Thicker Than Blood by C.J. Darlington is a story about a pair of estranged sisters. Their parents died in a car accident when they were just teens. One went to live with an elderly relative, and then grew up to become a rancher, starting off as a field hand and working (and investing) her way into full partnership. The other ran away from her pain, ended up making some hard decisions, some bad decisions, and more or less mucking up her life.

The twist comes when Christy (the messed up sister) tries to rectify one of those old bad decisions and it puts her life in danger. She ends up escaping into the loving arms of her sister, though the reunion is anything but hugs and kisses.

Thicker Than Blood by CJ Darlington is a book about relationships. Relationships between sisters, between close family friends, between those of us who are totally messed up and God.

Now, it’s a common misperception that is founded in truth  that Christian books are nothing but sermons in thin polyester disguise. This is very true of many older Christian fiction books, and even currently of some particular genres and publishing companies. This is certainly not true of all of them, and most of the Christian fiction I read certainly doesn’t fit that category.  It’s also a hard line for truly talented Christian writers to walk. Many feel that it would be a betrayal of their faith to NOT put in a sermon or two, and others fear that allowing any shred of their personal beliefs to shine through might spoil the story or limit their market. For many others it’s simply a part of the story since it’s a part of them.  I bring this up, because there is a bit of overt Christianity in Thicker Than Blood. I can’t call it preaching, because it’s not. It’s something that’s kind of hard to explain, but in my opinion it was handled very well- not detracting from the story but adding to it. Your opinion may differ.

A common complaint that I heard about Thicker Than Blood by CJ Darlington is that there wasn’t enough romance. And this is true, in my opinion, but since I actually know CJ, I was personally surprised to find as much in it as I did!  Of course, I know who the main character ends up with in the next book, but honestly, I couldn’t help pulling for a certain different character. *sigh*

There are a few sensitive spots for a some people. If you’re vehemently Pro Choice, this book will probably irk you. There is also a physically abusive man in the book (the one that the main character-Christy- is running away from). This might be a little sensitive for some, although if you can handle it, CJ wrote that character really well. I mean really, really well. I’m not sure if it’s a compliment or not, but I actually think the abusive ex-boyfriend (Vince) was the best fleshed out character in the whole book. I’ve told her before that she should be a suspense writer (Thicker Than Blood is simply labeled as “Contemporary”), and his character just proves it. Although, maybe that would be more suited to a thriller. Not sure.  What I do know is that if you struggle with writing genuine, realistic baddies, you’ll want to pick up a copy of this book as a study guide. If you’re anti-Christian, just ignore the parts that irritate you and study his character.

I echo the sentiments of the many other reviews and comments that I’ve seen on my friend’s book- it’s really, really good. Maybe I’m biased, but with so many others saying the same thing, I think it probably doesn’t matter.  I noticed a missed opportunity to add a little more suspense to a section of the novel- a rare first edition Ernest Hemmingway plays a large part in the plot- if a part of the reveal had been left out till later, the suspense would have been raised for the next chapter or two. It’s not a big deal, but it could have made a big difference in the pacing of the book.

Also, I noticed, as did another reviewer, that most of the internal thought scenes were basically digesting the action that had happened in the previous scenes. No new information seemed to come out of those, and as a result, I felt as though the space was being wasted. I didn’t get to know the characters any better than I had through watching them act. I would have enjoyed a little more time spent learning about the secondary characters instead in the same space.

As far as I’m concerned, CJ’s debut novel is really strong, with a great story, no cardboard characters, and some really great insider info on the rare book trade (it’s her day job). Even though it’s not in the genres that I normally read (chick lit and fantasy), I did find it rather hard to put down at night. My mother said the same, and even told me that at one point she had to put it down over night before continuing because she found a Vince scene too intense to read before trying to sleep. She also told me that she’s planning to buy a copy for a friend of hers because she’s afraid that if she lends it, she won’t get it back.  She also found it amusing that Christy’s drug of choice was sherry.  Very amusing. I think she spent about 10 minutes giggling about Christy drinking sherry to me.  Yeah, mom’s cute.

I suspect that the fact that her book has just gone into its third printing (remember, it was only released at the end of December), and the fact that Amazon has actually raised its listed price by almost $1 means that other people quite like it too! Check out some more reviews of Thicker than Blood, then buy a copy, or come back here and leave a comment. If you’d like to win an autographed copy, put in your comment that you’d like to win a copy (Travis can’t enter because he already won a copy when I posted about TTB before- though it hasn’t been sent because I haven’t had a chance to get CJ to autograph it yet- but I should have that on Saturday- sorry it took so long Travis!). To win, you must leave a comment stating that you want it, have a blog or website where you will mention the book (you don’t have to review it, but you do have to at least say “Hey, I won this book over at Vixen’s blog!” though a review would be appreciated. You also have to live in the continental USA cuz I’m cheap, and leave a valid email address (the one you use to leave a comment is fine) so that I can contact you and get your mailing address if you win. Entries end some time around 11:59pm Thursday, March 11, 2010, give or take a few minutes either way. I’ll try to announce the winner that Friday, but I tend to be lazy and sometimes things happen to prevent me from actually doing anything that I should be doing. But, I’ll still notify the winner so I can get their mailing addy.

Aaaaaaand, I think that’s it! I really wish I could write a better review than that, but my writing brain just hasn’t been functioning lately.

So, anyway, I was thinking about Mrs. Winterbourne and the fact that Ricki Lake is a really lousy actress, and how if the movie were made today it would probably have Nia Vardalos from My Big Fat Greek Wedding in Ricki Lake’s part.  So I was thinking about that and it occured to me that she can’t help being funny. This in itself is not bad, but I don’t think it would work with Brendan Fraser’s hotness bumbling humor. She’d totally upstage him. But then I realized that they wouldn’t use Brendan Fraser, they’d likely choose Matthew McConaughey. And that would suck, because Matthew McConaughey is neither hot or funny (sorry Matt, but the truth hurts).

So then you have the humor/drama parts totally switched and TOTALLY out of sync. The great thing about Mrs. Winterbourne is that if you don’t have the right sense of humor, the movie is a total snoozefest. You up the quality of the acting, humor, or drama, and it totally throws the whole thing off and it becomes another loser of a movie that DOESN’T have its devoted fans. Like Monster-in-Law.

Is there a point to this post? Absolutely not. Well, maybe you could say that it’s a good thing that classics are classics and to be grateful that they were made when they were and not to mess with them? Or maybe “timing is everything”. But most likely “Lori has lousy taste in movies”. I could probably come up with something really insightful and tie it into novel writing, but honestly? That’d be too much work, and I have a brand new Wii to play with. Yay!

***OK, so the reason I was thinking about Mrs. Winterbourne is that I was thinking about cars- specifically how Lexus and BMW are actually in the Buick class and not the Cadillac class even though most people get that mixed up. Well, my favorite line from that movie was as the chauffeur opens the door to the family’s Rolls Royce, she looks in and says something like “Wow, a Rolls Royce! This is like the Cadillac of automobiles!”. The chauffeur looks at her and calmly says “No, madame, the Cadillac is the Cadillac of automobiles. This is a Rolls Royce.” And from there my brain traveled on.

I’ve heard the suggestion that Movado Watches make great Valentines gifts for those who think in riddles (Love that lasts a lifetime, love for all time, etc), which is actually pretty traditional. Just think of the Victorians and their fan language, or the language of flowers, and so on. Lovers have always sent secret messages to each other in these types of ways, and BlueDial.com makes it easy by including free 2nd day shipping to the continental US and free sizing with each watch sold.

To hubs, however, the ultimate in classiness is a Cassio watch, and I don’t wear watches. There’s one Seiko watch that I think I’d like, but I still can’t see me wearing it. I’m perfectly happy with my Christmas Mickey Mouse watch and my Nightmare Before Christmas watch. I rarely even wear bracelets, and I make those!

No, if I ever feel the need to wear a watch, I’ll probably just make one.

Hubs and I are sick of renting. Sick of having to call in the maintenance guy to fix the crappy equipment that comes with the place, sick of the horribly drafty doors and windows, the literally hollow baseboards and trim (I kid you not, what wethought was solid wood was in fact rotted out leaving the form of the original wood in the paint so that it looked totally normal until we accidentally pushed too hard on it and it caved in), the mysterious leak from somewhere around the tub that leaks through the ceiling in the kitchen and INTO the ceiling light’s cover. The kitchen faucet that can only be turned off by pushing down on the center of the thing rather than the actual handle, and now we just had to have a part replaced in one of the toilets to stop the jackhammer noise that woke me from a dead sleep 2 hours after I went to bed after a long day. I’ve already talked (at length) about the neighbors, and now the CO2 alarm goes off every time I make chicken or turkey broth.  I’d mention more, but I don’t like to complain. (insert tongue into cheek here)

So hubs and I found a cute little end of unit townhome in an awesome location. New community, immaculate exterior and yard, ditto for all the neighbors. Only problem is that it was a 2 bedroom 1 bath, and for all of its shortcomings, our current home is 3 bedroom, 1 1/2 bath plus an additional toilet (weird set up). So, we sat on it for a few days, unsure whether we should apply for a mortgage, set up a viewing, etc. A few days later, we looked at the listing again and it was under agreement.

No big deal. We really liked the house from the outside, but really? were we ready?

We’re still not sure. But after this weekend’s incident with the jackhammering toilet, we’re a little more ready than we were. My friend wrote a post on waterproofing basement walls which is a good reminder that not all is rosy in the home owning world. I would hope that a home we buy would be in better condition than this place, but at least the fix is free when you rent!

In the meantime, my internet marketing income as well as the posts like the one just before this is starting to creep up. It’s not enough to make the difference between home ownership and renting yet, but it’s getting closer. I just need to keep hammering away at my sites, and eventually we should be able to start looking at homes that are in the slums and actually have all the amenities we require. I hope.

Now, my husband and I want to own our own home for different reasons. Me, I hate being stuck with “landlord beige”. Luckily, the townhouse we’re renting now only has the lame eggshell wall paint (flat, of course, so everything marks it), but the carpet is actually more of a tan. SOOOOO much better than landlord beige! I want to be able to paint walls, buy quality carpet, choose my own washing machine, clothes dryer, oven/stove, dishwasher, maybe even bathtub if finances would permit.  Hubs just wants privacy. No maintenance guys having keys to our apartment (though all the maintenance guys here are great and the kind of guys hubs would invite over for coffee if he were the kind of guy that did that sort of thing), a detached so we’re not listening to the neighbors having band practice and they can’t hear hubs crank up the volume on his video games, movies, and music.

We really want to buy, but because of finances, we can’t. Not yet anyway. The housing market hasn’t come down far enough, and the economy gave the bosses a good excuse to not increase our financial situation for a while. I hope that’ll change soon, but since we’re having so many problems with our rental (the building itself), we’re looking to move again and may not be able to buy before we snap. That means hunting for apartments again. Luckily there are some amazing apartments just up the road. They cost a bit more, but they sit on a golf course and have their own little village shopping center right in it! Pizza place, needlework supplies, a bank, post office, and gift shop. Not too shabby!

Granted, in truth Lady Catherine meets our current understanding of the word, but at the time, condescension wasn’t an offensive description. Quite the opposite.

In America and most of the modern world, the term condescension is quite an insult. It means that the condescending person seems to think so highly of themselves that they have to lower themselves to our level. And that’s offensive to suggest that we’re at a lower level.

But think of when there was such a thing as rank. A social system where your rank dictated what you could wear, what you could do, your power in society, how you could marry, and so on. In a social system such as that, for a powerful person to condescend to the lower level was the utmost in gentility, kindness, thoughtfulness of those in a lower status than they. Not that it could never be considered an insult- a person of equal or lower rank behaving as though they were condescending from a higher rank would be the ultimate of fools. Which is why we use it exclusively as an insult today- after all, no one is higher than anyone else now. Even the President is the servant of the people- perhaps we should condescend to him?

But the truth of the matter is, we are still impressed by those who seem to truly condescend to us, even if we don’t call it by that word. Now we say “S/he’s just like a regular person” or “They’re so normal!” or “They’re just like us” and count it a compliment. Think of all the stories you hear of someone meeting a really pleasant Hollywood star, a rock god, or famous politician? How about when you work at a company where the boss is just “one of the boys”?

Rank still exists, condescension in the original still exists, but we’ve used it so much as an insult that it can no longer be considered a compliment. It’s just a shame that unless you write historical fiction, even writers are constrained by modern society’s norms. Oh well.

(click here for my actual review of Thicker Than Blood by CJ Darlington)

Remember I talked about my friend who won the Operation First Novel contest way back when? Well, the book was officially released in mid-December, and I ordered an additional copy just so that I could give it away here.

I haven’t started reading it yet- there’s the whole nervous-about-reading-my-friend’s-published-novel thing combined with the fact that I wanted to do my review at a later date, and the fact that I’ve been so tired lately that I just crash in bed instead of reading at all. However, my mother is over 1/3 of the way through and loves it.

Since I seriously suck at describing story lines, and since I have a paranoia of sounding overly biased, I’m just going to copy/paste the description the publisher gives on the back:

Christy Williams finally has her life on track. She’s putting her past behind her and working hard to build a career as an antiquarian book buyer. But things begin to unravel when a stolen Hemingway first edition is found in her possession, framing her for a crime she didn’t commit. With no one to turn to, she yearns for her estranged younger sister, May, whom she abandoned after their parents’ untimely deaths. Soon, Christy’s fleeing from her shattered dreams, her ex-boyfriend, and God. Could May’s Triple Cross Ranch be the safe haven she’s searching for? Will the sisters realize that each possesses what the other desperately needs before it’s too late? A stunning debut from the latest Christian Writers Guild winner.

After I read it, I’ll give my full review here, but in the meantime, I’m giving one copy to the first person to comment (stating that they want it) who promises to at least talk about the book and link to some place that it can be purchased (Amazon, Barnes & Noble, ChristianBooks.com, Berean, etc). You don’t have to review it, though that would be appreciated, but at least post about the book and link out to some place that sells it. I’ll send it to you once I get it autographed.

For more info on CJ’s Christian fiction Thicker Than Blood, see her website or her blog.

Remember, first come, first served!

Update: We already have a winner. You can buy a copy through the link above, or wait until my review. I might offer another copy at that time.

I think I’ve mentioned it before, and I meant to get this video up a while back (remember how I was done decorating about a month ago and I’d finished my Christmas shopping before the end of Thanksgiving weekend? Yeah, I know ya’ll hate me and you’d THINK in that month that I’d get around to posting a video before the actual Christmas Day, but you’d think wrong).

Anyway. Hubs and I went a little nuts decorating this year. Fresh garland on the tree, put our pre-lit garland on the stair railing, the old garland absolutely everywhere, new Santa and snowmen lamps, the Christmas village, our Nutcrackers, our humongous How the Grinch Stole Christmas and The Night Before Christmas books, our Christmas stuffed animals under the tree, and a bunch of knick-knacks. I think it looks pretty sweet, so I video’d it (including my hippopotamus that sing “I want a hippopotamus for Christmas”) and had intended to actually dub in an MP3 from one of my many Christmas cds, but found out too late that just because I rip a song off a cd that does not turn it into an MP3. Bummer. So, the vid is mostly silent. Hope you enjoy it anyway, because there will be a quiz later.

And, since I’m a “settle for second best” kind of girl, I thought I’d show you exactly hard it is to achieve even second best for me!

Two more things. In the first video, at the end, you’ll see the lights on my stair rails in the shape of stars, snow flakes, and snow men. This is because I found these awesome glasses at Lowe’s or Home Depot or something that look like 3d glasses, but which actually make little lights look awesome. I have a Santa one too, but it doesn’t work as well. And the second thing is my earring ARE blinking. Love ‘em!

Periodically, I get the urge to work on my novel- which is also about the time that I remember something that actually has to get done. Most of the time, I ponder which of my many sites I have to work on while I’m busy feeding virtual fish.

Last week, my friends convinced me to finally write a PLR pack like I’ve been talking about for the past 3 or 4 years. I keep meaning to, just never get around to it. But guess what? They pushed me, I did it and… Now I’m putting off learning how to list it so that it gets automatically delivered, and knowing that I’ll actually have to post it up for sale. Personally, I think sales pitches are stupid, so I probably won’t bother doing that at all, but I then worry that if I don’t do a sales pitch, will I not actually sell the pack?

And then I think, “I should do an e-book!” But what on? I know Walt Disney World better than almost anyone who hasn’t worked there for 5 or more years (seriously, I’ve met lifers there who barely know how to do more than ring up a sale). And should I really be spending my time on an ebook when I won’t even go do the link building for the sites that are already earning me money?

I know, I need to just suck it up and do it. Focus. The problem is, what on?

Where I work, most of the PCs run both of the two most popular personal antivirus and anti malware programs on the market, and my personal desktop (at work) also runs a third. And you know what? I STILL get viruses, adware, spyware, corrupted files, and who knows what else. I swear it’s not from me, but since I have to use that computer, I’m the one that has to deal with the consequences.

What we need is a better grade of Data protection. It’s a shame that the top antivirus companies don’t deal directly with individuals, but understandable because this kind of iron clad protection comes with a price. Individuals will usually find it cheaper to simply pay a tech to remove malicious programs, or even buy a new computer! But when you’re entire business is on the line, you only want the best.