Valentine's Day Giveaway

* ENTRIES ARE CLOSED ON THIS GIVEAWAY *
CONGRATULATIONS JIM!

It's high time I offer my dear readers another giveaway and seeing as how it's the season for romance, I thought nothing would be more perfect than an autographed copy of FADE TO MIDNIGHT, the most recent romantic suspense novel by my favorite romance writer (and good friend), Shannon McKenna.

If you are not familiar with Shannon and her work, let me introduce you . . .

"Shannon McKenna is the New York Times bestselling author of numerous romantic thrillers and several novellas. After a bizarre assortment of jobs, from singing cocktail waitress to medical secretary to strolling madrigal singer, she decided that writing hot romantic suspense suits her best. She lives with her husband and family in a small seaside town in southern Italy."

And to find out even more about Shannon, I asked her a few nosy questions . . .

What was the plot of your very first piece of fiction?

It was a story I wrote back in the fifth grade. From the feel of the first few chapters, it wanted to be a novel. A fantasy coming of age story about a maladjusted twelve year old girl who discovers she has magical powers and gets recruited by a wizard and sent to a school for witchcraft. Hmm. Too bad I didn’t know how to finish a story back then or I might have started a global bandwagon before the exalted Ms. Rowling did! But alas, that was not to be my destiny, the wealth and the fame and the movie franchise, and taking tea with the Queen and all that. 

Do you have any rituals or routines when you write?

Well, it takes a long time for me to get revved up, that’s for sure. I scribble ideas in a notebook for literally months until I hit on something I think of as a decent starting place. And once I get that starting place, the first few chapters are an eternity, because everything about the story is still up in the air, and everything that happens is a decision that I have to make that could determine the whole story, and the omni-potentiality of it all is absolutely crippling!

What draws you to write in this genre?

Oh, I just love romance. I always have. I used to gobble up regencies and Georgette Heyer and Barbara Cartland novels by the dozens per week, from age ten onward. So I had the necessary shape of a romance burned into my brain at an early age—the structuring, the way that they are carefully calibrated to give the reader an emotional high, and satisfy all of those clamoring but otherwise unsatisfied desires and fantasies. Those fantasies may be unrealistic, but we all still have them, and romance novels really feed those secret cravings. It’s better than drugs, or chocolate or overeating, that’s for sure. 

When you’re not writing, what do you like to do?

Well. Hmm. I’m a mother of small children, so right now I have just made a bargain with my daughter that as soon as I finish these questions I will go and play paper dolls. So what I do is very much conditioned by what they’re doing. I LOVE to read. I love to see movies. I am a singer, and I love to make music. I have done very little of all this since my kids were born. Plus, I live in Italy, which can be very all encompassing. It’s hard to describe it without writing a book, and who has the time with my schedule? So, all I do really is just get from day to day. I love the sun, I love cooking, I love the food here, I love the coffee, I love my kids. It keeps my mind flexible to juggle languages and cultures. 

And now, a little bit about FADE TO MIDNIGHT to whet your appetites . . .

Gone But Not Forgotten

Davy…Connor…Sean… Three brothers who have conquered their demons, but they’ve never forgotten their long lost brother, Kev, whom they believed to be dead. When the McCloud brothers discover Kev is alive, they won’t rest until they find him...

Beaten and tortured almost to death, Kev Larsen was found eighteen years earlier in a warehouse alley. He survived his brutal ordeal, but his memories before that night were completely erased. When he nearly dies from trying to save someone from drowning, the brain surgery he has to save his life triggers fragmented, terrifying memories. With only these memories and the name of his torturer to guide him, Kev is determined to unlock the secrets to his past.

Edie Parrish has always been good at not letting anyone get too close to her. If someone were to learn of her unusual gift, her life would be immediately jeopardized. But when Kev Larsen discovers who she really is, Edie has only one choice: to trust him. And soon, Edie can’t resist her consuming desire for him—even though she knows she’ll have to pay a price for it.

Now Kev and Edie must race against time and place their faith in each other to stop a deadly legacy...

*  *  *  *  *

One lucky Amid the Olive Trees reader will win an autographed copy of FADE TO MIDNIGHT. 

Giveaway Rules

Open to everyone!
Contest ends February 26, 2011 @ midnight CET.

The mandatory entry must be done for any other entries to count.

MANDATORY

(leave a comment saying you have completed this step)

Follow Amid the Olive Trees publicly through Google Friend Connect (see righthand side of page) and visit Shannon McKenna's website and tell me one thing you learn about her or her books.

Optional extra entries (make a separate comment for each)

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Blog about the giveaway (leave a link to the post on your blog in your comment)

* Be sure I can find your email in your comment or profile so I can contact you when you win! *

Winner will be chosen using random.org and will be contacted via email. The winner will have 48 hours to respond or another winner will be chosen.

Dandelion Greens

If someone had told me, almost 20 years ago when I first moved to southern Italy, that you could just walk along the side of the road gathering the weeds that grow there . . . and then take them home and eat them, I never would have believed them. I'm a city girl, you see, the kind who thinks of going to the supermarket for food rather than going directly to the source.

My mother-in-law Eva, who is now practically bed-ridden, never went anywhere without a plastic bag and a small knife in her pocket. Just in case she sighted some good-looking plants along the side of the road. She would cry out, "Oh, look, some nice dandelion greens!" and get busy choosing the good ones, discarding the bad, and filling up her bag with her treasures.

I thought she was nuts. I'd never seen anyone do anything like that before!

But, she is from a different world than me, completely. She was born in 1923. People in southern Italy still travelled in horse-drawn carriages for the entirety of her youth. She was a young woman when her town was occupied first by the Germans and then by the Americans during World War II. Her family were large-scale farm owners and over her lifetime she has been both relatively rich and relatively poor. She is accustomed to southern Italian rural logic, often rooted in ignorance and superstition, but also based on solid values like waste not, want not.

Eva - circa 1943

We can no longer take those walks in the country with her like we used to, but sometimes we go out into the countryside behind my house with our plastic bags and little knives to look for dandelion greens. I know it makes my husband happy to be doing something that he used to do with his mother, and my sons enjoy having that connection, too.

I'm still hopeless at identifying the weeds from the edible greens, but our sons seem to have inherited her eye for it.

Pondok Sate Pejompongan Djono Jogja

Jl. Raya Joglo - Jakarta Barat

Ini salah satu pondok sate yang ueeenakkk buanget, menurut gua lho. Pusatnya ada di pejompongan. Tapi karena jauh gua makan yang di deket rumah gua di joglo. Gak tau kenapa ada embel2 Jogja-nya, apa di Jogja ada? Dunno. Boleh dibilang di sini house of mbek. Sebenernya sih satenya ada 2, mbek ama ayam. tapi ayamnya di sini kurang favorit.



Buat sate mbeknya ada macem2, mulai dari daging, hati, torpedo. Nyam2. Kalo masakan yang lain kebanyakan mbek juga. Favorit gua di sini gulai mbeknya. Enak banget. 100% jeroan tanpa daging. Uhuy. Kalo menu mbek lain ada juga tongseng ama sop mbek. Sopnya bening campur wortel ama kentang kalo gak salah. Terus ada nasgor mbek juga. Pokoknya serba mbek deh. Oh ya, salah satu menu yang gua selalu gak kebagian melulu itu sop otak. Entah kosong apa sold out. Hiks. Terus tiap meja pasti dihidangin tahu sumedang. Enak banget tahunya. Sambel petisnya bikin ketagian nyomot tuh tahu terus. Gak kerasa 10 biji seporsi bisa habis sendiri lho. Hehehe.




Nah kelemahan pondok sate ini cuma satu, mahalllll. Udah kayak makan di mall aja harganya. Mungkin karena masalah harga ini, cabang dia yang di joglo sepi banget. Soalnya daerahnya gak mendukung, daerah kampung gitu. Kalo yang di pejompongan sih rame banget. Nah ini salah satu yang top recommended dari gua. Happy testing !!!

Thai Express

Mal Taman Anggrek Lt. 4 - Jakarta Barat


Gara2 habis nonton Hello Stranger waktu itu, jadi pengen makan makanan thai. Wkwkwk. Sebenernya dulu udah pernah makan di sini sih. Dua kali kalo gak salah, pertama waktu di singapur tahun 2000. Waktu itu di indo belum ada. Terus yang kedua pas dia buka di indo. Seinget gua gak enak, tapi ngebet makanan thai dan adanya cuman ini ya udah. Hahaha. Selain outlet dia yang di TA ada di tempat lain juga tapi gua lupa ada di mana aja.



Makan berdua ama bini, jadi pesen 2 macam aja. Gua pesen Yellow Chicken Curry terus bini pesen Thai Tom Yum Noodle. Sebenernya ada 2 macam chicken curry kalo thai, yellow ama green. Tapi gua pilih yang yellow. Chicken currynya dagingnya dikit banget, banyak kuahnya doang. Rasa STD. Tom yumnya aneh lho kuahnya agak putih keruh, gak kayak biasanya merah. Tapi walaupun putih tapi rasanya rasa tom yum. Agak mendingan enaknya dibanding ama chicken currynya.



Kalo dari segi harga sebenernya standar makanan di mall sih. Tapi kita dicekik di minumannya. Kalo gak salah aqua aja berapa gitu. Makanya merasa gak worth it kalo pesen aqua, kita malah pesen yang aneh2. Gua pesen ice coffee thai, bini pesen es jus kedondong. Alhasil, bill membengkak. Huhuhuw. Buat 2 minuman itu aja udah 40rb. Total makan berdua abis Rp. 120.000,-. Mahal yah....

Bake Sale! Moo Shoes! TODAY!

Stop by Moo Shoes TODAY for a Valentines-themed bake sale benefiting Darwin Animal Doctors! Who *doesn't* want to stock up on vegan baked goods while contributing to a good, animal centered cause? You KNOW I'll be stopping by... with my own tupperware container. :D

The Search for a Good Book

Reading is one of my great passions and I'm always on the lookout for a good novel to read. When I first came to Italy, getting my  hands on a decent selection of high quality books in English was a real problem. There were some titles available at the Feltrinelli in Bari, but they were mostly the bestsellers (not always synonymous with "good reading" in my personal opinion) or language teaching reference texts. 

Imagine my joy when I discovered Daedalus Books & Music, "Quality Books and Music at Up to 90% Off." They carry overstocked items and sell them at fantastic prices, plus somehow their taste and mine are really a perfect match. Back then I would receive a paper catalogue in the mail, peruse it passionately for days and days to make my selections. Mail off my order and then wait months until my precious box of books would arrive from the US by ship. Now you can find Daedalus on-line and all shipping is by air, such a luxury!

For the last several years my recreational reading choices have been determined by the monthly selections of the book clubs I've belonged to. Since a different club member chooses a book each month, we have had some real highs and some real lows. I really hated both Where Rainbows End, by Cecelia Ahern, and Oblivion, by David Foster Wallace. Two wildly different books, one a saccharine-sweet romantically improbable bit of fluff, the other the mind-grinding observations of a neurotic and overly analytical, deeply unhappy genius (in fact, Wallace committed suicide in 2008). 

Book club has, however, brought me such treasures as A Fine Balance, by Rohinton Mistry, and introduced me to the magical dreamlike world of Toni Morrison. But, in all honesty, one of my favorite things about the book club group's choices is this very aspect of its nature . . . I never know what I'm getting myself into when I start reading each month. The book may be a gem, or it might drive me crazy, but either way a friend of mine thought it was worth reading, so I'm willing to take a gamble on it.

I have recently screwed up my courage and taken a dive off the deep end into reading novels in Italian. 

After finishing Io e te by Niccolo Ammaniti in one day (it was that good!), at the moment I'm reading his Che la festa cominci. I am a big fan of Ammaniti because he writes in a clear, immediate style. His characters speak the way Italians really do today. His stories and characters accurately reflect contemporary Italian social issues, people and their real lives . . . he exaggerates them just enough to render everything absurd and laughable, but in a sort of bittersweet way. You laugh because he takes people and situations that you recognize, but then pushes them just one stop beyond "normal." So they are funny, but they are so close to real that it's a funny that's not really funny . . . painfully funny, if you know what I mean. They also have an emotional depth and punch that you don't find every day.

Che la festa cominci (published in Italian in 2009) is not out in an English translation yet, but several of his others are. I'll Steal You Away, I'm Not Scared and As God Commands are all brilliant. So far, this is not my favorite of his books, it's a little bit silly, a little bit too wild and wacky, but I haven't finished it yet, so I can't pass final judgement.

What are YOU reading right now? Do you have any suggestions for me? I love to read books recommended by a friend!

The Bitter Truth

"Mungkin hal-hal seperti ini yang membuat pemuda-pemuda optimis berhenti berkarya untuk Indonesia. Mungkin hal-hal seperti ini yang membuat individu-individu brilian memilih untuk tinggal dan berkarya bagi negara lain… agar keluarga mereka tetap utuh." - http://alandakariza.com/ibu


just couldn't agree more...