I know you must be wondering what happened to me.  It’s been months since I posted.  Am I busy?  Oh yes.  Am I overwhelmed.  It depends on which hour of the day you catch me.

One major hassle was being put out of my office for five months.  Yep, I was back to working on the dining room table where I started writing more than thirty years ago.  I have my trusty laptop these days, but I was several rooms and a flight of stairs away from my comfort zone.  I did put together a new proposal — which has yet to sell.  And I have some new projects up my sleeve.

1.  I’m a Story Consultant for a video game company.  I signed a nondisclosure agreement so I can only say that it’s a lot of work, and a lot of fun.  Working with men, and trying to get my game head together.  Learning a lot, stretching as a writer, reading lots of things I might not have picked up in the general course.  And it’s exciting.

2. Am working as a writing coach.  Have two clients.  I help them shape their stories, get at the best way to tell those stories, and offer feedback from an agent/editor’s perspective.  After 30 yrs of working with publishing professionals, I have a pretty good idea of what might work and what will not.  There are no guarantees on selling.  If I could do that I would not be shopping my own material around at the moment.  BUT, I can help fix that slow beginning, the wandering-itis that often comes after the first burst on creativity, and make sure the ending delivers what’s promised by those first chapters.  Yes, I charge.  But you get a written critique and discussion time online.  If you’re interested, or want more info, contact me at lcastoro@cablelynx.com

NOW FOR THE LAST BUT NOT LEAST:

3. On PAR Woman. Two writers friends and I did a workshop at Romance Writers of America Conference in Orlando, FL in late July called “Boomers in Love” – about books with heroines 45 and older — or rather the scarcity of them.

I believe that the shelf life for a heroine or she-ro shouldn’t end at 39.  And yet much contemporary fiction takes this tact, with any female character over 50 resigned to the second banana role.  Until recently nearly every female over forty in a commercial fiction storyline was a second banana: the patient mother, evil boss, kindly mentor, or dotty aunt.  Midlife books were often three-hankie affairs with broken marriages, ungrateful grown children, death, cancer, and a sense of life being wasted.  Past her looks, her charm, her youth, the fifty year old woman might as well have been a death sentence in modern fiction.

Even editors say they don’t know how to market the books for an audience with main characters over 40.  Authors — me included — have been asked to young-up our main characters, moving a heroine back from 49 to 39.  Now anyone knows that what you might do at 39 isn’t necessarily going to fly at 50.  Or, at least, it won’t go the same way.  And that in itself means there are new kinds of stories to be told out there.

So, my colleagues in the workshop –Sandra Kitt and Marcia King Gamble — decided to take our plight directly to the audience, you.  So here’s what we are doing.

On PAR Woman was born.

On PAR stands for On top of, Primed and Ready.  It’s a site that will be about a grown up woman’s Point of View. First we launched an On PAR Facebook Page.  It’s aimed as an upbeat site :For the over 45 grown up woman, and those who simply feel grown up.  And, the men who admire them!”

Discussions led by authors , Marcia King-Gamble,Laura Parker Castoro, and Sandra Kitt: we are respectively: 2nd, 3rd, and 4th from the left.

What we discovered during and after our workshop is that there are many women over that age of 45 who want to read books that reflect their lives.  And not just novels that detail the sometimes sad and misused lives of heroines of what I call midlife crisis books.  Those of you who read me know what I have written two books which I called Midlife Crisis Comedies. They are A NEW LU and ICING ON THE CAKE.

Two other books, CROSSING THE LINE and LOVE ON THE LINE, that I wrote in recent years, and the COUGAR TALES anthology to  which I contributed last year, also feature main characters over the age of 40.

It’s been a natural progression for me, not some calculated gamble.  But writers like me who need for our audiences to find us and know what we’re doing are going to have to be (hate the word!) proactive.  We want you to help us tell publishers that 1) yes, you are out there, 2) you want to read 45+ main characters, 3) you were willing to pay for these books just like all the rest.  So if you, just like writers, want your voices to be heard, here’s a place to sound off.

So, I have a proposition for any and all who read this, and the blogs of the coming days.  If you are a writer with main characters over 40, let me know so we can post your book.  If you’d like to guest blog, let us know that.  This issue is largar than three authors.

If you are a reader, please let me know if you agree, if you’ve read a book with a heroine over 45 — I don’t care what genre — and if you’d like to see more.  Reply to this blog.  It’s that simple.

Oh, and log into On PAR, if you have a Facebook Page.  If not, look for On Par Woman to be a website soon.  You will find the link here as soon as we’re up and running.

“The Hubble’s new Wide Field Camera 3 peered into one of the more crowded places in the universe in this view of a small region inside the globular cluster Omega Centauri, which has nearly 10 million stars. Globular clusters are ancient swarms of stars united by gravity. The stars in Omega Centauri are 10 billion to 12 billion years old. The cluster is about 16,000 light-years from Earth. The photograph showcases the new camera’s color versatility by revealing a variety of stars in key stages of their life cycles.” Photo: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble SM4 ERO Team.  From the New York Times

I’m not suggesting that our own lives and problems are insignificant or meaningless in view of the BIG PICTURE.  I am suggesting that sometimes it helps to sit back, look around, and realize maybe the problem isn’t so STUPENDOUS after all.  I have multiple deadlines this week.  Feeling the pressure.  Thought it might be helpful to look up and get a new perspective.

I feel better.  Hope you do, too.

Oh, for those of you asking, the Delta River Trilogy is still under consideration at my publishers in NYC.  Fingers and toes crossed, ya’ll!!!

We have 52, yes, that’s right, FIFTY-TWO PAID AS OF MONDAY! Come and join the fun.  We will learn, read, write and generally share the writing experience.  Click HERE

JULIE COMPTON Check out her web pages.

Her new book is called RESCUING OLIVIA.

EXCERPT

Here’s what the heavy hitters are saying about it.

“Compton’s intense, entertaining second novel involves a horrifying cover-up and a powerful new drug . . . [She] pulls off a super-satisfying resolution to this romantic thriller.”
–Publishers Weekly

A “[m]odern-day fairy tale about a princely Florida lawn guy who must rescue his princess from a clutch of monsters. . . Compton burrows so deeply into Olivia’s and Anders’ troubled back stories and dramatizes in such psychologically compelling terms the swain’s attempt to rescue his princess . . . that the result is a pleasing hybrid of fairy tale and contemporary thriller. . . [Her] increasingly pointed questions about what exactly it would mean to rescue Olivia make the journey worthwhile.”
–Kirkus Reviews

“A page-turner.”
–Booklist

Next up:

JERDINE NOLAN

Children’s book are not easy.  Some are almost perfect.  Others, just so-so.  I was captured from the first by Jerdine’s titles:

She’s witty, imaginative, and wonderful!

If you like an author who isn’t afraid to step into controversy, in fact, likes to put on her waders and stomp all through controversy, try this lady.  She’s audacious, an original, and one of a kind.

Newest release: REBEL YELL

The Washington Post – James A. Miller

…Rebel Yell offers a rich journey through the world of distinguished graduates of Southern black colleges, black fraternities and sororities, Jack and Jill societies, Ivy League institutions and summer vacations at Martha’s Vineyard—the world, in short, of a black elite whose lives are only dimly glimpsed by many Americans…Part detective story, part love story, Rebel Yell is a novel deeply suffused with nostalgia and mourning.

Publishers Weekly

What starts off as a drive from Nashville to Birmingham quickly moves across the globe as Randall (The Wind Done Gone) unravels the life of Abel Jones. “The day Abel was born, sweet tucked deep in the dark South, Langston Hughes, out west on a speaking tour, typed a little poem in celebration… Abel was colored-baby royalty”-but things aren’t always so sweet. Abel faces run-ins with the KKK and, after a short lifetime as an angry husband and father and a secretive spy, meets his untimely end in the bathroom of a campy dinner theater restaurant. We learn most of his history via his first wife, Hope, following her journey from “a young Georgetown matron” to the present (thoughts on President Obama and all). As she tries to reconcile Abel’s “right to tell necessary lies to his wife, and to whomever else he chose,” she discovers what it is that bound them together in the first place. Randall leaves much to the imagination, but in the end, she successfully creates a family that’s been torn apart and haphazardly put back together by forces sometimes terrifying, sometimes hopeful. (Oct.)

To round out the groupings, and give the guys a shout:

JIM BUTCHER

I know, he’s been around a while, even has a cable series, but I’ve just discovered him.  And, boy,can

he make the little car go!  I’m reading the first of the DRESDEN FILES.

“The Dresden Files are Jim’s first published series, telling the story of Harry Blackstone Copperfield

Dresden, Chicago’s first (and only) Wizard P.I.” — From the official website.

The hero’s not a bad ass but he can bring it when necessary.  I like the fact he doesn’t sling magic first

then ask questions later.  The baddies are bad enough for anymore into gore.  But the story is about a

man dealing with his gift/curse and making his way with as much integrity and humor as he can

manage, as the only Wizard in the Chicago phone book.  You gotta love that.

So, go forth and read.  Something here for almost every taste in fiction.  Oh, wait!  there’s still me.  If

you haven’t read ICING ON THE CAKE (Available as a ebook) or LOVE ON THE LINE (ebook and audio

book) you can get your Women’s Fiction fix here.

I’d like to know who you are reading and why.

FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO CAN’T MAKE IT: I’d love to see what you come up with.  Feel free to paste it in the Comment Section of this Blog entry to share here.  That would be fabulous!

B.S. (no, not that, BEFORE SCRIPT)  If you have an organization, club, family reunion, church group, writers’ group, conferences, genealogy, history, or whatever kind of group you think might be interested in  this All-Day Family Folklore Workshop: contact me.  I hold workshops all over the U.S.  Heck, if the money’s right, I’ll go most anywhere!   LOL.  WRITE ME: Laurawrite@aol.com or lcastoro@cablelynx.com

NOW THE EASY PART:

Writing Exercises for the FAMILY FOLKLORE Workshop

by LAURA PARKER CASTORO

If you would like to enjoy an enhanced workshop experience, I encourage you to try one or all the exercises below.  We will use them in class to talk about writing.

DIRECTIONS: Choose One Sample from each of the Three Categories below and write at least One-Paragraph about the Memory that this sample triggers for you. Write at most ONE SAMPLE FROM EACH CATEGORY.  There are no rules.  It can be prose, dialogue, reflection, or the beginning of a short article using factual information about you, a family member, a friend, or a relative. Category Four is your choice!

I. Incorporate as written one (1) of the following examples of dialogue below into a memory of being a child in the summer time.

1. “Be sure to refill the ice trays, we’re going to have company.”
2. “Watch for the mailman, I want to get this letter to _____in the mail today.”
3. “You have torn the knees out of that pair of pants so many times there is nothing left to put a patch on.”
4. “Open the back door and see if we can get a breeze through here, it is getting hot.”

II. Choose one (1) of the attitudes in the sentences below as a prompt to a memoir about eating, cooking, or obtaining food in your family when you were a child: i.e. who cooked, who went to the store, what food you liked or disliked, who was the pickiest eater in your family and what your family did about that?  NOW, contrast that with what happens in your family today.

1. Be sure and pour the cream off the top of the milk when you open the new bottle.
2. I have a cake in the oven.  You are going to make it fall if you …!
3. Eat those turnips (or some other vegetable you hated).  They’ll make you big and strong like your daddy.
4. Run (bike) down to the corner store and buy me_______.

III. Choose one (1) of the attitudes in the sentences below as a prompt for a memoir about how glad you are you aren’t, or wish you were, young again.

1. Hush your mouth! I don’t want to hear words like that! I’ll wash your mouth out with soap!
2. If you get a spanking in school and I find out about it, you’ll get another one when you get home.
3. It’s: ‘Yes Ma’am!’ and ‘No Ma’am!’ to me, young man, and don’t you forget it!
4. Sit still! I’m trying to cut your hair straight and you keep moving and it is all messed up.

IV. Write a story about a relative you never met but you have heard so much about you feel you know him or her.  This could be someone who died before you were born or lived in another place.  Why was this person important to you?

The Village Writers’ Club of Hot Springs Village, AR
presents, a day with …

Laura Parker Castoro

Seminar Title: FAMILY FOLKLORE — Writing memoirs that capture life for fun and profit.

Writers, from scribblers to experienced, will gain insight from this prolific author with more than  three-dozen titles in print.

Who is your family historian? Most families don’t have one. Yet we all know stories that family and friends love to tell when they get together; be it for the holidays, for family reunions, at church functions, school reunions, social organizations, weddings, funerals, or births. We must save our stories. If you don’t tell your family’s story, who will?

About Laura: Laura has thirty-nine published books in print in such genres as contemporary romance, westerns, sagas, and romantic suspense.  She is past president of the Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow in Eureka Springs, AR. She is on the Board of the Pine Bluff Symphony and was named recipient of the Arkansas Writers Hall of Fame Award for 2005. Laura is much in demand as a mentor for emerging writers. We are thrilled to have her as our workshop leader for the second time. Complete details about Laura are available at: http://www.lauracastoro.com

Date: Saturday, March 20, 2010 — Registration 8:30 a.m. to 9:00 a.m.
Location: Auditorium, Coronado Center (150 Ponderosa Lane) Hot Springs Village, AR 71909
(a map to Coronado Center is available below)

Investment: Pre-registration is $30 (workshop only); lunch will be available for $10.00. Registrations will be accepted at the door if space permits; however there will be no guarantee of lunch for late registrants. Due to the lack of eating venues nearby, registrants are encouraged to either reserve lunch or bring a sack lunch from home.

DEADLINE

Registrations with checks must be postmarked by March 8, 2010

Hope you have a wonderful, cozy, day!

Recently in a large city in France , a poster featuring a young, thin and tan woman appeared in the window of a gym. It said, “This summer, do you want to be a mermaid

or a whale?”

A middle-aged woman, whose physical characteristics did not match those of the woman on the poster, responded publicly to the question posed by the gym.

To Whom It May Concern,

Whales are always surrounded by friends (dolphins, sea lions, curious humans.) They have an active sex life, get pregnant and have adorable baby whales. They have a wonderful time with dolphins stuffing themselves with shrimp. They play and swim in the seas, seeing wonderful places like Patagonia, the Bering Sea and the coral reefs of Polynesia . Whales are wonderful singers and have even recorded CDs.

They are incredible creatures and virtually have no predators other than humans. They are loved, protected and admired by almost everyone in the world.

Mermaids don’t exist. If they did exist, they would be lining up outside the offices of Argentinean psychoanalysts due to identity crisis. Fish or human? They don’t have a sex life because they kill men who get close to them, not to mention how could they have sex? Just look at them … where is IT? Therefore, they don’t have kids either. Not to mention, who wants to get close to a girl who smells like a fish store?

The choice is perfectly clear to me: I want to be a whale.

P.S. We are in an age when media puts into our heads the idea that only skinny people are beautiful, but I prefer to enjoy an ice cream with my kids, a good dinner with a man who makes me shiver, and a piece of chocolate with my friends. With time, we gain weight because we accumulate so much information and wisdom in our heads that when there is no more room, it distributes out to the rest of our bodies.

So we aren’t heavy, we are enormously cultured, educated and happy.

Beginning today, when I look at my butt in the mirror I will think, ?Good grief, look how smart I am!?

After reading this I thought this person would make a great character for a story!

Please keep fingers and toes crossed that my editor is as happy as I am with the DELTA RIVER SERIES first book:  DELTA BLUE.  Oh, and a contract will follow, soon.

Family Folklore–Writing memoirs that capture life for fun and profit

On another note, I’m holding an all-day writing workshop in Hot Springs Village, AR Saturday March, 20.  It’s about writing memoirs, yours and your family’s experiences.  I coined the term FAMILY FOLKLORE because I think it best describes those stories we know that are handed down through the generations.  They may absolutely be the truth, or have been embellished in the retelling, or the details may have been confused over the years but they are the stories tell us about our place in the world as gleaned from ancestors, our families, and our friends.  And, of course, ourselves.

Psychologists say that every healthy family has a handed-down family history of usually oral stories: the good, the bad, and the hilarious.  It makes us feel connected.  Look, there are people out there like me:  Great Uncle Henry stole a horse?  Really?  Oh, to save the baby boy who’d fallen down the well.  Whew!  I thought I was about to learn why I keep having these brushes with the law. (I’m joking!  Unless you know better. LOL)

In this workshop I will explain how to write, what approaches to take, writing exercises to tickle those long-forgotten memories, and how to expand the particular into a broader interest piece in order to sell.  Intimate writing for public consumption.

Hope some of you will join me.  If you need to come in and spend the night the Hot Springs Village crew can offer accommodation advice.  My favorite spot is a B&B owned by friends Mike & Rhonda Hicks:  http://www.mountainthyme.com

Below the photos there’s a site to go to for more information  and to register.  Hope to see you there!

Psst! I’ve lost weight since photos were taken!  LOL  Laura Castoro

The deadline to register for the March 20 annual writing workshop sponsored by the Hot Springs Village Writers’ Club is March 8. (If you’re a little bit late that’s okay but you may not have a chance to do the pre-workshop homework!!)

Entitled “Family Folklore–Writing memoirs that capture life for fun and profit,” the workshop will be conducted by Laura Parker Castoro.

Registration and details here. or here: http://www.johnachor.com/beejay/

Seems as if every year-end I think, “Boy, I’m glad that one’s over.  Next year has got to be better.”   But I’m not sure that’s true.  Last year wasn’t really better than the year the before.  In many ways the previous years’ indulgences, greed, and wishful thinking just finally all caught up with us at the same time in 2009.  So, instead of being glad to see 2009 go, I’m going to rethink the year 2009 as having been better than it started out to be, bad as it was.  And I’m still here.  My family is all here.  We are alive and mostly healthy, and moving on.

About New Year’s Resolutions: hate them!  They seem, to me, to burden the new year before it’s begun with “Have Tos”, “Should Dos”, “Do Nots”, and other general admonishments that really just call attention to whatever I think is wrong or deficient with myself in the first place.  NOT a good way to clear the decks and begin with renewed vigor.  So I’m going to start with Happy Tos:

1. Happy to have lost weight this year.  Will repeat with even better results next year.  If not better then more of the same.

2. Happy to have had a book out this year.  Will repeat the effort next year even if the results don’t turn up until 2011.  One must begin.

3.  Thrilled to have seen all my immediate family at least twice each last year, particularly since everyone lives at least one state, some more, away.  Repeat at will in the new year.  And maybe I can add other family members.

4. Grateful to have so many good friends.  Some I haven’t seen in a long time but thank goodness for email, Facebook, YouTube, Skype, and so forth.  I feel in touch even when I can’t touch.  For the new year I will try to learn to be a better texter.  Tweet?  Probably not!

5. Grateful and honored to have so many readers of my novels. It’s been mostly a pleasure to write and its always and continuously an honor to hear from anyone who spent the money to buy a book and then thought enough of it to write me about it.  Those make my day, the Icing On The Cake. (Sorry, couldn’t resist!)

Who knows what the future holds?  Mostly more than we can imagine and a few things we wouldn’t want to face if we knew about them in advance.  Yet here we are, again, on the precipice.  And the view goes on forever, for all we know.