Author name: Sayling@@Away

Part III That afternoon, Boots and Gracie were curled side by side on the sofa. Gracie heard “Pssst!” and looked up. “I’ve got it,” Boots told her. “What have you got? Worms?” “No, silly, the way to get Willow in the tub.” “Shhh. He’ll hear you.” “No he won’t. He’s up on the kitchen counter, sniffing around for food. Puss is waiting below with her mouth open. Mmmm, I wonder if there’re any blueberry muffins up there?” “I don’t understand why you like blueberry muffins so much, but I doubt there’s any just lying out on the counter. Don’t change the topic. What’s your idea?” Gracie asked. “You and I are going to challenge Willow to a race up the stairs. Make it a game – who can get to the bathroom first? The first few times we’ll win, and we’ll finish up sitting on the edge of the tub. The third time, we’ll let him win.” “And then what?” “I’m working on it.” “But I’m not sure I can beat him up the stairs on only three legs.” “Well, I’ll win and you can follow him up, like you’re chasing him. Anyway, the night of the big dip, Master will have to be taking a bath and you’ll have to create a diversion to get him out of the tub.” “And just how do you think I should do that?” “Get into a hissing and spitting match with Puss. Roll around on the floor. Pull out some fur.” “Are you kidding? She’ll flatten me!” “Use your claws. You know she hates claws.” Just then Puss meandered into the living room, but not before crouching on the hardwood floor at the edge of the rug, sneaking forward and attacking a knot in the wood. “Honestly, Puss,” called Gracie. “You do realize that it’s just a mark in the wood, don’t you?” “Well, sometimes I think it moves,” Puss responded haughtily. “What are you two talking about? I saw you, you’re conspiring to get Willow, aren’t you? “Maybe,” answered Gracie, in an I-know-something-you-don’t tone and a wiggle of her whiskers. “And you know what I’ll do to you if you say anything?” “Not exactly, but I’m sure it won’t be nice. Still, I don’t like you ganging up on him. He’ll blame me and I won’t be able to snuggle with him anymore. I know he prefers Boots. He never hisses at her and he even tried to wash her last week.” “Yuck. Like that’s ever going to happen,” replied Boots, lifting her nose in the air. “Is that a blueberry muffin I smell?” And she ran to the front door, where Mister and Missus were coming in with packages.   That night after dinner, Puss, Boots and Willow were lying in a row on the couch with Gracie in Mister’s chair, all of them licking their whiskers. Boots said to Willow, “Race you up the stairs to the bathroom? I’ll bet with all that food you ate, you won’t even make the top stair.” “You’re on!” Willow assumed a crouch, wiggled his rear end, and with that, both cats, with Gracie following, raced out of the living room. As they rounded the curve into the hallway, their rear paws scrabbled on the wooden floor, and they slid in to the far wall with a mighty thump, then regained their feet and thundered up the stairs. Boots won by a hair and sat on the edge of the tub looking down at Willow, who walked back and forth in irritation. Gracie came in last and sat down to rest. “Wanna go again?” asked Boots. “Maybe tomorrow,” replied Willow. “I’ll be up there looking down at you the next time.” “I hope so,” said Boots under her breath. 0 0

Part II After dinner that night, Boots called a meeting with Gracie and Puss. Willow was on the cat tree, washing his face, and the ladies convened in the wash room, next to the kitty litter box. “Phew,” said Boots. “The box was just cleaned. What’s that stink?” “It’s Willow,” replied Gracie. “He can’t hit the box and just sprays everything. I think it’s a male thing.” “Can’t he be taught better manners?” asked Boots, flopping down on the floor and gracefully swishing just the tip of her tail. “I think Mister and Missus have tried, but I heard them saying they didn’t know what to do at this point. He can’t help it, he’s male. What they need to do is put a cover on the wall behind the box,” Puss suggested as she rubbed her face against the door jamb. “What about one of those enclosed boxes?” suggested Gracie, who was delicately sniffing out the location of the odor. “They had one where they kept me after whatever they did at the vets.” “Think, Gracie,” counseled Boots. “Would you like to crawl into a covered box with walls all covered with Willow’s spray? No, better to keep him in the open.” “Yuck, you’re right,” said Gracie. “So Boots, exactly why are we here?” “I’m tired of Willow ruling the roost. He complains constantly, eats from all our food bowls, and insults us from morning to night. Plus he’s always stalking me. He needs to be taken down a peg or two.” “I don’t think he’s so bad,” whined Puss. “That’s just because you are always mooning after him and trying to lie next to him. Have some pride,” exclaimed Gracie. “Look at how he insults you! So just how do you think you’re going to do this, Boots?” Gracie hunkered down on the floor and gave her coat an absent-minded lick in apparent disinterest, but kept one ear cocked towards Boots. “Well, that’s where the three of us come in,” Boots answered, walking over to the food bowls and looking to see if there was anything left. “I figure it will take the three of us to figure out what to do and three of us to do it. Are you in?” “Well, he did take a swipe at me on the couch this afternoon and then he tried to trip me when Mister and Missus called us for dinner,” commented Gracie. “And he took my place on the bed last night,” complained Boots. “You know I like to sleep curled up next to Missus, but he pushed me away and I had to sleep between the pillows where he usually sleeps.” They both looked at Puss and said at the same time, “Okay, what about you?” “Well, I don’t have that problem. I have my own bed.” Puss went and sat with her back to her two friends, looking out into the kitchen. “Yes, and you like to sleep under it. What a dodo. You’re supposed to sleep in it.” Puss’s tail switched back and forth in annoyance. “I don’t want any part of this,” she said rather crossly. “Then you’d better keep your mouth shut,” warned Gracie. “If you tell him what we’re up to, you’re toast.” “Hummpph,” said Puss, getting up and walking through the kitchen and into the living room, where she jumped up in Mister’s lap and mewed piteously. “Good grief,” said Gracie, as they followed her out. “There she goes again, crying for treats. Mister will give in to her, wait and see.” The next morning, after Mister and Missus had left for the day, Gracie and Boots met in the upstairs hallway. “So have you given any more thought to what we talked about last night?” asked Boots. She sat calmly, looking down the stairs to make sure they wouldn’t be overheard by Puss or Willow. “Where are they by the way?” “The last time I looked they were on the sofa,” replied Gracie. “Willow was washing his nether parts and Puss was inching her way over to lie beside him.” Gracie was crouched on the hall rug with her one front paw tucked under, watching Boots and switching her tail from side to side. “And yes, I’ve given it some thought, but no, I haven’t got a plan. How about you?” “I think I’ve come up with something. I had to. Willow ate my entire breakfast this morning,” and here Boots gave a half sneeze that sounded like a hair ball coming up. “All I had to eat was that tasteless stuff Mister gives to Puss to help with her weight. There was nothing else left. I’ve simply must get downstairs earlier in the morning.” “So? What’s your idea?” “It’s got to involve water. You know Willow hates water.” “Well, I don’t like it much myself,” commented Gracie, “but I notice you like to be on the edge of the tub when Mister takes his shower. Do you like water?” “I do. It’s wonderful stuff! I like to put my paw in the water when Mister is shaving in the morning and splash it around. I actually got in the bathtub with him one night, you know. The water was nice and warm and I was enjoying it, but he didn’t like me in there with him because he yelled at me and threw me out.” “What did you do then?” “I ran downstairs. It took me two hours to lick myself dry. Don’t you remember the morning Missus sat in the wet spot on the sofa?” “Oh yeah, all the yelling at Mister. Did she ever scold you?” “No. I heard her telling Mister she couldn’t scold me because it had been too long a time from when I got it wet and I wouldn’t understand. As if. Anyway, I got to thinking maybe there’s a way we could get Willow in the bathtub. The tub has to be full, of course.” “But how could we do that?”

PART 1 Gracie, Willow, Puss and Boots are four cats who live together in an uneasy truce, part of a loving household run by their two humans, Mister and Missus. On this particular day, Gracie lay curled on the sofa, soaking up the late winter sun that poured in the floor-to- ceiling windows of the living room. Willow, the only male in this clowder, joined her at one end of the brown leather couch, taking a swipe at Gracie’s head before plopping himself down on Missus’ favorite pillow. “You missed,” purred Gracie lazily. “And you’re not supposed to lie on that pillow.” “I missed on purpose,” replied Willow. “And I can lie anywhere I wish. You deserved a swat. You ate part of my breakfast this morning.” “Did not. That was Puss. Look at the size of her. She’s put on so much weight, it takes her five minutes just to get upstairs.” “I still think you did it. What do you think, Boots?” Willow asked. Boots, who was Puss’ slender sister, meandered into the living room, flopped down on the rug in the sun and began licking her sleek grey fur. “Oh it was my sister alright,” answered Boots. “Look at me, sleek as ever. I didn’t even like what they served for breakfast.” “You’re all so picky,” complained Gracie, the matriarch of the family. “You should just be happy you have a home. They’re nice people and they love us.” She began a vigorous tongue-washing of her light gray calico fur, arching her neck and extending her tongue to reach her chest. Just then Puss, the larger and darker gray version of Boots, waddled in to enjoy the sun, her middle swaying from side to side. “Are you talking about my weight again? I’m just large-boned, you know.” With that she flopped down next to Boots and started licking her paws. “Large-boned, my whiskers,” taunted Boots. “It’s getting so this rug isn’t big enough for the two of us.” And she gave Puss a pointed stare and rolled over, stretching out on her back with all four limbs up in the air, letting the sun warm her belly. She extended her toes in sheer pleasure. Puss looked at Boot’s belly as if contemplating a strike, but then looked at Gracie, still curled on the couch. “Who made you Queen Bee, Gracie?” she asked meanly. “You’re just sucking up to Mister and Missus because they rescued you from that wheel well. You’d be in a cemetery or landfill somewhere if Mister hadn’t taken the wheel apart and pulled you out. And then they tried to save your leg. Look how that turned out. You’d be better off pushing up daisies than hopping around on three legs.” “What bit you this morning?” Gracie replied. “I can run faster on three legs than you can on four!” With that, Gracie gave her coat one last lick and jumped down off the coach, hopping nimbly over the prostrate mound that was Puss. “Say what you like, but we’re all lucky cats. Look where they found you and Boots. Living under a trailer and foraging for food. I heard what they said. A lady who worked in the trailer claimed you ruined the insulation and gave them fleas!” Gracie shuddered. “At least I was clean.” And with that, she three-pawed it toward the kitchen While Boots continued to luxuriate in the sun, Puss lumbered ungracefully to her feet and ambled over to the cat tree. She leapt onto the bottom level, stretched up almost to the next perch, and began picking at the rugging on the tree. “Keep doing that, Puss,” called Willow. “With enough exercise, you might be able to get to the top.” Puss didn’t answer but finished stretching and picking, then sat upright on the platform and stared at Willow longingly. Boots continued making starfish paws while thinking, Willow’s meaner than Puss, but what can you expect from a male? Worse, in this case, he’s right. Puss hasn’t been able to leap to the top of the tree for several months. The last time she tried, she didn’t make it, hooked a paw on the edge and dangled until the tree fell over. Boy, she scared all of us. Boots rolled over back on her stomach and tucked her paws under her. He needs to be put in his place. But how? And what to do about Puss? She just moons after him all day.   0 0

The Haunting of Secrets by Shelley Pickens is really a YA novel, but I decided to give it a read because the premise – a high school girl who sees and feels all the memories of anyone she touches –seemed rather intriguing. Also, I’ve found a lot of other YA books very enjoyable (think the Harry Potter series, the new volumes of which I anticipated as much as my daughter). This book indeed held my interest, and I had a hard time putting it down – but looked forward to picking it up again, like a treat. The author has teenagers pegged: their brattiness and snide senses of humor, their brutal honesty, and of course their bullying. There were also rare kindnesses, providing sweet spots in the narrative. The action moved briskly and the author provided a few tantalizing hints of whom the villain might be. Sixteen year old Aimee protects herself from touch by dressing as a Goth in long black pants, long sleeve black shirts and black gloves. During her escape from the high school’s cafeteria following the explosion of a bomb in the room, her clothes are torn and she inadvertently makes skin contact with another student. This student is a butcher of young girls and the memories that flood Aimee’s mind are devastating. Worse, she has no idea who this boy is. Worse yet, he knows that she knows. Aimee is faced with a conundrum: how can she find this person and how can she identify his victims without revisiting his terrifying memories. She is helped in her search by her one friend, Dejana, who is willing to overlook Aimee’s idiosyncrasies and who brings in another student to help in the search. During this time, Aimee is bewildered, flattered and ultimately warms to the attention paid her by Logan, a handsome young jock who wants to protect her from her demons and the killer who begins to stalk her. The author does a great job portraying a first love with its angst and tremulousness. If there is anything of a drawback to this book, it is the fact that there was a great deal of narrative, particularly at the beginning. In other words, a lot of telling instead of showing, and there were areas where this repeated later in the book. The dialog is great, and I would have liked to see more of it as a way of telling the story. That being said, this book was really enjoyable and the ending had a kicker of a twist. It kept me on the edge of my seat and since it is obvious from the ending there will be a sequel, I am looking forward to reading it! From her blog site (shelleypickens.wordpress.com), I learned that Shelley is in love with anything on the dark side of paranormal. She is a former high school Spanish teacher who decided to take what she had learned about teenagers in the classroom and apply it to her writing. She’s done a great job in The Haunting of Secrets, which is her debut novel. This review will also be published by Rosie Amber; I am a member of her book review team. 0 0

I met Seumas Gallacher online. No, not that way, but as a fellow blogger. His irrepressible personality shines through his posts and as a result, I had to read one of his books. I chose Vengeance Wears Black, the second in his series – nothing like jumping straight in – but it reads nicely as a stand-alone, without the first book needed. One of my own rules for a good series. Vengeance Wears Black is definitely a man’s thriller. Written with spare prose, but enough to give you a good idea of the characters and their emotions, the book provides lots of action with hardly a pause for breath. Not to say that a woman reader wouldn’t enjoy it — there are lots of handsome characters. The story: It begins spectacularly, when a truck load of women from Eastern Europe being smuggled to England for ‘a better life’ is blown up as they wait for transport across the English channel. Flash to Jack Calder and his colleagues at International Security Partners (ISP) all former SAS, meeting at the Peking Garden Restaurant in London’s Soho, for a quiet lunch. Two figures, clad in black with their faces covered, enter the restaurant and throw a bomb onto the floor. A friend of Jack’s, Chandra Rana, ex-Ghurka captain, throws himself on the bomb and saves everyone’s life but his own. Investigating the incident, ISP learned they were caught in a turf war between an Asian gang led by a ruthless 80 year old Chinese matriarch and her son and Eastern European mobsters led by an equally ruthless ex-Chechen fighter. Both groups want control of drug smuggling, female trafficking, prostitution and money laundering in London and beyond. When international law enforcement pays ISP a visit to enlist their help, Jack and his colleagues are offered an opportunity to wreak their vengeance on both gangs, while operating outside the normal constraints of the law – in other words, black ops. Once the gangs realize they are both being pursued relentlessly by an unknown group, they decide to form an unholy alliance, complicating ISP’s plan to eliminate them. The story takes the reader across Europe, through France and Germany to Istanbul and North Africa, following ISP’s and the gangs’ actions. What struck me as different in this tale is that the reader knows who the bad guys and the good guys are from the start, no guessing, none of the ethical dithering which weighs down other books of the same genre in a sea of moral molasses. As a reader, you want vengeance as much as the main characters and it is accomplished without a lot of verbal gore. If you like action and a fast-paced read, you will enjoy this book. Now I need to go read the first, The Violin Man’s Legacy, and the third, Savage Payback, launched late 2013. Seumas Gallacher can be found at http://seumasgallacher.com/. 0 0

Don Charisma (http://doncharisma.org/2015/01/06/my-adoption-story/) kindly asked me to do a guest post on his blog. It appeared today and told the story of the adoption of my children and a few words on adoption in general. I hope if you visit his site, you will like what I wrote. On another note, Luccia Gray, the author of All Hallows at Eyre Hall, also did a post on the Epiphany. I hope you will visit her (http://lucciagray.com/2015/01/06/6th-january-the-epiphany-and-the-end-of-christmastide/). Do visit her site; the post is really interesting! 0 0

Ever since I heard a soaring sermon by the late Reverend Peter Gomes on the Feast of the Epiphany, the three Wise Men have fascinated me. (Peter was an African American minister, theologian and author who announced he was gay a generation ago and who became one of America’s most prominent spiritual voices against intolerance. He was also a friend of mine from childhood.) He opened this particular sermon by saying that he had a lot in common with the Wise Men: he too was always late. So who were the Wise Men? The Bible doesn’t name them and traditions and legends have given them a variety of names, but in Western Christianity they are commonly known as Melchior, a Persian scholar, Caspar, and Indian scholar, and Balthazar, an Arabian scholar. These names come from a Greek manuscript probably composed in Alexandria circa 500 AD, which was translated into Latin. They have also been called the Kings of their respective lands with these same names in a Greek document from the 8th century, of presumed Irish origin and also translated into Latin. When you consider the written word was not common in those times and books were handmade and exceedingly rare, this is pretty amazing. Were they real? Here’s where it gets a bit confusing. One theory is that the Gospel story of the Magi was influenced by an Iranian legend concerning magi and a star, which was connected with Persian beliefs in the rise of a star predicting the birth of a ruler. Another source for the story of the homage of the Magi might have come from the journey to Rome of King of Armenia, to pay homage to the Emperor Nero, which took place in 66 AD, a few years before the composition of the Gospel of Matthew. In other words, you have to take it as gospel that the three Kings actually existed. Where might they have come from? The Bible only says they came from the East. They were initially considered to be Babylonians, Persians or Jews from Yemen; the Armenian tradition is the one having them come from Arabia, Persia and India. Most likely they all came from Persia, a journey of 800-900 miles. It is assumed they traveled by camel, so it is not a mystery why they arrived late to pay homage to the Christ Child. And why were they called wise? These men are also called the three Magi. From Ancient Greek and old Persian, the term magi refers to practitioners of magic, to include astrology, alchemy and other forms of esoteric knowledge; it was only in the first century AD that magi came to be known as wise men and soothsayers. But the practice of astrology would explain how these three men started on their journey to what is now Israel. They were supposedly guided by a miraculous stellar event, the “Star of Bethlehem.” In the Gospel of Matthew,  the Magi follow the star and arrive at the court of Herod in Jerusalem. There they told the king of the appearance of a star which signified the birth of the King of the Jews; Herod then directs them to Bethlehem, on the basis of information from his advisers, based on the Prophet Micah. Many scholars regard the Star of Bethlehem as a pious fiction, created to establish the child as the Messiah. Linking a birth to the first appearance of a star was a popular belief at the time, and interestingly, the miracles and portents surrounding the birth of Jesus are very similar to those described for the birth of the Emperor Augustus in 63 BC. Why only three Wise Men? It appears that no one is even sure there were only three; this number has been inferred from the Biblical reference to the three gifts they brought: gold, frankincense and myrrh. There could have been more. In Eastern Christianity, the Magi often number twelve, so the visitors could have been a crowd. How late were the Wise Men? The Greek word in the Gospel of Matthew describing Jesus translates as “young child,” so Jesus could have been a day old when the Magi visited or as old as two years. Joseph and Mary almost surely stayed in Bethlehem until Mary could travel again, at least for the 40 days necessary to complete Mary’s purification following the birth, making the five mile trip to Jerusalem easily. The Magi came to a “house” according to Matthew, and it makes sense that Joseph would have removed his family from the stable as soon as possible. Herod, who was Jewish by choice only so he could consider himself to be King of the Jews, must have been threatened by the Wise Men asking where they could find the child born King of the Jews. When he ordered hundreds of innocent children to be slaughtered in an attempt to have this new Messiah killed, he sentenced all male children under the age of two. So it is quite possible that the Magi did not arrive until Jesus was close to two years old. Where did the Wise Men go after their visit to the Christ Child? Christian Scriptures report them going back to their own country but returning by another way, having been warned in a dream to avoid Herod. One of the many traditional stories about what happened to the Magi has them baptized as Christians by St. Thomas on his way to India, so moved were they by their encounter with Jesus. The Epiphany, which is the 12th day after Christmas, celebrates the visit of the three kings or wise men to the Christ Child. It falls this year on Tuesday, January 6, today.   Whatever you believe about the Three Wise Men, and this humble blogger does believe they existed, I hope you will find this short description informative. 0 0

Trisha Surgarek, is in my opinion, one of the best cozy writers around. She recently sent me a copy of The Taste of Murder, book five in her World of Murder series, and it didn’t disappoint. The time the murder takes place on the set of a televised cooking competition show, when someone with a serious ax to grind poisons the food of Executive Chef Jeff Kirikos. The killer is never found and Detectives Jack O’Roarke, tall and second generation Irish, and Stella Garcia, petite and with a Cuban husband and children, get it as a cold case three year later. They get the directive with an order to solve it from their commander. Turns out Kirikos is the brother-in-law of the new mayor, so they have to overcome their aversion to cold cases on the spot. O’Roarke and Garcia have featured in the previous four books, and their relationship is easy. The reader gets a view of Garcia’s family life and the detectives’ interaction with the grandmotherly, gray-haired Chief Medical Examiner, Ruby Crutchner. Ms. Sugarek takes us backstage into the world of cooking shows – how they are run and how they are filmed — as O’Roarke and Garcia maneuver through the politics of investigating the mayor’s relative and taking over another investigator’s case. There are plenty of suspects; the chef’s widow, the man for whom the chef left her, people fired from the show, and obsessed fans. The reader has no clue right up to the last chapter. I highly recommend The Taste of Murder for a short, enjoyable read to curl up with on a rainy or snowy day, and I look forward to the next in the World of Murder series. Trisha Sugarek is a talented writer of several genres, including The Secret Language of Women a spirited journal/handbook intended specifically for men, and most recently Women Outside the Walls, a tasty piece of fiction about women whose husbands are all in the same prison. Ms. Sugarek reaches over a million viewers on social media and can be found at http://www.writeratplay.com and The Taste of Murder can be purchased at http://www.writeratplay.com/shop/the-taste-of-murder-book-5-in-the-world-of-murder-series/. 0 0

This is part of a launch tour for Jo Robinson’s new book Echoes of Narcissus in the Gardens of Delight.  Jo was born in Port Elizabeth, South Africa and still lives in SA with her husband Angus, a dog with an odd sense of humour, four birds, and some chickens.  Her stories are mostly about people, in the genre of science fiction / fantasy, but also literature and she is an accomplished short story writer.  I’m delighted to join in her launch party! The story of Echos of Narcissus in the Gardens of Delight: Donna thought there was something wrong with her. That she was suffering from a mental illness that has caused her husband to despise her, distance himself from her, and cheat on her. She blames herself for the desolate, miserable thing that is her marriage and her life. Then she comes across a book that will change everything for her, and reading it, she discovers that there’s nothing wrong with her mind at all, but that there is something very wrong with her husband instead. Marco, she realises, is a malignant narcissist. A text book case.   He has a real and documented mental disorder, and that he’s been controlling, manipulating, and abusing her for decades. The sudden full knowledge of all that he’s purposely done to her enrages her. Not sure how to leave after thirty years of what she finally knows has been intentional mental and emotional abuse from him, and believing that she has nowhere to turn, being so physically isolated, she bides her time. Then she meets and befriends a group of unusual people who share her passion for gardening, and so begins her journey to escape. She joins her new friends in their project to assist elderly people in old age homes care for their small gardens, as well as secretly supplying those suffering from painful and terminal illnesses with medicinal herb and plant remedies, including illegal plants such as cannabis. As weeks go by, she delves into her memories, relearns what it is to be respected, liked, and loved again, and slowly she formulates a plan to safely leave her dangerous husband. But unbeknownst to Donna, Marco is in serious trouble, and has desperate plans of his own, and absolutely no regard for her safety. This is a work of fiction, but malignant narcissists really do exist, and it is a recognized mental illness. Unfortunately, many people never realize that they are involved with a narcissist, because their actions are so demonically bad as to be unimaginable and unbelievable, and so they spend their lives in misery, depression, fear, and isolation. If only by the accidental reading of a fictional story, I hope that this book will help even one person, unknowingly suffering narcissistic abuse, to realize that they don’t have to, and that it’s never too late to start over, be happy, be fulfilled, to love and care for yourself, and be truly loved and respected by others. Do check out Jo and her other books on her blog:https://africolonialstories.wordpress.com. 0 0