Healing through story
“A shuddering ripple, a thrill of strength.” Rainer Maria Rilke’s description of Auguste Rodin’s sculptures. Mannequin Monday this week examines the work of Rodin, with implications for authors.
I offer my own story, Scars Tell a Story, where I try to absorb some of Rodin’s artistic outlooks into my writing.
Continue reading“So why then does he feel he is on his way to perdition and not paradise?” We’re dressing our mannequin, our story framework, with words from an emerging Irish writer. The Irish Independent celebrates David Ralph’s “Taghazout” this week.
And I offer my own short story “It’s Best Not to Talk,” about a rookie cop finding out when to speak, when to shut up, on her night shift.
Ireland’s national newspaper The Irish Independent offers New Irish Writing, edited by Ciaran Carty and appearing on the last Saturday of each month. Currently featured is “Taghazout,” by David Ralph. Ralph hails from Tipperary and lives in Dublin. He is working on a collection of short stories.
The story opens, “He wakes like a swimmer emerging from water, his head rearing up off the pillow, his mouth sucking hard at the air.” Coming up from the deep. “He is hungover, his head hammering.”
He is hungover, his head hammering.
The man wakens to a huge hangover, remembers he is scheduled to go on holidays, hurriedly gathers his gear and dashes off to the airport. He will meet his friend in Morocco to surf and party. As he rushes to the airport, prepares to board his flight, he is riddled with anxiety. It’s a black cat kind of day. He can’t shake the feeling death awaits him somewhere before the day is over.
“His bag is packed in no time. His friend Francois is already there, waiting for him in Taghazout, a village along the coast past Agadir. A midwinter break to the gloom. Francois says it’s a paradise for surfers, yoga enthusiasts, sybaritic partygoers. So why then does he feel he is on his way to perdition and not paradise?”
The author immerses readers in the chaos swirling in the character’s head. “He passes gate after gate after gate. When he approaches Gate 111, he sees that people are already queuing to board. Already they’re snaking round a corner, tripping over each other to get inside an iron canister that will javelin them in a miraculous arc up over France, on through Spain, and finally set them down on the edge of the Sahara.”
As fellow passengers are boarding, the man’s mind is spinning: “And then the thought comes to him as he considers the blue liveried hostess with her hair pulled tightly back in a bun. He could just stand up and walk off. There is nothing and no one stopping him. He doesn’t have to get on that plane.”
Read on to see what the man decides to do. The author has captured one long foreboding moment in a man’s life. A singular moment? Or one of a string of such moments?
“Come to Paris. Your sister is dead.” The opening lines from Elle Marr’s debut novel The Missing Sister. This week we clothe our mannequin with words, stories set in Paris, We visit three novels, two historical, one contemporary, all set in the City of Light.
And can we talk of Paris without Edith Piaf joining us? I offer an imaginative story of my own about the Paris catacombs. Thanks for joining us this week.
Over the last few months I’ve read, by coincidence, a handful of novels set in Paris, written by women authors, featuring women protagonists. Two were historical fiction, one contemporary. And all gripping reads.
The first was Pam Jenoff’s The Lost Girls of Paris. Here’s the opening line: “If not for the second-worst mistake of Grace Healey’s life, she never would have found the suitcase.” The story moves back and forth between New York in 1946 (the opening line) and Paris in 1943. A woman administrator in the London office of war operations proposed using women operatives behind enemy lines.
Continue readingPutting a grin on our faces isn’t easy these days. I share a few lines of humor from two books I recently read. Authors James McBride with Deacon King Kong and Louise Penny with All the Devils Are Here drape our weekly mannequin in smiles.
And I offer another short story of mine, about a writer’s own King Kong.
Continue readingTake me somewhere I’ve never been. This is what I look for in a story. Werner Sonne has written a fine novel on the post-WWII division of Palestine to create the Israeli state. This week on Mannequin Monday we clothe our story in the garb of an RN in a combat zone.
And I offer a story of a hospital worker’s act of kindness.
Continue readingMy Lord, our mannequin drives a flatbed Ford this week. Ride along as words dress her story.
“Stuff your eyes with wonder… live as if you’d drop dead in ten seconds.” Words from Ray Bradbury. Today’s Mannequin Monday is a mashup of song lyrics, a real-life memory, and Ray Bradbury quotes.
And then I present “Hollywood and Highland,” a short story I wrote using all these pieces.
Continue readingIn our creative work we give form to feelings. In writing, music, sculpting, painting, photography, film. “We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect.” Anaïs Nin.
This week Mannequin Monday looks at the wonder of re-reading a novel. I re-visit authors Louise Penny and John Steinbeck to help us with that.
The Wonder of Re-reading a Novel
I am not a fan of re-reading novels. In my lifetime I have read hundreds, perhaps thousands of novels. They span a wide range of styles and genres. Most of them have been mysteries, police procedurals, thrillers, international espionage. I love a good mystery. In the mystery genre, my favorite authors include Michael Connelly, Daniel Silva, Louise Penny, William Kent Krueger, Frederick Forsyth. All excellent authors, with exciting, well-crafted novels. I admire Connelly’s detective Harry Bosch. His driving force: everybody counts, or nobody counts. And Silva’s latest novel, The Order, exemplifies hope in a troubled world, more so than many of his previous books.
Few of these, however, inspire a re-read.
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