Fortuitous Find

Sometime last week I wrote a post on bookstores and the problems they were having competing with online offerings. In that post, I mentioned how I love to go and just wander around a bookstore and admire the books, and how sometimes a book that you might not have ever seen or thought about reading, will jump right off the shelf, into your hands, and go home with you....

Thursday a friend asked if I would give her a ride to get her hair cut and stop a couple of other places. One of the places she needed to go was a bookstore. Twist my arm! I had just been to a bookstore on Tuesday, so I wasn't looking for anything in particular. But, since this was a different bookstore from Tuesday's, I was happy to wander the shelves , checking out discontinued, sales, and new arrivals.

As is my custom, my feet eventually led me to the Scifi/fantasy section. And there, sitting facing outward, was a book with an absolutely wonderfully beautiful cover. It was one of those large paperbacks that I normally don't like since I can't tuck them in my purse. Still, it had such a wonderful cover that I pulled it off the shelf to have a look. The blurb on the back was oh so interesting, and inside the back cover was an ad for the next book in the series. I asked the clerk, and she said it would be out in May. Interesting cover, cool story idea, next book out almost immediately? Sold!

 

When I got home I saw an entry in my RSS feed about the book/cover over at the Tor site. Since I had just bought the book, I clicked thru and was pleased to get a lot more info. Seems these books are going to be just one of three trilogies set in this universe. All three of the books are already out in England. They decided to do these wonderful complimentary covers for the US release and are releasing them one each month for 3 months. World's End was April, Darkest Hour will be in May, followed by Always Forever in June!! This is wonderful news for me because one of the things that drives me crazy is waiting for the next book in a series to come out. LOL! I think that is why I often wait till a couple of books are out in a series before I dive in.

Click here for a better look at all the covers, and an interview about the books, the covers, and how they all came about.

Oh, and just to wet your appetite for what's inside, here is part of the blurb from the back cover:

IN TIMES OF TROUBLE, HEROES ARISE!

A dragon firebombs a freeway. Shape-shifters stalk the commercial district. The deadly Wild Hunt wreaks havoc on the highway.
A pedal-to-the-floor, high-octane fantasy thriller that pitches magic and wonder into a pop culture mash-up of the modern world. Described as “One part Lord of the Rings, one part Illuminatus!, one part Arthurian romance, one part Harry Potter—100 % original!”

For more info on the book, and author, and to read the rest of the blurb from the back of the book, click here.

The Adventure Continues

In my last post about my big adventure I let you all know our final destination: The Big E in Springfield, MA. We had arrived safely and had a few days before the kickoff. This turned out to be a good thing because due to circumstances (weather, delivery schedules, trouble finding certain products) I got to strip and re-bed our 10 stalls 3 times LOL! Quite the work-out. Between that, the crazy schedule of shows, and stripping and repacking everything at the end, I managed to lose 10 pounds without even trying. Combined with the weight I had lost during the spring and fall of this year helping with the training and general upkeep of the horses, my weight is now back to what I consider a good one!

We were very happy to wake the morning after our arrival to sunshine. After all the rain on our trip, the sun was a very welcome sight. We got ourselves set-up for the next couple of weeks and spent some time seeing who else we new as they arrived. It wasn't surprising that we knew some of the people because we were there for Sylvia and the horses to perform with The Big E Super Circus and this was not the first time Sylvia had performed in this venue. The picture they use on this link is one of the ones I took of Sylvia earlier this Spring... I felt sort of famous. It was fun seeing old friends and making some new ones.

In answer to some of the questions in the comments of the last Adventure entry.... The horse hauler will haul 12 horses, but we were hauling only 10. Yes, there is an area in the front for a person to sleep, and actually that is where I was bunking during the trip and the show.

For anyone interested in what the horses do in the act, here are links to two videos of Sylvia and the Horses. It's in two parts, but is actually just the one act. I had to split it because of the length of video was too big for You Tube.

Hope you enjoy the horses!

The Adventure Begins.... early!

Those of you who read my blog on a regular basis know that I have spent the last couple of years taking care of some horses for a very good friend. I had some retired horses, a couple almost ready to be trained, and a couple of 'babies'. I spent this last spring and summer helping her get 2 of these horses ready to perform. The event we would be attending would be there debut. We had a plan of action, the horses were ready, and we were all set. But, as usual, the best laid plans are usually the ones who go awry!!

This event was quite a distance away (approx 1200 miles), and we needed to arrive there around the 9th of Sept. The event would run from the 12th till the 27th. The plan was to leave on Saturday, giving us 4 days to get to our destination. Plenty of time. However a little thing called a hurricane interfered! It seemed that Hurricane Hanna had a different idea. Hanna had decided that traveling up the east coast looked like a lot of fun to her too. This forced our hand and we left 4 days early trying to stay ahead of the worst of the weather. Not a problem if you hadn't thought you had 4 more days to get all the things you needed together.

Somehow we all managed to get everything we, and the horses, needed together, packed and loaded into the vehicles we would be taking with us. This doesn't sound like a big deal until you realize that we are talking about 10 horses, 3 adult humans who would be staying at the event, and 1 adult who would be driving us and then leaving. We were also leaving 3 horses here at home with my boyfriend, G, and we needed to leave all the food, hay, etc he would need for the period until I returned home.

Yep, things got hectic! And the trip that followed our late night leaving on Sept 4 wouldn't be a picnic either. Although we were running ahead of the main storm, we still had to deal with a lot of rain, wind, bad visibility.... yep, it was not a good time. Think about any long trip you've made in bad weather, and then add in having to take care of the needs of ten horses on the mix. They didn't care that we were getting soaked, they still wanted us to provide food and water whenever we stopped.

Still we arrived safely at our destination...... but the storm arrived with us and we ended up soaked to the skin by the time we got everything ready for the horses and then got them unloaded from their transport and bedded down for the night. Luckily that seemed to be the last of the storm and we would wake to sunshine the next morning.

The next day we spent getting ourselves set up, finding our way around, seeing who else was attending, and watching in amazement as the fair went up around us. Yep, the event I'm talking about was none other than the Big E. The largest fair in the northeast. Since we were a few days early we would have a chance to get oriented before the fair actually kicked off.

I have very few pictures of the trip/event. It poured most of the trip up there, and once there I was usually too busy to run and grab the camera! The picture of S.'s horse hauler at the top of this entry is one I had already in my collection . It's an 'air ride' vehicle and travels much smoother than a lot of horse trailers you see. I know I have a picture of the hauler hooked up to a tractor somewhere, but I unexpectedly had my laptop replaced, and I can't seem to find it at the moment. LOL!

To be continued......