Bavarian Sugar Cookies for Pub Day!

It's pub day! I can't believe it's here! A Table by the Window is officially on sale. I was up late (more on that later) and refreshed my web browser until the "pre-order" button became a much lovelier "order now" button.

It's finally available from retailers nationwide, including Amazon, Barnes & Noble, CBD, Lifeway, and Powell's Books.

I'm so excited that it's received such lovely reviews from Publishers Weekly and RT Book Reviews, as well as endorsements from Joanne Bischoff, Suzanne Woods Fisher, Katie Ganshert, Leslie Gould, Meg Moseley, and Carla Stewart, who each took the time to read during the hectic holiday season.

Lessons from Television: Olivia Pope vs. Veronica Mars

Last month I decided that, with the new Veronica Mars film coming out, the time had come to re-watch all three seasons of the original show.

Tough work. I suffer for art, y'all.

The more I re-familiarized myself with the show, which is a treasure trove of clever writing and surprising guest stars (Jessica Chastain, Melissa Leo), the more I saw similarities between Veronica Mars and Scandal, specifically the two main characters.

Scandal has its own strengths. The characterizations can be sharp, the writing crisp, the plot fearless. 

Both women are fixers. When people find themselves in the midst of tragedy and scandal, Veronica and Olivia can find a clever way out. They both use unorthodox means of questionable legality. They have friends and associates who are fiercely loyal, while their love lives are a mess.

Both shows struggled during the third season. In Veronica Mars, the tertiary characters wobbled and behaved erratically (never mind the frequent, giant plot-holes, such as Vinnie Van Lowe somehow being an eligible candidate for Sheriff, despite never having been a policeman), and yet Veronica remained strong.

We knew what she wanted, who she cared about, how she was damaged, and in Season 3 we learn how this negatively affected her life and relationships. In shows where you have to suspend a healthy amount of disbelief to buy into a teen-aged detective, the realism helped to ground the character.

Until now, watching Scandal has been like watching a top that's been spinning crazily and yet remained upright - somehow, despite the soapy twists and turns it managed to maintain its balance.

And then Season 3. The top is pinging and bouncing, and while it hasn't crashed yet, there's the feeling that it's inevitable.

For starters, there are a lot of tertiary characters that the writers want us to emotionally engage with. And that can be fine. But if you're going to build out a team of strong characters, you have to make sure that your central character is still the most compelling.

The telling moment for me was in the most recent episode, when Olivia yells at Fitz that she has her own hopes and dreams.

I sat there and thought, "Really? Hopes and dreams? Do share, because this is the first we're hearing about it."

And three seasons in, that's an issue. We should know what motivates her, and we're pretty sure that the Truth, Justice, and the American Way ship has sailed, because Olivia Pope is nobody's girl scout.

Much of her character in the first two seasons centered around her past and present affairs with the president. And yet, for the woman that we're told she is, there should be thoughts and motivations beyond her (admittedly concerning) personal life.

Contrast this with Veronica Mars. We knew her long-term goals, to finish college and make a career of investigation. For a 16-18 year-old, it works. In the shorter term, she wants to solve her best friend's murder, the double-mystery of her drugging and subsequent rape, and find her mother.

All of these are emotionally loaded, and we care deeply about each outcome. We watch her be alternately stoic and overwhelmed as she sifts through each issue. 

But all we know about Olivia Pope right now is that she wants Fitz to be reelected, and she likes the idea of living a "normal life" with Fitz in a "cabin" in Vermont. 

Yet when it comes to Fitz, we don't have any compelling reasons why he should be president (he admits that his greatest talent does not lie in foreign policy, cough), or why the two of them should be together. I get that Olivia is supposed to be mysterious and enigmatic. But after three seasons - we need to know stuff. It's important. We have to be able to get behind her goals, want to root for her success. 

And if not? That is a major, major structural issue. 

Shonda Rhimes is great at launching shows that are compulsively watchable, but the sustainability is an issue. Sure, Grey's Anatomy has been on for nearly ten years, but it began to jump back and forth over the shark in season 4; I don't know what's been going on and I'm okay with that. I'll watch previews in passing and simply be pleased if certain characters have managed to stay alive (when the death rate rivals Vampire Diaires, that's saying something). 

I'm excited to see how the transition from TV to film goes for Veronica Mars. And who knows - Scandal may be able to course correct. 

But until then, it's a strong lesson in character building. Even with established characters, sometimes it's important to step back and refocus on your character's goals and motivations.

Short term and long term, they inform the character's actions and keep your protagonist from becoming passive or unknowable.

Which strong characters have stuck with you? How do you think the serial-nature to television writing affects characterizations? Share your thoughts below!

Remembering Memphis

Sometimes it feels funny to experience Martin Luther King Jr. Day in Portland, OR. Political correctness is...assumed, and expected. That's not to say racism doesn't happen, but it's different, and often more subtle.

Not so in Memphis. You can't get through the morning commute without noticing the stark racial and socio-economic divide. When I drove Danny to work in the morning, we'd be driving from the east side of the city to the center along with other Caucasian commuters, usually driving newer American cars or German imports.

On my way back to our hotel, though, I drove back with the African American service employees headed to work on the east side. The cars were either much older, much flashier, or both. Sometimes the tires were worn so deeply that the metal core sparked on the asphalt, and yet I've never seen so many Mustangs and Corvettes as I did on Memphis roads.

I'll never forget what it was like to be driving somewhere new, and to transition from a clean, photogenic neighborhood into a poorer, less safe one - with only a street or two in between. Antebellum-style houses would give way to loan shops, alcohol stores, run-down restaurants, and most tragically, funeral homes. So many funeral homes. All of these would have bars on the windows.

Danny and I once picked up Thai food for takeout, from a restaurant we later realized was near the Hickory Hill area. We counted the number of cop cars we saw until we returned to the hotel; there were seven.

Some time on the internet will tell you more about the racial/socio-economic divides that plague the city. Violent crime rates in the poorer neighborhoods are some of the highest in the nation. Public schools are predominately populated with African-American students; most of the middle-class Caucasian families send their children to private schools or home-school.

Memphis is, of course, home to the Lorraine Hotel, where Dr. King was assassinated. That site is now the home of the National Civil Rights Museum. Having spent time in that city, I can only hope and pray that one day it will be a place where grace and generosity will abound. As it was two years ago, I found it a city that could alternately the friendliest and the most frightening place I'd ever been.

As a Caucasian woman in the Pacific Northwest, I feel profoundly under-qualified to offer any sort of commentary on race relations. But I've traveled enough that in remembering Martin Luther King Jr., I can't shake the profound sense that we still have so very, very far to go. 

Writer's Corner: Compelling Characters

It's been a while since I've had a Writer's Corner post. Which...is kinda too bad, because I had some cool insights about characters a few months ago. Be sure to tell me what you think in the comments.

So, the last writerly post was about active versus reactive characters. As I was thinking about active characters and their common threads, I landed on a thought - the very best active characters have a superpower.

Why Cookbooks Matter in a Pinterest World

Funny story - I received a bunch of gift cards for Christmas, for both Amazon and Powell's Books.

For a while I've been circling various craft books, whether it's paper craft, needle felting, what have you. But the thing is, new hobbies take time.

And - I've got books to write. Food books, not needle-felting books. So after hemming and hawing over using the gift cards to get started on something new, I decided to take what is, likely, the wiser path.

Simple Holidays from Thanksgiving to New Year's - an Update

The holidays - they're over!

Did you survive? I hope you did. We did, though there were a few skin-of-our-teeth moments.

I wrote in the previous post about how we were simplifying the holidays, and I wanted to write up a recap of what that looked like and how it went.

For Thanksgiving, we had nine loved ones over for Soupsgiving 2013. Now, if you've followed this blog for any length of time, you know that I have a deep and abiding love for soup. What you likely don't know is that I have an equally abiding hatred for roast turkey. So for me, the Soupsgiving was a win on several levels.