I took a bunch of pictures of the busts yesterday and have included several of them here (please click on the images to enlarge them.) Your challenge, if you choose to accept it, gives you two options:
a) Create a sculpture (or bust) of yourself. Use any materials – real or imagined – using the guidelines within Victoria’s 2012 prompt. b) Write an ekphrastic poem using one of the included busts. If you choose this option, please make sure you include artist attribution on your blog.
Picture caption: Covid 19 cake – The young woman who lived in a shoe (she was me at the time)Picture caption: Close up of the young woman with her washing outside the shoe housePicture caption: Close up of the children. Michael is the one with the curly hair who is asleep. Haha!
Picture caption: Book cover of A Life in Frames featuring a few small trees in the desert
What Amazon says
A photojournalist consumed by his passion for telling stories through his camera lens, a father and son at a war of wills, and lovers struggling to find a way to each other.
A Life in Frames follows the life of Namibian photojournalist Lejf Busher as he navigates through childhood and manhood in this coming-of-age literary saga. Two women are central to Lejf’s existence: his mother and the woman he loves. Destined for success and international acclaim, he discovers the complex reality of a career that separates him from his relationships. His mother is a beacon of strength, but he feels unsupported by his father. Lejf wants that acceptance. He also longs to succeed romantically with his great love, but her own search for independence and escape from a conservative upbringing widens the distance between them. Lejf’s expectations of a world and people he cannot change force him to confront his fears and choices when he can no longer run from them.
A Life in Frames is about the push and pull between the ties that bind us and the desires that motivate us. It is also about coming to grips with the consequences of unspoken and misinterpreted words.
My review
Picture caption: Badge for Rosie’s Book Review Team
I reviewed this book in my capacity as a member of Rosie’s Book Review Team. If you would like your book reviewed, you can contact Rosie Amber here: http://rosieamber.wordpress.com/.
I was attracted to this book for two reasons: It is set in Namibia and it focuses on photography. As a South African with a passion for wildlife photography I knew I would enjoy reading a story set in our neighbouring country of Namibia and I also knew there must be a focus on wildlife photography. I was correct on both counts and I loved the beautiful descriptions of the main character’s, Lejf Busher, home in a small town in Namibia and his trips into the bush to discover amazing photographic opportunities. I related completely to Lejf’s love for his country and its wildlife and people. The author described the small town attitudes of the people who surround Lejf as a child, including his father, with a sharp pen, and I enjoyed the disruptions to their thinking caused by Lejf’s mother, a Swede with an open-minded European mindset. The scenes about a book about sex, written by Lejf’s mother to teach her five sons about women, and its making the rounds of the town’s people made me laugh. It would be like that here in conservative South African towns too.
Lejf’s father’s lack of support of his son’s choice of career also rang true for me, having experienced this attitude of creative careers being unreliable as pay cheque jobs in my own family. The clashes between Lejf and his father over many things were well portrayed and realistic. A conservative farmer from a small Namibian town would react to a dramatic and creative personality like Lejf’s with concern and a lack of understanding. The author has a very initiate understanding of small town people in southern Africa.
This is a coming of age story and follows Lejf’s life from a boy of ten into later adulthood. It beautifully depicts a man driven by deep empathy for the first nation people of this planet who have been displaced and their way of life decimated by interlopers. There is a great tragedy and sadness in the scenes of Lejf’s visits to these people and places. The author must have first hand experience of such peoples and places and has done a lot of research.
In summary, this is a beautifully written book filled with thought provoking and interesting scenes and well worth reading. It is literary fiction and the pace is slow and considered so it is aimed at a certain readership.
I am overwhelmed by Michelle from Hotel by Masticadores wonderful and insightful review of Square Peg in a Round Hole: Poetry, Art & Creativity. Thank you, Michelle, for your appreciation of my creativity.
Thank you to Michelle Ayon Najavas for publishing Michael’s poem, Words of Suffering on Hotel by Masticadores. This poem features in my poetry collection, Square Peg in a Round Hole which includes nine of Michael’s poems.
I’ve been watching international stock markets react to the current media dubbed ‘tariff war’ with fascination. This poem is the outcome of my reading today. A good market is called a bull market and a bad one is called a bear market.
Sunflower Tanka, edited by Robbie Cheadle & Colleen M. Chesebro, is an annual anthology of contemporary tanka, tanka prose, & experimental tanka from a broad mix of new and established poetic voices from across the world.
Our theme, “Into the Light,” draws inspiration from the way a young sunflower bud constantly turns to face the sun. Poets delved into the realms of death, love, and the natural world, capturing their human experiences in the timeless form of syllabic poetry.
Contributors to the first edition of the Sunflower Tanka: Suzanne Brace, Yvette Calleiro, Kay Castenada, Luanne Castle, Robbie Cheadle, Colleen M. Chesebro, E.A. Colquitt, Melissa Davilio, Destiny, Tamiko Dooley, Lisa Fox, Cindy Georgakas, Chris Hall, Franci Hoffman, Marsha Ingrao, Jude Itakali, JulesPaige, Kenneth, MJ Mallon, Brenda Marie, Selma Martin, Michelle Ayon Navajas, Lisa Nelson, D. Wallace Peach, Freya Pickard, Dawn Pisturino, Gwen M. Plano, Jennifer Russo, Aishwarya Saby, Reena Saxena, Merril D. Smith, Nicole Smith, Ivor Steven, Ben Tonkin, Trilce Marsh Vazquez, Cheryl Wood.
Just a reminder that I am having surgery tomorrow, so I won’t be around much from about lunch time tomorrow until next week, Wednesday. Apologies in advance for any delays in responding to comments.
The Mystery of Folly’s End by Jaye Marie
What Amazon Says
Two estranged sisters, a dead husband, a mysterious hotel and a ghost?
Charlie’s sister Angela is not her favourite person after deliberately stealing the love of her life.
Years later, Angel’s husband dies mysteriously, leaving her with two children and no money. She begs her big sister to help her.
Can Charlie find it in her heart to forgive her sister, or will old feelings destroy any chance of a reunion?
Can they work together to solve their problems, or would that be asking for the impossible?
My review
I don’t often read murder mystery books of this nature so this was an unusual book choice for me. The story was engaging and there were a few great twists although I did have a good idea of how the murder element was going to pan out early in the story. This is not uncommon for me and one of the reasons I don’t read many books in this genre. In this case, it did not hinder my enjoyment of the book as the characters were interesting albeit not being my version of nice in any way.
I thought the main character, Charlie, was a kind person but her relationship with her sister, Angie, a horrible and entirely selfish woman, was astonishing to me. She was a bit of a doormat despite being a fairly successful woman in her chosen career in interior design. This aspect of Charlie’s personality was evident throughout the story in her relationships with her boss, Maggie, lover, Peter Channing, and finally with Stuart Rankin, Angie’s apparent nemesis and business partner to Tom, Angie’s missing husband and Charlie’s ex-boyfriend. The fact that Angie’s missing husband was also Charlie’s ex-boyfriend and the reason the two sisters were no longer close is very indicative of Angie’s grasping and me centric personality.
Although I found Charlie’s behaviour mystifying, I did understand it because I have seen similar behaviour by many women I know. Many women seem desperate to please at any cost to themselves. I think this is one of the reasons I enjoyed this story despite my dislike of most of the characters including Maggie, Angie, Stuart, and Peter. Angie’s two daughters were sweet girls and quite neglected by their mother, so they were a nice intervention into the storyline. Charlie’s psychology was quite fascinating, and I enjoyed trying to unravel what made her tick and why she put up with the abuse she suffered from practically every person in her life. In the end, I believe it was a desire to be accepted and loved that made Charlie the way she was. That is my opinion and I’d be interested in other readers opinions in this regard.
On the whole, an interesting book that is well worth the time investment.
Winter Journeys: A Novel of Music and Memory by Audrey Driscoll
What Amazon says
Winter Journeys is a story about the power of music and imagination.
In 1827, a year before his death, composer Franz Schubert wrote twenty-four songs that trace the physical and mental trajectory of a man who has parted from the young woman for whom he had romantic feelings. Wandering the winter countryside, he passes from sorrow to disillusion, anger, confusion, irony, loneliness, and a final surrender—to madness?
In 1987, Ilona Miller’s final year at university, she is enchanted by a recorded voice singing those twenty-four songs. A misfit who has struggled to please and succeed, she becomes an explorer of uncontrolled emotions. When she meets a man who seems to embody the marvellous voice, she acts out her romantic imaginings, but her giddy joy soon spirals into chaos.
In 2007, Ilona Miller is downsized from her office job. Instead of adjusting her attitude, upgrading her skills, and sending out resumes, she retreats into grief and paranoid imaginings. Her walks along streets and seashores awaken a long-suppressed alter ego and summon a parade of lost memories. Did the choices she made twenty years ago harm someone besides herself? Who is the man whose harmonica she hears at night? And where is she going now?
My review
This is an extraordinary book of literary fiction that reminded me in many ways of various works by the Bronte sisters. The writing is beautiful and vivid, and the main character, for me, was compelling in a strange and almost dark way. It was clear from the start of the story that Llona Miller was a woman with severe mental health issues. She obviously had difficulties in relating to other people and suffered from a persecution complex where she believed her colleagues were conspiring against her.
The story starts with Llona rushing to get to the bank during her lunch break. She spots a homeless man playing a harmonica which makes no tangible sound. She believes this man to be someone she knew from her collage days. She dwells on the man, Davy Dawson, in a rather obsessive way, but the reader gets the impression this would have passed had Llona not had the misfortune to be retrenched during a downsizing exercise. She disbelieves management’s commentary that her retrenchment is due to her being the most recent introduction to the team and becomes more and more certain that, somehow, her past has infiltrated her work environment, and people can sense she is different. Llona starts her slow descent into a complete withdrawal from functional society. Her obsession with finding Davy Dawson grows and she starts searching for him. As she walks about in the depths of the Canadian winter, trying to find him, she relives the story of her life and how she became immersed in the music of Franz Schubert to a point where writing an essay about his life takes over all her time and focus.
This is a sad story of a woman’s mental degeneration and the related collapse of her life. Llona’s life story is one of tragedy and loss. It was never clear to me as to whether the homeless man she thought was Davy Dawson actually existed or whether he was a figment of her imagination.
This is a fascinating story which provides a lot of insight into mental illness and its effect not only on the sufferer but also on the people around them. A most worthy read for people who enjoy literary fiction and character driven books.
A few examples of the compelling writing: “That spring I wore sunglasses whenever I went outside. The light was intolerable, harsh, uncouth, needle-like, whether hazing a dusty window or jabbing laser-like into my eyes from chrome bumpers and trim on cars, or glassware and cutlery on a table.”
“It’s clear to her that Nicole is out of her depth. Her face is even redder, and her eyes dart from computer screen to window to her own fingers; she looks anywhere but at Ilona, who sits and gazes at her. (Ilona has done this before, but now she is doing it differently.”
I didn’t write a haibun, I wrote a shadorma prose and here it is:
Borrowed Time
Time heals all wounds they say. But it’s not true. Some wounds do not heal. Some have a significant impact on your future life. This seems to be particularly true when it comes to life threatening conditions. In June 2021, my father was diagnosed with a pulmonary embolism. Covid delayed his diagnosis, and he nearly died. We did manage to get him the blood thinners he needed, and I injected him twice a day, every day, for ten consecutive days. He lived, but he never recovered fully. Recently, he has been diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension resulting from damage done when the blood clots broke up. He is now being treated for this condition and his health has improved dramatically. The treatment cannot repair the damage to his lungs though. Neither can it repair the damage to his heart caused by the pulmonary hypertension and resultant lack of oxygen to his brain. For over six months, my dad was sleeping approximately 19 hours a day. He was not able to drive or go out anywhere as the lack of oxygen in his blood was making him so dizzy and unwell. The medications have made a huge difference, and he now has quality of life again. It has been incredible to watch this transformation take place. It did make me think that he is actually living on borrowed time due to the marvels of modern medicine.
My oldest son, Greg, graduated from his university today with a B Science degree in mathematics and computer science. He passed with distinction.
Picture caption: Greg and I before the graduation. Greg is wearing his cape and blue sash for a B ScPicture caption: Greg and Michael before the graduation. Mike came instead of TC who is in London currently.Picture caption: Greg outside the Great Hall at The University of the Witwatersrand before his graduation.
roberta-writes.com 