Books and Christmas and more

So while my Dad was at home reading mt first novel, I spent my first Christmas away from home. I was with my boyfriend of 1 yr's family. I suppose I don't have to tell you how different that was for me, how foreign some things seemed (really I was the foreign one). I gave 2 books to my boyfriends darling elderly aunts, and I signed it for them. This was a new experience for me. I took out the Mont Blanc pen my father had given me and signed my greeting and my name. The whole time my eyes were on the pen.

For me it represents my father's faith in my abilities, however meager they are. He has always believed in me and that has made all the difference.

Lately I have been having odd dreams, about heroes and masculinity and femininity and babies and things of that nature. I think last night I dreamed of a forest, although I vaguely remember it. My boyfriend tells me he had some kind of vivid dream abut gladiators or something. He normally either doesn't dream or doesn't tell me his dreams. In general he can be a very reserved person even as he is quite friendly and personable. Its an intriguing contrast.

Last night we were watching The Princess Bride. I remembered why Westley was always my favorite character. I think that is slightly related to my dreams lately of heroes.

Anyway... I have been reading lately about the sons of Noah. It is a fascinating time in history. I love the way the author of "The Heavens Before" wrote the story of Shem, father of the Semites. The one thing that is difficult is the pronunciation of the characters names. I read one part about the prophecy of the serpent biting the woman's heel and her offspring crushing the serpent's head, and it gave me chills. The author's depiction of Shem is stunning, much like Westley in "The Princess Bride." Its like John Eldridge states in "Wild at Heart" and "Epic," we all long for adventures for heroes, and for a cause...

But anyway, "Before the Heavens" is a wonderful novel and you ought to read it if you are so inclined. After this I will be reading "Sons of Encouragement" by Francine Rivers and Paul's Epistle to the Romans with the young adults at my church. And of course, many loved ones will be reading my first novel this month.

MY NEW BOOK IS OUT: THE RED ENVELOPE

So since I havent written in this blog since before I moved out, back when all of the family sadness was going on, I doubt if any readers are still subscribed.

If you are though, check this out! My book (the one I has such a time with and commented about on this blog) is written!!!

it is available at the Christian Book distributers, at Barnes and Noble and at Wine Press Publisher's website!!!!

It's late, but Les Miserables is the best novel ever written.

This week has been a crappy one. Loss of job (and thereby income), average GRE scores (much lower than my target score), loneliness, stress of getting 12 Christmas gifts for loved one, stress of getting into grad school, stress of finding a new job. . . I could go on but I've pretty much been stressed out about my future, even though I KNOW that God has a plan for my life.

It just so happens that I noticed my favorite book Les Miserables by Victor Hugo on my bookshelf last Friday. And it just so happens that I picked it up after a decade of not reading it, and it just so happens that I fell in love with it all over again.

It is the best book ever written. It shows how one good deed done not for the sake of man, but for God can have repercussions that span generations. That is, a middle-aged newly released prisioner comes into a new town, is turned away from everyone in town except for the local priest. The local priest takes him in, and, when stolen from reacts in love, giving him the items that were stolen.

This stirs the man, who sets out to make a good, pious life for himself. Ever present in front of the man are his failures, his sins. He seeks out to act rightly and does so. In the process he takes in Cosette. The little orphan girl grows up and is raised to love and revere God, the church and her father. And through a glance, she falls in love.

I don't know why the story of Cosette and Marius moves me so much. They are youths, he 20 and she 16 when they fall in love. He a historian-lawyer-rebel and she a quiet daughter. They exchange glances at the park and he pursues her. When the insurrection of 1832 causes them to be separated, the father brings them back together.

Jean Valjean is my favorite character now. Back when I was 15, I thought Marius was the best. However, now I see that Jean Valjean is the best character because he truly shows not only what it means to be redeemed, and reconciled with Christ, but what it means to love.

Its late and this isn't well written, but Jean Valjean gives up his own security so that his adopted daughter may be loved. That is an example what Christ has done for each of us. It is completely laudable. One day I will have to write a better review on this masterpiece of fiction.

Weddings and Murder

So over this weekend I babysat and read Melody Carlson's "Three Weddings and a Bar Mitzvah." This book is the final book in the 4 books series 86 Bloomsberg Place. In my opinion, it was one of the strongest in the series. Lelani and Gil are getting married, Gil's sister Ana is having difficulties at work and in love, her housemate Megan's boyfriend just up and leaves her for a mission trip to Africa with next to no notice, and crazy Kendall is marrying her Maui Man. Throughout the whole book the girls struggle with patience and communicating (in life who doesn't)? I believe that many Church pew Christians will identify with Megan and Ana, while many of those trying to figure out how to balance life will identify with Kendall and Lelani.

For my self it was a hard book to read, simply because I began this series a year or so ago while in a dating relationship, and ended up reading the last book of this series single, with no prospects at all. I think I most closely identified with Ana, although my mother and I have a wonderful relationship. I kind of wish that there would be a spin off series with Ana, Megan and their men. I could go on, but I'll just shut up and give Mrs. Carlson a Gold Star!

As for "Midnight in Madrid" by Noel Hynd, this is the type of novel that I would relate more too in away because I am single. Although it kind of makes me glad I'm single. Single people can go off and have adventures while those married are tied to their apartment and responsibilities. In the first book, Alex LaDuca loses someone who she loves with her life, and in the second book she is on vacation recovering from said loss when artistic disaster strikes. The suspense kept me turning pages every night this weekend and made me wish I had mastered all of the languages I took in college. Many murders later, we realize that Alex might just be ok after all. Gold Star Mr. Hynd for a novel that was as entertaining as it was encouraging.

Both of these novels show that love changes us. God's love is there all along, and sometimes he brings godly men into our lives to love, and sometimes he doesn't bring a spouse, but a people we care deeply for. Either way, God's love sets us free.

High School Humiliation week & books

So Anne and May, those lovely ladies who wrote A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS asked people what their most humiliating moments were in high school. Well, I thought about it for 2 days and then this morning it came to me, and I was even more embarrassed. Notice the picture, its me 15, in 10th grade at my surprise quinceanera. Notice I'm not wearing a lame gown. That was 2001.

You see, my sister and I used to take the bus. I used to sit next to a cute kid who I didn't think was "Christian" enough to date. We became bus-buddies though & I guess you could say and he always knew who I was crushing on and resented them for it. As it happens, a family from my church, took in a foreign exchange student from Ecuador (this is not to be confused with the foreign exchange student from my freshman year Spanish class I mentioned on Camy Tangs website). This boy was tall, way cute, and an upperclassman. He often wore a jean jacket, a white sweater and was the Antonio Banderas version of Eric Matthews from Boy Meets World (in my humble opinion).

Anyway, so 10th grade was the year I was all into poetry, ok, I was always into poetry. Well, I wrote him a poem. and I showed it to my bus-buddy. I didn't title it or anything, and all I remember are the lines, "Hero from across the sea, came to sit in front of me." Yeah, it was that bad. Bus-buddy laughed, and then stood up and said "Hey Eric Banderas (I can't remember his real name), Mandy wrote a poem about you!"

I tore it out of his hands, but for the rest of the ride home it was "Oooo your eyes are so dark and dreamy," or "oooo your my latin lover from across the ocean."

So there you have it. One of my most humiliating moments in high school. I have a bunch, though, and most involved foreigner exchangers. Oh and this week we're reading: Midnight in Madrid by Noel Hynd

Do you cry when a character in a book dies?

Ok so this weekend I read Noel Hynd's novel "Conspiracy in Kiev" as you'll note from my last post. And while there was no sex (yay I won the bet!) there was a lot of flirting and bantering back and forth between characters. There were jealous boyfriend's, and jealous Ukrainian mobsters...and death. I mean you have to have death in a political/spy thriller right? I expected certain characters to die, or be kidnapped, but of course Mr. Hynd pulls a fast one on me. A totally unsuspected death in the novel.

And the most surprising thing out of the whole day was not that one character died. No, no, the most surprising thing to me was the fact that when I came home from bringing James (a 4 month old we have in our home now) from the doctor, my sister was up in our room all emotional about a character who died in a series she was reading! And since I hadn't yet read the death of the character in Hynd's novel, I was a jerk. I mean my sister is reading a YA series, Cirque du Freak or something like that and is almost done the series. A major character dies. All day she was complaining, "How could the author do this?" And of course I have to be a professional jerk and say, "Well you know, authors are really thinking of the story arc and character development and how could this one character develop if this other character was holding his hand the whole time?"

Is it silly to cry over fake people? See, I view it this way: we will never know the lives of FBI guys or Secret Service or CIA people, so in a way, when I get upset over the death of a character in a novel, I'm thinking: there is a chance that one of these patriots has died like this or in a similar way; and: isn't the world so unfair?

This is only one of the many reasons why my mother only reads memoirs and biographies. When she gets upset over characters in books, she wants it to be real people she has learned about and formed an attachment too, not fake people.

I give this book a Gold Star, not only for the emotional response it invoked, but because of a particular character's faith in God and the theme of long-suffering through out the novel. Bravo!

Now Showing...

I went to see the Broadway musical "Chicago" with my sister on my last night in New York. Balcony seats. It was marvelous, even if Jerry Springer was playing the lawyer Billy Flynn. I loved the whole experience. Although it bothers me that no one dresses up to go to the theater any more, not to the nines, especially those in the cheap seats, like we were. My sister and I were raised to wear black to the theater, so if you have to get up in the middle of the performance, you're not noticable (My family is big on theater, books and movies). Anyway, people were in sundresses, which is ok, you made an effort, but jeans-shorts? Come on. Respect the arts. They put in hours of practice into it, I think you can look a little bit nice in return, right?

Anyway, in other news, my books came in the mail!!! I'm very excited to read "Little Earthquakes" by Jennifer Weiner, "This Side of Married" by Rachel Pastan, and "Vintage Jesus" by Mark Driscoll this week. The first two are lighthearted reads that use the city of Philadelphia as their setting while the third book is a book about Jesus. I'll have a review for you next week on how they went!

And hopefully I'll have heard about Milwaukee by next Tuesday.

Day of Typewriter!

So, I e-mail the 1st half of my mystery manuscript to a certain publisher for him to take a look at. With any luck, I will be published next year.

Thinking about this while straightening my hair this morning made me think of the beginning of my writing asperations.

I first wanted to become a writer in Miss. Murphy's second grade class. My first ever story was about my cat Rainbow.

After this I wrote stories about my school in a black and white composition book. I changed all the names of course (I knew about libel at a young age somehow) and they all pretty much ended in some one being converted to Christianity in a way that John Wesley would die for.

I think my writing got muddled for a while after I spent a couple years reading Sandra Cisneros and Julia Alveraz. I thought hispanic writing ought to look a certain way, so I tried to immitate it. This is also around the time my father found this 1932 Corona typewriter and gave it to me for my 10 birthday. I wrote 4 pretty amazing stories about Maria, Jesus and Theresa living in Spanish Harlem. These are the only stories I like from this era of my writing. And yes, Maria and Jesus are Mary and Jesus. They make a special appearance and convert Theresa's family. I swear some times I should have been a Catholic.

Next up comes stories filled with teen angst. I think its because when I was 12 and 1/2 my grandfather died and then there were all kinds of family drama. My writing reflects that in an amplified way. Characters were being pushed down stairs, disowned, abandoned in diners full of wilting flowers... Actually, I wrote a pretty good stage play from all this. I used The Godfather as a template but the story is entirely my own. Its about a man who marries the wrong woman. Very dramatic.

After this my stories died down a bit, and I spent almost all of college writing poetry. I wrote one story, OK two, but my heart wasn't in them. Then I got into mysteries. Enough said.

Day of Sopping Wet Rain Race

It rained for all of ten minutes about two hours ago and my sister and I were right in the middle of it. We ran all the way from our front door to the truck, and boy were we soaked. Then we went to 7-11 and became even soaked-er. By the time we reached the house and our room we were a sopping mess.

Which reminded me of Jane Austen's book Sense and Sensibility. The part where the girl played by Kate Winslet (and her eyebrows) gets caught in the rain and has to stay at the eligible bachelor's house? Ok, so I didn't read this book, but I do own the movie.

In fact I hate Pride and Predjudice. I never read Persuasion, Northanger Abbey or Mansfield Park. I did read Emma though. I love that book, the BBC verson AND the 1995 movie "Clueless."

Anyway, I just wanted to post and update saying I'm glad to be in the house reading "A Walk with Jane Austen: A Journey into Adventure, Love & Faith" by Lori Smith. I'm thinking of my summer plans. I'm so excited to be doing something different.

And don't worry, I do plan to write while I'm in NJ.