And the winner is. . .

I’m delighted to begin 2013 by announcing a  contest winner.  Wanda, also known as commenter #14 on my Sunday Poetry blogs, just won an autographed copy of Horoscopes for the Dead by Billy Collins, an ongoing contest for the read-poetry-along-with-Emilie crowd.

Wanda’s comment: “Emilie I love this weeks poem. It says play! Have fun and do not take your self too seriously. I carry paper and pen everywhere, you never know what you may see of hear. I write down snipits of conversation and observations because they may end up in a story or a poem or may be the inspiration I need on another day.”

Great comment, Wanda.  As always random.org did the honors.  And in a side note, the poem Wanda commented on was a Billy Collins poem.  Poetic justice?

I love giving things away.  Just to let you know there are more giveaways on my schedule this year.  I’m working out details now, and will make that announcement soon.

If you haven’t liked my Facebook Page, where news is updated daily and your comments are much appreciated, why not visit and do so today?  Or if you aren’t on my mailing list, sign up for my quarterly newsletter (a New Year’s resolution) to have news occasionally delivered to your inbox.  The first is right over the horizon.

Another New Year’s resolution is to update my website.  I’ve already had a cover photo taken since one of 2012′s resolutions was to find out what color my hair really is by forgoing highlights and other salon tortures, and the second was to quit fighting the curl since I was moving to Florida and curl was inevitable.  So my new PR photo is the “new” me.   Curly and grayer than I expected.  But my hair is so much easier to deal with.

I’m gearing up for a great 2013.  Most of our moving is finished now and I can hunker down in my study.  I’ve even heard my desk will be delivered this week, which is great since I’m about to toss the little temporary desk out my window.  I’m excited about finishing a novella and launching into the third book in the Goddesses Anonymous series.  I’m also toying with a Shenandoah Album idea that I can do directly as an ebook.  I’ll let you know more about that when it’s closer to reality.

Do you have big plans for 2013?  I’d love to hear them.  A heartfelt Happy New Year one and all.

Southern Exposure is taking a holiday break until Wednesday, January 2nd.  In the meantime why not finish 2012 with a bang?  Do something you’ve been afraid to try, or haven’t made time for this year while there’s still time.  Visit an old friend, or give one a call.   Take a long walk with your dog or toss a ball of yarn to your cat.  Read a book you’ve been saving. Practice a random act of kindness for no good reason other than the joy it will bring.

May 2013 be a wonderful year for you and everyone you love–as well as for those you will meet and learn to love this year.  And, hey, even for those you will never meet.

Thanks for stopping by this year.  You are much appreciated.

If you’ve been reading this blog for a couple of years, you are prepared for what comes next. And I don’t mean the end of the world according to the Mayan calendar. You’re reading this, right?  No, it’s time for a new and ridiculous Booklover Carol.  You’re not prepared?  Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

Every year for the last three, I’ve produced a carol or two about the book biz.    Last year I treated you to Borders, the Bookstore, and Manuscript is Comin’ to Town.  In 2010 we had The Little E-Reader and I’ll Shop There for Christmas.  2009 brought us too many to recount, here and here.  Can you tell I’ve had fun?

This year I restrained myself and stopped at one.  Please sing with me:

HERE COMES AMAZON (sung to the tune of Here Comes Santa Claus.)

Here comes Amazon, here comes Amazon
Right to your front door,
UPS or US postman
Bringing books and more
Doorbell ringing, VISA singing
Profits on the rise
So clear a space ‘neath the Christmas tree
For Amazon’s latest prize.
 

Here comes Amazon, here comes Amazon
With your favorite tome
You made a wish list for your friends
So they could shop at home
Don’t need Santa or Old St. Nick,
Computer did it all
So stick the box ‘neath your Christmas tree
‘Cause Amazon came to call.
 

Here comes Amazon, here comes Amazon
Without a reindeer sleigh
All the things you ever wanted
One “enter” key away
Peace on earth will come to all
If Amazon prices it right
So let’s give thanks to *Bezos himself
‘Cause Amazon comes tonight.

(*That, of course, refers to Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s CEO and not Beelzebub.)

Happy Holidays!

Greater Good Science Center.  Really?  I didn’t remember “liking” any such institution on my Facebook page, but now these interlopers were sending me updates. Just as I was about to send them to “unlike” purgatory, the link itself caught my eye.

Gratitude vs. Materialism. 

Okay, now I realized who they were.  GGSC researches emotional and social well-being and even better, finds ways to apply their findings.  The organization might want to rethink its name, but the headline intrigued me.  So off I went to explore.  Quite honestly if I wrote as many hours as I “explore” I might turn out three books for every one I actually do. 

As it turns out, this post was part of a blog by a sociologist, Christine Carter, who studies happiness and explains how her findings can help us raise happy children. (more…)

Some of you have been reading this blog long enough to remember that each Christmas I “gift” you with new Booklover Carols. For those who hoped I would forget this tradition, my apologies. For those who crave more, you’ll find links to tongue-in-cheek carols from previous years at the end. 

This year we highlight the “publishing world” with a brand new duo.  “Borders, the Bookstore,” honors, well, you can figure that out from the title.  I find it ironic that just last year I honored the many independent bookstores that had closed.  Who will be next?

“Manuscript is Coming to Town,” honors all my colleague who so often are stuck with December deadlines somewhere along the endless parade of finishing the book, receiving revision letters, receiving edits to go over, receiving copy edits to go over, and finally, receiving galleys.  Personally I’m working on edits due next week, so this one seems appropriate. (more…)

O Lord that lends me life, Lend me a heart replete with thankfulness! ~ William Shakespeare

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures. ~Thornton Wilder

As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them. ~John Fitzgerald Kennedy

“What we’re really talking about is a wonderful day set aside on the fourth Thursday of November when no one diets. I mean, why else would they call it Thanksgiving?” ~Erma Bombeck

“Be with family, be with friends, laugh and eat ’til supper ends. When its over, this mom wishes, everyone will help with dishes.” ~Emilie Richards

Happy Thanksgiving

At this time of year I’m reminded of a young mother I once knew.  Christmas was always her favorite time of year, and each year she baked the family’s traditional cookies and the annual bishop’s cake.  With the family in tow she bought or cut down the season’s Christmas tree, and hauled the ornaments from the attic to be carefully unwrapped and placed on limbs by little hands.  At night she read The Night Before Christmas  or The Grinch out loud, when she wasn’t attending school concerts to listen to her children sing or play the instrument of the year. 

Like everyone else at that time of year she also shopped for gifts, sometimes at garage sales during the lean years, when old wooden sleds got a new coat of paint and doll clothes a careful wash and mending.  Finally on Christmas Eve, with the children asleep after the traditional candlelight church service, she and her husband played Mr. and Mrs. Santa and assembled, wrapped and placed gifts by the lights of the Christmas tree, pleased with all they’d managed to do.

By Christmas morning, of course, she was exhausted.  It happens, even at  Christmas.  After the cranberry bread was served, the gifts opened, the merriment at  a lower key, she had one more joyful ritual to look forward to. 

She read her Christmas novel.

You see, somewhere along the way, the young woman’s husband happened to buy a novel for her Christmas stocking.  The family lived where there was no bookstore, but when one of the few gift shops in town added a shelf of books, he wandered in and asked for a recommendation.  The novel, Shanna, was by a new author, Kathleen Woodiwiss, not at all the kind of novel the young woman had read before.

But that year it was the star on top of her personal Christmas tree.  

Now every year during the Christmas season, my husband reminds me of that starry-eyed mom.   He laughs at the way I retreated into Shanna and all the other novels that followed through the years.  I remember that Christmas well, of course.  The utter fascination with someone else’s life.  The much-needed retreat into a quiet space inside my imagination–and the author’s.  The thrill of escaping into my own new world as my children escaped into theirs.

Books for Christmas.   And never, at any time as I read that first Christmas novel, did I think that perhaps, one day, I might write my own.

I still believe in books for Christmas.  Not because now  I write them and hope for sales.  Because I know that the simplest story can transform a life, even for an afternoon.   And if we give a book we’ve loved?  Then we’ve said something about ourselves.  We’ve shared a point of view, a different look at the world, a treasured memory.

I no longer need a new novel at Christmas.  My bedside is piled high with books I want to read, and the holiday is no longer the exhausting race to the finish line that it once was. Now I live in a city with bookstores everywhere, but I’m always grateful to be given a new book anyway.  A book I might never have tried on my own.  A book that meant something to the person who chose it for me. 

I hope this year you’re given the gift of a book, as well.  If someone loves you that much, if you’re that lucky, don’t feel a bit of guilt.  Take it from one who knows.  Put your feet up on Christmas afternoon and savor it.

Booklover Carols are becoming a tradition here.  You’ll find links to last year’s tongue-in-cheek carols at the bottom.  This year we have to honor the ” talk of the publishing world” with its very own selection.  Plus, as we run out to buy last minute gifts, let’s not forget our favorite independent bookstore, which will quickly vanish if we don’t support them.

So without further introduction and my best holiday wishes.

The Little E-Reader
(sung to the tune of The Little Drummer Boy)

Come, they told me
Pa-rum pum pum pum
A new technology
Pa-rum pum pum pum
No paper to be seen
Pa-rum pum pum pum
A story on a screen
Pa-rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum

Fifty books we need
Pa-rum pum pum pum
When we read

Kindle, Sony
Pa-rum pum pum pum
They feel so phony
Pa-rum pum pum pum
I want to turn a page
Pa-rum pum pum pum
Don’t care if they’re the rage
Pa-rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum

Ignore the corporate greed
Pa-rum pum pum pum
When you read

Trees are treasures
Pa-rum pum pum pum
Chopped down for pleasures
Pa-rum pum pum pum
When e’er you load a Nook
Pa-rum pum pum pum
No tree perished for that book
Pa-rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum

Story is the thing to heed
Pa-rum pum pum pum
When we read

I’ll Shop There For Christmas
(sung to the tune of I’ll Be Home For Christmas)

 I’ll shop there for Christmas
You can count on me
Please wrap Poe with misletoe
To place beneath my tree

Christmas Eve will find me
Where bestsellers gleam
I’ll shop there for Christmas
If only in my dreams

I’ll shop there for Christmas
I can count on you
You know where to find Jane Eyre
And Dan Brown’s latest, too.

Christmas Eve will find me
Where “for rent” signs gleam
I’ll still shop there for Christmas
If only in my dreams

Booklover Carols Part One

Booklover Carols Part Two

“If the only prayer you said in your whole life was thank you, that would be enough.”  ~Meister Eckhart 

“We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.”  ~Thornton Wilder 

“On Thanksgiving Day, we acknowledge our dependence.” ~William Jennings Bryan

“Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.” ~William Arthur Ward (more…)