One of the first things people generally ask me at lectures and book signings is, “When did you start writing? Have you done it your whole life?” I have been writing for as long as I can remember. I was first published when I was eight years old in a Southern California religious newspaper. I had written a small poem that my proud mother submitted to the publication. I also created reams of fairytale-princess-happily-ever-after tales, complete with illustrations and text balloons. Looking back, they were storyboards, actually. I was the publisher, editor, and reporter for the neighborhood newspaper, The Estrada Press, when I was nine or ten years old. I still have the first copy, although, alas, the storyboards were lost in a house fire. My mother was a gifted and prolific writer of poetry. One of her poems honoring General Douglas MacArthur is in the West Point Library. Did I inherit a gene? Did the bedtime ritual of having poetry read aloud to us have a profound effect on my subconscious? I can still recite The Highwayman, Little Boy Blue and several other well-loved poems by heart; including those of my mother….(to be continued)
Archive for » 2009 «
Watching Carlos Santana perform at the The Joint at the Hard Rock Hotel evoked a lot of forgotten moments and memories. Music has the magic to do that. Santana brought to mind memories of high school… and my brother, Pat, who chose to end his life on March 15, 2003. Strains of music run through my novels. In A Port of No Return, sexy Noah hums a Jamaican follk song to Quinn on watch one night: a folk song I still remember from when I lived with a Jamaican family in Negril, Jamaica, in the seventies. In The Shadows of the Sea, Quinn awakens to Guns and Roses, Sweet Child of Mine. Crosby Campbell is haunted by strains of a Vivaldi concerto in The Devil’s Valet.
I’ve been blessed with a house full of music and a host of friends of all walks of the arts and of life. My former husband is a gifted forties-style crooner. I’ve had a live rock-n-roll band play in my music room. A sax soloist performed there once, and recently, a well-known Italian opera singer, Ulysses Borgia, did us the honors with an aria. I also have a very well-used karaoke machine!
This summer Helen and I took a magnificent, 1800-mile road trip along Pacific Coast Highway. As always, we brought our favorite CD’s and Helen brought along her VIDEO CAMERA. Cruising along Half Moon Bay, what should queue up on the CD player?? Guns and Roses! SWEET CHILD OF MINE. What washed over me at that point in time when that song came on? I don’t know! But, Helen has it on video. The question to you, dear blog readers, is (this is also a trick question of sorts, to see if any of you really read these sweet blogs o’ mine) SHOULD WE POST THE VIDEO?
”Music hath powers to soothe the savage breast.” (The Mourning Bride, by William Congreve)
Las Vegas rolled the lucky 999’s on 09/09/09. Wedding chapels were booked and couples got married in packs at 9:09 a.m./p.m. Dinners were discounted to $9.99. Winning poker hands of four nines were rewarded. There’s so much festivity, frolicking, and freakishness that surrounds odd calendar days and standardized calendar days such as Halloween.
This once in a millennium bundle of 09’s precedes a somber memorial date, 09/11/09. Nine years ago this newly-standardized calendar day, September 11, was birthed in blood by the coordinated attacks of Al-Qaeda terrorist hijackers upon the United States. What American could ever forget even the smallest detail? One could no more bury those visions than most of the victim’s families could bury their dead. I have my American flag posted at my front door to honor those who died, and also to honor their mortally wounded families, friends and loved ones. God bless YOU, Americans. Raise your flags and honor not just the 9/11 victims, but all who stand, and those who die, for America.
I get whiplash every year during the U.S. Open. I type a few lines, watch a few points and repeat the process. Tennis is my Other Passion. I’ve played for over twenty years, competitively and now 3 x’s a week just for the delight of it. Tennis is like writing in a sense; yah, you have to have some innate talent (hand eye coordination) but, you also have to concentrate and practice, practice, practice, to get a real handle on it. I think there is a general misperception that authors sit in a cloud of illusion and absentmindedly peck away at the keyboard. Nothing is further from the truth. Its takes a lot of focus and self-discipline to write a novel, and the first 110,000-word draft is only the beginning. Writing is intangible: a plot twist or character development can be driven right out of your head by the doorbell or the telephone ringing, or the dogs barking. It’s not like accounting where you can pick right back up where you left off and all the facts and figures still add up. There is no paycheck and no time clock. Like the tennis pros, writers are driven by love and a deep passion for the craft. And, it’s a rare few who make it to the finals.
I’m more than happy to annnounce that soon some of my short stories will be available for purchase in PDF format at my webstore. Bits and Pieces, a short crime fiction story that was pubished in Las Vegas Noir, 2008, was my first stab at crime. The resulting short story features one of my favorite characters. Madison Feldon is the only child of Las Vegas real estate tycoon, Louie Feldon. Years of being belittled and forced into starvation diets by her abusive father have turned Madison into a solitary young woman who still deprives herself even in the midst of plenty. As a fitness trainer and nutritionist, Madison feels she is giving something to a world that she knows she will always walk in as a stranger; until a new client, Garvey Kendall, comes along. Garvey seems to see beyond the brittle facade Madison has so carefully built around herself. As construction booms around Madison’s condo, bit by bit she begins to lose control. Even her only hobby, beading, becomes a symbol of her personal decay. There is only one person Madison can turn to for salavation. And when Garvey fails to rescue Madison…
Stop and take just a minute to laugh at this You Tube video…
SHATTERING THE GLASS “CIALING” (first published, Las Vegas Woman Magazine, August 2009)
by Christine McKellar
When I declared myself a born again virgin on the heels of two disappointing romances following my one and only divorce, I certainly gave no thought to one very dire consequence. No, not the lonely nights staring at reruns on TV and the dregs of a bottle of red wine. What I had neglected to consider is the bane of most women over forty, past menopause, who aren’t sexual athletes: the loss of the sex hormone estradiol. Estradiol is the most important form of estrogen found in the human body; male and female.
The threat to aging men is the overly advertised ED (yup, that dysfunction). Men have Viagra and Cialis, which is available at the click of a button, to help them through the inevitable process of male aging. There are clinics sprouting up nationwide that specialize solely in enhancing the sexual performance of males. Millions upon millions of advertising dollars are spent annually to make men aware of their options. Even more ridiculous, more than half of Viagra prescriptions are covered by insurance; yet, birth control pills for women are not. Now, there’s a dichotomy for you: Insure erections but make contraceptives an out-of-pocket expense for women. Who are these men having sex with, anyway? (Oh, I know, the babe in the nearby bathtub.)
However, the old adage is true it seems: if you don’t use it, you lose it. Born again virgin or not, on the off-chance that a decent man with a good sense of humor, some moral integrity, and a secure foothold in the world might come along, I decided I was game to ward off one more cruel disadvantage women have to deal with. To compensate for my diminishing estradiol, my personal physician prescribed a mild dose of estrogen that was to be used twice a week—and not orally. The dosage is slight and is designed only to be absorbed where it is applied; other tissues and bones aren’t affected as with oral hormone therapies.
When I shared this information with a circle of women friends my age and older, I was amazed at the response. Many of them clamored for more information. None of their doctors had thought to recommend this particular panacea. Among eight women, only one, me, had been made aware of this option to prolong a healthy sex life. And it’s not lost on me that my doctor is also a woman.
Mature women well know that just being a homo erectus doesn’t necessarily make a man a good lover. Shouldn’t the woman who is maturing along with her man be afforded sexual enhancement methods to insure she can match her mate in the ecstasy department? This is the age of the Vagina Monologues and Menopause the Musical, after all. Besides, if ED products really work so well, the question that begs an answer is—why is that guy and that woman in separate bathtubs?
I am a lover of all things Japanese. The “musical muscle” show, Matsuri, at the Imperial Palace, is a must see for everyone…of all ages. The costumes and stage settings are as spectacular as the act. The music is good, too! I spent two weeks in Japan four years ago with my then-teenage son and his best friend. I was so enchanted with the people, customs, and the land that I wove Japan into the plot of my fiction suspense novel, The Devil’s Valet; my protagonist goes to Japan for her honeymoon…and the key to all her anquish lies there as well. Ahhh, fiction, I simply adore it!
romance and the tangled web
If given half a chance Christine McKellar would give Jackie Collins a run for her publishing money. The Devil’s Valet, McKellar’s third thrilling, steamy novel introduces readers to a lovely set of likable California twins. The author fleshes them out, and when the heroine, Crosby Campbell falls in love with an English film star, the tangled web of murder, seduction and intrigue springs from Manhattan to the Hamptons to London to Tokyo and California. The environments are intoxicating, the characters filled with power and passion. And, even though Crosby’s handsome husband is villainous, McKellar makes him a truly tragic figure. She avoids what I like to call the cookie cutter character pitfall, which is refreshing. Even characters with few redeeming qualities are complex. Nothing is entirely black or white.
Published by Philia Publishing, The Devil’s Valet is a page-turner. How far would you go to get what you want? To get revenge? To find the love of your life? Who is Darby’s father, and why did a Japanese billionaire kidnap her? If you want a fast, adventurous read featuring characters that will stay with you, then you will find McKellar’s latest book the perfect escape.
Mother Goose covered all the bases with the birthday week rhyme: Click here: Monday’s Child Is Fair of Face by Mother Goose . I’m a Saturday’s child: “works hard for a living.” And while, yes, that is the case, at least I get to work at what I love, writing! I’ve seen “the look” on reader’s faces at book signings, and that alone makes all the hours of toil worth the while. Writing is truly a labor of love and passion. The odds of getting on the best seller lists are slim, at best. I know, I’ve written and published three novels in the past three years. And, all three are going to CD’s soon. So, I’ll soon be saying, “I’ve written, published AND recorded three novels in three years!” (Click the above link to find out which Child you are.)