A New Genre in Books?

You know, I debated about whether I should give a review on the book I just finished. I'm still not sure whether I should or not, but...here goes.

I've always said I'm not a book snob, but I must admit there are some books that just aren't my cup of tea. I don't think that's being a snob, though, I just think we all like something different. Keeping in mind this book wasn't really my genre, I will try to give a fair and impartial review.

I read Luanne Rice's book Summer Light because one of my friends chose it for book club. She purposely chose an easy read because she had read it over the summer. She also said she liked it because it is set in several places that she was able to travel to on vacation. There is also good descriptions of the great outdoors in the book, and my friend loves nature and being outdoors.

As for me, well, it was something easy to read to help change the channel in my head from thinking about work too much. The story wasn't believable at all, but that's OK. You know the type, woman with a small child who has never been married herself - never could find the right man...and the jerk who is the absent father was, of course, married to someone else at the time of their affair and she didn't know it,...of course. Well, this single mom owns a successful wedding planner business (complete with old country house and adorable barn) and one day finds herself on an airplane taking her child to a psychologist and, wouldn't you know it, there just happens to be a professional hockey team on the plane. The woman's daughter is drawn to one of the hockey players and says there is an angel flying around his head. She also believes the man is supposed to be her new daddy. (Now you know why the child is on her way to the psychologist.)

Long story short, the child predicts the plane will crash, tells the man to please save her and her mommy when that happens. The plane has to crash land, and hockey-man heroically scoops up the woman and her child and saves the day! Ah, and another love story begins...

Now, I don't have to tell you they end up together - you know they do. In fact, you know it in the first few pages. I'm not giving anything away. You learn a great deal in the first chapter, which makes me ask...why write the story? There were no surprises, you know how it's going to end at the beginning. Is it fun to go through the details of their relationship and read about them making the same stupid mistakes all the rest of us make - except they get to do it with lots of money, three homes, and a sports car? No, not particularly,...but it was something to read instead of focusing on work. It was a brain vacation.

Remember when I said I wasn't a book snob? Well, honestly, I'm not. I do, however, have a new genre code for books I know I don't want to read. I call it the "Lifetime Movie Network Genre." In other words, if the author has had one of their novels made into a movie for LMN, it is definitely not my kind of book. As you might guess, I am not a fan of LMN.  I actually checked on the author after I read the book. Luanne Rice? Yep, she's a Lifetime Movie Network gal. Not my genre.

If it IS your type of genre, perhaps this author's books are for you...or maybe the mini-series version?

I consider the yellow sticker
a warning label. ;)

Hey, this one has Rob Lowe!

As for me? I'm currently almost halfway through a pretty decent middle school novel about a present-day teenage girl who comes across an old ghost in a cemetery in New Orleans. It seems there was a murder back in the 1800s and, because it was unsolved, the ghost can't find peace. It was a slow start, but it's getting to the good part now. I can't wait to find out what happens next! See y'all later...

Happy Reading! :)

Things You Learn About Yourself

While I was in England, I took around 4,000 photos. No, I'm not kidding. Since my return home, I try to spend a little time each day going through the photos. It isn't a task, really, because I enjoy looking at them and reliving the moments of my trip. I'm learning things about myself as I go through them. Odd things. Interesting things.

One thing I've learned is I am strangely attracted to taking photographs of flowers growing where they shouldn't. I mean, I take the normal nature photographs in gardens and parks, but I seem to always find some obscure flower poking out of a crack in concrete or a small crevice in a rock. I can't tell you how many pictures I took of flowers growing out of street walls in England. Not exactly a big tourist attraction, if you know what I mean.

I am aware I am doing it, of course, I just didn't ask myself why until...someone else did. It was a fisherman in Newlyn - a true, blue, dressed-in-work-clothes-and-big-yellow-rubber-boots fisherman sitting on a bench by the side of the road. He didn't ask me why I was taking pictures of a wall. He couldn't. I was too busy taking photos. It was my friend, who was patiently waiting for me, he asked, "Does your friend like the wall?" She explained that I like the wall and the flowers. The man seemed puzzled, "Hasn't she seen a wall and flowers before?"My friend smiled and tried to give him a brief explanation. She told me about this little conversation after she'd gotten directions from the helpful fisherman, and we were continuing our walk to the next town.

I laughed when she told me and wondered how many good English people had wondered about the strange American woman taking pictures of odd things, laying on the ground to get a good shot of something, or speaking to her friends in "y'all"s and "ma'am"s. It wasn't until I'd been home awhile, and going through my photos, that I heard the fisherman's questions in my head again.

I began skimming through all my photos from the two weeks. In almost every set of outside photos, there they were - flowers growing in unlikely places! I'll be the first to say they weren't all good photos, but...I still liked them. In some cases, I had taken the "pretty" shot - including the flowers as background/foreground - before taking one of just the little flowers, focusing on them instead of the bigger picture. Just for me.

I decided to look at other trips I've taken in the past and found that I had the same type of pictures mixed in with those, as well. They weren't  photos I took because I planned to frame them or show them to other people, I took them for my own pleasure. As I said, I liked them.

So,...the question I asked myself was, "Why?"

The answer came to me as I looked at picture after picture and began putting them all together in a group: I admire the little flowers. I truly admire them - not for their beauty (although I do find them beautiful), but for their strength and their endurance. They have not been cared for and cultivated in a garden. No one made sure they had the right amount of sunshine and water and fertilizer. Everything you see was brought forth by effort and stamina.

After all these lovelies have been through - bad weather, heat, cold, and very little room for growth - they keep coming back every year. They lay dormant for a season (a rather long, cold season in England), but some part of them hangs on and pushes back through to bloom in due time. They don't even have a deep root system in which to depend on! It's funny, if you think about it. They thrive in a little dirt and dust between the cracks, adding softness and beauty to the rough landscape around them. They are quite determined to flourish, even in the most difficult of circumstances.

I think there's a lot of really good lessons in all that, don't you?

By the way, I have a bare wall in my new library room that needs some pictures. I wanted to have "just the right" photos from my travels to put on that wall, but...I'm thinking it's not always about hanging the perfect photo on the wall. Sometimes, it's a good idea to display perfect reminders about the importance of finding the beauty in life and learning to have "just the right" attitude about your circumstances, along with a good amount of determination and motivation to thrive.

Camera Buddies & Bluebonnets

It's bluebonnet season here in Texas! My friend, Kristi, and I took a little adventure yesterday and headed down to The Bluebonnet Trail in Ennis. For those of you who may not know what bluebonnet flowers are exactly, don't feel badly. I didn't know about them either until I moved to Texas. They grow wild around here, and they are beautiful! When you ride around the backroads between fields of them, the smell is intoxicating. The flowers aren't around for very long, so there are "bluebonnet watchers" that let people know the best time to get out and see them.

Yesterday was a perfect day to enjoy and photograph these Texas beauties! Kristi came prepared with all the information we needed to find some fields of wildflowers. We were both armed with our cameras and decided to stop at anything we found interesting.

It's a rare treat to travel with someone who loves to take pictures as much as I do. Kristi didn't laugh when I crawled around on my belly to get "just the right shot" (did I mention I wore a white shirt??) because she was too busy crawling around on hers. She didn't get impatient and sigh for me to hurry up because she was busy taking more pictures or just enjoying the scenery. She laughed with me when we both failed to get the attention of a stubborn longhorn who refused to pose for our cameras! We often found that we were both waiting for the same thing to happen for a good picture - a vehicle to move, the wind to stir a flag, the cows to tussle with each other again. You know, things most people wouldn't want to stand around and wait for them to happen.

It's nice, of course, when your photography-loving friend also enjoys being outside as much as you do, enjoys riding around in the Texas sunshine in a Jeep with the top off (which means she doesn't care if her hair gets messy), doesn't care if you wear make-up or not, and loves to listen to music as loud as you do.

Yes, all those things are very nice.

It was a wonderful day...