“Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read.” – Groucho Marx
An Experiment in Self-Publication
Snowbasin is where I learned to ski at 40. It was also the venue for the 2002 Winter Olympics downhill events. Shown above is the finish line for the Super G. — Photo by Ken Lund
Back when I was all thumbs and big toes about blogging, I hooked up with Dani Greer and her group at the BBT Cafe and learned a lot. Now I’m learning a lot more as I follow her group as they write, e-publish and promote a short-story anthology called “The Corner Cafe.” It’s an experiment to see if the book, now selling for 99 cents on Amazon, will drive traffic to the writers other books.
Not to be totally left outside whining to get in, since I’m not one of the anthology authors, I volunteered to help them promote the book. And since my blog is primarily about travel, I thought it would be fun if I focused on story settings.
I mentioned this to Dani, and in reply she asked if I skied. I, in turn, went into my spiel about learning to ski at 40, then related my adventure walking the men’s 2002 Winter Olympics downhill course, when it was being put in, with current presidential candidate Mitt Romney.
At the time I was city editor at the Ogden Standard-Examiner and responsible for the paper’s Olympic coverage. Mitt back then was CEO of the Salt Lake City Organizing Committee. Ogden’s Snowbasin ski resort, where I had learned to ski, had been chosen as the venue for all that year’s downhill events.
“Great,” Dani chortled. “That’s a great lead in for Helen Ginger’s story in the anthology. It takes place on a ski hill.
A poster from Helen Ginger’s days as a mermaid. She’s the tall girl on the bottom left. She said she didn’t have a picture of her in her tail. — Aquarena Springs poster
So I asked Helen about the setting in her latest book, “Angel Sometimes.” She told me that a big part of the book takes place in a bar/restaurant called The Aquarium, where Angel swims as a mermaid.
“Since I spent three years swimming as a mermaid at a resort park, I know how to swim in a mermaid tail, how to eat and drink underwater, how to do back flips and spinning dervishes,” Helen said.
I don’t know about you, but I found that fascinating.
Helen has two stories in “The Corner Cafe,” Gila Monster, which takes place in a high school, and “One Last Run,” which takes place on a ski slope. She said she left the high school and its town generic and that readers could imagine it as the one they attended.
But for the ski slope, she said she pictured it being somewhere in the Colorado mountains.
“I envisioned the tall trees that seem to whisper in the wind, the snow piled high along the trails, and the brilliant blue skies that can turn dark and cold so quickly,” said Helen.
“One Last Run” is one of the shorter stories in “The Corner Cafe,” and Helen wanted to share it with readers to entice them to buy the book. All proceeds from the sales, by the way, is being donated to a charity.
One Last Run
By Helen Ginger
Coming down a steep hill at Snowbasin. I wonder if this is the kind of setting Helen imagined for her story. — Photo by Scott Appleby
When soft flakes turned into a blinding storm, Roger veered off the ski path. A .black diamond skier, he led the way through dense trees.
He was gone now. I was alone, lying on my back staring up at a sky of stars blinking through wispy clouds. As soon as his gray jacket disappeared from sight, I’d packed snow over the gaping hole in my stomach to slow the blood flow.
How naïve I’d been to believe Roger when he said we had time for one more trip down. Now I was slowly bleeding out and freezing to death while Roger most likely sat by the fire pit at the Corner Café, drinking his favorite wine, watching his gloves burn – the ones he’d worn when he shot me. I wished I had a glass of Cabernet now. So many times I’d turned it down, worried it would send my blood sugar skyrocketing.
He’d get away with it. The snow would hide his ski tracks. After he shot me, he smiled. When he leaned over to kiss my lips, I scratched his face. He used a tree limb to break my leg then scraped my fingernails.
Kneeling close to my ear, he whispered, “Thanks. The scratches and any DNA on my clothes will add credibility to my grieving boyfriend act.”
He didn’t notice his own blood dripping on my forearm.
No one else would either. I eased my hand into my pocket and pulled out the blood sugar meter. His blood had started to congeal, so I pushed the stick into the tiny pool and let it soak in. Then I emptied my lip balm and driver’s license out of the zip bag and put the stick in. Clutching the sealed evidence in my palm, I stared up at the trees and sky.
Stars winked before sliding behind clouds as a cold quiet seeped into my bones.
Helen Ginger is a partner/owner of Legends In Our Own Minds®, coordinator of Story Circle Network’s Editorial Services, writer, editor, teacher, and maker of a mean margarita. She cannot, however, ski worth a flip. If she ever dies on the slopes, it’ll be her own doing. Before that happens, stop by and say hi to her on her blog, Straight From Hel: http://straightfromhel.blogspot.com/ .
You can purchase this book for 99 cents on Amazon
Other links: The Corner Cafe on Amazon http://amzn.to/KyQ2wv
https://www.amazon.com/author/helenginger
http://www.storycircleeditorialservice.org/
http://helenginger.com
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