TRAVEL WITH SERENA -- SIENA, ITALY WITH GUEST AUTHOR BARBARA QUINN

Photo of Piazza del Campo, Siena by Ricardo Andre Frantz    

Visit Siena, Italy today as we welcome Barbara Quinn, a novelist and award-winning short story writer. Barbara is founder and former publisher of The Rose & Thorn and the author of four novels: Speed of Dark, 36C, Slings and Arrows, and Hard Head. Her love of travel has taken her to four continents and 47 states. Barbara welcomes email at BAQuinn@aol.com  and would love to keep in touch via twitter.com/BarbaraQuinn. -- AP

Settings are extremely important in fiction. Think about memorable scenes in your favorite novels and I bet you conjure up a picture so vivid you think you can smell and hear it. Whether it’s a fantasy world such as those created in The Hunger Games or Lord of the Rings, or the mansions and surroundings of The Great Gatsby, or the orphanage of Oliver Twist, memorable settings reel you in and deposit you on heady shores. They breathe life into a story and can become another character in the book, one that makes a reader want to visit in person and follow in the footsteps of the characters you come to know so well.

 One of my favorite scenes in my suspense novel, Hard Head, is set in Siena, Italy in the stunning main square called Piazza del Campo. Siena is a charming walled city with medieval roots. Its winding streets and sepia light beckon you to wander slowly through its mazes. The central shell-shaped square, Piazza del Campo, is a jewel. After walking the winding streets, it is breathtaking to spill onto the Piazza del Campo from one of the tiny narrow streets that lead into it. As you enter from dark passages, you are immediately immersed into light and air. Twice a year, once in July, and again in August, the interior of the square turns into a madhouse when the horse race called Il Palio is run and thousands of people manage to squeeze into the square.

In the Palio, jockeys ride bareback and circle the Piazza del Campo three times. They cover the inner square with dirt to provide some traction, but it is not uncommon for riders to fall off and horses to stumble. The race itself takes only a little more than a minute. Events leading up to it occur over four days. Ten horses and riders representing sections of Siena ride around the square at a furious pace. The winning horse does not even need to have a rider. Amazingly, the horses without riders still run hard. The participants do it all for the right to display a banner.

I’m not a fan of crowds and have never attended the Palio, but the spectacle of that race has been a draw for me since I became aware of it many years ago. I knew I wanted to set a part of my novel there. So when I was writing Hard Head, I steeped myself in every article, account, and picture I could find to understand the rituals and pageantry. Incidentally, the title of the book, “Hard Head” is a term commonly used to describe people who come from Calabria, the place of birth of my main character’s ancestors. She journeys to several places in Italy including Siena and Calabria.

I did eventually visit Siena and its gorgeous Piazza del Campo, not during a Palio, but during the fall season, when the walls were covered in a fiery orange from climbing vines. There’s something magical about the square, and the history associated with it. I was most content to sit in the Piazza and sip an espresso. The square was all I had imagined it to be and I could imagine the thunder of the horses and the shouts of the crowd.

Is there a magical setting or event like Il Palio that you’d like to visit?

I’m ready to pack my bags, Barbara! Thanks for visiting with us today. -- AP

DECORATING WITH JEANIE -- HOW TO CLEAN A LAMPSHADE

How often have you replaced fabric lampshades because of dirt build-up? Decorating editor Jeanie Sims has some great tips for making those shades last a lot longer. -- AP

There are several ways to clean a lampshade:

1. Use a hairdryer set on the low, cool setting, positioning the dryer at the top so the air blows down.

2. Remove dust with a lint roller.

3. For pleated shades, try brushing with a clean paintbrush.

4. Tide To Go pens are not just for clothes stains. If you’ve got a stain on a lampshade, try the pen. It might not work for every stain, but it will work for many.

There are few things harder to clean than lampshades. Thanks for the tips, Jeanie! -- AP

COOKING WITH CLORIS -- GREAT GRAPE RICE

I love grapes. I eat them like candy and toss them into salads. Today Cloris has a recipe for a side dish with grapes. -- AP

GREAT GRAPE RICE

Ingredients:

3-1/2 cups cooked brown rice

1/2 cup chopped scallions

1 cup seedless red grapes, halved

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1 tablespoon all fruit apricot jam

2 tablespoons olive oil

1/2 cup red wine vinegar

Combine the rice, scallions, grapes, and walnuts. Mix together the jam, olive oil, and vinegar. Add to the rice mixture and toss to combine.

I definitely need to try this one. What about you, readers? -- AP

CRAFTS WITH ANASTASIA-- GUEST SCRAPBOOKER MOLLIE COX BRYAN

Mollie Cox Bryan is a food writer with a penchant for murder. Her first mystery, Scrapbook of Secrets, was just released, and I’ve invited her here today to talk about scrapbooking. Read more about Mollie at her website and blog.

Mollie is giving away a copy of Scrapbook of Secrets, along with a scrapbooking kit, to one of our lucky readers today. Post a comment to be entered in the drawing. -- AP

One of the best things about being a crafter of any kind is the ability to use a skill to give a gift that has meaning—even more meaning because we make it with our own hands. I know some of the best gifts I’ve ever received were of the handmade variety. Scrapbooking is no different than quilting or knitting, in this regard. You can make any number of gifts with the scrapbooking hobby. I’ve made gift scrapbooks—one for my mom about her life, another for my niece who was getting ready to go off to college. It was full of photos of her growing up, peppered with advice from me about the college life. But it doesn’t have to be a whole book. It can be one page—suitable for framing.

 To do a page like this, gather the photos, embellishments, paper, and so on, keeping the person you’re making the page about in mind. For example, for my daughter’s thirteenth birthday, she wanted to see a Broadway show. She has high hopes of pursing an acting career. So, when I went to the supply store, this is what I was attracted to. Aren’t the stars fabulous?

I liked this photo because you could see the city behind her so I tried to find paper that would suit. It’s okay to play like this with paper. Just have fun with it. When I begin a page, I often switch around to find the right paper. I didn’t like either of these:

  

For my taste the page turned out a little busy, but it’s perfect for her. It’s really who she is—what she likes and the page is for her.

One of the things I wanted to point out about this layout is the “journaling” piece, which in this case, is just your basic “this is what we did when Emma turned 13.” But you can get really creative with this part of it. Initially, I wanted to list 13 things I love about Emma. But the page stated to look too crowded. I hardly ever stick to my plans—it’s just the kind of crafter I am. I find that for me it’s important to have a plan as a sort of guideline in my mind—but it hardly ever works that way.

You can purchase scrapbook page frames and give this as a gift—and for my just-turned thirteen-year-old—it will hang on a wall, which will look out over her very messy room. But it will be something she might have for the rest of her life. That thought warms me—the messy room, not so much.  

Scrapbook of Secrets: Having traded in her career as a successful investigative journalist for the life of a stay-at-home mum in picturesque Cumberland Creek, Virginia, Annie can't help but feel that something's missing. But she finds solace in a local "crop circle" of scrapbookers united by chore-shy husbands, demanding children, and occasional fantasies of their former single lives. And when the quiet idyll of their small town is shattered by a young mother's suicide, they band together to find out what went wrong...Annie resurrects her reporting skills and discovers that Maggie Rae was a closet scrapbooker who left behind more than a few secrets - and perhaps a few enemies. As they sift through Maggie Rae's mysteriously discarded scrapbooks, Annie and her "crop" sisters begin to suspect that her suicide may have been murder. It seems that something sinister is lurking beneath the town's beguilingly calm facade - like a killer with unfinished business...

scrapbooking kit giveaway

Thanks for joining us today, Mollie! Readers, have you ever done any scrapbooking? Ever wanted to? Let’s hear from you. Post a comment to be entered in the drawing for Mollie’s giveaway. -- AP

THIS WEEK'S BOOK GIVEAWAY WINNER

Thanks to all who stopped by this week, and a special thanks to Marilyn Meredith, our Book Club Friday guest author. Marilyn offered a copy of BEARS WITH US, her newest release, to one of our readers who posted a comment. The winner this week is Patti Brooks. Patti, please send your mailing address to me at anastasiapollack@gmail.com, and I'll forward them to Marilyn.

BOOK CLUB FRIDAY -- GUEST AUTHOR MARILYN MEREDITH

Today we welcome back mystery author Marilyn Meredith who has published over thirty novels, including the award-winning Deputy Tempe Crabtree mystery series, the latest Bears With Us from Mundania Press. To learn more about Marilyn, visit her at her website and her blog.

Marilyn will be giving away one copy of Bears With Us to one of our readers who posts a comment to the blog this week. -- AP

What would you do if you found a bear in your kitchen?

In my latest Deputy Tempe Crabtree mystery, Bears With Us, bears turn up everywhere in and around Bear Creek where Tempe is the resident deputy, including someone’s kitchen.

A family enjoying their Thanksgiving dinner not too far from where I live in the Southern Sierra spotted a huge brown bear lolling on a branch of an old oak tree a few feet beyond the back porch. Of course the children were delighted, the grownups not so much, as they all watched him through a picture window. That episode started me thinking about bears and how much fun it would be to included them one of Tempe Crabtree’s adventures.

When my grandson, a police officer in another mountain community, wrote to me about chasing bears out of people’s houses that same fall, that cinched it. I emailed him with a long list of questions. What did the bears look like? What did they eat when they invaded someone’s kitchen? The answer was ice cream and Rocky Road was their preference. Of course I asked other questions like how did you chase them out? What did they smell like?

I did more research on California black bears which can be black, many shades of brown including a light cinnamon shade. And yes, they do roam the California mountains and foothills and sometimes make appearances in strange places like people’s swimming pools and hot tubs.

From there a plot began to form that included other facets besides bears such as a woman suffering an unusual form of dementia, a secret from the past, the suicide of a teen with odd acting parents, and a mother who didn’t like her daughter’s choice of boyfriend mainly because of his race.

Readers often ask authors where their ideas come from and that will give you a taste of what happened with me when it was time for me to come up with another dilemma to complicate the life of my Native American heroine, Tempe, one that might happen in a mountain community, like Bear Creek.

Here are some snippets of a few of Bears With Us reviews:

“…For those readers who may not live in bear-y areas, it accurately depicts what life with those creatures can be like.  (Just check out some of our National Park's pages like Yellowstone and Yosemite and see the real damage bears can do!)  Far from the cuddle teddy bear image we've grown accustomed to, we are treated not only to a well-crafted tale, but also it's topped off with the unpredictability of 'nature.'  And isn't that what really happens in our lives?  Unpredictability.”

Victoria Heckman, author of Hawaii Mysteries and "Burn Out." Sisters in Crime-Central Coast Chapter President

“…Bears With Us didn't disappoint. Marilyn's writing is as usual, crisp and sharp--and her story interesting, touching timely issues in a lot of folks lives, and connected to Native American traditions…” M.M. Gornell

…A strong female lead, Native American mysticism, and well-drawn characters fill Bears With Us. It can definitely be read as a stand-alone novel, but I suggest you read all the Deputy Tempe Crabtree novels. They're a bit like Lay’s® potato chips, "you can't have just one." –Cheryl Malandrinos, The Book Connection

“…There are bits of Native American customs, tips for protecting against bears, and issues families dealing with dementia face sprinkled throughout the story. In addition, there are moments of humor that will have you smiling…” Patricia Reed on GoodReads

Bears With Us is the 11th installment in the Tempe Crabtree Mystery series, but is a stand alone read. This is an intriguing tale of murder, mystery and mayhem you shouldn’t miss. –Mason Canyon, Thoughts in Progress

Blurb: Deputy Tempe Crabtree has her hands full when bears turn up in and around Bear Creek, a young teen commits suicide and his parents’ actions are suspicious, a prominent woman files a complaint against Tempe and her preacher husband Hutch, a love affair from long ago comes to light, and a woman suffering from dementia disappears.

Bears With Us is available in paper and all the electronic formats direction from the Mundania Press and from all the usual places.

Thanks you for joining us today, Marilyn. Readers, what would you do if you discovered a bear in your kitchen? I certainly know what I’d do! Post a comment to enter the drawing for a copy of Bears With Us. -- AP

BEAUTY WITH NICOLE - ITCHY WINTER SCALP

Does your scalp itch in winter? I recently came across this great tip for itchy winter scalp, so I’m subbing for Nicole today to pass it along to all of you. Simply massage 5 to 10 drops of jojoba oil into your scalp before going to bed. Wash your hair in the morning. The jojoba oil balances the pH levels in your scalp, which will banish the itchies, and it won’t leave your pillow greasy. 


Post a comment to enter the drawing for a book from our Book Club Friday guest author this week. -- AP