Book Review: The Candy Darlings by Christine Walde

Ever since Hershey Canada broke my nostalgic wee heart with their blatent buggering of my beloved Goodies, I've been off candy. Nothing is sacred anymore. Corporations should not mess with tried and true candy recipes of one's (rapidly fading in the rearview) youth.

Repackaging Good & Plenties as Goodies is like attempting to sell an unsuspecting customer a neurotic, yappy poodle in place of a well-trained border collie. True - they are both dogs, but it just ain't what the customer wants and the customer is always right.

But I digress.

The thing I loved most about Candy Darlings were the stories within the story. Megan Chalmers, troubled, mysterious and candy-addicted, relays to her new friend truth-dipped, candy-coated fairytales which underscore Megan's hidden origins as the girl battle three shiney and popular bullies at school.

This is a YA novel with a bittersweet adult edge. Walde pulls no punches as the girls meet Edie, an elderly lady with her own troubled past, who loves candy as much as they do and who spins her own fairy tale.

One line above all jumped out at me.

"Whoever says they haven't met a terrorist doesn't know the heart of a teenage girl."

I love the YA books that can transend their YA status to leap lightly into the adult realm. Christine pulls this off well. I recommend Candy Darlings highly. Just don't read on an empty stomach.

8 out of 10 Bardmarks.
Sweet!

'The problem with reality is there is no background music'.

One of my guilty pleasures is a desire to collect really trashy pulp novel covers. Some women like collecting those delicate china figurines. Others like tasteful crystal or antique jewelery.

Nope. Not me.

I want a poster size versions of Dime a Dance Queen and Divorce Bait on my walls.

I don't know Art, but I effing know what what'll make the neighbours talk about me behind my back!

What I really want to do is direct.

If I could option movies I would SO do this. The perfect date film. Chick flick with zombies. Every demographic would totally get into such a flick. Am 1/3 through it and just SO loving this.

I do recommend it. It's one of the few books I can think my kids might actually read on my recommendation.

It's also a contagious idea. I now am dying (no pun intended) to try my hand at Anne of Green Gables VS the Undead..

Rambling and the Write Stuff.

It's been a pretty hectic few years since I first moved to London. A lot of new beginnings and a few endings too.

For example, the London Writers' Society has a new executive. I spend the last year as treasurer and learned a few things. I am hosting the Monthly LWS Pub Night this year. Beer! Not just for breakfast anymore. **evil grin**

The first pub night was pretty cool. Laid back talk with other writers, and the partaking of some very nice Austrian cheese. (Hey Bob? How do they milk Austrians?) Not as wild as JA's pub, but heh! that's alright too.

As I mentioned in my last blog post, I have a bit more time to actually read these days. Picked up No Time to Say Goodbye by Linwood Barclay. Another excellent book that I walked away with from Bloody Words IX in Ottawa.

Bloody Words was a treat, by the way. The highlight was the WOULD I LIE TO YOU workshop - wherein I learned never to hot air balloon behind Mary Jane Mafini's house, and NEVER trust Rick Mofina to multitask with infants and coldcuts at the same time. (Will have to tell Sandra that story!)

Reconnected with Melanie Fogel, editor of Storyteller magazine and attended an excellent workshop of hers. Storyteller publisher Terry Tyo accepted a short story of mine WAY back in 1994 called The Ice King, despite having submitted the hard copy in a vile font, sans double spacing, and numerous other faux pas.

It was my first serious writing credit.

Melanie helped me remember why I started writing in the first place. The constant love affair with words, the crafting of a plot, the sheer joy of entertaining others with the children of one's imagination - not for money, fame, or any banal return - except for the satifaction of creating a mood, a place and time and most importantly - characters that would not otherwise exist.

To watch words take on a life of their own. To reveal things about yourself you might not otherwise realise. Sometimes I think the only real sin in the world is to not use the gifts God has given you.

You can replace almost anything, except time. It's going to be an interesting year.
Watch me.

Back between the sheets...

Time for me to get blogging again. I've been letting things slide.
I actually have some time to read.

Currently reading Candy Darlings by Christine Walde.

Just finished:
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
As always, Neil totally delivers!
10 out of 10 Bardmarks

Midnight Cab by James W. Nichol
Abandoned infant grows up and tries to find out the fate of his mother.
Winner of the Arthur Ellis Award for first novel.
9 out of 10 Bardmarks
and

Six Seconds by Rick Mofina - a great little thriller I could not put down until finished.
Bonus points for being set in both the US and Canada!!
8 out of 10 Bardmarks

Saw Great Big Sea on Thursday night, along with Spirit of the West.

Marvelous concert. Would go again to see both bands in a heartbeat.

Must admit to now having a unhealthy fascination for tin whistles.

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Long story. Never mind.
Just assume it's a very naughty reference to something vaguely sordid and let's just leave it at that.

It getting to be that time again...

I have a bit of a passion for really horrible prose as Corey (Shelf Monkey) and Jeff (Lilley Press) will avow.

http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/
The best little bad writing contest on the web is the focus of the London Writer’s Society’s March meeting as we attempt to write the worst opening sentence to the world’s worst non-existent novel!

Why deliberately attempt to write wildly wretched prose? Well, because sometimes knowing how NOT to write is as instructive as knowing how to write. Give it a go and then enter Scott Rice’s world famous Bulwer-Lytton Bad Writing contest. 2009 entry deadline is April 15th, 2009.

Here an example of what to expect:

Overall Runner-Up winner 2008
"Hmm . . ." thought Abigail as she gazed languidly from the veranda past the bright white patio to the cerulean sea beyond, where dolphins played and seagulls sang, where splashing surf sounded like the tintinnabulation of a thousand tiny bells, where great gray whales bellowed and the sunlight sparkled off the myriad of sequins on the flyfish's bow ties, "time to get my meds checked."

Andrew Bowers


Winner: Detective
Mike Hummer had been a private detective so long he could remember Preparation A, his hair reminded everyone of a rat who'd bitten into an electrical cord, but he could still run faster than greased owl snot when he was on a bad guy's trail, and they said his friskings were a lot like getting a vasectomy at Sears.

Robert B. Robeson
Lincoln, Nebraska

Want to read more? Check out the best of the worst!
http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/lyttony.htm

Links to other excruciatingly bad writing:
Worst sex scenes ever published... in real books!
http://books.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,331379643-99819,00.html

The Eye of Argon, By Jim Theis
http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/SF-Archives/Misc/Eye_Of_The_Argon
This is really really bad. I mean, the worst...
Can cause hernias!
You have been warned!

(From the Bulwer Lytton website)
The rules to the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest are childishly simple:
Each entry must consist of a single sentence but you may submit as many entries as you wish. (One fellow once submitted over 3,000 entries.)

Sentences may be of any length BUT WE STRONGLY RECOMMEND THAT ENTRIES NOT GO BEYOND 50 OR 60 WORDS, and entries must be "original" (as it were) and previously unpublished.

Surface mail entries should be submitted on index cards, the sentence on one side and the entrant's name, address, and phone number on the other.
E-mail entries should be in the body of the message, NOT IN AN ATTACHMENT (and it would be really swell if you submitted your entries in Arial 12 font). One e-mail may contain multiple entries.

Entries will be judged by categories, from "general" to detective, western, science fiction, romance, and so on. There will be overall winners as well as category winners.

The official deadline is April 15 (a date that Americans associate with painful submissions and making up bad stories). The actual deadline may be as late as May 30 (the 2009 results will be released by mid-June).

The contest accepts submissions every day of the livelong year.
Wild Card Rule: Resist the temptation to work with puns like "It was a stark and dormy night."

Finally, in keeping with the gravitas, high seriousness, and general bignitude of the contest, the grand prize winner will receive . . . a pittance.

Send your entries to:
Bulwer-Lytton Fiction ContestDepartment of English
San Jose State University
San Jose, CA
95192-0090,

or go the website
www.bulwer-lytton.com
to submit your entry electronically!

Good luck!