P is for Paper Son No matter the time in history or place of origin, immigrants in search of a better life will go to almost any lengths to secure it—even if it means circumventing the law. To protect American jobs during a slumping economy, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, which meant that only certain groups of Chinese immigrants and their family members could be allowed in or granted U.S. citizenship. Chinese merchants were acceptable because they didn’t replace American ... VIEW POST
Musings on the Depth of Beauty M-N-O
During the course of researching my historical novel The Depth of Beauty, I came across scads of fascinating facts that I've been sharing over time. Here are a few more relating to Chinatown: M is for Mornay Sauce To illustrate the shallow world in which Will Firestone lives, I begin the novel with his wealthy mother’s complaints about her chef’s rendition of a mornay sauce, which is really just a basic cheese sauce. It’s variation of a bechamel, or white sauce, one of the standard ... VIEW POST
Musings on the Depth of Beauty J-K-L
J IS FOR JACK LONDON I inserted the novelist Jack London as a “walk on” character in The Depth of Beauty because he was a San Francisco native and is well known to readers today. His iconic novel, The Call of the Wild (written in 1903) had already made him famous by 1906. The novel is based on London’s experiences in the Klondike Gold Rush, which figures prominently in my first novel, The Art of Love. On the day of the earthquake, London and his second wife, Charmian, were living at their ... VIEW POST
Musings on The Depth of Beauty G-H-I
G is for Guandong In the Depth of Beauty, most of the Chinese immigrants hail from Guandong province, and the novel touches upon the stirrings of revolution in China. Guandong province lies on the coast of the South China Sea in the People’s Republic of China. Its capital, Guanzhou, (known to westerners at one point as “Canton”) was an important trading port for rice, opium and silk, among other goods, which meant that the Chinese people who lived there were more accustomed to westerners than ... VIEW POST
What Does an Authentic Italian Wedding Look Like? (Part One)
Despite our modern sensibilities, marriage is still the ultimate goal for the vast majority of those who fall in love around the world. At the end of my new romantic suspense novel, The Lair, which takes place in Verona, Italy, two characters get married (not going to tell you which two, you’ll just have to read the book to find out!). To research that scene and the brief lead-in to it, I read up on what makes Italian weddings, well … Italian. I found many traditions that Italians ... VIEW POST
Yes, You Still Need an Editor … and here are five reasons why
[portions of this post were originally published as a guest blog for donnacookauthor.com in 2014. Check out Donna’s award-winning fantasy novel, The Gift of the Phoenix http://donnacookauthor.com/book/gift-of-the-phoenix/ ] I had just finished the manuscript for book number four. After going over it several times, I was feeling pretty darn good about my work. My best one yet, I thought. I’ve got this novel-writing thing down. I turned it over to my editor, thinking she’d probably ... VIEW POST
