Some Books Refuse to be Written

There are some books that refuse to be written. They stand their ground year after year and will not be persuaded. It isn't because the book is not there and worth being written—it is only because the right form of the story does not present itself. There is only one right form for a story and if you fail to find that form the story will not tell itself.

MARK TWAIN

Bank Experience

      My wife and I went to the bank yesterday. I had to get money for the plumber. He finished all the work, and that's good. My wife, on the other hand, had to verify that she was still alive. She gets a German pension, so every year they send her a letter to check if she is still with us. Heaven forbid that I would just keep the money.
She just has to go to a teller, gets a couple of papers signed, and they send it away. How difficult that depends on the teller. Yesterday was fairly easy. There was one occasion when she was sent to a notary. I got my money faster than she got her signature.

Review: Deadlock (Tweed & Co. #5) by Colin Forbes

      'Deadlock,' is #5 in the series 'Tweed & Co.' by Colin Forbes. It belongs to the Genre of action/adventure. The title is appropriate for the story, but I find the cover a bit bland. The book is aimed at a male audience.
      Having lived for a time in that part of Europe, I recognize a lot of the locations and can verify that they are well researched. There is a lot of accidental dropping of names to move the story along.
It is a fast-paced thriller and a long read, but every page is worth it. All the characters are well developed and so well described you would probably recognize them if you saw them walking down the street.
      From very early in the story, there was a continual reference to scuba divers, but no one seemed to pay any attention to them until the end. The story depended a lot on two new characters. One had a minor role in an earlier book and the other someone new. I would expect to see them in future stories. The book had an ending I did not expect.
      A drawback to this book of good versus evil is that it is similar to all the other books in the series. There were some editing mistakes that seemed to increase towards the end of the book.

Ripley's Believe It or Not

Review: The White Lioness by Henning Mankell

"The White Lioness," is the 3rd. in the "Kurt Wallander" series. This novel is two stories existing in the same book. I found that the stories blended well together and taken separately could be two novellas. Kurt, a man who consistently eats sandwiches tried a pizza this time. The story is fast paced, and the author has a good insight into the Apartheid system. 
I fast read a few pages because too much time was spent on Kurt's mental state. I enjoyed the book, even though the end held no big surprise.

Positive Quotes

Cinderella

What's in the Vietnamese version of Cinderella (Tam Cam)? At the end, Cinderella dismembered her step sister, put the body into a jar of food and sent it to her step mother to eat, which she enjoyed until she found the skull at the bottom of the jar and died of shock.

Won a free book on Goodreads. "The Lost Codex' by Alan Jacobson'

The Color Purple

 

The color purple is the royal color because the dye was so expensive to make: "dye-makers had to crack open the snail’s shell, extract a purple-producing mucus and expose it to sunlight for a precise amount of time. It took as many as 250,000 mollusks to yield just one ounce of usable dye"

Toaster

   

  I have this toaster that was a wedding present - that makes it 47 years old. Used almost every day. Still works. General Electric and made in the U.S.A. They don't make them like that anymore. The problem is, it has one drawback. We can't toast a bagel. I have to use the toaster oven, but it doesn't do a good job. So, my wife bought a toaster at a yard sale. Cost her $5.00. White. Cheap. A piece of junk. But, it does toast a bagel. Guaranteed not to last 47 years.
      My bathroom was supposed to be worked on this morning. He called last night and said he was sick. Even plumbers call in sick. At least he didn't say he was working from home. The new date is set for Friday.
      It's supposed to rain all day, but it hasn't started yet. I'm on the road today. That's my term for taking my wife to do errands.

Review: Richard the Lionheart - Crusader by Tristan Clark

Richard the Lionheart - Crusader is a very short story. If you are looking for some pages from a history book - this would be it. You would find the same, if not more by looking King Richard up on the internet with no need to spend your money. More or less a list of facts.

My lawn is being de-bugged. Lots of birds.

Ripley's Believe It or Not

Beethovens Ninth

Review: Dark Web by T.J. Brearton

	"Dark Web," is a murder mystery that will make you think twice about what teens see on the internet. A fine example of what can come from the dark side of the web. The end of the story and the culprit hold no surprises - expected, which I found disappointing. Still a good story.

Sunday Afternoon Encounter

This is what went on Sun. afternoon after a knock on my door.

Me - "Hello."

Man - "I got the sign."

Me - "What sign?"

Man - "The 'For Sale' sign for your front lawn."

Me - "What 'For Sale' sign?"

Man - "For your house."

Me - "My house is not for sale."

Man - "Isn't this #18?"

Me - "Yeah."

Man - "Well, I got the sign."

Me - "I think you have the wrong house. Maybe next door?"

Man - "No. That's an empty lot."

Me - "Well, they tore down the house a few weeks ago and I heard the lot is for sale."

Man - "OK, I'll call the office and find out.

After awhile, I hear tap, tap, tap. I look next door and he is pounding the sign into the vacant lot. By the way, that lot is priced at $90,000.

Jell-O

Conversation with my son.

Jack - "I hear we are going to have a mini ice age in 15 years. Like the one they had in the 1860's."
John - ?
Jack -"We'll have to stock up on food then. Yeah, I'll be 87 then. Still able to eat."
John - "We'll need lots of Jell-O."

Review: "A Bitter Truth" by Charles Todd

"A Bitter Truth" is the third in the series "Bess Crawford." This book did not catch my imagination as much as the first two. It seems to drag along trying to make a story. The author(s) seem to be slapping something down hoping that it works. I'm always waiting for her to meet Ian Rutledge. I feel that is why this second series has been added.

Novels Are Never About What They Are About

But novels are never about what they are about; that is, there is always deeper, or more general, significance. The author may not be aware of this till she is pretty far along with it. A novel’s whole pattern is rarely apparent at the outset of writing, or even at the end; that is when the writer finds out what a novel is about, and the job becomes one of understanding and deepening or sharpening what is already written. That is finding the theme.

DIANE JOHNSON

Need A Plumber

      The plumber was here to see me on Friday. I have to tell you that story. The pipes for the bathtub were in an outside wall, so when the wind blew in a certain direction, they always froze. I tried different options to cure the problem - more insulation, electric cord around the pipe. etc. A couple of years ago I said enough is enough. I'm going to move the bathroom around. At one end of the tub, I put up a wall with all the pipes inside it. On one side, the pipes went to the tub taps. On the other side of the wall, they went to the sink taps. The sink taps are where the bathtub taps used to be. I figured that would do it. Surprise. When winter came, they froze again. When I looked to see what they had done, I found that they had taken the pipes in the new wall and hooked them back up to the pipes that always froze. So that is what I have to get changed again. I'm watching this time.
      I also need him to clean out the drain pipe. It's starting to make noise, the kind you hear before it plugs up. Then I need him to clean out my furnace.
He has to wait until next week he do this. I'll be away all week. Taking my daughter on another mini vacation to New Brunswick.
      I put up a photo showing the wall between the sink and tub.