Kate Preston's Blog

[image error]Renata and Michal Hornstein Pavillion at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts has free entry to its permanent collection this week, so a friend and fellow writer set off for a visit. I love going to the museum for inspiration and a bit of calm reflection, especially during the holidays. You chat about life and look at beautiful paintings and sculptures, getting a history lesson in at the same time. It’s great brain candy and a lovely way to spend a cold dark winter afternoon.

My friend told me she was creating a new series about time-travel targeting young adults. So we discussed different modes of travel to help get the main character to where he needed to be in order for the story to take place. It was a fun conversation while we admired works by AJ Casson, Picasso and Monet.

I told her about a story I’m working on that takes a main character from the future to the past to solve a mystery that has remained unsolved. “Wow,” she said. “Two of us working on time-travel stories at the same time. That’s kind of weird.”

And then I remembered speaking with two other authors I know who are also working on the same time-travel theme. So, naturally, I started to wonder if maybe it wasn’t coincidence, but rather a sign of the times we live in.

You know how when one successful novel with an underlying theme (like vampires), comes out, a slew of other stories in the same genre suddenly pop up? We all know that publishers are building on the trend set by the author.

But in this case, there hasn’t been a recent hit novel or movie about time travel. The last one I can think of is The Time Traveler’s Wife which debuted in 2003 (please correct me if I’m wrong).

I’m wondering if it’s more about an uncertain future and people going back to a time where life seemed simpler, but more importantly, the outcome was known. With all the animosity between nations and people, massive weather events related to climate change, wars forcing refugees into neighbouring countries and farther abroad, it feels like there’s a lot of negative stuff happening these days.

But how much simpler were those times, really? To us, yes, the problems seem surmountable because, in fact, some smart and sensible people found a way to solve problems like food shortages, lead poisoning, political issues, etc….The reality is that for the people living in each era you think about, the problems were equally dire as they are now. In the 1950s people built bomb shelters in their backyards while schools ran drills for getting students to safety in case of an attack. Things were pretty grim back then.

Let’s hope that the rational minds, geniuses and others prevail and can solve our current problems. We want to be able to look back to this time and realize that all was well and problems were solved with even tempers and level heads.

Sometimes the unexpected happens – like yesterday when I was chatting with the business owner across the hall from our office. One of her clients was there and had just slipped off to use the facilities. She looked at me and then nodded towards her client’s bag that was resting on the chair. “There are two Olympic medals in there.”

“What do you mean?” It’s not every day you hear that phrase.

“There are two Olympic medals in that bag. Right now.”

“You mean, like, from PyeongChang?”

“Yup.”

“Does that mean there’s an Olympian in the bathroom?” I was still focused on the medals, but able to figure out that if there were two Olympic medals in that bag, that there must be an Olympian nearby.  She told me who it was – and since I didn’t ask the Olympian if I could write about her, I’ll respect her privacy. Sorry.

The Olympian appeared and I became star struck and said idiotic things like, “Do you think the gold medals are really made out of gold?” *  (This is why I should never meet important people – especially when I’m unprepared.) So, the business owner said to the Olympian, “Can we see your medals again? I was just telling Kate about them.” The Olympian pulls them out and puts them in my hand. They are as big as saucers and very heavy. Like 5 lbs heavy, maybe more. And I’m looking at them and I am in awe of what this woman has accomplished. And every other athlete who competes at an international level.

That night at dinner, I told my kids about my experience and what a thrill it was to hold these medals. My daughter said, “Why is it such a big deal? You didn’t win those medals.”

“Because I can appreciate the amount of training, effort, and sacrifices this woman made to get to where she is. Her medals are symbols of her achievements.”

“Well, what’s she doing with them in her bag, walking around the city?”

Yeesh. My kids and practical questions. I didn’t know the answer – I didn’t feel it was appropriate for me to ask that question. Instead, I just took them in, asked the Olympian about the venue, the event, and life during the two weeks they were there and admired her tenacity and drive that led her to the top of her sport.

 

* This is quite possibly the dumbest question I could have asked. I was holding the medal and feeling its weight when I said it. At $1300/oz. a 5 lb medal would cost approximately C$104,000. –  each gold medal contains 6 grams of gold.

 

This book is a tongue in cheek look at the old money Singaporeans and contrasts it to “new wealth” Mainland Chinese, as well as to all the rest of us. The premise is simple: a history professor at NYU has to return to Singapore for the wedding of his best friend and asks his girlfriend of two years to go with him. He has kept his ultra-wealthy background a secret from her and has lived a fairly low-key life in New York. Nothing prepares her for her introduction to Singapore and the scrutiny she comes under from his family and the rest of his circle once she arrives. Mayhem ensues, competition for her beau’s affection abounds, and she is completely stunned by everything she sees and experiences.

Kwan is incredibly detailed in his descriptions of life among the uber-elite in Singapore. Their wealth goes back farther than the Europeans and certainly makes old-money North Americans look like nouveau riche. He has an excellent way of developing all his characters including his main character, Nick, who, having grown up with enormous amounts of wealth doesn’t understand what the big deal is. His naiveté gets him into a lot of trouble with his girlfriend (who provides the normalcy in the book). The other characters around them are well-developed and also fascinating.

It is a great story, really, it’s a family saga, and provides more depth and insight than you might be expecting from a book that is also fun and entertaining. It also makes me want to visit Singapore, a country I hadn’t really considered before. I am looking forward to reading China Rich Girlfriend.

There are a series of events that take place, her narration is wonderful, and we figure out fairly quickly that she is not a reliable narrator. But she really has a dry sense of humour and is fun to read. The other characters she interacts with are equally funny and dry. I enjoyed this book although like many other reviewers was a little in the dark at the end of it…..But here is my theory.

You may not want to read the rest of my review if you are planning on reading the book as there are spoilers. 

When I’d finished it I immediately got on the phone with a friend and said, “Hurry up and read it already, so we can discuss it!”

I am wondering if this book is an elaborate and fun way for Mr. Redhill to kill off his alter ego, Inger Ash Wolfe. He wrote a mystery series under the pen name of Inger Ash Wolfe, which he revealed in The Globe and Mail a few years ago.

Am I way off the mark?

By the last third of the book, I wasn’t sure who the real person was and who the imaginary character was, but by the time she travels through the woods in the north to get to the literary festival, I am pretty sure that the real person is the doppleganger she’s been seeing throughout the book (whose name is Ingrid and is a mystery writer. In the book, Ingrid is the pen name for Inger Ash Wolfe, the woman who is presenting at the festival). I think this is all taking place in the mind of Ingrid/Inger who is actually lying in a hospital bed living out her last days in a coma probably with a brain tumour (again, completely guessing based on how I am interpreting what I read so I could be way out in left field.)

By the end of the book, when Jean is looking down at herself and then strangling herself, and eventually walking into a room with bright lights which she can’t see past, I’m thinking that it is either the end of her personality or more likely the end of Inger Ash Wolfe. So, that’s my guess. What do others think? Am I as crazy as Jean Mason?

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You know those fiction series where you finish the first one – which you loved  – and you’re so excited to discover that there are more to come? It’s kind of like eating the first Cheezie. All that addictive cheesy-salty taste and a texture like styrofoam that melts in your mouth. Yum! But by the twentieth book (or thousandth Cheezie), the characters are no longer as enjoyable as they once were and the suspense in the character’s personal life begins to wear on you. Maybe you’re tired of the main character with two competing loves, or the possessionless wanderer who never seems to settle down. You need closure.

Characters who genuinely grow and move forward in their lives – and in a series – are much easier to stick with than those who never seem to get it together. Even whacky characters can get stale after the 15th book and as readers, we lose interest. I think the worst, however, is when the author has lost interest in the characters and it shows in the writing. If you’re not sure, just go back and read the first in a series you love and compare it to the latest to see if the attention to plot and detail is the same. Are you reading it because it’s just the next in the series and you don’t know when to stop (just like Cheezies!), or are you enjoying each one because it’s authentic?

The problem, of course, is money. If the series is hugely successful, the publisher is going to be offering the author delicious, wonderful sums and royalties to continue the series. Eventually, however, the author may be out of ideas of how to progress the series or have fallen out of love with the main character and that’s when it shows in the writing.

One of my favourite series started to lose me after about the 10th book.  The main character responded to a question with “Don’t know, don’t care.” It was so out of character, I felt like the writer was actually talking about her own interest in the plot! But I still went out and bought the next book – just to confirm that the author hadn’t had a rebirth of enthusiasm (no such luck). Which is exactly why publishers write cheques for those series in the first place. You see? I’m part of the problem!

In another instance of a series I had been devoted to, the plot turned out to be so thin that 3/4 of the book was sub-plots – to the point where you almost forgot what the main plot was about and it was solved so quickly and easily with little intrigue, that there too, I thought the author had lost interest in the series.

I think it’s up to the author to recognize when a character’s series has reached its natural end and not wait until the publisher says, “Sales are down! We need to come up with a new, intricate plot twist!” That only usually makes things worse. As painstaking as it might be to say goodbye, there are likely other, wonderful stories pent up inside the writer just waiting to get out. Given a strong fanbase, any new story introduced by the same author will be just as much of a hit as the old one.

Memorable stories start with memorable characters. But if a character just keeps getting into the same scrapes and never moves forward, eventually, we readers will say goodbye – even if the author won’t.

 

From a writing perspective, I have been silent and unproductive over the past year, although it’s been particularly bad for the past 6 months. This is due to experiencing Post Concussion Syndrome (PCS) from a concussion I received FIVE years ago.

In 2012 I fell while skiing (and yes, I was wearing a helmet) giving myself a nasty bump on the head. For the next few weeks, I did the bare minimum — which, when you have three kids, is still significant. I off-loaded laundry to the kids (which they still do to this day) and made simple meals, and took a lot of naps, outsourced carpooling, etc.

I couldn’t work. I’m a writer and consultant during my day job but had to pretty much stop for six months. During the first three months I couldn’t look at a computer screen without feeling nauseous, but perhaps even scarier was that I couldn’t form sentences in my head. It’s a bit of a problem for a writer.

On top of all that, I began experiencing migraines. I’d had two in my life before the fall. As I started getting back into an exercise routine, I noticed that each time I exercised I got a migraine within 24 hours. Concussion protocol is to stop anything that gives you symptoms for at least a week, better two, and then try again at a lower level.

Over the next four years, although I slowly improved physically and was able to get back to a normal exercise routine, I still suffered from migraines. I figured it was just “that time in my life” as my mother told me that my grandmother had suffered from migraines during menopause.

I tried everything to get rid of them and lead a more normal life. I saw a neurologist who prescribed all kinds of medication to prevent them from coming on or make them less severe. Nothing worked except the medication to alleviate the pain once I had one. I saw a physiotherapist (several, actually), acupuncturist, cranial-sacral therapist, massage therapist, my family doctor, a nurse-practitioner who put me on hormone cream, my gynecologist, a naturopath and finally a sports psychologist. At least you can’t say I’m suffering without doing anything about it!

Each of these professionals, while good at what they do, felt that there was nothing more they could do and that my migraines were no longer concussion-related. It was discouraging because I knew they were a result of the concussion and that there was still something wrong with my brain.

The migraines are debilitating. When I get them and can’t stop them, they last at least 5 hours and then it takes me another day to recover from the episode.

By early 2016, I was having migraines that lasted for three weeks. A dull pain that rotated around my head, never staying in one place very long, just enough to make me lose my concentration and patience with anyone who crossed my path.

A friend of mine is a doctor and she told me that one of her patients who also had continuous migraines took gluten out of her diet and later turned out to be celiac. Maybe I should give it a go. As much as I love my sweets and bread, I was ready to try anything.

Lo and behold, for about three months I was headache-free! I felt amazing! I exercised, I was patient, happy, pain-free! I could write and concentrate!…..and then, they came back.

I had started tracking the migraines in a journal and noted that I seemed to get them after exercise – again! I felt like I was right back to the beginning of my concussion journey four years earlier. I stopped exercising. I cut out dairy. The headaches went away. But, it wasn’t really a way to live. Plus, I couldn’t understand the diet-concussion connection. It didn’t make any sense to me.

The worst was, when I told people that it all went back to the concussion, most people would look at me with disbelief or disdain like I didn’t know what I was talking about. It makes you feel stupid —  like you aren’t diagnosing your own symptoms properly.

I got progressively worse through the fall of 2016. I could eat very little without triggering a migraine, I couldn’t exercise, I couldn’t even drown my sorrows….and I couldn’t write. Producing articles was painful, there was something about the thought process that wasn’t working for me.

Finally, through friends and referrals, I found a health professional who actually looks at the brain damage as opposed to just the symptoms. I was encouraged when one of the referrers acknowledged that I wasn’t making it all up, but that my concussion hadn’t been treated properly at the time of the trauma and that’s why the symptoms had come back. The thing I’ve noticed about concussions is that all the health professionals treat what they are best at, but no one puts it all together and goes back to the original source of the symptoms. I was checked for a hematoma and nerve damage, the physiotherapists treated my skeletal and muscular issues, the neurologist just wants to give me meds to deal with the pain instead of addressing why I get the pain in the first place. No one seemed to think that brain damage was an issue, although by definition, that’s what a concussion is.

The health professional I’m currently seeing says there is absolutely a brain-gut link – what you eat will affect how you feel, and he’s given me the studies to back up the claims.

It’s a slow process and given my experience with professionals from both the alternative medical track and the traditional medical track, I’m not holding my breath, but I’ve started to notice very small improvements – for one thing, writing is becoming easier again.

 

By brewbooks from near Seattle, USA – i103005 254, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...

I am new to the cozy mystery genre but have been reading many books in it since I started signing up for ebooks through various websites (For information on where to find free e-books, see this post).

I couldn’t figure out the phrase “cozy mystery” and wondered about the definition. What does someone do when they want to figure out the origin of something? She Googles it, of course!

I found this great article by Brian Klems over at Writers Digest, which explained the genre and history of the genre – and of course, the reason why I tend to gravitate to it. So, here are four things about cozy mysteries I didn’t know:

1. G-rating

Lack of violence or sex in a storyline. According to Klems, the first ones were written by Agatha Christie. While we see the dead body, we follow Miss Marple or Hercule Poirot around as they interview (never interrogate) their suspects.

2. Amateur Detective/Shop owner

These days, the sleuth tends to be amateur and owns his/her own business in a small town or community.

3. Fast-paced compared to the originals

The pace of the story is much faster today than in Agatha Christie times. In my opinion, this is probably due to our being accustomed to the fast pace of  TV programs and movies which translates into a page-turner in fiction.

4. Usually developed as a series

What hasn’t changed since Christie’s writing days is that most cozy mysteries are written as a series. They have become a popular sub-genre of crime fiction.

For more information on cozy mysteries, visit Brian Klems’ original article:

http://www.writersdigest.com/online-editor/4-things-you-should-know-about-writing-a-cozy-mystery-novel

 

 

Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle in the BBC’s Pride and Prejudice http://www.express.co.uk/comment/colu...

I ‘ve probably read Pride and Prejudice a thousand times — yes, that is an exaggeration, but I have read it enough times to help my daughter get 100% on her English assignment (yay me!). When I am looking for story structure, vivid characters and a plot with various sub-plots that fit together seamlessly, it is my go-to novel for inspiration!While my daughter was studying the book, she offered me her opinion  which was fairly blunt and blasphemous to Austen fans the world over. “It’s so boring. All they worry about is who is going to marry who, and what kind of match it is. Who cares?”

To say that the premise of the book was lost on her would be an understatement. She is 15 and brought up in an age and country where girls are taught that with the right amount of work, skill and talent, you can achieve what you want without attention to class level or gender. So Austen’s focus on “marrying well” and “above your rank” was something she couldn’t understand.

In a way, this is a story that should be taught along side history  or women’s studies in order to better understand the context of the story. Yes, marrying well was important, really, right up until a few decades ago.  I suggested she just read it for the story itself, the plot line and how all the characters interacted, instead of trying to fit it into the modern world.

She begrudgingly accepted my advice (I think it’s a first!), and read the entire thing, although she said she liked Darcy before he confessed his actions in the letter to Elizabeth after his first proposal. My daughter thought he showed too many signs of weakness after the letter! Wow, not much of a romantic.

In an age when fewer couples are marrying and women earn their own incomes and can choose whether or not they even want to marry (or get out of a marriage that isn’t working), Austen’s focus on marriage and social status seems “silly” according to my daughter. Listening to her comments about the novel, I can understand her perspective. It also provides a good opportunity to demonstrate just how much women have progressed in terms of equal rights thanks to the trailblazing women before us.

We also discussed how doctors and lawyers and other professionals were looked down upon at that time by the upper class, which she also had trouble with. Austen, at least, portrayed Elizabeth’s uncle (a lawyer) and aunt as smart, level-headed people who could get the job done. These characters contrasted with the lazy, indulgent and superficial relatives of Mr. Bingley. So, Austen was ahead of her time in terms of respecting the professional class of people vs. the aristocracy.

Had Austen been writing today, I like to think she would have created an entertaining piece on the social ills of our times. All in all, the romance of the story Austen created is timeless, and my daughter notwithstanding, Mr. Darcy is still held up as the ideal mate for many women out there.

 

 

By Flickr user eyeliam (http://www.flickr.com/photos/eyeliam/...) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b...)], via Wikimedia Commons

In A Vintage Year, the main character, Harris Tucker, ends up working as a farmhand on a vineyard that happens to be bio-dynamic. I decided to make the farm bio-dynamic instead of organic for the interesting aspects of bio-dynamic farming. I did a lot of research and have found that a lot of bio-dynamic farms tend to be vineyards, especially those in North America.

Bio-dynamic farming was developed by a German scientist, Rudolf Steiner, in the 1920s. The idea behind it was all about helping the soil be the most fertile soil possible, and to work with the plants and animals raised on that soil. In the ’20s, a lot of farmers were becoming concerned with the quality of their crops based on the chemical fertilizers they were using. They had noticed that the quality of their crops was deteriorating.

Steiner went to work, believing that there were many factors involved in developing good soil that grows superior produce. He believed that soil fertility could be increased by using field preparations and compost preparations. The field preparations he developed are called 500 and 501 — these are the ones that involve stuffing a cow’s horn with manure and planting it in a field for the winter, then digging it in the spring in time for field preparation for planting. Compost preparations consist of herbs stuffed into the stomach of a red deer, or the lower intestine of a cow, and left in the sun for the summer, then buried in the winter and dug up for use in the spring. These preparations, six in total, are dubbed 502-508.

Planting your crops is based on the cycle of the moon and whether it is a root, leaf, flower or fruit type of crop.

Annual crops are rotated from year to year in order to stimulate the soil.

There is no scientific evidence that bio-dynamic farming produces any better results than organic farming, and it sure seems like it’s a lot more work than organic farming. However, I have spoken to bio-dynamic vineyard owners who swear by it and say that the flavour of the terroir so much more pronounced in bio-dynamic wines versus wines made from conventionally grown or even organic grapes.

For more information on bio-dynamic farming, check out some of these links.

Biodynamic v Organic Winemaking – Southbrook’s Ann Sperling Video

https://www.biodynamics.com/what-is-biodynamics

Here is a great website on the practicality and reality of biodynamic vineyard farming – love the website url: “http://biodynamicsisahoax.com” !

For the record, while my farm family are bio-dynamic farmers, I have to admit, that if I were a farmer, I would fall on the organic side of things. The extra work involved to make a farm bio-dynamic just doesn’t have me convinced that it’s necessary. Also, when you think about the tiny amounts of “preparations” that are mandated for field coverage (1 tsp. per hectare), you have to question how much work the preparation would really do. Sorry to those bio-dynamic farmers out there for being a skeptic.

 

 

I admit, birthdays are one of those mixed blessings. Yes, it means you’re another year older, but it’s better than the alternative. My father used to say, “Birthdays: another year older, another year closer to death.”

When you’re a kid of course, you’re desperate to grow up. You are “10 and a half,” or “8 and three quarters.” Even when I was in my mid-twenties, I would forget how hold I was. I was 25 for three years because I didn’t pay enough attention to keep track. When you’re in your mid-twenties you’re old enough to do everything and too young to worry about your body falling apart.

When I was in my late thirties and early forties, I was constantly disappointed by my birthday. It never lived up to my expectations (I blame TV sit-coms!). Of course, life goes on and hockey games, meetings, and dinner still need to get done whether it’s your birthday or not. One year my birthday was a take out pizza around the kitchen island before we all continued on with our other activities. It was kind of depressing. I readjusted my expectations and put them in line with reality, and I’ve been fine ever since. Although I do find that every year the day comes and goes and I feel like I’ve been missing, well, something — I just couldn’t put my finger on it.

This year I decided to take my birthday into my own hands and create one super duper awesome extra fun day! So when my husband said, “What do you want to do for your birthday?”

I replied, “It’s a surprise!”

He looked at me puzzled and said, “But it’s your birthday — shouldn’t I be planning it?”

I said, “Can you read my mind?” — a rhetorical question, answered by an eye roll from him.

The point is, I realize that in my family, I am the only one who truly knows what I want to do for my birthday. What I really wanted from him was just to tag along and do stuff he wouldn’t do on his own. And I knew my kids would have absolutely no interest in the activities I had planned.

I was lucky, because this year my birthday fell on a Saturday and I really took advantage of it. What I planned was:

Something fun: A chocolate festival called Je t’aime en chocolat at Marché Bonsecours in old Montreal
Something foodie: an awesome lunch at Olive and Gourmando
Something cultural: the new Pompeii exhibit at the the Musee des Beaux Arts and the really fun bird exhibit;
Something social: Drinks with friends
A nice dinner out: Brasserie T!

I had also planned something sporty — skating on Beaver Lake, but we ran out of time — go figure. Hmm, I just noticed the entire day seemed to revolve around food, but it’s not surprising when you live in a foodie city.

It was a nice way to spend a typical gloomy and blah February day and I’m glad I got to do what I wanted to.