THE REVIEW

FALL FOURSOME

Charity and Annette joined me Wednesday night in welcoming Carolynn Howard to her first Ram’s Meeting. We hope she enjoyed herself and will return.

I started by outlining the Lit Café I attended on Monday. Five authors were invited to read for 10 minutes each and I was one of them. The venue was a large yet comfortable and cozy room at the Lodge at Alexandra Neighbourhood House in Crescent Beach. The authors sat on a semi-circle of sofas at the front of the room with the audience on chairs in front of us. There were tea and coffee available, and tables to display our works and/or books for sale. I was the first to read and just as I was introduced a car alarm started to wail outside and I spent the first couple of minutes trying to project my reading voice above the competing volume from the car. Good practice for reading without a microphone, I guess. My reading did elicit laughter at all the right spots and a nice round of applause when I finished. After all the readings were completed there was a question and answer segment with the audience and then audience members who wanted to read were invited to do so. The whole experience was friendly and positive. The next Lit Café there will be in January and I have forwarded notice of same to all members.

Annette read Chapter 6 of her novel about Maxine and Jarod. He has come back from surgery and she sits with him and talks about their relationship, remembering the happy beginning and admitting some of her own failings. A policeman arrives and starts asking her questions about a motorcycle she didn’t know Jarod owned. She finds this confusing. Now the reader is wondering what this is all about, too.

Charity read more from “Trixie Trouble”. She is spending her time healing at her Pa’s hideout, but is running out of supplies. And her leg injury has become infected. Soaking in the pool, she finds more gold coins, but almost drowns in a whirlpool. Getting to shore, she watches as a landslide hits the roof of the cabin that she has just patched. The chapter ends with suspense, as we know she cannot stay there any longer.

Carolynn says she has tried writing in different forms and in different genres. She had recently entered the contest for the Surrey International Writers’ Conference and read that story to us. It is entitled “Who Are You?” and is about two individuals who met up online and are now meeting in person for a dinner date. They banter over dinner, have very little in common, but open up to considering other ways of looking at things. Carolynn incorporated some local landmarks in the story and I love all writing with an obvious Canadian setting. We wish her luck with the story.

Since I had finished reading all of “Honey Signed The Waiver”, I was looking for something else to read and pulled out a novel I had started a few years back. This one is “Nigel Wingate Is Dead” and is the one that Jason kept urging me to continue. On Wednesday, I read the Prologue and the first chapter. The story starts with a young single mother killing her disabled toddler in 1969, and then calling a male friend to stand by her and support her. Charity and Annette both said they are interested in the local history at that time and how it influenced events. I’ll have to spend some time looking at what I had previously written.

The next Meeting will be Wednesday, October 18th at 7:00 p.m. here at my place. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

Lisa A. Hatton
Author