A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

October leaves in Vermont have a half life of about 10 minutes.  The "red-red rose that's newly sprung in June" outlasts our leaves.  We may have hit the very peak of excellent fall leaves today here, and lucky me, I was home.

My daily-rider is a dull modern bike, but I have a garage (and barn) full of old bikes

Today was also very like the October day I imagined for that opening scene of Up, Back, and Away.

Sooooo, what could I do but get on my bike and take a bit of a ride through the Vermont woods with my little point-and-shoot camera in my jacket pocket?

I am glad I recorded today's ride because it was as beautiful as any I have ever taken. And when I say "recorded" I mean it.

Lucky for you, you other residents of the Universe, I have this new MacBook as well as the aforementioned cheap camera.  I used the computer (and YouTube) to turn the bit of video I took into a very short movie.  My first iMovie manages to be dull and irritating, all at once, which I think is a kind of achievement.  It will give you an idea, however, of why I chose the Vermont woods as the place where magic happens in the book.  That's the movie, right down there.

I wish there was some way to give you the scent of these autumn leaves along with the pictures. It's a big part of the whole fall thing.  Maybe you had better visit...

Would You Want to Live Here?

Erddig Hall, Wrexham Wales

Seems like an easy answer, but (for my purposes today) it's a trick question.  The lawyer in me (and your inner lawyer) would want to know, in what capacity? and in what time period?

In Up, Back, and Away, I really wanted to explore the response that a young, privileged, contemporary American kid would have to English class structure in the early part of the 20th century, just when the Bolsheviks and trade unionists were giving it what-for, but while it was still firmly in place.

Coachman's livery in a closet in the Butler's Pantry

When I was researching the English social history of the early 20th century, I learned that Erddig Hall was a particularly rich repository of information about below-stairs life.  The letters and poems and other bits of history preserved here were helpful in getting some insight on the reality of big-house life.

The laundry at Erddig

There were only a handful of owners down the years.  They were wealthy, for most of the time at least - things got bad at the end - but none of them were real grand aristocrats.  Maybe that's why they all demonstrated an interest in the lives of the people who worked on the estate.  My "Lady Fisher" shares some of that democratic impulse, as a wealthy woman only two generations removed from the advent of family wealth through her pottery manufacturing grandfather.

The Quarter Sessions that I imagined after studying Erddig was somewhat different from the real thing, as I know now, having visited the place last week.  The main house at (the fictional) Quarter Sessions is grander and more vast than the one at Erddig - closer to Blenheim Palace, for instance, but the spirit was Erddig.  The gardens and parkland at Erddig, were, however, every bit as beautiful as I had imagined

View over park from west front of the house

And it was an absolutely great place to see the Upstairs/Downstairs worlds in real life that we have all seen on TV for such a long time now and to see in person the places I had imagined.  I only wish I'd had more time to wander around the park and soak it all in.  I guess I'll have to go back.

Housekeeper's Office - Where "Mrs. Grimwald" would've conducted business

Back From Blighty

It has been a wild two weeks, featuring a back-and-forth across the Atlantic for yours truly.  I went to England and Wales to see friends and to see some of the places that inspired the book.  When I catch my breath, I'll say a little about it all here.  Many a magic moment.

In the interim just stopping in to say Cheers! or Hidey-ho! or whatever (this was a neighbor's greeting to me yesterday as we were picking up the kids from school - she was searching for "Cheerio").

Also a word to the winners of the Bookreads Giveaway that ended on September 15.  The books are now in the mail - one to Illinois, one to Oklahoma, and one to way down under in South Australia.  Sorry for the delay but I was just starting my trip the day the Giveaway ended and it has been madness around here in the few days since my return.  They are in the hands of the Postal Services now, though, so I hope you'll have your copies soon and that you'll enjoy them.

Strange, Fun Fragment of a Lost World

I know eight minutes is a lot of time to commit to anything from the Internet, but for those who like an odd little window on the past, I've got one for you that I especially enjoyed.

A couple of things that jumped out at me from this old movie short.  In addition to my affection for the look of the animated scenes of the brothel-cum-nightclub featured here, where sinful elephants, bears, and cows sway in time to the music with their rubbery limbs,  I was taken with how they cleared the dance floor so Betty Boop could present the evening's entertainment. (I have a similar scene in the book  set in the fictional London nightclub, The Ginger Jar- dancing ends, floor show starts, there's sin at the back of the house).  I liked the odd little confirmation of my research.  So hard to imagine the young people of today in tuxes and gowns out for a debauch...

Also of particular interest to me is the way this urged the audience to sing along to "Just a Gigolo."  This sing-along business has a long history (which I also mined for the book) and is not altogether dead.  Adele's concerts feature them, which is one reason I  view her, in part as a modern day iteration of the grand girl singer of the music hall.  The DNA, at least, is there...

So, for your viewing pleasure:

Live and In-Person: Bear Pond Books, Stowe - August 17

Jane Faintly, my New York publicist, just sent me this press release with strict instructions to post it here. (If you don't like it, blame Jane F. and remember, I didn't have a big publicity budget. [FYI, Jane works for peanuts but she is very stern]).

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NEW YORK - The international book trade has been wondering for months about the elusive K. Velk, author of the time-travel adventure story, Up, Back and Away.  Who is she, really?  Why does she keep her clamoring readership at arms length?  Well, answers may be had, and soon.

It has been said of Velk that she is so retiring that she makes the famously reclusive J.D. Salinger look like a Kardashian sister. Now, in an astonishing volte-face, this veritable Willie Wonka unicorn of an author, has announced that she is emerging from her cone of silence on Saturday, August 17 to sign copies of Up, Back, and Away at Bear Pond Books on Main Street in Stowe, Vermont.  

Velk will be coming down out of her mountainside hideaway on that day from 11 AM to 1 PM to sign paperbacks. "If anyone wants one, that is," Velk said.  "Assuming there is not a line down the street, which is a fairly safe assumption," she added, "I'm just as happy to chat with people, take questions about the book, or about how they might write and produce their own book. Maybe I'll bring some butterscotch candies or something.  Maybe a thermos of tea.  Maybe the first five people or so can have the tea.  The candy should hold out for the full three hours."

Here's a link to the Bear Pond Facebook page for more info: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Bear-Pond-Books-Stowe/232454216764792

Thumbs Up From Canada

I don't really need another reason to love Canada.  I feel demi-Canadian myself, but I got one today anyway.

Here's a link to a fresh and lovely new review of the book (or, as I think of it THE BOOK) from the Ontario-based book blogger (and exquisitely perceptive genius) the Teatime Reader.  She's a children's librarian by day so I am particularly gratified to get a nod of approval.

Book bloggers today largely occupy the space once taken by newspaper book review supplements and book review sections. Those have all but disappeared, but there are lots of amazing reviewers who have taken up the slack.  I am very pleased to have these bloggers take note, especially since I am not really kidding about how good they are.  Did I post link earlier to another nice review over at A Garden Carried in the Pocket earlier this spring?  Can't remember, but while we're on the subject, here's that.

All right. I ought to do something nice for you, gentle reader, for having stopped in and listened to me trumpet about my reviews.  Since I am feeling grateful to Canada again today, I have just the thing.

Some months ago I was moving pictures around in my new house and my attention was drawn to a letter I received more than 25 years ago from the great Canadian writer Robertson Davies.

Of course "Morgan Davies" the Professor Emeritus and owner of the Britannic Wheelman in Up, Back, and Away was heavily influenced by the late, great Robertson Davies.

I have always valued the letter highly, but it had become a fixture in its little box frame and I hadn't stopped to consider it in a long while.  Before I re-hung it,  I re-read it and decided that this relic of the pre-internet days should be shared.  I scanned the letter and wrote a blog post about it then over on my other blog.  I had the bright idea one late night this spring to send a link to the post to Margaret Atwood, whom I follow on Twitter (me along with a significant portion of the English-reading world).  She re-tweeted it, and the response was quite impressive.  Anyway, while I am feeling all grateful to Canada again today, and as a reward for you who have read to the end here today, here's a link to that lovely, wise letter.  

Talismans

I am superstitious, about the usual, stupid things. I don't like the number thirteen.  Tails-up coin on the floor? DON'T PICK IT UP! Black cat crossing path? Change course! If I spill some salt, I make it better by throwing more salt on the floor, over my left shoulder. I make my kids do the same thing, which I am sure will be a big help to them down the road.

The post before this one (re: "Giveaway Weekend!"), was post number thirteen on this blog.  

Irksome.  Possibly dangerous.  

True, the weekend went quite well and thanks to all of you who downloaded the Kindle book.

Now, to make sure that those of you who procured it will like it, I am back here with post number fourteen.  (The flip side of this particular symptom of a weak mindedness is that I also have a belief in lucky charms. If some things are unlucky, others are lucky, right?)  

Here though, I am a little more original.  No rabbits feet or four leaf clovers for me.  As I was writing Up, Back, and Away, I surrounded myself with bits of English things that I felt would beam genius at me, or at least a little inspiration.  I wrote it in a few different places.  Mostly in this cabin behind our farmhouse.

I kept certain things near me in there like this:

This plate and one of its mates hang on the wall in the cabin, right over my writing desk.  (English pottery, particularly English transferware, has a role to play in the story and I have LOTS of it - don't start me).

I also had the works of Shakespeare, in a gimcrack 19th century multi-volume set, on the book case behind me.  I had an old Union Jack, the sort people might wave at a parade, stuck into a salt-glazed jug made by T.J. Mayer, Longport and dated 1851 on my writing table.

I had this stamp (and its penny and a half companion) in a little frame on the window sill:

I had these guys.  They MUST be lucky:

I had this 1917 pound note on my desk in a protective plastic sleeve.  It's just like the ones Miles brings with him on his journey.

And I had this: the original "Banded Stone."

You'll have to read the story, maybe on that free Kindle download, to find out what this is all about.  

These rocks are common in some places in Vermont.  I encountered them at one of my favorite places in the world, Shelburne Farms in Shelburne, Vermont.  If any place has magic, Shelburne Farms has magic.  I dragged my kids there one day while I was deep into writing the story and made them round up some choice examples to inspire me.  This is the one I actually wound up describing in the book. 

Lucky?  

I can't help feeling so.

Thanks again for your interest.  I hope you will enjoy the book as much as I liked writing it. Fingers crossed.