One day down, two days left of this semester. Did my last faculty senate meeting today. That’s six years out of seven that I’ve served. I’m ready for a break. Kind of interested in a different committee though. Might talk to someone about it.

People looked at the house today but have decided to go with acreage I guess. Depressing. But at least the house is clean.

I wrote a page today on the WIP and don’t like it at all. I think it’s going too slow and that my main character isn’t quite right. She’s a bit cardboardy. At least on the page, though not in my head.

I want to go dig crystals, but I don’t know if Crystal Park is open yet. My feeling is that it should be and the roads should be open. We haven’t had that much snow.

I haven’t planned a book club book for May. I wasn’t sure anyone was up for it. Maybe start again in the fall? What do you think? I’m reading Thieftaker right now. Or rather, I started it, but then got caught up in other stuff and now I have to go back to it.

I keep wondering how my house shows in comparison with other houses. I know it’s old–1917. But it’s in really good shape with a lot of the original woodwork and fixtures. Sure, some of my room paints are on the bold side, but the kitchen is only 4 years old. I know we only have 1.5 baths, but I feel like there ought to be more interest. I just wish I could figure out what the deal is. We supposedly aren’t overpriced, but yet we aren’t getting much looks. And we’ve lowered the price.

Emptied off a bunch of my DVR recordings. Decided I was never going to watch this season of Person of Interest. I also deleted my Havens. I like the show but– well, I want to read more and write more.

My folks are going to be visiting for a few days. I’m looking forward to that. At least the house will be clean for them.

Okay, opening up the book nominations. Pick a book published since Jan. 1, 2012, preferably something you haven’t read. Anything is fair game. Nominations are open until Thursday at noon, and then we’ll start voting. The next discussion will be a little bit later, on April 13th. So lots of time to get reading.

I’m going to nominate Thieftaker by DB Jackson (aka David Coe).

Pick a book!

We had a blizzard today. A thunder blizzard. It didn’t last long, but we had whiteout conditions and meanwhile the thunder was just rolling. It was pretty cool actually, but mostly because I was in the house, not outside trying to walk around in it. Very little snow stuck, but I’m expecting it will be nasty slick in the morning. Can hardly wait.

Other than that, I have little to report. Oh! Except that I read the first chapter of Kelly McCullough‘s upcoming Crossed Blades novel and was totally blown away, and then promptly ordered all three books. You should go check out his website, sample chapters and dig in.

Also, in other news, I want brownies.

Tomorrow I start back to Montana. It should take two days. Actually I can do it in one, but I want to stop overnight and go to Costco before I go home. So I probably will.

On the really cool mystery front, this is about an Australian cold case that sounds fascinating. I wish I’d see it solved. Could be interesting for a story. Is it a murder? Is it a suicide? Was he a spy? And a book is the central clue. How cool is that?

next week I start back to school. Teaching that is. I have to go home and plan my class out some more. I have a tendency to change it up and so I’m going to. It will be easy this fall to teach about logical fallacy though, what with political ads and speeches. I mean, do politicians have a list and check it twice to make sure that everything they say is a logical fallacy? Seems like it sometimes. Anyhow, it’s fertile ground for working with logic and reason. Or lack thereof. I love teaching students how to be critical of commercials. And news. And politicians. Pretty much everything, really.

Been reading the Wishcraft series by Heather Blake. I do enjoy it. It’s magical mystery and kind of a cozy.

I also have to research southern living, southern style, southern language, southern behavior . . . I’m thinking of southern here to mean Alabama/Georgia, maybe South Carolina. So if anybody has suggestions for movies, TV, documentaries, books, youtube, anything really, that would help with that, I’d love to hear. I may hit you up for more of that on a continuing basis. Seriously, anything you’ve got would be helpful. I’ve got some things, but I’m looking for more. Lots more.

I don’t have a lot of time to read anymore, and worse, the time I have I sometimes (frequently) squander. A few months ago I got an ARC of a book by an online friend of mine. I was buried in day jobbery and my own writing, life and a few other things, so I didn’t get to it. I wanted to because it has an amazing cover, but I didn’t. I started reading it this week finally, after carrying it around with me for sometime. It’s probably got more than 3000 travel miles on it by now. Anyhow, I read it and I have this to say: Wow. Wow wow wow.

Let me tell you about it. First, the cover, because I think it really is one that grabs the eye:

Matchbox Girls by Chrysoula Tsavelas

This book is urban fantasy. It involves the faerie, angels, demons, and others. The plot revolves around a woman, Marley, who gets panic attacks and tends to run from life, and has a hard time keeping a regular job. She’s got a couple of really great friends, Branwyn and Penny, and she’s started hanging out a bunch with Zachariah and his two orphaned nieces, who are four year old twins. When Zachariah disappears, the girls call Marley for help and that sets off the plot.

There’s a lot going on here and you really have to pay attention, because things happen fast and there’s a lot of worldbuilding going on. The reader has to put a lot of the puzzle pieces together on the fly, because nothing is super obvious. I like this. I have to admit that for me, this was a page turner. I kept having to shoo people away while I was reading because they annoyingly kept interrupting.

I like the characters quite a bit, though I have to admit Tarn and Branwyn were my favorites. But I think what kept me going most was just wanting to find out what was going on and why. The mystery was really well built and the descriptions were compelling and vibrant. I also liked the way she portrayed the kids. They seemed real to me and not just incidental. They were important. I also liked the way that the magic was portrayed in this book. I really enjoyed it.

I do admit that I still have questions. I’m hoping they get explained in the future. Plus I want more of these characters and more of this story. More! Is it bad that I want to bug her for an early copy of the next one? I really hope there’s a second one coming. A lot.

Anyhow, this is a really good book and I recommend giving it a read.