Brenda Novak’s Auction to Benefit Juvenile Diabetes

By now, everyone knows about Brenda’s Auction, right? Just click through to the main auction site to browse a huge list of items for readers, writers, and everyone. There are trips, editor critiques, agent critiques, books, arcs, and a bunch of other stuff. I donated a complete set of my books, airfare for a trip to Bainbridge Island in Washington, and the opportunity to die . . . in one of my books.

In addition to being a donor, I also bid on a bunch of stuff. I’m waiting for the “editor for a day” comes up with Kate Duffy. It might go above and beyond my budget, but it’s definitely on my watch this!

The money goes to a good cause–juvenile diabetes. You can read more about the history of the auction and the need for diabetes research on Brenda’s website. Anything over and above the value of the item you receive is tax deductible. (So if you pay $1,000 for a piece of jewelry that has a value of $700, you can write off $300. Of course, check with your accountant because I’m NOT a tax expert!)

Other Things

We’re moving this week! We’ve already started, and we plan to move the beds on Sunday (Mother’s Day–appropriate!) I can’t tell you how excited I am about this. I took pictures to post here, but I can’t figure out how to download them from my husband’s camera, and he had to leave early to meet the satellite guy at the house. Hopefully next week!

I won’t have my office ready, however, for another 8 weeks. I’m having someone build bookshelves and a desk for my office. They do gorgeous work, and it’s very comparable to retail off-the-floor prices, but it’ll fit exactly into my space. I’m very excited. If you live in the greater Sacramento area, check them out.

Yesterday I received my author copies of TEMPTING EVIL and so if you won a contest here, the books are going out tomorrow. Enjoy!

I’m in the middle of copyedits for PLAYING DEAD. This book has been written under intense stress with the house and move, but I’m hoping now that most of that is done, I can make sure this book is as strong as it can be.

For fun, post the first line of your current wip or the first line of the book you’re currently reading in the comments below.

A friend sent me something the other day that really put a spring in my step, and I thought I’d share it with you. Now it has nothing to do with writing, then again, it has everything to do with writing. It has nothing to do with my books, and thank heaven for that because even I get tired of touting those puppies. It has to do with attitude, an attitude that, if adopted by Americans en masse, just might change the future of our country. It has to do with one woman simply having enough . . .

This is an open letter written to the branch manager of Proctor and Gamble—

Dear Mr. Thatcher,

I have been a loyal user of your Always maxi pads for over 20 years, and I appreciate many of their features. Why, without the LeakGuard Core ™ or Dri-Weave ™ absorbency, I’d probably never go horseback riding or salsa dancing, and I’d certainly steer clear of running up and down the beach in tight, white shorts. But my favorite feature has to be your revolutionary Flexi-Wings. Kudos on being the only company smart enough to realize how crucial it is that maxi pads be aerodynamic. I can’t tell you how safe and secure I feel each month knowing there’s a little F-16 in my pants.

Have you ever had a menstrual period, Mr. Thatcher? Ever suffered from “the curse”? I’m guessing you haven’t. Well, my “time of the month” is starting right now. As I type, I can already feel hormonal forces violently surging through my body. Just a few minutes from now, my body will adjust, and I’ll be transformed into what my husband likes to call “an inbred hillbilly with knife skills.” Isn’t the human body amazing?

As bran manager in the feminine-hygiene division, you’ve no doubt seen quite a bit of research on what exactly happens during your customers’ monthly visits from Aunt Flo. Therefore, you must know about the bloating, puffiness, and cramping we endure, and about our intense mood swings, crying jags, and even out-of-control behavior. You surely realize it’s a tough time for most women. In fact, only last week, my friend Jennifer fought the violent urge to shove her husband’s testicles into a George Foreman Grill just because he told her he thought Grey’s Anatomy was written by drunken chimps. Crazy!

The point is, sir, you of all people must realize that America is just crawling with homicidal maniacs in Capri pants. Which brings me to the reason for my letter.

Last month, while in the throes of cramping so painful I wanted to reach inside my body and yank out my uterus, I opened an Always maxi pad, and there, printed on the adhesive backing, were these words: “Have a Happy Period.”

Are you #*#$^ kidding me?

What I mean is, does any part of your tiny middle-manager brain really think happiness—actual smiling, laughing happiness—is possible during a menstrual period? Did anything mentioned above sound the least bit pleasurable? Well, did it, James? FYI, unless you’re some kind of S&M freakazoid, there will never be anything “happy” about a day in which you have to jack yourself up with Motrin and Kahlua and lock yourself in your house just so you don’t march down to the local Walgreens armed with a hunting rifle and a sketchy plan to end your life in a blaze of glory. For the love of God, man, pull your head out. If you just have to slap a moronic message on a maxi pad, wouldn’t it make more sense to say something that’s actually pertinent, like “Put Down the Hammer” or “Vehicular Manslaughter Is Wrong”? Or are you juts picking on us?

Sir, please inform your accounting department that, effective immediately, there will be and eight dollar drop in monthly profits, for I have chosen to take my maxi-pad business elsewhere. And though I will certainly miss your Flexi-Wings, I will not for one minute miss your brand of condescending bullshit. And that’s a promise I will keep . . . ALWAYS.

Best,
Wendi Aarons
Austin Tx.

You tell ‘em, sistah!

Boy, how’s that for blatant self promotion? But it’s just a lovely coincidence that

Pointe and Shoot’s release date coincided with my blogging day. I bet you are all very thrilled. I know I am!

In this third installment of Jenny T. Partridge’s crazy, chaotic, and amusing life, you FINALLY get to figure out just who has been dogging her for months, driving, of all things, a silver Hummer.

One of the craziest dance moms I have ever met just HAPPENS to drive a Hummer. It’s not silver, and I’m not telling what color it really is, so don’t ask, but she was kind of the inspiration for Jenny’s harasser to be driving the rather ostentatious vehicle. If you have a Hummer, please don’t take this personally, but come ON, you gotta know, the Hummer stands out.

So, back to the psycho dance mom who drives the Hummer. I have, on occasion, talked to people who will say, “Oh, I met Molly, and she seems like the NICEST person.” (Molly, FYI, is the name I have chosen to give to the Hummer-driving psycho dance mom I am referring to at this time.) And my response to whatever person might make that comment is, “Oh, so you met that personality?” Because on any given day, any sort of response at all is possible, at least from Molly, and you never know WHICH one you are going to get.

Some days you get Missing Molly, because she appears to have NO idea who you even are. Other days, it is Manic Molly, because suddenly you are her best friend, and she needs to tell you all about her visit to the doctor’s office to have a mole removed, even though two days before that she acted like you were a complete stranger when you said hello.

This year, Molly took her three darling daughters away to a different studio, which was mighty nice, although I still ran into her a few times at competitions. Nice Molly was inhabiting the body all of those days. However, my own daughter has been lured to the same new studio so we will be, uh, forced to endure MORE of Molly’s personalities in the upcoming months. The truth is, there are psycho dance moms at EVERY studio, and probably psycho whatever moms on every soccer team, and on every football team (and of course psycho sport dads, as well).

And, of course, this gives me fodder, so I just thought I would reassure those of you who were worried that moving studios will NOT mean I am running out of material. In fact, it will probably amp it up just a little, because there are at least TWO moms that have already expressed their displeasure that my Dancing Daughter is joining the new studio.

One of them is the loudest, pushiest, most obnoxious mother on the planet, and she has her own office down at the school board, because she is there so much complaining about the rules that are keeping her children from their rightful place on every school team. Daughter can’t do an aerial, which is required for high school drill team? School Board! Other daughter can’t do back handspring? School Board!

My daughter is the same age as one of her daughters, but is more advanced in her tumbling and dance skills, so look out. I imagine there will be fireworks.

But back to Molly. It takes a certain kind of person to drive a Hummer. It makes a statement, and Molly is all about statements. One of these days she’s gonna run someone over, during a Maniacal Molly phase, and we will all be knowing just what her main statement is. And that is where I got the idea for the Hummer that in the Jenny T. Partridge Series. I mean, it takes a certain kind of person to “stalk” someone in a Hummer, right? People notice a Hummer. And either you can pull off driving a Hummer, or you look like a complete idiot. And for that reason alone, I thought it was a nice touch.

I don’t think Molly pulls it off, except on the days when she is Maniacal Molly. On those days, it fits. And on those days, stay out of her way.

A little over a week ago, my editor sent me the revisions on my book. I opened the file, scanned the notes, and shut the file.

For the entire weekend, I tried to forget about it. But that was a little hard to do with the big, red neon sign in my head flashing, FAILURE. Voices started chanting, “We have failure. FAILURE!”

At the same time, we were in the middle of an insane project of painting the inside of our house. The ENITRE inside of our house. I usually don’t think of my house as being very big…until we started painting. Then the house seemed to grow. I swear it was like something out of THE TWILIGHT ZONE, the walls were expanding and the ceiling was rising.

And the stairs got longer. Sometimes at the end of a day of painting, my husband and I would drag ourselves upstairs where we foolishly keep our bed and we’d both say, “When did the stairs get so LONG?”

But we kept going past the doubts and pain. It took us three long weekends to paint the house. Seven or eight days in total—we actually can’t remember now. It’s all a blur of painting and pain.

Oh. The. Pain!

But the house looks fresh now, really beautiful and clean. There was nothing fundamentally wrong with the house. It just needed a fresh coat of paint. But since we were pulling furniture out of rooms and taking down blinds, we cleaned those areas too. And as long as we were moving stuff, we found all the junk that was just taking up space and threw that out. Oh and some stuff just wasn’t working anymore, like the old window valances, so we threw those away to replace them with something fresher.

And that is exactly what my editor is asking me to do in the book. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with the book, it just needs some tweaking. The FAILURE sign has faded away. Now I’m seeing this as my chance to clean up the book, pull out the extra junk cluttering up the pages and fine tune some of the plot points. I’m actually excited to tackle this.

What irritates me is that I’ve written several books and am fairly experienced, yet I still fall prey to fear. I start doubting myself and my book. And that’s not fair to anyone, including my editor. She put a great deal of work into reading the book carefully and writing up a very clear set of suggestions. She did that because she believes in the book! This is no time for me to fall apart.

I really mean that.

It’s time to step up. It’s time to work even harder, dig deeper and make this book shine.

Whatever project we choose to tackle, painting, writing a book, revising a book, it all requires us to step up. Accepting the pain and fear, and doing it anyway. So I’m stepping up and am going to do whatever it takes to get this book revised.

What about you? Are you stepping up?

P. S. But I’m not going to EVER paint this house again! I’ve put a couple pics on my Jen’s Attic Blog

So, maybe I’m out of the loop, or maybe I’m just getting old, but last night at dinner with my husband, youngest son who is 18, and my soon-to-be son-in-law, I learned a few new terms. The first of which was backne. Pronounced Back-knee.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Back, acne,” the boys said in unison shaking their heads.

Well, hell if I’ve ever heard that before! So it got me to thinking; there is a whole ‘nuther language out there going on right under my nose I am clueless about, one that even if you listen closely you can miss the meaning. So I polled the kids for terms and here’s what they gave me, and for the sake of a PG -13 blog, I told them I didn’t want to hear the smutty words. So here goes:

You’re wolfing it right now, means, you’re lying.

Cakin’ it means, (as a guy speaking) you’re hanging out with the girl friend. Cupcakin’ is also used. As an aside I heard my son say this a few months ago during a phone conversation with one of his buddies, after I heard the cupcake word, I walked into his room and asked, “Where did you get the cupcake?” (coz I wanted one)
He shot me a look and said, “That means I’m going over to name of girlfriend’s house.”
“Oh,” I said.

She’s a bop (again from a guy) this means the girl they are speaking about moves around a lot. If you get my meaning.

Freak, is a term for a girl

When a guy says, “She’s floss” he means, she is above hot.

That’s jacked: means, that’s wrong

Sav: a guy who gets around

That’s grit: expensive
Hella grit: very expensive

Grill: teeth

She’s jocking, pertains a girl who is all up and around a guy, basically she won’t leave him alone (currently my eldest son has some freak jocking him).

Hit me up: call me

That’s straight boostie: that sucks

I’m straight off that: no thanks

Late: short for later or good bye

Let’s bounce: let’s leave

You’re trippin’: you’re wrong

KB: kick back, which means relax

She’s roach (again from a guy) it means she’s a skanky gross girl

Peace out: good bye

Feelin’ fresh: means, I’m looking real good

I’m so crispy: means, I just popped the tags off my new clothes and now I’m wearing them.

Okay, so, I learned a few things last night. Are any of these terms new to you? Or are you a dinosaur like me? Now, keeping it clean, if anyone has some vocab to add please share.

And I wanted to let you all know, the hubster is guest blogging over at The Graveyard Shift today, stop by and harass ‘er and say hello.

Yesterday was Brennan #2’s 12th birthday. Like I do for the older kids, I took her from school at lunch time for three hours of alone time–lunch and a movie. She wanted to see PROM NIGHT. (Warning: SPOILERS Ahead.)

Based on the synopsis, I wanted to see this movie as well. My older daughter saw it with her friends, so it was just #2 and me. Literally. One thing about going to a movie that’s been out awhile, in the middle of a school day, is that NO ONE ELSE was in the theater. Which can be fun.

The movie started promising. Three years ago, Donna, a high school freshman, was the target of an obsessed stalker. The backstory itself–which was handled very well in the movie–is the most interesting part of the show, and unfortunately only took the first 10 minutes or so of the film. Donna’s stalker was one of her high school teachers. He became obsessed with her, followed her, wasn’t very subtle about it, and was removed by the school board. He then continued to stalk and harass her. They got a restraining order against him. He then killed her family trying to find her–she was under the bed watching while he strangled her mother, who lied to protect her daughter.

The murders were told in a dream/flashback that seemed real and appropriate to the story to convey a lot of information in a scary and powerful way. The history of the stalker was told by the detective who had worked the case to a new detective who hadn’t been around three years ago. Okay, a little cheesier, but it worked. (The detective was played by a guy I’d never heard of, Idris Elba, who I thought was pretty good. It wasn’t his fault that some of the writing was way off.)

Actually, the acting wasn’t bad. It made the show tolerable, and even a bit enjoyable in parts if wholly predictable. Okay, there were a few parts where I was a bit surprised, but for the most part I predicted everyone who would die (except one girl) and they built the suspense up pretty well–at least for young teens who haven’t seen as many “scary” movies as I have.

But there were two things that really, really, really bugged me. (There were other things that bugged me, but two big ones.) First, when the aunt and uncle who raised Donna after her family was killed learned that the killer had escaped from the mental institution, the uncle didn’t want to ruin her prom night. Yeah, they played lip service to a “good” reason–i.e., they had no proof he was in town, he was supposed to be 2000 miles away, and they didn’t want Donna to have a relapse because she’d spent so many years in therapy with nightmares, etc., etc. Okay. But the cop should have said, “Look, I understand, but other lives are at stake here, and the only way I can protect her and make sure that no one dies is to bring her home and surround the house. Until we find him, she’s here under lock and key.” So the whole premise of the prom night didn’t work because it was stupid that the cops let her stay there up until the point they found a dead body and realized he’d car jacked someone and taken his identity.

Two other procedural things really bugged me. First, after the bodies were found they cleared the hotel (good) but they didn’t check the faces of everyone who left. Come on, this guy killed a bunch of people, escaped from a mental institution, and is wholly obsessed with this girl and will do anything to be near her, and they didn’t check the faces and ID of everyone who left the hotel? I don’t buy it. And then, at Donna’s house, there were only TWO COPS watching the OUTSIDE of the house–both of them alone? Right. Don’t buy that, either. Sitting ducks (and the both ended up dead, surprise.) I’d think once they confirmed that this guy was loose, he’d already attacked Donna, he’d killed a bunch of people, that they’d have people INSIDE and OUTSIDE of the house, KNOWING the guy is going to go after her.

Okay, one more technical detail. The jury said he was insane. This wasn’t California so I don’t know all the rules, but I was under the impression that insane means that you’re not competent to stand trial, so it never goes to trial–that when and if you are “cured” then you will go to trial and would need to prove that you did not know what you were doing was wrong. Very hard to prove. And even if the guy did go on trial and pled insanity, he would still have to prove that he did not know what he was doing was wrong–he literally did not have the cognitive reasoning to know that murder was not okay. But I digress.

Okay, the second BIG thing that bugged me. Blood. There was very little. Not that I wanted a gory movie, I much prefer suspense than gore which isn’t in and of itself scary, I still had a huge problem with this. I know, I know–they didn’t have a lot of blood because they needed a PG-13 rating. This would never have passed muster with the hardcover Rated R scary movie crowd. But come on! The killer uses a knife. He stabs his victims multiple times, either in the chest/abdomen or slits their neck. The only marginally realistic scene was when he killed the best friend. We didn’t actually see it, but he slit her throat and an arc of blood hit a plastic tarp, and that’s what we saw (and yeah, that’s good scary rather than seeing the actual murder.)

But the first girl he kills by stabbing her repeatedly in the abdomen. There are only little red lines on her torso when her body is found. And no blood in the carpet? He kills her boyfriend same method on the tile of the entry of the hotel suite–and no blood? Yeah, he could have cleaned it up–but I’d have liked to have SEEN him at least clean up one of his kills so I could at least suspend disbelief enough that he did it with everyone. All we saw was him washing the bloody knife (and where were the bloody towels? Smears? Arcs of blood on the walls or ceiling?) BUT the big thing was, this guy only has one outfit. He doesn’t change until near the end when he kills a hotel worker and takes his uniform. He stabs to death four or five people and has NO BLOOD on his clothes and is able to walk around the hotel without being noticed? Stabbing people is messy, especially the way he did it. There is blood. The guy didn’t change. That bugged me big time. That interfered with the plausibility of the entire story. I could almost buy that they didn’t show a bloody corpse because they wanted the PG-13 rating, but when that interfers with the actual STORY, it doesn’t work.

There was one other big important plot point that was completely ruined because there was no blood. BIG SPOILER (not that I think any of you are going to see this movie.) … . . . . .. . . .

Near the end, Donna’s boyfriend is staying with her in her room and she gets up to use the bathroom. Comes back and lies down and says she’s happy he stayed with her. He doesn’t respond. She turns his head. He has a gash in his neck (not very bloody, but red.) He’s dead. Duh.

Sorry, that plot point didn’t work AT ALL. If he had his throat slit so deep to kill him that he wouldn’t have had time to move or try to defend himself, there would have been blood on her nice white comforter and pillows. The blood would have seeped into the bed. She wouldn’t have been able to NOT see it when she came out of the bathroom. It wouldn’t have ruined the scene to have her walk out, see the blood, and try to scream, only to be grabbed by the killer. But this was such a dumb set-up.

My girls hate going to movies with me or their dad because we predict everything that will happen (especially with the teen movies.) I remember seeing DISTURBIA with the girls and Dan and I predicted pretty much everything. The movie wasn’t as graphic or violent, but it was definitely more suspenseful and I’d recommend it. Suspenseful like THE HITCHER (the original) where there is a lot of build-up (though there isn’t much overt violence until the very end.)

Like PROM NIGHT, the set-up for DISTURBIA was very good. In DISTURBIA, the teen hero’s dad died and the teen becomes withdrawn and acts out. He hits a teacher and is put on house arrest for three months. The actor, Shia LaBeouf, is very good in the movie, an the writing was good. DISTURBIA is essentially a teen version of REAR WINDOW where LaBeouf’s character believes his next door neighbor is a serial killer, but he can’t leave his house or he’ll be put in jail. There’s other good backstory set ups about why the cop doesn’t like him, etc., so this becomes believable. Like most teen movies, there are some problems with plausibility, but unlike PROM NIGHT, they didn’t ruin the movie for me. My big complaint about DISTURBIA is that the climax was too fast. A lot of great build-up, then the ending came too fast.

I love movies, and I’ll see the good and the bad. After all, that’s how we learn, by seeing what works and what doesn’t work.

Right now, I’m looking forward to the INDIANA JONES (who isn’t?) I love the first three movies, and THE HOLY GRAIL (III) was outstanding, one of the few franchise movies where the third movie was the best. So I have high hopes for THE CRYSTAL SKULL.

What movies are you looking forward to this summer?

Over the last week or so, I’ve been trying to recollect and journal some of the old superstitions I’ve heard over the years. Ones from this area, sayings my grandparents, parents, and their friends mentioned often. Especially the ones that managed to lodge in my brain and take root as if they were actual truths. Ones I shared with my own children.

I’m planning to lace some of these superstitions into a future book. For whatever reason, I’m getting the notion that these nuggets may help flesh out ‘place’ in my writing. That they will give the reader a more three-dimensional view of the community that surrounds the main character, then, with any luck, turn the community into a character of sorts. That’s what I’m hoping for anyway.

Anyway, here are a few I remembered . . .

1. A long nose is a sign of intelligence.

2. If your nose itches you will kiss a fool.

3. If a person’s eyebrows meet, he is of a mean disposition.

4. If your left palm itches, it’s a sign of money. To be sure to receive that money, rub the itchy palm over a pocket.

5. To cure a child of asthma, stand him up by a post and lay a knife on his head, then run the knife into the post. When the child grows above this knife, he will no longer have asthma.

6. To cure hiccoughs rub the palm of your left hand with the thumb of your right.

7. To cure night sweats put a pan of water under your bed.

8. Put a chew of tobacco on a bee-sting to relieve the pain.

9. When a crawfish hole is open it will rain soon. If it is closed, there will be no rain.

10. If the sun is shining while it’s raining, the devil is beating his wife.

11. Before you go swimming, dip your hand into the water and make the sign of the cross. It will keep you from drowning.

12. If you touch a bird’s nest, the bird will not return to it.

13. If you handle frogs, you’ll get warts.

14. Don’t hand over a saltshaker during a meal. Slide it across the table.

15. If the picture of a living person falls from a wall, it’s a sign that someone will soon visit you.

Are superstitious diddies like the ones above common where you live? If so, what are the most common?

I’m telling you, straight from the world of the WACKY and WEIRD, the news stories recently have been El Bizarro. And everyone KNOWS that a LOT of writers get their inspiration from real life, so this past few weeks have been a bonus for those of us inspired by news stories.

For example, there is the story of the Austrian woman who was held prisoner in a cellar BY HER FATHER for more than 24 years. And worse, she gave birth to at least SEVEN children by him.

Police said the 42-year-old woman, identified only as Elisabeth F, told them her father, Josef, had lured her into the basement of the block where the family lived in Amstetten, north-west Austria, on August 24 1984, and allegedly drugged and handcuffed her before locking her up in the dungeon. A police spokesman said she was “psychologically extremely disturbed”, but her version of events was “completely believable”.

UhhhhhOkkkaaayyyy. Can you say YUCK?

Then there is the continuing story coming out of the FLDS Compound in Texas, where authorities from CPS now claim that at least 31 of the 53 girls removed from the compound, in the age range of 15 to 17, have either had children are or currently pregnant.

FLDS spokesman Rod Parker said he does not believe the CPS count is accurate. He said that from talking to ranch residents, he believes at least 17 of the girls may actually be adults but have been labeled by CPS as minors.

Agency officials have called into question claims of adulthood among the girls since the raid and have in some cases disputed documentation provided, saying the girls look younger than 18. Because many FLDS members share similar names and have complicated family relationships, identifying all of the children taken into custody has been a challenge.

Teen Disney star, 15-year-old Miley Cyrus, who has recently been under fire for provocative pics of her that made their way onto the Internet is now getting SLAMMED for a controversial Vanity Fair shoot in which she was topless, albeit covered with a sheet. Now, she is claiming foul and saying that Vanity Fair took advantage of her. Except her parents were BOTH at the shoot, and neither parent nor Miley herself was apparently bothered by the pictures until a public uproar started.

In Florida, if some lawmakers have their way, it is going to be illegal to have BULL TESTICLES on your vehicle. No, I am not making this up.

Metal replicas of bull testicles have become trendy bumper ornaments in some parts of the Sunshine State, but state Sen. Carey Baker is campaigning to ban the orbs.

In Detroit, they discovered an 80-year-old woman living with her mummified sister.

Investigators believe the surviving sister had been living with the body for up to three years. They say the body was partially covered with newspapers and that a cat and dog apparently ate part of it.

A Florida woman heard a noise in her kitchen, and when she went to investigate, she discovered an eight-foot alligator.

Alligators are ubiquitous in Florida, and Frosti sees them all the time in the ponds behind her housing development and on the lawns. But they seem to know their place; although one will occasionally wander into an open garage, house invasions are virtually unheard of.

And in one that really gives me the creeps–and probably a few nightmares–in Oregon, a policeman saved a pet shop owner from being eaten by a Burmese python!

I may never recover from reading that story, especially after reading that the pet store owner asked police NOT to kill the snake. And they didn’t. You just KNOW what that snake is planning for his next meal….. Stephen King story anyone?

So, which of these weird stories inspires you? If you were going to use a news article to inspire a book, what would you choose? And if none of these does it for you, have you ever had one that did? And if so, what was it?