Rebecca M. Douglass, Author

  Time for the December WEP/IWSG 'writing together' competition.  The challenge is Ribbons and Candles.  Perfect for the festival/festive season. Perfect also for flashes not themed around festivities or holidays. All prompts here work year-round and are pan-global. Genre, themes, settings, mood, no bar. Only the word count counts. And you could ignore that too and come in with a photo-essay or art, minimal words required. A party. A power-cut. Gift-giving. Hair braids. Ribbons of roads, rivers, paper, love, hope. Candles in the room. Candles in the church. Candles in the wind. And any combo thereof. It could go in a thousand different directions, choose yours and step outside the square! The WEP admins are asking that we post as soon as we can, so there's more time to read the stories before the holidays hit. So I've managed to get mine up a few days early, anyway. And, since this is clearly the perfect time for a Christmas/winter theme story, I've written

  Title: The Egg and I Author: Betty MacDonald. Read by Heather Henderson Publication Info: Audio book 2015 by Post Hypnotic Press, Inc. Originally published 1945 Source: Library digital resources Publisher’s Blurb: When Betty MacDonald married a marine and moved to a small chicken farm on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State, she was largely unprepared for the rigors of life in the wild. With no running water, no electricity, a house in need of constant repair, and days that ran from four in the morning to nine at night, the MacDonalds had barely a moment to put their feet up and relax. And then came the children. Yet through every trial and pitfall—through chaos and catastrophe—this indomitable family somehow, mercifully, never lost its sense of humor. An immortal, hilarious and heartwarming classic about working a chicken farm in the Northwest, a part of which first appeared in a condensed serialization in the Atlantic monthly. My Review: Following their time on the

  Title: The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate Author: Jacqueline Kelly Publication Info: Henry Holt & Co., 2009. 344 pages. Source: Library digital resources Publisher’s Blurb: Calpurnia Virginia Tate is eleven years old in 1899 when she wonders why the yellow grasshoppers in her Texas backyard are so much bigger than the green ones. With a little help from her notoriously cantankerous grandfather, an avid naturalist, she figures out that the green grasshoppers are easier to see against the yellow grass, so they are eaten before they can get any larger. As Callie explores the natural world around her, she develops a close relationship with her grandfather, navigates the dangers of living with six brothers, and comes up against just what it means to be a girl at the turn of the century. Debut author Jacqueline Kelly deftly brings Callie and her family to life, capturing a year of growing up with unique sensitivity and a wry wit. My Review: I liked this book a lot. The title ch

I have fallen far behind in my photo reports (and then I forgot to make this live, so it's late, too), so this week we are going way back to the end of September to give you all a blast of fall color from what I gather is an iconic Maine hike (okay, we'd never heard of it before, but it really is spectacular, if a bit remote). The roads to the area are private, and the trails are maintained by the Maine Appalachian Mountain Club. We accessed the gorge from the AMC's lodge at Little Lyford Pond (which was lovely). Although we thought that calling the gorge the "Grand Canyon of the East" was a bit over the top, there is no denying that the 3 miles of gorge, with walls up to about 130' high and a series of non-trivial waterfalls was worth the price of admission. (Note: there is a literal price of admission, as the roads that lead to the trails are privately owned and maintained. Our entrance was covered in the cost of our stay at the lodge. The figurative "p

Purpose:  To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!  Posting:  The first Wednesday of every month is officially  Insecure Writer’s Support Group  day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writer - aim for a dozen new people each time - and return comments. This group is all about connecting!  Be sure to link to the IWSG page and display the badge in your post. And please be sure your avatar links back to your blog! If it links to Google+, be sure your blog is listed there. Otherwise, when you leave a comment, people can't find you to comment back. Let’s rock the neurotic writ

Tandem Demise: A Cycle Path Mystery by Duffy Brown About the Book Tandem Demise: A Cycle Path Mystery   Cozy Mystery 3rd in Series Independently Published (October 28, 2018)   Paperback: 298 pages   ISBN-10: 1729374786 ISBN-13: 978-1729374788   Kindle ASIN: B07JRB373X Publisher's Blurb: Smugglers on the hunt, a police chief on the run, lost loot and a dead wedding planner have the Mackinac Island regulars riding in circles. After solving two murders, bike shop owner Evie Bloomfield thought life on Mackinac Island would settle into boredom until she finds out Nate Sutter, island police chief and once-upon-a-time under cover cop is on the run. Some badass guys from Nate’s Detroit days think he stole money from them in a champagne smuggling operation and now they’re headed to the island to get their loot. Evie is determined to help Nate because he’s a good cop, Nate is determined to keep interfering Evie and island locals out of harms way, and the crooks are determined to get their mo

  Flashback Friday is a monthly meme that takes place on the last Friday of the month . The idea is to give a little more love to a post you’ve published on your blog before.  Maybe you just love it, maybe it’s appropriate for now, or maybe it just didn’t get the attention it deserved when you first published it. Thanks to Michael d’Agostino, who started it all, there is a solution – join Flashback Friday! And thanks to Jemima Pett , who has kept it going--visit her blog to add your name to the list ! Just join in whenever you like, repost one of your own blog posts , including any copyright notices on text or media, on the last Friday of the month.  ###### I posted the first half of this story a couple of weeks ago because I was using parts of it in the new Pismawallops PTA mystery.  You can check that out if you don't remember or didn't read it, because this is part two, and needs the first half to make sense. In a quick summary, Kitty and JJ have been setting up the PTA