A Wintery Sunshine Blogger Award

Yes, it's true.  I'm here with another Sunshine Blogger Award post!  This time, I was nominated by Astrya of Inkling Corner.  Thanks, Astrya!  I have such fun with these sorts of posts :-) 

Here are the Sunshine Blogger Rules:

1. Display the award’s official logo somewhere on your blog. 

2. Thank the person who nominated you. 

3. Provide a link to your nominator’s blog. 

4. Answer your nominator’s questions. 

5. Nominate up to 11 bloggers. 

6. Ask your nominees 11 questions. 

7. Notify your nominees by commenting on at least one of their blog posts.

And here are Astrya's questions!

1. What was the last book you read? 

Snowhawk by Deborah Koren, book two in her Dark Throne duology.  These books are high fantasy, meaning they take place in a fictional world (as opposed to low fantasy, which takes place in our world but with magical elements).  They're edge-of-your-seat, high-stakes adventures with ordinary people stepping up to save their kingdom from those within and without who are poised to destroy it.

You can read my review of Balefire here and my review of Snowhawk here.

(From my Instagram account)

2. What are you looking for in a ‘perfect’ movie adaption of a classic?  

The same thing I'm looking for in a good movie adaptation of a modern movie or play:  capturing the characters in a way that feels true to the characters in the book, and portraying the story in a way that makes sense for the medium.

It's no secret that I'm not a "purist" when it comes to movie adaptations ;-)  I even made this little button illustrating that fact years and years ago, and it remains in my blog's sidebar to remind people of this.  You cannot translate a work between two different mediums without changing things, because every medium -- be it print, radio, stage, or film -- has its own peculiar restraints, its own strengths and weaknesses.  A slavish reproduction in a new medium of a story created in a different medium will inevitably fail to work in some way or other.  And what is the point of creating an exact replica of a story in a different medium?  Bring something new to the story!  I have learned more about Hamlet from the 20+ stage and film versions I have seen than I would have from only reading the text itself (though I usually pick up a new nuance or detail when I reread it, too).

3. What’s your favourite season of the year and why? 

Winter!  I love snow.  And, yes, I know whereof I speak -- I lived in Iowa and Michigan as a kid (and in the Thumb of MI, where Lake Effect snow is magnificently mountainous), and in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Connecticut as an adult.  I've had to drive to work through snowstorms, I've had to shovel my driveway more than once in the same day, and I've had to help get my car out of a ditch.  Yet I still LOVE snow.

4. If you could go anywhere in the world for one week, where would you go? (This could also be a fictional place.) 

New Zealand so I could see all the Middle-earth filming locations and sets and so on.

5. If you could choose your own name, what would it be? 

Reid James.  I might use that as a non de plume at some point.

6. If you had to write a short story about anything, what would it be? 

I've written more than a hundred short stories over the past 30 years.  And I'll be writing another beginning in January.  If I want to write a short story about something, I do it, or I plan it out to write in the future.  

My next one will be about a fur trapper who's left a poke of gold by a deceased friend, but discovers the gold is being held in the safe of a greedy saloon owner who is unwilling to let go of it (or all the other semi-legally-gotten money in his safe).  It'll be part of an anthology of western short stories being put together by Allison Tebo.

Meanwhile, I do have ten short stories out in a collection called Prairie Tales: Volume One.  You can learn more about my books here.

7. What was the worst movie you watched this year and why? 

Probably Pan (2015).  I didn't care about any of the characters, a lot of the special effects were kind of kludgy, and even though I love Hugh Jackman very much indeed, he actually managed to annoy me in that movie.

8. British or American spelling? 

Well, I'm an American, so I tend to stick to American spellings, except for the word 'grey.'  I much prefer the British spelling, 'grey,' to the American spelling, 'gray.'  It simply looks more grey.

9. Desert or Forest? 

Forest.  I love forests, but I hate deserts.  Well, actually, I just hate both heat and dryness, but that means deserts are a huge NO from me.

10. What is your favourite piece of music (or two, or three, because I know how hard these questions are)? 

Well, I'm always partial to "Mack the Knife" when sung by Bobby Darin, I've been jamming to Harry Connick Jr.'s "We Three Kings" rendition on repeat this week, and I never get tired of the main theme from The Magnificent Seven written by Elmer Bernstein.

11. What was the last movie you watched?

Horizon: An American Saga, Chapter One (2024), which I rewatched this week while chatting online with my best friend while she watched it too.  I loved it when I watched it twice in the theaters this summer, I loved it again this week while watching the DVD at home, and I am ridiculously impatient for them to get a move on and release Chapter Two already!!!

Also, I've realized that my favorite character in the whole thing is Sgt. Major Thomas Riordan (Michael Rooker).  I thought he was my second-favorite, but this third viewing made me realize I really love him best.  (But I still have high hopes for Junior Sykes [Jon Beaver] to get a cool redemption arc of some kind.)

Now it's supposed to be time for some nominations.  However, I just tagged a whole lot of people with The Christmas Movie Tag, and this is a really busy time of year, so... I'm actually not going to tag anyone.  However!  I WILL provide eleven questions for anyone who wants to join the fun.  If you like my questions, you can consider yourself tagged, fill out the questions, link back to this post, etc.  If you do that, please leave me a comment here with a link to your post so I can see your answers!

My Questions:

1. Movies or books?

2. Singing or dancing?

3. Walking or swimming?

4. Cotton candy or popcorn?

5. Road trips or airplane rides?

6. Snow or rain?

7. Fantasy or sci-fi?

8. Ketchup or mayonnaise?

9. Elephants or polar bears?

10. December or July?

Play if you want to!

The Christmas Movies Tag

I love Christmas.  I love movies.  Today, I'm inviting you to join me in combining those two delightful parts of life so we can talk about our favorite Christmas movies! 

The Rules:

• Fill out the prompts (expound as much or as little as you like)
• Tag some friends (however many or few you feel like)
• Have fun (this is mandatory)

The Tag:

1.  A favorite funny Christmas movie:  We're No Angels (1955)

It's only one of the absolute funniest movies I've ever seen, AND it's a Christmas movie!  Who can resist the hilarious tale of three escaped convicts (Aldo Ray, Humphrey Bogart, and Peter Ustinov) who set out to rob a storekeeper (Leo G. Carroll) so they can get off Devil's Island and instead end up helping him and his family escape the clutches of a merciless relative (Basil Rathbone).  Comedy genius AND Christmastime gold all at once!  (And if you think Humphrey Bogart isn't funny, boy, do you ever have another think coming.)

2.  A favorite poignant Christmas movie:  It's a Wonderful Life (1946) is the perfect blend of darkness and hope.  It's remarkably gritty, with enough desperation and anger simmering in it to fuel several noir films, and yet it's also imbued with so much hope and love.  

3.  A favorite romantic Christmas movie: The Holiday (2006) grows more loveable every time I watch it.  Yes, there's a bit of "adult content," but most of it is alluded to, not shown on-screen.  But the themes of standing up for yourself, learning who to trust and how to trust them, and caring for others even when you've only just met -- all so good!  And "W-i-d-o-w-e-d" never fails to make me tear up.  If you know, you know.

4.  A favorite feel-good Christmas movie:  White Christmas (1954)

Have I seen White Christmas a few dozen times?  Of course!  Will I be watching it next weekend when it's on the big screen at our local theater?  Absolutely!  Man, this movie has everything I love in a Christmas movie -- soldiers, war zones, trains, horseshoes, romance, sparkly dresses, earworm songs that make me happy every time I think of them, miraculous snowfalls, and the occasional small, internal muscular hemorrhage.  Magic!

5.  A favorite movie adaptation of A Christmas Carol:  For me, it's a tie between A Muppet Christmas Carol (1992) and A Christmas Carol (1999) starring Patrick Stewart.  They both bring me to tears, make me laugh, and make me want to clap.  Sometimes I do clap. 

6.  A Christmas movie you watch any time of year:  While You Were Sleeping (1995)

I mean, it's technically a Christmas movie.  You have a Christmas gathering and a Christmas tree and a gift exchange and snow and mistletoe.  But I watch it any time of year because the fact that it's Christmas is only a sort of backdrop.  And also because it was released in April, and I saw it in late spring at the second-run theater with the girls who were becoming my best friends, and... it's so Christmassy, but I almost never watch it at Christmas time ::shrugs::

7.  A Christmas movie that surprised you:  Holiday Affair (1949)

The first time I watched Holiday Affair, the story and characters kept taking these random left turns that would seem to come out of nowhere, but yet made absolute and total sense.  I just could not ever see them coming, and that entranced me.  Which is a bit odd, because usually when movies start zigging when I am quite sure they will zag, I start to get frustrated.  But every single surprising turn of events made the story So Much Better, and I was spellbound.  I now tend to watch this during the week before Christmas after everyone else is in bed, while sitting on the floor in the living room and wrapping gifts.  It's a private, cozy little pleasure I look forward to and savor.

8.  A favorite "but is it really a Christmas movie?" movie:  The Three Godfathers (1948) is kind of hard to describe.  It's a John Wayne Christmas movie.  You've got three desperadoes and an orphaned baby and a desert and people quoting the Bible, and Ward Bond playing a guy named Perley Sweet... and it's generally considered a Christmas movie, but I am not sure I have ever watched it at Christmastime.  

9.  The oldest Christmas movie you've seen:  The Thin Man (1934), which is one of the most delightful murder mysteries ever filmed.  I think we will introduce it to our kids this Christmas season.  Nick and Nora Charles are #MarriedCoupleGoals, and I find this movie funnier every time I watch it, which is pretty rare.

10.  The newest Christmas movie you've seen:  A Christmas Love Story (2019), which was also the first Hallmark Christmas movie I had ever seen!  My mom is living with us part of the time now, and we don't have the Hallmark Channel.  She was missing getting to watch lots of Hallmark Christmas movies, so I hunted up a few on DVD that sounded like I would also enjoy them, and which were made before Hallmark kowtowed to the pressure to push unbiblical agendas on their audience.  We watched this last week, and it was cute and fun.  I'm pretty sure my youngest is going to want to see it because it stars Kristin Chenoweth, and my little ballerina was just in a ballet version of Wicked, which led to her being a bit obsessed with all things Wicked at the moment.  And you know what?  This movie would be totally fine for her watch.  Yay!

I Tag:

18 Cinema Lane

I'm Charles Baker Harris (and I Can Read)

Ink Calamities

The Maidens of Green Gables

Meanwhile, in Rivendell...

Movies Meet Their Match

Musings of an Introvert

Phyllis Loves Classic Movies

Sidewalk Crossings

Silver Scenes

Taking Up Room

YOU, if I didn't tag you and you want to play!  

Here's a clean copy of the questions, if you want them:

1.  A favorite funny Christmas movie:

2.  A favorite poignant Christmas movie:

3.  A favorite romantic Christmas movie: 

4.  A favorite feel-good Christmas movie:

5.  A favorite movie adaptation of A Christmas Carol:

6.  A Christmas movie you watch any time of year:

7.  A Christmas movie that surprised you:

8.  A favorite "but is it really a Christmas movie?" movie:

9.  The oldest Christmas movie you've seen:

10.  The newest Christmas movie you've seen:

Guest Post for the Brave Authors Blog

I've written a guest post for the Brave Authors blog that's all about how and why historical fiction authors can and should include minorities in their books.

You can read that article right here!

I know most of my posts lately have been about my writing and not about movies and so on.  I've got some fun movie posts planned, I just need to make time to finish them!  Everything is busy for everyone this time of year, so I hope you all understand :-)

The Black Friday Book Sale!

From Black Friday through Cyber Monday, the Kindle editions of ALL of my full-length books will be only 99 cents each!

That means you could buy all six Once Upon a Western books, plus A Noble Companion, for less than $7.

And if you're looking for amazing deals on hundreds of other good books, you need to visit BlackFridayBookSale.com because Perry Elizabeth Kirkpatrick has once again assembled the most magnificent collection of clean books across genres, all of them 99 cents or less this weekend!  And, by 'magnificent,' I mean there are more than 700 books listed there.

I'll be shopping the sale myself this weekend.  It's such a fun way to try new authors or fill in gaps in a collection.  I'm not quite finished with all the e-books I bought via last year's sale, in fact!

I Published a Third Book This Year!

It's true!  My third new release for 2024 is here at last!  A Noble Companion retells Hans Christian Andersen's "The Ugly Duckling," but by focusing on side characters from the original fairy tale, not the ugly duckling himself.  

A Noble Companion is part of a multi-author project called The Cornerstone Series, sixteen fairy tale retellings from an unusual angle by sixteen different authors.  All of the books in the series are non-magical fantasy novellas, which means that, yes, I have written something other than historical fiction!  

Well, sort of ;-)  I set A Noble Companion in a fantasy world based on Spanish California of the very early 1800s, in a place I call Costa Nueva.  This book has talking animals and dragons, but it is definitely low fantasy, or historical-esque fantasy.  I am a historical fiction author at heart, so this has a lot of similarities to my Once Upon a Western series, in that I did lots of research into the time and place I was basing my fantasy world on.  But it has little fantasy elements, too.

If you buy a copy of A Noble Companion before the end of November, you can receive some book swag related to it!  All you have to do to claim your swag is fill out this form and wait for me to email you to request proof of purchase and an address to send the swag to.  The swag includes:

• 1 double-sided bookmark
• 1 piece of dragon treasure
• 3 vinyl stickers

Here's what they look like:

This swag bundle is available worldwide!  And you can buy either the paperback or the e-book.  Or, if you are a Kindle Unlimited reader, you can also get this swag if you read the entire book on KU before the end of the month.

If you want to know more, here's the official synopsis:

Raid a dragon's hoard for her dowry? It seemed like a good idea at the time... 

Madelena isn't in love with her friend Armando, but his marriage proposal offers the security she needs. She sympathizes with him—his father insists Armando must either find a bride or join the army. Armando would rather become a husband than a soldier, but his ugly face has scared away all other eligible ladies despite his family's wealth. Although she harbors only friendship for Armando, Madelena agrees to marry him on one condition: she insists on acquiring a dowry worthy of his family's noble standing in the land of Costa Nueva. But as a humble stablemaid, Madelena has no idea how to find such wealth. That's when the talking burro Terco mentions he's heard how to find a dragon’s treasure. 

Javier, Armando’s younger brother, has loved Madelena in silence for years. When he learns of their impending marriage, he offers to help her find the treasure, even though succeeding may cost him the chance to spend his future with her. Together, they face a dangerous wilderness, a charming bandit, and a dragon’s lair, forcing Javier to confront his feelings and Madelena to re-evaluate her heart.

I promise that's the last book I'm releasing this year ;-)  I'm tired and need a little break!

Soon, Soon to Faithful Warriors Comes Their Rest

Today, the Christian church traditionally celebrates All Saint's Day.  The hymn "For All the Saints, Who From Their Labors Rest" by William Walsham How is a pretty traditional choice to sing in church services on or around this day.

Three weeks ago yesterday, my dad joined the throng of saints who from their labors rest.

It was the phone call you don't want to get, the one from a neighbor of your loved one saying there's been an accident, we aren't sure what happened, the ambulance is on its way, and we'll update you when we know anything definite.

And then you wait, and you put your kids to bed after letting them know their grandpa has had an accident, and you wait some more.  The neighbor calls you back, you talk to your mom, and you learn that your dad is gone.  

Somehow, your heart keeps beating, your thoughts keep progressing, your lungs keep inflating and deflating.  You call your brother to let him know.  You put on your pajamas and go to bed and cry and sleep and cry and sleep.

And you pray.  Pray for courage, for comfort, for the ability to continue.  For the right words to say to your kids, your brother, your mom.  To your best friend since high school who thought of your parents as basically hers too.  To your church family that your dad pastored for 26 years.  To your dad's last surviving sibling.

And God in His mercy grants you all that you need, just like He always has and always will.  HIs grace is sufficient.

He Didn't Expect to Change the World: Martin Luther

Five hundred years ago, a monk and professor at the University of Wittenberg, Germany, wanted to discuss some theological questions with other learned Christians. So he wrote them all down and, since the internet was a few centuries from being invented yet, he posted them to the door of the church instead of to his blog or Facebook wall. He wasn’t trying to cause trouble, he wasn’t trying to start a new church body, and he definitely wasn’t trying to change the world. He just had questions about some church practices that troubled him, like charging money to get souls out of purgatory. 

His name, of course, was Martin Luther. And, whether he meant to or not, he most certainly caused trouble, started a new church body, and eventually changed the world. But what he’d meant to do is reflected in the name we now have for the movement he started: the Protestant Reformation. He was protesting that some of the church’s activities went against what was taught in the Bible, and he wanted to reform the church, to fix things that had gone wrong. Not overthrow it, not replace it, just reform it. 

The trouble was, he attacked the selling of indulgences. Indulgences were like “get out of jail free” cards for purgatory, which the church taught was a sort of limbo world between earth and heaven. They said that if you believed in Jesus as your Savior, but you’d committed more sins than the good works you’d done would atone for, you had to hang out in purgatory for a while until, as the Ghost in Shakespeare’s Hamlet put it, your foul crimes were “burnt and purged away” in “sulfurous and tormenting flames” (I,5). 

If you or someone you loved was probably going to have to stay in purgatory for a while, the church said you could lessen their sentence, or even forgo it entirely, by buying an indulgence. That was a piece of paper that entitled you to some of the extra good works done by various saints who had done so many good things in their lives that not only would they go straight to heaven, but they had leftover goodness you could get credited to yourself or a loved one. Why worry that your mother or father or child who died recently was languishing in torment when you could pay the church to get them released? Or, as a popular rhyme about indulgences went, “As soon as the coin clinks in the chest, the soul flies up to heavenly rest.” 

Selling these indulgences was a really big moneymaker for the church at that time, which made church officials happy. Why? Because they were building a gigantic cathedral in Rome called St. Peter’s Basilica. This was an expensive and lengthy project, and selling indulgences was a super-successful fundraising idea. So when some upstart monk had the audacity to question whether or not selling indulgences was a scriptural practice, the church authorities couldn’t ignore him. 

But wait — what was one unknown professor at some German university going to do against the power of the church, which had the support of the entire Holy Roman Empire? What did it matter if he posted ninety-five discussion questions on the door of some church? How many people were going to attend his little theological debate, anyway? The internet didn’t exist, TV didn’t exist, radio didn’t even exist — nobody except some musty old professors were going to care about this, right? 

A century earlier, that would have been true. But, by 1517, the world had Gutenberg’s printing press, which allowed pamphlets and books to be printed cheaply and quickly. Ideas spread swiftly and accurately now, not passed by word of mouth or by people copying out what someone else had written, but by being printed and distributed in massive quantities. And that’s what happened with Luther’s 95 Theses — someone printed them up and started passing them around. People got excited about this debate. Word spread that some professor in Wittenberg was daring to question the church’s practice of selling indulgences. Shocking! Exciting! News-worthy! 

Suddenly, Dr. Martin Luther was the center of all kinds of attention and controversy. Simply by wanting to discuss church practices and whether or not they were based in Scripture, he’d caused trouble, he was on his way to starting a new church body, and the Reformation he began would end up changing the world.

(This post originally appeared in Femnista magazine on April 27, 2017.)