Saturday Seven: Favorite Musicals - #musical #lyrics #SaturdaySeven #LASR

I grew up with music. My father was a jazz musician who played clarinet and sax in bands from the time he was eleven. My mom had an amazing singing voice (and was also a dancer) and played piano. And I’ve always had an exceptional memory for tunes and lyrics.

I know dozens of the 1940’s torch songs my mom liked to sing. I also picked up my parents’ love of musicals and comic opera. (They took me to my first Gilbert and Sullivan concert when I was only five years old!)

So here are seven of my favorite musicals—many of which I know by heart!

My Fair Lady – Lerner and Loewe

I have often walked down this street before,

But the pavement always stayed beneath my feet before.

All at once am I several stories high,

Knowing I’m on the street where you live.

This may have been the first musical I ever heard. My mother loved to play the record (yes, the vinyl record...!) and sing along. Pretty soon I was doing that too.

This classic tale of the snotty, sexist Professor Henry Higgins and the alluring Cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle was an early introduction to romance.

Gypsy – Style and Sondheim

You can sacrifice your sacro

Working in the back row,

Bump in a dump till you’re dead,

But you’ve gotta get a gimmick

If you wanna get ahead

“Gypsy” was another family favorite, though it’s hard to imagine a plot or tone more different from “My Fair Lady”. This wonderful musical is based on the life of legendary burlesque performer Gypsy Rose Lee, who started out as a child performer managed by her bossy mother.

I still remember most of the lyrics, though it has been almost sixty years. I guess I identified a bit with Louise (as Gypsy Rose was originally named). My own mother had show business aspirations for me and my siblings. We even appeared as a singing trio on TV!

Camelot – Lerner and Loewe

It’s May, it’s May, the lusty month of May,

That gorgeous month when everyone goes

Blissfully astray

As a kid I loved to read tales of King Arthur’s knights. This musical offers something of a different view! I didn’t hear this at home, but saw the movie with Julie Andrews, Robert Goulet and Richard Burton (the original Broadway cast) and was hooked. I don’t know all the songs from this play, but I’ve always viewed “The Lusty Month of May” as something of a theme song!

Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical – Ragni, Rado and MacDermot

Harmony and understanding,

Sympathy and peace abounding,

No more falsehood or derision,

Loving living dreams of vision,

Mystic crystal revelation

And the mind’s true liberation

Aquarius...

We marched against the Vietnam War. We wore flowing skirts, love beads, flowers in our hair. We repudiated the hypocrisy of our parents’ generation, determined to build a new society based on love, peace, nature, sensuality... “Hair” gave us our anthems.

The Age of Aquarius didn’t quite turn out the way we’d hoped, but the music still captures the ferment and the optimism of my teen years. Meanwhile, the vibrant sexuality of this musical definitely influenced my future development as a woman and an author.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show – Richard O’Brien

It’s astounding

Time is fleeting

Madness

Takes its toll.

The Rocky Horror film came out while I was in graduate school. In one week, I went to see it three times. Silly, sexy, exuberant and irreverent, the story struck a chord. I’ve listened to the sound track hundreds of times since then; I don’t seem to get tired of it.

Erotic visions without any measure,

And sensual daydreams to treasure forever...

Another influence on my writing, I guess, and very likely a source of my enduring interest in gender-bending characters.

The Phantom of the Paradise – Brian De Palma

Our love

Is an old love, baby;

It’s older

Than all our years.

I see in strange young eyes

familiar tears.

My lover/Master introduced me to this rather obscure musical film early in our relationship. It’s a peculiar mash-up of The Picture of Dorian Grey, Faust and the Phantom of the Opera. Actually, I’ve never seen the film; I’ve just listened to the haunting song “Old Souls”, again and again.

Once More With Feeling – Joss Whedon

Apocalypse -

We’ve all been there,

The same old tricks,

Why should we care?

Unlike most of America, I never watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer on TV, but years after the show ended, a friend loaned us the full series on DVD, and I was hooked.

“Once More With Feeling” is one episode of the series, in which the major and minor characters all burst into Hollywood-esque songs under the influence of a demon. I was impressed enough by the music (Joss Whedon is a multi-talented genius) that I got the soundtrack. Now I listen to it frequently. When I’m not singing it, that is!

By the way, all the lyrics in this post are from memory, so they might have errors. However, I’ll bet there aren’t many.

Be sure to check out the other Saturday Seven posts today. You'll find the links at Long and Short Reviews.


 

Seven Genres I’ve Never Written - #SaturdaySeven #LASR #giveaway

I was going to title this post “Seven Genres I’ll Never Write”, but I decided that was unnecessarily rash. For one thing, I’ve been known to tackle a particular genre that feels alien just for the challenge of it. Also, I really don’t know how my tastes, or the market, will change. I don’t normally tend to be much influenced by the current trends or the latest hot selling themes, but it’s always possible that I’ll have a killer idea I just can’t resist.

So here’s a list of the genres I haven’t tried yet. I won’t try to predict the future.

Sports romance

As I noted in an earlier Saturday Seven post, I’m almost completely uninterested in any sort of team or organized sports. The closest I’ve come to a “sports” story was Crossed Hearts, a MM tale set at a competitive Scrabble tournament.

Western romance

For some readers, and authors, cowboys have an enduring appeal, but they generally leave me cold. I’m a born-and-bred Easterner, for one thing. I’ve traveled through the American West, but I don’t know it well and actually don’t feel that comfortable in those dusty, arid, wide open spaces.

Then there’s the smell. Whenever I try to imagine a sexy cowboy, I start thinking about what he’d smell like after riding a horse all day, or rounding up the cattle, or mucking out the barns... The question of olfactory stimuli becomes particularly off-putting when I think about historical Western tales. Back in the days of the Wild West, baths were at best a monthly activity!

Zombie romance

Vampires, yes. Shifters, sure. Ghosts, tentacled monsters, even Big Foot might make their way into one of my stories. But zombies? As characters? I’ve written a bit of erotic horror, but I can’t imagine how I could make zombies appealing. Again, decomposing bodies are going to reek, and bad smells put me in a very bad mood.

I guess I could imagine writing a scifi romance set in the context of a zombie apocalypse, though that’s been done so often I think I’d be bored. I will say that I’d be deeply impressed by an author who managed to create a sympathetic, non-disgusting zombie protagonist.

Secret baby romance

I’ve never written a pregnant heroine, let alone a classic (dare I use that term?) secret baby romance. This is partly due to the fact that I personally don’t have children (other than my fur babies) and have never been pregnant. I came of age after the advent of the Pill, so I’ve always had control of my fertility. I think the whole topic is less central for me than for many women.

I certainly can imagine writing a story where the conflict involved pregnancy, but I haven’t done so yet.

In fact, as far as I can recall, only two of my many heroines have children, Ruby Jones in Wild About That Thing, and Beatrice, the Victorian woman with the secret life in my novel Miranda’s Masks.

Regency romance

I love historical fiction. I love to read it, and I’d love to write more of it than I do—though to be honest I’m sometimes too lazy to do the research this would require. Still, I’ve written a few historical tales, set in the Middle Ages, in Elizabethan times, in the Victorian period and in the Gilded Age at the turn of the twentieth century. Somehow, though, I’ve never had the slightest inclination to write a Regency story, despite their popularity.

One factor is my unfamiliarity with the period. However, I have to say that in general, I have not found the Regencies I’ve read to be all that interesting. I guess I prefer ordinary, everyday people to the dukes and earls that seem to populate this sub-genre.

Military romance

This is another really popular sub-genre that doesn’t ring my bell at all. I grew up during the Vietnam war, and I’m certain that colored my view of the armed forces. Everyone I knew would do anything they could to avoid military service.

Futanari romance

In case you’re not familiar with the term, futanari refers to individuals who have the sexual characteristics of both genders. There’s a popular niche genre for erotica and erotic romance featuring such characters. Sally Bend’s Bending the Bookshelf blog reviews many of them.

I’ve never read any of this genre, let alone written any. However, I’ll be frank; I’m tempted, if only because I really like mixing things up in my stories.

So—let me ask you, my readers: are there any of these genres that you’d like to see me try? Leave me a comment with your thoughts. I’ll randomly draw the name of one reader who’ll receive his or her choice of Crossed Hearts or Wild About That Thing.

By the way, be sure to visit the other authors who have Saturday Seven posts today. You’ll find the full list of links at Long andShort Reviews.

Saturday Seven: Favorite Poems - #SaturdaySeven #Verse #NationalPoetryMonth

We still have a few days left in National Poetry Month (celebrated every April since 1966!), so I thought I’d share seven of my favorite poems.

I was introduced to poetry at a very young age. My dad, who was a musician (among his many other talents) composed poems for my siblings and me, then set his cute doggerel to music. Both my parents read to us—poetry as well as prose—before I learned to read myself. I guess it’s not surprising that I started writing my own poems at the age of six or seven.

Anyway, here are some of the poems that are special for me. Some I encountered in the distant past; one, only a few days ago.

Jabberwocky by Louis Carroll

‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

The Alice books were among the first novels I read. I loved Lewis Carroll’s verse as much as his fantastic stories. This classic poem illustrates how the patterns of English grammar can convey meaning even when the words themselves are nonsense. We can tell that “brillig” is a time of day (or maybe a description of the weather); that “toves”, “borogoves” and “raths” are creatures of some sort; that “gyre”, “gimble’, and “outgrabe” are actions; that “mimsy” and “mome” describe the creatures.

This poem comes from Through the Looking Glass (or more correctly, “Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There”.) As the mirror above her fireplace dissolves into mist, Alice steps through to find herself in a similar, but distinctly twisted reality. She picks up one of the books from the shelves, to find it’s written backwards, but is able to read the poem by holding it up to the now solid mirror in the looking glass room.

Like me, she manages to get some sense from it, despite the made-up vocabulary!

The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes

The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees.

The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas...

I don’t remember where I first encountered this tale, but I’m pretty sure I’d read it before I reached puberty. Nevertheless, the tragic romance embodied in the poem deeply touched me. Only now do I realize it’s actually a paranormal romance!

This poem clearly shows the relationship between poetry and music. Its strong rhythm and repeating refrain are like a song.

I recently returned to this poem, finding I liked it as much as ever. Actually, I have a plan to write a story based loosely on “The Highwayman”—but with a much happier ending!

Barter by Sara Teasdale

Life has loveliness to sell,

All beautiful and splendid things,

Blue waves whitened on a cliff,

Soaring fire that sways and sings,

And children's faces looking up

Holding wonder like a cup.

In seventh grade, we had an activity in English class called “recitation”. Basically, the goal was to give us practice in public speaking. For some assignments, we had to teach the class how to do something. For others, we had to make a logical argument. The assignments I recall best, though, are those where we had to memorize a piece of verse and declaim it to the class.

“Barter” was one of the poems I chose to recite. I can still do so. The message in this brief, poignant poem resonates with me, decades later.

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot

Let us go then, you and I,

When the evening is spread out against the sky

Like a patient etherized upon a table;

Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,

The muttering retreats

Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels

And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells

I studied this poem in high school English class. It was possibly one of the first pieces of verse that I approached from an analytical as well as an emotional perspective. The sensual, nostalgic, gently erotic imagery in this poem have stuck with me all my life, though only now as I grow old, like the poem’s narrator, can I fully appreciate the world-weary beauty of it.

The Summer Day by Mary Oliver

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand

I’m embarrassed to say that I’d never heard of Mary Oliver, until I noticed a close friend using the stunning last lines of “The Summer Day” as her email signature. This poem is a gem, capturing the breathless beauty of a single moment then showing the deep truth it contains.

the garden of delight by Lucille Clifton

for some

it is stone

bare smooth

as a buttock

rounding

into the crevasse

of the world

I first read this poem only a few days ago, posted by one of my high school friends (a poet herself) on Facebook.

How few words are necessary, to make a miracle.

Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish

A poem should be palpable and mute

As a globed fruit,

Reading Clifton’s poem—which I believe is partly about what it means to be a poet— inspired me to look up what is perhaps my favorite poem about poetry.

Alas, I aspire to these heights but don’t come anywhere close. Still, if you’d like to read some of my poems, most of which are love poems, you can find them at my website on the free reading page.

By the way, be sure to check out the other Saturday Seven posts, all linked to the Long and Short Reviews post today. Just to sweeten the pot, LASR is giving away the seven books they're listing!
 

Saturday Seven: seven things my characters don’t do - #SaturdaySeven #personality #bloghop

I’ve been traveling for the past two weekends, hence didn’t post a Saturday Seven, but I thought I’d remedy that today.

I’ve written a lot of books and stories—it’s difficult to figure out exactly how to count, but I probably have at least a hundred novels, novellas and short stories available. That’s a lot of characters!

While I strive for variety in my characters, the people I create have certain commonalities. In particular, there are some activities they’re very unlikely to ever engage in. This generally reflects my own life and preferences—for the most part these are things I don’t do, either.

1. Play hockey

I know that sports romance is quite a popular genre, but I could never write one. I have zero interest in team sports, either amateur or professional. And I probably know less about hockey than any other sport except rugby. (Okay, I do have a rugby team in an upcoming book. However, they don’t actually play the game in my story.)

2. Smoke cigarettes

In fact, smoking provides a quick way to establish certain sorts of characters (for instance, the hard-boiled, world-weary private investigator so popular in noir tales). So I won’t go out on a limb and claim I’ll never write a character who smokes. I can’t think of anyone I’ve written who does, though.

It’s a bit odd, because many of my characters drink alcohol. Especially wine!

3. Watch TV as a regular pastime

I haven’t owned a television in more than thirty years. When I think about ways to spend my time, TV doesn’t even occur to me. Hence, the same tends to be true of my characters.

Anyway, they tend to be busy doing more interesting things!

4. Trick someone into getting her pregnant

Having a heroine seduce a hero in order to get pregnant is a trope I’ve encountered in some romances. To be honest, I find this notion horrifying.

The idea that a character might deliberately sabotage a woman’s birth control so he can impregnate her is equally repugnant.

Child-bearing is too serious an issue to play with, even in fiction.

5. Be celibate

I might have a character who starts out being celibate (or a virgin). However, given my favored genres, which are erotica and erotic romance, it’s quite unlikely such a character would remain so by the end of the tale.

All right—I can imagine writing a tale with a character who engages in sexual activity in his or her fantasies only. That might be a challenge. I’m not sure you could really claim such a character was strictly celibate, though.

6. Take a selfie

I’m sure it’s a function of my generation, but I find the current passion for constantly photographing oneself to be embarrassing, even a bit pathetic. My characters use their phones mostly for the original purpose of communication.

7. Abuse an animal

I’ve written a few truly despicable villains, people who have no compunctions about rape, torture or murder. However, I don’t think I could ever create a character who was deliberately abusive to animals. Just thinking about that makes me queasy.

Seven Places to Revisit -- #SaturdaySeven #Travel #Giveaway

Travel has always been one of my passions, and I’ve been fortunate enough to have seen a lot of the world. Of course, like many people, I still have a bucket list of destinations I haven’t yet visited—a list far longer than seven items!

At the same time, certain places call me back. In some cases, I didn’t get enough time to fully experience the location. In other cases, I’m so deeply in love with the place that, even though I’ve been there many times, I want to return.

You might not be surprised to learn that quite a few of these places have found their way into my stories. I guess what’s surprising is that I haven’t used all of them for settings. At least not yet!

1. Prague

Prague is the atmospheric, history-steeped capitol of the Czech Republic. With its massive castle overlooking the Voltava River, cobbled town squares and centuries-old bridges, magnificent cathedrals and narrow alleys, the city whisks you back in time. Meanwhile, it’s also a mecca for art, both traditional and avant garde, and music, especially classical. I only visited for a few days, decades ago, but during that period I went to two concerts (Vivaldi and Monteverdi) plus saw a performance of Mozart’s “Cosi Fan Tutte”, in the same elaborately decorated opera house where it was performed more than two hundred years ago.

The city left an indelible impression on my imagination. My first published short story (“Glass House”) is set there, as is my paranormal tale “Prey”. Somehow I’ve never made it back. But I will.

2. Marrakesh

My very first overseas travel experience included a week-long bus tour of Morocco, as part of a longer trip to Spain. This was right after I graduated from university. Alas, the exoticism of the country was a bit wasted on me. Not that I didn’t appreciate the sights and the culture, but I found everything on that trip amazing and new.

In Marrakesh, my traveling companion and I explored the markets in the old souks and went to a night club featuring a belly dancing floor show. I remember the thrill of using my high school French to communicate with another customer sitting next to me. I really was in a foreign country!

Morocco hasn’t yet shown up in any of my books. I need to go back and refresh my memories.

3. Railay Beach, Krabi, Thailand

Railay is a peninsula on the western Andaman Sea coast of Thailand. Cut off from the mainland by craggy hills, Railay feels like an island. It is accessible only by boat.

I’ve seen many astoundingly beautiful places in my life. Railay has to be one of the most exquisite. The deep turquoise ocean nestles in the embrace of soaring limestone capes. Verdant palms shade the white sand. With only a dozen or so resorts and guesthouses, the peninsula is rarely crowded, though its precipitous cliffs make it one of the top rock climbing destinations in Southeast Asia.

I’ve visited Railay twice, once just for the day, once for a weekend. Since then I’ve recommended it to everyone who wants to see the best beach in Thailand. I know I’ll go back before too long.

4. Gloucester, Massachusetts

Although I now live in Asia, I spent much of my life in lovely, blustery New England. The old fishing port of Gloucester, on Cape Ann north of Boston, is one of my favorite New England destinations. For years my husband and I had a tradition of spending our mid-June wedding anniversary there, in a motel with an ocean view. Hence I strongly associate Gloucester with romance.

The geography of the city is delightfully complex, with several harbors and beaches that have very different atmospheres. Two hundred years ago, Gloucester Harbor sheltered the clipper ships returning from the Far East, full of treasures. Museums in the town bring that history to life. Gloucester also offers amazing seafood, as well as art galleries, book stores, and the chance to go whale watching.

If you’d like to get a sense for the place, pick up a copy of my lesbian paranormal romance, The Witches of Gloucester. Any reader will immediately grasp how much I love the place.

5. Bruges, Belgium

Photo by Hans Hillewaert, Wikipedia

My husband and I spent one magic night in Bruges, a city frozen in time. Starting from the 12^th century, Bruges was an important commercial center for all of Europe. Canals crisscross the historic central city, lined with warehouses and the homes of wealthy merchants. Wonderfully preserved medieval buildings surround the market square, where traders used to set up their stalls.

At night, the ancient buildings are illuminated, giving the whole place a fairy tale atmosphere. I remember the sight left me breathless. We left on an early morning train, without much time for exploring. I’ve wanted to return ever since.

6. San Francisco

I’ve never lived in San Francisco, but I’ve probably set more of my tales there than anywhere else, including my BDSM romance Her Secret Ingredient and my dystopic MM sci fi novel Quarantine. Many important events in my personal life unfolded in the City by the Bay. I can’t think of the place without a sense of excitement.

The gaily-painted Victorian houses—the artsy cafes of Noe Valley—the sweeping grandeur of the Golden Gate Bridge—the view from Twin Peaks—San Francisco would be a gorgeous place even without the emotional overtones. I haven’t been there for more than five years, but the place lives in my memory. I know I will go back.

 
7. Shanghai

I just returned from my first visit to Shanghai. I loved it. As is often the case when I travel on business, my time there was limited to a mere two days. I used that time mostly to walk around, exploring the crowded residential warrens that somehow have survived urban renewal; admiring the art deco department stores and villas, relics from the period when the city was the gateway for Europeans to encounter the Middle Kingdom; marveling at the gleaming skyscrapers that dominate modern Shanghai.

I didn’t have the time to visit any of the museums, or wander through the French Concession quarter, or take a lightning fast elevator to the observation deck on the tallest building in Asia.

Next time.

Meanwhile I’m wondering whether I have enough of a sense of the city, from this short but intense visit, to set the next book of my Asian Adventures series there.

And speaking of Asian Adventures, you could win your choice of books one through four from this series. Just leave me a comment, with your email, telling me about one place like to revisit.