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Connect with Linda Joy Myers, Kate Farrell and Amber Lea Starfire at these sites:
“Legacy of the ‘60s and ‘70s and What It Means for Women Today”
by Elise Frances Miller, Winner Second Place, Prose
In the early ‘70s, I was doing just what I wanted to do: teaching three art history and humanities classes and conducting research as a college instructor. I was not happy being “part-time,” underpaid, and with no benefits. I did not consider myself an artist, though I still tried my hand at a variety of media in those days. I admired artists, especially women, who put their work out there in public, sometimes defying a parent or spouse, usually for very little remuneration.
Then I joined an organization called “Women Artists It’s Time” (W.A.I.T). The mission was clear: find ways for female artists’ work to be appreciated and understood on a level commensurate with that of male artists. We had role models from Berthe Morisot to Georgia O’Keefe, Louise Nevelson to Joan Brown, but these pioneers did not have many peers. In the realm of art history, Women Artists: 1550-1950 published in 1976 by Linda Nochlin and Anne Sutherland Harris took academic art history departments and the stuffy College Art Association by storm.
At universities in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, almost no female artists made it into the curriculum. Nochlin and Harris broke the Western, white, male version of art history, and encouraged others, both men and women, to broaden their research for international, ethnic and gender equity in publications.
Our small efforts in W.A.I.T. soon blossomed, not because more women chose to go into art, but because more of them became known. We also celebrated the recognition of women’s “crafts” by art museums. Quilting, weaving, needlework and other handicrafts were accepted as subjects for both historical and current exhibitions.
By the 1970s and ‘80s, I was writing art reviews for major newspapers and magazines. Judy Chicago, Betye Saar, Eleanor Antin and Jennifer Bartlett were just a few of my favorite artists to review. As galleries began to exhibit women’s artwork, I encountered no resistance to featuring them in my articles.
Today there is no lack of women artists. Some of these have made a splash, but as in other fields, the struggle is not behind us. Women still lag behind men both in exposure and remuneration.
As a member of W.A.I.T., I learned that when we band together, boosting our sense of purpose, we push forward, and best of all, we create in diverse fields, guilt-free, with families and all. This personal growth was important to the expansion of social, political and professional roles for women in the 1970s, and in turn, women’s movement activity also enhanced the individual’s journey.
The Times They Were A-Changing: Women Remember the ‘60s and ‘70s preserves the record of that two-way nourishment in varied circumstances. As this anthology shows so well, in tandem with the political struggles, social experiments, and hard-fought gains that are the legacy for today’s women, there was always the girl becoming a woman, unsure, seeking strength through collaboration, building the story one scene at a time. Since our era, as never before, that has been the way it is done.
Elise Frances Miller’s novel, A Time to Cast Away Stones (Sand Hill Review Press, June, 2012), is set in 1968 Berkeley and Paris. With degrees from UC Berkeley and UCLA, Elise began writing about arts for the Los Angeles Times, Art News and San Diego Magazine. She taught high school and college humanities, and served as communications director at San Diego State University and Stanford. Her short stories have appeared in The Sand Hill Review (fiction editor, 2008), Fault Zone: Stepping Up to the Edge, and online. Her novel and its historical background are described at http://www.elisefmiller.com.
Just in time for the holidays, Linda Joy Myers, Kate Farrell and Amber Lea Starfire launch their anthology Times They Were A-Changing: Women Remember the ’60s and ’70s. The book is the perfect gift for opening discussions with friends and family members and illustrating what a powerful time the ’60s and ’70s truly were.
Forty-eight powerful stories and poems etch in vivid detail breakthrough moments experienced by women during the life-changing era that was the ’60s and ’70s. These women rode the sexual revolution with newfound freedom, struggled for identity in divorce courts and boardrooms, and took political action in street marches. They pushed through the boundaries, trampled the taboos, and felt the pain and joy of new experiences. And finally, here, they tell it like it was.
Through this collection of women’s stories, we celebrate the women of the ’60s and ’70s and the importance of their legacy.
BOOK DETAILS:
Paperback: 354 pages
Publisher: She Writes Press
Publication Date: Sept. 8, 2013
ISBN-10: 1938314042
ISBN-13: 978-1938314049PURCHASE LINKS:
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Jac Wright is a poet published in literary magazines, a published author, and an electronics engineer educated at Stanford, University College London, and Cambridge who lives and works in England. Jac studied English literature from the early age of three, developing an intense love for poetry, drama, and writing in Trinity College Speech & Drama classes taken afternoons and Saturdays for fourteen years, and in subsequent creative writing classes taken during the university years. A published poet, Jac’s first passion was for literary fiction and poetry writing as well as for the dramatic arts. You will find these influences in the poetic imagery and prose, the dramatic scene setting, and the deep character creation.
These passions – for poetry, drama, literary fiction, and electronic engineering – have all been lovingly combined to create the first book in the literary suspense series, The Reckless Engineer. There are millions of professionals in high tech corporate environments who work in thousands of cities in the US, the UK, and the world such as engineers, technicians, technical managers, investment bankers, and corporate lawyers. High drama, power struggles, and human interest stories play out in the arena every day. Yet there are hardly any books that tell their stories; there are not many books that they can identify with. Jac feels compelled to tell their stories in The Reckless Engineer series.
Jac also writes the literary short fiction series, Summerset Tales, in which he explores characters struggling against their passions and social circumstances in the semi-fictional region of contemporary England called Summerset, partly the region that Thomas Hardy called Wessex. Some of the tales have an added element of suspense similar to Roald Dahl’s Tales of the Unexpected. The collection is published as individual tales in the tradition of Charles Dickens’ The Pickwick Papers and Thomas Hardy’s Wessex Tales. The first tale, The Closet, accompanies the author’s first full-length literary suspense title, The Reckless Engineer.
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-Do you draw from personal experiences and/or current events?
Quite a bit of my experiences make their way into my writing, but not in a direct way. Bits of different experiences are mixed together with a lot of imaginary and fictitious characters and events. A character might have the looks of a stranger I might have spotted on the train, certain mannerisms of a friend, and a completely imaginary personality. It is so mixed together that the end result is fictitious.
I have not used events in the news for my books published so far. However, I use parts of the Northern Bank Robbery which happened in Belfast in December 2004 as an event to fictitiously model some action in my next book, “Buy, Sell, Murder”. I also use the Barclays Libor fixing scandal somewhat carefully in it.
-Do you start with the conclusion and plot in reverse or start from the beginning and
see where the story line brings you?
Oh, no. I start with a core idea central to the plot that would have come to me in a moment of inspiration, almost like a dream or a segment of a movie. The main characters are inextricably interwoven into this segment. I then build the other characters around this, give each character a psychology, and let the characters drive the story forward by keeping each one true to his or her psychology.
For example, I woke up late on a warm summer day this June with an image of a fugitive escaping and running away from an overturned van transporting him to court from prison that had met with an accident. Prisoners wear normal clothing in England, not orange jumpsuits, and they are not in chains. He runs into the crowds and a bus parked behind a mall to hide among the people only to find that it is a film set. The actor playing a main character of the movie and the director are having a fight. The actor suddenly punches the director in the face who falls backward. My protagonist fugitive hiding among the supporting film crew catches him and breaks the fall. The director gets up, wipes the blood off his nose, fires the main actor loudly, and asks him to get out of his movie set. He turns to my protagonist and asks: ‘You there, what’s your name?’ ‘Art Miller,’ he gives a fake name. ‘Art, you are playing Michael Fallon. His trailer is yours now. Go with my crew and get dressed.’ And there I have the plot, the main characters, and the first chapter of my standalone book, In Plain Sight.
-Your routine when writing? Any idiosyncrasies?
My only routine is I have none. I write when time allows me and inspiration hits me. I usually prefer to write at my desk on my big-screen server I do my engineering work on, but sometimes I might move to a different spot or go outside with my laptop. To make it easy I keep my writing on a USB drive and back up onto my 3 computers about once a week.
-Is writing your full time job? If not, may I ask what you do by day?
I am an electronics and software engineer by day. However, I have recently left full-time nine-to-five work to start an engineering firm with a friend and I take on engineering subcontracts that allow me more flexibility to write when I want and do the engineering work when I want.
-Who are some of your favorite authors?
I love most of the classics. Out of the authors in my genre I really like Patricia Highsmith, Roald Dahl, Ian Rankin, and Benjamin Black.
-What are you reading now?
I am re-reading Wuthering Heights. I grew up reading a lot of mystery and suspense fiction and writing in the suspense genre comes easily to me. However, I need to hone my skills in writing the romances that run as sub-plots in my work, and what other way is there to do that than read the greatest romances ever written? I read Wuthering Heights in my mid-twenties, but I have forgotten the details; and this time I am really absorbing the work.
I am also reading this time’s Mann Booker prize winner, The Luminaries.
-Are you working on your next novel? Can you tell us a little about it?
One of them is In Plain Sight that I described above. The second in The Reckless engineer series – Buy, Sell, Murder – and Summerset Tales #2 – The Bank Job– are also half written. I hope to publish two of these in 2014.
-Your novel will be a movie. Who would you cast?
Daniel Craig would be good to play the series lead, Jeremy Aiden Stone, though he would have to look a decade younger.
A great alternative would be Scott Eastwood (Clint Eastwood Junior) if his acting abilities are anything like his dad’s, but they would have to age him a decade which I not hard.
Richard Armitage would be absolutely perfect to play Harry Stavers, the defence counsel.
Desmond Harrington (from Dexter) could play the mess that is Jack Connor really well.
Jessica Biel had the right looks for Caitlin McAllen-Connor, Jack Connor’s wife, with a shorter haircut; and she would have to play the character a stronger personality than she is used to.
Jeremy Irons for Douglas McAllen, Caitlin’s father.
I know Otter looks like Lenny Kravitz. So they will have to cast a new actor in the role.
-Manuscript/Notes: hand written or keyboard?
Keyboard. It is too hard to do re-writes and corrections with handwritten. Having said that, I admit that I wrote chapters 28 through 44 (to the end) with a black ballpoint pen, doing correction with a blue ballpoint pen first and typed it up later.
-Favorite leisure activity/hobby?
Writing. LOL. Other than that I love kittens and puppies.
-Favorite meal?
Authentic Spanish enchiladas with a shredded beef filling; with a Margarita to sip.
Thank you for stopping by CMash Reads and spending time with us.
Can you forgive betrayal?
The aftershocks of an affair reverberate out to those in the lives of the lovers, who will NOT take it lying down.
Jack Connor lives an idyllic life by the Portsmouth seaside married to Caitlin McAllen, a stunning billionaire heiress, and working at his two jobs as the Head of Radar Engineering of Marine Electronics and as the Director of Engineering of McAllen BlackGold, his powerful father-in-law’s extreme engineering company in oil & gas. He loves his two sons from his first marriage and is amicably divorced from his beautiful first wife, Marianne Connor. Their delicately balanced lives are shattered when the alluring Michelle Williams, with whom Jack is having a secret affair, is found dead and Jack is arrested on suspicion for the murder.
Jeremy Stone brings in a top London defence attorney, Harry Stavers, to handle his best friend’s defence.
Who is the bald man with the tattoo of a skull seen entering the victim’s house? Who is the “KC” that Caitlin makes secret calls to from a disposable mobile? Has the powerful Douglas McAllen already killed his daughter’s first partner, and is he capable of killing again? Is Caitlin’s brother’s power struggle with Jack for the control of McAllen Industries so intense that he is prepared to kill and frame him? Is the divorce from his first wife as amicable on her part as they believe it to be? Are his sons prepared to kill for their vast inheritance? Who are the ghosts from Caitlin’s past haunting the marriage? What is the involvement of Jack’s manager at Marine Electronics?
While Jack is charged and his murder trial proceeds in the Crown Court under barrister Harry Stavers’ expert care, Jeremy runs a race against time to find the real killer and save his friend’s life, if he is in fact innocent, in a tense tale of love, friendship, power, and ambition.
Despite the comfort and luxury all around him Jeremy was woken from a night of disturbed sleep by the sound of the dogs barking. It was 8:20 Saturday morning. There were voices downstairs in anxious chatter. His room (huh, he thought of this as his room now, did he?) was a first-floor en-suite with a bath. Actually it had a shared bathroom separating two twin rooms, but the second one had never been occupied whenever he had been here.
Jeremy washed his face quickly and hurried to the cupboard. Caitlin had laid out some clean clothes. He set his oversized laptop case, in which he carried a sleek laptop he had enhanced to pack in massive processing and memory power, so compact it hardly took any space, on the bed. Into the remaining space he generally packed various gadgets and electronics equipment he needed at client sites, including some “emergency” underwear and socks.
He pulled on a pair of black slacks and a blue Polo T-shirt from the cupboard. They must be Ronnie’s. Being slightly over 6 feet tall and having a wider frame, he did not fit so well into Jack’s clothes. He stepped out of his room and followed the voices downstairs.
One of the boys who worked in the stables and on the land, a brown lad in muddy Wellington boots, was talking animatedly to Caitlin, who was still in her dressing gown, in the kitchen.
‘There is police again at the front gate, sénora,’ he said with a heavy Spanish accent. ‘I put Molly and Max in the stables, ha?’
Caitlin and Jeremy hurried to the front reception with little Bubbles the puppy Lab running circles around them. There were two police cars at the gates.
‘If you could open the gates, Caitlin, I shall handle this,’ he said, thinking how lovely and vulnerable she looked with no makeup on and with tousled dark brown hair some length between short and medium. Something about a damsel-in-distress in silks stirred a man’s loins.
Jeremy went back to his room, splashed his face with icy cold water, and put on his shoes. He stepped out as the police cars pulled up outside the front door.
BOOK DETAILS:
Genre: Mystery, Legal Thriller, Suspense
Print Length: 340 pages
Publisher: Soul Mate Publishing
Publication Date: November 3, 2013
ISBN-10: 1619353210
ISBN-13: 978-1619353213
ASIN: B00GH67LVCPURCHASE LINKS:
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After some thirty years writing everything from political encyclopedias to software manuals, I retired from corporate life to write fiction, travel, and play on the beach. Since that time, I’ve traveled extensively throughout the United States and the world. I live most of the year in Hollywood, Florida, with my two doggie best friends, Mattie and Jakey, where I own and manage a vacation rental business.
Connect with Liz at these sites:
Things are not always what they seem in Liz Stauffer’s fast paced book of murder, mystery, and intrigue. When the “breakfast club” ladies of idyllic Mount Penn see bruises on Clare Ballard’s pretty face, they suspect her hot-headed husband of abusing her, but the truth is much more complicated. When violence disrupts this Appalachian village’s lazy routine, the ladies, led by the irascible Lillie Mae Harris, jump feet first into danger as bodies appear, neighbors disappear, and Clare is arrested for murder. Follow Lillie Mae and the other “breakfast club” ladies, who, armed with casseroles and pastries, help the police uncover the deep secrets this town hides beneath its perfect facade.
“Clare’s dead!”
When she spoke the words, her voice was so low it was barely above a whisper. The sturdy woman with short, curly red hair dropped the handset back into its cradle and began to pace, the phone still ringing on the other end of the line.
Lillie Mae Harris stopped at the front window, taking no notice of the white buds that were just opening on the two Bradford pear trees in her front yard, or the spring flowers peeping through the freshly hoed soil in the close- by flower bed. Her thoughts were of Clare.
She had the best view in Mount Penn from this window. On a winter’s morning she could see for some thirty miles out over the valley with the big blue sky as the backdrop. The night view was even more amazing, offering a shower of dancing lights in the distance competing only with the brightest stars.
It was now early spring and the vista had already begun to shrink even though the trees were just beginning to bud. Once the trees were filled out with big green leaves the view would pull in even more until fall when the colors exploded and the view once again took one’s breath away. But today the scenery did nothing to still Lillie Mae’s pounding heart or quell her shaking hands. She couldn’t stop worrying about Clare. Rushing back to the phone, she scooped it up, and punched in a familiar number.
“Hello.” Alice Portman answered in her sweet Southern drawl, after just one ring. Her Jack Russell terrier, Alfred, barked in the background.
“Clare’s not answering her phone this morning,” Lillie Mae said. “I’m so worried about her, Alice. I’m not sure what to do.”
“Settle down, Lillie Mae,” Alice said, shushing Alfred. “Why are you more concerned today?”
“You were at the water meeting last night,” Lillie Mae said. “You saw how Roger was acting. Yelling and screaming like an idiot. When he’s gotten that riled up in the past, Clare’s been his punching bag.”
“Well, yes,” Alice agreed, deliberately slowing the pace of the conversation. “But, Roger was just being Roger last night, dear. Just showing off. I didn’t see anything unusual in his behavior. Certainly nothing to make you so worried this morning.”
“He was acting worse than usual,” Lillie Mae insisted, still pacing the living room floor. “And I’m sure he drank himself crazy when the meeting was finally over. That’s the real reason I’m worried, Alice. You know how he is when he drinks. What he does to Clare.”
“Roger playacts, you know, when it suits him, Lillie Mae,” Alice said, her voice still soft and cool. “He knows he’s going to make a lot of money hooking people up to the public water in a few short months, but he wants to come across as the good guy to his neighbors, not the money grubbing fool that he is. He’ll use every wile that he has to seduce the community. If the project fails, which it won’t this time, he looks like he’s the man who stopped it. If it passes, he wins big time.”
“You’re probably right, Alice,” Lillie Mae said, calming a bit. “I know Roger is shrewd. If he wasn’t always out there trying to make a deal, he wouldn’t be Roger, I guess.”
“So, stop overreacting, Lillie Mae. What’s brought all this on anyway?”
“I’ve been calling Clare’s house all morning and nobody answers the phone,” Lillie Mae said. “It’s stupid, I know, but I picture Clare lying on her kitchen floor, needing my help. Dead, even.”
A sigh escaped Alice’s lips. “You’re way over dramatizing this morning, Lillie Mae,” she said. “Roger’s not even home. He drove by me in that stupid yellow Hummer of his while Alfred and I were out on our early morning walk.”
“That’s good to hear,” Lillie Mae said. “Stop imagining the worst, Lillie Mae. Clare’s probably out, too. It’s such a warm spring day. Doesn’t she usually go grocery shopping on Wednesday mornings?”
“Maybe,” Lillie Mae conceded. “Or she could be in her garden, I guess.”
“She’ll call you back when she gets to it,” Alice said, a hint of impatience in her voice.
“I doubt if she does.” Lillie Mae’s voice broke. “She rarely calls me anymore. We’ve been such good friends for so many years and I miss her, Alice. I wish I knew what I did wrong.”
“Clare’s changing, Lillie Mae. She’s getting stronger. Give the girl some space.”
“I’ve noticed a change, too,” Lillie Mae said, “since Billy went off to university. She does have more confidence, I’ll give you that.”
“Have you written your article on the water meeting for the Antioch Gazette, yet?” Alice asked. “I thought it was due today.”
“Not yet,” Lillie Mae confessed. “I’ve been too worried about Clare.”
“Maybe being busy will take your mind off things that are not really any of your business,” Alice said.
“I guess you’re right,” Lillie Mae said. “Clare’s a big girl and can take care of herself.”
“I know that well,” Lillie Mae said, then suddenly turned serious again when her thoughts returned to Clare. “I’m walking down to Clare’s to check things out before I start on the article. I need to make certain she’s all right, or I won’t be able to concentrate on my work. Do you want to come along?”
“No, you go on, if it’ll make you feel better,” Alice said. “You can fill me in on the details at dinner this evening.”
BOOK DETAILS:
Genre: Mystery & Detective – Women Sleuths
Publisher: Sartoris Literary Group
Publication Date: June 28, 2013
Number of Pages: 244 pages
ISBN-10: 0989318605
ISBN-13: 978-0989318600PURCHASE LINKS:
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“I grew up in rural Derbyshire, but my adult life has been spent mostly in London, with long intervals in Norfolk and Deal, all inspiring places. I was educated mostly in convent schools; then studied English and went on to qualify as a solicitor, working for what is now the Crown Prosecution Service, thus learning a bit about murder at second hand. Years later, writing became the real vocation, although the law and its ramifications still haunt me and inform many of my novels.
I’m a novelist, short story writer for magazines and radio, sometime Radio 4 contributor, (Front Row, Quote Unquote, Night Waves,) and presenter of Tales from the Stave. When I’m not working (which is as often as possible), I can be found in the nearest junk/charity shop or auction, looking for the kind of paintings which enhance my life. Otherwise, with a bit of luck, I’m relaxing by the sea with a bottle of wine and a friend or two.”-Frances Fyfield
Connect with Ms. Fyfield at these sites:
Marianne Shearer is at the height of her career, a dauntingly successful barrister, respected by her peers and revered by her clients. So why has she killed herself? Her latest case had again resulted in an acquittal, although the outcome was principally due to the death of the prime witness after Marianne’s forceful cross-examination. Had this wholly professional and unemotional lawyer been struck by guilt or uncertainty, or is there some secret to be discovered in her blandly comfortable private life? Her tenacious colleague Peter Friel is determined to find out of that last trial held the reason for her taking her own life. The transcript holds intriguing clues, but it is another witness at the trial who holds the key to the truth.
The trial had gone wrong on her, with the right result, certainly, one achieved through exploitation of weakness, legal argument, bullying, manipulation and luck. The suicide of the prime witness could only be called a misfortune. A thoroughly professional hatchet job on her part, in other words. It was for the prosecution to prove their case and for her to destroy it; she had done the latter but the result would not cover her with glory simply because it would be seen as an outrageous piece of cruel luck, rather than advocacy.
She would not want to say goodbye. She would never want to see him again, but he was fresh out of jail and for the first time he was leaving the court via the front door and not via the prison van. The prison van, he had told her, was an exquisitely uncomfortable mode of transport, like traveling on the inside of a human time bomb complete with molded plastic seats and manacles.
BOOK DETAILS:
Genre: Crime Thriller
Published by: Witness Impulse
Publication Date: 11/26/2013
Number of Pages: 336
ISBN: 9780062301864PURCHASE LINKS:
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