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Dear Reader,
Today you can sample Barbara Bretton's book Just Desserts and I have 15 copies to give away. Barbara and I have never met in person, yet it feels like we're old friends. She reads along with us every day and is one of the book club's biggest cheerleaders. I teasingly suggested that since I'm featuring her book, she could write a column and give me the day off. After all what are friends for? And by golly that's just what she did.
A few words from Barbara Bretton:
As I type this I'm a few days away from finishing my latest novel. I don't know what day of the week it is. I'm pretty sure it's still March but I wouldn't bet money on it. My hair is pulled back in a scraggly ponytail. I'm wearing pajama bottoms, one of my husband's old t-shirts, a fifteen year old red sweater, and bunny slippers. (Yes, bunny slippers.) My eyes haven't seen mascara in months. In fact I haven't seen daylight in months. In an attempt to keep temptation at bay I've flipped day for night and am currently living the life of a middle-aged vampire whose highlights seriously need refreshing.
Last year I wrote a book about a baker and turned to knitting for relaxation. This year I'm writing about a knitter and I've turned to baking! If I'm not knitting my way through a knotty book problem, I'm baking my way toward a solution.
This past Saturday I wrote myself into a corner. Sometimes the strangest things will stop a writer cold. Once I actually had a character trapped on the third step from the top for two weeks because I couldn't come up with the simple words, "She climbed the stairs."
Anyway I was stumbling my way around the house Saturday afternoon muttering plot points under my breath when my husband turned the oven on to preheat and said, "Go bake something."
So I did. For some reason I have always wanted to make my own bagels. Which is probably crazy since we have three perfectly fine bagel shops within a two-mile radius of our house. I dug out my recipe from the wonderful blog Baking and Books, assembled my ingredients, started a pot of water boiling, plugged in my beloved nineteen year old Kitchen Aid stand mixer, and got to work. By the time I set the dough to rise I could feel the book knots starting to untie themselves.
I worked a little on the book while the dough did its thing. I let my mind wander while I punched it down and formed it into circles. One bagel, two bagels, eight bagels, twelve bagels all ready to be dropped into a pot of boiling water, drained, then covered with poppy seeds or sesame seeds or kosher salt or whatever struck my fancy. Pop into a 500 degree oven for sixteen minutes or so (remember to turn them; I forgot one and it got a little scorched) and start gathering compliments.
And guess what? By the time my husband and I gobbled up some fresh-from-the-oven bagels with cream cheese, I had figured my way out of the book problem and was back at work again.
Some writers go shoe shopping when they hit the wall. Some writers go for a run. Some writers even throw in the towel. Me? I bake. Not great for the waistline but it's wonderful for the imagination!
So here I am, maybe seventy-two hours away from typing THE END. In my fictional world I have a knitter in danger, a cop trapped in a cemetery, and magic breaking out all over the place. In my real world, I have an oven preheating and the ingredients for a sour cream coffee cake on the counter.
Life is good!
Thanks Barbara. To sample Just Desserts and to enter the book giveaway, go to: http://tinyurl.com/24xt48 and if you'd like Barbara's Sour Cream Coffee Cake recipe (and the stories that go with it) drop her a note at bretton5@yahoo.com with RECIPE in the subject header and she'll zip it out to you.
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
Suzanne@DearReader.com
http://www.DearReader.com
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