Tracy Reed: Our September Featured Author
September 1, 2024 by Tracy Reed in category Apples & Oranges by Marianne H. Donley, Featured Author of the Month tagged as Beautiful Men, fashion, Sophisticated Romance, the Big Apple, Tracy Reed
Tracy Reed: Our September Featured Author
A California native, novelist Tracy Reed pushes the boundaries of her Christian foundation with her sometimes racy and often fiery tales.
After years of living in the Big Apple, this self proclaimed New Yorker draws from the city’s imagination, intrigue, and inspiration to cultivate characters and plot lines who breathe life to the words on every page.
Tracy’s passion for beautiful fashion and beautiful men direct her vivid creative power towards not only novels, but short stories, poetry, and podcasts. With something for every attention span.
Tracy Reed’s ability to capture an audience is unmatched. Her body of work has been described as a host of stimulating adventures and invigorating expression.
Books by Tracy Reed
Salad Days
August 30, 2024 by Dianna Sinovic in category Columns, Quill and Moss by Dianna Sinovic, Writing tagged as paranormal, short fiction, writing
In the shade of a red maple, Ana helped spread the tablecloth over the picnic table and stepped back to let her family lay out the food: tuna salad, pasta salad, chips, grapes, strawberries, brownies, muffins. She and her grown children and her two grandchildren had gathered at the edge of Lake Nockamixon to celebrate her seventieth birthday, on an August afternoon laden with humidity.
Unscrewing a thermos lid, her son Jasper poured sparkling wine into paper cups. Alcohol was banned at the park, but in a nondescript container, who would be the wiser? When everyone but the teens, Luna and Geoffrey, had a cup, Jasper raised his.
“To our mom, on this milestone birthday.” He chugged his drink. “If only Dad could have joined us.”
“Here, here.” There was polite applause.
Ana raised her cup and smiled at the group. There had been some bumps and potholes on the road of life for her family—perhaps the biggest bump, Emery’s death almost a year ago from a heart attack.
Jasper’s eyes glistened as he poured himself another round. Her oldest seemed the most deeply affected by his father’s passing. Kaitlin, his wife, laid a hand on his shoulder in comfort. Ana’s other son, Paul, and her daughter Mindy and partner Sonja lined up for another splash of wine.
What the rest of the family didn’t notice—or failed to sense—was Emery’s presence just beyond the picnic table, a shimmering apparition with waving arms. Emery showed up with regularity, frightening Ana at first when he popped into view a few days after his death. Picking up the shards of the plate that broke when she dropped it in surprise, she wondered what a hallucination of a dead spouse portended for her mental health. But as his sightings continued, she realized he was benign if annoying, much like he’d been in real life.
On this day, Emery signaled to her with his arms. As always, he was silent. Apparitions didn’t make noise anyway, did they? He had been a silent bear of a man, and his children took after him. The group remained quiet around the picnic table, until she sighed, picked up a paper plate, and dug into the spread.
Emery was still waving at her, gesturing at the table—did he want a glass of the wine? How would that work?—but she decided to ignore him, as she too often had done while he was alive.
“Thanks, everyone,” she said. “This is a wonderful get-together. Let’s eat!”
Plates filled, the group moved to the next picnic table over to sit down. Paul and Jasper talked about the Phillies prospects, and Mindy chatted quietly with Sonja.
It was Luna who took the volume up a notch.
“Grams, I made the tuna salad. Don’t you want any?” Luna, at thirteen, could still pout if the mood suited her.
Why had she passed up the salad?
“Your granddad—” Ana started, but knew that explanation wouldn’t do. On her seventieth birthday, she didn’t need to worry her family that she was going crazy.
Jasper broke off his conversation with Paul to look at Ana oddly. “Mom? You okay?”
She nodded. “Of course.” She reached out and gently squeezed Luna’s shoulder. “I just didn’t feel like tuna today. I’m sure it’s scrumptious.”
Smiling, Luna returned to her own plate, scooping up mouthfuls of food. “It is. Mom said so.”
What had Emery been so insistent about? He was now standing behind Jasper, hands on his hips. No more waving or acting agitated. Words from the past bubbled up. I kept trying to tell you.
Kaitlin brought out from a cooler a boxed birthday cake. Luna crowded next to her to plunge the candles into the frosting. Geoffrey, Luna’s older brother, seemed uninterested as only a fifteen-year-old can be at a family gathering.
Paul pulled a lighter from his pocket, but paused, arm extended toward the candles, his face now a pale shade of green. He thrust the lighter at Kaitlin and hurried to the restroom facility across the picnic area. She lit the candles.
Instead of a sweet chorus of the birthday song, one by one, the members of Ana’s family fled to the restroom, their faces wan, holding their stomach.
“What’s going on?” Ana muttered. She watched the candles flicker in the breeze off the lake. “Happy birthday to me,” she sang softly. “Happy birthday to me.” She blew out the flames. Emery moved closer to her and pointed a shimmering hand at the tuna salad.
Oh.
“Food poisoning?” She addressed her husband’s ghost out loud.
He nodded vigorously. Death apparently had given him license to add drama to a situation. Why couldn’t he have been a little more lively before?
“I’m sure they’ll be fine. Just a touch of ptomaine.” She idly began cleaning up the picnic debris, collecting the paper plates, pouring out the bubbly left in glasses. She closed up the food cartons, including the suspect tuna salad. No one had yet returned from the facilities. Should she call 911?
Before she could pull out her phone, Jasper staggered back to the table.
“Taking everyone to the hospital,” he croaked.
“If you must go, I can drive,” Ana said. “I feel fine.”
“No, no,” Jasper said, waving his hand half-heartedly. “It’s your birthday.”
“You are sick. Everyone is sick. This is ridiculous.” She picked up the cooler and bags and carried them to her van. Emery walked beside her, fading in and out. Fourteen months ago, he kept complaining about back pain, an ache that wouldn’t ease up. For a man who said little, that should have been her clue. And now, he’d tried to alert her to another threat, and she’d failed again to understand.
Ana started the van, picked up Jasper and then the rest, who were puddled by the restrooms.
At least she could help salvage the remains of the day.
As she pulled onto the highway, Emery, hovering near her window, smiled.
Some of Dianna’s stories are in the following anthologies.
Kitty Bucholtz, August Featured Author
August 28, 2024 by Kitty Bucholtz in category Featured Author of the Month tagged as Featured author, Kitty Bucholtz, romantic comedy, Superheros, Write Now Workshop Podcast
August featured author Kitty Bucholtz is a writer, podcaster, and a book coach. She has combined her undergraduate degree in business, her years of experience in accounting and finance, and her graduate degree in creative writing to become a writer-turned-independent-publisher turned coach.
She writes romantic comedy and superhero urban fantasy, often with an inspirational element woven in. She loves to teach and offer advice to writers through her WRITE NOW! Workshop Podcast.
Kitty has also created the Finish Your Books Coaching Program. Find out more about either 1:1 Coaching or Group Coaching on Kitty’s website. http://kittybucholtz.com/
Besides Kitty’s Coaching Program and WRITE NOW! Workshop Podcast, you will find her here at A Slice of Orange on the 9th of each month writing It’s Worth It.
Books by Kitty Bucholtz
Roots by Neetu
August 26, 2024 by Neetu Malik in category Poet's Day by Neetu Malik tagged as entrenched, miracles, Neetu, strength
Roots
She needs to dig deep
to pull the roots
that grow under her feet
to do so requires strength
and a sharp shovel
the earth on which she stands
has hardened to stone
she waits for a miracle from sunrise
to sunset, but none appears—
her own shadow lengthens before
it merges into night
and so days and months pass,
seasons roll by—
she cannot see, but feels the tug
of the roots,
how entrenched they must be
to hold her
bound.
© Neetu Malik
Some of Neetu’s Books
Lyrical Language Lab Poetry Contest
August 25, 2024 by Kidd Wadsworth in category Writing
On June 25, 2024, I posted about the Lyrical Language Lab poetry contest. The winners have been decided. You can read the winning poems here:
https://www.reneelatulippe.com/poetry-contest-winners
My entry won an honorable mention.
Happy Writing,
Kidd
Some of Kidd’s stories are in the following anthologies.
Featured Books
A SOUTHERN GENTLEMAN
"A woman walks into a crowded Manhattan bar and meets a nice southern gentleman." That sounds like the beginning of a bad joke or the beginning of an intriguing love story.
More info →
