Wordless Wednesday - 137

Heather says I love walking through Halifax and seeing the buildings that survived the Halifax Explosion. It is hard to see them come down rather than being restored.

Akelamalu says Those buildings would probably be 'listed buildings' here (in the UK) which means no-one would be able to demolish or change them in any way.

Wylie Kinson says Maybe, when that building was standing, people fell in love within the walls, or went mad from stress, or flirted, or discusses wars and marriage and death and birth and solved life's mysteries around water coolers...

Through the Opera Glasses - 46 - Blogosphere Event - One World One Heart

My comments are now closed - thank you to everyone who participated. This has been an amazing event!














I just love stumbling upon blog events. I came upon this one when I popped over to Robin's blog, Around the Island, last week.

Robin started the Summer Stock Sunday series last year, which of course is something for which I can't wait to start up again. I'm already thinking about photos I can post.

So I was enchanted by her Magic Carpet Ride post for the One World One Heart event, which I'm just squeaking in under the wire to join, as sign-up time ends at 11:50 PM Pacific time tonight.


Lisa at A Whimsical Bohemian "feels it is imperative to have a 'tribe' of kindred spirits to help feed one's soul." As I begin my fourth year of blogging, I marvel and cherish the friendships I've made through my blog, and look forward to many more years of laughter, sharing and amazement with all of you.

As of this posting, Lisa has nearly 1000 bloggers signed up to this event. "This international event transcends geographical location, socio economics, political affiliation, religious beliefs......it's a coming together like the giant community we are on this planet."

Lisa - all I can say is - AWESOME.

In a spirit of giving, participants offer something to give away to a lucky winner, whose name shall be drawn on FEBRUARY 15th. Check back next week to see if it might be you!

All you need to do is leave a comment, with a way to reach you in case you are chosen. If you post a comment as Anonymous, please include your email address so I can get back to you.

My prize offering is A Numerology. What's a numerology, you may ask? It's very similar to a horoscope, but the information comes from your name and birthdate.

Good luck to everyone playing, and I hope to see lots of wonderful new blogs in the coming week as I roam the blogosphere, visiting bloggers who cherish the idea of One World One Heart.

I have made many dear blog friends from four previous blog events I've joined: Kailana's Advent Blog Tour, Mimi Lenox's Blog Blast For Peace, Kim's Blog Improvement Project and 5 Minutes For Mom's Ultimate Blog Party.

Who knows where One World One Heart will lead me?

Barbara Olivo Cagle says Hi A Piece of My Mind, Wow, I'm first and hopefully the winner! What a lovely idea and post you have. I love the Numerology Idea. I'm working on getting all the country flags. I promise to revisit your's too.

Valrie says I wonder if there is a fortune in store! Neat!

Red says Very intriquing. Thank you for your generous spirit!

Poetry Train Monday - 138 - Falling With Abandon

With Valentine's Day approaching, here's an ode to love, which I wrote this evening after indulging in watching ballet pas de deux on You Tube.



For more poetry, Ride the Poetry Train!











Falling With Abandon


Love yearns
Yearns like the sea
The shore always slipping through
Fingers of foam

Its absence cr-
-acks
cracks the heart
Cracks like a dry lake bed

Love refuses
Will never give in
Love scrambles like tiny turtles
Scrambling from the sand for their watery refuge

It stalks with lethal prowess
Stalks like the panther gazing
From the shadows

Love competes
Love collides like
Tangled antlers

It shyly flirts
Flirts like the cocked head of a kitten

Love swirls
Swirls in the pit of the stomach
Swirls like dervish snow squalls

It bursts from the breast
Bursts like startled flamingos

Love burns without warning
Love burns like orange flame
Flame wrenched from trees by blue lightening

It falls with abandon
The abandon of a glacier calving
Into the open arms
Of the sea

Love kicks with springy delight
Rambunctious delight
The springing leap of young goats

It protects
Love protects like a bear's
Swiping claw

Love soothes like the tongue
The tongue of a doe nudging her fawn

Its joy spreads
Spreads through the cosmos
Spreads like smiling stars
Stars revolving in the vast night

- Julia Smith, Feb. 7, 2010

Panther photo by Liorah_Lleucu

The Accidental Novelist says Happy Valentines Day in the tangled antlers of love!

An Aesthetic Bard says Felt like going up an ethereal escalator to ultimately reach the “smiling stars, stars revolving in the vast night”.

Janet says Love truly is multifaceted, sorrow and joy tangled together in an emotion no one is immune to!

My Third Blogiversary

I'm celebrating my Third Blogiversary here at A Piece of My Mind today.

Find a seat and settle in - I've got Broadway's best to set the mood and bring us all to my favorite place in the world. The house lights go dark. The pit band strikes up and the curtain rises.

Let's go to 42nd Street!




*clapping*

Yes, Radio City Music Hall is on my Bucket List. Can't wait till I walk into that amazing theatre with my own two feet.

The house lights have gone back down from a quarter to dark. The curtains slide open. *whispers* Ooo, here she comes! Here she comes!

Princess Aurora from the Sleeping Beauty ballet, arriving at her debut ball to perform the Rose Adagio. This is such an amazing piece of dance. The role of Princess Aurora demonstrates the full range of the female dancer's technique: quick footwork, lyricism, solo presence, partnering, flexibility and solid balance. It announces both a character and a dancer capable of seizing their true potential. It's performed here by French superstar Sylvie Guillem.

(The music is quite low. You might want to turn it up.)




Sigh. *wiping tears of joy at such perfection*

I can hardly collect myself before the curtains open upon a scene from my favorite Puccini opera, Tosca. Placido Domingo, my favorite tenor, sings Recondita Armonia as he compares the woman he loves to the model he paints.

The translation from Italian into English appears as subtitles.

(Don't forget to turn down your volume!)



'Art, in its mystery, blends different beauties.' - oh, I love that.

Next up - in honour of the upcoming Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia, here are Tracy Wilson and Rob McCall, Canada's first medal-winning ice dance pair.

Rob McCall was born here in Halifax, Nova Scotia and grew up in my own hometown of Dartmouth (which is across the bridge from Halifax.) When future hockey phenomenon and Cole Harbour son Sidney Crosby was a mere 6 months old, Rob McCall was taking home a bronze medal from the Calgary Winter Olympics.

Here are Tracy Wilson and Rob McCall with their bronze medal-winning free dance, Elite Syncopations.



Oh, I loved that little skipping thing he did toward the end! (4:40 mark) And the shuffle-off-to-Buffalo. (4:29 mark) How on earth...?

Just love that ragtime music, especially the slow one that starts at the 2:14 mark.

Now for something sophisticated from the 40's.



Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha...!

Oh no - here come the Knights of the Round Table - Ha! Ha! Ha!



No wonder I turned out the way I did. Explains everything, really.

It's amazing to find myself at my Third Blogiversary, heading into my fourth year of blogging. Thank you - all of you - for your friendship, your comments, and the joy you bring me.

As my parting gift, here is Gerry Butler on the dance floor from The Ugly Truth. Enjoy!



Janet says I knew I had found a kindred spirit. 'Ni, Ping' to you, Julia.

Wylie Kinson says Happy Blogiversary, Julia! I enjoyed the McCall-Wilson routine.

Akelamalu says Happy Blogversary Julia! You reminded me it's almost mine too! :)

Thursday Thirteen - 144 - 13 Reasons to Read Dark Harmony by Lilly Cain

Dark Harmony is the debut novel from Lilly Cain, one of the amazing women from my writers' group, Romance Writers of Atlantic Canada.

She's been to the writers' retreats I so adore, and at the latest one this past fall we all celebrated along with her when she received confirmation of Dark Harmony's release date.

1 - Dark Harmony is part of Red Sage's Action & Adventure/Contemporary/Vampire categories, and is an erotica eBook romance.

2 - We meet Helena Townsend, who loves to feel the pulsing energy of the club crowd as she dances to live music. One night she's uncharacteristically drawn to a gorgeous man who parts the dance floor like a mist to draw her to him. Twenty years later, Lena has escaped the cruel dominance of that man from the club - no man, but a vampire pack leader who made her life both a living hell and a confusing passionate release.

3 - Richard Heron is a music journalist covering trends for Rolling Stone, still not recovered from the violent death of his sexually-submissive wife at the hands of an unknown dom. Richard is entranced by Lena, a beautiful woman he meets in an Irish bar, her face glowing with the energy and vibe of the band and the crowd, as though she's fed somehow by live musical performance.

4 - Before his wife died, Richard had supplemented his journalism by opening a club where sexual fantasies could be revealed and pursued. His own dominant tendencies initially scare off a once-bitten-twice-shy Lena. The same instincts which led him to open his club in the first place serve him well when he rises to the challenge of re-introducing Lena to the authentic lover inside her.

5 - I found this story's BDSM subplot very touching. What is dominance and submission if not the symbolic surrender to a lover? The very fact that Lena has vampiric strength that could break any bedroom bondage puts her scenes with Richard into a different realm, which Lilly writes with accomplished emotional depth.

6 - Lilly Cain handles the reactions of the human characters to the shock of vampires entering their world with wry realism. Her scenes take us from the contemporary world into the paranormal with the jolt one would expect from such a revelation, and she doesn't shy away from the horror aspects of traditional vampire stories. These characters aren't simply bad boy characters - they are chilling killers. As a lover of traditional vampire stories, I'm very grateful for that.

7 - I really enjoyed the black humor peppered throughout the story. This part made me laugh out loud in the midst of a high-tension vampire attack scene:

Glimpses of the men and women surrounding her flashed in the available light. Gleaming eyes, soft lips, long hair, they were beautiful, and they laughed at her. What the hell was wrong with her? She was being molested by a group of psychotic fashion models, and she should be screaming.

When Richard realizes he's been bitten twice by his vampire lover, he says 'So why are you following me? And does being marked mean that you have some sort of power over me? Will I start eating bugs?' He smiled weakly, but the questions were serious.

8 - Lena has made an interesting decision by the time we meet up with her again, twenty years after her turning. She rejects the truths her maker Darien told her about what it takes to live as a vampire. I enjoyed this original concept toward alternatives to the taking of human life.

9 - In order to survive against the vampire pack she left behind, Lena has become an adept martial arts fighter. As a huge fan of the Kill Bill films, I also relished this aspect of Dark Harmony, which leads to some exciting fight sequences.

10 - Lilly really knows how to end each chapter with a hook. Like this, for example:

"Her eyes flicked to the other man, one she really, really didn’t want to recognize. Her fear grew, oh, so much worse. He snarled in anger. Darien. He had yet to move in her direction, but the threat he exuded could not be ignored. He could be her death. Sweat drenched her in a quick flood. The noise in the bar faded, and people near her backed away as her terror brushed against them.

Time to run. The sounds of the bar flooded back into her senses. She grabbed her satchel and left the table. Her body swayed in tempo with those around her as she passed through the crowd. Some wouldn’t step aside for her and she shoved them, hard, and headed for the back.

'Helena.'

She heard him call, her ex-lover, her ex-master, his voice harsh with anger and, perhaps, longing. Both emotions had her heart pounding. There, a fire door. Forcing it open, she ignored the shrill burst from the fire alarm and fled the area as quickly as possible.

Not quick enough. As she entered the alley, she caught the sickly scent of cooling blood."

11 - As someone who also writes about vampires, I really enjoyed Lilly's scenes involving practical problems such as dealing with the oncoming sunrise. Very nice world-building here.


12 - The three-pronged sai, Lena's weapon of choice, is a good symbol for the flavors of this story. The vampire aspect is the central blade, with action/adventure and dominance/submission running alongside like the two outside blades.

13 - I leave you with an excerpt. Enjoy!

"He walked to the mirror hanging over the dressing table. Those few steps made him dizzy again. He clutched the panties in his fist. Great sex was one thing, but this weakness, that was another. He looked pale in the mirror, and tired. A soft green bruise bloomed on his inner thigh, and on his wrist a darker mark had formed. He looked at his arm and shuddered. There were two tiny scabs in the middle of the bruise.

'Lena?' he called again.

She had to be in the bathroom. Was she embarrassed by their impulsive night? Or feeling like him, sick as a dog?

He pounded against the bathroom door. 'Lena, are you okay?'

The door was locked.

Despite his screaming skull, he knocked louder.

'Lena! Are you all right? Let me in.'

What if she isn’t okay? He dropped her underwear and threw his weight against the door.

***

Lena's dream changed. She bared her fangs and hissed a feral warning. The demon threw agonizing beams of light at her. Her eyes streamed as the light pierced them, and she threw up her arm to protect herself.

Then it was gone. All was quiet. She lapsed back into complete unconsciousness. The dark had returned so her slumber deepened. A part of her sighed for the lost dream.

***

'Holy shit!' Richard panted as he slammed the door between him and the creature in the bathroom.

'Jesus Christ!' He scrambled backward and stared at the door, expecting at any moment to be faced with the spitting cat-creature he’d awoken in the tub. It couldn’t be Lena. It couldn’t. What the fuck was that?

The lights had been off. He’d seen a figure wrapped in blankets lying in the tub. Odd, but perhaps she was shy about sleeping in front of a man who, although they had shared the most intimate of moments, barely knew her.

He’d called her name and flicked on the lights. He’d reached in to shake her shoulder. And then—

Richard shuddered and wiped at the sweat beading on his forehead. The bathroom door remained closed. Everything was quiet. Still, he couldn’t move.

As the bathroom light had flickered on, she changed. It had been Lena, he was sure now. But with the light her face grew furious, and she snarled and hissed at him. And her mouth, her mouth stretched wide to bare those gleaming white fangs, so long—

He checked his wrist. The bruise seemed lighter but the marks were still there. Jesus, she bit me!"

- Lilly Cain, 2010

Join me next week when I review Captive of Sin by Anna Campbell.

Jennifer Leeland says I love the way you break books down like this. I'm going to check this one out.

Lilly Cain says Thank you so much Julia for the wonderful review! I love the way you do these Thursday 13 lists. :)

Shelley Munro says I enjoyed the excerpt at the end.

Wordless Wednesday - 136

Wylie Kinson says Normally I'd be all over this lovely winter scene, but srsly soooo sick of this season.

Janet says Winter can be so beautiful...Looking out a window!

Anne MacFarlane says Lovely picture. Winter sucks.

Through the Opera Glasses - 45 - Spartacus: Blood and Sand

Hmm...what do we see through our opera glasses today...?




Spartacus: Blood and Sand

This series debuted here in Canada on the Movie Network last week, and tonight I settled in for the second episode.











After a Thracian warrior rebels against his Roman commander, his wife is taken into slavery and our hero is condemned to die in the arena. But he fights like the fabled Thracian king of old, and is now renamed Spartacus.













Spartacus refuses to believe his wife is lost to him forever. He'll kill for his Roman master in the hope of wrapping her in his arms once more.



I'm liking Andy Whitfield, I can tell you that much.



WARNING: This trailer includes graphic scenes of violence.



Janet says Now I want to subscribe to cable - thanks a lot Julia :(

Travis says It certainly seems to have the gritty realism required.

Wylie Kinson says Andy - oh yum.