LA Times Festival of Books – Conquered!

LA Times Festival of Books – Conquered!

by | LA Times Festival of Books, Life, Observations, Writing

I Did It!

I only went to the wrong parking garage twice. Sigh. BUT. Traffic behaved (though there were a couple of folks out there who learned how to drive by playing Mario Kart 8). I got there, parked, found my way to the Los Angeles Romance Authors booth (924), and settled in to start the volunteer process.

Let me tell you – we had SO many people! We were out of free goody bags way before lunch! I don’t know how Alexis Morgan-Roark and all the other wonderful volunteers did it. A great big beautiful booth, not too far from the LA Times Main Stage – we were perfectly positioned for excellent foot traffic, and we got it.

Yes, there were a LOT of people. But the Festival was spread out across the campus, so it wasn’t like we were all crammed into a performance venue. Below is our booth…The Duke, Just Ken, and Fabio got a LOT of attention. Just Ken is the object of an Opportunity Drawing…a fundraiser for our chapter. We’re hoping someone will take him home today!

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was music, there were outdoor talks that were free, there were panels and indoor talks that you needed to have previously purchased tickets for. There were food trucks galore, and they all had huge lines, but I chatted with Kelle Z. Riley and we got to know each other a bit, which was nice.

 

I took Sandy R. home (a chapter mate I’ve known since 2002), but unfortunately we received the wrong directions to get to the Shrine Parking Garage – We were sent to Exposition Blvd and should have been sent to Jefferson St, which we were actually closer to! Which means we walked the length of the Festival. Twice. But I got 8,200 steps in, so that counts for something, along with aching feet.

The drive home was jammed with traffic – where was everyone going??? Always a mystery…but I got Sandy home safely, and made it to my house where Tom had my bath ready. A hot bath, a lovely nap, and some wonderful Mario Kart 8 racing (Tom won, thanks to the algorhythims. Bloody blue bomb…). A tasty dinner, and a wonderful night’s sleep, and all is right with my world.

My fears dissipated with the morning clouds yesterday – and I vowed then and there that I’d be signing books next year, at the Festival of Books, with my LARA Chapter mates. Which means I have plenty of work to do now. It took me twenty years, but I did it.

Is there something that scares you, but that you know you want / need to do? Grab your courage with both hands and give it a go. You’ll never know until you step into your power and do the thing.

Sending everyone love and hugs. Always.

–Christine

 

Los Angeles Times Festival of Books!

Los Angeles Times Festival of Books!

by | Life, Writing

After 20 Years of Resistance – I’m Being Brave. Seriously.

Seriously. It’s been at least 20 years since I’ve known about the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, but I’ve never gone. Today – in little over an hour, actually – I am going to show up. This is a BIG deal for me. I LOATHE huge crowds. I am always anxious about driving to places I’ve never been to – and anywhere downtown or near USC is enouch to put me into a near panic attack.

But I’m going. I signed up to be a volunteer at the Los Angeles Romance Authors chapter of Romance Writers of America booth (#924 in the Black Zone) for today, for six hours. I figured out parking and even paid for my spot, got the app, did the stuff. I just need to shower, dress, remember to feed myself, and actually get in the car and go.

That last part will be extremely difficult. I find I don’t like going to new places anymore at all, especially not by myself, but no one in my family wants to go, and no one in my chapter lives close enough to swing by and pick me up (or I pick them up, either way), so…it’s just me and my sense of impending doom, toddling off to USC. The main saving grace in today’s adventure – looking on the bright side here – is that it’s during the day, not at night. Also, I have a full tank of gas, so I won’t have to find a gas station down there.

I’m not going to be that stereotype person who as she gains wisdom, experience, and silver in her hair, also decides to become a hermit and never go anywhere or try anything new.

This is me, trying something new. And I’m just a few shades of terrified. I’ll take photos and write an update when I return this afternoon.

Be cool, people, and be kind. You just never know.

Always,

Christine

 

Reboot for 2024

Reboot for 2024

by | Observations, Publishing, Writing

March is almost over, and I’m finally turning my attention to my website again. I know, it’s been rough and I haven’t been here. I apologize. Life, you know? At any rate…so much has been happening. I did a lot of travel after my book about Scott came out in September last year; San Diego, Massachussets, London…it all wore me out, and after we got  home from London, both Tom and I got very sick. So December was mostly a rest month, and the first quarter of this year has been about me reclaiming myself.

Which basically means putting relationships in the past, after acknowledging the good and the ill I received (and gave) to them. That was a very long season of help and harm during some of my worst moments over several years; now it’s done and done, and I’ve moved on. I’m eating healthier (and feeling ill when I don’t eat healthy); I’m loving Pilates, and walking the dog, and gardening again.

And I’m back to writing. I’m behind in the book of a new series, which I’m SO excited about but can’t really talk about just yet. So there’s that. I’m also figuring out the details of getting a newsletter up and running again; as soon as I do, I’ll let the world know.

I don’t know if I’ll get back to blogging about affordable wines…it seems very few are under $10 anymore, which was my top price when I first started blogging about wine. We shall see.

In the meantime, thanks for being here. I promise I’ll be showing up more. Sending you love and lots of hugs.

Cheers,

Christine

 

Summer and the Garden

Summer and the Garden

by | Life, My Garden, Observations, Publishing

Forget-me-nots

July 4, 2023

So many emotions for this day…I cannot celebrate a country where over half the citizens have had their rights severely restricted by the bunch of so-called Christians sitting on the Supreme Court. So there’s that.

When I got up this morning, it was misty outside and the temperature in the mid-50s F. Feeling the cool sting my cheeks was lovely, as it had been in the upper 80s – low 90s here this past week. I’ve made breakfast, and now Tom is out in the garden with our youngest helping him. Whimsy the dog is barking at anything that walks past the house (or the houses behind us). He still fairly reeks of skunk, though my nose now is trying to tell me he actually rolled in garlic. Um…yeah, no.

Gardening, because murder is wrong. A decorative picture of a woman in the garden tending to plants.

But the garden continues to be my happy place. It’s a lot of work, but exercise with a definitive purpose is always a good thing. We’ve pulled down my sunflower bed, and shall plant that haphazardly with wildflower seed, along with some Strawberry Palestine Clover. Doing our part to help the bees.

Now available!

So on the fiction front, Wolf’s Heart is now available. It’s a novella that is adjacent to the Caine Brothers world that was originally published in an anthology. I’ve finally gotten it back up online. Slowly, I am reclaiming my writing life.

Non-fiction News

My summer schedule is heating up and will be full steam right through December 1st (so far). This month is the Romance Writers of America National Conference in Anaheim. I kind of figured I should go since it’s technically in my back yard, and I’m presenting as well. I grabbed a hotel room for Tom and I for a couple of days.

In August, a gal who produces her own shows and also works for HBO is coming out from New York City to discuss – something film-ish – with me, and that’s really all I can say about that.

September is the launch of my new book, Scott Cunningham – The Path Taken, and there will be activity around that for sure. September also takes me to TempleFest in Massachussets. I will finally get to meet so many people in person, and I’m excited for that!

October sees me flying to London, England with my husband for the U.K. Tarot Conference put on by Kim Arnold. Then on Monday October 9, from 2:30 – 5pm, I’ll be doing a booksigning at the Atlantis Bookshop, in the Gerald Gardner room. GAH! SO exciting!

November, I’ll be at the Trees of Avalon Gathering once more, giving two talks that I’m super stoked about.  Later that month, I MIGHT have a booksigning in the Seattle area; we shall see.

Scattered throughout will be podcasts and so forth. A busy time, and I’m doing my best to be ready for it.

Wine Blog?

I’m considering reviving my wine blog, since that was fun. Not sure I’ll keep it at wines under $10, as those seem to be impossible to find unless on sale, but I’ll figure it out.

Well, that wraps up this update. Hope you are doing well! In the meantime, much love to you.

Scott Cunningham The Path Taken

by | Observations

New Book! Scott Cunningham The Path Taken – Honoring the Life and Legacy of a Wiccan Trailblazer arrives in bookstores September, 2023. Pre-order your copy now!

Publishes in September 2023 from Weiser Books

Here is a bit from the Preface of this book. Enjoy!

If I had known my older brother Scott would be so beloved, so polarizing, so prolific, and would die so young, I, in my youth, would have taken notes. Kept all our correspondence. Taken more photos. Or perhaps had a cassette deck tape recorder going whenever we talked.

But I didn’t. So here we are.

Memories are, at best, crystal-clear images frozen in time. Sound, scent, sight, taste, touch, all right there, so vivid. At their worst, memories are foggy, amorphous, intangible things that no one can verify. A pity that all I have is my memories. . . but both my parents are gone, so it’s up to me now. Throughout this book I have added snippets of conversations. Most of them took place in one form or another. They are not word-by-word conversations. What they are is what memory has given me, whether through family repetition (stories told again and again), or what might have been said in a private setting that rings true.

The longer I work on this labor of love, the more snippets come to me. Bits of conversation. Colors. The heat of the day, or the cool of an air-conditioned hotel room, the scent of a city. I’m trusting these snippets and sharing them with you.

I am not an historian. I don’t have dates of his major life events written down. I don’t have salacious details of his deeply personal life (and even if I did, I wouldn’t share them). I have not memorized every one of Scott’s books. Hell, I didn’t even read most of them until after he died.

That’s a confession, by the way.

What I am is the younger sister who alternately adored him and ignored him; and he did the same with me.

This is where I need to tell you that, in reading those books he wrote, I saw a side of him I never saw in person, heard a voice I had never heard from him before. It both pleases me and saddens me. Pleases, because now all I need to do is pick up his books and he is there with me. Saddens, because I never got to see that part of him in real life.

So it goes.

It has struck me now that once I let this book out into the world, my memories won’t be my own anymore. They will be seen by you. Known by you. Filtered through your experience. My words, yes, but your internal translation.

A part of me is hesitant, now that I near the end of this journey.

I have to laugh. . . when I wrote that, I swear I heard Scott sigh and tell me to get on with it, already. So here I go. . . getting on with it.

From my heart to yours.

PREORDER NOW!   <– Click that link!