by Roseanna White | Dec 2, 2013 | Word of the Week
Hello, all! I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving week (for all you Americans out there. For all you internationals, I hope you had a lovely week too, even if it wasn’t a holiday for ya). š You may think I was just relaxing and taking the week off from the blog, but really I was hard at work on the galleys for Circle of Spies, the final installment to the Culper Ring Series.
Today said manuscript is ready to go back into the hands of FedEx though, and so here I am back to blogging. =) And today I bring to you…
Swell. We think of it as a tiny bit old-fashioned these days (as in, more of The Greatest Generation than mine. Whatever my generation is. I think I shall dub it Generation Sarcastic), but not old. Right? It’s a swell party sounds decided ’40s or ’50s. But as a matter of fact, the meaning of “elegant or fashionable” dates back to 1810! And by 1897, it could mean generally “excellent.” American slang made it an exclamation that could stand alone in the 1930s.
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| These ladies look to be having a swell time at a South African beach in 1944 |
The adjective comes from a noun applied to a person with a distinguished style–so a swell could make or break a gathering, I suppose. Said noun dates to 1786.
And all of these come from the more literal meaning of “puffed up,” i.e. “arrogant.”
So there we go. Hope everyone has a swell day. =)
~*~
And while I have your attention–the next FREE novella/short story (not sure which it technically is at 11,000 words, LOL) in the Culper Ring Series, A Hero’s Promise, is up for pre-order! Click now and it’ll be delivered to your device on January 1. (It will also be on iTunes and B&N, but those links aren’t live yet.)
by Roseanna White | Nov 25, 2013 | Uncategorized
In lieu of my usual postings this week, I’m going to instead focus on one of the things I’m most thankful for–my best friend, and her newest book. In this time where we count our blessings, I have the pleasure of looking down at a newly-arrived paperback and feeling an immense burst of pride. Not quite what I feel when I look at my own newly-arrived books, but pretty close. Because it’s by my best friend.
Any avid readers of my blog will have heard a lot about
Stephanie Morrill over the years. I’m always quick to chat up her books, and to mention her in posts. The first book in her Ellie Sweet series was, at its publication, my absolute favorite of all her books–and that includes the unpublished ones I’ve gotten read as her critique partner, plus the ones out in the world. So when she said she was writing a sequel, I got pretty excited.
One of the biggest blessings of my year was getting to take a writing retreat with Stephanie. We locked ourselves in a cabin in my mountains for four days, emerging only for food, LOL, and just wrote. We both logged over 30,000 words in that weekend. And lots of laughter. We live a thousand miles apart, so face-to-face time is rare for us–usually only at writers conferences. Which means that though we deem ourselves unable to make a lot of simple decisions without the other’s input, I have no idea what color shirts Stephanie wears most often. And she had never seen me in jeans before this March retreat. š
During this retreat, I was writing Circle of Spies, and Stephanie was working on this much-anticipated sequel, The Unlikely Debut of Ellie Sweet. Now, as one of Ellie’s biggest fans, I have to confess–she was making me nervous, LOL. The things she tossed out for brainstorming had me seriously worried that everything I loved about the first book was just gonna get trampled all over in this second one. There was one point when she asked, “What would you do if…?” and I replied with something like, “Well, this. BUT CHASE CAN’T DO THAT! Do you understand me?? Nooooo!” š
Well, not surprisingly, Stephanie wrote the book how it needed to be written. And equally not surprisingly, she outdid herself. I fell in love with the wit and sass of Ellie Sweet, teen novelist, in The Revised Life of Ellie Sweet. But in this one, Stephanie managed what so few writers ever can. She took those things I most loved and made me question why I loved them. She took what I thought was the truth and made me dig deeper, to a truer truth. She took what I thought was an epiphany and made it pale in the light of the real epiphany Ellie has in this one.
Stephanie, you’re amazing. And one of my biggest blessings. When I count the things I’m thankful for, you’re high up on that list.
And so, this Thanksgiving week, I want to offer a signed copy of
The Unlikely Debut of Ellie Sweet to one lucky winner. I
know it’ll end up on your thankful-for list too! Here’s the blurb–and don’t miss my question of the week at the end before the giveaway. =)
For once, Ellie Sweet has it all together. Her hair now curls instead of
fuzzes, sheās tamed the former bad-boy, Chase Cervantes (she has,
right?), and her debut novel will hit shelves in less than a year. Even
her ex-friends are leaving her alone. Well, except for Palmer Davis, but
it canāt be helped that he works at her grandmotherās nursing home.
Life should feel perfect. And yet, itās not that easy. Ellieās
editor loves her, but the rest of the publishing biz? Not so much. And
theyāre not shy about sharing their distrust over Ellieās unlikely
debut.
Ellie has always been able to escape reality in the pages of her
novel, but with the stress of major edits and rocky relationships, her
words dry up. In fiction, everything always comes together, but in real
life, it seems to Ellie that hard work isnāt always enough, the people
you love canāt always be trusted, and the dream-come-true of publishing
her book could be the biggest mistake sheās made yet.
This giveaway will run through FRIDAY at MIDNIGHT–so don’t miss out!
Now for my question, geared, as you might expect, toward thankfulness. What is the most unexpected thing for which you’re grateful this year? That could mean either a blessing you didn’t expect, or something you didn’t expect to be able to see the blessing in.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
by Roseanna White | Nov 21, 2013 | Thoughtful Thursdays, Uncategorized
On Sunday, I had the pleasure of attending my great-grandmother’s 100th birthday party. Most of the family was there, including some of her great-nieces and nephews that I’ve never even met. Everyone, it seemed, wanted to come and celebrate this amazing milestone.
I admit it–I didn’t want to leave home so early that day. I was in a writing groove, and Rowyn had been under the weather the day before, and I was afraid he’d crash back into exhausted at the party. I didn’t want to prepare a dish, I didn’t want to stop writing. But of course, I did. And oh, how glad I was.
Because as I sat in a metal folding chair beside my mother and sister, my kids right in front of me playing with the gourds used as decoration, I listened to the stories everyone told of this woman I’ve known all my life. And I realized I’m a part of a legacy.
Over and again people told the same stories. The stories of how she loved–and how she loved all, without distinction, without bias, without favoritism.
(Grandma says, “Well, you’re all just swell!”)
Stories of how Grandma’s old house was always an oasis of safety, a place everyone loved so much that we didn’t mind imitating sardines on Christmas Eve to get to spend time there.
(Grandma says, “It isn’t as big as I remember, is it?”)
Stories of how she always, always welcomed each addition to the family, whether through marriage or birth or adoption, with the exact same love and embrace as she had her own children, always remembered each one, always took care that they all received the same consideration.
(Grandma says, tearfully, “Thank you all so much for all your beautiful kids. Welcome to the family.”)
And my dad, tears in his eyes, reminded us all of the passage in one of Paul’s letters where he says, “Imitate me, as I imitate Christ.” To us, Dad said, “We can say ‘imitate Grandma, as she imitates Christ.’ She has always been a shining example of Jesus’s love for us.”
I don’t know what my legacy will be. I don’t know what people will remember me for. I don’t know how many would gather to celebrate a milestone with me. I certainly don’t know what milestones I’ll reach in this life.
But whatever age, whatever place in life, whatever people cross my path, I pray I can share in my grandmother’s legacy. I pray that they see even a morsel of her strength and goodness and kindness in me.
I pray, with tears in my eyes, that I can be like Grandma.
by Roseanna White | Nov 20, 2013 | Remember When Wednesdays, Uncategorized
Okay, so A Soft Breath of Wind is taking me longer to write than usual. Life right now is just not allowing much writing time. But I’m so, so excited to be at my big middle turning point right now. Might not be quite as interesting to you, who don’t know what’s going on in the story here (yet, LOL), but it’s all that’s on my mind, so…
So. For the first half of the book, my main characters are working toward and then in a four-year separation. The guys, Benjamin (the baby in Stray Drop) and Samuel (the slave boy who becomes a son), go off adventuring, one of them to recover from a loss and the other to slake his wanderlust. They’re visiting the churches. Main character, female lead Zipporah has always yearned to travel too–but that’s denied her. Instead, she get to stay at the villa outside Rome.
As in, at the villa. Within the walls. She’s forbidden to leave.
So now, finally, I got to bring my guys home. Which is joyful news…but as they bring with them the other female lead, Dara, who’s pitted against Zipporah, it’s getting real interesting. And a bit intense. =)
Yes, Roseanna is having fun. I finally get to start diving into the love story I’ve been itching to tell. I get to start exploring the difference between loving someone despite their faults and loving someone faults and all. And what happens when you marry the wrong person, disobeying what the Lord has told you.
And as a member of a family divided, how do you know what side to take? And how do you knit it back together in the wake of that rift?
In the part I just wrote, the whole church is basically given the same challenge: who do you believe, when two trusted sources tell you something different? When only one can be right and compromise isn’t an option?
Have you ever been in a position where family, either blood or church, is divided? Was it what you deemed a big issue, or were you baffled at why it became so important? Looking back, do you think you made the right chance in which side you took?
by Roseanna White | Nov 18, 2013 | Word of the Week
First of all, I did do the drawing last week for the winner of the digital of one of the Ellie Sweet books, and the lucky duck was
Kirstin Whitener!
Congrats, Kirstin! I know you’ll love them!!
This week I’ll be starting a giveaway for a signed paperback of The Unlikely Debut of Ellie Sweet, so if you were holding out for the hard copy, stop back by later!
And now on to our word of the week. =)
Any historical writer knows that a big challenge in writing authentic dialogue is trying to find era-appropriate exclamations…especially when writing for the Christian market and wanting to avoid any that venture toward cursing. And one can only use “blast it” so many times, LOL. I’ve looked up a lot of these over the years, and figuring out their etymology is always fun.
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| The Broken Vase by Harry Watrous, circa 1900 |
Today, we’re taking a look at dash, which I have used a time or two. The verb dash dates from about 1300 and comes from a Danish word that means “to beat, to strike.” And so, the oldest English sense is of something getting “dashed to pieces”…including the metaphorical “dashed hopes.” Around the same time, it also took on the transitive sense of “to move quickly,” which lead to the noun by the late 1300s.
Round about 1726, it began being applied to hurried writing (to dash a letter to someone…), but it took until 1881 for it to be applied to a race, originally one run in one heat.
And now back I go to dash a few more words into A Soft Breath of Wind before it’s time to start school. š
Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award winning author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, sheās homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her booksā¦to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary.