Coming Home

by Sandy Cody

I'm home. That's how it feels to be writing a post for this blog. I've been away for a while as a poster, but I've continued to read ClassicAndCozy and, always, I've been grateful to be a part of this family of writers. I was reminded of that recently when I started a new book. My first published works were the Jennie Connors mysteries, published by Avalon Books, and the Avaloners group was my introduction to these talented, generous people.

I've been writing other things for a while, but always knew I would come back to Jennie. That's where I am now - writing the sixth Jennie Connors mystery. Feeling the need to renew my acquaintance with Jennie and the characters who share her crime-solving adventures. I decided to re-read the books in that series. I began with LEFT AT AT OZ - amzn.to/2chHD5A  When I opened the book, the first thing I saw was the acknowledgement:

"Writing for Avalon makes me part of a very special group of writers. Whatever our genres, we share a belief that "happily ever after" is possible and that good will triumph over evil. Thanks to the wonder of the internet, many of us have become friends, though we have never met face-to-face and our physical addresses span the globe. I am truly grateful for the encouragement given me by my fellow Avaloners."

A bit about Jennie: She's an optimist by nature and an unrelenting champion of the underdog. She has two young sons and works as Activities Director of Riverview Manor, a retirement community where the residents are feisty, mobile, alert, and just bored enough enough to stir up trouble. If there's a murder to be solved - Whoo Hoo and Hurray! They're in.

So, here I am again - blogging on Classic and Cozy and writing a Jennie Connors mystery. I've come home. More than ever, I want to share my belief in "happily ever after" and to show good triumphing over evil. It's good to be back.

Still Not Nesting

When I sold my first book to Avalon, I learned that the print run would be about 2,000 copies. Of course I was thrilled anyway, and the thought of having several thousand people read my book made me giddy. The print runs on the other four Avalon books were similar, and since I chose to put the last Wally Morris mystery out myself, with the help of CreateSpace, it was probably less.

But the amazing thing is that I once had an audience of over a million readers. A long time ago I had read an op-ed column by Anna Quindlen, a person whose opinions I respected, and I strongly disagreed with her. You can read my letter to the editor, thanks to the magic of the internet. Believe me, though, if I couldn’t have found it that way, I have copies of the newspaper from that day tucked safely away.

LIVING DESK

Nesting

Published: February 10, 1988

To The Living Section:

Anna Quindlen's column on the nesting instinct [ Life in the 30's, Jan. 27 ] reminds us that the grass is still greener on the other side.

Nesting is not all what a person who doesn't have a job does all day. Those of us who don't have jobs do not all spend the entire time our children are in school having lunch with our friends or furniture shopping and picking out wallpaper. We have the luxury of having time to do these things occasionally (and without the children, which is the only sane way), but we also feel strong responsibilities to various activities, which we probably wouldn't have time for if we were working.

We make sure our children get to their different after-school activities. We also work on committees handling such trivialities as improving our children's education and starting recycling programs in our towns. Some of us even have to find sitters to take our infants so we can have the time to do such things as performing in a puppet show that seeks to sensitize third graders to the handicapped. We don't expect help from working mothers for these things, although some of them occasionally ask us to chauffeur their children around since they think we have nothing better to do.

One thing that I have noticed is different: we don't have to send a sick child to school. That's usually the day we do a lot of nesting, because it stops our whirlwind of activities and there's not much else we can do. One or two days spent at home nesting, particularly with a cranky child, is plenty for most of us, and more than satisfies that need for months. JOANI ASCHER South Orange, N.J.

Looking at that letter all these years later. I hope I did not hurt anyone’s feelings. It is hard to get everything done, I’m sure, especially if a person has a full-time job. And now, from the standpoint of a writer trying to get book after book finished and published while people think that just because I only work part time the rest of my time is available for whatever, I find myself just giving in, putting off my work, so that I can do those jobs that full-time workers don’t have time to do. My children are grown and gone, and the only person home with me, during the days when I’m not working at my outside job, has four legs and a tail. But she needs time too, so that she can develop into a good Seeing Eye® guide dog.

And I can always hope that someday I’ll have a circulation closer to the one I had for my letter to the editor over twenty years ago before I started writing professionally.

Ludima Gus Burton — A Very Special Lady

Jean C. Gordon here with a tribute to Avalon author and personal friend Ludima Gus Burton who passed away July 23 at age 94. I met Ludima in the late 1990s when I belonged to the Saratoga Chapter of the Romance Writers of America. Ludima was a charter member of the chapter and served as Treasurer for many years. She sold her first book, Only for a Year, to  Erin Cartwright-Nuimata at Avalon Books in 1999, the same month I sold my first book to Avalon.

Our books came out June 2000. They're still available for Kindle. And we had our first book signing together, along with Classic and Cozy author Tracey Lyons, who later also sold to Avalon Books.

Ludima was 80 years old!

She went on to write three more books for Avalon . . .

 . . .  and published six more non-Avalon books after that: A Surgeon's Miracle, The Christmas Ball, Never a Cougar, Drew Get's It Right, Wife: Lost and Found, and His Son, Her Daughter, which was just recently released.

Before becoming an author, Ludima taught high school Social Studies at Northville Central High School in the Adirondack Mountains of Upstate NY for many years. She began her second career as an author of sweet romances in 1991 at age 71.

Always ready to give encouragement, she was a popular speaker at conferences, book signings and events, and her positive and generous spirit will be greatly missed by all who knew her. She loved life, literature, her family and friends, and animals, especially her little dogs, Nikko and Buster.

The Reader, the Author, and a Book: a Love Story in Three Acts

Welcome to Classic and Cozy!

And welcome home. Settle down with your cup of tea and I’ll tell you a story. (This is the part where you imagine yourself with a warm cup of your favorite tea or coffee, perhaps a crackling fire on the hearth, and the smell of brownies in the oven. Mmmm.)

ACT 1

There was once a group of writers, all published under a particular book imprint that concerned itself with the sharing of stories that fell under three categories: sweet romances, cozy mysteries and classic westerns. (At this point, envision a group of writers. We all look very cool and/or elegant. Honest.)

Through this publisher, readers enjoyed the diverse voices of writers who were writing the sorts of books they wanted to read. A book that was comfortable. A book that you could share with your child, a co-worker, your grandparent. Sold largely to libraries and schools, the writers enjoyed sharing their stories and built a bond of trust with their readers.

And then it all changed. (Insert ominious music, a storm brewing outside, a shadowy figure flits past the window. Oooooh, Scary.)

ACT 2

The publishing industry changed – practically over night (crash of cymbals). The publishing company sold its back list and our books were no longer going out to libraries, high-schools, no longer reaching our readers.

(Insert sad music. I’m choking up, at this part.) Separated from our readers, we reached out to our other family – our fellow writers of sweet romance, cozy mystery, and classic westerns.

In a massive brainstorming session, we puzzled over how best to reach out to the other members of our family – our readers. (Here, you can envision a think tank, sans the water, where all of us cool and/or elegant writers are sitting around an oblong table, throwing out ideas, and using the very latest in technology to share brainstorming ideas. It’s all very techy and edgy.)

Then an idea was born. (Light bulb.)

As edgy as we all had become, going off on our writerly tangents, writing willy nilly, literary, lusty, dice'em-slice'ems, we knew our readers were the same traditionalists. Our readers still needed access to our sweet romances, cozy mysteries, and classic westerns. Yee ha! We would create a blog. A massive cooperative blog – where we could re-connect with our readers. We would reassure our readers that we did not abandon them! (“Shane! Come back, Shane!” - Shane, 1953.)

ACT 3

And so, here we are! (This is the resolution of the conflict scene. The setting, a beach. The sun rises over the ocean, U.S. east coast. The reader and the author approaching one another from opposite directions on the beach. They see one another. They increase their pace in moving toward one another.)
Reader: "I missed you!"
Author: "I thought I had lost you forever."
We are so sorry if you couldn’t find us for a while. We missed you too!

Epilogue:

Classic and Cozy writers would like to invite YOU, dear  reader, to follow this blog by clicking that little clicky thing - there - to the right - or maybe it's down below. Okay, actually, it's one of those things where you insert your e-mail address. Click it to follow Classic and Cozy for updates on more of the books you love and trust!

Sofie Couch writes sweet romantic comedies with just enough piss and vinegar to make you spew your coffee and test your bladder control. From her home in Central Virginia, she writes in and around raising a “pa’r-a-normal young adults”, wrangling chickens amidst nightly coyote raids, and living a romantic comedy with her sweetie-pie of twenty years. She studied Rhetoric at the University of Virginia to obtain a B.A. in b.s. and fiction is what she continues to crank out with the help of her writing muses – a dog that thinks she’s a cat, a cat that thinks she’s the alpha dog, and 1,000 (fictitious) Typing Monkeys, (which also just happens to be the name of her blog). You can follow the high-jinks of Sofie and her menagerie at http://www.sofiecouch.blogspot.com, (Originally published through Avalon Books under the name Annette L. Couch-Jareb, she has been going off on those aforementioned writerly tangents, but has found her Classic and Cozy home again with KEEPING UP WITH MR. JONES and her free Christmas read, The Snow Globe. Enjoy!