Month: November 2019

We had a big change this week in my family.  Meet Scruff and Poots:

So, Scruff (short for Scruffy) is the little love on the left.  Poots (which is short for Pootsen) is on the right.  Poots’ name got shortened because my youngest child kept leaving the “s” off the cat’s name and it sounded like we had named the cat after a certain Russian despot. As I mentioned in my Instagram post, I really miss Digger, my beloved cat of 18 years.  But it’s fun to have kittens again.

Another week, another piece about Carrie Fisher.

Taffy Brodesser-Akner is one of my favorite longform journalists.  Her article about Tom Hanks was no exception to the awesomeness I’ve come to expect from her.

I’m also a big fan of Michael Chabon and this essay The Final Frontier was beautiful.

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Listening: I’ve documented my love for Gregory Alan Isakov pretty well in the pages of this blog.  I was happy to see this from APM’s “Live From Here”:

Reading:  I’m reading Priscilla Paton‘s “Where Privacy Dies.”  And I’m loving it.  Priscilla’s a friend, but I’m loving her voice. (And I’m also loving the fact that she’s asked me to beta read the sequel to her debut novel!)

Writing Life: My alarm on my cell phone is currently set for 5 AM every morning.  And on Monday … I heeded its call.  The rest of the week?  Not so much.  I have a lot of things that I need to accomplish, so I need to turn the tide on this, but at the same time I am fairly tired most of the time and … yeah.  I need to think about how I can do all of the things.

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What is Friday Fare? As a recap, on Fridays I post link love to the various bits of arcane shiz I discover on the Interwebs.  I liken it to a glimpse into my mind, but without the 80s song lyrics or mental cobwebs.

Well, I’m back from Bouchercon and back in time for the first snow in my town and fighting off the last vestiges of what I thought was a sinus infection, but seems to be a garden variety, phlegm-producing cold.  I’ve been pissed off at myself that I’ve been ignoring the chunks of time that I’ve put in my calendar to go to the gym, but then I realize … I really can’t breathe properly right now and I’m hacking up lung cookies.  Maybe they don’t want me at the gym? Probably not.  I’ll work off the Halloween candy that I’ve been stealing from my kids next week.

I have so much to process from Bouchercon and a list of “to-dos” (that I originally said I’d have done by Wednesday … ha!).  Look for more posts in the coming weeks – people I met, books that are now on my list (or in my 20 lb. box), etc.

I’m an unabashed Carrie Fisher / Princess Leia fan.  I loved Carrie Fisher for her blunt honesty about depression and addiction.  I remember reading “Postcards from the Edge” when I was way too young to realize / understand its contents, but even then my brain grasped her brilliant talent and biting wit.  (And now I realize, I really should read Postcards again.)  It turns out that Fisher’s daughter Billie Lourd is just as talented as a writer.  Time Magazine featured an essay by Lourd that memorializes her daughter and her journey in becoming Princess Leia’s keeper. The last line made me cry.

This piece features favorite songs reimagined as book covers. It’s awesome.

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Watching: I got to watch Olivia Wilde’s “Booksmart” on my flight from ORD to DFW.  It’s a coming-of-age story about two best friends and their last night before high school graduation.  The dialogue is whip-smart and whereas I am now old enough to be the mom in these “coming of age” stories, I couldn’t help but remember my high school friends and I.  How lucky I was (and am) to have them. It’s a great movie.

Reading:  First and foremost – a disclosure.  I shipped 20 pounds worth of books back to Minnesota from Bouchercon.  I haven’t even opened the box yet, because I don’t want to see the expression on my husband’s face when he sees my haul.  But beyond the AMAZING amount of books netted, I had a really weird moment of symmetry / destiny on my recent Bouchercon trip.  I was at Content Bookstore in Northfield recently and bought a used copy of Karen Dionne’s The Marsh King’s Daughter.  This was an “it” book from a few years back and it wasn’t long into my trip and in the book itself that I realized why everyone raved about it.  It’s an intense read from beginning to its conclusion.  And … Karen Dionne was at Bouchercon.  I had no clue that she was going to be in attendance and I was thrilled to talk to her and get her to sign my copy.  I finished the book from DFW to ORD and wow … I can’t recommend the book enough.

Writing Life: What is the line from the song … I’ve got a long way to go and a short time to get there?  <– That’s pretty much my writing life right now.  Which is a blessing, but a big challenge too.  But … one that I’m up for. Attending Bouchercon was a huge inspiration and it’s time to leverage that to get my work done.

 

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What is Friday Fare? As a recap, on Fridays I post link love to the various bits of arcane shiz I discover on the Interwebs.  I liken it to a glimpse into my mind, but without the 80s song lyrics or mental cobwebs.

I’ll write more after my mind has a chance to recuperate from five days of conference learning, but wanted to share a quick picture from my Bouchercon* 2019 experience.

I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to do proper justice to my first Bouchercon, but it was a wonderful week of seeing old friends, making new ones, and making some valuable contacts in the mystery world.

Happy Monday!

– Shelley

 

*Bouchercon is a mystery convention that is named in honor of Anthony Boucher.