in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, during WWII. On the Manhattan Project (you know, the Atomic Bomb). My grandmother was one of those girls. She was recruited right out of Winthrop University (then College) in South Carolina, with a friend, but when the friend bailed, she still went. She met my grandfather, a nuclear physicist and a Yankee to boot, at a dance. He told her he was going to marry her the night they met. My mother and aunts were raised in Oak Ridge, the “Secret City.” And the rest is history.

Speaking of history, these women, and their stories, are incredible. A must read for your nonfiction stack this summer. It’s already on mine.

2.) Brave

Have you seen this movie? It’s not just for kids. About a strong-willed young Scottish princess, Merida, and her quest to break from tradition in order to live her own life. It’s set in the Highlands of Scotland and is a great big adventure, complete with a legend, a witch, and ill-fated wish, and a host of unforgettable characters. The animation is absolutely gorgeous, and truly different than anything I’ve seen before.

We watched it over the weekend with my 3 year-old (who’ll be 4 in late July), and she loved it!

My husband and I backpacked and traveled through the Scottish Highlands several years ago, and came away forever changed–not to mention determined to get back there one day. Disney Pixar gets it right with this one. It’s a good movie for everyone–battles and humor and danger and redemption–but it’s great for girls. All hail the female hero! Plus, it won the Academy Award for best animated film.

3.) “Being But Men” by Dylan Thomas

This was the featured poem-of-the-day on Wednesday at The Writer’s Almanac. I love Thomas, and this poem demonstrates why I think he’s a poet for the ages. I think it speaks to quiet truths about nature and humanity; that it’s lovely and sad at the same time.

Poets slay me. I don’t know how they do it.
 



4.) And last, some quotes to welcome the unofficial start of summer:

“Summer afternoon—summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.” ~ Henry James

“A man says a lot of things in summer he doesn’t mean in winter.” ~ Patricia Briggs

“Come with me,’ Mom says.
To the library.
Books and summertime
go together.”
~ Lisa Schroeder

“Summer’s lease hath all too short a date.”
~ William Shakespeare

“The summer demands and takes away too much. /But night, the reserved, the reticent, gives more than it takes”
~ John Ashbery  

“If a June night could talk, it would probably boast it invented romance.”  ~ Bern Williams

“The summer night is like a perfection of thought.”  ~ Wallace Stevens

Southern Summer Reading List

Looking for a few good books to read this summer?

Just wanted to share a new board I’ve posted on Pinterest while the baby was sleeping. Called Doggone Good Southern Books, it’s a list of many of the books–novels, biographies, memoirs, nature books, etc–that have affected me over the years. All by Southern authors, set in the South, or Southern in nature.

Check my board out here.

This is most definitely a work in progress, and I’ve left several off (including, by not limited to, works by Zora Neale Hurston, William Faulkner, Kaye Gibbons, Mary Alice Monroe, Lee Smith, and more). But these are books that have touched my flawed Southern soul, and I wanted to share. Please feel free to write me here, and let me know if you agree–and for heaven’s sake, suggest some good books for me, too!

Happy Reading!

Back Momentarily & Just Because

Hello, friends! I've emerged from the cave of newbornland just to say "hi," and to introduce my new baby girl.

Willoday Tiger Dodson

"Willa"

Born May 1, 2013

The names: "Willoday" is a family name on my husband's (the Dodson's) side, and Tiger is a family name on my side (the Crawford side--my great-grandmother's maiden name, to be exact). We're calling her "Willa." Mostly this is for one of my favorite American novelists, Willa Cather. Also because we think it's retro and cool. 

Today marks Day 29 of Willa's life, and we've been ensconced like all new parents are in sleepless nights, busy days, and what we're calling the-distracting-of-the-3-year-old-sister. Said sister, Wylie, is quite proud. Now if we can only keep her from waking Willa up....

There won't be much coming from me here for a little while longer, but just for fun, check out these AWESOME headphones my super-cool husband brought me from his most recent business trip.

Yes, that's Wonder Woman. I'm hiding behind her because I haven't showered or slept in 29 days.

Just kidding. I've showered.

Well, a couple of times.

See y'all soon!