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Dear Reader,
Stephanie Butland, today's guest author, writes in a studio at the bottom of her garden, and when she's not writing, she trains people to think more creatively. For fun, she reads, knits, sews, bakes, and spins.
Her first two books were about her dance with cancer, then she turned to fiction, with three novels set in small English towns. Stephanie lives with her family near the sea in the northeast of England. Her latest book is The Lost for Words Bookshop, and she has two copies to give away to readers. To enter, send an email to: [email protected]
You can follow and contact Stephanie via Facebook
Please welcome author Stephanie Butland...
BESIDE THE SEASIDE
I live near the coast in the northeast of England, and I love the sea. Of course I do! I always thought everyone did--who wouldn't?--until I walked on a beach with a friend from Kansas City. 'Nope, never liked the ocean,' he said, 'maybe it's because I grew up such a long way from it.'
Well, I am a sea-devotee. But don't go getting ideas about beach umbrellas and surfing in your Speedos. My special stretch of coastline is called Druridge Bay, and it is where the North Sea meets the UK; it regularly plays host to winds that last touched land mass in Norway.
My beach is a beach for walking, in wellington boots or good strong shoes, with your hat pulled down over your ears and your coat zipped up to your chin. (In July, August and September, go barefoot in the pleasantly chilly sand, but you probably still want to have a cardigan with you.) It's a good place for going arm-in-arm with someone you know well, in cheerful silence, because the wind may whip your words away. Paddle in the sea by all means, but be prepared to lose all feeling from the ankle down within a minute or two.
My beach is a quiet beach. I often walk there with my Dad and his unruly Springer Spaniel, Harvey; if we see six other people in an hour we will complain about how busy it is. When I'm stuck on a book, or wrangling with a what-next, a walk on the beach on my own will get ideas flowing again. On a windswept beach you can talk to yourself, argue with yourself, be mad with the world or embrace it. The beach understands. The beach knows. All thoughts are valid, at the beach.
I love that I could walk on the beach every day but it would never be the same. Some days the sky is a uniform wedgewood-blue, others it's a furious oil painting of blacks and greys and thundering khaki. Sometimes the tide-line is shells and seacoal scribbled along the shore, others there's nothing but sand in shivering patterns made by the water as it withdrew.
But most of all, I love that the beach makes me feel small, insignificant, and that in the scheme of things, whatever I am worrying about or hoping for is really not that big a deal. All is well, my heart says. You live near the coast, after all.
--Stephanie Butland
Two copies of The Lost for Words Bookshop, are in envelopes, waiting to be sent to readers. Enter the drawing, email:
[email protected]
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
[email protected]
** AUTHORBUZZ **
THE MYTH OF PERPETUAL SUMMER (Fiction) by Susan Crandall
Return to the tumultuous 1960's Mississippi; stomping grounds of award-winning bestseller, Whistling Past the Graveyard. Tallulah James parent's tumultuous relationship and their hands-off parenting set tongues to wagging in their staid Southern town. When tragedy and betrayal arrive hand in hand, Tallulah's life is sent on a path she never imagined.
Go to: AUTHORBUZZ click on THE MYTH OF PERPETUAL SUMMER to read more and to email author Susan Crandall, you'll get a reply.
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