Marilyn's Musings

Over the years, I experienced lots of earthquakes. When we lived in Southern California, we went through some big shakers. Ones that did lots of damage both in the town we lived in and much more in other areas. Outside of dishes sliding to the front of cabinets and having to hold on to something to keep from falling down, personally, I've never experienced any real damage. A sound like a train coming close accompanied those earthquakes. When the last big earthquake hit San Francisco, I was riding in a car going to a meeting. In Salinas, I thought something had gone wrong with the car. Then we noticed all the signal lights were out. We turned on the radio and heard about the devastating earthquake a bit farther North. We continued to Carmel where the hotel we were supposed to stay in had experienced damage. After hanging around for a while, we knew the meeting we'd planned to attend wasn't going to happen. We turned around and drove home. Since we've mo...

Damage Control             by Denise Hamilton ISBN: 978-0-7432-9674-8 a 2011 hardcover release from Scribner. 372 pages. More than just romance can often flower under the hot desert moon. In southern California, a lot more. In the artificially irrigated hothouse of perfectly sculpted bodies, overabundance of wealth, aggressive power and overweening ambition are a dangerous combination that leads, almost inevitably, to corruption. And it is corruption that’s at the heart of this complex, lyrically written tale, along with a strong dose of murder and mystery. Maggie Silver grew up on the far side of the tracks. Now in adulthood with a mortgage, a failed marriage, and an ill mother, she’s scrambling for a place, if not in the sun, as near as she can get without singeing her fingers. Her values are aspiring middle class. She’d like to be one of the beautiful people, and for a while in a private school with a rich girl ...

We will be leaving this morning for Southern California and Saturday's Art Festival at the San Juan Capistrano Community Presbyterian Church which begins at 11. I'll be giving a presentation on How to Write a Mystery with group participation as we brainstorm ideas for one. First though we'll be stopping at Lorna and Larry Collins' home. This event is their baby and they've invited hubby and me to stay with them. We're excited to be spending time with Lorna and Larry. We first met them at Epicon (the conference for e-publishing) though I'm not sure exactly which one. The one I remember the best was held in Virginia Beach in March. We had a wonderful oceanfront hotel, but it was too cold to enjoy being outside. Of course we've seen them at others, including the last one that was held at the Montelongo Resort in Henderson, NV. They are a fantastic couple and it'll be wonderful to get to know them better. The drawback is getting down there. We'll be ...