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Apart From Love
My author interview on Katheryn Lane's blog has just been posted. Katheryn is the author of Her Latin Lover and The Royal Sheikh. She works full-time as a teacher, mother and wife, but somehow also finds time to be a part-time writer as well! She loves to write contemporary romances set in exotic locations.No wonder, then, that she titled the interview Art, Love and Writing.
To read more, click the link
http://katheryn-lane.blogspot.com/201...
The Voice of a Kindle BookOn Friday the thirteenth I'll be free, but be forewarned
Don't you come near me, or else you'd be scorned--
Unless you delight in contemporary fiction
And enjoy reading a book with detailed scene depiction
If you let me pull you in, deep inside
Until you find yourself there, in my characters' mind
I'll make you burn in hell, ablaze in desire,
I'll let you swirl like smoke, ever higher and higher
I'll bring you down here: Santa Monica, Venice Beach
For a father-son meeting, with a blame and a breach
You'll hear Lenny, Natasha, Anita and Ben
And be tortured by guilt, again and again
Find a path to forgiveness, find a way to come clean
Find the words to explain what exactly you mean
Turn page after page, then fall to your knee
'Cause Apart From Love, no feeling is free
Be Still, Poet's HeartBe still, poet's heart, this moment is rare
Stop this hammering, why would you dare
To set up a challenge, to write your own fate
Be still and accept, perhaps it's too late
Unlucky the number, unlucky the day
Friday the thirteenth, come what may
Set yourself free, Apart From Love
Change whatever was decreed from above
Sing out a ballad of passion and hate
Sing it out as you drown, and ignore that date
Someone may notice, may listen out there
So quicken the pounding, sing out with a flair
The flood is abating, release the dove
Pray to find yourself a part of love
"I picture her staring at the black-and-white image of her brain, not quite understanding what they are telling her. The doctors, they point out the overall loss of brain tissue, the enlargement of the ventricles, the abnormal clusters between nerve cells, some of which are already dying, shrouded eerily by a net of frayed, twisted strands. They tell her about the shriveling of the cortex, which controls brain functions such as remembering and planning.
And that is the moment when in a flash, mom can see clearly, in all shades of gray blooming there, on that image, how it happens, how her past and her future are slowly, irreversibly being wiped away—until she is a woman, forgotten."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-Love-Uvi-...
T'was a hot summer evening, Anita laid eyes on Ben But summer's gone now, and so is their kiss
The only witnesses left are my paper and pen
Let me tell you what happened, from conflicts to bliss
To read more, click the link
http://uviart.blogspot.com/2012/08/tw...
Summer's come to a close, the breath of autumn is here Time for reflection, time for a break
The wind start gusting at this time of year
Listen to my whispers, so you make no mistake--
As golden leaves drift, rustling in the air
Come cuddle with me, open my cover
Apart From Love, there's not a moment to spare
Leaf through my story, it's for you to discover
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
Bring me along, when you celebrate Labor DayI'm free--Apart From Love... I'm your prize
It's your chance to imagine, to let me play
A story of passion before your eyes
Take a deep breath and take me outdoors
Watch the leaves falling, never mind autumn blues
If you touch me, I'll be all yours
My pages will rustle, and awaken your muse.
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
Unique & Spellbinding!!By Dolores Ayotte
Uvi Poznansky is an artist! There is no doubt about it. As I read "Apart from Love", I was drawn into a masterfully created piece of artwork. This is no ordinary novel. It richly depicts the product of a dysfuntional family and how they are drawn together, yet so repulsed by each other.
There is a quality so deep and raw in "Apart from Love" that it's almost impossible to put this book down. In my opinion, Uvi Poznansky writes like a painter. She starts with a clean canvas and dabs a little paint here and a little paint there as she develops her characters and creates her masterpiece. Her strokes then become broader, more passionate, more vivid and vibrant as she continues to let her characters' stories unfold. She draws you in to a deeper level than you might actually want to go as she ignites the fire to your own love, passions, and fears.
Ben, the 27 year old son grudgingly returns home many years after the divorce of his parents, Lenny and Natasha. He finds that there is a mutual attraction between his father's young wife Anita, and himself. Their stories, along with Lenny's are related in a narrative as each person has the opportunity to share his side of the events that take place. "Apart from Love" reminds me of a movie I enjoyed many years ago...Cat on a Hot Tin Roof because it is a well-written drama that could take place on a stage similar to this movie. In "Apart from Love" Ben states..."In our family, forgiveness is something you pray for, something you yearn to receive but so seldom do you give to others." There is defintely a great need for forgiveness both on the giving end as well as the receiving end in this novel.
Similar to any other work of art, the artist leaves so much of themselves in their work. Uvi Poznansky has done just that! Kudos to her on a job well done!
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
"The last thing I want to see is his face, when he comes home to realize that—poof!—the grand piano is gone. Vanished! My father is known to have an eccentric attachment to things, especially to that old, massive, ornately decorated, polished white beast. Why, you may ask? I have wondered about it, too, and can offer only this: it brings back to him a certain presence, the presence of mom, playing. So perhaps for him, it is a remnant of love: namely, guilt.By the time I turned sixteen, mom had developed an unexplained fear, a fear of getting lost, which was quite pronounced, even as she headed out for a short walk, such as to the grocery store on Wilshire Boulevard, not more than a couple of blocks away. She seemed to rely, with an increasing sense of anxiety, on the familiar, and would become ferociously shaken if a chair was accidentally moved out of position. We all knew that the instrument—which was only hers, because I had stopped playing by then—was sacred. It was not to be touched.
And so, too, was she."
Ben, in Apart From Love
Shimmering luster, let me try, let me reach youLayers beyond layers of red, all aglow
With trembling fingers I touch... Flimsy tissue
It comes down upon me, folding high into low
I dance with abandon, with no inhibition,
Entangled in fabric, I can no longer flee
Can't breath, for now I can see the strange fusion
Now I know: this tissue is me
To read more about the cover image of Apart From Love, which is inspired by my art, click here:
http://uviart.blogspot.com/2012/01/wh...
"Back home after the funeral I cannot find a moment alone. The place is buzzing with neighbors and distant relatives, including my three aunts, each of whom has eyebrows painted in, in place of the real ones. At first they talk in low voices, afraid, perhaps, that grandma might hear what they say, or come out to scold them for their manners. They bend over me and pinch my cheeks so hard that instantly, I forget all about the pain in my foot inside the bandages. So I am forced to hide from attention. I stand there, very quietly, in the corner behind the tank, and feed the new fish, which dad got for me earlier that morning; just a smidgen between the fingers, like he told me... And then maybe one more smidgen, or two, because I hate learning lessons, and because I am bored and lonely here, in this crowd, and also because of the fish, because they look so hungry for these little specks. You can see them flocking up in a big haste, competing to reach the surface."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
In my novel Apart From Love, Anita imagines the baby she carries in her womb, and the bond forming between them:"My little one would gurgle and coo right here, in my arms. I would be brushing my lips over his scalp—ever so gentle—careful not to touch nowhere close to the tender spot, right there at the top. I could almost feel the fine fuzz of his hair, real soft, tickling my cheek.
In my head I could kiss, I could almost swallow his tiny fingers. They would wrap around my finger, their nails so pink, so incredibly clear. And the little hands, they would stroke my hair or like, search for my breast.
Then I would touch the nipple to my baby’s lips, and watch him latch on and like, suck, suck, swallow, breathe; suck, suck, swallow, breathe.
All the while his eyes would be fixed on me, curious to see, to separate my face out of that blurry chaos, that first, misty sight of lights and of shadows. And so I promised myself: I would give him that which I never got. I would become such a good mama, like no mama ever was! I would keep him safe right here, close to my heart."
The image I chose to illustrate this promise is my bronze sculpture, Mother and Child. And this--in the most profound sense--is Home, too.
There are over thirty eloquent, beautiful reviews on Amazon for my novel Apart From Love, but I have just received the one I consider the most rewarding of all! Check it out; this is why a writer writes:http://uviart.blogspot.com/2012/09/th...
"I imagine him coming back home, later this evening, and taking a step back—away from the mat—to make certain he has unlocked the right door. He would call, “Anyone home?” and an echo, a crisp echo would rattle the air, as if to announce an unusual depth, an emptiness.
He would then raise the key to his eyes, staring incredulously at it. It must be the right one, or else the lock would have jammed—but even so, the old man would check it again carefully, as if some bend, some scuff on the metal might, perhaps, explain the wrong turn of things.
He would rub his eyes, amazed to discover Beethoven's bust planted down there, in the dust, on the floor, its eyes frozen in dumb confusion. Discarded. No longer perched on top, it seems to have shrunk—or else the space has, somehow, ballooned around it.
The marble head seems cropped by a beam of light on one side, and a pile of music notebooks on the other. The sculpted shoulders lean against streaks of peeling wallpaper, blackened streaks that have previously gone unnoticed, crumbling away in the shadows, behind the bulk of the piano, which is now missing.
I cannot begin to guess what my father would say, if he would say anything at all, I mean, before he starts shouting."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
Then he says, “She still walks on both feet, still looks the same, more or less. To a stranger, Natasha still looks as if nothing at all is wrong with her. The shell, so to speak, is intact. You are young, son, and may laugh at what I say, but to me she is beautiful. Pure. As if only a few days have passed since I first laid eyes on her. But on each visit I see changes. Each time, her mind disappears a little bit more.”“Dad, you still didn’t give me an answer.”
“Do I miss her? No, son,” he says, and takes a long, painful pause. “Not all the time.”
“Was it difficult for you, bringing her here?”
“For several weeks, I had dreaded what she would say. That morning I got up from bed, and found her talking to the mirror. I said, This is a special day, Natasha! Let’s go out for breakfast. And pointing straight ahead, at the glass, she said, OK, and what about her, is she coming, too? And I said, No, not today. Just you and me. Oh, she said, OK. And to her reflection she said, Goodbye. And so we came here.”
“Again, dad: you still didn’t give me an answer.”
“Was it difficult to bring her? No,” he says. “The difficult part was to leave her behind, and go home, and find myself lonely, lonely and empty and, at long last, free. I stood there, on the threshold, without her, not knowing what to do with my hands.”
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
"Then he says to his son, You should go, because this place can’t hold the two of us for much longer, and because a young fellow like you must be hungry for adventure, and eager to see the world, and the last thing you want is to remain here, stuck in this stuffy place, with a grumpy old man, so here’s some money, it should be more than enough—if spent modestly—for travel expenses, and stay in touch, and good luck with everything. And Ben tries to say No, quite to the contrary, there’s much more space now than there ever was, with the grand piano cleared out of the way, just look at Anita over there, stretching her arms and doing quick twirls, all across the room.
At hearing all that, Lenny just clenches his jaw—but he don’t even grumble or nothing, and I bet he’s holding his tongue just to drive home the point, like, how calm he manages to be, and how there isn’t no sign of anger in him, or nothing.
All the same Ben seems to know that he’s being punished. So without even glancing at me—like I’m the one to be blamed for all this—he bites his lip and goes into his room, where he can’t help kicking the wall once or twice, after which he comes out to the kitchen, and kicks the refrigerator and then opens it, to look for an ice pack."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-Love-Uvi-...
"Before I can move, I can sniff trouble. Here it is, the smell of bread baking. Tinged with vanilla and honey, the scent has come in, perhaps sneaking around the door, finding its way through a crack, or puffing through the keyhole. It is forming, even now, into a channel, an invisible channel floating somehow in midair, right above me, swelling up there as if it were an extension of my nostrils.
By now, my stomach is growling, so I have no choice. Up, up and away flies the pillow, off come the blankets! I walk out of my room—hair uncombed, chin unshaven—and find myself waking up to hunger. Or at least, to an undeniable craving.
Framed by the kitchen door, standing there with her back to me, she cranks open the oven. Fume comes out of its gaping mouth, inside which lay two freshly baked loaves, shining with the gloss of egg wash, and sprinkled generously with crispy, toasted sesame seeds.
With a large oven mitt, this woman—my father’s new wife—puts her hand inside, and takes hold of the baking pan. I can hear a slight sizzle. Now her thighs tighten. One foot is rising behind the other as she pivots, bringing the loaves right under my nose."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
I truly enjoyed reading the following review because it suggests a blending of the subjects found in my two recent books, Home and Apart From Love. While the two are distinctly different, there are naturally some themes that can be found in both of them. Apart From Love is a work of fiction. Lenny, the father in this novel does share one trait with my father: he is a writer. To read more, click the link
http://uviart.blogspot.com/2012/10/a-...
Apart From Love is not for everybody. Let me quote from the numerous reviews on Amazon, whenever they talk about the type of readers that would appreciate the story:"I did enjoy this book and thought it made both sad and amusing reading and I laughed and cried while I was reading it. I thought the passages about Natasha and her illness were very well done. I would recommend this book to anyone who would like to read something a little bit different from the normal run of fiction." [By Damaskcat]
"Highly recommended, especially for those whose tastes lean toward innovative literary fiction." [By Marcia Quinn Noren]
"This novel was a true pleasure to read and I recommend it to anyone that loves a compelling story of family struggles and affairs of the heart." [By Ashley Fontainne "Ashley"]
"Apart from Love has a feel of modern art, inviting readers in to enjoy, explore and eventually wrap themselves in the mystery of lives and loves drawn together and thrown apart. An intriguing tale, it's not an easy read but it's certainly an involving one that doesn't necessarily go where the reader expects." [By S. Deeth "Sheila Deeth"]
"Reading this novel is like gawking at a tragic crime scene; you know you are intruding into something way too personal, but you NEED to know all the details--who was hurt and how, who was the guilty party, and most importantly how do I avoid this?" [By Melodie K. Starkey]
This and a lot more can be found here:
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
"I bet that like me, he remembers that night, the first time we danced, ‘cause now that the tape recorder has finished giving out the long, rustling hush, and the music comes on, it’s the old song, doubled by a ghost of its sound: something slow from the sixties, which years ago used to bring tears to ma’s eyes, ‘cause like, it awakened her to being lonely, and now it brings them to mine.Lenny cups my face in his hand and pecks me lightly on the cheek. Then he starts showering me with the littlest kisses, all along the trail of tears, his mouth slipping down the skin of my neck. And I laugh—not only on account of being ticklish, but because suddenly I’m aroused, and even a touch nervous. And I say, “Let’s just dance,” which is echoed, like, by the laughter of the walls.
So Lenny backs away and I come, and then in reverse, he comes as I back away, and we go and come, come and go this way for a long while—but we don’t hardly move from the same spot, here by the sofa, even though there’s so much space now around us, for dancing and what not."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
"In the first couples of months or so after his son left, Lenny’s been very quiet. In some ways, things ain’t all that bad between us. He comes home every night, even asks—when he cares to look at me—if the baby’s started kicking already. His question is kinda polite, and it don’t really break the silence, just marks a place from where we can restart it. Anyhow we’re together, so I don’t have to worry no more about where he is, and I don’t have to call aunt Hadassa, who has her sources, and I don’t have to listen to her squirming, trying to spare me from knowing what this entire town already knows, which is, that Lenny’s been sleeping around.
It’s always the same thing now. Me and him sit down at the kitchen table and eat dinner together, like a normal family, except that we do it in silence. Then we settle into that old, sagging couch—him in one corner, me in the other—and wait. What it is we’re waiting for isn’t exactly clear. At first I could swear it was, like, a word from Ben—but now I figure it’s a good thing the day’s getting shorter."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
Join me in celebration of the bonds we have with our parents, bonds that at times are stretched to the limit through life challenges, which I describe in my books: my novel Apart From Love and my poetry book Home. With this theme in mind I invite you to take part in a variety of fun-filled activities leading up to the Thanksgiving weekend. http://www.facebook.com/events/299302...
“After a while I whispered, like, Just say something to me. Anything. And I thought, Any other word apart from Love, ’cause that word is diluted, and no one knows what it really means, anyway.”I am thrilled that this excerpt and others, along with my interview appear in the "Hottest Book Club on the Street"--namely, the DJ GATSBY BOOK CLUB.
http://djgatsbybookclub.wordpress.com...
★★★★★ Bookreview: A novel to be savoredBy Juliet Parnell - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
Liberally salted with buttery smooth prose and fascinating insights as to the mindset of a dysfunctional family, Uvi Pozansky's Apart From Love chronicles Ben, Anita and Lenny's struggle with their desires, hopes and dreams as they clash with decency, moral values, and tragic secrets unveiled. Pozansky vividly illustrates the cracks in the fragile relationship between these characters. So much so, I felt was inside their heads speaking and acting for them. Seldom has a book gripped my imagination as Apart From Love did.
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
At first my father seemed relaxed enough to tell me—at more length than usual—about my grandfather, whom I never met, because he had died long before I was born. I got a distinct sense that dad was, somehow, still afraid of the old man, who had pressed him hard to achieve that which he himself had failed to become: a lawyer. “So,” I asked, “what did you do?”
A brief laughter erupted on his lips. “I told him that I had registered at the university, and would be majoring in Law, just as he had always wished—but somehow I neglected to mention that the closest I ever came to registering was flipping through an outdated course catalog, while sitting on the toilet, and dreaming about something else.”
“And,” I hesitated to ask, “did he ever find out?”
“Well,” said my father, and in a flash, his face turned red, “if it occurred to the old man that this might have been a nasty lie, he admirably concealed it.”
I listen to his voice, which is still here, echoing in my head, and all of a sudden I grasp that he grew embarrassed not only because of his obligation to his father—but to me as well. Perhaps a sudden sense of shame caught up to him, shame for falling short of becoming an acceptable role model. Or else he had a premonition—a fear, even—of how I would treat him, not too far in what was then the future.
Which makes me realize one thing: up to a certain point, I wanted to become a man just like my father. And from then on, I wanted to be anything but. Which made me spend a whole decade in diametrical opposition to him, so that I wound up living a life based directly on his, as though I had never left home.
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
"My little one would gurgle and coo right here, in my arms. I would be brushing my lips over his scalp—ever so gentle—careful not to touch nowhere close to the tender spot, right there at the top. I could almost feel the fine fuzz of his hair, real soft, tickling my cheek. In my head I could kiss, I could almost swallow his tiny fingers. They would wrap around my finger, their nails so pink, so incredibly clear. And the little hands, they would stroke my hair or like, search for my breast.
Then I would touch the nipple to my baby’s lips, and watch him latch on and like, suck, suck, swallow, breathe; suck, suck, swallow, breathe.
All the while his eyes would be fixed on me, curious to see, to separate my face out of that blurry chaos, that first, misty sight of lights and of shadows. And so I promised myself: I would give him that which I never got. I would become such a good mama, like no mama ever was! I would keep him safe right here, close to my heart."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
Please retweet:"He has undone the buttons of my blouse, he loosens it this way and that, and then, in one firm pull it’s already down"
http://tinyurl.com/apartfromlove
"I can just see him in my head, like, holding the baby’s hand, guiding him already in his first steps. Then, letting go, he’s gonna take a step or two back, and hold his breath, waiting there for the little one to walk into his open arms. Lenny’s gonna buy him a brand new tricycle, and teach him how to set his little feet on top of them pedals, and push, push harder, even harder—yeah! Just so! And again: Go on, push, until—oh boy! With great joy, he’s gonna clap his hands, because here—for the first time—you could detect a move, a slight move ahead.
And then, a few years down the road, he’s gonna surprise our child with a large, shining bicycle, and adjust the training wheels as time goes by, until they wasn’t needed no more; at which point, Lenny would remove them, and hold them in his hands, like, to weigh them for a moment, and try to wipe the rust, and wish that time would like, slow down, just a little, because it’s hard, so hard for the old heart to let go.
Yes, Lenny needs a son: someone to need him, trust him, and make him trust himself again."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
Am I a leaf about to drift About to fly away, to chance
The cold, the heat, the drop, the lift
Upon the wing of wind, to dance?
Or else, nestled in this tree
Am I to stay, and thus be free?
Here I am, Apart From Love
Flying Home just like a dove
Woke up to a nice surprise: my interview on Digital Books Today is up! Asked to describe what I see when I look at my desk, I said, "Since I am an artist, poet and writer, the best way to show you the surface is my painting. As a creator, I see myself this way: I paint with a pen, write with a paintbrush. My art strives to tell a story, and my stories strive to bring you into the scene being painted, letting you sense everything my characters touch, see, or hear."To read this interview, click the link:
http://digitalbooktoday.com/2012/11/1...
Ruth Jacobs lives a quiet life in a small village in Hertfordshire, England, which is quite a contrast from her teens and early twenties, spent rather waywardly in London. She is the author of In Her Own Words... Interview with a London Call Girl. I was tickled pink when she offered to interview me on her website.
And so, this morning I woke up to a surprise: having answered her questions only last night, the interview 'In the Booth with Ruth' is already up!
Over a year ago I wrote a short story about a twelve years old boy coming face to face, for the first time in his life, with the sad spectacle of death in the family. The title of the story is Only An Empty Dress. In it, Ben watches his father trying to revive his frail grandma, and later he attempts the same technique on the fish tilting upside down in his new aquarium.“I cannot allow myself to weep. No, not now. So I wipe the corner of my eye. Now if you watch closely, right here, you can see that the tail is still crinkling. I gasp, and blow again. I blow and blow, and with a last-gasp effort I go on blowing until all is lost, until I don’t care anymore, I mean it, I don’t care but the tears, the tears come, they are starting to flow, and there is nothing, nothing more I can do—”
I set the story aside, thinking I was done with it. But the character of the boy, Ben, came back to me and started chatting, chatting, chatting in my head. It became the seed of my just-published novel Apart From Love.
In writing it I asked myself, what if I ‘aged’ him by fifteen years? Where would he be then? Would he still admire his father as a hero, or will he be disillusioned at that point? What secrets would come to light in the life of this family? How would it feel for Ben to come back to his childhood home, and have his memories play tricks on him? What if I introduce a girl, Anita, a redhead who looks as beautiful as his mother used to be, but is extremely different from her in all other respects? And what if this girl were married to his father? What if the father were an author, attempting to capture the thoughts, the voices of Ben and Anita, in order to write his book?
So the process of writing became, for me, simply listening to the characters and trying, as fast as I could, to capture their thoughts. My role as an author was merely suggesting a place, coming up with the stage set and illuminating it as appropriate for the time of day, and allowing the characters to describe what they see and to act out their passions and fears.
In a recent exhibition at the Getty museum I saw a little sketch by Rembrandt, showing the master artist and his students carefully observing a model, who is posing on a stage in his studio, and drawing her. It inspired me to create a variation on the theme: I used the same grouping of figures, where the woman is set apart from the rest of them, but changed the environment from a studio to a cave, and the figures from art students to a primitive mob. It brings out some primal emotion in all of them. Here is the watercolor I painted:
While in this painting the woman turns her head away, as if she has no voice, she talked loud and clear in the chapter In My Defense, in my book Apart From Love. Here is what Anita says:
"In my defense I have this to say: When men notice me, when the lusty glint appears in their eyes, which betrays how, in their heads, they’re stripping me naked—it’s me they accuse of being indecent.
Problem is, men notice me all the time."
Ashley Fontainne is an avid reader of classic literature. She is also the author of Zero Balance, Accountable to None, and Ramblings of a Mad Southern Woman, and the host of a Blog talk radio show called the WriteStuff, which is coming to its close this weekend (to be replaced with a new show.) I have read Ashely's poetry, and trust me--her writing is no rambling, it is a full throated roar! So I am truly honored that she brought me on her show for this special episode, to talk about Apart From Love, Home, my sculptures and paintings, the new possibilities of publishing in this new Indie era, and more.
Come take a listen to our conversation:
http://uviart.blogspot.com/2012/12/no...
Lying still in a corner of the cave, I try my best not to rattle, not to betray my fear. I figure, as long as they think me unconscious, I am safe. I have jolted awake because of the voices, only to discover they are incoherent and muffled. In between the gusts of wind, I can hear them hissing...http://uviart.blogspot.com/2012/12/a-...
I am truly moved by this a recent review of Apart From Love, written by one of my earliest readers, Angela Davis, whose poems I have been following for the last few months:★★★★★ incredible read!, May 26, 2012
By Angela Davis - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase
This review is from: Apart From Love (Paperback)
Apart From Love is an inspiring novel by an amazing woman who is a writer, poet, sculptor, painter, and more. This novel spurred me to write again, and delved into my soul in a way that no other novel has done in many years. The intensity of characters, and their interconnections with one another, will entrance the reader, and remind us of the times when love was complicated and furious, yet honest and real. The voices of the primary characters are genuine and touching, and the story will encapture even the most jaded persons. A true voice here, a brilliant search into what can be and what truly is.
Ashley Fontainne is an avid reader of classic literature. She is also the author of Zero Balance, Accountable to None, and Ramblings of a Mad Southern Woman, and the host of a Blog talk radio show called the WriteStuff, which is coming to its close this weekend (to be replaced with a new show.) I have read Ashely's poetry, and trust me--her writing is no rambling, it is a full throated roar! So I am truly honored that she brought me on her show for this special episode, to talk about Apart From Love, Home, my sculptures and paintings, the new possibilities of publishing in this new Indie era, and more.
Come take a listen to our conversation:
http://uviart.blogspot.com/2012/12/no...
I am so lucky that my work has engaged this amazingly fast reader with a sharp perception of story and execution. Being an avid reader Cynthia J. Smith consumes ten books a week, this in addition to being a truck driver and the author of Voices in My Head. Here is the review she posted for my novel Apart From Love, on Amazon and Goodreads. For me It is a road mark--it bring the number of reviews on Amazon to 40!5.0 out of 5 stars perfect title, December 6, 2012
By Cynthia J. Smith - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
Amazon Verified Purchase
This review is from: Apart From Love (Paperback)
This book starts with the perfect title. Apart from love is a phrase used by all three of the main characters and its meaning is slightly different for all three. Amazing.
This story is written by Lenny but, he uses Ben's and Anita's words as they seem to narrate.
A story of secrets, family conflicts and confusion. Each of the characters has a stumbling block which keeps them unable to love or be loved.
Ben is the son who is estranged from his father due to the fact that his mother left. Even after he discovers why she left, he still can't seem to figure out how to get his father's love which he so needs. He hides in plain sight and cannot just come forward.
Anita is Lenny's mistress at first then his second wife. She comes from a slightly abusive family and has no real idea what love is. She only knows what she wants is safety and prestige. To be a wife! She becomes mistress to Lenny knowing he is married. She assumes her beauty will make him love her and replace his wife.
Lenny is just lost in his love for his first wife and the secret he must keep from all. He tries to write the story in the hopes that if he gets it just right, life will return to the way it was.
The ending was so amazing!
Uvi has written a poignant story. I am truly amazed by the depth of each of her characters.
Winter comes with frosty nights, Winter comes with snowball fights
Time to find a quiet place
Hold my books in your embrace
It's warm now, take off your glove
Stay Home and read Apart From Love
Get it for you and for your friend
A holiday gift, to give, to send
My books are here, no need to wait,
Night will come, it will be great.
"Then I go back and close the door to the corridor, which at once darkens the room. It is a vacuous black, a nothingness that is falling in upon us. I have to feel my way around, as if my eyes have suddenly grown blind. Finally I reach the corner of the room and crouch down there, on the floor, and I hear him panting, panting in distress. The one thing that seems to help him relax is listening to the sounds around him, especially to the sound of my mother breathing, and to my voice saying, I am here, dad. I am right here if you need me. After a long while the room starts to take shape. You can slowly discern the folds, the faint folds of the curtains, and the light seeping in under the wavy edge. And there, in the bed, you can see his outline, combined with hers."
Excerpt from Apart From Love
So I bend over, putting my ear to his mouth. He breathes, “Here—now—I could not have written it any better.”
And a moment later, “This is the most important day, the most important hour of my entire life. I can see things clearly, more than ever before, as if from a distance. You,” he takes a pause, “you have made your share of mistakes—but the whole thing started with mine.”
“Sorry, dad,” I say.
And he says, “It is my fault, and we both know it. Both of us have been paying the price. Don’t—don’t worry, son. I am going to fix it.”
These few words between us do me good, and my lungs expand and suddenly I can breathe so much easier than before—even though I am left wondering what he means by the whole thing and how exactly can it be fixed.
(Excerpt from Apart From Love)
"He lays there, having wrapped himself in my mother’s arms, his eyelashes still somewhat aflutter, his hands still shivering slightly over his heart, his face pale, nearly blue, and I know that if I would leave him at this moment to go look for Martha, the care giver, it would be over. Dad would be gone by the time I rush back. So I draw closer and stand there, behind the head of the bed, over my sleeping mother. From this angle, his ribs seem to move—but I think it is because of her body clinging to him, and because of her breathing, which is so deep and so peaceful. I lean over her arms to take his hands in mine, absorbing his shiver, taking it into my flesh, until finally it dies down.
And the light, growing even brighter, washes his face, till all that is left is a smile, frozen."
http://www.amazon.com/Apart-From-Love...
Contrary to popular belief, I see the brain working together, undivided between it left and right sides. It is overlaying its creative and analytical functions in every task. There are compositional problems to resolve, and color combination methods to gauge when you are painting a picture, at the same time that you are chasing your muse. The same is true for writing a story or composing a piece of music, with the added effect of time: a painting is perceived at once, more or less, while music and story unfold for the listener one note at a time. So I say, paint with a pen, write with a paintbrush. My art strives to tell a story, and my stories strive to bring you into the scene being painted! Here is a good example of the mutual influences between art and writing. I painted this oil painting a few years ago, driven to do so by a recurrent nightmare. Then, earlier this year, I brought it to life in letters, and weaved it into my novel, Apart From Love (see excerpt below.)
Just yesterday—when I laid there in bed, bleeding all day, not even knowing where I was—that was when at last, the dream found me.
In it, I find myself in a public place, which is strange to me—even though I know, somehow, that I’ve already been here. I’ve visited this place, perhaps the night before.
It’s raised like a stage, and flooded with light: a harsh glare, which blinds me. For a minute I can’t see nothing in the dark, beyond that ledge—but I know that them faces are out there, blank and blurry. They’re all there, hushing each other, gazing at me.
I see myself standing there in front of them, naked.
Red-faced, I hunch up as tight as I can. I fold over my thighs, trying to hide, to cover my body, my shame—but my hands, they’re way too small, so my nipple slips out of my fingers. And there it is, circled by light, for all to see, and to jeer at me, and to lick their lips, which is like, glistening out there, tiny sparks hissing in the distance.
For a little while, my sleep is light. And so—even as I’m looking straight into that spotlight, or like, reaching down to touch the ledge of that stage—I can tell that all this is false, it’s nothing more than a dream. But then I fall deeper, even deeper into it, and now I really believe what I see:
Some thread is crawling on my skin. Laying across my knees is a strap of fabric, which is frayed and stained, here and there, with my blood. When I pull it in, trying to drape it around me, or use it for a blanket, it resists. It don’t hardly give in, ‘cause it’s tied to something—no, somebody—standing right here, directly over my bare back.
Me, I don’t want to turn, but I take a peek over my shoulder. Wrapped in layers of rags and straps and loose ends, all of which is tattered and like, drenched in reds and browns, the figure seemed shaky. He lifts one leg, and tries to balance himself, teetering—this way and that—on one foot. His hand tries to touch the back of my neck—and misses it, grabbing a handful of air, instead.
And his blood-red lips, they’re curled up, in something that looks an awful lot like a smile. A mocking smile, one that don’t change.
In my dream, my feet must have frozen. I can’t move, can’t run away from him, or even climb off the stage, because at that point I’m weak, and too scared to even breathe, and because of that thread, which binds us. And so, rooted to that spot, I look up at him. At this close range, our eyes meet, and my heart skips a beat, ‘cause at that second, his are empty.
Suddenly I catch sight of someone else, someone standing way over there, in the distance, behind him; behind the curtains, even. Except for her hand, which is caught in the light, it’s hard to even notice her, ‘cause at first she’s like, real shy, even modest, and keeps herself in the shadows, out of the spotlight.
But then, she changes. Her long fingers, they’re gathered, one by one, into a fist. And twisted around her little finger, you can find—if you focus—the ends of the rags, and the straps, and the thread, all of which extend from there to here, where he stands; all the way, to the joints of his wrists and his elbows, tying them like, real tight.
And from backstage, she’s pulling him—raising, dropping, tightening, loosening—making the puppet move, shake, jiggle, even dance on the tip of his toe, and like, bringing him, somehow, to life. I gasp, thinking: she can twist him around her little finger, if she wants to.
Me, I cringe as he puffs, breathing something in my ear. “Go, go back home, go,” says the puppet, in a voice that is not really his. “Go to the place, the place where you came from, you came from. Go back to your ma, ma, your mama.”
"I leaned over the railing of the pier, and for a second hoped he would see me. How could he not, with my hair flaming red, and blowing, long and wild, in the winter wind, which swept across the divide? Now I could see the girl sitting there, opposite him. She raised her glass and clinked it against his, then cuddled up to him, like, to whisper something up close, in his ear.
I don’t hardly know if there was something odd with the air, which stirred past me with cloud after cloud of salty mist; or the sheet of glass over there, which must have had some flaws all over it; or the mirror image of sunset, which buckled out of shape, in and out of the flaws; or else, was it the film of tears, which formed in my eyes; or the sorrow, which came in like a tide, to wash over me—but in a blink, everything blurred.
Everything started swimming in front of me: like, the shadow of her little black dress, the flash of her gold earring, even the blond streaks in her hair. All of them things, which lived on the other side of the layers—the layer of mist, and of glass, and flaws, tears, wash—they all rippled a bit and then, settled into a haze."
Anita, in Apart From Love
Inspired by a sketch of a nude I have drawn earlier, here is a collage using magazine cutouts glued to transparency paper. Because of the materials I used, it was a bit difficult to photograph this properly; but in real life, the best way to view it is against a window, so the lights seeps through the transparency paper.
Here is an excerpt, especially for celebrating holidays, a flashback to Passovers past, taken from Apart From Love:If I were to focus strictly on my parents, ignore the entire background of this place, and let the clutter and the smell of it just fall away, this could take me back to a different time, a time in my childhood, when our kitchen table was set for the Passover meal. What comes back to me first is the tinkle, as my father finished blessing the wine, and clinked his glass against hers, against mine.
I remember: the table was draped, all the way down to the floor, with mom’s best, rarely used tablecloth, made of the smoothest ivory satin you ever touched. Dad sat at the head of the table, mom to his right, I opposite her.
All day long she had been cooking, which infused the air with a wonderful aroma. In it you could detect a sharp whiff of horseradish and of gefilte fish and sweet brisket and red cabbage and roasted potatoes, all of which made my stomach growl. It went on growling until he finished reading the long, archaic text in the Hagadda, which meant little to me, except a vague notion of the utter futility of patience.
I remember: my mother ladled the clear, golden chicken soup and set it here, steaming before my eyes, with three matzo balls floating inside, which was her way of giving. “It’s hot,” she said. “Make sure to blow on it first.” Yes, the smell of her cooking was good, but then, the taste! Just wait till you took the first bite—
In my novel Apart From Love, Ben refuses, for the longest time, to give up on his mother, who has been diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's. But in the later part of the novel he is finally facing the moment of truth:And this, this is the moment when the truth comes to me, clear and naked in its full ugliness, and I cannot deny it, cannot ignore the horrific meaning of what she who used to be my mother does next:
Sensing a presence next to her, she stirs back, as if by instinct, and for a split second smacks her lips. He may think this is a sign, perhaps of gratitude. I can see the sudden relief, the surprise in his smile. His eyes start closing, as if in anticipation of a kiss.
And then, then she opens her mouth, like some animal—a lizard comes to mind—hungry for its prey. She stays there, seemingly lazy, utterly motionless, jaws dropped, chin hanging, waiting for her feed. Waiting, waiting, waiting for more. Waiting without a word. Waiting with a need that can no longer find its satisfaction, the need of a body, an empty shell of a body whose mind has finally left it. Waiting, because mom will never be able to give.
At once I let go of the double doors so they swing, and come to a close. And I turn, and I run, run out of that place as fast as I can, so as not feel her eyes, looking at me without taking me in.
I am still running. I have to, because I find myself held still in that moment, when the truth has come to me, damn it. Who can be so brazen as to deny it, and who wants to take a second look.
In this charcoal sketch you can see how I study the features of the face at the moment of shock, when in a flash, you are facing that which you would not face before. A moment of truth can be a personal one, which you experience in private, or a communal one. Which is why I used this sketch also in my large oil painting, Earthquake.
To those of you who are unfamiliar with my work, here is a way to introduce myself. I feel honored that RDW Creations (which provides freelance creative writing, publishing and literary services) introduced my work on their site. In the article they show my two books Apart From Love and Home, and--get this-- a link to my art site, check it out!http://www.rdwcreations.com/Author-Sp...
"Later, when I wake up, it takes me a while to grasp where I am, and even longer to figure out that I’ve lost time, that time has passed. The last thing I remember is like, making breakfast for him—and now, somehow, it’s late afternoon. I’m lying here on my side, with the bedside lamp shedding a dim light behind me. I can tell that his side of the bed is empty. Why am I here? How did I get here? Why am I so dazed, so confused?"
(Anita, in Apart From Love)
This is a a watercolor painting I created a few years ago, on a non-absorbent sheet of paper called Yupo. It allows for lovely water puddles to happen on the page, which can drive you crazy if you have a meticulous, careful character. It is a great exercise to use this paper, because it invites you to relinquish control of every aspect of your creation. Only then can you discover the beauty of 'happy accidents'. Only then can you, as well as the watercolors, flow.
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Another way, perhaps more interactive, is to join the conversation at my Q&A Group: http://www.goodreads.com/group/show/6...