Claire was lost in her thoughts when Mason crunched on something in the weeds.
“No.” Claire tugged at the leash, trying to pull the Lab back to her side. “What have you got?”
The dog kept his head down, not allowing her to reach the object, and growled.
“Mason? Give it,” she commanded. But still the dog worried the thing.
Whatever it was, it couldn’t be alive, she decided. Most likely a bone, but you never knew with a dog. She didn’t want a mess back home, when the object Mason had disagreed with him.
“Let’s go.” Claire tried again to separate the dog from his newfound fetish. Mason lifted his head and shook it, then responded to the pull of the leash. He wagged his tail as if to say, Aren’t you proud?
Protruding from either side of his jaws was a length of deer leg, stripped mostly of fur and skin. A strong whiff of decay floated up, making Claire scrunch up her nose.
The trail through the woods behind her house often crossed paths with the narrow routes made by white-tailed deer. It wasn’t unusual for Mason to flush out a doe or even pounce on a fawn hidden in a clump of wild grasses.
“No,” Claire said. “You can’t bring it.”
The dog pranced around her, and each time she tried to snag one end of the leg, he moved away from her.
Giving up, she turned toward home, and the dog followed, still grinning in that canine way with his prize in his mouth.
It was a lot like her brother, Duane, and his endless stories about their childhood, unearthing a past she had done her best to bury. A past now thankfully down to the bones and a little skin. The meat—the core of what had happened—had rotted away, as long as she didn’t go looking for it.
Duane knew only the good side of their father. And with the funeral in two days, she would steel herself to listen to the well-wishers and keep her mouth shut. Let her brother do all the eulogizing. She’d told him she didn’t like talking in front of a crowd, and he’d believed her.
Back at the porch steps, Claire pulled her house keys from her coat pocket and bent to unclip Mason’s leash from his collar. The dog dropped the deer leg into the flower bed and looked up at her with a whimper.
“Good dog,” she said, and dipped into another coat pocket for a biscuit. “We’ll leave it out here.” Mason trotted onto the porch with her, eyeing her hand for another treat.
If only discarding the past were that simple, she thought. Still, she could try.
I am happy to report that our Girl Scout cookie hustle has wrapped up for season. Hopefully now I can stop giving mental space to Thin Mints and Lemonades.
Unfortunately, Sprinter continues in Minnesota. Actually, we’ve experienced all four seasons this weekend. On Friday, we had 83 degrees and sunny. Today we have 30 degrees and snowing.
Sometimes variety isn’t such a great thing.
I had a bout of sneaky creativity recently. I sat down to work on Mac and Cheese, Please, Please, Please the Sequel (working title) and I ended up finishing a completely different children’s book that I started years ago. Like, M&CPPP it’s a rhyming story about food.
As a children’s book author, I wish that rhyming came a lot easier to me. The truth is that I struggle when I’m trying to rhyme. My best rhymes come to me usually when I’m not trying or even writing for that matter. It’s typically when I’m crawling into bed after staying up waaaaay too late binging Love is Blind on Netflix, or when I’m mid-shampoo in the shower. So frustrating!
Anyways, I finished a book! Yay! Now I get to start the wonderful journey of editing and self-doubt. So fun! I also need to find an illustrator – Hoping to collaborate with a fellow Minnesotan on this. The topic is very niche to Minnesota (hint, hint). Good vibes are welcomed!
Here’s a text that my husband received this week from a close friend of ours:
He’ll be happy to know that more variety is on the way. 🙂
0 0 Read moreTHE RUNAWAY GIRL. was a special challenge to write because of the importance to ‘get it right’ re: every moment aboard the ship since the ship of dreams set sail on April 10, 1912.
It’s all in the details, they say…
But how many details do you know about the TITANIC?
Check your Titanic knowledge with:
A Titanic Trivia Quiz
We’ve seen the films, read the books, but what do you know about the Titanic, really?
Take the quiz and find out!
(answers at the bottom of the page)
================
Titanic Trivia Questions:
Answers:
THE RUNAWAY GIRL:
———–
US:
Kobo.
0 0 Read moreI’m not being blasphemous. It’s actually a funny story from earlier this week. I was in a Zoom Bible study and we were talking about the body of Christ, and how we make up all the parts of the body, and I was super tired and blurted out — “Yeah, even the underwear!”
Hahaha!!! Then I tried to explain — “You know, when I’m thinking too highly of myself I remind myself that I might only be the underwear.”
My friend Charlotte said, “But you’d be the lacy underwear, Kitty.”
“Yeah, that’s true,” I said. “The bride of Christ isn’t wearing granny undies. She’d be wearing lace. So she’s probably wearing Victory’s Secret lace underwear.”
Hahaha!!!! It took a minute for us to get back on track after that!
Then I was thinking that’s probably true. As much as we try to be “good,” we don’t always succeed. Sometimes there are holes in our faith. And lace has holes. So our faith — my faith, for sure — is probably more like lace underwear than sturdy granny undies. Hahaha! Of course, that analogy only goes so far since sturdy cotton lasts a long time, longer than lace. But you see where I was going with it! Haha! Sometimes I blurt out the strangest things when I’m tired! (And guess what conversation is going to find its way into this book or the next one!)
Whatever your views on cotton vs. lace 😉 I hope you have a beautiful Holy Week and a blessed Easter!
0 0 Read moreHappy Spring.
This is a special week for me. It’s Easter and my birthday.
Let’s get to this month’s post. I just finished the first quarter of my newsletter building project. As of this post, my efforts have netted 2365 new subscribers. I am beyond excited about this number. As I mentioned before, whenever I send an email, I lose a few. My current loss number is 65…less than 3% of the new subs. I can live with that. Right now, I’m averaging approximately 17 new subs per day. I can live with that as well. If I stay on tract, I’ll reach my goal of 10,000 subscribers.
If you’re looking to build your newsletter list, I highly recommend using Book Funnel group promotions. They’re free, easy to set up, offer multiple genres with minimal effort.
The only thing I haven’t done, is check for duplicate email subscribers. I know that’s a possibility, because each download requires an email sign up. Once I export all the lists, I’ll get the answer to the question of possible duplicates.
While the email sign up promos are doing well, the sales promotions aren’t going as well. I’m not sure why, but once I do I think it will be good for sales. I’ve read a few articles or posts about the success authors are having direct selling ebooks. Direct sales don’t allow refunds. YEAH!. I don’t about you, but I’m tired of readers binge reading and then returning the books. I’ve gotten to the point when I see a series has been ordered, I cringe waiting to see if the books will be returned or not.
In a nutshell, I’m about to join the ranks of authors direct selling ebooks. I believe this is the answer to dealing with Amazon’s read and return game. Sure, I can’t stop Amazon from allowing people to read and return, but I can offer another ebook option that will work to my benefit. It may take me a little while to set up my books and get readers used to this option, but I believe it will work.
One of the reasons why I think I’m tanking on direct sales at Book Funnel, is incorrect sign up. Once I get that fixed, I expect see a vast difference in my direct sales numbers. As well as studying authors who are doing this successfully.
Speaking of new sales options, I was reviewing my Kobo sales and discovered I’ve been earning sales with Kobo Plus. I completely forgot I had put some of my books in this lending program. So while I was a little disappointed in my sales, I’d actually been earning money. The reason I didn’t know about the Kobo sales is because Kobo Plus sales don’t show up on the Kobo sales dashboard.
Have a wonderful Easter and see you next month.
0 0 Read moreA Slice of Orange is an affiliate with some of the booksellers listed on this website, including Barnes & Nobel, Books A Million, iBooks, Kobo, and Smashwords. This means A Slice of Orange may earn a small advertising fee from sales made through the links used on this website. There are reminders of these affiliate links on the pages for individual books.
✧༺♥༻∞Retelling of a classic with a Happily Ever After! ∞༺♥༻✧
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More info →A Slice of Orange is an affiliate with some of the booksellers listed on this website, including Barnes & Nobel, Books A Million, iBooks, Kobo, and Smashwords. This means A Slice of Orange may earn a small advertising fee from sales made through the links used on this website. There are reminders of these affiliate links on the pages for individual books.
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