Jackson's Lemon and Lee Out Lee In

Sometimes, though not often, a smooth solution appears for a thorny dilemma. In last week’s post, I wrote about the renaming of Robert E Lee Elementary School in Austin, Texas as a close-to-home example of the movement to erase things “Confederate” from the public domain--school names and mascots, statues in parks, on university malls, and on courthouse lawns, and the old Rebel battle flag just about anywhere but in a museum display.

So far, the political push has brought about changes in some places, and not in others. I’m half smiling as I report that Lee Elementary School in Austin will remain Lee Elementary School. But Robert E. is being replaced with Russell. It is now Russell Lee Elementary School. The school in question was built in the 1930’s, and lies just north of the University of Texas campus. Russell Lee lived in the neighborhood and served as the first Chairman of the UT Photography Department, a course of study which he initiated at the university. His own work with a camera is well known and he’s recognized as a Texas pioneer in the field of photography.

How nice is that little bit of serendipity and common sense on the part of the Austin School Board. Hoorah for them, and hoorah for whoever suggested Russell Lee as an acceptable compromise name. Regretfully, as with most compromises, the advocates for both sides will not be truly pleased with the outcome.

Moving on, how about this photo of Little Jackson sleeping. I know I’m not his daddy. But I am his daddy’s daddy.  I easily get all mushy looking at him and the daughters of our other son, especially when they’re sleeping.  What I really wonder, is what the little rascal is dreaming about to bring on that bare hint of a Mona Lisa-esque smile. I’d really like to know.

And now I wonder if ole Leonardo was painting his daughter’s daughter when he did the world famous portrait. If so, I bet Grandpa Leo been wondering for twenty years about her sleeping wisp of smile and just decided to let folks forever more worry over it, too. Such a smile on a sleeping babe is nothing but cute and precious. On the lips of a teenage girl, I expect it’s time for daddy to worry and keep the shotgun handy, or the crossbow in Leonardo’s era.

And a Jackson tidbit for a Civil War connection. We took Jackson to eat lunch yesterday at a café. His granny Nita gave him the lemon slice out of her ice tea. He grabbed it and licked the sour side all through lunch.

My Confederate historian friends will understand that our kids named Jackson correctly, because Stonewall Jackson is widely known for his love of sucking lemons during battle. I’ve twice visited Stonewall’s grave in Lexington, Virginia, and both times a bunch of bright yellow lemons were laying around his big tombstone inside the iron fence.

Finally, it’s Memorial Day Weekend, and today I want to remember the only two American soldiers from my generation’s war—the Vietnam War—who I knew by name, and who gave “their last full measure.” First was a classmate at Longview High School, Edwin Bodenheim, who was an Air Force pilot and died on a mission. The second was Robson Wills, an Army officer, who was my brother’s college roommate and close friend, who died in combat leading his infantry platoon.My hat is off and prayer said in the memory of their sacrifice.

And since Memorial Day began as Confederate Decoration Day, here’s to the memory of my great-great-great grandfather, William Gill, of the 6^th Mississippi Regiment, CSA, who died of his battle wounds in 1863.

William Gill’s death as a Rebel soldier is the reason the Todd side of my family landed in Texas. My granny remarried, and William's son, Elijah Gill, didn’t like his new stepdad. So, at age 12, he took Cricket--the family mule, and rode to East Texas from Chunky, Mississippi. Elijah must have been a tough little fart. He became a Texas Ranger for a couple of years and then a jailer. His daughter married a Todd. Here’s a photo of my mother, born Betty Lou Todd, who is now 90, and her great grandpa Elijah holding Baby Betty in 1925.

I hope everyone has a terrific holiday weekend and stops for a moment along the way to remember what this holiday is all about.

Grits, Toilets, and Robert E. Lee Elementary

Someone recently asked this question on the American Civil War Forum, an online site that includes discussion about most anything Civil War related:

What southern traditions really are in danger of disappearing as the political and cultural clashes continue over Confederate statues, schools named after Confederate heroes, and display of the battle flag?

One lady wrote in that manners are at great risk, evidenced by Southern children no longer being taught to address adults by “Sir” and “Ma’am.” She also mentioned children addressing adults as “Mr.” Phil or “Miss” Nita, putting an adult’s first name with a “Mr.” or a “Miss” to show respect, and yet not be too formal with an adult who the child knows well. Good reply, I thought.

My answer of a disappearing Southern tradition is grits. That is, grits for breakfast as a side serving.

Twenty years ago, our preacher told a great grits story. A salesman from the North was traveling through Mississippi, well off the interstate highway, and he stopped at a small town café for breakfast. He ordered breakfast eggs and bacon. When the plate arrived the eggs and bacon looked just fine, but a blob of mushy white stuff was on the plate, too.

He called the waitress over and asked what the white pile was. She answered, “Them’s grits.”

He replied, “I didn’t order grits. I don’t even know what they are. And I’m not going to pay for something I didn’t order.”

The waitress jutted out one hip, and patiently explained, probably while chewing gum and scratching her bubble of dyed red hair with her ballpoint pen.

“Honey, you don’t order grits, they just come, and you don’t have to pay for them, neither.”

Our preacher’s point was that God’s grace is like grits. You don’t have to order grace, it just comes. You don’t have to pay for grace, Jesus did that already, for all of us.

I’ve enjoyed retelling that little story for two decades now. I hope it was new to at least a few of you. But my point is not quite the same as our preacher’s.

Sometimes, the way folks behave, I fear that along with breakfast grits, human grace, not to be confused with God’s grace, is also disappearing.

I watch the abrasive political squabbles over silly stuff, like which school restrooms should be open to which kids. As an old high school principal, I have to laugh in dismay at the idea of teenagers showing their birth certificates to a potty-guard in order to gain entry to the approved toilet stall. To the politicians, I say, please, spare us all from this nonsense. Schools have more important matters, matters that actually matter, to impart to our teenagers.

And, in thinking what just happened in Austin, Texas, I shake my head sadly when a school that functioned just fine for sixty years while as known as Robert E. Lee Elementary, is suddenly renamed, banishing public recognition of venerable old General Lee.

I think I’m sensitive to both sides of the debate about how Confederate heroes should be remembered. I do see the huge irony of African-American kids going to schools named for Confederate generals. That’s not hard to recognize as inappropriate.

In the pre-integration years of the early 1960’s, my wife attended John B. Hood Junior High in Dallas, built during the centennial years of the Civil War to serve white kids. I can’t imagine the school board in Dallas, or anywhere, naming a new school built for black kids after General Hood or any other Confederate leader.

But, desegregation and white-flight--the departure of the white middle-class from urban school districts--including Dallas, have changed who is “qualified” to have his or her name over the doors of big city public schools.

That doesn’t really ruffle my feathers in anger. I just regret that so many white parents reacted to public school desegregation by moving to all-white suburbs, so their kids could attend all-white public schools, or all-white private schools. What a sad commentary that has been for fifty years now. What a lost opportunity to show the world that we are still a melting-pot nation, that black and white, they are all our kids, who should be sitting elbow to elbow in the same schools.  

Our wonderful nation would be better if every school was naturally integrated, full of students of all ethnic groups who live near each other in the same communities. Sadly, the white-flight train left the station half a century ago, and I don’t see it coming back.

I freely admit I feel sorry for Robert E. Lee, who is losing his shine as a role model for all Southern children. By all reports, he was an honorable man whose memory deserves better than to be erased off school signs. Nonetheless, if I was an African-American parent, for the obvious reasons, I’d not want my kids to attend a school named after General Lee.

I don’t feel so sorry for General Hood. I’m a student of the Confederate Army of Tennessee, and I’ve not yet forgiven him for the Battle of Franklin. It still breaks my heart to think about that day.

Back to breakfast grits. While the unordered white blob of mush may be on the way of the do-do bird, shrimp-and-grits are surging across the South. I’ve ordered them in nice restaurants from Washington, DC to my little hometown of Lockhart, Texas. Every chef seems to have his own take on how to season and garnish shrimp-and-grits to make his dish memorable.  

For our Mothers Day lunch a couple of weeks ago, Nita and I followed a shrimp-and-grits recipe from Southern Living magazine. Salsa verde, heavy on the basil, much like pesto sauce, was the crowning touch to our crustacean and hominy delight.  That colorful photo is our Mothers Day meal.

And the nap that followed the shrimp-and-grits lunch wasn’t so bad either.

TMI

Sometimes, less is a lot better than a lot. TMI. Too Much Information. 

Historians love TMI. It lets them cherry-pick just the best pieces of historical fruit to include in their books. Writers of historical fiction sometimes hate TMI, because having too many known facts sets us on a restricted plot line.

Sometimes discovery of one sentence telling of a scantily recorded bit of history is grist for a better chapter than is the diligent study of a whole book of detailed facts about a more important happening.

For instance: On May 6, 1864, Longstreet’s corps, led by the Texas Brigade, arrived at the Battle of the Wilderness just in time to literally save the day for General Lee’s Confederate army. The Texas Brigade was “first in.” It was such an important day in the Civil War and the role of the Texans was so vital to the outcome, that every book about the battle includes a full description of the Texas Brigade’s last-minute arrival, rapid deployment, and heavy casualties. Over the last 150 years, I bet more than a hundred writers have written tens of thousands of words about the Texas Brigade’s performance on May 6, 1864.

That meant when I described the Wilderness Battle in Defiant Honor, I had to keep my narrative tightly in accord with the well-established facts. I admit it is fun to dig around in several books, and primary source accounts that are easily found online. It’s fun to pare down TMI until I’m left with a set of details that fit my characters’ actions and my novelist’s need to tell an exciting story. But, TMI makes writing historical fiction more akin to detective work than freewheeling writing.

But not always. Jump ahead just one month to June 17^th, to the next time the Texas Brigade charged the enemy. I’ve found just one modern historian who has written about it. In 1970, in Hood’s Texas Brigade: Lee’s Grenadier Guard, Harold Simpson wrote, “Annoyed by the constant sharpshooting, skirmishing, and shelling to their front…the Texas Brigade spontaneously charged from their earthworks with one of the grandest yells heard in a long time.”

Now that’s a description that this writer of historical fiction can run with. It’s not an event that a dozen eyewitnesses recorded for newspapers back home, nor one that old veterans wrote about in their foggy memories decades after the war ended. It’s just a bare-bones account that leaves me lots of creative wriggle room. The term spontaneous  provides a rare opportunity for my fictitious characters to jump out front.

Writing fiction is full of spontaneity. Fiction authors just follow their noses and create the plot as they go. History writers are hide-bound to do the opposite. Historians have to stick with the known facts. When they get spontaneous and start speculating, they lose their academic credibility, and their next book doesn’t sell well.

Writers of historical fiction are in a nice middle ground. We have to stay within the known historical facts, but we’re free to toss in fictitious people and fictitious actions by real people, as long as we don’t mess with the known history.

So, today I’m putting Captain McBee’s company into the cauldron again. They’ve been in battle after battle, their numbers have been halved and halved again by disease and battle casualties. The Confederate army is down, but not out.

The remaining men in Company C are lean and mean, accustomed to deprivation and hardship. They are committed to staying the course, but secretly fearful the end is near. They are not dumb, they have eyes, and their bellies are empty more often than not. After three years of soldiering, they have little patience for bullshit or Yankees.

It’s a fine time for High Private Rafe Fulton, Lieutenant Hubbard, and Corporal Jason Smith—all fictitious soldiers—to lead the Texas Brigade’s historical June 17^th spontaneous charge at a little-known place known as Howlett’s Farm. The Yankees better watch out, because my spontaneous juices are flowing.

You Are NOT Going to Cut Off My Legs

I almost let it slip by, again. Today, May 6th, is a day of personal remembrance for me. I don’t indulge in the Chinese sort of ancestor worship. I mean, it’s not a religion for me. But I have adopted one old McBride as a personal project. It’s hard to honor a man who died in 1879, never married, and has no direct descendants.

If you’ve been reading my blog posts for a while, you might know already who I’m talking about. The ancestor is my great, great, great-uncle John J McBride, who was a lieutenant, then captain, then acting major of the 5^th Texas Infantry Regiment, CSA, in the Civil War.

He’s the man who inspired John J McBee, the main character in my three Civil War novels about the 5^th Texas regiment and the war in Virginia. I affectionately call him Uncle JJ.

Uncle JJ was twice wounded in two of the great battles of the Civil War. He was first shot in the shoulder late in the afternoon on August 30, 1862 at the Battle of Second Manassas (or Second Bull Run, as we Southerners prefer to call it).

Two years later, having soldiered through the 1863 battles at Gettysburg and Chickamauga unharmed, Uncle JJ was severely wounded in both legs, near his hips, at the Battle of the Wilderness early in the morning on May 6, 1864. 

That was 152 years ago today. 

I find Uncle JJ’s war experiences to be fascinating, but war service records are only a skeleton of facts. I wanted to bring his tale alive for others, but not just as bare-bones history. 

So, I’ve built personalities for the real-life McBride’s in the Civil War--Uncle JJ, his widowed mother Elizabeth, his brother James who was a Confederate cavalryman, and his real-life manservant Levi (his slave), who now has his own Wikipedia page for what he did during the Civil War. It’s worth a look. I even created a fictional love interest for JJ with a saucy woman named Faith.

Those books are why I started writing this blog, and why I keep putting out new posts.

So, around sundown today, I’m going to sit on our back porch with several other McBride’s. At least one or two of us will lift a cold Lone Star beer in honor of Uncle JJ, while I retell the story of the old soldier who 152 years ago today told the field surgeon:

“You are not going to cut off my legs. I am not going to die from this wound. The Yankee bullet hasn’t been made that’s going to kill JJ McBride.”

Or so it was reported in the Houston newspaper a month or so later.

Snarky and stubborn, Uncle JJ lived until 1879, walking on both legs after a long year of recovery, to die at the age of 60.

Here’s a photo of Uncle JJ’s grave in Palestine, Texas, and a post-war oil painting portrait of him.

I Hate Funerals, But...

I hate funerals.  I guess we are all supposed to.

Yet, to this day I regret that when a very good friend died nearly 30 years ago, a suicide victim, his family chose not to have any sort of service after his remains were cremated. The circle never closed. Whatever value or meaning his life had was never addressed to those of us who cared for him. It was a bad decision.

Yesterday we attended the service of a cancer victim, a wonderful lady who taught high school Spanish for many years and spent her 15 years of retirement volunteering in all sorts of Christian and civic activities. Her name was Pat Allred and her chosen portrait for the funeral service bulletin was at age 70, right before her cancer hit, standing in a jumpsuit and harness, waiting to take her first and only leap from an airplane. She was good-hearted and vibrant, a special person to many, certainly including my whole family.

When I was writing my first Civil War novel, Whittled Away, I made one of the two main characters born of a Mexican mother and a Scottish father. That character’s name is Jesús McDonald, and he is still probably my favorite character in all my novels. Anyway, I would sometimes want him to speak a few words or a phrase in Spanish, and Pat Allred was my go-to resource to see if the computer and I had it right. She seemed flattered to be asked, and I was really grateful for her help.

Pat was Episcopalian so her funeral was in her church sanctuary. In Lockhart, the Episcopal Church is the oldest church building in a town full of old churches. The sanctuary is quaint and small and dates to the 1860’s. Too many of us crammed into too few pews, but no one fussed about it. The music and the liturgy was high church, with a soft crystal-clear solo of Ava Maria sung during Communion. The sermon-eulogy was brief and well-spoken. The last song probably didn’t fit, but we all joined in to sing “I’ll Fly Away” to send Pat off.

Then we went outside to the little garden next to the sanctuary for her sons to put the brightly painted Mexican ceramic jar containing her ashes into the niche already holding her husband’s ashes.

Finally, most of us walked a block around the corner and had a reception-wake in an old storefront that is now Lockhart’s only wine bar-music venue. I don’t know if the whole thing was pure Texas, but it was pure Pat.

Prison Pen-Pal and A Chubby Reb

It’s 7 am here and just growing light enough to watch the rain. The thunder has been a background noise since 3 am, at least that’s when my digital bedside clock started blinking after the electricity burped. I confess I didn’t hear the thunder until my bladder woke me later. 

Question: If I slept through the thunder, did it actually happen, since thunder leaves no puddles, no blown down limbs, no residual echo in the air?

Deep philosophy aside, I’ve made coffee, filled my new Mexican mug that smiles at me with a fun/scary face and sat down in Recliner #7 to enjoy the sound of the rain on the tin roof over the patio and write. My cup runs over. Honestly.

I mentioned in last week’s blog post that I have a new pen-pal. I’ll call him Bill. He is in prison in another state. My brother asked if I might write him. They know each other through a church program that allows my brother to teach a small group of inmates. I wrote, and Bill’s first letter back to me was half introduction and half prison poetry, something like cowboy poetry, I guess. That is, rough, but the meaning clear enough. It was more than enough for me to glean immediately that prison is NOT where anyone would want to live. I reckon that’s the point of prison, after all.

In Bill’s second letter he wrote that he is prison for “killing the man at work who touched my wife’s breast.” If ever a statement screamed for more details, that one does. Maybe in future letters he’ll elaborate. For now, I’m leaving alone the rest of the content of Bill’s letters because he and I are just starting this exchange of letters, and I want to ask his permission to share more.

By the way, we exchange paper letters, no email. One of the first things I’ve learned through Bill’s letters is to take nothing for granted about his circumstance. No internet, for instance. Even paper, pencil, envelope and stamp have to be bought from the prison store. So, no money, no communication with anyone outside of prison.  Moreover, since his prison doesn’t have paying jobs for inmates, his ability to buy anything in the prison store depends on funds being deposited in his prison account via a Paypal type program, that has a very high fee attached. Rates comparable to those of payday loan sharks. No breaks for the low-income families of prisoners in that “service.”

I’m cheating somewhat by loading each of my letters with a couple of old blog posts that somewhat serve to introduce me to Bill. As to what else I might write to a guy incarcerated for killing another man, you got me. I’m pretty much clueless, other than trying to find things in his letters that I can respond to. Does he want our letters to be all about him, or does he want to read about the world outside prison, the world denied to him?

Also, I don’t know what writing “voice” to have with Bill. Sympathetic? An older man to a younger man? Christian to Christian?  I just don’t have a feel for it, at all. He might as well be on Mars in terms of our commonalities. Yet, he seems willing to try, therefore, so will I.

Moving on to my novel writing, I’m happy to make a personal announcement. In my internet research for the chapters of Defiant Honor that I’m writing now, I’ve stumbled on a period photograph of a chubby Confederate soldier. Since I’m a chubby Civil War reenactor several weekends a year, I find myself sometimes joking with folks that real Civil War soldiers were skinny, not of comfortable girth like me, and like so many other middle-age American men who go out to play war on weekends.

The real soldier of comfortable girth who I found was actually General Robert E Lee’s nephew, General Fitz Hugh Lee. Fitz Hugh was a cavalry commander, and a good one, but a man who appears to have missed few meals, bless him.  Here’s the photo.

General Fitz Hugh Lee is in Defiant Honor for the day in 1864 when he sent two thousand of his dismounted soldiers to attack a fortified Union position near the James River, south of Richmond. It was an earthen fort manned by a brigade of US Colored Troops. It was the first battle for the African-American soldiers, and many people on both sides thought they would not fight well. 

In fact, the USCT regiments held the fortifications through an attack that last all afternoon. They inflicted substantial casualties on the Confederates before General FH Lee finally gave up the assault, after three bloody attempts. The success of the USCT brigade was much to the relief of the Union commanders. All that fits nicely into the action of Defiant Honor .

What I’m reading this week: I’m on the third book of a series of historical fiction novels about Vikings in Ireland back in the early days.  This one is titled The Lord of Vik-lo. A good writer named James Nelson self-publishes the series, even though he authors other novels through a traditional publishing house. That’s encouraging to “indie” writers like me.

Have a great week.

Tam's Palindrome: In Words Drown I

I’m leaving the Civil War behind for this post, to shift from the 1860’s to the 1940’s, the years of World War II. 

I meet every Thursday with five other writers in a critiquing group. Three of us email the others drafts of our newest chapters each weekend, and on Thursdays we sit down face-to-face and offer written and verbal suggestions—critiques. After three years, we are still learning how to be honest, but not snarky, how to step on the other’s toes sometimes, but not mess up their shoeshine, and how to praise without gushing.

One of the writers, Tam Francis, has just entered a novel set in the 1940’s in Amazon’s Kindle Scout competition, something I also plan to do with Defiant Honor when it’s done. More on Kindle Scout at the bottom of this post.

Tam is a writer whose books and blog posts I enjoy. Besides being a substitute teacher, wife, soccer/cheerleader mom, and local actress, she is a dancer, a 1940’s dancer.

 As I vicariously live in the 1860’s much of the time, Tam daily dances through the 1940’s. We never know when she’ll show up on Thursday afternoon dressed in vintage clothes from the ‘40’s, hairdo, stockings, and all.

Tam let me do a short quirky interview with her for this blog post, writer to writer. Here's a photo of her.

What punctuation mark best describes you and why?

Em dash. First of all, to say its name is very musical. It almost sounds like your singing. Parenthesis sounds like a disease, and period and colon—well, you know. Em dash also includes the word dash which is movement, fast movement, at that. I can picture all the little em dashes, sliding around in a jitterbug swing out. Then there’s the way em dashes can be used. They have great versatility, to replace commas, parentheses, and colons—which gives a writer the freedom to add information and even bring attention. Lord knows I like to bring attention.

How do you handle criticism?

Receiving criticism is a process that has become more refined for me with time, experience, and the abundance of it. I used to reject criticism or take it to heart so deeply I would cry and wallow in self-pity for a few days. Over time, I’ve learned to consider criticism as one of many possibilities and points of view, opening myself up to grow from it. How can I put my own spin and signature on a suggestion or correction?

What is your philosophy towards your work?

I tend to obsess and get hyper-focused when I’m writing. I have to make deals or play games with myself. You cannot edit UNTIL you do the laundry. You cannot edit UNTIL you’ve done the watering and weeding. Incidentally, those real world chores relax my brain and help me puzzle out manuscript problems.

What is your favorite palindrome and why?

In words, drown I.  I think, being a writer, the answer is obvious.

What things do you not like to do?

I do not like raising my voice at children or reprimanding them. It breaks my heart when I’m teaching when kids do not have the interest in learning or see the value.

What 1940s song best describes you and what song best describes your latest book, The Girl in the Jitterbug Dress?

For the book, it’s easy: The Best Things Happen While You’re Dancing, Danny Kaye. It could easily be a tagline for the novel since even though I put the characters through some hell off the dance floor, everything comes together when they’re dancing.

For myself, Coming in on a Wing and a Prayer. I always feel a bit frazzled with two very active kids. On top of that, my hubby was active Navy and deployed a lot. Now he’s in school full time—driving me crazy. Plus, I just have to be in the PTO at the kids’ school and youth coordinator for our local theatre.

I squeeze the writing in everywhere I can and always feel like I’m creating on a wing and a prayer, even using that “moment of silence” when I’m at school—did I mention I substitute teach—to pray for patience, kindness, and creativity.

Pick two 1940s celebrities to be your parents.

John Payne, for my father. You might remember him from “Miracle of 34^th Street” and “Sun Valley Serenade.”  He’s handsome, humorous, and kind. And Hedy Lamarr for my mother, she was not only a classic beauty, but she was brilliant, co-inventing Spread Spectrum Technology. Google her name and read the story, she was one smart cookie.

If you could only do one dance move the rest of your life, what would it be?

The swing out from the Lindy Hop, of course. It has everything you need. It has distance, then togetherness, speed, centrifugal force, and enough counts and beats to forever play with the rhythm to create and improvise interesting footwork.

Now tell me about The Girl in the Jitterbug Dress and the Kindle Scout program.

GitJD is the parallel story of two women coming of age, struggling with loss, love, and redemption, united by a dancer’s dress. Anyone who liked The Notebook, or Water for Elephants will love reading the past come to life on the dance floor in GitJD.

The Kindle Scout program is a new opportunity for writers to eliminate the middle-man agent, but still have the benefits of a publisher.

Your novel must be ready for publication, with a kick-ass professional cover.

Here’s the cover to GitJD, so you'll know it when you see it.

You submit to Kindle Scout and if approved, Amazon posts a blurb, an excerpt, and your book cover on their website. You have 30 days to garner nominations or votes. After 30 days, Amazon counts your votes, and reads your book if there’s been enough interest. Then they decide whether to offer you a contract.

So, pop on over to  

https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/8DGVSKEE3VMQ

 to nominate The Girl in the Jitterbug Dress. Give me a shot at publishing with Amazon. And please check out my blog at

http://www.girlinthejitterbugdress.com

Phil says: I don’t really read girlie books, chick flicks in print, but I did read The Girl in the Jitterbug Dress and liked it a lot.

As for the Kindle Scout Program, it’s a sales deal for Amazon, sure. But, it’s also a viable way, even if a longshot, for independently published writers like Tam and me to get “kicked up a notch,” and join those novelists who have publishing contracts for their products.

So, I hope you’ll take a look at Tam’s novel on the Kindle Scout website and consider casting a “nomination” for her. I hope you don't mind my making theplug for her, because I'll be asking you do the same for Defiant Honor later this year.

Next week’s post will be about my new real-life prison pen-pal. His first two letters have already been an eye-opening and sobering surprise to me.