Linda Naseem's Blog

This is so exciting! My novel EDEN has been named a finalist in the 2018 Drunken Druid Book Awards out of Ireland. I consider this a real honor because my writing style---lyrical, intense & a bit complicated---and my subject matter---social issues---are not usually appreciated in the indie contest world. So thank you, Drunken Druid!

For today only you can get the kindle version of EDEN free.
A 2018 Gold Winner in the Human Relations Indie Book Awards.
A story of first love set in San Francisco in the late 60's against a backdrop of flower children, racial prejudice, and the Vietnam War.

Was in Tucson last weekend for their annual Festival of Books on the University of New Mexico campus. Love Tucson! Saturday my grandson & I visited Saguaro National Park---with all those giant cacti with their arms raised. well, they aren't all raised, some are droopy. It was overcast, in the 60's, and drops of rain fell for a while. Sunday, the day I was at the Festival, it was in the 80's.

You can watch a short video of me reading from NOTHING on you-tube---look for Linda Naseem at the Tucson Festival of Books. I apologize for the background noise---when you see all the people in the video you will understand where it is coming from. I spoke at loudly as I could.

Martin Luther King Day has come and gone. I went to a small sweet kid-friendly celebration in Woodland Park, 18 miles west of us & quite a bit higher in elevation.

I still remember where I was when I heard the news of his murder: in a little grocery store in San Francisco, where the only other customer--an older white woman--said "They should have done that a long time ago."

I was so shocked I didn't know what to say, and walked out without buying whatever it was I was there for.

I was 18 years old.

That scene, by the way, is in my new book, EDEN, which will be out in April. A bit altered but the main point--the contempt--is there.

Here we are, 2018. Do you remember where you were for the millennium? I was working in the San Francisco County Jail booking facility. They made us all work 12-hour-shifts that night, expecting a ton of drunks, but they had set up "drunk stations" in several places around the city, so we twiddled our thumbs for 12 hours. Never imagined that i would still be here 18 years later...
Anyhow, thought I'd share my favorite books from this past year with you. none of them are new.
THE GIVER, by Lois Lowry (YA)
THE CAPTAIN'S DOG, by Roland Smith (YA & younger)
THE FIFTH CHILD, by Doris Lessing
THE ORPHAN MASTER'S SON, by Adam Johnson
LONGING---STORIES OF RACIAL HEALING, by Phyllis & Eugene Unterschuetz
THE WAILING WIND, by Tony Hillerman
THE HELP, by Kathryn Stockett
TEARS OF THE GIRAFFE, by Alexander McCall Smith
THE INDIA FAN, by Victoria Holt

So exciting: NOTHING won a gold award in the Indie Human Relations Book Awards.

The category was "Contemporary Realistic Human Relations Fiction Books." (What a mouthful!!!)

To celebrate, I am doing another giveaway starting January 5.

And---can't forget---Merry Christmas to all!

My granddaughter and I went up to Cripple Creek this past weekend to watch their Christmas parade.

What's so special about Cripple Creek? It has a population of just over a thousand and it's something like 14 miles to the nearest grocery store. It sits at 9490 feet above sea level and it is hilly, so yes, you huff & puff a little as you are walking around.

But the air is clean, the sky is so much closer, there are donkeys roaming the streets as a thow-back to yesteryear (when they pulled the carts through the mines), and--that's the draw--it takes me back to a simpler time.

Although it wasn't all that simple. Around 1900 Cripple Creek was the second largest city in Colorado, after Denver. It had 20,000 people crammed into tents, boarding houses, shanties; there were saloons & bordellos and blasting going on every fifteen minutes round the clock because there was GOLD. And there wasn't even a road at that time. People had to go south to Florence and take a stage coach up the back of Pike's Peak to get there.

There is still a working gold mine but those wild days are gone. The parade was short and sweet, which is how I like them. I got my fix of history and my granddaughter got a ton of candy thrown by the people in the parade, and then we went down the mountain to home.

Last Sunday I attended a toy drive concert in Denver sponsored by the Bearsheart family. Every Christmas they collect toys to take to an Indian reservation. This year it will be the Santo Domingo Pueblo in New Mexico.

The performers were a Navajo folk-music group called Our Last Chants. Beautiful music. They are also a film production company and showed some of their short films.

You can check them out on Facebook---Our Last Chants or Kody Dayish productions. Well worth the look.

And they are calling for actors to be in their productions, which (the ones they showed) are about Navajo people (& others) and social issues, like bullying & domestic violence.

The second round of editing is done (last round). This is what the editor ( a different one from the first edit) said about the book:

"This is an interesting historical fiction, and I am positive that your target audience will find it an enjoyable read."

I am finishing my own last edit and then I will send it off for a review.

On the home front, I am taking my youngest grandson (6 yrs old) to Monkey Bizness (sp?) today--a big room full of bouncy houses. The kids jump for hours when I take them there, and I get to read. (Right now I'm reading "Tears of the Giraffe" by Alexander McCall Smith, a detective story set in Africa. I lived in Nigeria for several years so I love reading all things African).

Afterward we will buy a new parakeet: my youngest, Blue Bird, died a couple days ago, and now the one left doesn't seem to be mourning---right now he is singing up a storm---but I'm sure he is lonely.

And it snowed last night, just a light dusting, but people are scraping their windshields. We are at that time of year when it is warm for a few days---but gradually getting colder---and then cold for a couple days, each time a bit colder than the time before.

To bring you up to date on my trip to Arizona (last weekend): the speaking parts (ASU & the Tucson Baha'i Center) went well.

The rest of the trip, not so...I forgot my cell phone. Now, I am not a cell phone person, it is not permanently attached to either my ear or my hand, but there are times when it is needed, and traveling to Arizona to stay with a friend, Saraiya, whose home I'd never been in, was. Because I couldn't find her. Had to ask a neighbor to call her number & got no answer. Had her call my friend's grandmother in Colorado Springs and left a message. And this lovely person waited with me, at least an hour, until Grandma called back & told me where I was supposed to go.

Ok, that was day 1. Day 2: I had to go to northern Arizona to pick up a wall-hanging that a Navajo friend of mine had woven for my daughter-in-law. I didn't realize how far it was: 391 miles from Tucson to Chambers. Except that when I got to our meeting point in Chambers she wasn't there. And she couldn't call me because...you know. I was given a note: Come to Gallup. Fifty miles further. i went, got the weaving, got some of her jewelry to sell, drove back to Phoenix.

Day 3: I went to the airport after my talk, content to sit & read until i boarded my plane. Except the plane was overbooked & i gave up my seat for $400 in travel vouchers, and got to my door at 2 am. And was greeted by a house full of cat puke. I mean, it was everywhere. He apparently ate the three days' supply of food i'd left in one sitting. going to have to find a new system.

So that was my Arizona adventure. i will be going back to Tucson in March, as part of the Tucson Festival of Books.