Books, Backs and Other Stuff
Oy.
July came and went so fast, I have a feeling I missed most of it. However, I
didn’t miss the demise of my beloved Daisy, former winner-picking wiener dog,
who left this life and crossed the Rainbow Bridge on July 6. Bad start to the
month.
Then
I had to spend most of the following week in Albuquerque, prepping for various
surgeries. On August 15 I’ll have the stupid cataract that developed after
surgery to reattach my retina removed. It’ll be a pleasure to be able to see
again. Since that blasted retina decided to detach itself last December, my
left eye has been totally blurry. Everyone I know who’s had cataract surgery
has told me it’s a breeze, so I’m looking forward to having the surgery
performed.
On
the not-so-breezy side, I’m going to have spinal surgery on September 11 (an
ominous date if I’ve ever heard of one). Don’t yet know if it’ll be on my
cervical (neck) spine or my lumbar (lower back) spine, but it’ll be one or the
other. If it’s cervical surgery, I get to have the lumbar surgery another date.
I can’t really say I’m looking forward to either of those surgeries, but if
they’ll help take the constant pain away, I’ll be very happy. I also hope to
regain one or two of the four inches my blasted spine has crunched from my
overall height. Heck, I looked at the video of my daughter’s June wedding, and
my noticed that my body’s now shaped a garden gnome! I swear, it didn’t used to
look like that.
Better
news on the book front. I self-published ANGELS OF MERCY in July! This is the
fourth book in the Mercy Allcutt historical cozy mystery series. ANGELS OF
MERCY is so darned cozy, you never even see a body, because the dastardly deeds
occur off the pages. However, lots of other kinds of mayhem are reported by
Mercy, who’s turned her home into a haven for young women working to support
themselves in Los Angeles in 1926. She considers she’s performing a public
service. Her boss, Ernie Templeton, doesn’t share her Pollyanna attitude. But
everything turns out all right in the end. You can check out the first chapter
of the book (and even click on links to buy it in either trade paperback or e-book
format) on my web site: www.aliceduncan.net
Also,
I managed to get HEAVEN SENT, a sugary-sweet historical romance I’d totally
overlooked when I was generating e-books from my backlist, up on Kindle, Nook, Sony
and whatever. This is actually a good book, and it features my late mother’s
late cat, Monster. Again, you can check it out on my web site: www.aliceduncan.net
And
I’ve fostered two dogs! Freckles, an adorable speckled (dappled) dachshund, and
Billie Burke, a terrier mix, who was adopted by a New Jersey couple from the
Roswell Humane Society (still not entirely sure how that happened). Billie flew
to her new home on July 31 (coach class. No cargo for her). Freckles is still
with me, and it’ll hurt to let her go. Sigh. I don’t know why I do this to
myself. Oh, yeah. I remember. It’s for the dogs.
Hmm.
Maybe July wasn’t as boring as I’d originally thought. It was definitely full
of mayhem, if not much magic.
