Katherine Krieg has been friends with Jason Shepherd for years.  He was her late husband’s best friend, and became the one person she could lean on after her husband’s untimely death.

Jason has loved Kathy ever since the first moment he laid eyes on her.  He’s bided his time, waiting until she was ready for another relationship before telling her exactly what he wants and exactly how he wants it.

He’s shocked her with his bawdy talk, but Kathy cannot deny her own desires.  It isn’t long before lust overtakes propriety and they both go up in flames.

http://www.cobblestone-press.com/catalog/books/whatiwant.htm – Buy the eBook!

WARNING!  THIS REVIEW WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS!!  READ AT YOUR OWN RISK AND DON’T SAY I DIDN’T WARN YOU!!!

I first heard of Twilight when DH found the movie trailer on Apple.com.  He called me over to his computer and told me to watch, saying it sounded like something I’d be into.  It was romance + vampires.  Sounded right up my alley.

Well, I never actually saw the movie in theaters.  I kind of wanted to, but the throngs of teenage girls turned me off.  Then, I learned it was a book series.  For Christmas, DH put the first book, Twilight, into my stocking.  I must admit, I think I actually rolled my eyes when I saw it.  LOL  I think I was turned off by the fact it was written or geared toward young adults.  I do have a few friends in the writing industry who avidly read young adult, but I haven’t read them since I was… well, a young adult.

The book went on my shelf and sat there.  I even stuffed it into my hospital bag when I checked in to give birth to my daughter.  But it still sat untouched.  One day, after we’d come home with a new baby, my hubby asked me if I’d read it yet.  Since he’d given it to me as a gift, I knew he’d keep asking every few days until he became so annoying that I’d read it just to shut him up.  Before things escalated to that point (lol), I decided to pick up the book, if only to give me something to do while breastfeeding.

Twilight and the other books in the series, New Moon, Eclipse, and Breaking Dawn are all written in first person.  I find first person point of view to be tedious most of the time, and the only author to really pull it off in my opinion is Jim Butcher of Harry Dresden fame.  However, I found myself not hating the writing style.  Actually, the writing style is probably the best part about this saga.  I thoroughly enjoyed Ms. Meyer’s prose.

You see, as an author myself, I rarely read a story just for the “story” these days.  I pay attention to how an author tells a story, how they set up their characters, and where they lead them.  I must say, parts of these books were painfully obvious, plot-wise.  In order to have any kind of suspense in a saga where each book is a tome, there has to come a time when the hero and heroine are separated.  In romance especially, there comes a time when the heroine puts herself in a stupid or dangerous situation, whether intentional or not.  With a teen story, you have to have the disapproving parent.  And with a beautiful girl, every dude in the neighborhood wants to hook up.

These books had all of the above.

The heroine, Bella Swan, suffers from an affliction we like to call in romance the “TSTL syndrome”, or “Too Stupid To Live”.  While I understood Bella’s angst, her recklessness was taken a bit too far at times.  Jumping off a cliff into the ocean by YOURSELF comes to mind.  Riding a motorcycle for the first time by yourself without a helmet is up there as well.  How about walking alone through a dark, ominous part of town (which is also up there in the predictable section with the unsavory ne’er-do-wells she needs to be saved from)?  Not to mention Bella’s kinda whiny.  I have to admit, I didn’t like her character much, until the last book when everything comes together.

The Jacob storyline throughout bothered me.  At times, he reminded me of a creepy stalker who won’t take no for an answer.  He was determined to convince Bella she was in love with him, at the expense of forcing her to her feelings.  That rubbed me the wrong way.  What man will force a woman to kiss him except the insensitive ones?  I didn’t like Jacob much.  At first, I felt for him pining over a woman who would never love him.  I think we’ve all been there at one point or another in our lives.  But once he became a wolf, his “alpha-ness” took over.  Didn’t like his version of alpha.  And don’t get me wrong, I LOVE me some alpha males in my stories.

What bothered me is when Edward left town in book two, New Moon, Bella begins doing reckless things just to hear his voice in her head.  His voice isn’t a memory, it talks in her head as if he’s there with her, prompting her to do the disastrous things just to hear it again (which is supposed to make us understand why she risks her life…  Uh, no, she’s still TSTL.  LOL).  Anyhow, this was never explained as the story went on.  I fully expected Edward to be secretly spying on her and inserting his voice in her head as a part of his mind-reading powers.  But when he eventually does come back to town and learns of Bella’s recklessness, he’s genuinely shocked and horrified at the things she did.  So his voice in her head really was her own psyche?  I didn’t like that much.

However, book two also has one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen in a book, with regards to artistic expression as a writer.  And that is the passage of time while Edward is gone.  I absolutely ADORED what Ms. Meyer did, and praise her editors for letting her do it.  I think I literally exclaimed, “Awesome!” when I saw that.  It probably doesn’t mean much to you readers, but for me, it made me sit up and take notice of this series  moreso than I would have otherwise.  To put it simply, instead of chapters, six (I think it’s six) consecutive pages simply has one word centered on it in capital letters.  The names of the months passing.  Totally original in my opinion.

Toward the end of the series, I fully expected Jacob to find his mate, to imprint, I think, as they called it.  But what happened I totally did NOT expect.  I had expected him to imprint with Leah, and in fact, it probably would have been more “comfortable” for me if he had.  The romantic in me SO wanted it to be her.  Poor thing is still out there somewhere without a mate.  But the intense draw between Edward and Bella seemed to be along the same lines of Jacob’s pack’s imprinting with their mates.  I actually expected there to be some similar explanation with vampires, but Ms. Meyer didn’t go that way.  That surprised me, seen as how they felt so deeply for each other, to the point of wanting to curl up and die when separated even for a little while.  It seemed supernatural to me rather than merely finding your one true love.

My recommendation, however, is for this saga to only be read by young adults 16 and older.  If you have younger teens who want to read it, you should read it first and then decide.  There’s nothing overly gory or scary in these books, however, Ms. Meyer doesn’t always “close the door” with regards to the sex scenes.  While the scenes are nothing as hot as what I write (lol), they’re still intense for the type of story it’s marketed to be, especially as the books go on.  If you don’t want your young teen to read that, proceed with caution.  I actually believe this story, the entirety of it, is geared toward adults but marketed as young adult because of the age of the characters.  However Ms. Meyer did succeed in taking me back to my high school days, as horrid as they were.    I remember sitting next to “that guy”, being excited or disappointed in class when he did or didn’t show up.

All in all, I devoured the books (no pun intended) in just a couple of weeks.  Let me tell ya, it’s hard holding a 700 page hardback behemoth while clutching a nursing newborn, but by golly I did it!

I loved the prose, I loved the way Ms. Meyer told her story, even if it was predictable and annoying at times, and I enjoyed her new take on vampires.  Edward’s unwillingness to turn Bella and his reasons for it are a far cry from vampires in your “typical” romantic fiction.  I’m used to vamps getting it on and biting women with nary a care.  Edward was portrayed much differently, and that was a breath of fresh air.

All in all, I would recommend this series despite the rabid fangirls.  I still haven’t watched the movie, but I’ll probably buy it on DVD when it comes out in a few weeks.  My only suggestion is to buy all four books at the same time to save yourself the midday trip to the bookstore when you’ve just gotta find out what happens. 

Good job, Ms. Meyer.  Four stars from Becka. 

If you’ve been a reader of my blog, you’ll know I’ve been on a weight loss journey.  True, my journey has stalled a bit.  I’ve only exercised a handful of times since my baby was born.  However, due to all the weight I’d lost in a year (a total of 65 lbs), I still hadn’t bought myself any new clothes.  I had no idea what size I really wear.

Since I’ve had Sophie, my pants were hanging loose, even the “smallest” jeans in my closet.  I’d finally had enough of looking like MC Hammer.  Even my OB told me since I was 9 weeks pregnant at my first weigh-in there, I’d lost 21 pounds.  It’s pretty exciting to lose weight while pregnant.

It kind of sucks not knowing what size you are, especially when you’re carting around 5 children.  It’s not so much that they’re misbehaving in the store (they talked a bit too loudly and were bored off their rocker, but no serious misbehaving).   It’s more an issue of, “Nope, these don’t fit, back to the rack!”  I went back and forth to that damn rack about 4 times.  It didn’t help matters that the dressing room was on the other side of the store.

Come to find out, however, that from my fattest fat pants to now, I’ve dropped a total of 5 sizes!  Truth be told, I bought three pairs of pants, two in my new smaller size, one in one size up.  I guess it depends on the cut of the pants whether or not I’m truly in the smaller size.

At my fattest weight, I was in a size 30.  Right now, I’m in a size 20.  Or 22, depending on pant-cut.    But the weird thing is, I’m still looking at these new jeans with “fat eyes”, meaning, I remember being heavier and trying on pants that were too small for me, so small I couldn’t even fit them over my hips.  Looking down at the waist, I’d think to myself, “Yeah, that will never work.”  LOL  So when I look at these pants as I’m putting them on, the waist seems too small to me; it seems as if they *shouldn’t* fit.  But lo and behold, they do!  It’s really a strange feeling.

But I haven’t seen a size 20 for close to 10 years.  Heck, maybe even longer.  I was a size 16-18 when I got married in ‘95.  It wasn’t long before I was gaining more weight, even before I started having kids.  DH and I used to look at old pictures of me and go, “Dang!”  It’s not that I was ever skinny before, because even then, I knew I needed to lose weight.  But it’s that I’ve been so fat for so long, that even those pictures seem “skinny”.

In a perfect world, I still have about 100 pounds to lose.  I’ll be happy if I can just fit into a size 10-12 one of these days.  Heck, if I can drop 5 sizes, I can drop another 5 sizes right?  However, something tells me the next 5 are going to be MUCH harder to lose…  As 2009 rolls on into spring and summer, here’s hoping I can get back on the bandwagon and be more active with exercise and being with my family in the beautiful Oregon outdoors!

~~Becka

My daughter Hannah has such a big heart.  Ever since I taught her how to crochet, she’s been making things for everyone she knows, and only just recently made a lap blanket for herself when we’re watching TV.  Because she loves to give more than she actually loves to receive, she decided to use her own money to buy her own yarn to make hats for cancer patients.

Her idea came out of the blue, it wasn’t my idea or anyone else’s.  She asked me to find her a hat pattern online and away she went.  She reads Highlights and Discovery Kids and National Geographic for kids; she might have gotten the idea to donate from other similar stories of stellar kids giving back to their communities.  Whatever it was, she asked me when she’d made about 3-5 hats if she could donate them.  I told her it wasn’t enough to make a good enough donation, and that I’d help her donate them when she’d made about 25.

She gave me a round-eyed look, knowing full well how long it would take to crochet 25 hats, but away she went, undaunted.  When she’d made the hats, I suggested giving a small index card with each hat with her name and age on them, so the people would know who made it for them.  Instead, we found some blank cards that said “For You” on the outside with a lovely floral pattern on the front and she wanted those instead.

Inside these cards, she wrote, “Made especially for you by Hannah, age 9″ along with a few different Bible verses, her favorites, of course.

I called two places, OHSU, which is the premiere cancer institute in the state of Oregon.  After a couple days, they didn’t call back (I’d left a message on a machine) so I decided to call my local hospital, Tuality Community Hospital.  It took them another day to get back to me (because I’d left another message – does every hospital leave their donation line to a machine?) and we were contacted by the Tuality Cancer Center, which is across the street from the hospital.

The lady there, whose name was “Hanna” as well (no ‘h’ at the end), but actually went by her middle name of Jean, was so very nice and scheduled an appointment for the following Friday for us to come in and spend some time.  Hannah, my daughter, was a little disappointed she’d have to wait another week to donate, but was happy someone wanted them and responded back.

While we waited the next week, OHSU actually did get back to me.  The donations lady had been on vacation, and no one had sent her my message until the day she called.  She apologized for not getting back to me, but said they’d definitely be interested if my daughter made more hats, but that she understood we’d decided to go with another hospital.

So today was donation day and Hannah was so excited.  They invited us back to their office where they had a plate of cookies they’d ordered especially for her, cookies in a heart shape.  Of course, I’m sure it wasn’t too hard, since tomorrow is Valentine’s Day.    But the lady told me the doctor who treats the patients at the center has an account at the local bakery and orders donuts every Friday, so he just added on an order of heart-shaped cookies.  Too cool!

Hannah's Cookies

After Hannah was presented with cookies, she got to meet all the other doctors and nurses on staff.  One of them even had a tube of confetti he popped and we all cheered for her.

They opened her bag of hats and took some out for the table with the cookies and took a picture of Hannah, of which they had her and me sign a photo release form so they could photograph her.  I snapped some pics with my iPhone.

Posing for the Center

Hanna Jean told us in the six years the cancer center has been in business, this is the first time someone has called and asked to donate something they’ve made.  She said Hannah should feel special, not only because she’s the first, but because when you do nice things for people, you make the world a better place.  I really should have taken a picture of the lady, but I didn’t think of it until just now.  Ah well.

They wrapped up the cookies for us in a nice pretty gift bag with a bow and everything for her to take home.  They said they’ll be handing out the adult hats at the center, and their doctor will take her smaller hats to the children, who apparently are treated at a different facility.  One thing’s for sure, all work stopped when we came in and Hannah was the talk of the town.  Even the patients in the waiting room were smiling and talking amongst themselves about what we were there to do.  The entire time, Hannah was beaming, just so darn happy to do something nice for someone else.  She’s already talking about making more hats.  Perhaps next time, we’ll give them to OHSU.

Today is one of those days you feel like you’ve succeeded as a parent. 

“Even a child is known by his doings, whether his work be pure, and whether it be right.” ~~Proverbs 20:11

~~Becka

A while back, I remember reading an article on something called “Synesthesia”.  I remember thinking, “Oh wow, I didn’t know there was a condition for this!”, which seems to be the normal reaction for those who are “diagnosed” with this “disorder”.

I put those words in quotes, because I’m not so sure it’s a “disorder”.  You see, Synesthesia is when you perceive colors along with letters, words, or sounds.  Sometimes, even different tastes.

When I was a kid, I remember learning the alphabet with colors.  No one taught me that each letter had a color, it was just something I did on my own.  The same thing with numbers.  Even days of the week and months of the year have colors.  It’s not so much that I see these colors when I read words, but rather, think of them.  It’s very unintentional, as well.  I even remember as a kid when I’d draw pictures, I’d pick the color of the letter for whatever word I was writing.  A is red, for example.  B is black, C is yellow, D is brown.  E is also brown, while F is a light sage-y green.  The number 1 is white, 2 is blue, 3 is a tan, 4 is red, 5 is black…

I guess I’d just always assumed that’s how it always was.  But it’s not that I see a rainbow of colors when I read.  I’m not THAT bad, although some people with the disorder do see rainbows on the page for every letter.  Rather, when I see the letter, I think of that color.  It’s automatic and I don’t even know I’m doing it most of the time.

Even when teaching my kids, I was just realizing today while my son counted to 100 and wrote the numbers down on his worksheet that the teens were white, the twenties were blue, the thirties were tan and so on.  But only in my head, not on the page.  It’s so weird.

Sunday is light blue.  Monday is brown.  Tuesday is a mustard.  Wednesday is white and black together, however, it’s not grey (very strange), Thursday is orange and Friday is green.  Saturday is a dark blue.

January is yellow.  February is green.  March is brown.  April is pink.  May is black.  June is gold.  July is orange.  August is red.  September is light blue.  October is black.  November is white.  December is brown.

I always thought I was kind of weird that way, and actually, I haven’t told many people about “seeing” colors with letters, numbers and words.  Because I don’t really think it’s not normal.  I know other people don’t do it, but I never really thought to bring it up before.  Some people who see the same things often put colors to music as well.  I’ve never done that.

But here’s an interesting article on Wikipedia about it:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia

I’m quoting from the text; this is what it’s like for me:

“Another reports a slightly different experience. “When I actually look at words on a page, the letters themselves are not colored, but instead in my mind they all have a color that goes along with them, and it has always been this way. I remember back in kindergarten thinking that each homeroom had a different color associated with it. I would sometimes say things referring to that class and calling it by its color. It is also like this with days of the week, months, and so on. I thought this was caused by me over-thinking things. But I finally have come to realize that Synesthesia is real.”

Here’s a link to a story on seeing color with music:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/02/09/synesthesia.genes/index.html

Anyone else have similar experiences?  I must say I always thought this was one of my many weird quirks.  Looks like I’m not alone after all.

~~Becka