A New Review of Waiting for Richard

Waiting for Richard by Carol Ann Kauffman

5.0 out of 5 stars Peggy Sue Didn’t Get Married . . . She Changed Her Name to Skye and Moved Down Under March 7, 2014

By carol

Format:Kindle Edition

A Review on Waiting For Richard
I don’t usually use the blurb for my review but because this back story is so complex I am including the blurb for edification of the story line in the words of the birth mother of the project Author Carol Ann Kaufman
“This is an unnumbered, rather long, short story in the TIME AFTER TIME series, which follows a pair of quintessential lovers, Richard and Nicole, through their lives together, at different times, in different places, with different names and faces. This follows the alternate theory that the relationships we forge in this lifetime, both good and bad, are continued in the future and rooted in the past. Those people who have had a profound effect on us in this life will find us in the future.”

With that said on with the review from a reader’s perspective.
Imagine kissing someone for the first time after you've already kissed them for the last time. This is a charming and delightful slice of life comedy/fantasy that explores that premise with all the humor and pain that accompany it. Not to mention a really cute costar by name of Gretchen. You'll know it's her when you read her she carries her baggage in her trunk.
But seriously there is a much deeper subtext as far as I’m concerned. It is about reevaluation and those glorious second chances in this life or another to get it right in love, destiny and purpose, the story is unique in the context of time travel books.
Think about it - if you had the chance to see someone again who had died long before, from a relationship that felt like a dream, or was it? What would you say to them? What would you do? This wonderful story gives us the chance to find out. This is a truly touching story about going back in time or into the future and being able to experience your youth and priceless times that you will never be able to experience again, or so you think.
This book addresses the answers to those questions of doing it all over again. In the end, would you still do the same thing? If you had the opportunity to relive your life. Making the same mistakes and suffering the same consequences, would you do it? Remember, in making your decision, that it could effect for instance your life, and the loves and friendships experienced. The memory of these are contingent upon your answer.
So Skye isn't actually going back in time occupying the same space actually she is reliving the past with memories buried in her subconscious. There is a big difference.
The author’s attention to details pays off on an emotional level. The heroine isn't weak because Skye ultimately surrenders to a destiny that she can't seem to escape from. Quite frankly who would want to.
Her surrender is what ultimately sets her free. But did Skye actually relive her life? Or was it a dream? You can speculate either way. The important thing is the lessons learned from her experience. The author deserves credit for taking a story that could have been a rip-off of any time travel book. Skye turned it into a great story about love and life I highly recommend this book. I hope it becomes a bit more well-l known along with the series
Perhaps it's because we often find ourselves daydreaming of the good old days and simpler times...far removed from the hectic pace of today. That I find this story so appealing it should be noted. The tension between the two main characters was at times that age old come here go away game lovers play. I wanted to just yell and say "quit your whining enough already let’s just make this happen, you two.”
But at the end of the day only they can connect the feelings about mistakes and choices made in this or any other life. I got from this that all the experiences make us who we are. That destiny is destiny regardless of what time capsule we wake up in. Or as Miss O'Sullivan says in Peggy Sue Got Married, ‘‘you’re just browsing through time.''
I’m giving the book five stars because “Ms. Kaufman, you worked me like a fiddle, leading me right into the need for reading the series Time After Time.
Well played Ms. Kaufman, well played.”

COMING TO MOMA, NY, ROBERT HEINECKEN

Robert Heinecken (1931 -2006) was an American artist/photographer whose passion in life was making art and teaching.  He was instrumental in getting UCLA's photography program started in the early 1960's and was also a professor there for a number of years.

He was a self-described "para-photographer", explaining that his work was outside the bounds of what is considered traditional photography.  He derived inspiration from books, television, pornography, magazine photos, and common consumer items, using them to investigate the portrayal of every day life by mass media.  Heinecken also liked to explore the relationship between reality and the world "manufactured" by media.  Contradiction and inequality intrigued him and was apparent in his humorous and provocative displays of societal attitude towards gender, sex, and violence.

Over 150 works comprise this exhibition, a number of them never before seen here.  To quote Heinecken,  "There is a vast difference between taking a picture and making a photograph".  It will be seen in this exhibit.  OBJECT MATTER by Robert Heinecken  runs March 15 thru September 7, 2014, at MoMA, NY.

Image above, "Are You Rea #1",  1964-68 lithograph,  10 13/16 x 7 7/8". By Robert Heinecken.

Excerpt from Chantal Bellehumeur's NOT ALONE

Excerpts of  ``Not Alone`` by Chantal Bellehumeur

Excerpt from Part one

Hi.  My name is Harmony Goodhumor.  Before you ask like most people I meet, yes I like to live in harmony with others and am generally in a good mood.  However, as I am human and therefore not perfect, I don’t always live up to my name definition.  From time to time I am in an unpleasant mood and sometimes get made fun of because of it.

I will admit that I had problems living harmoniously with one particular person in my youth.  Wow!  The last part of my statement just made me feel really old!  I actually just celebrated my thirty second birthday and hope to live until I am about triple my current age.

Anyways, my younger sister Katherine and I did not always get along when we were kids.  In fact, we argued a lot.  Most of our arguments were about movie rental selections, and the uncleanliness of our playroom or the small bedroom we shared.  Sometimes we would cause scenes over stupid things, like the fact that one of us looked in the other’s window during a long car ride or even went over the invisible line of the middle car seat that separated our sides.  I always sat on the left and Katherine sat on the right.  We shared the middle seat and were pretty anal about our spaces.  Not even our toys or books could go over the other’s side without us arguing.  We would also annoy each other by placing the tips of our fingers close to the other’s face.  When we would yell out “Stop touching me!” the other would say matter of factly “I am not touching you.”  We drove our parents nuts.  Of course, they always told me to show the example because I was the oldest and it irritated me.  My sister seemed to find it amusing and always stuck out her tongue at me.

As we grew older though, Katherine and I started appreciating each other’s company and became closer to one another.

I think the fact that our mother died when we were children made us realise how important it was not to take your family for granted.  I was fourteen and my sister eleven years of age when we found out that our mom had cancer.  It was a complete shock to us both, and to our father as well.  My mom just went to a doctor’s appointment and came home with the bad news.  We all thought that she would fight it, but the disease had already spread too much by the time it was discovered so the chemotherapy treatments didn’t do anything to improve her well-being.  It seemed to just make her sicker and lose all her beautiful long black hair.

My mother died six months after her diagnosis, at the age of forty-five.  I was holding her hand in the hospital when she took her last breath.  I don’t remember ever crying so much in my life.  I don’t think I ever saw my sister cry so much either, and she used to be a real cry-baby.  My father tried to be more discreet about it, but he wasn’t fast enough in wiping his first tears.  Katherine and I told him it was okay for him to cry in front of us, something we had never seen him do.  He ended up crying a river just like us.



Excerpts from Part 2

  I had trouble getting up Sunday morning after my alarm went off, but was highly motivated by the fact that I would be reunited with my sister soon.  The fact that the weather report announced a sunny and cloudless day made me confident that we would get on a plane this time.

  Everyone was a bit slow at getting ready because we were not fully awake.  When I saw that it was time to go, I urged Andrew and Christian to get their things and put their shoes on.

  Our taxi arrived before we made it to the lobby so when we saw it in front of our building we ran towards the white vehicle with our luggage.  Once at the airport, we repeated everything we had done on Friday evening with three exceptions; we picked up caffeinated beverages, didn’t need to dry ourselves because we were not wet, and we actually boarded a plane this time.

  I stopped at one of the airport’s coffee shops to get a hot chocolate for Andrew as well as a vanilla flavoured coffee for myself.  Christian didn’t want anything.  He isn’t a coffee drinker and wasn’t in the mood to drink anything except cold water.  He filled his water bottle at a drinking fountain.

  We could see the sun shining brightly outside by the time we got to our boarding gate and were all smiles.  There were no visible reasons not to fly.

  Suddenly, an ear piercing alarm went off.  Everyone looked at each other, unsure what to do.  No announcements were made and none of the airport employees gave us instructions.  They all just went about their business as though they could not hear anything unusual.  It took a while for the noisy alarm to get shut off and we never found out exactly what the problem was.  Many people were curious and I heard some of them ask a stewardess at our gate what had gone on.  She calmly said something about an emergency door.  I assumed that nothing was wrong with our flight and all that mattered to me was getting on a plane to Moncton.

   When the boarding announcement was made, I jumped up excitedly.  We were finally leaving!  I mean, REALLY leaving!

…………..

Landing went as well as the entire flight.  We got out of the plane in a hurry, but I took the time to take a quick picture of the aircraft as a souvenir before walking into the airport.

  After getting our suitcases, we walked as fast as we could to go meet my sister.  Unfortunately, she was nowhere in sight.  Not many people were at the airport so we just headed to a café located right in front of the only entrance.

  A few seconds later, I saw my sister walking alongside a casually dressed man who had short black hair.  I presumed it was Daniel.  I excitedly ran towards Katherine and was greeted with open arms.   We both gave each other a tight hug.

  Remembering where I was and that there were other people around, I let go of my sister.  Andrew gave his aunt a big hug too, and then formal introductions were made.  I introduced Katherine to Christian and Katherine introduced us all to Daniel.

 “I forgot to park the car,” Katherine admitted once everyone had said hello to each other.  Daniel started laughing.  I didn’t understand what my sister meant so I asked her to explain.  “I was so excited about picking you up that I started getting out of my car before shifting my gear and setting the parking brake in place.”  Andrew and I laughed at that, ignoring Christian’s concerned look, and we started heading towards the exit.

………

  At Cape Pele, we carefully hiked down a small rocky hill, walked near the ocean tide, and climbed many huge rocks.  The view was breathtaking, especially when the sun started setting because the rays glittered on the water.


  I stopped for a moment to close my eyes and take a deep breath of fresh air.  I realised it smelled lightly of fish.  I became more aware of the noises around me, which included nagging seagulls and the blowing wind.  The sound of water heavily hitting the large rocks was pleasant.  Christian took my right hand, which was pleasant as well.

  Christian and I took a moment to cuddle together.  Katherine and Daniel did the same.    

  I saw that Andrew felt a bit adventurous.  He dipped his feet into the water and began to walk towards a boulder.  He made it, but lost both of his green flip-flops in the process.  I ran and quickly fished them out of the cold water before the tide could bring them further into the ocean.  I then went to get Andrew from the boulder because he was afraid of losing his footwear again but did not want to walk directly on seaweeds.  He didn’t like how slimy the marine algae were.  It reminded him of worms.  To be honest, I was never a fan of the texture either.

  Doing my best to ignore the gooey plants that brushed my sandaled feet as well as the bottom half of my bare legs, I told Andrew to get on my back.  I carefully gave him a piggyback ride to the shore, realising how heavy he was now.  He is not fat.  He just grew so much and I remained short and skinny.


  As we continued our pleasant walk, we found a few curious openings in the massive rocks, many snails, broken oyster shells, and of course sand.  Andrew wanted to bring some of the reddish granular substance home, so I gave him a small zip lock bag to fill.  I had brought it with me just in case I found some nice seashells since I collected them.  The only ones I found had holes in them so I tossed them back on the uneven ground.

  Before it would become too dangerous to walk around the rocky grounds we headed back to the car, taking the time to admire the stars and shiny moon in the darkening sky right before getting inside the vehicle.

………….
Nothing compared to the high tide of Hopewell Rocks though, starting with our first lookout. The grounds that looked cracked earlier could not be seen.  A mass of water covered it all.  “I told you it would look quite different, didn’t I?”  Annie said.

  “Now, remember how there was no water at all there before?” Annie asked us.  We all nodded.  “Now that you have seen the low and high tide of this part I can tell you my story, which is funny now but really wasn’t at the time.”  Annie then explained how her and three of her friends had ventured far out onto the dry land and then noticed that the tide was coming in.  “We started walking back but realised that we would never make it to the shore before the high tide.  We knew we would not be able to swim once the water rose because it was too far and the water is freezing which would have led to hypothermia.  So, we escalated some high rocks and waited until the tide came and went.”  Annie gave a little chuckle and added: “As I said before, this happened way before I became a tour guide.  I am much more experienced now.”  She had definitely proven that.

  With Annie’s story in mind, we took the small shuttle that looked like a golf cart down the foresty hill like we had done in the morning.

  When we got to the lookout, we could see several people in yellow kayaks floating in the water where we had walked around earlier in the morning.  We could not go all the way down the stairs unless we didn’t mind getting wet.  Who knew where the crab Andrew had found was now.  All the seaweeds we had seen where now covered and completely out of sight.  So was the large opening between the flowerpot rocks.  “The water has now reached fifty feet,” Annie said.

   I think I must have stood with my mouth partially open for quite a while.  I had seen pictures of the low and high tides of Hopewell Rocks, but being on site was something else.  It was amazing!

WHAT'S UP WEDNESDAY, MARCH 12, 2014

Hello Readers!!  The past few months I've posted photos of my latest series, FACES, which has steadily grown to include 7 works.

The image above is the seventh in the series that I just finished.  Titled "FEMME", the composition is 8.5" x 11", textured and printed pattern cardstock and prisma pencil, by Parker Kagan-Kaufman, 2014.

This work is available on my website, along with the other 6 in the series at www.parkerkaufman.net.

Interview with Author Chantal Bellehumeur

Chantal Bellehumeur

I live in Montreal and I like it here,

but my fantasy life I think I would either live on a tropical island or Europe.

Good morning, Chantal.  Welcome to Vision and Verse, the Place for Art and Authors.  What have you written? 

I published fictional diaries ''Veronica's Soap Opera Life,'' ''Veronica's Attempt at Romance,'' and ''Veronica's Happily ever after,'' a horror novel ''Just. Another. Common, Killer,'' the fantasy book ''Sdrawkcab'' originally written for my son, as well as the books ''Thirteen-A Compilation of Short Stories,'' ''Hope'' and recently ''Not Alone.''  I also write family oriented short stories for The Suburban Online Magazine. 

Upcoming publications include ''Emily-A Compilation of Short Stories,'' my poem "Hiding in the Wilderness," which reads like a story, in the 2014 Aspiring toInspire Woman Writer's Anthology as well as the Fall 2014 issue of the AllAuthor's Magazine, my short story "Born to Sing," in the 2014 Aspiring to Inspire Woman Writer`s Anthology and my memoir of motherhood in ''They call me mama Bear''

For details on all my publications, please visit my website: http://author-chantal-bellehumeur.webnode.com/

Or follow me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Chantal-Bellehumeur-public-author-page/347446362035640

   

What is your favorite genre to write? 
 I am a multi-genre writer because I am inspired by many things and don't really have a particular genre I prefer. 


Favorite food. 
I love chocolates!  As far as meals are concerned, I always loved pasta or steak.

Tea or coffee? 
Tea, although I do enjoy special coffees like French Vanilla or Hazelnut. 

Pizza or ice cream? 
Pizza


Where would you like to visit?
I have travelled a lot in the past, but wish to go to Ireland one day because it is part of my heritage.

Favorite musical artist. Do you listen to music when you write? What?  
I don't really have a favourite artist.  I like dancing, so I enjoy anything with a good beat.  When I write however, I need complete silence.

What makes you laugh? 
The things my sons does, being with my sister (we laugh at nothing), when I do silly things like trip or run into walls... comedies (The Big bang Theory comes to mind)

How old were you when you started writing?

My first stories were verbalised to my mom, who would write them down for me.  Once I learnt how to write, I started making little books by stapling pieces of paper together.  I actually still have all of them. 

Describe your perfect evening.

It is tough to say.  I enjoy spending quality time with my son but am often tired when I get home from work so also appreciate the bit of time I get to myself. 

I guess the perfect evening would be for me to come home from the office and get a few minutes to myself, see that my son set the table and did the previous day's dishes, make dinner and eat with my son without being bombarded with things to sign or letters to read... watch a movie with my son, and then do some writing or reading when he is in bed. 

When my son is away, which is rare, my ideal evening would be to either write or go out for a bite to eat with friends.  I don’t like to eat supper by myself unless I am working on a writing project.  Then my characters entertain me.  Lol

I like to read outdoors with a cold drink when it is nice and sunny, or watch a movie under warm blankets while holding a cup of hot chocolate when it is cold out.  I also like to take warm bubble baths by candlelight to relax.

Where do you get your inspiration?

My inspirations mainly come from real life, my travel and my dreams.

What do you do when you get a writer's block?

If I get writer's block when I am working on a specific project I simply set it aside for a couple of days.  As od as this may sound, sometimes I go take a nap or go to bed early and my ideas start to flow in my sleep.  I wake up knowing what to write.

If I just can't think of what to write in general I write notes about random things until an idea hits me.  But, generally I am full of ideas. 

Who is your favorite author?

I don’t really have a favourite author.  I have discovered many good writers of various genres and it is hard to pick my absolute favorite.

Best book you ever read.

I read too many good books to pick just one. 

Who is the one person who has influenced your personal life the most and why?

My mom because she always encouraged me to be creative and has always been supportive of my writing

What advice would you give someone who aspired to be a writer?

Never give up on your dream, write every day, always keep writing material with you.

Appreciate all the positive feedback you get.  Don’t let bad reviews get to you but listen to constructive criticism since the comments could help you improve your work. 

What do your fans mean to you?

They have given me extra motivation to write.  Before, I just did it for myself.  I love hearing that my hard word was appreciated by others.  The internet has given me a way to connect with my readers with is great.  I love to hear from them, and especially thanking them when they give me positive feedback or reviews.

Links:

Here is the direct link to my US Amazon Author page, where you can also buy my books.
http://www.amazon.com/Chantal-Bellehumeur/e/B008YX5YGK/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_1

Here is the direct link to the Canada Amazon page, where you can buy my books.
http://www.amazon.ca/Books/s?ie=UTF8&field-author=Chantal%20Bellehumeur&page=1&rh=n%3A916520%2Cp_27%3AChantal%20Bellehumeur

Here is the direct link to my UK Amazon Author page, where you can also buy my books.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Chantal-Bellehumeur/e/B008YX5YGK

Follow me on Facebook by liking my author page:www.facebook.com/pages/Chantal-Bellehumeur-public-author-page/347446362035640

Visit my webpage:http://author-chantal-bellehumeur.webnode.com/

Follow me on Twitter:twitter.com/c_bellehumeur

Find me on Linkedin: ca.linkedin.com/pub/chantal-bellehumeur/31/26/658

REQUEST A PERSONALIZED DIGITAL AUTOGRAPH www.authorgraph.com/authors/c_bellehumeur

MY FAVE ARTISTS

From time to time I'll be sharing some of my favorite artists and their works with you.  These are artists that I've discovered through events and exhibitions, that I've been following.  Hopefully they will pique your interest as they did mine and become some of your favorites too.

KATHERINE BERNHARDT. 

Her recent piece,  "Hamburgers and French Fries and Basket Balls", 2014,  is featured below.  I'm particularly intrigued by the bold color saturation.

IVAN NAVARRO.

Navarro is a lighting installation artist.  I'm fascinated by the dimension and depth he creates using light and shadow.  Below is one of my favorites titled "Nowhere Man", 2009.

LAURIE SIMMONS.

The use of color coupled with the subject matter is what attracted me to this artist.  The doll-like images she creates whimsical and yet creepy aspect to them, making them not only visually, but emotionally appealing. Below is Simmons' 2014 work titled "Blue hair, Red dress, Green room, Arms up".

JULIA WACHTEL.

I'm drawn to Wachtel's use of imagery.  Her compositions are tight and I love their commentary.  Below is "SANS TITRE",  (dyptique) 1989.  This is quite an extraordinary piece.

Images above from Google Search 2014.