Best Books of the Year and What's to Come in 2016

It's been a great year. I won a prize for flash fiction, got seriously started on my editing business, released Unpredictable Worlds and received some recognition for it, released Tree/House in audiobook, spent ten gorgeous and hard-earned days in Spain, took part in Launch Lab, made it safely to my new home, and had Seven Noble Knights accepted for publication, to name just a few of the best events.

I also read quite a few good books. Which were the best?

That's really not a fair question in the year when the grand finale of a trilogy I have passionately, unreasonably adored came out.

The Map of Chaos by Félix J. Palma

Which book is best is hardly fair in light of another fact: this one is the manifestation of a historical novel I hoped would materialize some day to dramatize the life of Queen Emma for this Anglo-Saxon enthusiast.

The Price of Blood by Patricia Bracewell

So there you have it, the best novels (in my humble opinion) of 2015. The best nonfiction book was undoubtedly La nación inventada by Arsenio and Ignacio Escolar. I enjoyed this book more than I expected to (which is saying a lot) and will probably tell you more about it in future posts.

The year 2016 will see the debut of my darling Seven Noble Knights, so many of my resolutions have something to do with getting it into the limelight as much as possible. I also plan to draft the sequel this year. You didn't know Seven Noble Knights was going to have a sequel? It's a pleasant surprise for all of us! For those of you waiting patiently for more of my unusual contemporary work, I've resolved to get Awash in Talent published this year. More on that soon, for sure. In my personal life and "day job," I've got a lot to do to make this latest move make sense. In the meantime, if you need an editor for your awesome novel, call on me.

Vague as they seem, these are my professional resolutions, leaving room for the surprises that always seem to crop up.

What are your plans for 2016? Happy new year!

A selection of some of the other best books of 2015:

Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell

Along the Far Shores by Kristin Gleeson

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

Mermaids in Paradise  by Lydia Millet

Raven Brought the Light by Kristin Gleeson

Lucky Us by Amy Bloom

The Gracekeepers by Kirsty Logan

Love in Infant Monkeys by Lydia Millet

Retracing Our Steps

As you'll note in the video above, it sounds better in Spanish: Volveré sobre mis pasos. I'm going to retrace my steps. 

Since I'm in my beloved New England now, you might think the next step would be Pennsylvania, where my husband and I moved from Massachusetts in 2010 to accept a job. No, we're skipping that formality and heading straight to the unavoidable: Arizona. 

The first time we went to Arizona, there was little purposeful about it. It was a desperate move to keep us from insolvency and to help my bereaved sister-in-law. 

Looking back, we actually liked quite a bit about living there, even though while we were there, we never tired of dreaming of getting out. This time, our move to Arizona is full of purpose. I intend to reconnect with people I still know there and get some of that desert mojo that was so productive for my writing before. 

Connecting with people is the most important thing, not location. 

Other things to look forward to in Arizona:
Great Mexican food
The Tucson Festival of Books
Coyote and bobcat sightings
Springtime
Et cetera...

I discovered long ago that there are no guarantees, especially where location is concerned. But here's to intentionality.

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring 
Will be to arrive where we started 
And know the place for the first time.         —T. S. Eliot

Birthday Facts About Jessica K, 2015

Waterfire in Providence has more pyres. 

I'm taking cues from a previous post for this one. Keep the plagiarism close to home.

1. Yesterday was my birthday!

2. Waterfire in Providence has more pyres than I had birthday candles. Thank goodness!

3. My husband and I have been mock-lamenting the fact that nothing could ever top the gift I got last year. Achieving a lifelong dream and having it be so moving... Nothing better.

4. This is the first birthday in five years that I'm living in exactly the same building as I was for my last birthday! Before that, it was a hotel in North Carolina (2013), an apartment in Atlanta (2012), an apartment in Arizona (2011), a condo in Pennsylvania (2010), and an apartment in Cambridge, MA (2009 and 2008). That skips a couple of locations we happened leave before August. And yes, our traveling feet are itching to get on the move again.

5. Partially because we haven't moved in the interim, and partially because of the theory of the way perception of time collapses as we age, it really doesn't seem as if a whole year has passed since my last birthday. Normally I can tell the difference between years because we're in a different location; this time the changes are more subtle.

6. One change is that last year, I didn't have to ask for time off because my birthday was on a Saturday. This year, I don't have to ask for time off because I'm freelancing, so time management is all up to me, anyway. My husband, however, had to do a lot of fancy footwork to get some time off because he now has a job where he usually has to work on Sundays.

7. I thought I would have "it" all figured out by this age. I'm not sure if that was a silly thing to think or it really has become harder to get one's affairs in order in this tumultuous world.

8. Here's what I've figured out: I love my husband. I love Spain. I love rhinos. I love living in New England. I don't ask for a lot, and most of the time I get even less than I ask for. New theory: ask for more.

Some of 2014's Gifts

Inspired by Tara Lynne Groth, who blogs from the last place I lived and who was inspired by another blogger, who was inspired by a blogger before that, I'm taking the last day of the year to reflect on 2014. Skimming over the bad news of the year, here are ten things I can consider 2014's gifts.

1. My husband and I moved to the Northeast after five long years away.

2. I got a job working with my two favorite languages, English and Spanish.

3. This job meant that my husband and I could stay in the Northeast.

4. Early snow.

5. No traffic accidents.

6. I finished my second novel, Awash in Talent, and the people who've read it say it's my best writing yet.

7. I got to meet Thelma and Louise.

8. I got to see Harapan.

9. Saxophone Santa.

10. My husband reads to me and sings me Happy Birthday for weeks surrounding the actual day. This amounts to more good fortune than can be counted, period.

Six Years of Christmas

Having a full time job has made me into one of those people who just can't do it all. This blog has suffered most. I've worked hard on it for years and appreciate every single one of my readers, so my New Year's Resolution will have something to do with establishing a regular schedule here again.

Looking back on the year at this holiday time has brought to mind all the travels (and accompanying emotional ups and downs) my husband and I have done since we met. And so, enjoy photos that represent Christmas through the past six years.

2008

We had been living together in Massachusetts for half a year when Christmas 2008 rolled around, and it was a small apartment and so had only a tiny potted Christmas tree at home. But we had love, and my husband was determined to fulfill a promise he'd made sooner rather than later, so we also had Mickey! At Disneyworld! An unbelievable Christmas.

2009

Christmas 2009 was bare-bones. We had moved to Pennsylvania only days before. But at least we had love, and Saxophone Santa (still our favorite holiday toy). See Saxophone Santa in action here and with a friend here.

2010

The following year, we had placed our stuff in storage and moved in with my gracious sister-in-law in Arizona the previous month. It was the beginning of an explosively creative period in all aspects of my life, but I wasn't aware at the time. Holiday 2010 is represented by fake snow for the wondering Arizonans at the Winterhaven lights display.

2011

By 2011, we had moved to our own apartment in Arizona and both had interesting jobs, and I was writing like crazy. But we hadn't been able to get our stuff out of storage, so at home, we decorated a tree with candy canes and a beautiful compass rose ornament I received from an author who had already become a good friend. This year, we had even more fun at the Winterhaven display because we found this gorgeous Christmas rhino!

2012

We moved from Arizona to Georgia in 2012, but didn't make it to Christmas there. Instead, we went from the boiling pot of water that was summer in Georgia to the icebox winter of Illinois. This was the Christmas my husband realized that I own four giant tubs worth of Christmas decorations, enough to decorate our tree several times over. My mom got me started when I was a kid, and you can't throw away memories like that. I accomplished the amazing feat of finishing my first novel, Seven Noble Knights, in November 2012, and it's commemorated with the cake and the thumb drive, and the new ornament.

2013

Christmas 2013 was probably the most surprising of all, as my husband and I had been living in a hotel in North Carolina since May. We never expected to stay there for so many months, and yet again, our stuff was in storage. We got a little tinsel tree and set it on top of the dehumidifier I insisted on earlier in the year. Those North Carolina summers might be even wetter than the one in Georgia!

2014

And that brings us to this year! In the photo, our tree with a lot, but not all, of the ornaments from the four tubs, stands out in front of a medieval Christmas banner I picked up at a museum in New York City and stacks and piles of other memories. Note the Fight for Rhinos sustainably sourced wooden ornament, front and center.

Finally, this photo was taken on Thanksgiving Day, but the bare trees, the church tower, and roofs covered in snow scream Christmas.

Coming soon: a guest post from outstanding author Kristin Gleeson!

Happy Holidays!

The Flowering and Wilting of Writing Groups

Some of the best ladies in the world, my critique group.

We left our saga in Arizona, an epic place, to be sure. I was involved with that critique group in person the entire year and a half we were in Arizona and made it through about half of the first draft of Seven Noble Knights. The worst thing about leaving Arizona was the possibility that I would no longer be involved in the group. Luckily, these are some of the kindest, most generous people in the universe, and I've been allowed to Skype in every month since I left despite a key clause in our bylaws that specifies this as an in-person group.

Skype at its best can really give you a sense of personality. They added an in-person member when I departed, and I'm amazed to think I've never actually been in the same state with her, much less the same room. Based on that cyber-support, I finished Seven Noble Knights. What I most remember about living in Atlanta is writing the last chapter of Part I and the next several chapters getting away from me in length and complexity. Should I devote so much space to the migrating sheep? Which details of all the research I've done really develop the characters?

I tried to get into writers groups in Atlanta (the South is so wordy, it seems everyone writes!), but was daunted by two thoughts: Would I have to start over the critiquing of the entire novel? And I knew in my heart I was not in the right place and we would be leaving soon, so there was little point in investing as much effort as is necessary to find a group that really works.

The unnamed town where we lived in Illinois was a cultural wasteland that required a car to get anywhere, so the Arizona ladies were my only lifeline to the outside world. My most vivid memory of Illinois is scribbling the last few lines of Seven Noble Knights by hand because they wouldn't come while I stared at the screen. Oh, and completing it before the Mayan Apocalypse.

Then came North Carolina. You'll forgive me if I never felt settled in there, since we never lived anywhere but a hotel. I thought it might be the right place for us, and tried out a couple of critique groups, but while some of the writing was really enjoyable for me, barely one or two people ever seemed to understand what I was trying to do, whether it was historical or contemporary. Several months in, I saved myself the frustration by no longer attending. I had Skype to fall back on!

The reason I'm thinking about all this is that I'm now in a place I don't intend to leave within a year, so my best way to put down roots is to find a critique group. I have time to find one that works! I'm shopping around, but have already become a regular at one that meets every week.

Meanwhile, the writer the Arizona group added when I left has herself left, throwing all five of us into surprise and grief. She made her exit saying that the group wasn't giving her the regular discipline she needed. Not everyone has been able to submit writing on a regular basis, while she has been churning out the pages in an admirable fashion. I thought for a moment that this might mark the end of the Arizona group, and I was terribly sad, because it's become about much more than writing. It's a group of friends who all like to write and who support each other through many of the other things life throws at us.

Luckily, the remaining members agreed with that part. I'm still in transition, and deciding how to use all the wonderful local resources in order not to feel alone in this writing thing. But at least I haven't lost my best gals. Further critique groups may come and go, but Low Writers are forever.

The Evolution of Writing Groups

Most people, I think, realize that writing is a lonely business if you don't have some kind of support group, a magical few people who either read your writing willingly or understand what you're going through because they're writers, too — or, in the best of all possible worlds, both. When the support group does both those things, they're called a writing or critique group.

When I first decided to take fiction writing seriously, back when I lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts (sigh!) (I'm not quite back there, but I'm within commuting distance), the first thing I did was dig through my files to see what I had. The close second was to look at Meetup.com and find out whether there were any writers in the area willing to meet.

Of course, now there are plenty of groups to choose from all over New England, and they fill up and get waiting lists. Only five years ago, it was a different scene all together. I had to try running my own Meetup, and it was disastrous. The most I ever got was one other attendee. I didn't know exactly how it should work, so I have to give myself a break on that. How painful to wait in some café and feel like a sore thumb with a Meetup sign, only to be joined by someone who confrontationally wanted me to have a better handle on what the heck I was trying to do. (That was the worst time. The other times I tried were more low-key and vaguely disappointing.)

Then, the moving saga began. I married my husband in September, and in late December, we left Massachusetts during a snowstorm for the middle of nowhere northeastern Pennsylvania. It was so cold, overnight all the tires on our tow trailer deflated. And it got colder and more desolate from there.

I'm sure Pennsylvania is wonderful. Indeed, I love Philadelphia and the beauties of the mountains. But I was trapped in a mountain home, in utter isolation, with no possibility of even the half-hearted attempts at Meetups from before. I would write it off as eleven months of nothing, except that I was in PA when I began getting published in literary magazines and when I began this blog. Reaching out through cyberspace!

And then, Kismet. We moved, against our wishes, to Arizona, but I was determined to build or join a community. That place is chockablock with writers of every age and ilk! I started through Meetup again, and met the founder of Fireship Press, which led to my editing career. Then, another writers Meetup was such a behemoth that smaller groups began splintering off, and that's where I found the critique group I still Skype into today. You know it's working when people willingly add technology into the mix. The group has been a tremendous comfort to me through too many moves and oodles of rejections. What a relief!

Tune in on Wednesday, March 12, for the continuing saga of the writing group!

Fried Chicken

My husband and I love living in New England, have been trying to get back here ever since we left, and are over the moon with joy now that we're here. In spite of all that, North Carolina was a nice place to live (in a hotel room). Although I never had a good hair day there, I do have pangs of nostalgia for the last place we lived.

For one, some parts of the hotel felt like home. On the morning we left, the staff explained that they would give themselves some time before they rented out the room where we stayed for nearly eight months to avoid the feeling that something was terribly wrong when someone else was in "our room." They also got to know my husband's morning coffee habits so well that they gave him a bagful of his favorite creamer and chocolate as a parting gift. I thought that was really touching. My husband made sure to treat everyone there well from the beginning, but I maintained my shy standoffishness even through all their southern openness and charm.

The immediate difference I've noticed has been our eating habits. In North Carolina, it was possible for me to go weeks with chicken as my only protein. Fried chicken has always been my favorite food (aside from chocolate, which is not food so much as life force), so perhaps you can imagine the bliss of living in a place where all anyone ever eats is fried chicken or pork barbecue. Every restaurant does it differently, and yet every place does it right. How can that be? Even the chain restaurants gave consistently virtuosic performances, with my favorites being Smithfield's (they show you that KFC clearly uses too much black pepper), Zaxby's, and O'Charley's. Any time one of them wants to franchise in New England, I will give them a southern welcome.

Welcome 2014 with Manolo García

Note: Starting January 4, I'm participating in the Clear Your Shelf Giveaway Hop. Five prizes will be up for grabs, so stop by and check it out.

"One Year After Another" by Manolo García
English translation by Jessica Knauss
from Los días intactos (2011)

One day I realized searching

was what kept me awake.

Without a trace of treasures,

without finding answers,

in the happy morning light.

January came and went

the way a traffic light changes

on those confounded highways

where I sometimes still feel

like a donkey tied at the entrance to the dance.

New years came and passed by,

Like the lives of monks in monasteries.

One year and another, so much time,

so many August moons that pass by.

A hot wind came from the south,

the deepest south,

and in it, you came, intensifying.

One year and another.

One day I realized searching 

was what kept me awake.

Without a certain reward

asking myself questions

while dusting my own buttresses.

A wind blew from the south.

You came inside it with your heat

and your Gypsy talk.

You came joyfully in a puff

to this pile of trash

where we sometimes bog ourselves down.

You came inside a light.

Days are bullets and when you yearn to head for the horizon

you're already ploughing the deep blue.

One year and another, so much time,

so many August moons that pass by.

A hot wind came from the south,

and in it, you came, and you came yearning.

One year and another, so much time,

so many August moons that pass by.

One year and another, so much time.

A hot wind came from the south

from the deepest south,

And in it you came intensifying,

desiring new horizons.

One year and another.

Note: "Like a Donkey Tied at the Entrance of the Dance" is the title of one of Manolo García's biggest hits with his former group, El Último de la Fila.

Note: We're finally leaving the hotel! After nearly eight months! We're headed for another hotel... soon to be replaced by an apartment, complete with my books and other items necessary for feeling like home. Catch you on the other side.

Note: Happy New Year!

Unusual Historicals Feature

Today I'm featured at Unusual Historicals. Find out the three most pressing facts about me, and send me your good wishes for finding a place in the world.

Thanks for stopping by!

When You Can't Explain It, Sing It!

I'm loving this song right now because it expresses poetically the way my husband is feeling. Here's my inadequate translation:

"Provincia de Río Negro" 
Manolo García

I’ve seen the province of Río Negro reflected

in your lake system gaze.

I’ve seen the flight of the white shadow,

a chain that moors a traveler who doesn’t want to go home.

Your Basque grandfather was a shepherd in Patagonia.

I’ve touched your meadow hair,

I’ve held your copper-colored thatch hands.

Hung up on sheepskin fleeces,

trembling tendrils on golden fields,

on the windy, soft afternoon of the earth.

Like foam on the crests of some earthen waves

shimmering in your sea of pampas grass.

Ooh, I’m leaving now. Ooh, here I am.

When I come back, I find myself frozen stiff with nostalgia

on this impossible highway.

Under the private smoke from the thousand chimneys

of the new development on the edge of the city,

we move along at infernal speeds

on machines with wheels — and I can’t get used to it —

to come together like a plague of locusts

at the same times, in the same places.

So I feel I’m wasting my life here,

that I only want to hold

your copper-thatch hands in mine.

Ooh, I’m leaving now. Ooh, here I am.

Hung up on sheepskin fleeces,

Trembling whiteness on golden fields

on the windy, soft afternoon of the earth.

Like foam on the crests of a few eternal waves

shimmering in a sea of pampas grass.

Ooh, I’m leaving now. Ooh, here I am.

Ooh, I’m leaving now. Ooh, here I am.

Put simply: my husband knows there's something better out there. Even more simply: he's fed up.

Call it a mid-life crisis. Call it 30 years of bouncing around doing work that vexes his soul. Whatever it is, I think we're on the verge of a life-changing decision. I'll keep you posted.

Meanwhile, the Clear Your Shelf giveaway hop is still going on, so get your entries in there while you can! 

The Wanderers

So Illinois hasn't been working out very well for my husband and me. It's not much of a surprise anymore. We're taking positive steps to better our situation, but when I think we might have to move (again) and when I'm tired of the waiting, I listen to this song. My translation here is perhaps rudimentary, but anyone who's done any wandering should have a good sense of what this is about.

The Wanderers by Manolo García (from Los días intactos, 2011)

I am my own inner slave

who staunches his wounds by biting his fists.

I am a previous stranger,

a tightrope walker who unleashes false skies.

And today

when this uncontrolled fire devastates all thought,

today, when I am a prisoner of my desires,

I’m far from wanting to be the stoic I once was.

There will be a place for the wanderers,

there will be time to wander.

Today I think about the song of the emigrant,

of the residual tourist.

Now that the pumping of my blood

is getting strangely discouraged,

today I think about the song of the emigrant,

of the trapped people who struggle in their exile,

of the people who run.

A city full of amazed people,

that would be me, asking for help.

Asking for help, with an outstretched hand,

looking for plenitude, that elusive animal.

A rudimentary destination of bone and orange light,

that would be me. A pitcher in space who needs

clamps and roots is who I would be today.

And today, when an uncontrolled fire

devastates all thought,

today, when I’m a prisoner and desire you,

I’m far from wanting to be the stoic I once was.

There will be a place for the wanderers,

there will be time to wander.

Today I think about the song of the emigrant,

of the emotional traveler.

Now, when I’m grounded and a dilettante,

the planking is curving,

today, I think about the song of the emigrant.

Of infuriated people in search of wonders,

of the people who run.

And it’s not about love or misunderstandings.

Not about lost years.

Not even longing for the brilliance inherent in life.

Today only I want to win this round against impatience

and the apathy that brings a desolate grimace.

It's a Go! Part Two!

I wouldn't have dared to write it, for fear it would seem too hackneyed and unlikely. We were driving through the wilds of New Mexico, almost back to our Tucson home with all our worldly possessions in a 14-foot U-Haul truck, when my husband's boss called. Yes, my husband answered the phone while he was driving, tsk tsk. I took out my left earbud and heard the most outlandish things:

"How many seats will it be?"

"How many people would report directly to me?"

These are the kinds of things I overhear when my husband has a phone interview. So after a good ten or twenty minutes of suspense, he said the most telltale thing of all, "Let me talk it over with my wife," and hung up.

I said, "What? What?"

He said, "Todd started out by saying, 'This may be an inopportune moment, since you must be almost back to Tucson with all your earthly possessions, but we've just won the contract for Atlanta. If you want the job, you can have it.'"

My husband hates Arizona with a passion, so it was pretty much foregone that we would take it. We've been trying to get out of here ever since we set foot here against our will. It was another full week of back and forth negotiation and confirmation, and now we're supposed to be moved in by the first week of June. We'll miss "monsoon" and the worst of the desert summer heat, only to dive into the dripping wet heat I understand occurs in Atlanta. But oh, Atlanta has seasons. It's everything we've been looking for! I've lived in all the other US regions except the Southeast, so it's overdue.

But more on that some other day.  Now is the time to say, "Isn't it NUTS that we're leaving only now that we went to get our stuff in storage?" I admit I had an inkling that it would happen in a way similar to this, but I would not have predicted that we would still be in the U-Haul when we got the call! Astounding.