Virgin River's Christmas tree

One of my favourite series to read is the Virgin River series from Robyn Carr, and I am not alone in loving it. I am sure I heard something somewhere which said that there was a community in America who have taken the idea of honouring the armed forces with the Christmas decorations on their town square and made it their own.

This quote comes from pages 88-90 of Bringing Me Home for Christmas by Robyn Carr pages 88-90

The cutting of the Virgin River Christmas tree was an all-day affair that involved way more spectators than actual woodsmen. First, there was hunting for the tree - a thirty-foot fir high in the mountains. Becca watched from the truck the entire time. Then there was the cutting down. She would've expected that to take seconds, but it took a very long time and involved pulleys and ropes and chain saws. Next came the netting and dragging of the tree along barely visible old logging roads. Only big pickups with four-wheel-drive ventured back into the thickest part of the forest.

Once the tree was dragged as far as a main road, a local builder, Paul Haggerty, and his crew met it with a big flatbed truck and their hydraulic gear to lift it and haul it the rest of the way. By the time the tree made it to Virgin River, it was dark, but half the town seemed to be present to look at the catch, so to speak. There was lots of "oohing" and "aahing" going on.

On Saturday the tree was erected - a process that took many hands and more of Paul Haggerty's equipment and men.

"The first time we brought a tree this size into town, it was just Jack, Preacher and Mike Valenzuela standing it up," Mel told Becca."During the night, it fell down. Thankfully not on the bar."

Becca sat on Jack's porch between Mel and Paige. They all held hot drinks. Her eyes grew large at the prospect of that huge tree falling on the bar. "Should we move?" she asked.

Mel just laughed. "I think that now Paul's on board with this project, we're in pretty good hands. And I think your brother and his friends are kind of enjoying this. Too bad they won't see it completely decorated."

"That must take a long time," Becca said.

"A day or day and a half, and at least one cherry picker," Mel told her.

It was past noon before that tree was upright and stable. Mel and Paige were back and forth to the porch, taking children in and outside. By afternoon, a couple of cherry pickers had arrived and the stringing of the lights commenced.

Becca was surprised she wasn't frozen to the bone, but she couldn't stand to miss a second of this process.  And neither could anyone else! Townsfolk came and went throughout the day, everyone with a new opinion  about the tree. By then, night was falling, although it was only about five, and Jack and Denny were fastening up the last of the lights.

Cars and trucks were pulling into town. Becca gave a wave to Noah Kincaid and his family. Connie and Ron walked across the street from The Corner Store. Lorraine Thickson arrived in a beat-up old pickup with a passel of kids stuffed into it. No husband and father, she noticed. Becca sat up a little straighter as she saw Denny in the cherry-picker basket, going up up up to the top of the huge tree. Mel and Paige came back outside; their kids ran into the street. Everyone seemed to sense that culmination was near.

Denny fussed with the top of the tree, then the cherry picker lowered him to the ground again. Jack must have connected the electricity, because the tree came alive! Light twinkled all over the giant fir and on the very top was a star that positively brightened the sky! There was a collective "aww" in the crowd and as the night grew dark and the lights bright, there was silence. People seemed motionless.

Then magic happened - a gentle snow began to fall.

"Unbelievable," Becca whispered to no one. "Amazing." She felt her eyes water from the sheer beauty of the moment. Then the tree went dark and, after her eyes adjusted a bit, she noticed people beginning to disperse.

Suddenly Denny was beside her, scooting his chair close. "You okay?" he asked.

"Sure," she said, wiping at her eyes. "It was just so emotional - seeing all the work done and so many people turn out.

"Its far from done. There are ornaments and trim still to do. The official lighting is tomorrow night, after the rest of it is decorated. It takes half the town to get it done." He grabbed her hand and squeezed it. "You're going to love it. Too bad the boys can't stay for that."

And then from page 104

And that tree - a town project - was awesome. Finally done, it was trimmed with red, white and blue balls, laminated military unit badges and strung with gold tinsel. It was gorgeous in daylight; it would be magnificent lit against the night sky.

Teaser Tuesday: Every Secret Thing by Emma Cole

Susanna Kearsley is one of my favourite author discoveries over the last few years, and this book is by her, even though it was originally published under the different author name of Emma Cole.

My teaser comes from page 79

In all the years I'd known her she had always seemed the same, the constant point around which my own world, chaotic as it was, revolved. And with the selfish eyes of youth, I'd only viewed her from the angle that applied to me - she was my grandmother, not Georgie Murray, woman in her own right. I supposed that she hadn't been really allowed to be plain Georgie Murray for years, not since she'd been twenty-five, when she had married Grandpa. After that she'd always been somebody's wife, somebody's mother, someone's grandmother. In fact, she'd always filled that role so perfectly I'd never stopped to wonder what she might have been before all that ... when she was my own page.

Teaser Tuesday is hosted by Miz B at Should Be Reading. Head on over to find out all about it, and how to join in! 

Anticipating Christmas

I was as guilty as everyone else in my desire to pretend nothing was happening at Camp Nine, and with my first sight of an autumn leaf in October, I welcomed the thoughts of Christmas vacation that began creeping into my head. The reedy, echoing sound of a woodpecker indicated the thinning of the air that foretold coming holidays even before the landscape changed. These sight and sounds primed me to drift away from my lessons, down deep into a fantasy of the boxes Mother kept up the dark stairs in our gloomy attic, which was illuminated by a solitary four-paned window through which light barely filtered. While my teacher deadened my reality by scratching fractions on the chalkboard, my mind climbed the stairs with anticipation, searching among the dusty cardboard boxes stuffed with satin Hallowween costumes, baby toys, and clothes since discarded, until I found the holy grail of the season - the glittery glass ornaments and velvet skirt for our tree.

It seemed to snow more then than now, and, too young to appreciate the difficulty that accompanied the occasional dumping of heavy snow, I was always enchanted by it. Along with a welcome snowfall, Christmas was a time for special treats, like the multi-colored iced molasses cookies baked each morning by Mrs. Capps down the road and the oranges Mother ordered for me from New Orleans.

Today's quote comes from Camp Nine by Vivienne Schiffer.

I can't help wonder what the equivalent to oranges is now. It is often said that the children of the past looked forward to an exotic treat each Christmas when they all got an orange.

Kommandant's Christmas memories

Today's quote comes from page 303 of Kommandant's Girl. These memories come from the Kommandant himself.

"Christmas is coming," he says at last. he sounds as if the realization has only just occurred to  him, though I had mentioned the holidays in his office earlier in the day.

"Just a few days away," I reply. I might have forgotten the holiday myself, but for the sprigs of fir and red bows that Krysia has placed around the house in lieu of a tree. The city, usually festive with displays in the window shops and the aroma of holiday treats, was virtually unadorned this year.

 "Christmas was such a grand affair in our house," he says. For a moment, I wonder if he is speaking of his life with Margot, but he continues, "Our father would take us on a midnight sleigh ride through the woods to search for the Weinachtsmann, whom we believed would bring the Christmas gifts." He walks over to the sofa and sits down beside me. "We never found him, of course, but would come back to the house to find that he had sneaked in while we were gone to the house to find that he had sneaked in while we were gone to leave us wonderful presents. And the next morning, the breakfast table was always piled high with cakes." He smiles, his expression almost childlike.

"That sounds lovely," I say. My mind races to come up with a story about my childhood Christmases, in case he asks.

Sandy's Christmas wish

Today's quote comes from Jill Shalvis' novella Kissing Santa Claus which was published in the Small Town Christmas anthology.

What hadn't helped her was the costume she now had on over her sexy little red dress., complete with a stuffed belly and butt, white beard and wig, red fur-lined hat, and the final touch, thick wire-rimmed glasses.

Santa Claus.

From outside her office and down the hall, there was only silence. The party had emptied out, leaving her alone in the building. Tomorrow night, Christmas Eve, everyone in town would be here for the annual Christmas parade, Santa would head up in the same 1972 Buick convertible, aka rust bucket, that they'd been using for years. The evening would culminate at the end of the pier, with all the kids lining up to sit on Santa's lap so they could whisper their holiday wish.

Sandy's wish, if anyone had asked, would be that Anderson hadn't caught the flu so he could play Santa as planned. She'd tried to get a last minute replacement, oh how she'd tried. But Jax Cullen, Lucky Harbor's mayor, was master of ceremonies of the parade. Ford Walker and resident hottie had taken his new fiancee to Palm Springs for a holiday getaway. Sandy's third and final choice, Sherriff Sawyer Thompson, was going to be on duty at the parade, handling crowd control.

There was no one else to ask, which panicked Sandy. No one but her... She took her roll of town clerk very seriously...but this was going over and above the call of duty. Yet all she could think of was the kids of Lucky Harbor, and how disappointed they'd be without Santa. Dammit. She sighed and took one last look at herself. She did actually look a little bit like Santa, albeit a very short one.

Weekend Cooking: And I don't even like Brussel sprouts!

Jules was in the zone. Every move she made - bend, open the lowboy, grab ingredients, swirl them in to the pan, toss them over the leaping flame with a flick of her wrist  - flowed naturally. Her mind was a perfect, beautiful blank, empty of everything but the next order, and the one after that, and the one after that, an endless line of rib eye, mid-well, no mushrooms in the garnish; Brussel sprouts side, heavy on the bacon; two lamb chops, normal; a porterhouse, bloody....

She dipped and whirled, leaning up to grab a clean saute pan to reheat the sprouts, and instinctively curved her body inward to avoid Winslow as he spun a set of dirty pans toward the dishwashing station on the back wall.

Flinging a handful of diced pancetta into the hot pan, she let the heat render some of the fat while she checked on her steaks. The big, heavy porterhouse was giving off enough red juice to let her know it was about done, but the rib eye needed another couple of minutes.

Spinning the porterhouse onto an individual serving platter spitting with hot butter, she put it up on the pass for  a runner to grab and take up to the window, then turned back to her sizzling bacon.

Jules stirred the bits of salt-cured meat around, then added the baby Brussel sprouts. As she watched them dance in the molten spiced pork fat, she thought about how much she'd hated these vegetables when she was a kid. her mom had sure never cooked sprouts this way.

Okay, granted - Victoria Cavanaugh pretty much never cooked at all, if she could talk a man into taking her out instead, but still. Jules was a connoisseur of public school lunches and diner specials, and none of them had made Brussel sprouts like this, either.

One of the first things Winslow did every day when he got to the restaurant and started to prep for dinner service was to crank the oven up high and roast a big batch of the tiny green orbs. When he spread them out on a hotel pan, they looked like miniature cabbages, their tightly furled leaves shiny with oil.

When he pulled them out of the oven half an hour later? The were shrivelled and golden, the edges of the tender leaves cured and caramelized to a tasty, dark brown crispness.

He let them cool on the rack, then put them in a container, and when Jules came in to set up her mise en place for the night, she always made sure to keep the sprouts close at hand. They were one of the restaurant's specialties, and she could count on putting out at least twenty orders of sprouts on a busy night like tonight.

Thank God for Friday, indeed. It was the one night they could count on doing at least one full turn, fifty covers, and sometimes even more once the posttheater crowd has a chance to make it from Times Square down to Greenwich village.

Seasoning the roasted sprouts with salt and pepper, Jules savoured the nutty, rich scent rising from the pan as they warmed through . While they got hot, she checked her vinaigrette - a little low - and swiftly added a generous glug of balsamic vinegar and a steady stream of olive oil, whisking like crazy. A sprinkle of chopped fresh herbs from her stash of bowls at the corner of her station, and her stock of vinaigrette was replenished.

Scraping the sprouts and crispy pancetta into a bowl, Jules drizzled them with the vinaigrette and shook the bowl to make them jump. Since she'd done new vinaigrette for this order, she grabbed a clean tasting spoon and popped one of the sprouts into her mouth.

The sharp sweetness of the balsamic vinegar burst across her tongue, and as she crunched into the sprout, she took a second to marvel at the way the little vegetable retained its deep caramel flavor and pleasingly burned edges. A warm sauce would've turned them into the limp, soggy sprouts of her youth, uninspired and unappetizing. This bright vinaigrette elevated them to another level.

A quick dash of salt, a few more turns of the pepper grinder, and the sprouts were done.

There are lots of contemporary romances in particular which combine romance with very prominent foodie themes and I have a half written Weekend Cooking post here somewhere about this very theme. I think it is something to do with the sensousness that is conveyed through the description of food that matches well with romance.

Certainly if I had Louisa Edwards doing this explanation of brussel sprouts for me regularly I would perhaps be more tempted to be brave and them again!

Weekend Cooking is hosted by Beth Fish Reads and is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs

Emmy's Christmas Eve

Today's quote comes from page 204 of You are my Only by Beth Kephart. Just to explain the context, these character are institutionalised, and yet I thought this passage about their Christmas was very poignant.

"The barn was very large," I read, from the Charlotte's Web book. "It was very old. It smelled of hay and it smelled of manure. It smelled of the persperation of tired horses and the wonderful sweet breath of patient cows. It often had a sort of peaceful smell - as if nothing bad could ever happen again in the world."

Past the rectangle of the window, snow fall, fat and wet and white. All morning, all afternoon, it has laid its whiteness down, and beyond the window, in the courtyard, the bare trees wear the red bulbs of Christmas. The sound of the weather has worked its way inside - the hush-pause and the down tick, the ache in the clock on the walls.

"Autumn." I stop. "Sweetheart, look."

But she has closed her eyes and she won't look up. "Keep reading," she says with a sigh.

"It smelled of grain and of harness dressing and of axle grease and of rubber boots and of new rope," I read on. "And whenever the cat was given a fish-head to eat, the barn would smell of fish. But mostly it smelled of hay, for there was always hay up in the great loft overhead. And there was always hay being ditched down to the cows and the horses and the sheep."

I smell Christmas Eve on Autumn's breath, the chicken pot pie that we ate with a slender wedge of cheese and a little puddle each of cranberry juice poured out in Dixie cups. Someone had bought in an old stereo and plugged it in with old-fashioned Christmas blues and we sat there, together, while Jimmy Butler sang "Trim Your Tree", and Felix Gross sang "Love for Christmas," and when Sugar Chile Robinson sang "Christmas Boogie," Wolfie took up Virgin Mary's hand in hers and a space was cleared on the tabletop and the two of them danced, Virgin Mary's eyes a million miles away, but something close and near on her lips, something like a blessing.

Christmas in Wattle Street - Hania

Today is the last of the passages that I will be sharing from Empire Day by Diane Chamberlain. This one comes from pages 292 to 294.

For weeks Hania had heard the other children talking about Christmas. Beverley and her family were going to Thirroul to visit her Aunty Tessie, but when Aunty Muriel invited Hania to go with them, her mother tried to talk her out of it.

"Christmas is a family day for Christians," she said. "You'll be out of place."

But Hania was adamant. It was bad enough missing out on the Christmas tree, the presents and festivities she loved; she wasn't going to miss out on the outing as well. Away from her mother, with Beverley and her family, she'd be able to forget she was an outsider, and feel she was part of something for once.

On the train she sat next to Beverley, her nose pressed against the grimy window as she stared out at the back of red-tiled cottages with their outdoor wooden dunnies and the skinny dogs running around and barking  in backyards. Every few minutes the train ground to a halt at another station, until finally they reached Thirroul.

Aunty Tessie, Uncle Dick and their three children lived in a fibro cottage facing the beach. They kept chooks out the back, and as soon as they arrived, all the children rushed out to see if there were any eggs. Inside, the men were arguing about football, and Uncle Bill told Hania that his brother used to play for the Butchers, the local rugby league team. There was a strong piney smell in the loungeroom where the Christmas tree stood, hung with brightly coloured paper chains, tinsel, shiny baubles, and and an angel with a silver star on top. As they stood admiring the tree, Uncle Dick said that now the cedar forests around Thirroul had been logged, read Christmas trees were hard to come by, but he'd managed to get on for the kids.

Exciting boxes and parcel wrapped in bright Christmas paper were piled under the tree. Except for the fact the tree stood in a bucket and was propped up with bricks, it reminded Hania of Christmas at her foster parent's home in Poland. Despite her mother's warning that she'd be intruding, they all made her feel as if she were part of the family, and Beverley's aunty told her to call her Aunty Tessie like the other kids did.

After the roast turkey, ham and baked potatoes, Aunty Tessie bought out a steaming Christmas pudding and warned them to eat slowly to make sure they didn't swallow the threepences she'd put inside. Beverley's little sister Daisy was the first to squeal that she'd bitten into one. Auntie Tessie had been very generous with the coins, because by the time the pudding was finished, all the children had found at least one.

When they'd finished lunch, Hania hung back while Beverley and her little sister and cousins were given their presents but, to her surprise, she hadn't been forgotten. Aunty Tessie handed her a small parcel wrapped in Christmas paper, and said "Merry Christmas, love." It was a book called Seven Little Australians. Hania was thrilled to be given the book, but the best thing about the whole day was being included.

Christmas in Wattle Street - Kath

Last week I posted a couple of Christmas based excerpts from Empire Day by Diane Chamberlain. Today and tomorrow we are going to revisit some of those same characters.

Today's quote comes from page 291

After giving Meggsie a bed bath and massaging his back and legs, Kath went into the kitchen to make the Christmas pudding. Whenever she thought about Christmas she let out a long sigh. She'd managed to scrape together a few shillings to buy the boys some comic books, socks and a cricket ball, but she'd only be able to put rabbit on the table this year - a turkey was out of the question. Lost in her thoughts, she was stirring her worries into the dough along with the sultanas, and throwing in a few silver threepences, when the doorbell rang.

She wiped her floury hands on her apron and hurried to the door, but before she got there she could hear hoarse voices singing 'Jingle Bells'. Collecting money for some charity she supposed. She opened the door and was about to say she was sorry she couldn't spare anything, when she stepped back in surprise. On her doorstep stood Mick Kelly and Bob Longley from the pub, and they were struggling with a large cardboard box.

"This fell off a truck the other day and we thought maybe you could use it," Mick said. Thrusting the box into her hands, he mumbled, "Merry Christmas, love," and before she could thank them they'd gone.

Inside the box was the biggest turkey she'd ever seen, a leg of ham, a bag of potatoes and a box of biscuits.

Kath rushed to Meggsie's room. "It's a miracle, that's what it is," she kept saying as she sat down on the edge of his bed. "We'll have a proper Christmas now. All we need is another miracle to make you well."

Library Loot: December 14 to 20

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Claire from The Captive Reader and Marg from The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries!

Phew! I am not sure why, but that no requests thing I did in November doesn't actually seem to have made much different to the number of new book I have to pick up at the library. It is always the way isn't it though  - all the requests come in at once.

Here's my loot for this week:

One Dance with a Duke by Tessa Dare - Time to start Tessa Dare's second trilogy. I really enjoyed her debut trilogy and the reviews on her latest series are good too!

The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald - This is a reread for me, and is my January book club book.

The Winding Ways Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverini - It's been an eternity since I read one of the books in this series. I have heard good things about some of the later books in the series so it  is time to get back to it.

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern - Lots of hype around this book. I had requested as soon as this book was added to the catalogue but it seems to have taken an awful long time to get to me.

Destined by PC and Kristen Cast - Why do I keep reading this series? I really don't know.

Grace and Glory by Sophie Laguna - the next book in the Grace series of Our Australian Girl books.


Share your loot by adding your link to Mr Linky below

Mistletoe Kisses

Today's quote comes from one of the stories in the Jane Austen Made Me Do It anthology. It is from page 122 and is from the story Jane Austen and the Mistletoe Kiss by Jo Beverley

Elinor laughed at that, turning to share amusement with the Austen ladies. "I'm far past the age for mistletoe kisses, I fear."

Miss Jane cocked her head. "That seems a shame, for we must be older still."

Elinor hastily apologized, but Miss Jane shook her head. "I was only teasing Mrs. Carsholt. I believe Sir Nicholas said you were thirty-six. I don't think you should refuse the mistletoe its chance.'

"Chance, ma'am?"

"Do you not know that tradition?"

"Oh, sister," said Miss Austen, as if uncomfortable with the subject.

"Cassandra doesn't approve," Miss Jane said, smiling. "She thinks it has a touch of pagan magic about it. Local tradition says that if true lovers kiss beneath a mistletoe bough, they will instantly know their devotion."

"It sounds a little pagan to me, too, Miss Jane," Elinor said, but lightly. "And perhaps overly romantical."

"If by romantical you speak of men and women forming true matches based on love, does that not happen all the time?"

Maria spoke, with the disastrous honesty of a young child. "Did you never find your true love through the mistletoe bough, ma'am?"

"Maria!" Elinor chided, but Miss Austen replied.

"I did, my dear, but it was not to be. However, to experience true love is better than not, and one can always imagine a story with a different ending."

Teaser Tuesday: Lost and Found by Marilyn Harris

Not too long ago a couple of my Goodreads pals were reading the Eden series by this author, and they were all raving about them. My library didn't have any of Marilyn Harris' books at all, and even through inter-library loan there are only a couple of her books available, and only one of the series (and it isn't the first one in the series) and so I decided that I would start with this book from her.

The teaser comes from page 74:

She looked back to see Harold Shoda still staring at her as though she'd grown another head. "Are you coming?"

"Why, yes," he muttered, and took his troubled expression all the way to the door, where he extended a hand to the county coroner, a rail-thin man with a small black bag.

"Mr Dixon," he said, and introduced him to Florence, who assumed the pose and posture of the grieving widow and thrust her handkerchief to her lips, though truth be known she was thinking less about poor Stanley and more about poor Florence....

Teaser Tuesday is hosted by Miz B at Should Be Reading. Head on over to find out all about it, and how to join in! 

A Wartime Evacuee's Christmas

Today's quote comes from The Very Thought of You by Rosie Alison, which is the story of a young girl who is evacuated from war time London to a big house in the country.

Some of the evacuees never got letters, but they still could not resist hovering on the outside edge of the letter crowd with forlorn eyes. Yet even for those who were remembered, there was still a dull ache of homesickness which never really eased, running like a buried river through their daily lives.

December, in particular, was a time when many of the children grew sad, and in the years to come, Anna would never forget her wartime Christmases so far from home. But she would remember, too, how generous the Ashtons were, always making sure that every evacuee had a gift under the tree. And how on Christmas Day itself they all shared a hearty lunch, with the rare treat of roast chicken and crispy potatoes, with plenty more vegetables from the grounds.

Yet none of those consolotions could ever quite staunch the Christmas night tears in the dormitories. The remembrance of home, of mothers, of fathers. The emotional wasteland of their lives without them. It would take years for many of them to dare to love again.

Sunday Salon: BTL Live!

Today Bree from All the Books I Can Read and I were lucky enough to be part of a group of Melbourne bloggers who visited the headquarters of Penguin Australia! The event was BTLLive! - an opportunity to showcase the YA titles that are going to be published by Penguin in the coming six months or so, and I have to tell you, there are some fun titles coming out!

In case you are wondering BTL stands for Between the Lines which is the name of the YA publicity team at Penguin. You can check out their blog here.

The morning started with a live chat with Marie Lu, author of the book Legend which has been recently released here and is receiving some good reviews! Apart with having to deal with the delay each time a question was asked and answered the cross was a lot of fun, and it was great to have the opportunity to discuss a book and it's sequel in that way with the author.

Marie talked about where the idea for Legend came from, the movie adaptation which is the book, the characters in the book and so much more! The idea for the book was inspired by watching Les Miserables and also from wondering what the world would look like if the sea levels rose around the world due to the melting of the polar ice caps!

She also said that in the second book in the series we would see more of the impact of the environmental changes around the world rather than just in Los Angeles which is where Legend is set. That did lead to a very important question for those of us in the room - Does Australia exist in this new world? The short answer is not as we know it now!

Other questions she answered were in relation to her favourite reads of the moment, how her main characters evolved, her reading background which consists mainly of spec fic reads and a lot more!

The second guest for the day was Gabrielle Williams who is an Australian author. Her previous book was Beatle Meets Destiny and her next book which is going to be released in February is called The Reluctant Hallelujah. I really enjoyed listening to Gabrielle as she talked through the amazing writing process that she went through for this book (she basically wrote a chapter a day thanks to the hard driving encouragement of her husband), and how that writing process was made easier as she worked through the various elements that have come to make up the story. Some of the particular inspirations for the book included her own children and also a famous, famous movie which includes a main character called Dorothy and some characters who are missing some parts!

Gab Williams talked about her background in advertising, about the fact that the book most likely won't be picked up in America due to the irreverent nature of the subject matter (the cover might give a little clue about some of that aspect), about her previous manuscripts, about being a very character driven writer and also a few little details about her next book after this one!

The third part of the official proceeding was a look at some of the upcoming titles. Here are just some of the covers for books that were talked about!

Other titles included:

Losing It by Julia Lawrinson
A Million Suns by Beth Revis
Dark Eyes by William Richter
Immortal City by Scott Speer
Disharmony by Leah Giarratano

There was a lot of excitement in the room for the Kirsty Eager and Leah Giarratano books, as well as the release later in 2012 of Isla and the Happy Ever After by Stephanie Perkins.

There were several other books also mentioned during the day as well, but this is already quite the long list!

There was also an unofficial part of the day where there was going to be a video made to be sent to John and Hank Green, but I have had a headache since yesterday and so it was time to go home for me!

Special thanks to the BTL team from Penguin both for the day, and for the loot we picked up (both of which will count towards the Australian Women Writer's Challenge that I will be participating in in 2012 so you will hear more about them then). It was also awesome to catch up with some Melbourne bloggers I already knew, but also to meet some new ones!

I look forward to attending another BTL Live day in the future!

John Baxter's first French Christmas

For last week's Weekend Cooking post I reviewed John Baxter's Immovable Feast: A Paris Christmas. My quote today comes from that book and is describing the author's first French Christmas with his new extended family.

This quote comes from page 19:

With Jean-Paul present, the meal could begin. A few minutes later, he took his place at the head of the table, and the other dozen guests arranged themselves, with me at the foot.

The marathon of Christmas dinner commenced.

I'd been warned what to expect. After the foie gras, we'd be enjoying white boudin veal sausage  with fried apple, then roast pintade - or guinea fowl - a grating dauphinois of sliced potatoes baked with cheese and cream, accompanied by green beans and carrots, followed by cheese, and Francoise's twenty-five-egg mousse - each course with its wine, including champagne with the dessert.

The goose liver was delicious enough for one to spare little thought for the poor bird that produced it.We smeared it into fresh white pain,, larger brother of the more familiar baguette, washing it down with '84 Bordeaux from Madame's own cave - which was literally cave, hollowed out of the rock on which this house was built.

The women never stopped handing around plates, offering more foie gras, and returning to the kitchen for bread or cornichons. Jean-Paul exchanged a few phlegmatic words with Jean=Marie, then fell silent. From time to time he would tilt a wine bottle away from him and stare at the label, as if it might have changed miraculously into a better year.

Page 19 - Immoveable Feast - A Paris Christmas

Weekend Cooking: Sunbird by Neil Gaiman

Sunbird is one of the short stories in the Fragile Things short story collection by Neil Gaiman that I finished reading at the end of October as part of the readalong during RIP VI. Now you would have thought after 8 weeks of posts about this short story collection that I wouldn't have much more to say about it, but you would be wrong!

I do have to warn you though, these quotes are not really our standard Weekend Cooking fare, but I thought they were fun so I had to share them.

Let's meet the members of the Epicurean Club. First there is Augustus TwoFeathers McCoy ("big enough for three men, who ate enough for four men and drank enough for five"), also Professor Mandalay ("who drank nothing but water, and who ate doll-sized portions from plates the size of saucers"), and the food and restaurant critic Virginia Boote (""who had once been a great beauty but was now a grand and magnificent ruin, and who delighted in her ruination"). The fourth member of the club was Jackie Newhouse ("who had both broken his share of hearts and eaten his share of great dishes") and rounding out the group is Zebediah T Crawcrustle (flat out broke, drunken and yet he "ate with more appetite than any of them").

After running through a list of the many exotic foods that they have eaten including flash froze mammoth and Patagonion Giant sloths ("if we had but gotten to the mammoth earlier"), beetles ("when you've tasted one beetle you've tasted them all"), vultures ("tasted like rotten pheasant") the group come to the conclusion that they have eaten just about everything there is to eat:

We have scaled the heights of gastronomy, we have plunged down into the depths of gustation. We have become cosmonauts exploring undreamed of worlds of delectation and gourmanderie. 

Augustus declares that it might be time to close the Epicurean club if there are no exceptional foodie experiences left when Zebediah suggests that there is one great experience that they have left untried - the Sunbird. So all the club members head off to Cairo and set the plans in motion to catch the Sunbird.

After successfully catching it, the plan is to cook it in what is a suspiciously tongue in cheek representation of any barbecue that you might attend, including a Kiss the Cook apron!

I can't tell you what happens precisely, but it surprising, especially when you realise that another name for the sunbird might be the more familiar name of phoenix.

This was one of my favourite stories from the collection, and I knew as soon as I read it that I wanted to do something with the story for a Weekend Cooking post.

There are two questions that I am prompted to ask - what's the strangest thing you have ever eaten and how far would you be prepared to go for a special meal?

Weekend Cooking is hosted by Beth Fish Reads and is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs

Christmas in Wattle Street - Marija

The third and final character that I am going to introduce you to for these posts is Marija who is struggling with the idea of a hot Christmas, something that seems quite normal to us Southern Hemisphere peeps! There are lots of other characters to meet in the pages of Empire Day by Diane Chamberlain, not just the three I have introduced you to over the last few days!

Page 226-227

Marija Olmanis was thinking about Christmas too. Christmas in Latvia. Walking to church on Christmas Eve on snow that creaked under her fur-lined boots, placing Advent wreaths in the front of her home, watching the mummers who visited homes to bless the occupants and drive out evil spirits. And preparing the traditional food: brown peas with bacon, beef pies filled with cabbage, yeast cake with chopped almonds and cardamon, and ginger biscuits that made the whole house smell wonderful and which they ate with a drink made from honey, cranberries, rye bread and whipped cream. In Latvia, St Nicholas didn't arrive with gifts on just one night, he stopped by every evening for twelve wonderful nights.

Page 227 - 228

Marija wiped the sweat from her forehead and neck. Christmas in sweltering heat, without snow or ice, skating or toboganning, wasn't Christmas. Even the sky here was different. Whenever she looked up at night, she couldn't find any familiar stars.

Christmas in Wattle Street - Kath

In today's excerpts from Empire Day by Diane Chamberlain we hear part of Kath's story: Kath is a single mum, battling to make ends meet, and also having to deal with the serious illness of one of her children.

This one is for the battlers.

Page 216:

Christmas was approaching and she regretted her reckless outburst at the pub. Now that she'd lost her job, she wondered how she's make ends meet, let alone provide Christmas dinner and buy gifts for the boys. She felt she'd fallen into a deep well without a rope or a ladder to climb out. She'd never felt so alone or so desperate. Jobs were scarce, and with Christmas only weeks away, her chance of finding one was slim. And to make things even worse, Meggsie wouldn't be home for Christmas

Page 226:

Across the road Kath sat at the kitchen table trying to figure out how she could stretch her meagre savings to put Christmas dinner on the table and buy something for the boys as well.

A few times lately , whenever she'd passed the red telephone box on the corner, she'd been on the verge of swallowing her pride and ringing Gran, but at the last moment the thought of going begging, and then having to listen to her grandmother's acid comments, had changed her mind.

Kath didn't care about Christmas for herself but she did want to try and make it special for the boys, especially little Pete. But what kind of Christmas would it be, with Meggsie still in hospital, unable to work, and no one knowing when he'd recover?

"I'd better start praying for a miracle because that's the only thing that'll help me," she mutter to herself.

2012 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge

If you head over to Historical Tapestry, the sign up post for next years Historical Fiction Reading Challenge is now up!

Once again, you can choose what level of participation you wish to have, varying from just a couple of books to 20 (or more!)

I am of course signing up for the highest level of participation and so will be aiming to read 20 historical fiction novels next year. The likelihood is that I will read more though!

Once again, Alex has done a fabulous job with the button for the challenge!

Click on the button below to be whisked away to Historical Tapestry and don't forget to grab the code so that you can add it to your own blog too!