tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9520947918717488972024-02-20T12:36:47.498-06:00Down in the BogStories, artifacts, wordplay, research, and musings on archaeology, writing, literature, Irish music and moreErin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.comBlogger74125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-43762185358197821692016-01-14T12:36:00.001-06:002016-01-14T12:47:06.728-06:00Come to Ireland with me!<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Erin Hart & Celtic Journeys Present</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">IRELAND WITH ERIN HART</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">April 8-18, 2016 </span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">10 days/9 nights in Ireland focusing on history, mystery, archaeology & folklore</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm excited this year to be working with Jean Wynne of Celtic Journeys. I will be leading a small band of a dozen or so on a wonderful trip called "Ireland with Erin Hart" focusing on history, mystery, archaeology & folklore—full of fascinating historic sites, informal chats with archaeologists, folklorists, storytellers and musicians. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dates are April 8 (departing the US) to April 18. Have a look at our full itinerary, and find out how to make your reservation—just click on the links below. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>The booking deadline is February 8, 2016</b>, so please get in touch with Jean Wynne right away if you're interested!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Join me for this unique trip through Ireland, visiting many of the places that have inspired my writing, from the archaeology of ancient sites, the peat bog and its hidden treasures, and all along the way exploring the folklore and folkways of Ireland, past and present. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We'll spend three nights in Dublin, exploring the city and taking in the the bog men and the Faddan More Psalter at the National Museum, along with the Book of Kells at Trinity College, traditional music sessions, and a day trip to Lough Crew megalithic cemetery. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">From Dublin we'll head to the ancient monastery at Glendalough, and take in Ireland's oldest city of Waterford where we'll go into the Mayor's Wine Vault, under the city from medieval times. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Then westward to Dingle Peninsula, taking in its rugged beauty (not to mention its music and fresh seafood) before traveling up the coast and into West Galway, Connemara and the Aran Islands. Along the way, we'll visit with renowned storytellers, musicians, archaeologists, and folklorists. Finally, we'll head east across the bogs toward Dublin again and have a last night in a Barberstown Castle, a magical way to end your journey through Ireland! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Questions? Please call Jean Wynne at 651-291-8003 or email her at <a href="mailto:jean@celtic-journeys.com">jean@celtic-journeys.com</a>. </b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Full details, itinerary and reservation form are also on <a href="http://erinhart.com/tour-ireland.php" target="_blank">my website</a>, and at <a href="http://www.celtic-journeys.com/erin-hart/4588911857" target="_blank">Celtic Journeys website</a>. </span></b>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-49461722560516892232015-05-26T12:33:00.000-05:002015-08-10T11:01:14.930-05:00Come to Ireland with me!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One of the great perks of my job is that I get to travel to Ireland for research. And I love to bring people along with me and share some of the amazing places I've discovered in many visits there. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm taking a small group of 8 intrepid travelers this September, on a tour called "IRELAND: The Creative I," which will focus on Ireland as the inspiration for painting, photography, music, poetry and prose.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We'll spend 10 days and 9 nights in Connemara (a region of West Galway, and one of my most favorite places in Ireland), the Dingle Peninsula in Kerry, and West Clare, the home of some of the best traditional music in the world.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In addition to day trips to amazing places—historic sites, ancient ruins, and landscapes that will take your breath away—we'll also be talking with and learning from artists, photographers, musicians, and writers (myself included), as we follow our creative impulses. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My partner in crime is Linda Rosen of Ireland On My Mind, a tour company that specializes in small groups and off-the-beaten-path adventures.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm putting together a reading list for the group, some of my favorite poets and novelists whose voices seem to rise up from the land: Seamus Heaney, Edna O'Brien, Liam O'Flaherty, Patrick Kavanagh, and of course W.B. Yeats, among others. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I'm talking with musician friends to see if I can fix up some music sessions for us along the way as well.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is going to be an excell</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">ent adventure. Hope you'll think about coming along with us.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">FULL ITINERARY AND TOUR DETAILS:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">MY WEBSITE</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://erinhart.com/tour-ireland.php">http://erinhart.com/tour-ireland.php</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">IRELAND ON MY MIND WEBSITE</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.irelandonmymind.com/creative-i.htm">http://www.irelandonmymind.com/creative-i.htm</a></span><br />
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Dunquin Pier, one of the fine sights along the Dingle coastline. <br />
The ramp where the curraghs used to bring the sheep and cattle in from the Blasket islands...</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-53130334646093902772015-02-02T23:49:00.001-06:002015-05-26T12:34:40.331-05:00Writing From Memory - History Theatre Class<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'll be teaching another session of <b>Writing From Memory</b>, a History Theatre memoir writing class open to all, starting on February 20!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Writing From Memory</b> is a fun and accessible six-session writing workshop that will help you discover new ways to explore your own history. Using artifacts, photos, letters, music, maps, and timelines, we'll begin to explore significant chapters in your personal or family history, and with the tools of creative writing bring your memories to vivid life on the page.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The six sessions will include discussion, writing exercises, and time for sharing work with the class.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Absolutely no writing or theater experience necessary — everyone is welcome!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Meets Fridays from 10:00 am – 11:30 am</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">February 20, February 27, March 6, March 13, March 20, March 27.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Cost: 6 sessions for $150</span><br />
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<a href="http://www.historytheatre.com/education/adults" target="_blank"><b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Information and Registration</span></b></a><br />
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<br />Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-5814038259417757632014-12-01T12:03:00.003-06:002015-05-26T12:34:52.121-05:00Caroling with O'Rourke's Feast - December 5<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Join me on December 5 for a special Christmas concert with O'Rourke's Feast, my husband's wonderful six-piece Irish traditional band. </span><br />
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I'll be singing a couple of Irish carols, the Enniscorthy Carol ("Good People All") and the Kilmore carol from Twelfth Night ("Now To Conclude Our Christmas Mirth.")</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4FnkBN2hhpgqgJ7Pc5OQ2M0C9qjPAQDSSXL1p74NNVvMX3x8gPtlMYBgCOtvY5zLsl8_poMtnEuqMoiEG9wrHK2RFRtISKfdfwJzlruq2otldmnOw5Qab2O9wGkRB-hTos5LG8DJS-ug/s1600/ORF-Christmas-POSTER_621x1026.jpg" width="242" /></span></span><b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">December 5, 7:30 pm</span></b><br />
<span style="color: #990000; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>SAINT PAUL, MN</b></span><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">O’Rourke's Feast Celtic Christmas Concert</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Celtic Junction </span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">836 Prior Avenue North</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Saint Paul MN 55104</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />Come join the musicians of O’Rourke's Feast for a special Irish Christmas concert! The band has planned a feast of not-your-usual holiday fare, including harp tunes from the 17th century, lively jigs and reels, and a couple of ancient traditional carols from County Wexford sung by guest artist <b><span style="color: #990000;">Erin Hart</span></b>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />Tickets are $15 for adults, $10 for seniors, and $7 for children under 12. Complimentary holiday treats will be served. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b><b>Reserve your tickets today: call (651) 698-2258 or send an email to <a href="mailto:paddyobrienbox@gmail.com">paddyobrienbox@gmail.com</a>.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The new O’Rourke’s Feast self-titled CD will be on sale at the concert, along with other titles from New Folk Records, and Paddy and I will also have copies of our books on hand to inscribe for holiday giving...</span>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-81662492333762420292014-11-20T19:02:00.000-06:002015-05-26T12:36:14.950-05:00SOME LAST-MINUTE HOLIDAY EVENTS!<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b>
<b>November 22, Lunch @ noon, followed by author talks and book signing</b></span><br />
<span style="color: #990000; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>CHASKA, MN</b></span><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Tipped In Book Event — Sponsored by Magers & Quinn Booksellers</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hazeltine National Golf Club</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1900 Hazeltine Blvd</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Chaska, MN 55318</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">(952) 556-5400</span></b><br />
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Featured speakers include: <b>Lorna Landvik</b>, <b><span style="color: #990000;">Erin Hart</span></b>, <b>Jonathan Odell</b>, and <b>Matt Smiley</b> from the University of Minnesota Press. </span><br />
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Book club members and reading enthusiasts are sure to enjoy this rare glimpse into the world of publishing. Featuring local authors, representatives from major publishing houses, and the staff of Magers and Quinn Booksellers. The perfect time to bring your book club and stock up on holiday gifts!</span><br />
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Tickets are $25, including lunch and program — RSVP to Emily at (952) 556-5400. Books available for purchase.</span><br />
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<b>November 29, 10 am to 12 noon</b></span><br />
<span style="color: #990000; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>SAINT PAUL, MN</b></span><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">SubText Indies First — Small Business Saturday</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">SubText: A Bookstore</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">165 Western Ave North</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Saint Paul, MN 55102</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">(651) 493-2791</span></b><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">November 29, 12:30 to 2:30 pm</span></b><br />
<span style="color: #990000; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>HUDSON, WI</b></span><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Chapter 2 Indies First — Small Business Saturday</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Chapter2 Books</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">226 Locust Street</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hudson, WI 54016</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">(715) 220-8818</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /><b><i>Two signings in one day to support local independent booksellers! </i></b>I'll be with fellow Sister in Crime Barbara Merritt Deese at both events, and David Housewright will join us in Hudson. There will be books galore, authors, and lots of good cheer! </span><br />
<br />Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-7288093381601992992014-06-21T12:53:00.000-05:002015-05-26T12:35:02.029-05:00Gettin' Literary at the Irish Fair<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One of the things I'm doing (when not working on the new book, of course!) is that I'm coordinating the Literary Corner at the Irish Fair of Minnesota. It's the largest free Irish festival in the nation, drawing crowds of 80,000-100,000 for three days in early August. This year the Fair is August 8-10, and it's held on Harriet Island, across the river from downtown Saint Paul.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This year, in keeping with the 1,000th anniversary of the Battle of Clontarf, the Literary Corner is also focusing on 1,000 years of Irish literature. We're working on getting a <b>calligrapher</b> to speak and demonstrate Irish medieval writing, and we'll also feature <b>14 Minnesota writers</b> who will talk about and read from their own work, and also about the Irish writers and various literary traditions that have influenced them. And there's going to be a <b>Limerick contest</b>, with winners both Saturday and Sunday. Books by participating authors will be available for purchase and signing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Literary Corner will be open Saturday and Sunday, August 9-10, from 11 am. We have a great lineup of talented authors including:</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">GARY BRUGGEMANN</span></b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgX-VcEaHAd1RnVnVEFFwJSpMFNR654Jr-p3zrxuxwq224yO3V_MvKI0X_7TBi14zg5OjgbpZSAClaLrLYrQxJsRgOLpBcEb7XJCoVfKk8cHHUdFsQWA2e58mQTtmzTFbzIrGcFHUE2AU4/s1600/Brueggeman_Minnesotas_Oldest_Murder_Mystery.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgX-VcEaHAd1RnVnVEFFwJSpMFNR654Jr-p3zrxuxwq224yO3V_MvKI0X_7TBi14zg5OjgbpZSAClaLrLYrQxJsRgOLpBcEb7XJCoVfKk8cHHUdFsQWA2e58mQTtmzTFbzIrGcFHUE2AU4/s1600/Brueggeman_Minnesotas_Oldest_Murder_Mystery.jpg" width="130" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Gary Bruggemann teaches history at Century and Inver Hills Community Colleges. A lifelong resident of Saint Paul, he has spent the last 35 years researching, writing and teaching Minnesota history. He is the author of numerous works on Saint Paul history, including at least 40 newspaper and magazine articles. In 2012 Gary published <i>Minnesota's Oldest Murder Mystery: The Case Of Edward Phalen, St. Paul's Unsaintly Pioneer</i>, selected as a Midwest Book Awards finalist. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">CAROL CONNOLLY</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTCAj2XrL64KWeS2D8zkYmxCR0lGlKncwWSylVhwVch5ZWpgbrQ6rsnWrJXqYwxOA5R55GSslcX53_QQNg_psNo7_y8Mv_RNhbtVtB9_Iv7u_fzNbhlNRb20fGtw4fPxiyOSJfbl-Zqs8/s1600/Connolly_All-This-And-More.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTCAj2XrL64KWeS2D8zkYmxCR0lGlKncwWSylVhwVch5ZWpgbrQ6rsnWrJXqYwxOA5R55GSslcX53_QQNg_psNo7_y8Mv_RNhbtVtB9_Iv7u_fzNbhlNRb20fGtw4fPxiyOSJfbl-Zqs8/s1600/Connolly_All-This-And-More.jpg" width="133" /></a>Carol Connolly, Saint Paul’s Poet Laureate, is the author of <i>All This And More</i> (Nodin Press, 2009). Her first book, <i>Payments Due: Onstage Offstage, Midwest Villages & Voices</i>, now in its fifth printing, was first produced for the stage in Los Angeles and then in Minneapolis, running for two years in each locale. Carol curates a monthly series, Reading by Writers, now in its fourteenth year, to benefit Public Art Saint Paul. She is the recipient of the 2011 Kay Sexton Award, presented annually by the Minnesota Book Awards in recognition of longstanding dedication and outstanding work in fostering books, reading, and literary activity in Minnesota. Carol is a Saint Paul native, has seven children, eleven perfect grandchildren, and one perfect great grandchild.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">JOHN DINGLEY</span></b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmJ2fX6bpvh5e8KuXKPKnmg9xlW0Qo1h5F5bRjrknoQgKvaUubiN1zRF5UajQ7n0EbMPcLYU5eaOPJvWYGwlpL6e-QlSxRCfXW7DXox8yS5yUGtYkXs1iYsIiAaYEiefPQg15RF3VLZUE/s1600/Dingley_The-Timeless-Cavern.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmJ2fX6bpvh5e8KuXKPKnmg9xlW0Qo1h5F5bRjrknoQgKvaUubiN1zRF5UajQ7n0EbMPcLYU5eaOPJvWYGwlpL6e-QlSxRCfXW7DXox8yS5yUGtYkXs1iYsIiAaYEiefPQg15RF3VLZUE/s1600/Dingley_The-Timeless-Cavern.jpg" width="133" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">John Dingley grew up on a hill farm in Mid-Wales and now lives in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota. He has been called a renaissance man who has shown a variety of notable talents. John is an animal scientist and his love of nature has involved him in a major role for wildlife reintroduction—he sits on the board of directors for the Raptor Resource Project and the Decorah Eagle Cam. He is also a master glass cutter and engraver as well as being an accomplished stonemason. John’s love of theater has led to performances in a variety of roles, both in Wales and around the Midwest. A noted storyteller and singer, he can occasionally be discovered performing his one-man show, “John Dingley and the Biggest Pack of Lies You Ever Heard.” John also takes a major interest in urban agriculture, sustainable agriculture, and permaculture and has spent time teaching urban young people about the efficient use of gardening and agricultural hand tools. His nonfiction book, <i>Hard Work in Paradise: When All Our Food and Lives Were Organic</i>, will be published soon. <i>The Timeless Cavern: Marged Evans and The Pebbles of Time</i> is John’s first novel, a young-adult fantasy, and he is currently working on the second and third books in the series: <i>Marged Evans and the Pebbles of More Time</i> and <i>Marged Evans and the Pebbles of Distance</i>. For more visit <a href="http://www.timelesscavern.com/">www.timelesscavern.com</a>.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">MIKE FARICY</span></b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqdw4HZDHe_O_YDw5FXsorEZSfS5_WpaEybxZefF_0_SJby1Lf-D3WnB41LlRTC95FaKSY7bd3evFliBFsbwticY8Q3ZirrTuvyvG57jWPt4Ep57MzMUi3F4M0Sr8shLHwdr4HoX8bqto/s1600/Faricy_Slow-Slow-Quick-Quick.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqdw4HZDHe_O_YDw5FXsorEZSfS5_WpaEybxZefF_0_SJby1Lf-D3WnB41LlRTC95FaKSY7bd3evFliBFsbwticY8Q3ZirrTuvyvG57jWPt4Ep57MzMUi3F4M0Sr8shLHwdr4HoX8bqto/s1600/Faricy_Slow-Slow-Quick-Quick.jpg" width="132" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Mike Faricy is a Saint Paul native who splits his time between the saintly city and Dublin, Ireland. He writes books of no redeeming social value… crime fiction, theoretically with a sense of humor and even some romance. His <a href="http://www.facebook.com/devhaskell">Dev Haskell series</a>, set in Saint Paul, has earned the #1 Amazon slot a half dozen times, and has been nominated for a Minnesota Book Award. His stories don’t deal with government coups, terrorists or international bank conspiracies, but rather the sort of individuals we all know and wisely prefer to keep at a distance. His characters find themselves in situations due to their own bad decisions—but then bad decisions make for interesting tales! Visit his website at <a href="http://www.mikefaricy.com/">www.mikefaricy.com</a>, on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/mikefaricybooks">Facebook</a> or on <a href="https://twitter.com/MikeFaricyBooks">Twitter</a>.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">MIKE FINLEY</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUJtCW3sbT9o4PiWMvm0bPjY9xdR7mJvVbjiQniviIMOcP6ymcIBlTyQMp5EvcLgeueqNbDY6fve89LGV-S2VJvFWaiwrOuDAwi_IgXTabsxdHO_n_gwD42trW9jraBCF3NWtM-0uWVV0/s1600/Finley_Bluebeard-of-Happiness.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUJtCW3sbT9o4PiWMvm0bPjY9xdR7mJvVbjiQniviIMOcP6ymcIBlTyQMp5EvcLgeueqNbDY6fve89LGV-S2VJvFWaiwrOuDAwi_IgXTabsxdHO_n_gwD42trW9jraBCF3NWtM-0uWVV0/s1600/Finley_Bluebeard-of-Happiness.jpg" width="133" /></a>Mike Finley, with ancestors in Counties Down and Laois, is author of over one million books, including <i>Skibbereen </i>and <i>A Pox on Your Blessings</i> (with master bread baker Danny Klecko). He grew up in northeast Ohio and is now a Saint Paul writer and poet, videomaker, and performance artist who’s been writing and publishing since 1966. Visit his website at <a href="http://www.mikefinleywriter.com/">www.mikefinleywriter.com</a>.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">ERIN HART</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWtgPXRtgSdOROSioSuc-ZYAC-rLy4UX5K6lSQ8-AT-y8f25CTwwIUu2_VNhsm1a8sXeusTtOKkBr_BYW6F2YSEUSCBsaR5B3pBCI3K2AOqe-mfwb-Cul2GCvZ3k-jX7dTJUXgaLCpRUQ/s1600/Hart_Book-of-Killowen.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWtgPXRtgSdOROSioSuc-ZYAC-rLy4UX5K6lSQ8-AT-y8f25CTwwIUu2_VNhsm1a8sXeusTtOKkBr_BYW6F2YSEUSCBsaR5B3pBCI3K2AOqe-mfwb-Cul2GCvZ3k-jX7dTJUXgaLCpRUQ/s1600/Hart_Book-of-Killowen.jpg" width="132" /></a>Erin Hart’s archaeological crime novels are set in the mysterious boglands of Ireland. Her debut, <i>Haunted Ground</i> (2003), won the Friends of American Writers award and Romantic Times' Best First Mystery, was shortlisted for mystery’s prestigious Anthony and Agatha awards, and translated into eleven foreign languages. <i>Lake Of Sorrows</i> (2004) was shortlisted for a Minnesota Book Award, and <i>False Mermaid </i>(2010) was named by ALA/Booklist as one of the Top Ten Crime Novels of 2010. Her latest, <i>The Book Of Killowen</i> (2013), was also a Minnesota Book Award finalist. Erin lives in Saint Paul with her husband, Irish accordion legend Paddy O’Brien, and travels frequently to Ireland, where she leads tours to some of the fascinating places described in her books! For more, visit Erin online at<a href="http://www.erinhart.com/">www.erinhart.com</a>, read her <a href="https://erinhartbooks.blogspot.com/">blog</a>, and follow her on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/author.erin.hart">Facebook</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/erin_hart/">Twitter</a>.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">LAURIE HERTZEL</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDZnxIYP0fROqFu1I9jd9zD9K539w643arqkVdPCur0jUnx4gzKvZPx2j9qOE63YO1gMI_iI4lXDFX62faZdu3KdeVmJYMVM6PZV65y-iRSTRxOwF_pxZ3pzLxfWXC0bjITm2jHWbg09w/s1600/Hertzel_News-to-Me.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDZnxIYP0fROqFu1I9jd9zD9K539w643arqkVdPCur0jUnx4gzKvZPx2j9qOE63YO1gMI_iI4lXDFX62faZdu3KdeVmJYMVM6PZV65y-iRSTRxOwF_pxZ3pzLxfWXC0bjITm2jHWbg09w/s1600/Hertzel_News-to-Me.jpg" width="129" /></a>Laurie Hertzel is Senior Editor/Books at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, where she has worked since 1996. Previously, she was a writer and editor at Minnesota Monthlymagazine and at the Duluth News-Tribune. She is the author of a memoir, <i>News to Me: Adventures of an Accidental Journalist</i> (University of Minnesota Press, 2010), winner of a 2011 Minnesota Book Award, and co-author of <i>They Took My Father: Finnish-Americans In Stalin's Russia</i> (with Mayme Sevander, University of Minnesota Press, 2004). She has received state and national awards for her short fiction, magazine articles and newspaper stories. She lives in Saint Paul. Visit her online at <a href="http://www.lauriehertzel.com/">www.lauriehertzel.com</a> or follow her <a href="http://www.lifewiththreedogs.blogspot.com/">blog</a>.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">AMANDA HUGHES</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYDSC-za8YLEQmIZ-cWBfE0chhlSh4mrUkixLp2HOxcau1mUbnLt27WUZxOIfR7YrQ1mkGS8brGk2neninmrz-L9xEKUkZmeTkAvhtsqEZzIAtczCPhWVCN9vxoaIWdtuIe9MxtPDPJQs/s1600/Hughes_Sword-of-the-Banshee.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYDSC-za8YLEQmIZ-cWBfE0chhlSh4mrUkixLp2HOxcau1mUbnLt27WUZxOIfR7YrQ1mkGS8brGk2neninmrz-L9xEKUkZmeTkAvhtsqEZzIAtczCPhWVCN9vxoaIWdtuIe9MxtPDPJQs/s1600/Hughes_Sword-of-the-Banshee.jpg" width="125" /></a>All her life Amanda Hughes has been a "Walter Mitty," spending more time in heroic daydreams than in the real world. At last she found an outlet: writing adventures about audacious women in the 18th century. Her best-selling novel, <i>Beyond the Cliffs of Kerry</i> was published in 2002; <i>The Pride of the King</i> released in 2011, and <i>The Sword of the Banshee</i> in 2013. Amanda is a graduate of the University of Minnesota and when she isn't off tilting at windmills, she lives and writes in Saint Paul. Visit her online at <a href="http://amandahughesauthor.com/">www.amandahughesauthor.com</a> and read her <a href="http://www.fortheloveofreadingandwriting.blogspot.com/">blog</a>.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">TRACIE LOEFFLER DONAGHY</span></b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidq-lkUwt7kbteIgBLcMflf4o8oJemE8EPwmXBd1LNW-60XWhD_8SziuwRlFvDKG2l50g3tbPpbL2bguIGU00QbTa0lZh5PiWZt8vG478aGco2UdIsQ5W5WFLumPRKH3sKx6hSShdz1Zk/s1600/Loeffler-Donaghy_Tracie_cropped.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidq-lkUwt7kbteIgBLcMflf4o8oJemE8EPwmXBd1LNW-60XWhD_8SziuwRlFvDKG2l50g3tbPpbL2bguIGU00QbTa0lZh5PiWZt8vG478aGco2UdIsQ5W5WFLumPRKH3sKx6hSShdz1Zk/s1600/Loeffler-Donaghy_Tracie_cropped.jpg" width="136" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In 2001, Tracie Loeffler Donaghy went on a vacation to Ireland and came home married to an Irishman. Her memoir, <i>An American in Belfast</i>, is a personal journey into a darker side of Ireland, one of paramilitaries, bomb scares, and sectarian violence. She has been a guest speaker on local radio and at various literary events, reading from her memoir and discussing her experiences of life in Northern Ireland. Tracie also regularly organizes and hosts Irish pub-style literary readings in the Twin Cities, featuring writers and poets from the local Irish community. She teaches writing and has a master’s degree in Creative Writing from Hamline University.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">NORA MURPHY</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvA3KNEED4gOQ6r8PNzMSdK6_YEaJ2WewL77SZUkZEG6AevaSM76BKqdGyuSwycu3Olh0G5-GWYfKgVcLS16pGLBBIbj1QQcJ9C5aq1l4HrdiJ_43KIu10tsQG2oVY2LQjKPudsQnBww0/s1600/Murphy-Knitting-the-Threads-of-Time.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvA3KNEED4gOQ6r8PNzMSdK6_YEaJ2WewL77SZUkZEG6AevaSM76BKqdGyuSwycu3Olh0G5-GWYfKgVcLS16pGLBBIbj1QQcJ9C5aq1l4HrdiJ_43KIu10tsQG2oVY2LQjKPudsQnBww0/s1600/Murphy-Knitting-the-Threads-of-Time.jpg" width="127" /></a>Nora Murphy is a fifth generation Irish-American Minnesotan whose great-grandfather cut and laid granite for the Saint Paul Cathedral. Author of essays, poems, and nonfiction books, Nora fell in love with Saint Brigid in the Cathedral’s shrine of nations and pays tribute to the great saint in her memoir, <i>Knitting The Threads Of Time: Casting Back To The Heart Of Our Craft</i>.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">PADDY O’BRIEN</span></b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNnQT2ykSpxuzi97RJbwJ2Ma2wmp2CXYeZhw8RByJ-rwL6Olh_fVGsdlbZ51SnpW9Y9UVYGwJzIayoW8gA3nBDI09MAy-DkKV6gdys5NGmc70FXutesrq5tF3HwUfxMXiAhnuv9GpYhOg/s1600/O%2527Brien_Road-From-Castlebarnagh.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNnQT2ykSpxuzi97RJbwJ2Ma2wmp2CXYeZhw8RByJ-rwL6Olh_fVGsdlbZ51SnpW9Y9UVYGwJzIayoW8gA3nBDI09MAy-DkKV6gdys5NGmc70FXutesrq5tF3HwUfxMXiAhnuv9GpYhOg/s1600/O%2527Brien_Road-From-Castlebarnagh.jpg" width="132" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Paddy O’Brien is an Irish traditional musician and noted tune collector. In 2012, <i>The Road From Castlebarnagh</i>, his account of growing up as a musician in rural Ireland, was published by Orpen Press in Dublin. He has also published a number of poems in a series about the older generation of Irish traditional musicians, and three volumes of the <b><i>Paddy O’Brien Tune Collection</i></b>, comprising 1,500 tunes and stories from his vast repertoire. Paddy's encyclopedic knowledge of Irish music is legendary. In a career spanning more than 50 years, he has collected more than 3,000 compositions—jigs, reels, hornpipes, airs, and marches, including many rare and unusual tunes. Paddy is a master of the two-row button accordion and in addition to several All-Ireland titles, he was named Ireland's Traditional Composer of the Year at the Gradam Ceoil Irish Music Awards in 2012. He lives in Saint Paul with his wife, mystery novelist Erin Hart. Visit his website at <a href="http://www.paddyobrien.net/">www.paddyobrien.net</a>, on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/Paddy.OBrien.Offaly">Facebook</a>or on <a href="https://twitter.com/PaddyOBrienBox">Twitter</a>.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">PATRICK O’DONNELL</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS0zfeEmCyFH-a3mzusJxcOOjBvyFfnOPxbkuRy94sAIackuQnDoD3tHGRZCJs7n3F5Oy0DPOn6Ig3kvhh2493gLI3t73Cib7EoVaZLTT3HlVkIkEzv5OE2S_zS9td-iA2Xhn45eigr8A/s1600/ODonnell_Guthre-Theater-The-First-Fifty-Years.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS0zfeEmCyFH-a3mzusJxcOOjBvyFfnOPxbkuRy94sAIackuQnDoD3tHGRZCJs7n3F5Oy0DPOn6Ig3kvhh2493gLI3t73Cib7EoVaZLTT3HlVkIkEzv5OE2S_zS9td-iA2Xhn45eigr8A/s1600/ODonnell_Guthre-Theater-The-First-Fifty-Years.jpg" width="132" /></a>Originally from Dublin, Patrick O’Donnell is a college teacher, theater director, literary historian, and author. He teaches writing and literature (with a focus on Shakespeare and James Joyce) at Normandale Community College. He has been the Artistic Director of Cracked Lookingglass Theatre, Titanic Players, and the Celtic Players. He has written such plays as <i>Vampire Moonshine</i>, <i>I’m Switzerland</i>, <i>Dickens in Dublin</i>, and has created a stage adaptation of Joyce’s novel, <i>Ulysses</i>. Patrick’s focus at present is creative nonfiction with an emphasis on the career of Sir Tyrone Guthrie. He has published work in the Irish scholarly journal <i>New Hibernia Review</i>, The <i>St. Paul Almanac</i>, the online newspaper <i>The Daily Planet</i>, and <i>The Irish Gazette</i>, and has contributed an essay on the Guthrie’s Theater’s Irish roots to Polly Grose’s anthology <i>The Guthrie Theater: The First Fifty Years</i>. Patrick also writes short fiction based on Dublin city and its imagined alternative ancient histories. He is married and lives in Saint Paul with his wife and three children.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">DAVE PAGE</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhScY48eey4dsnhKq2dW8ubXnK5jUNtRHRIcLTduRHZFu4mUurBhlR3tgzLf3WO78Gpvj9ffECR84jns7Rq2fSKZU15mKLhNdvKM7v-tSq7v7MIZWwTlUeghwe-Mzmchjt78u-fy8sOb_w/s1600/Page_Thoughtbook-of-F-Scott-Fitzgerald.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhScY48eey4dsnhKq2dW8ubXnK5jUNtRHRIcLTduRHZFu4mUurBhlR3tgzLf3WO78Gpvj9ffECR84jns7Rq2fSKZU15mKLhNdvKM7v-tSq7v7MIZWwTlUeghwe-Mzmchjt78u-fy8sOb_w/s1600/Page_Thoughtbook-of-F-Scott-Fitzgerald.jpg" width="137" /></a>Dave Page has written and edited several books on the Irish-Catholic writer F. Scott Fitzgerald and his connection to Minnesota, including <i>The Thoughtbook of F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Secret Boyhood Diary</i>, a journal by the young Saint Paul writer. Dave is a member of the International F. Scott Fitzgerald Society and a board member of Fitzgerald in St. Paul, a nonprofit seeking to promote Fitzgerald in his birthplace. Dave currently teaches writing at Inver Hills Community College. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">JIM ROGERS</span></b></div>
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Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-4701649977959467722014-06-02T20:05:00.000-05:002015-05-26T12:35:19.928-05:00My Writing Process — Blog Tour<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjX3FINtMkLufQiZo9J5sBQDacccQKPqn_ioxFXjbLxx5fknoExJZ-8evJL3Y5jzxfqGOVgNscqwYjiFt0IK0TzpPlao7soedwQtitm6J_n4OTK5zmXOqSqGeU1aHojjx7rKpqycZnU1t4/s1600/Erin-Hart_585x762_300dpi.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjX3FINtMkLufQiZo9J5sBQDacccQKPqn_ioxFXjbLxx5fknoExJZ-8evJL3Y5jzxfqGOVgNscqwYjiFt0IK0TzpPlao7soedwQtitm6J_n4OTK5zmXOqSqGeU1aHojjx7rKpqycZnU1t4/s1600/Erin-Hart_585x762_300dpi.jpg" width="243" /></span></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thanks a million to Mickie Turk for asking me to take part in the Writing Process Blog Tour. Mickie is a fellow member of the Twin Cities Chapter of Sisters in Crime, and the author of two stand-alone crime novels, <i>The Delilah Case</i> and <i>Made in the Image</i>, and is just completing the first book in her Clemsczak Cleaners Mystery Series, <i>Cleaning Up The Bodies</i>. You can find out more about Mickie and her work at: <a href="http://mickieturkauthorandfilmmaker.blogspot.com/">mickieturkauthorandfilmmaker.blogspot.com</a>.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What am I working on?</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I’m in the messy middle of a fifth novel, which is departing from the Nora Gavin/Cormac Maguire series in that it’s demanding to be set in 1933. So I’m imagining the main character, an Irish policeman-turned-archaeologist just might be Nora Gavin’s grandfather.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The story takes place in the Burren area of County Clare, where in the early 1930s Harvard University dispatched teams of archaeologists, sociologists, and anthropologists. It was also a time of great political upheaval in Ireland, as well as elsewhere in Europe, with the rise of nationalism in many countries—Germany in particular—with all that entailed. Ireland was in an interesting position, after achieving independence in the 1920s: many of their technical experts and high-ranking officials were actually from Germany and Austria, including a fellow called Adolf Mahr, who became the Director of the National Museum. Mahr was born in Austria, and became head of the Nazi Party in Ireland during the 1930s. My story is based on a real-life disappearance, but I’ve changed the details of actual events to fit the setting and characters I'm drawing.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How does your work differ from others in your genre?</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Well, I’ve yet to find anyone else who writes a whole series about people buried and preserved for thousands of years in the mysterious Irish boglands! It’s my own little niche, I guess you could say. For years after hearing the true tale of a red-haired beauty whose severed head was found in a bog, I haunted Irish bookshops, looking for someone who had already written about bog people. As it happened, I found none, and it turned out to be a tremendous opportunity. I couldn't believe no one had chosen the bog for a setting. It seemed tailor-made for mystery. When I first envisioned the novel that became HAUNTED GROUND, I wanted it to include not just forensic science and archaeology—though those two elements are very much the focus of my work—but it's also about the many layers of history in a place like Ireland, as well as traditional music, and folklore, and mythology. So it’s that combination of essentials that I think makes my stories just a wee bit different from anyone else’s.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why do you write what you do?</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I’ve always been inspired by true stories, and have always started with real events that lend themselves to mysterious, history-connected stories. I love to develop fully-fleshed characters, and most especially I love writing about the connections between those characters, as well as their troubles, their flaws and their foibles. Part of the reason I write the sorts of stories that I do is in reaction to crime novels that are just intellectual puzzles, where the victim is an unpopular boor, and there are no real moral or psychological consequences. For me, reading and writing fiction is all about empathy, about sharing the experience of the people on the page. So my stories tend to be serious, a bit dark, but they always leave open the possibility of redemption.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How does your writing process work?</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I always start with an idea based on something from real life—usually a recent bog find! THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN was based on the discovery of a 9th-century book of psalms in an Irish bog. From there, I begin populating the story with characters, and trying to imagine what might happen next. It’s usually the combination of the setting and the characters that helps fill out the plot. I do a lot of research before really beginning to write, but I continue with the research (including visiting Ireland) as I’m working on each novel, because I have to visit specific places that figure in the story to get them just right. I’m a complete pantser, which means that I have no idea how the story is going to end when I start writing. I write to find out what happens, if that makes sense. There are many drafts, and many walls covered in Post-It notes, and many scribbly pages that go nowhere, but help me find my way through the story. Writing a novel is almost like an excavation. I’m not adding, like a sculptor working in clay; I’m digging through details and backstory about the characters to find out more about them, and what’s most important.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For next Monday, June 9, I’m delighted to recommend a trio of excellent crime writers:</span></b><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Judith Yates Borger</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When the <i>St. Paul Pioneer Press</i> refused to pay for her little red two-seater convertible which was firebombed while she reported on a riot, Judith Yates Borger decided it was time to get a new gig. She began writing fiction and hasn't looked back. Borger draws on her 40+ years experience as a journalist to chronicle the escapades of her protagonist Skeeter Hughes, wife, mom, and reporter. In real life, Borger would never have taken the risks that come naturally to protagonist Skeeter. Her third Skeeter Hughes mystery, WHO BOMBED THE TRAIN?, was released June 1. Judy has also published short stories in three Twin Cities mystery anthologies. Those anthologies and her two other Skeeter Hughes novels, WHERE'S BILLIE? and WHOSE HAND?, were published in paper by Nodin Press. They are now available in ebook format from Amazon.com. Learn more about Judy and her work at <b><a href="http://www.judithyatesborger.com/">www.JudithYatesBorger.com</a>.</b></span><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The next two wonderful writers were not able to participate in this Writing Process blog tour, but I thought you should know about their work in any case! </span></i><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sujata Massey</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sujata Massey was born in England to parents from India and Germany and grew up mostly in Saint Paul, Minnesota. She holds a B.A. in Writing Seminars from Johns Hopkins University and started her working life as a features reporter for the Baltimore Evening Sun. After leaving the newspaper, she moved to Japan, where she studied Japanese, taught English and began writing her first novel, THE SALARYMAN'S WIFE. This novel became the first of many in the Rei Shimura mystery series, which has won Agatha and Macavity awards and been nominated for the Edgar, Anthony, and Mary Higgins Clark awards. Her August 2013 release,THE SLEEPING DICTIONARY, is the first in a series of historical suspense novels featuring Bengali women who each play a role in making modern India. Sujata’s books have been published in more than 18 countries, and if she could redo her youth, she would have double-majored in history and a foreign language and spent a gap year (or two) abroad. Currently, she’s based near Washington, D.C. You can learn more about Sujata and her work at <a href="http://www.sujatamassey.com/"><b>www.sujatamassey.com</b></a>.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Ellen Crosby</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Ellen Crosby is the author of six books in the Virginia Wine Country mystery series, as well as MOSCOW NIGHTS, a stand-alone mystery based loosely on her time as Moscow correspondent for ABC Radio News in the late 1980s. Before writing fiction, she also worked as a freelance reporter for <i>The Washington Post</i> and as an economist at the U.S. Senate. Her latest book, MULTIPLE EXPOSURE, was released in August 2013 by Scribner. It’s the first in a new mystery series featuring photojournalist Sophie Medina, the story draws on her insider knowledge of Washington politics, her journalism background, and her stint as a Moscow reporter. After living overseas for many years—England, Switzerland, France, Italy, Spain, and the former Soviet Union—Ellen, who has an undergraduate degree in political science and a masters in international affairs, now resides in the D.C. suburbs of northern Virginia. Find out more about Ellen and her work at <b><a href="http://www.ellencrosby.com/">www.ellencrosby.com</a></b>.</span><br />
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<br />Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-85321088869561711912014-05-28T19:42:00.001-05:002015-05-26T12:35:39.947-05:00Shrine of Saint Manchán Returns to Boher, County Offaly<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In researching ancient manuscripts, book shrines, and reliquaries for <b><i>The Book of Killowen</i></b>, I came across this fantastic 12th-century box, adorned with figures and filigreed metalwork. Saint Manchan's shrine was made at Clonmacnoise, a nearby monastery, around 1130 AD. It is a gabled box of yew wood with gilt, bronze, and enamelled fittings. There are several remaining figures of a possible 50 or 52 originals on the outside of the shrine, and it still contains the bones of Saint Manchán (pronounced 'MON-a-han'), a major figure in Early Christian Ireland, and County Offaly in particular (my husband Paddy's home county).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are many stories and legends about Saint Manchán, remembered vividly today even though he lived in the 14 centuries ago. He founded a monastery in the year 645 AD, at a place now called Leamanaghan, just outside the village of Clara in West County Offaly.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In one story, Saint Manchán had a cow that gave milk enough for every person in the locality, and he refused to charge anything for the milk. The people of the neighboring village stole his cow, killed it and cut it up, intending to boil the meat from its bones. According to the legend, when the saint arrived, his cow was in the cooking pot, but when he struck it with a stick, the cow was restored to wholeness and life, and went back to giving prodigious amounts of milk. That's supposedly the reason why the people of Leamanaghan refuse to sell milk.</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: xx-small; text-align: start;">Offerings left at Saint Manchán's Well</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In September 2012, I took my tour group to see the shrine at the parish church in Boher, County Offaly, where the Mooney family have been guardians of the shrine since it was made 900 years ago. When we arrived, we found that the shrine had been stolen sometime during the previous June. Fortunately, the thieves were a couple of knuckleheaded treasure-hunters, and had been caught very shortly after committing the crime. The shrine was recovered, but was not back in its case in the church immediately, for obvious reasons.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">However, just this past Sunday, May 25, Saint Manchán's shrine was returned to its home in the Boher parish church, where people can see it any time the church is open. Needless to say, security has been improved, with a CCTV, an alarm system, and a special secure case.</span><br />
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<a href="http://www.offalyindependent.ie/news/roundup/articles/2014/05/21/4030385-precious-shrine-set-to-return-to-boher-church-this-weekend/" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Read about the return of the shrine in the <i>Offaly Independent</i>.</span></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The most amazing thing about this story is that a 12th-century shrine should still be held at the parish church where it had always been kept, and that a particular local family would have been charged with keeping it safe. I tried to incorporate that hereditary role of certain families, given responsibility for important books and artifacts, in <b><i>The Book of Killowen</i></b>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm delighted to see this gorgeous piece of medieval metalwork back in its proper home, and looking forward to a visit to Boher Church this coming September!</span><br />
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<br />Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-2749803461115679692014-05-08T17:24:00.002-05:002014-05-28T19:49:31.630-05:00Turf cutting still kicking up dust and controversy in Ireland<br />
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When I speak to library patrons and book clubs, I often spend as much time talking about bogs as about the writing process. And I included Ireland's turf-cutting controversy in the opening chapter of my first book, <i><b>Haunted Ground</b></i>, way back in the mid 1990s:<br />
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Chilblains were the farthest thing from Brendan’s mind this unusually sun-drenched late-April morning. A steady westerly breeze swept over the bog, chasing high clouds across the watery blue of the sky, and teasing the moisture from the turf. Good drying today, his father would have said. Brendan worked in his shirtsleeves; his wool jacket, elbows permanently jointed from constant wearing, lay on the bank above his head. He paused, balancing his left arm on the handle of the upright sleán, and, with one rolled-up sleeve, mopped the sweat from his forehead, pushing away the damp, dark hair that stuck there. The skin on his face and forearms was beginning to feel the first pleasant tightness of a sunburn. Hunger was strong upon him at the moment, but just beyond it was an equally hollow feeling of anxiety. This might be the last year he could cut turf on his own land without interference. The thought of it burned in the pit of his stomach. As he clambered up the bank to fetch the handkerchief from his coat pocket, he searched the horizon for a bicycle.</blockquote>
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That plot thread was prompted by some signs I'd seen posted on the roadside in east Galway while driving around on a research trip. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Protesting the imposition of bog licenses, East Galway, around 1999.</td></tr>
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I also included Special Areas of Conservation in <i><b>The Book of Killowen</b></i>, where one of the characters is cutting peat from the bottom of a protected bog, and selling it for use as a beauty product. There are a few spas in Ireland where you can sign up to soak in a peat-infused bath, which I actually had to try in the name of research, of course. More on that later (with pictures!)...<br />
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Just this week, there's more controversy, as turf-cutters near Killimor in County Galway are cutting with machines in defiance of a ban on cutting turf from their own plots. The European Union has designated the bog in question as a Special Area of Conservation, which means turf is not to be cut there. But the families have been cutting in the same bogs for generations, and resent what they consider government intrusion. Turf-cutting rights, called 'turbary rights' often accompany the sale or transfer of property and farmland.<br />
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The controversy is made all the more complicated by the fact that Bord na Móna, the semi-state body that's been in charge of Irish boglands, has been strip-mining peat in the endangered high bogs of the Midlands for a hundred years, and continues to do so. They cut loose peat by the ton, and burn it in power plants to generate electricity.<br />
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BnM has been slowing down, but only because all the bogs have been cut away, and there's nothing left. The power stations are closing, and so are the jobs that the peat extraction has generated for the past century. My husband Paddy worked on Bord na Móna bogs, as did his father. It was the best job going in many parts of the Midlands.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Christy O'Brien, my father-in-law, working out on the bog with his mate Tommy Wright.</td></tr>
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You can read a VERY recent article about the scofflaws who cut peat from a protected bog in today's <i>Connaght Tribune:</i><br />
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<span style="color: #660000; font-size: x-large;">Turf wars re-ignite as cutters defy law</span><br />
Thursday, 08 May 2014 07:00 Written by Ciaran Tierney<br />
<a href="http://www.connachttribune.ie/galway-news/item/2830-turf-wars-re-ignite-as-cutters-defy-law">http://www.connachttribune.ie/galway-news/item/2830-turf-wars-re-ignite-as-cutters-defy-law</a><br />
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Thanks very much to Bridget Nicholson for sharing this article!<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbnllnje-mWLYtjete1NGHQ667yj37nO0mLik_yl7MsUCQPCU0P5mHQZpJpl9lxyDqj4A5n0J-IW6STIlyzo9-TaWdO2ibKDrr8yWT_OdYlwT5IH2OJdrqHF1DMrvj-vg8Uqm6coZ6Ifw/s1600/Machine+turf+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbnllnje-mWLYtjete1NGHQ667yj37nO0mLik_yl7MsUCQPCU0P5mHQZpJpl9lxyDqj4A5n0J-IW6STIlyzo9-TaWdO2ibKDrr8yWT_OdYlwT5IH2OJdrqHF1DMrvj-vg8Uqm6coZ6Ifw/s1600/Machine+turf+2.jpg" height="425" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sods of machine-cut turf from a County Offaly high bog, back around 2003.</td></tr>
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<br />Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-12365034200895014432014-02-14T16:03:00.002-06:002014-02-14T16:05:17.818-06:00Minnesota Book Awards<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A flurry of e-mails and Facebook posts let me know back on January 25 that THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN was a finalist for the <b>Minnesota Book Awards</b>. It's truly such an honor and a thrill to be nominated! I was a finalist once before, for FALSE MERMAID, back in 2004, and cheered along with fellow finalists Judith Guest and William Kent Krueger for our friend and colleague K.J. Erickson as she took home the award.</span><br />
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</span> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This year, I'm nominated in the genre fiction category with fellow crime writers <b><a href="http://www.bfreemanbooks.com/index.html" target="_blank">Brian Freeman</a></b>, <b><a href="http://www.caryjgriffith.com/" target="_blank">Cary Griffith</a></b>, and <b><a href="http://www.williamkentkrueger.com/" target="_blank">William Kent Krueger</a></b>. All three have won Minnesota Book Awards in the past, but Cary's latest is his crime fiction debut, so this is his first nomination in genre fiction — he's published in other fields.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you haven't read these great writers yet, you're in for a treat, and if you have, then you already know!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just being nominated is wonderful, even if you don't end up taking home the trophy at the end of the night. It's great fun, not to mention great validation for what we do every day, to see people getting so excited about books and writing. And heck, there will be champagne and dessert!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Minnesota Book Awards is all about getting great books into the hands of readers, and to that end there are lots of activities to raise public awareness of Minnesota writers and their books.</span><br />
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</span> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There's a "<b>Meet the Finalists</b>" night at Open Book on March 14, where nominees will give short presentations about their books. After the program you can chat with the authors and enjoy complimentary wine and refreshments. Finalist books will be available for purchase and autographing, and admission is free.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The really big party, the <b>Minnesota Book Awards Gala</b>, will be held at the Union Depot in Saint Paul on April 5. Here's what it says on the MNBA site:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Each April, authors, publishers and book-lovers celebrate the best of local literature at the Minnesota Book Awards Gala. The Gala returns to the capital city this year, to beautiful and newly restored Union Depot in Lowertown, Saint Paul.</span> </blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Books, autographs, wine, live music, and the announcement of the award winners make for an unforgettable evening. This year, the witty host of "Wits," John Moe, will emcee the event, and innovative jazz trio The Willie August Project will provide the music. </span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Check the <a href="https://thefriends.org/events/mnba/gala/" target="_blank">MBNA website</a> for more details, and order tickets <a href="https://thefriends.thankyou4caring.org/event-registration-mnba-gala" target="_blank">HERE</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And now, as a public service announcement, here's a little about the nominated books in the genre fiction category...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>THE COLD NOWHERE</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">by Brian Freeman</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As Jonathan Stride returns home to his cottage on the shore of Lake Superior after midnight, he finds a teenage girl hiding in his bedroom. She says that someone is trying to kill her. The girl isn't a stranger to Stride. She's the daughter of a woman he tried - and failed - to protect from an abusive, murderous ex-husband years earlier. With the guilt of that failure still hanging over his head, Stride is determined to protect this young girl, Cat Mateo, from a shadowy predator. However, Cat seems to have secrets of her own. A journalist who interviewed the girl has disappeared. Two more women are found murdered. Stride feels as if he is always one step behind a brutal killer who has Cat in his sights, and must find out why this young girl has been targeted for death - and why a decade-old crime is coming back to life.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>WOLVES</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">by Cary J. Griffith</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sam Rivers, wildlife biologist and special agent for the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, has a penchant for understanding predators. His expertise finds him returning to Defiance, Minnesota, his boyhood home on the Mesabi Iron Range, a place he hasn’t seen in twenty years. There, he investigates wolf depredation of local livestock—but wolves aren’t the only predators in Defiance. The mysterious death of his estranged father lands the agent on a case unlike any he’s worked before. His knowledge of cold, wilderness and wolves was bred in his bones. He learned his lessons well, and now he’ll need to use them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">by Erin Hart</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After a year away from working in the field, archaeologist Cormac Maguire and pathologist Nora Gavin are back in the bogs, investigating a ninth-century body found buried in the trunk of a car. They discover that the ancient corpse is not alone—pinned beneath it is the body of philosopher Benedict Kavanagh, missing for mere months. Both men were viciously murdered, but centuries apart—so how did they end up buried together in the bog? While on the case, Cormac and Nora lodge at Killowen, a nearby artists' colony and organic farm and sanctuary for eccentric souls. Digging deeper into the older crime, they become entangled in high-stakes intrigue encompassing Kavanagh's death while surrounded by suspects in his ghastly murder. It seems that everyone at Killowen has some secret to protect.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>TAMARACK COUNTY</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">by William Kent Krueger</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As a blizzard swells just days before Christmas, the car belonging to the wife of a retired local judge is discovered abandoned on a rural road. After days without any leads, the search-and-rescue team, assisted by O’Connor, has little hope of finding her alive, if at all. Early on, Cork notices small details about the woman’s disappearance that tell a disturbing story. And when the beloved pet dog of a friend is found decapitated, he begins to detect a startling pattern of ominous incidents throughout the area. Then Cork’s son is nearly killed, and he knows this is no trick of his imagination. Someone is spinning a deadly web in Tamarack County. At the center is a murder more than twenty years old for which an innocent man may have been convicted.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-23039583583221248352013-12-16T13:01:00.002-06:002013-12-16T13:07:05.999-06:00Grandma's Gingerbread Men<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This month (in addition to scribbling madly on Book Five, of course...) I'm helping to whip up the usual army of gingerbread men for the holidays. Does anybody else remember that great line from Margo Ledbetter on the Brit-com "Good Neighbors"? Surely you remember Margo (played by the estimable Penelope Keith), on the subject of her impressive baking output for charity: "Gingerbread men in quantity hold no fear for me!" The recipe below was handed down on the German-American side of the family by my wonderful grandmother, Morine Pickart Van Steenhuyse.<br />
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You might well wonder whether I've tried to make them into little replica bog men. Not yet, but I suppose it could be done...<br />
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<b>Gingerbread Men</b><br />
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2 cups sugar<br />
1 cup shortening<br />
1 cup dark molasses<br />
2 eggs<br />
7 cups flour (more or less)<br />
1 cup hot coffee (with 2 heaping teaspoons baking soda added)<br />
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon<br />
1 teaspoons ground ginger<br />
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Mix sugar, shortening, molasses, and egg with electric mixer, then slowly add hot coffee/soda mixture and stir well. (It will look horrible, but don't be deterred!) Add half the flour, spices, and stir thoroughly, then add remaining flour until the dough is easily handled, but still sticky. Cover and chill overnight. Roll out and cut as desired. Bake cookies at 350°F for 10 minutes, or until no imprint remains. When cool, frost and decorate as desired.<br />
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When the frosting is dry, layer the cookies in tins or plastic food containers, and put a few apple slices wrapped loosely in aluminum foil around the edges. This helps soften the cookies, and gives them a lovely apple flavor. Remove the apples after a few days, before they become a science experiment!<br />
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Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-37648937756226316832013-07-02T15:34:00.003-05:002014-02-14T14:38:18.261-06:00BOOK OF KILLOWEN glossary entries<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One of the delightfully fun things about writing novels is getting to share all of the strange and esoteric knowledge I gain through research. Many people want to know how to pronounce Irish words and names; I get to translate some of the slang my characters use, and explain forensic details, archaeological terms, and in the case of this new book, lots of fascinating information about the making of early medieval manuscripts, including all the strange materials used to create inks and pigments.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm working on definitions and pronunciations for the list of words below, and would love to know if there are any other words you're dying to know about. Let me know, and I'll include them on the <b><a href="http://erinhart.com/glossary.php" target="_blank">glossary page</a>.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>New glossary entries for THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Áine</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">An Feadán Mór</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Annala Rioghachta Éireann</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Annals of the Four Masters</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Aosdána</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">arcana</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">armagura</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">ascenders</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">atin’ (eating)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">aubergines</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">auripigmentum</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">azurite</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">beag</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">boilersuit</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Brehon</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">bugallas</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">caput humeri, tuberculum majoris, infra spinatus, teres minor...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">cashpoint</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">chevre</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">chevrette</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Cill Eóghain</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">cinnabar</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Clonmacnoise</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Coarb</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Colmcille</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Cormach</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Cosnamach</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">crottin</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">crozier</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Cumdach Eóghain</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">da</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">descenders</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Diarmuid</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dinnsenchus</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">dosh</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dun Aengus</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Eamonn</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Éile Uí Chearbhaill</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Éiru</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">eejits</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">ensuite</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Eóghan </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">epigastric</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">eToll</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">exsanguination</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">fromager</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Gaelscoil</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">gall</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">gallotannic</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Go mhéimid beo ag an am seo arís.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">gombeen</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Gráinne</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">gran</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">haggard</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">histopathologic</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Imbolc</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">infraumbilical</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">interphalangeal joint</span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXMuqqg3j8ClzQCzHiHT2YD61zcCWR4GqNfnvjYga-iWx-ba0tysuE0rQs_4xuoDOPtJmldzVI7KVcTezqScpJ7QvY8B5om58_Odx6f_4EvluSV42h2pdDrAq_F5Y7BvmkST0adPPsIWo/s400/celtic_knot.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXMuqqg3j8ClzQCzHiHT2YD61zcCWR4GqNfnvjYga-iWx-ba0tysuE0rQs_4xuoDOPtJmldzVI7KVcTezqScpJ7QvY8B5om58_Odx6f_4EvluSV42h2pdDrAq_F5Y7BvmkST0adPPsIWo/s320/celtic_knot.png" height="313" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">‘in ualle lacrimarum in loco quem posuit.’</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">John O’Donovan</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">journos</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">knotwork</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">lamina propria</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Laois</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">lapis</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">léigh</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">leine</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">liber sextus</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">livor mortis</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">luminaria</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjradl76-zOJXlGzpf6MEL8DCWWBDqMP5n3oPI88oDOuT2Y9Iwa0Ijyp8WPolNbT2K5KsvC0bCOGrD9VeN1nCa6vjG5KbivluJy9DiQyagzspsEh32yEiAIJOsJKLg5CIH6uZPbkVeHxnw/s179/majescule-02.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjradl76-zOJXlGzpf6MEL8DCWWBDqMP5n3oPI88oDOuT2Y9Iwa0Ijyp8WPolNbT2K5KsvC0bCOGrD9VeN1nCa6vjG5KbivluJy9DiQyagzspsEh32yEiAIJOsJKLg5CIH6uZPbkVeHxnw/s179/majescule-02.jpg" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">mac</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">malachite</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">majescule</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">miniscule</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Moleskine</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">navvy</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nisifortinus</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">nitrile</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Ó Beigléighinn</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Offaly</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">papillae</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Periphyseon </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">petechial </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">pillock</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">poncing, ponce</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Port na Rón</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">purpura</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">red lake</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">rushy glen </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix9lZJJ0CE2aAJvBYOh48lXy6xeEWlv4GihksaMkz9-azLkZDRRVTq3983dBq9cm1gB3sptaEmBzxx5wXfM33j1MQBAf3Qu_ECFUt81R96CKHnxPB_YHL5T3bXckgpIEbYAw_v4Vzw5pg/s450/Senchus-Mor-facsimile.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix9lZJJ0CE2aAJvBYOh48lXy6xeEWlv4GihksaMkz9-azLkZDRRVTq3983dBq9cm1gB3sptaEmBzxx5wXfM33j1MQBAf3Qu_ECFUt81R96CKHnxPB_YHL5T3bXckgpIEbYAw_v4Vzw5pg/s320/Senchus-Mor-facsimile.jpg" height="253" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">saag chicken and garlic naan</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Samhain</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">scurl</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">secondment</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Senchus Mór</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">shower of shites</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">shrine</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">skint</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">slapper</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">slagging</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">slash</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Smithwicks</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">splodges</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBYh2cPoTgxlaTPLHF-oUpRBre4BUBS6xnxvEevsGG61x9dRxFaKfEGRpZMqikFYCbHXcGge5VPMlIoNKtznLD_YN705xLXNfBylaatFpPTJcExtLKxooJc4arjU_lUEUB8QGfVNzAmvU/s500/shrine-2928225613_bb2a5871b4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBYh2cPoTgxlaTPLHF-oUpRBre4BUBS6xnxvEevsGG61x9dRxFaKfEGRpZMqikFYCbHXcGge5VPMlIoNKtznLD_YN705xLXNfBylaatFpPTJcExtLKxooJc4arjU_lUEUB8QGfVNzAmvU/s320/shrine-2928225613_bb2a5871b4.jpg" height="320" width="202" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">St. Manchan</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">stocious</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Templemore</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">termon</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Tir na nOg</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Tom O’Bedlam</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">tosser</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">tuberosities</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">turbary</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">verdigris</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">virescent</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">vitae aeternam</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">woad</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">yellow ochre</span><br />
<br />Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-31039092010908340992013-04-24T13:02:00.002-05:002013-07-02T14:56:23.354-05:00"In the beginning was the Word..."<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I confess to being a bit tongue-tied whenever trying to explain what my books are ABOUT. Yes, they're archaeological/forensic mysteries set in the bogs of Ireland, but I sincerely hope that each one is ABOUT much more than just whodunit. Any good novel is full of mysteries, and in some ways, I prefer to let readers find the connections and the meaning behind the stories. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But there is always an underlying theme: in HAUNTED GROUND it was how the past intrudes into and connects with the present; in LAKE OF SORROWS it was how the notion of sacrifice has stayed with us down through the ages; in FALSE MERMAID I got to play with all sorts of fairy-tale ideas about identity and shape-shifting.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9frBp9f-uY7DHOKAFPdMKxMilaS2zg6R_AbG7S2m9PDu9pyNS8CInvmvA7juvMdTa7su6up-AI8OmAgCg2ePu1Xmh3gJoML3g3HraAa-Boj-tStIIwj8Zv2DlnauSwHDh30vT_50JZuY/s1600/Faddan-000_knockout.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="281" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9frBp9f-uY7DHOKAFPdMKxMilaS2zg6R_AbG7S2m9PDu9pyNS8CInvmvA7juvMdTa7su6up-AI8OmAgCg2ePu1Xmh3gJoML3g3HraAa-Boj-tStIIwj8Zv2DlnauSwHDh30vT_50JZuY/s320/Faddan-000_knockout.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN was inspired by the discovery of </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Faddan More Psalter,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">a 9th-century book of psalms, in a Tipperary bog in 2006. I was fascinated by the thought of someone losing a book in a bog... Not to mention the fact that a leather satchel had been found not far away... seven years previously. Anyone who knows anything about medieval scribes knows that they stored and carried their manuscripts around in leather book satchels, known in Irish as <i>tiag libuir</i>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For those of you who know Cormac Maguire and Nora Gavin, THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN has them back in the bogs of Ireland, recovering the remains of a man from the ninth century who has turned up for some reason in the trunk of a car buried in the bog.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">(When I told people how the story began, they would always ask how a ninth-century guy ended up in the trunk of a car, and I'd say, "I don't know—I have to write the book to find out.")</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">While Cormac and Nora are out on the excavation, another body turns up, and this time it's a modern murder victim, Benedict Kavanagh, the host of a television program. Cormac and Nora are staying at Killowen, a local organic farm/artists' retreat, and the people living or working there (including Kavanagh's wife and her lover) all become suspects in his murder.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My fictional story centers on the search for an ancient manuscript. I'm fascinated by the ways in which Irish culture throughout the ages was perpetuated without written language (and is still being perpetuated, in some situations), and how the Irish monks who copied out all those thousands of manuscripts in the 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th centuries kept ideas and learning alive. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I've always had more than a passing interest in handwriting and calligraphy, but when the Faddan More Psalter turned up, I got very interested in the whole fascinating history of books and book-making. Imagine living in a time when every book in the world had been written out by hand...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To me, the theme of THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN centers on language and words, the ways and habits we have of encoding language, the ways in which words and stories and beliefs are handed down. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Various people in the novel have trouble communicating: some speak in fits and starts because of brain conditions like aphasia and Tourette's, some can't read or write, some speak languages other than English. To these people, and those trying to understand them, the link between words and their meaning cannot be taken for granted.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU8gZiclg6a_TNR_A_uFVmHC35As5vIm-mu9UsfmrNLoxXdVvHRg_0vR3YgLy8n8oVlnhrgD0AuCjcB3APTHxLxfdoylTxcxdS2rLavrX9QCzltuv5boVQyZUjjiQonQMNPpUTUqGpGGY/s1600/Faddan_More_letters.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="451" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU8gZiclg6a_TNR_A_uFVmHC35As5vIm-mu9UsfmrNLoxXdVvHRg_0vR3YgLy8n8oVlnhrgD0AuCjcB3APTHxLxfdoylTxcxdS2rLavrX9QCzltuv5boVQyZUjjiQonQMNPpUTUqGpGGY/s640/Faddan_More_letters.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We're going through a revolution at the moment, not unlike the revolution that occurred in Ireland in the early days of Christianity, when the written word began to supersede the spoken word at the center of the culture. THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN touches upon all those ideas, the mysterious ways that words and knowledge are passed down through the centuries. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The transmission of knowledge in traditional culture—music, song, storytelling, and history—is something that fascinates me, and it's something my characters often think about. At one point in HAUNTED GROUND, Cormac says to Nora: </span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Things do remain. People carry on, without even knowing. You can’t kill that, as hard as you might try. It’s almost like something embedded in our subconscious, like a virus, that only shows itself in certain conditions. Sounds daft, I know, but doesn’t it make sense, when you think of all that’s managed to survive?</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN, the young scribe in the prologue, Eóghan, is obsessed with words and writing, and keeps returning to a passage from the Gospel of John, something he probably would have copied out by hand many times over: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and God was the Word." </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Although I'm thoroughly agnostic, I am fascinated by this connection in the human mind between the idea of god and the idea of language. Every belief system in the world has its holy books, collections of words that distill and magnify religious and spiritual ideas. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Those books are our still-vital connection to the thoughts that traveled through the minds of ancient philosophers and scholars. There must have been many written works that did not survive. But a few managed to travel through millennia unscathed, and that we still have any of those ancient works at all is probably down to the Irish monks who patiently copied out every book they could get their hands on, spreading curiosity and the love of knowledge at a time when approved and accepted ways of thinking were growing narrower and narrower.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYfL9zQCOOfmt72Si-lnTbLOGrrZbFymqP_lNTRGa_hNQ_Ajv_4576pNioL2GJOmuRzd8_qaKysaiCQqPpbLoIcRY0RzcMzUb1_ufECDC-smUkMvho__6lSQVA4smEX_vsHbD8DIUIJ1U/s1600/Faddan-More-Psalter-det.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYfL9zQCOOfmt72Si-lnTbLOGrrZbFymqP_lNTRGa_hNQ_Ajv_4576pNioL2GJOmuRzd8_qaKysaiCQqPpbLoIcRY0RzcMzUb1_ufECDC-smUkMvho__6lSQVA4smEX_vsHbD8DIUIJ1U/s640/Faddan-More-Psalter-det.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm also playing around with ideas about how we define the word 'book.' The characters in THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN debate this subject over the dinner table Is a book an artifact, a physical object, something we can hold in our hands and touch? People who love books love that aspect of them, right down to the smell of ink and glue. Or can a book be a collection of words and ideas, in whatever format used to transmit them? I hear from more and more people all the time who are completely devoted to audiobooks, who revel in the words of a story brought to life by reading aloud. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That's the way I learned to love books, living along with the characters as my mother read to us from LITTLE WOMEN, ROBINSON CRUSOE, TREASURE ISLAND, MISTRESS MASHAM'S REPOSE...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I would love to hear YOUR thoughts about all this, dear readers. </span><br />
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Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-42223808773473242802013-03-21T10:55:00.000-05:002013-03-21T11:04:02.029-05:00Sisters in Crime - We Love Libraries!<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Like many of you, I pretty much grew up in the stacks at my local public library, and have long been an ardent fan and supporter of libraries in Minnesota, who do so much wonderful programming, in addition to fostering reading and learning every day of the year. So I am thrilled to report that another Minnesota library has won the national Sisters in Crime "We Love Libraries" drawing! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Libraries enter the drawing by sending in photos of staff members with books by members of Sisters in Crime. I was delighted that the Mille Lacs Community Library in Isle, Minnesota decided to feature in their winning photo a whole bunch of books by members of Twin Cities Sisters in Crime, including BLOODY HALLS by Carl Brookins, BUTTONS AND BONES by Monica Ferris, DEATH OF THE MANTIS by Michael Stanley, BINGO BARGE MURDER by Jessie Chandler, and FALSE MERMAID by yours truly. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieEwZIJGKtHEwDfCeVJsmKByvcn6ALhm-Ts_dIDGbHSi4ve3vpEOPcmdQzvBQP82rAjkeJnsv2xJsjXKDfrUFk2ewUZJqxe46nbc2dNIAPMWypQ7SHqLo5UpeErRuAHU406qCaYjb2yB0/s1600/Mille+Lacs+Lake+Community+Library285x418_SinC_2013-01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieEwZIJGKtHEwDfCeVJsmKByvcn6ALhm-Ts_dIDGbHSi4ve3vpEOPcmdQzvBQP82rAjkeJnsv2xJsjXKDfrUFk2ewUZJqxe46nbc2dNIAPMWypQ7SHqLo5UpeErRuAHU406qCaYjb2yB0/s1600/Mille+Lacs+Lake+Community+Library285x418_SinC_2013-01.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Mille Lacs Community Library will receive their check from current Twin Cities Sisters in Crime president Rhonda Gilliland and a panel of local SinC authors (</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Mickie Turk, Pam Leonard, and Christine Husom) </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">on April 17, at 7 pm. All are welcome for the panel discussion and celebration! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here's a bit more about "We Love Libraries" from the Sisters in Crime website: </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Grants of $1,000 will be awarded monthly from January through December 2013. At the end of each month, a winner will be drawn from entries received at our website at www.sistersincrime.org. Only U.S. libraries may enter the drawing. Below you will find photos of our latest winners. </span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To enter, simply complete the entry form and upload a photo of one or more of your staff with three books in your collection by Sisters in Crime members. You can find a list of our members who are authors by clicking here, or by navigating to our left side menu under Resources, SinC Authors. </span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After the random drawing on the last business day of the month, the winning library will be contacted and announced. All branches within a larger system may enter; however, once a library in the system has won, no other libraries within that system can win the grant. Those not successful in one month will automatically be entered for subsequent drawings. Grants must be used to purchase books and may not be used for general operating expenses. Book purchases are NOT restricted to the mystery genre nor to those by Sisters in Crime members. There is no cost or obligation other than allowing us to post winners' photos on our website. </span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">All libraries are welcome to enter.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://sistersincrime.org/displaycommon.cfm?an=1&subarticlenbr=53" target="_blank">For more details and an entry form, check out the Sisters in Crime website</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-26519307686830525832013-03-06T12:22:00.000-06:002013-03-21T11:00:51.619-05:00Celebrating the Book Launch - THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN & THE ROAD FROM CASTLEBARNAGH<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What a wonderful night! After worrying about the weather (about eight inches in the morning, and it didn't stop snowing until late afternoon), we went ahead with the launch party for THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN and THE ROAD FROM CASTLEBARNAGH on March 5.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thanks to our friends and family, and to all who braved the weather to come out on a snowy night to Saint Paul's beautiful James J. Hill Reference Library for a brief visit to Ireland's recent and not-so-recent past! </span><br />
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</span> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Hill Library</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, with its shelves reaching all the way to the second-story ceiling, is reminiscent of the Long Room at Trinity College Library, and </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">was a perfect setting for launching THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN, a story that draws upon the history of ancient Irish scholars and scribes and their marvelous handwritten manuscripts.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We had some gorgeous music from our friends Ann and Charlie Heymann—also known by the name of their band, Clairseach—with Ann on wire-strung harp, and Charlie on cittern, accordion, and various other instruments as well. </span><br />
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</span> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Paddy and I thoroughly enjoyed chatting about and reading from our books, and sharing images of the people, places, and artifacts that inspired our stories. Paddy read "Hairpins and Combs," a chapter from THE ROAD TO CASTLEBARNAGH about his first musical instrument, a mouth organ, purchased for one shilling from a peddler who visited his family home in the early 1950s. I read a section from the prologue of THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN, a dramatic tale of murder set in the 9th century.</span><br />
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</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Many thanks to Alayne Hopkins from the Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library and to Beth O'Connor and Dawn Knapek from the James J. Hill Reference Library for all their work in making such a wonderful and welcoming event.</span><br />
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</span> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Huge thanks also to everyone who helped with setup and making sure that everything ran smoothly: </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Bonnie Schueler,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Betty and John Rogers, Julie Hart, Karen Mueller, Linda White, Shannon and Mike Nemer, Lisa McDaniel, Laurie Muir, and Sue Zumberge and David Unowsky from SubText: A Bookstore.</span><br />
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</span> Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-40316832050730720682013-02-23T16:57:00.000-06:002013-02-25T17:16:18.507-06:00Kirkus Reviews - THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Review from January 15, 2013: Volume LXXXI, No 2</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm-xPTvd1dzXLy_aTYDhT1mKkG28bm5-D7IVdxeGtZ-FXETBlJtvnqS-KQeaIqz6ZaFUjZAhMo9hMXv2UdbAus8mcDf2KoEGxVEeNZTgMlOGfNyyEPmZFnUWgFKr7Dn_a2OgdllUeY_-o/s1600/killowen-rev_300x453_300dpi.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm-xPTvd1dzXLy_aTYDhT1mKkG28bm5-D7IVdxeGtZ-FXETBlJtvnqS-KQeaIqz6ZaFUjZAhMo9hMXv2UdbAus8mcDf2KoEGxVEeNZTgMlOGfNyyEPmZFnUWgFKr7Dn_a2OgdllUeY_-o/s200/killowen-rev_300x453_300dpi.jpg" width="131" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delighted to get a very kindly assessment from the folks at <i>Kirkus Reviews</i>, who maintain a reputation for finicky taste in literature, mystery and otherwise. I certainly don't mind, especially as I am an almost-famously finicky critic myself.<br /><br />It's always exciting to get the first few reviews from the trades before a book comes out, and a relief when they're not too bad. The review contains a nifty plot summary, positively exemplary in its brevity—nicely done!—and ends:</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />"</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hart’s foray into soggy Killowen has a rock-solid foundation of musical language and deft plotting."</span></div>
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<a href="https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/erin-hart/book-of-killowen/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;" target="_blank">Read the full text of the review at the Kirkus website</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Pub Date: March 5th, 2013</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">ISBN: 978-1-4516-3484-6</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Page count: 352pp</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Publisher: Scribner</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Review Posted Online: Dec. 27th, 2012</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15th, 2013</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-69374380281009104402013-02-14T08:49:00.001-06:002013-02-25T17:19:00.371-06:00Faddan More Psalter<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">All of my novels are inspired by real archaeological finds, and THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN is no exception. Things keep turning up in Irish bogs—gold, bog butter, wooden roads, even people—at this rate, I have enough inspiration to keep Cormac and Nora busy for for quite some time.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In July 2006, a workman named Eddie Fogarty was operating a mechanical digger in the bog at Faddan More, Co. Tipperary, located just a few miles southwest of Birr in County Offaly. He was cutting big blocks of turf, to be ground up for peat moss used in gardening.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifgM3eqfUPJZ05EswD1_b30zdoMjjtAb8zaZevSSLzVN1DMwSHgYVX8yllSkYpaQ1H56LrdsLBQVCg3quQJjckxu8DSGObryoc_4YRiA-FGpVG18tj9jst-gUUpkl9Is2LBA2Z6BMClXY/s1600/IMG_0061.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifgM3eqfUPJZ05EswD1_b30zdoMjjtAb8zaZevSSLzVN1DMwSHgYVX8yllSkYpaQ1H56LrdsLBQVCg3quQJjckxu8DSGObryoc_4YRiA-FGpVG18tj9jst-gUUpkl9Is2LBA2Z6BMClXY/s640/IMG_0061.JPG" width="640" /></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here's a view of turf blocks drying on Faddan More bog, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">taken when I visited </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">in April 2011.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Eddie Fogarty had spotted a leather-bound book as it fell from the bucket of his digger into an adjacent trench, and immediately called the landowners, Kevin and Patrick Leonard, who had some experience with artifacts previously found in this particular bog. More on that later...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Faddan More Psalter, </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">in situ</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Leonards knew they had something unusual when they spotted some illuminated pages, and phoned the National Museum with the news that they’d discovered something almost like the Book of Kells.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A crew from the National Museum, including museum director Pat Wallace, archaeologist and Keeper of Antiquities Eamonn Kelly, and Keeper of Conservation Rolly Read, all rushed out to the bog site.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The manuscript in question turned out to be a Psalter, a book of Psalms written in the 9th century. Several lines of text were visible, and it was the museum's Head of Collections,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Dr. Raghnall Ó Floinn, who managed to pick out a single legible phrase: ‘</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">in ualle lacrimarum</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">’—‘in the vale of tears.’ </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Faddan More Psalter, still wet from the bog</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After a bit of research, it turned out that the bit of legible writing was a line from Psalm 83, verse 7: ‘<i>in ualle lacrimarum in loco quem posuit</i>.’ — ‘In the vale of tears, in the place which he has set.’ </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Faddan More Psalter</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As you can see, the book wasn't exactly in great shape; many of the pages had been reduced to a sort of gelatinous goo, with only the edges preserved, but it was still an amazing find, unlike any other in the world. Judging from the style of writing and embellishment, antiquities experts estimated that it was written around the ninth century. There were many famous monasteries in the region around Faddan More—Birr and Clonmacnoise to name only two.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Clonmacnoise</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Faddan More Psalter underwent more than two years of conservation work (more on that later as well...) and is now on permanent display at the National Museum of Ireland, part of an exhibit entitled The Treasury: Celtic and Early Christian Ireland. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I suppose you know how the minds of crime writers work—always looking for a body. I heard about this discovery of a ninth-century book of Psalms and immediately started to wonder about the person who'd carried it into the bog... Images of a scholar and his assistant began to percolate, and became the opening prologue of THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-27814315153173139192013-02-13T20:54:00.001-06:002013-02-25T17:20:30.217-06:00Ancient wax tablets<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One of the world's most fascinating bog discoveries</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">—</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">thought to be the oldest existing examples</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> of Latin writing from Ireland</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">—</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">are the Springmount Bog tablets. These are wax tablets on which are inscribed the Vulgate text of Psalms 30-32. They were found in a bog in County Antrim, Ireland, in the early 20th century, and are now preserved in the National Museum of Ireland, and some of the tablets are part of the Faddan More Psalter exhibit at the museum. More on the Psalter later...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thou wilt bring me out of this snare, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">which they </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">have hidden for me: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">for thou art my protector. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"The tablets are c. 75 x 210 mm, c. 7 mm thick, and appear to have been lashed together as a group of six, waxed sides together" (Stevenson, "Literacy in Ireland: The Evidence of the Patrick Dossier in the Book of Armagh," </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">— McKitterick (ed) The Uses of Literacy in Early Mediaeval Europe [1990] 20).</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"These are an unusual survival, given the climatic conditions of northern Europe; they were preserved owing to loss in a peat bog, and they convey graphically the obligation of the priest to be ‘psalteratus’—to have memorised and be able to recite the Psalms, in the tradition of the Judaic priesthood—and recall exhortations to ordinands to spend whatever time possible learning them, even when travelling (as the person studying these extracts may have been)" — Michelle P. Brown,<i> Preaching with the Pen: the Contribution of Insular Scribes to the Transmission of Sacred Text, from the 6th to 9th Centuries</i> [2004]).</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuJh0zsNSz0Azv11_AahtGA3rwogH67vPHgOqTm9ghVZMZWwkKmEskXivC3u8OJJYTpOwTFJjkINIHThMuqPX90R8eboZtoqjgAEkKR2yGdB01M1BL6FtqaraaIMq8R-5nAYDbibWW_jg/s1600/diptych.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuJh0zsNSz0Azv11_AahtGA3rwogH67vPHgOqTm9ghVZMZWwkKmEskXivC3u8OJJYTpOwTFJjkINIHThMuqPX90R8eboZtoqjgAEkKR2yGdB01M1BL6FtqaraaIMq8R-5nAYDbibWW_jg/s320/diptych.jpg" width="297" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A wax tablet was often in the form of a diptych, a small two-paneled booklet, usually bound with a leather thong. Writing was done with a stylus, a pointed instrument made of metal, bone, or wood.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdwM0_ykvhgKDxZTI5Bdj2Q8QhxZbF9Sez1ApuAhjJzjMGh0v-K23wzt35WtjwrOcMSxFgwX92YwDJFoTW6ILOrXTrn3hpgVmPj7Is587kImnGKDkXlFWzyBdEUgnV2sFH1tuHI-RKy68/s1600/Anthropomorphic+head+on+a+bone+parchment+pricker+or+stylus+Kells-Co+Kilkenny.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdwM0_ykvhgKDxZTI5Bdj2Q8QhxZbF9Sez1ApuAhjJzjMGh0v-K23wzt35WtjwrOcMSxFgwX92YwDJFoTW6ILOrXTrn3hpgVmPj7Is587kImnGKDkXlFWzyBdEUgnV2sFH1tuHI-RKy68/s320/Anthropomorphic+head+on+a+bone+parchment+pricker+or+stylus+Kells-Co+Kilkenny.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here's a bone stylus featuring a human head, discovered during excavation at Kells Priory, in County Kilkenny. The archaeologists' report describes its possible uses:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">An expertly carved bone parchment pricker or stylus with an anthropomorphic head was used either when laying out the script on parchment or for writing on wax tablets. </span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The wax tablet and stylus were important in monastic life. The Rule of Saint Benedict, which dates to the sixth century, included the tablet and its stylus in its list of necessary accoutrements of the monastic life: "et ut hoc vitium peculiaris radicitus amputetur, dentur al abbate omnia quae sunt necessaria, id est cuculla, tunica, pedules, caligas, bracile, cultellum, graphium, acum, mappula, tabulas..." ["In order that this vice of private ownership may be completely uprooted, the abbot is to provide all things necessary: that is, cowl, tunic, sandals, shoes, belt, knife, stylus, needle, handkerchief and writing tablets..." </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg94YzmNiG_UjVCBUwWXZWeYGQYjbruxeMV2ofzXnGv-GLb-JVBuOZzd3mFCKq1FZNvXneXjXQFBjHW6XFjfTV9fAYxZWpgeMZrmfwNOsR-k0QfRWiNy4vA3wUEzrtfz5ulBX83kh_WvRw/s1600/sy14855_Shrewsbury.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg94YzmNiG_UjVCBUwWXZWeYGQYjbruxeMV2ofzXnGv-GLb-JVBuOZzd3mFCKq1FZNvXneXjXQFBjHW6XFjfTV9fAYxZWpgeMZrmfwNOsR-k0QfRWiNy4vA3wUEzrtfz5ulBX83kh_WvRw/s400/sy14855_Shrewsbury.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Some Roman </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">styli </i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">from Shrewsbury in England. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The pointed end was used for writing; the flat end </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">was used to smooth out the wax for re-use.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdULBxl0uwE553XirzFwHwUcQclyUY1_Ol-PsSvHyyKz5xvYxTLTPgZ_iNMIfNv3VR7DA9UWt0N5UGo1iuSZroH_yoO0cWIOVmLRCNcrE-4foHY54ERZYa6d6fiWBgkNmUC00LpIMeOIo/s1600/st_aldhelm_illustration.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdULBxl0uwE553XirzFwHwUcQclyUY1_Ol-PsSvHyyKz5xvYxTLTPgZ_iNMIfNv3VR7DA9UWt0N5UGo1iuSZroH_yoO0cWIOVmLRCNcrE-4foHY54ERZYa6d6fiWBgkNmUC00LpIMeOIo/s640/st_aldhelm_illustration.jpg" width="390" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Saint Aldhelm (639-709) was famous for his riddles. He composed one about wax tablets, or <i>pugillares</i>, as he would have referred to them in Latin, in the late seventh century:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Of honey-laden bees I first was born, </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> But in the forest grew my outer coat; </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> My shoes from tough hides came. An iron point </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> In artful windings cuts a fair design, </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> And leaves long, twisted furrows, like a plough...</span><br />
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Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-18623036728479134642013-02-13T16:11:00.002-06:002013-02-13T16:33:44.548-06:00Oak galls and iron gall ink<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Because I know many of you are as geeky about historical detail as I am, I thought I'd share some pictures of the people, places, and artifacts that inspired the story of THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When I thought about writing a story about ancient manuscripts, some of the first </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">objects that snagged my imagination were oak galls, used since ancient times to create ink for writing.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPslvHWda2R66aXUxKF5sWcg_XVC6HyH5O-qwdFcJyXL6iA22oizlHXC7Ndla3Y77UyfYNkNAeRY0RYZ_xstwR60KprvvvKxk-ocTpd4mbZZkHg7LWAIZ7ztTcn_I2kSBYLyyYviugRw0/s1600/800px-Developing_Oak_Marble_gall.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="298" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPslvHWda2R66aXUxKF5sWcg_XVC6HyH5O-qwdFcJyXL6iA22oizlHXC7Ndla3Y77UyfYNkNAeRY0RYZ_xstwR60KprvvvKxk-ocTpd4mbZZkHg7LWAIZ7ztTcn_I2kSBYLyyYviugRw0/s400/800px-Developing_Oak_Marble_gall.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here's an oak gall, a common growth on oak trees around the world, and a source of basic dark ink from medieval times right up to the 19th century. Many of the monks who created Ireland's ancient manuscripts used iron gall ink. It's not much in favor these days (too acidic - eats through paper), but in the days of calfskin vellum, the tannic acid in the ink bit into the page and made the lettering indelible.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT0HGmryOJYgwC28QCTYrgAJw7_tPb5nqAdEHz0rYcodJAbHQyZEGMeeaTL7h90KkJRfNV4fHYbErlopdcd72mM1Gl6AMhlX9nQIN9CemFfQQBmYEKSLDuzmswJZX27XyeFc3auSAGYgQ/s1600/Oak+Gall.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="234" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT0HGmryOJYgwC28QCTYrgAJw7_tPb5nqAdEHz0rYcodJAbHQyZEGMeeaTL7h90KkJRfNV4fHYbErlopdcd72mM1Gl6AMhlX9nQIN9CemFfQQBmYEKSLDuzmswJZX27XyeFc3auSAGYgQ/s320/Oak+Gall.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Oak galls are formed when a gall wasp lays her eggs on the tip of an oak branch, and the tree begins to secrete a fluid that ends up enveloping the egg, and ultimately becomes a food source for the developing wasp larva.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj57SWBK3at19c1JCoXDNJ8dJmApXSM0FcSXP2qHYWZasEDD9_qce-W-tABWdsViQUJlzv8YUfUf65O10emuBT1DXymqfQH6pFDsEpMTMBUoWDAjJKCbJY0P_2I4ipnSw8x_5aJ3e7fZ_4/s1600/Materia_medica_galls.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj57SWBK3at19c1JCoXDNJ8dJmApXSM0FcSXP2qHYWZasEDD9_qce-W-tABWdsViQUJlzv8YUfUf65O10emuBT1DXymqfQH6pFDsEpMTMBUoWDAjJKCbJY0P_2I4ipnSw8x_5aJ3e7fZ_4/s400/Materia_medica_galls.jpg" width="386" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here's how oak galls are described in an old medical text, A History of the Materia Medica, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">by John Hill, M.D., published in 1751:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">[From <i>galla</i>.]</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">***Galls or galnuts are a kind of preternatural and accidental tumours, produced by the Punctures of Insects on the Oaks of several Species; but those of the oak only are used in medicine. We have two kinds, the Oriental and the European galls: the Oriental are brought from Aleppo, of the bigness of a large nutmeg, with tubercles on their surface, of a very firm and solid texture, and a disagreeable, acerb, and astringent taste. The European galls are of the same size, with perfectly smooth surfaces: they are light, often spongy, and cavernous within, and always of a lax texture. They have a less austere taste, and are of much less value than the first sort, both in manufactures and medicine. The general history of galls is this: an insect of the fly kind, for the safety of her young, wounds the branches of the trees, and in the hole deposites her egg: the lacerated vessels of the tree discharging their contents, form a tumour or woody case about the hole, where the egg is thus defended from all injuries. This tumour also serves for the food of the tender maggot, produced from the egg of the fly, which, as soon as it is perfect, and in its winged state, gnaws its way out, as appears from the hole found in the gall; and where no hole is seen on its surface, the maggot, or its remains, are sure to be found within, on breaking it. It has been observed, that the oak does not produce galls in cold countries: but this observation should be confined to the medicinal galls; for all those excrescences which we find on this tree in our own woods, and call oak-apples, oak-grapes, and oak-cones, are true and genuine galls, though less firm in their texture. The true reason of the hard ones not being produced with us, seems to be that we want the peculiar species of insect to which they owe their origin, which is a fly of the ichneumon kind, only found in hot countries. The species of fly that occasions, by its punctures, the soft galls of France and Italy, is different both from the Syrian one and from ours, though still of the ichneumon kind; and we find the several kinds, which occasion the different galls in our own kingdom, produce different kinds, and those of different degrees of hardness, on the same tree. Galls are used in making ink, and in dying and dressing leather, and many other manufactures. In medicine they are very astringent, and good under proper management.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When the wasp is mature, it bores a hole through the flesh of the gall and escapes, and the gall dries up, leaving a nut-like body rich in tannic acid, the substance that makes them suitable for ink.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih7DXgdAS-VlJL5_uZWE0cA5aQn-iowmtcV4MieKdm5wVuD68LW1DBdFDczQUVghthCPTwE51ynft8aNxwVPvlc58vvCz_sDeNMhvjgi5Madkb8JV6ytN0092A1qB_eaAm7ggPstrcc5E/s1600/mecca-gall1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih7DXgdAS-VlJL5_uZWE0cA5aQn-iowmtcV4MieKdm5wVuD68LW1DBdFDczQUVghthCPTwE51ynft8aNxwVPvlc58vvCz_sDeNMhvjgi5Madkb8JV6ytN0092A1qB_eaAm7ggPstrcc5E/s320/mecca-gall1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Monks and other ink-makers would gather oak galls, and devise an ink using this ancient recipe, taken from a Booke of Secrets:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi80UZfoexEtCZT037fTrLimCZnnb1y9g3a5EHgUsdXMZ_W2YgD7zzX9Nz9j2CXc6awH9F0MXMUUIflkhRiopg6K4eu4ubAnWO4WeGmE6xTFkCAEZLtNY5GfSyL2D5j_m5dLZrEMXfjDNw/s1600/Gall-ink-method-crop.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="246" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi80UZfoexEtCZT037fTrLimCZnnb1y9g3a5EHgUsdXMZ_W2YgD7zzX9Nz9j2CXc6awH9F0MXMUUIflkhRiopg6K4eu4ubAnWO4WeGmE6xTFkCAEZLtNY5GfSyL2D5j_m5dLZrEMXfjDNw/s400/Gall-ink-method-crop.png" width="400" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Iron gall ink was used as the basic dark black/brown ink for countless books, including the Book of Kells and other Irish manuscripts, including the Cathach of Saint Columba, the oldest surviving Irish manuscript.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH7pN0AA9xysn6imXbhJGP8F98KAuALE_jmaxXE8HVYat1JWrvYe_XDfgTTrZbfMYA6IWFjitIeQHAAtmVBRyx6O932VeKschVly5O9pT3YNa1MnntSJbSvtxJ4KVmYtvanaIx4zrHXTw/s1600/Cathach.fol.48r.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH7pN0AA9xysn6imXbhJGP8F98KAuALE_jmaxXE8HVYat1JWrvYe_XDfgTTrZbfMYA6IWFjitIeQHAAtmVBRyx6O932VeKschVly5O9pT3YNa1MnntSJbSvtxJ4KVmYtvanaIx4zrHXTw/s400/Cathach.fol.48r.gif" width="326" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you'd like to read more about a modern artist's attempts to make ancient iron gall ink, check out John Daniel's very interesting blog about insects in art, <a href="http://endless-swarm.com/?p=834" target="_blank">THE ENDLESS SWARM</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-39889937263572977842013-02-13T15:37:00.001-06:002013-02-13T15:46:01.342-06:00BOOK OF KILLOWEN Giveaway on Goodreads<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3v7wnkhNI2GHRBhVCjkGRJLsytHsOBL1wRR3u3S8rABsfZQhffkyDEgLInMQA-ntB2F2lvd7r539sZEyqdLFxlkwFUvFV0NxgpPA-umLazLHisW9T2-XHsvfTp9vpKgzrXAfEeq_hBXk/s1600/2013-02-08+22.30.26.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3v7wnkhNI2GHRBhVCjkGRJLsytHsOBL1wRR3u3S8rABsfZQhffkyDEgLInMQA-ntB2F2lvd7r539sZEyqdLFxlkwFUvFV0NxgpPA-umLazLHisW9T2-XHsvfTp9vpKgzrXAfEeq_hBXk/s320/2013-02-08+22.30.26.jpg" width="240" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Finished copies of THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN arrived the other day... There's no getting over seeing a realy book for the first time. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I have to say, this one looks even better in the flesh than it did in mockups or galleys. I really love the smudgy, shadowy manuscript effect, and the way the artwork wraps around the spine is particularly spectacular. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To celebrate the new arrival, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Scribner is giving away 15 copies of THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN on Goodreads. All you need to do to enter is to click on the link below, and enter your mailing address so they can send the book if you win...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/42483-the-book-of-killowen" target="_blank">Goodreads Giveaway-THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Only three days left to enter the drawing!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-58052551660202946552013-02-09T11:43:00.001-06:002013-02-09T11:43:33.768-06:00Wait, how do you say that again?<br />
Thanks for asking. That last word in the title of THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN, is pronounced 'KILL-OWEN,' as if you were saying, 'Arrghhhh! I'm going to <u>kill</u> Owen if he does that one more time!'<br />
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I'm hearing a lot of people say 'KILLOW-en,' with the emphasis pronounced to rhyme with 'WILLOW-en,' but the place name is originally two words in the Irish language and that's why it's pronounced the way it is.<br />
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'<i>Cill</i>' in Irish means 'church', and the full place name in the story is <i>Cill Eoghain</i>, or Owen's Church. You'll understand how it got that name after you read the first chapter of THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN. And that's all I'm going to say about that!<br />
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<span style="text-align: center;">As pointed out in THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN, the country was fairly rotten with churches and monasteries in the early middle ages. There were chapels around every bend in the road. You can still see a fair number of them, thanks to the Irish attachment to crumbly stonework. </span><span style="text-align: center;">Thousands of place names in Ireland begin with 'kill,' and now you know why.</span><span style="text-align: center;"> </span><br />
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My farvorite reference book on all this is <i>IRISH PLACE NAMES</i>, by Deirdre Flanagan and Laurence Flanagan, which gives detailed information on certain common constructions in Irish place names, and then translations for hundreds more. Here's what they say about '<i>cill</i>':<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhELOInGTKVE_XOdZ531vLIxd-pUcrSnE8PNzMFzA-VNexqPLe7ww1gjELhny8Sn1XHBg3AMfJs0YBwJxpFI31_dsv7UWPvFWOFTfwebeloqrus03vBipNGldghJcWrL4UIiLWxfc9QuU/s1600/IMG_0043.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhELOInGTKVE_XOdZ531vLIxd-pUcrSnE8PNzMFzA-VNexqPLe7ww1gjELhny8Sn1XHBg3AMfJs0YBwJxpFI31_dsv7UWPvFWOFTfwebeloqrus03vBipNGldghJcWrL4UIiLWxfc9QuU/s320/IMG_0043.JPG" width="240" /></a>Means 'church' and is the form which most frequently occurs in Irish place-names. It is the dative singular of the word <i>ceall</i>, derived from the Latin <i>cella</i>, which in Classical Latin referred to a 'room within a building', one of its special applications being to a 'shrine of a deity within the pagan '<i>templum</i>'. In place-names it has a range of associated meanings: 'church, monastic settlement or foundation, churchyard, graveyard'. Of these, in place-names, 'monastic settlement' is the commonest reference, particularly where the name can be shown to pre-date the ecclesiatical reforms of the twelfth century.</blockquote>
If you're interested in the interesting and poetic place names in Ireland, you'll<br />
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My favorite ancient churches and chapels are places like Dysert O'Dea in Clare (pictured here), which has the most fantastic carved heads around the archway at the main door to the chapel. It's worth the visit, and cutting through the pasture and climbing over the stile in the stone fence to see this beautiful place.<br />
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The Nun's Chapel at Clonmacnoise (you have to cut through another pasture to get there!) is another great example of an intricately carved Romanesque doorway, and the interior of Cormac's Chapel at the Rock of Cashel is another, though it's badly damaged from too much moisture these days, and covered in scaffolding much of the time.<br />
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Another wonderful ancient church worth visiting (again, if you like climbing fences and hiking) is <i>Teampall Chrónáin</i> in the Burren region of County Clare.<br />
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<br />Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-83277878785905408072013-01-23T11:36:00.001-06:002013-01-23T17:27:33.804-06:00Starred review in PUBLISHERS WEEKLY!<br />
<img border="0" height="19" src="http://www.publishersweekly.com/images/reviews-star-19b.png" style="border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 28px; margin-top: -0.4em; vertical-align: middle;" width="24" /><span style="color: #333333; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 28px;">The Book of Killowen</span><br />
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Erin Hart. Scribner, $26 (352p) ISBN 978-1-4516-3484-6</div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hart combines powerful insights into human nature and pristine prose with history and archeology in her stellar fourth crime novel featuring Irish archeologist Cormac Maguire and American pathologist Nora Gavin (after 2010’s False Mermaid). When the bog-preserved but dismembered and stabbed body of a ninth-century monk is found with the body of Benedict Kavanagh—the host of an intellectual TV chat show who’s been missing for months—in the trunk of a car excavated from a Tipperary bog, Nora and Cormac investigate on the behalf of Ireland’s National Museum. The pair, working in parallel with local detective Stella Cusack, look into landowner Vincent Claffey and the residents of the artists’ colony at Killowen, a tight-knit community of individuals with hidden pasts and strong motivations to protect themselves. Hart teases the reader with hints without telegraphing the solutions to the mysteries a moment too soon. This exploration of the ways people keep secrets, innocuous and terrible, to create sanity out of difficult pasts, offers food for thought that persists beyond the immediate thrill of a well-told tale. Agent: Sally Wofford-Girand, Brickhouse Literary Agents. (Mar.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Reviewed on: <i>01/21/2013</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">This makes me so happy!</span></div>
Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-37881094244335585552012-11-27T13:42:00.001-06:002012-11-27T13:42:56.627-06:00Northern Lights - Music for Winter!<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just found this very interesting album featuring a blend of Irish and Scandinavian music from Lorcán Mac Mathúna and friends. Here's a bit from their website:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Like their landscapes, the music of Ireland and Scandinavia are spectacular, inspiring, and very different to each other. Northern Lights brings “Songs of the Fjord and Glen,” an exploration of Irish and Scandinavian traditional songs and dance music that connects a vast musical landscape. This performance evokes everything between the ice of the North sea and the warmth of Irish summer pastures, in search of a deeper understanding of the things that unite us all.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Northern Lights is a blending of Norse and Irish: sagas, stories, soundscapes, cultural flavours and perspectives, through a meeting of their music and songs. It is a project of Lorcán Mac Mathúna (voice, whistle), Raphael De Cock (voice, pipes, siberian harp, shrutti, hardanger fiddle, jews harp), and James Mahon (uillean pipes, whistle flutes). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To find out a little more on the background and theme of the project visit the <a href="http://www.lorcanmacmathuna.com/northernlights/index.htm" target="_blank">Northern Lights website</a>.</span><br />
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Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-24442560264988151142012-11-26T14:15:00.000-06:002012-11-29T15:03:18.650-06:00Events for the end of 2012 and into 2013 so far...<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thanks so much to all the wonderful librarians and readers and book clubs who've invited me to come and speak recently! Here are the new dates for the end of this year and into next. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There's a </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">lot more in store for 2013, when THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN is published. Check the </span><a href="http://erinhart.com/events.php" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;" target="_blank">running list on my website</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">!</span><br />
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2012</h1>
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<b>December 2</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">STILLWATER, MN</span><br />
Meeting with a local book club</div>
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<b>December 6, 7:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">SAINT PAUL, MN</span><br />
The Liffey Irish Pub<br />
175 7th Street West<br />
Saint Paul, MN 55102<br />
(651) 556-1420<br />
Reading with Irish and Irish-American writers including Jim Rogers, David O'Sullivan, Siobhan Kierans, Patrick O'Donnell, and Tracie Loeffler Donaghy Sponsored by The Cracked Walnut Reading Company</div>
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<b>December 10</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">MINNEAPOLIS, MN</span><br />
Meeting with a local book club</div>
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2013</h1>
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<b>January 10</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">MENDOTA HEIGHTS, MN</span><br />
Thursday Club Luncheon<br />
Mendakota Country Club</div>
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<b>January 22</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">MINNEAPOLIS, MN</span><br />
AAUW Book Club</div>
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<b>March 5</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">SAINT PAUL, MN</span><br />
LAUNCH PARTY FOR THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN<br />
Location TBA</div>
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<img border="0" height="1" src="http://erinhart.com/images/mtk.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;" width="150" /></div>
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<b>March 14, 7:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">LITCHFIELD, MN</span><br />
<a href="mailto:litch@litchfield.lib.mn.us" style="border: 0px; color: #394f0e; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;"><b>Litchfield Public Library</b></a><br />
216 North Marshall Avenue<br />
Litchfield, MN 55355<br />
(320) 693-2483</div>
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<img border="0" height="1" src="http://erinhart.com/images/mtk.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;" width="150" /></div>
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<b>March 17, 7:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">HUDSON, WI</span><br />
CHULRUA IN CONCERT (that's my husband Paddy O'Brien and his band)<br />
Phipps Center for the Arts<br />
109 Locust Street<br />
Hudson, WI 54016<br />
(715) 386-8409 tickets</div>
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<img border="0" height="1" src="http://erinhart.com/images/mtk.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;" width="150" /></div>
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<b>March 22, 5:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">WARROAD, MN</span><br />
<a href="mailto:warroad@nwrlib.org" style="border: 0px; color: #394f0e; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;"><b>Warroad Public Library</b></a><br />
202 North Main Avenue<br />
Warroad, MN 56763<br />
(218) 386-1283</div>
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<img border="0" height="1" src="http://erinhart.com/images/mtk.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;" width="150" /></div>
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<b>March 23, 1:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">ROSEAU, MN</span><br />
<a href="mailto:roseau@nwrlib.org" style="border: 0px; color: #394f0e; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;"><b>Roseau Public Library</b></a><br />
121 Center Street East, Suite 100<br />
Roseau, MN 56751<br />
(218) 463-2825</div>
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<img border="0" height="1" src="http://erinhart.com/images/mtk.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;" width="150" /></div>
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<b>March 23, 4:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">GREENBUSH, MN</span><br />
<a href="mailto:greenbush@nwrlib.org" style="border: 0px; color: #394f0e; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;"><b>Greenbush Public Library</b></a><br />
224 Main Street North<br />
Greenbush, MN 56726<br />
(218) 782-2218</div>
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<img border="0" height="1" src="http://erinhart.com/images/mtk.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;" width="150" /></div>
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<b>March 28, 6:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">HALLOCK, MN</span><br />
<a href="mailto:hallock@nwrlib.org" style="border: 0px; color: #394f0e; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;"><b>Hallock City Hall (attached to Hallock Public Library)</b></a><br />
163 3rd Street South<br />
Hallock MN 56728<br />
(218) 843-2401</div>
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<img border="0" height="1" src="http://erinhart.com/images/mtk.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;" width="150" /></div>
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<b>March 29, 5:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">WARREN, MN</span><br />
<a href="mailto:warren@nwrlib.org" style="border: 0px; color: #394f0e; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;"><b>Warren-Godel Memorial Library</b></a><br />
314 East Johnson Avenue<br />
Warren, MN 56762<br />
(218) 745-8807</div>
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<img border="0" height="1" src="http://erinhart.com/images/mtk.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;" width="150" /></div>
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<b>March 30, 1:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">THIEF RIVER FALLS, MN</span><br />
<a href="mailto:trfcirc@nwrlib.org" style="border: 0px; color: #394f0e; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;"><b>Thief River Falls Public Library</b></a><br />
102 First Street East<br />
Thief River Falls, MN 56701<br />
(218) 681-4325</div>
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<img border="0" height="1" src="http://erinhart.com/images/mtk.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;" width="150" /></div>
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<b>March 30, 4:00 pm</b><br />
<span class="redbold" style="border: 0px; color: #91202a; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px;">RED LAKE FALLS, MN</span><br />
<a href="mailto:redlake@nwrlib.org" style="border: 0px; color: #394f0e; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;"><b>Red Lake Falls Public Library</b></a><br />
105 Champagne Avenue<br />
Red Lake Falls, MN 56750<br />
(218) 253-2992</div>
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Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-952094791871748897.post-91253180992059423782012-11-25T13:58:00.001-06:002012-11-27T13:26:43.112-06:00Library Journal: Prepub Alert for March 2013<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thrilled to find THE BOOK OF KILLOWEN included in <i>Library Journal</i>'s prepub alert, a listing called "What's Hot" for March 2013, with fellow crime writers Rhys Bowen and Paul Doherty, among others! And now I'm f</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">eeling like an awful tease, since it'll be another 3+ months until the book is out. I am so sorry. (Okay, not really.)</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKmistyI4aFRLx-on4fgL7m7nSKhXyb1f3hmOYoBaFNJyqHxjidPMpNmcI3zULdxRCXod3-egvM6F0bhzUHuTJmq-aY2ImxzKNS8PlEKgkdPIqjgo_z046vdWh_8mIycf0tZn98Uq7aAs/s1600/Pre-pub-March-2013_Library-Journal_Oct-2010.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKmistyI4aFRLx-on4fgL7m7nSKhXyb1f3hmOYoBaFNJyqHxjidPMpNmcI3zULdxRCXod3-egvM6F0bhzUHuTJmq-aY2ImxzKNS8PlEKgkdPIqjgo_z046vdWh_8mIycf0tZn98Uq7aAs/s640/Pre-pub-March-2013_Library-Journal_Oct-2010.png" width="336" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here's a link to the <a href="http://reviews.libraryjournal.com/2012/10/prepub/what-else-is-hot/mystery-mar-2013-paul-doherty-rhys-bowen-erin-hart-and-more/" target="_blank">full article at the magazine's website</a>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Erin Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01013875385995568963noreply@blogger.com0