Water Wings
Owners: Monty and Gomery (age 3)
Our first shiny fun giveaway here at Wilfair HQ, the Caro Emerald album + more giveway, has officially wrapped! I got an email from her Very Nice PR Team with the super-secret name of the person selected from this blog. But it is a secret no longer: Bess, you won!
So, Ms. Bess, if you could email me some specifics, specifically your address, they will get the good stuff out to you. I can't wait to hear what you think about the album. I hope we have some of the same favorite songs. I bet we will.
And I'd be remiss if I didn't post a few style pics of the singer one more time. The coral-red dress in the second photo? This might be my dream dress. Is there a slight smocking thing going on around the neckline? That is so attractive. Why aren't we all rocking the smocking more?
It's important to me that, in the Wilfair books, not every joke lands.
When a joke lands, it should deliver a kick to the pants or an airtight punchline or something surprising. But that isn't life, as we all know. Life is messy and unstructured and what we say is often met by crickets chirping, golf claps, or worse, silence.
An example of this would be near the start of "Wilfair" when Fair Finley is at the motel for the first time. She does her go-to mastodon claws, a nervous habit, then quickly explains to the Overbove cousins that she's a prehistoric mastodon.
Her joke didn't land. Or perhaps she didn't have enough confidence to wait out their reactions to her hand claws. Once she's in the mastodon pose, she senses she has made a mistake.
In this spirit, I've gone back and rewritten Fair and Gomery conversations that seemed to "click" a little too well to my ear. I like a realer, messier charm that sneaks up. I prefer a looser, rangier, up-and-down conversation, not an exchange where every perfectly polished statement falls immediately into the space cut specifically for it, like a child's toy block might fit a corresponding hole.
And while The Wilfair exists in a heightened magical realism world, I want the people to be like us. Fallible, prone to raising mastodon claws and then lowering them, embarrassed, and sometimes running out of things to say.
Two more examples: Fair loses her train of thought while chewing out Thurs Mathers in "Stay Awhile" and admits it. And earlier in the book, Monty starts a saucy joke but determines his punchline stinks, so he drops it with a shrug.
I will say Monty is permitted to land more jokes than most of the characters, but even he is unhappy when he feels the reaction he expected is paltry. "That's gold!" he complains to Fair after she tsks him, post-joke.
None of this is to say that I sit at my desk with a funny-o-meter that tells me if some humorous bits work and some do not. If only. But if I get a sense that everything is flowing a little too efficiently, especially the private moments of Ms. Finley and Montgomery X. Overbove, I return to the conversation with my blunt-edged kindergarten scissors and do some gentle, slightly mischievous snipping.
A number of readers 'round Wilfair HQ are big fans of "The Lizzie Bennet Diaries." Not familiar? I bet you are, Austen aficionado: It's the modern online spin on "Pride & Prejudice" that became quite the sensation since it debuted just over a year ago.
I enjoyed it, too, and I'm looking forward to Welcome to Sanditon, which kicks off on Monday, May 13.
So. If you watched "The Lizzie Bennet Diaries" you might have enjoyed the character Jane and her singular fashion and hair choices. She reminded me of Fair Finley in a few ways, and certainly sartorially, and there wasn't a vintage-fab Jane costume I wasn't wild about.
Then I saw this sweet pic of Jane herself, actress Laura Spencer, in a snood. Please. This is so Fair Finley. I'm getting closer to really attempting this look.
What did you like best about the series?
One of the trickiest bits of the books is conveying a true and warm sense of parent love even as the parents of the books are off on their own projects and dealing with business. It is very important to me that parent positivity remains a Wilfair strong suit, even as the main characters weather things on their own.
Fair is very much connected to her mom and dad, via video chat, and she speaks with them several times a day. She spends some quality time with her father, too, in "Redwoodian" and "Stay Awhile."
Monty and Gomery are absolutely their moms' biggest fans. I think the cousins are both ready to leave the motel, age- and maturity-wise, but they feel complicated about leaving their mothers to run things. Not that their moms aren't capable, but for support reasons. It has been established Gomery and Monty cover the motel's nightbell, to give their mothers a break.
I just know that if Gomery got an apartment he'd wake up every night at 2 a.m. and wonder if his mother was having to check in after-hours guests. Monty would probably not wake up at 2 a.m. every night but he'd likely quiz his mom about how often she was waking up for the bell.
And because she didn't want him to worry, Billie Overbove would probably fib to her son and say "almost never." And Monty would probably fib to himself, wanting to believe that.
Ages 19, 20, and 21 are funny. You can live apart from your family, and manage, for the most part. But you still have complicated feelings and little homesicknesses over your parents or siblings or the people you spent the majority of your life living with. Everything you've known has very recently changed in a major way, and it can be discombobulating.
You also are walking that line between still wanting and needing guidance and wanting and needing to try things out and make mistakes. Actually, scratch that. At 19 or 20 you're more on the make-mistakes side of equation.
But I suppose parents make mistakes, too. I think about Sutton's father almost more than any other character who has been mentioned but not met in the books.
There are parents yet to meet, maybe related to our Wilfair friends or maybe parental in spirit. I adore both.
And there are some wonderful moms who visit this blog. You've shared sweet kid photos and you've weighed in from a parental perspective. I support this, invite it, welcome it, and love. Happy Mother's Day! And Happy Mother's Day to my own incredible mom and mom-in-law, too! xo
Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrang.
"One second," I coughed, briefly waking then promptly falling back to sleep.
The sound continued to ring, in the distance. It was like the night bell but whinier in pitch. Not really even whiny but... insistent and piercing. Not a friendly, fuzzy, warm buzz, but the aural equivalent of getting pecked on the side of the head by a hungry gull.
"Be right there," dream me said to the dream people standing inside my dream. Dream suitcases, overly large and bulky as old steamer trunks, surrounded the dream people. A dream man was asking dream me if I'd give him half-off a second room if he stayed a third night.
Banging in some far-off corner, bang bang bang, drowned out the dream man's request for a room discount.
"How can I help you?" I asked the center of my pillow.
A muffled "Mer" floated above the dream heads of the dream people inside my dream. I sat up, reached out my left hand, then my right, knocked the glass of water off my nightstand, swore, then continued to pat my palm around, finally landing on a pair of glasses.
Stepping in water as I put them on, I made my way to my door, realizing in the four steps between my bed and the room's entryway that I wasn't hearing the nightbell. It was The Wilfair Hotel's alarm.
"It's The Wilfair's alarm," said my cousin the moment I slid the latch. Monty scratched his head and stretched his mouth to summon a yawn that wasn't quite materializing. "No matter that we've asked them to turn the volume WAY down multiple times. No matter that we've told them the whole block can hear it, museums, office towers, and the Mmm Mmm Café included. No matter that it always seems to be some drunky guest who pulls it, meaning their well-paid guard is slacking. Nope nope, it's "everybody up! Wakey wakey!"
"Is the hotel all right?"
Monty gave the eight-story building a once-over and produced a thumbs up. "Seems so. My bet? Some awesome person dared another awesome person to pull it." He watched hotel guests spilling out the back door. "I hope I meet those brave lads, so I can shake their hands and tell them how fully developed their choice-making systems are."
"Where's my mom? Aunt Billie? Are they awake?"
"Are they awake? You're the laze-about. They're over filing a formal complaint with Lord and Lady Finley."
"In the middle of the alarm?" I reached two fingers under a lens and rubbed my eyelid. "In the middle of the night?"
"Ooookay. They're probably fishing for annoyed hotel guests. Grumpy grumps who'd like a room where they can finish out sleeping for the night for half the price and none of the alarm." Monty lifted his face and chin-pointed toward the hotel's citrus topiaries. Milling people wearing either monogrammed robes or rumply pajamas stood around staring at nothing while looking cold, confused, and chapped of cheek. A few guests wore less, and they seemed especially chilly.
I rubbed my other eye. "Can they turn it off? It's loud." It was stating the obvious to the person who obviously was going to take me to task.
"I don't know, let me call Fair Finley on my magic telephone." Monty dialed his palm, flattened his hand, and held it to his ear. "Hello? Fair? It's the losers over at the motel. Wait! Don't hang up." He shook his hand, then returned it to his ear. "You there? So the sound emitting from your precious important historic landmark is rattling the old bones beneath the tar pits, not to mention our brains and teeth. What? Really? You don't say. You're wearing what? Fair Finley! I had no idea you'd even own such a garment! My stars!" Monty turned away, covering his fake phone hand with his other hand. "Excuse me, Mer, but I have to take this."
"She's right there." I pointed at the other side of the motel pool.
Monty's eyes expanded. He spoke into his hand. "Fair! You're here. I have to go." He crammed his phone hand in his pocket. "What the hell?"
We watched the two small Finley boys, Wil and Bo, make for the tar bubble next to the pool. Their sister was in sleepy pursuit, whisper-shouting their names.
Monty strode over to the diving board, waving his arms. "Playtime is over, Finleys. It hasn't even started, in fact. This is a business. You have money for a motel room? Or a club sandwich? You're in, what, first grade now, right? You must draw a salary."
The Finley twins, gape-eyed and hangy of mouth, shook their heads.
"Then it's night-night time. Time for you to go home. No playing in the tar, which is frankly disgusting." Monty's voice softened. "Goodnight, monsters." He paused and waited. "I called you two monsters! You got nothing?"
The boys snarled and hunched their shoulders.
"That's better," nodded Monty, holding up his telephone hand in a monster-approving high five. "Now git."
I reached behind my door, grabbed my button-up off the peg, and shoved my arms into it, buttoning it as I hurried around the pool.
"What about you, Fair Finley? Do you have money for a motel room?" My cousin put his hands on his hips.
"I don't, like. Want anything from you," said my lifelong neighbor, gathering her brothers and turning for the hotel.
Monty dried an invisible tear. "That hurts. My tender self-esteem, shattered."
I buttoned the final button and cleared my throat. "We want something from you."
She turned. "What?"
"We need to ask the hotel to turn the volume down on the alarm. Alarms are serious, I know, but The Wilfair has a lot of false ones, and the noise wakes us up. And our guests."
Her eyes swept the paint-faded motel doors. Not a single Fairwil guest stood outside.
"When we have guests," I continued. "Which we do, tonight. Room 108. But I guess they're, uh. Out. At 3 o'clock in the morning."
She placed a hand on each of her brothers' heads and stared at the room. The pool area was shadowy, lit only by the bare bulb hanging in front of the motel lobby, but I saw a distinct look of pity on her face. It was the one emotion I preferred not to see register on any faces as they surveyed Motel Fairwil, especially hers.
Moving past the pity, I took in several more things about her face and person, with haste. A small speck of sleep sat at the outside corner of one eye. A dime-sized dab of toothpaste, or perhaps pimple cream, formed a perfect dot in the middle of her chin. Her robe was a Wilfair robe, complete with opulent pocket crest, but the nightgown beneath it was the color of a tangerine. And her everywhere hair, usually constrained by some vintage hat or scarf, could only be called a freaking mess.
"I'm sorry. I'm really, really sorry. First thing, in the morning, we'll summon, like, the alarm volume minimizing, uh, professionals. If that's even a thing." She did seem sorry, though I couldn't tell if it was because she was sorry about the noise or that she had remembered, at that very moment, that she'd ventured downstairs without washing her face. She was going to see herself, in her mirror, either in a few minutes, or in the morning, and I guessed she'd be embarrassed.
Not embarrassed about seeing my cousin or myself. I knew she didn't care about us. Worse than that, I suspected she didn't care for us. There were fleeting signs, though, that I was wrong. She'd sometimes wave at us from the citrus topiaries when things were especially heated between the motel and hotel. Every wave went into my personal wave bank, which I sometimes drew upon when I needed to believe the motel's large, slightly intimidating neighbor had our interests at heart.
I didn't know the inside of the building well, so I couldn't say exactly where the structure's brains or thoughts or muscles might be located. But I felt fairly certain that the hotel's heart beat somewhere on the third floor.
Monty spread his arms wide, then chopped air. "Alarm volume minimizing task force! You're swell, Fair Finley. Say, did you know I'm getting my driver's permit this week? Want to take a sweet ride in my stylin' motel van?" Monty pointed toward the pocket-sized parking lot where our early-model transport sat. It was a boxy vehicle that was attractively banged up near the passenger side tire well, but at least the air-conditioning periodically worked.
"Thank you, but I have drivers," she said, the look of pity, or something adjacent to pity, returning to her face. "I mean, like, our guests do, but I sometimes get rides. To. Uh." The thought remain unfinished.
"Can we go get pie?" begged Wil, pointing at the open-all-night Mmm Mmm Café.
"Pie!" shouted Bo.
"No, boys. We have our own restaurant and you want to go next door? Why?"
"Because next door is fun!" Monty exclaimed.
His statement made her pause. She suddenly turned and eyed my shirt sleeves. "You're not freezing?"
"A bit, yes." I unrolled the cuffs.
The blaring ceased, and the silence that followed seemed as pronounced and as loud as the alarm itself, as the silence following anything ear-splitting always seems to be.
She smiled. "So, like. Sorry. I'll tell my mom and dad. I don't want us waking motel guests. Guest." She made a pity face, again, then realized she was making it, again, and stopped. "Goodnight."
"Night," waved Monty, stooping to pick up an errant pool noodle near the diving board.
"See you," I said, taking one last read of all the outward parts that combined to make up my neighbor's physical self. She was definitely going to be embarrassed when she next encountered a mirror. I wanted to tell her "It's no big deal, about your chin," but didn't.
"What?" she asked.
"What?"
"Did you just say something?"
"No."
Did I?
Later the next day, after some tired, foggy-headed reflection, I determined three things.
1. The dot on her chin was probably toothpaste, given the faint aqua stripe that ran through it, and its thicker consistency. Whether it was there because she was an especially extravagant teeth-brusher, or because she'd used some toothpaste in the place of pimple cream, I wasn't sure. Both ideas appealed, strangely.
2. What I had interpreted as the look of pity on her face probably held a hefty swirl of sympathy, or even empathy. Or, at the very least, it was a look that said that while she didn't exactly understand the motel's daily predicaments, she didn't want us to feel like losers. Maybe she even wanted us to be happy.
3. Her nightgown, or at least its hem, was not so much tangerine in hue as pink grapefruit. The inside of a pink grapefruit, not the skin.
For some delightful reason the Buddy Barter has come up a few times in conversation this past week.
Know about it? It's where I send your pal a free book. Done.
But I worry that the bar may seem too high with the whole "writing me for the book" part. So I'm here to say a few things.
1. If we've spoken, you know I'm a dedicated goofball, so your email or your friend's email in no way needs to be formal or lengthy. Whenever anybody addresses me as "Ms. Painter" I want to print it out, decorate it with glitter, and pin it to my shirt all week, just to feel proper and important. So sweet. But is it me? Not at all.
2. Better yet, I'd love a very short email that is dominated by a photo of the sender's favorite food. I'm including my own, as an example.
3. Drat. I'm out of things to say with numbers. And I love listing things via numbers! Okay, here's one of my dream dishes. Actually, I'm curious what everyone likes for their favorite food. (wealhtheow, I still think there should be a post for that secret sauce recipe -- no pressure but want.)
My perfect weekend lunch: a savory falafel wrap and a beautiful craft beer, preferably enjoyed outdoors.
I'm excited because we're doing something that hasn't yet been done 'round Wilfair HQ: a giveaway!
Not of books -- you know I'm happy to send your friend a free copy, no fuss needed -- but of an album that is 1000% the type of music that would play inside The Wilfair Hotel's lobby. Wait for it. Get stoked. It's "Deleted Scenes from the Cutting Room Floor" by singer Caro Emerald.
So. Remember when I posted about Caro, a wonderful chanteuse the press nicknamed "the Dutch Adele," earlier this year? About her fantastic old-school Hollywood sound and gorgeous vintage look? And many "Wilfair" readers revealed that they, too, are wild about her music?
Caro's very nice people found this blog and asked me if I wanted to give away a "special edition prize package" that includes the album and a tote?
Uh, heck yeah I do!
But but but WAIT. Not only did they set up a sign-up link solely for people visiting this blog, they put me on the horn with Caro herself.
Heart flutters. Damp forehead. Overly loud nervous giggles. Thoroughly starstruck. (This was me, not Caro.)
She was incredibly charming, as you would guess, and didn't mind my rather offbeat questions.
One fun, book-related tidbit? Caro's favorite old movie is "Rear Window," a film that gets several mentions in "Wilfair," given the "Rear Window"-ish building set-up of the hotel and motel.
Love.
She also tours quite a bit, so I asked her about her hotel preferences and what she looks for on the road. "I really love hotel rooms," she revealed. "That's a fun part of my job. I travel everywhere and every time I enter a new hotel room it's like a playground to me! What's inside, what they have in the bathroom, how many closets they have, I just love it."
Caro also revealed a preference for big bathtubs and luxury properties, so I'm sure she would be quite comfortable at The Wilfair Hotel. (Though Fair Finley might be exceedingly fidgety about having someone who'd be one of her style idols staying under her hotel's roof.)
My final question was about Caro's funky-fab headwear. We're fans of old-school snoods 'round Wilfair HQ, of course, so I inquired about her beautiful hair pieces and if she had tips. "You have to look at your hair as something you can create," she advised. "When you put a hat on, you always have to look at the silhouette. And pin it very severely to your head. You can actually attach anything you want to, to your head, as long as you use a lot of pins. We've tried stuff that we weren't sure it was a hat! If it looks good, it's good."
Total agreement. Haven't you all seen a clutch of fake cherries or a bit of plastic Christmas holly and felt the urge to wear it as a behind-the-ear adornment? Full admission: I've done it.
Many thanks to Caro for chatting with me and now! A giveaway! Here's the deal: You only need to go here to sign up. The giveaway will end at the end of Tuesday, May 14 (so one week). And someone from this blog will win when Caro Emerald's very nice PR team picks the victor. (Thank you, Caro Emerald's very nice PR team!)
Trust: You want this album. "Back It Up" is impossible to listen to only once. Fact. (Can't wait to hear her new album "The Shocking Miss Emerald"; it isn't yet available in the U.S. but soon, I hope.)
That's it. Look at us, doing a giveaway, and a really good one, too! I'm charmed, I'm thrilled, and I've got a heart full of funky vintage Hollywood sounds and retro elegance. Cheers, Caro!
What's your favorite scent?
I'm always curious about the scents people respond to, and how those smells influence other areas of one's life.
Me? I like woodsmoke best. (Apple cider is a close second and cake-y smells are third.) When I think of woodsmoke I think of mesquite or juniper in a cabin fireplace in the distance on a frosty night.
We're having one of those here in LA -- it's pouring -- and a few fireplaces are going. It can surprise people that May and June lean cooler in Los Angeles, but we have two local terms for the weather phenomenon: May Gray and June Gloom.
Monty does not care for either period, because then he has to cheer up guests who find the pool too chilly to use. Fair enjoys cooler weather. Gomery doesn't mind it, and Sutton complains a bit, because the fruit stand is essentially outdoors.
So, woodsmoke. I like it so much I set some Very Big Moments near The Redwoodian's fireplace. I can smell all of those scenes.
Yeah, I said it.
Tell me your favorite scent and why. Maybe I can find a way to work those into "Fairwil"? We'll see. :)
Caitlin has gifted us with another very, very, very, VERY nice illustration. Reader talent, hooray!
She spied a photograph and was inspired to sketch it with a particular Fair/Gomery spin, complete with orange swimsuit. It arrived in my inbox tonight with these "Stay Awhile" lines:
"Are you walking out of the pool in this analogy?"
"Picture what you like."
"Oh, I do."
Thank you, Caitlin. And happy start of the week, everyone!
It's no secret: I like meeting you.
That these meetings started going down at Wilshire Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue still makes me laugh. Most writer-reader introductions tend to be inside a bookstore or maybe a convention hall, not a traffic-busy corner in the booming heart of Los Angeles.
wealhtheow started it. Oh yes she did.
I got the chance to meet Elisa, who lives in Iowa, and her sweet husband Ryan over the weekend. Elisa is a teacher and she writes a great email. I couldn't wait to know her in person. (She's also the first reader I've had a three-person conversation with; her pal Nicole is reading the books, too. Hi, Nicole! When will you come see me? Invitation's open.)
Elisa was smart and cheerful and I immediately coveted her funky glasses, but it would have been awkward if I'd snatched them and taken off running down Wilshire. If you wear glasses, though, you know how it is to covet another person's cool frames. She was also dressed all in purple, which revealed she has flair and a good amount of oomph.
My husband played photographer for the day -- thanks, Chris! -- and he and Ryan talked cartoons. Don't you love Moments like that, capital M? I do.
Here's our snapshot. Let me again state that Elisa lives in Iowa, I live in LA, and yet Elisa knew how to dress for the day, and I did not, choosing a sweater top for a morning that turned out to be rather roasting. (If only there was a motel pool nearby that I could jump into.)
Loved meeting you, Elisa! Thank you for stopping by Wilshire & Fairfax.
Oh, and something new? I've put the Readers Visit Wilfair photos all in a bunch. Check out the nav bar!
Remember when I said that if I saw art at a party-- not Art, as in a man named Art, but art, as in tangible output stemming from creative urge, I'd probably pat my knee and ask it to sit on my lap?
Yeah, I said that.
In short, I like visuals. And I've been enjoying many visuals as a regular reader of several Tumblr blogs for years. But I've never had my own.
But then Caitlin D. -- you admired her terrific illustration in the post below -- shared some of her "Stay Awhile" quote posters on her Tumblr, and soon I was visiting her blog regularly. I got inspired to give a Wilfair Tumblr a go and now it is officially rolling. Huzzah! Confetti! Dancing cats!
I'm posting anything/everything that has the scent of Wilfairiana to it. You can, too; I've added a "Submit" button to my page:
Wilfair
Here's where to find Caitlin, Caitlin, Chiara, myranda, and Nikki:
Caitlin D.
Caitlin O.
Chiara
Myranda
Nikki
You know 'em from the comments, so I am sure you'll groove on what they're
Tumblring, too. Austen! "Game of Thrones"! Anime! Ideas! Social Justice!
Friendship! "New Girl"! "30 Rock"! "Doctor Who"! Animals! A recipe for chocolate
lasagna!
Laws of like attracting like? I'm happy to report those laws govern the Wilfairverse, because now that I'm seeing more of what my ladies enjoy, I'm nodding vigorously and pumping both fists. The things I just listed? This is all my stuff, too, or stuff adjacent to my stuff.
(Isn't it fun knowing people who have stuff that lives next door to your stuff? Chances are high you'll get along.)
If you want me to add your blog to that list, just stick it in the comments or email me! Looking forward to getting to know the stuff that orbits your world.
One of the most special things, to me, here at Wilfair HQ? Reader synchronicity.
There are also some weird reader-reader-me triangulations in terms of what people would like to see in the books and what is actually ahead, but I'll let future scientists study that, after they get done with studying everything else in the entire universe.
Nikki made a comment in the ar-mar-zing Shoes thread about wanting to see an actual picture of a photo in her head of Fair & Gomery. I don't know exactly what she's seeing, of course, but the conversation leads me to believe it might be something like the illustration pictured here.
Which had already been created by Caitlin.
What? I KNOW. High fives for reader synchronicity!
Caitlin, thank you for sharing this. If I wrote out a dozen "loves" right here it would not quite convey how much I love this drawing. And how well it captures the feeling of the books. Captures and joyfully furthers!
When I first started thinking about the Wilfair series, I thought about all the stories I'd like to do. I wanted to center each around a hotel, and have that hotel be the title. Done? Done.
I gave the Finley family nine hotels, with a potential tenth property floating out there. The Overboves have two places, neither a true hotel: Motel Fairwil and the Stay Awhile Cabins.
My first thought was that each story could be short-ish, maybe 40-thousand words. I knew this might be a little tricky if the books ever went into print, but I figured three books could be bundled together.
But as I jumped into "Wilfair," then "Redwoodian," then "Stay Awhile," and now "Fairwil," I saw how the stories would unfold. I'm a short-length writer for work but a long writer with fiction, which makes my dream of doing a stand-alone book, something I actually love, harder to achieve.
I aim to be a tight writer, too. I do far more cutting than including as I go. (If I went over to summarygomery.blogspot.com, the place I stick the stuff I didn't use, and put all the words that got cut from the first three books, it would be one giant blog. Oof.)
The upshot? I decided to put four covers on the blog and see how I felt about continuing as I neared the fourth. And where things stood in the story and the mysteries that have been set up. Would I write something for each hotel? Is there story enough? Would all the characters achieve the things they should long before I've reached that seventh or eighth hotel?
Questions.
I'm feeling there might be a fifth book at this point. I could wrap it all up in four, but I fear "Fairwil" would be hefty. Too hefty. I have a personal policy against going over a certain word count, and it would exceed it.
Which is all leading up to a post I published last night, and then took down, so I could expand upon it a little. Now I feel as if I've expanded. :) Here's that post.
Endings are positive, and I welcome them, even with projects I've enjoyed, and I really, really enjoy doing this, and I enjoy you, very much.
And I know for a fact I'll be haunted by some of the unwritten stories, and Fair and friends, for a long time to come, but that's kind of fun, too. Everyone should have something nice to haunt them.
But I don't know if that means I'll return to writing about them one day.
So, in the short term? It means a heck of a hefty fourth book, or a nicely sized fourth book and a nicely sized fifth book. And then, the end.
I wonder what the very last word will be? I have a hunch.
Everything in a book is personal to a writer, to varying degrees, but certain moments are apt to ring a writer's bell a little louder than others.
Sutton Von Hunt says a few of the "Stay Awhile" lines that are nearest to my heart. I'm not puffing my chest and saying these bits of dialogue are exceptional, but they do mean a lot to me.
Here is the first one:
"I'm nobody's girlfriend!"
Sutton says this in The Redwoodian's kitchen when the misguided do-gooders claim that Sutton and Fair are Monty and Gomery's girlfriends. The full line is actually "Hey! I'm nobody's girlfriend! Watch it!"
This might seem like a odd line to land upon, as being especially important, but I feel close to it.
Why? I love love stories, but I've never enjoyed swoony tales where people aren't comfortable being alone. People need to have a good sense of themselves whether they are in a couple or not. It's about a million times more satisfying if people come together from that place, a place of self-worth, than from a spot where they did not feel not complete in their singular awesomeness.
We all know this, but that message isn't always strongly delivered, for my tastes. Needing a better half? Meh. Nope. People of Wilfair desire their equal whole.
(Prior Yates maybe has issues with fully grasping that. Yep.)
Sutton also delivers the line with enthusiasm. She's just fine being nobody's girlfriend. She likes romance, and guys, and crushes, but it isn't paramount to her to be in a relationship.
Upshot? That line, and a few more, set that tone: Everyone, or nearly everyone, in "Wilfair" is fine on their own. Are some of the people lonely? Yes. Do some of the people in the books want to be with other people in the books? That, I hope, is very, very clear at this point. But is everyone a-ok walkin' their own path by their owndamnselves? You bet.
Is it having it both ways? A love book brimming with sweet words and meaningful glances that also contains a not-small dose of nobody's-girlfriend-ness? I see them as counterweights attached to the same scale, keeping everything balanced.
Comments and questions? Adore. Relish. Love. I cuddle them to my heart and stroke them and pet them and ponder them and eventually answer them. Well, most of the time! If I ever miss yours say "hey, Alysia! You didn't see my comment. What gives?" And I'll be on it, lickety-split.
Apologies. Daily life.
But sometimes a comment taps into something that could and should be bubbled up. (Well, they all do, or they further discussions. Did I mention I love and pet and hug your comments? Yes.)
Here's Erika's question from the Training Wheels Off post. I've included it in full, plus my answer, plus a detail from cover #5. A cover that may evolve still but I don't mind giving a peek at an early draft now.
Erika said...
I have been visiting this blog post almost everyday since it went
up and it makes me want to write a fanfic about a freak cold front in
LA featuring Gomery and Fair. *le sigh*
It really is a great piece of art and it really works for this series I think. :)
Question: (I am sure you've answered this before but...) how many books do you foresee in this series?
Fair
When she's not in evening gloves, our hotelier goes with a stylish
wrist corsage. But instead of a traditional floral deal, she might go
origami or felt.
Those atmospheric motel photos snapped by our own Ginny? I can't tell you how many times I've revisited them. They are so well done, and they capture a certain desert motel spirit that can elude the camera. Love.
I was prepared to revel in those for a bit and then Ginny sent me MORE photos. And these? Too much. As mentioned, she has a special photo shoot planned this summer, and the shoot will have a bit of a Wilfair theme.
Again, I reiterate: !!!!!
Ginny ordered a dress and snood and gave the fashion for shoot a whirl. Lovely, amazing, beautiful! I'm clapping here in LA, just a state away from you, Ginny. Clapping! By myself. With excitement. At dawn. Who claps at dawn? I do, over you.
I also asked her about the snood, and how hard it was to get a handle on. Because? The netting. Problematic. She says "I just took the hair framing my face and twisted it back to the sides and held it with bobby pins. Then I kind of folded the bottom of my hair over while I put the snood on."
Sounds doable. Now I'm tempted to give one a try. Here's where she got hers. A bargain! Yes.
And, as a bonus? Ginny's cute son Jake makes a cameo in the last photo, with his "castlelope" creation, a castle he made from cantaloupe cubes. So creative, and real-life take on some of the fruit creations in the books (Sutton's strawberry Redwoodian). Yay, Jake! He also makes a sweet cameo with his mom in picture #2.
Also, cheers to Melodee, Ginny's mom (and a "Wilfair" reader, too!) for helping Jake out on the toothpick front. Toothpicks are very important in fruit art, as Sutton well knows.
I recently discovered the work of artist Lorraine LeBer Rocha. She's fantastic and this illustration? There are a dozen things that remind me of Motel Fairwil and its sweet swimming pool.
Hi, diving board.
Motel Fairwil's pool will never freeze over, and I'm pretty sure Fair, Gomery, and Monty do not know how to ice skate. Plus, they need to take bicycle lessons before they do anything else recreational.
Who will be first, though, to get the training wheels off? Would it be a competition?
Some searching around reveals that first-time adult cyclists don't always have the option of training wheels. Hmm. Skinned elbows and a few bruised egos may be ahead at Wilshire and Fairfax.
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