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Over the next several weeks, I have the pleasure and privilege of being the launch blog for a few talented authors on their latest blog tours. To kick things off, here is my friend from across the sea: Kate Tenbeth.

With this particular story all I had in mind was the first section of the plot i.e. where Holly is thrown into the Thames by her step-mother. I didn’t sit down and work on a complete outline plot, I just let it go its own way as I wrote. Sometimes I do write in a more organised way but this time Unlucky Dip just took on its energy. I think it was helped along by the fact I constantly had a house full of teenagers around me so it was easy to pick up the way they spoke and thought about life – I just had to grab the moment while it was still there. I have, in fact, dedicated the book to my son and his friends because without them I wouldn’t have been able to write the book in the first place!

It took me a long time to come up with a title. The book had been written and was ready to go and really, you’d think it would be easy to come up with a title, but no, it really wasn’t and I ended up with pages and pages of ideas. Unlucky Dip came to me in the small hours of the morning (3.34am to be precise!). I woke up, wrote it down in a barely discernible scrawl on the notepad that I keep next to my bed and promptly went back to sleep! Unlucky Dip just seemed perfect to me - I like the tie-in with the ‘lucky dip’ sweets I used to buy when I was younger, i.e. life is just a unknown mixture of randomness, you never know what you’re getting and that feeling of surprise reflects the character of the storyline, although in Holly’s case her surprises are not necessarily nice ones! I also like the fact you can have a ‘dip’ in the water which ties in with the start of the novel when Holly is thrown into the Thames.

I had the book, I had the title and then all I needed was a front cover. I knew that one of my son’s friends, Elizabeth Eisen, was an artist and when I looked on her website, I absolutely loved her style so I invited her to design a cover for the book. Other than asking her to read the book I gave her no guidance whatsoever – I know that I work better when I’m allowed free rein, so I let her do what she wanted. I could not have been more pleased with the result; I have an unusual and eye-catching cover that is most certainly a one-off. Thank you Liz!



I have many stories, mostly YA fantasy, that are sitting on the hard drive of my computer but Unlucky Dip was the one I chose to publish first. I learnt a great deal along the way, mostly through trial and error about how to structure a story, the importance of character development, continuity, etc. I learnt that loving writing isn’t enough, it’s actually very hard work if you want your story to be captivating. I also learnt the importance of editing – you have to edit, edit and edit again! The reviews I’ve had from Unlucky Dip have taken me to the next step of actually believing that perhaps I can write, that I do have some small talent so that’s something else I’ve learnt!

At the moment I’m torn between completing the other YA works I have sitting on my hard-drive and seeing if I can build on my children’s books I have published already, The Burly and Grum Tales, because they seem to be doing well and I’m being invited to speak to school children, take part in events, etc. It’s a hard choice but one that I’m going to have to make a decision about very soon.

I can’t imagine life without writing but there’s so much more I know I need to learn in order to improve skills. I want to write wonderful stories that people can enjoy and being able to write full-time is certainly something that’s high on my agenda!

Thank you for inviting me onto your blog.

Blog: http://www.burlyandgrum.blogspot.co.uk/ 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/burlyandgrum 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Kates_Puzzle

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I am crushed.  I was sure that A Monster Calls would take this match.   It is a masterful portrayal of the pain of watching a loved one suffer - the guilt, the fear, the resentment, the sorrow, the.... Of course, my personal situation may have made me overly appreciative of this book.  My Dad hasn't died but cancer changed him.  Sigh.

As for Life : an Unexploded Diagram I can't say much.  I could not get into the book.  Was it written well?  Yes.  Was I a teeny bit intrigued by the characters? Um, no.  So now that it has earned a Match 2 slot, I will have to trudge through it.  Friends who read it tell me they are very glad they did.  Hopefully, the second half is better than the first.    This is the allure of BoB.  I am encouraged to read books that I normally would eschew in favor of OTHER books because there are always OTHER books, aren't there?

It's Whatever Wednesday - a Wet Whatever Wednesday.  I have a slate full of stuff to do today so...
I will just remind you to reserve your tickets for StoryFUSION now. 

OK, here's my prediction for tomorrow's round.  I liked both of these books but I wasn't enamored with either of them.  I am going to choose Okay for Now over Wonderstruck.  I felt that Wonderstruck felt wooden compared to Selznick's triumph of The Adventures of Hugo Cabret.    That's probably a little unfair but life is not always fair and neither am I, I guess.

That said, Scholastic has put together a lovely webpage fore this book.  Click here to learn to fingerspell and to learn about constellations, too.

Too many neat coincidences in Okay for Now, I thought.  Funny how coincidences are fine and wanted in one book (The Grand Plan) but can feel hasty in another book.  HOWEVER, the librarian in Okay is totally cool.  Totally.  And the artwork connection was intriguing.

So, which?  Get on with it.   Hmmmmm.  Coin toss?  Nah.  I predict that Okay for Now will move on to the next round.  But now that I have been proved fallible I would not put any money down on this.  Hey, is there a board in Vegas for this Battle?  Does anyone know?

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Al Capone...

...public enemy #1
...one of the most notorious criminals of all time
...humanitarian?

Al Capone has been portrayed throughout history as a bad man, however, there's good in all people.  Deirdre Marie Capone is the grand niece of this infamous man and has shared a different and detailed back story in, Uncle Al Capone.

From Al Capone's efforts to integrate baseball, to what really happened to him while he served time on Alcatraz, Uncle Al Capone is a detailed and poignant look at Al's background.  In this book Deirdre also shares memories of Uncle Al and what it was like growing with the stigma of the Capone name - it wasn't easy!

In addition, Deirdre also shares her grandmother's recipes for some of Al's favorite and traditional dishes.

Uncle Al Capone is an interesting and page-turning read.  I enjoyed the details and true story of Capone from someone who was there and the never seen before pics from her own family album.

Check out Uncle Al Capone at Deirdre's web site at; http://www.unclealcapone.com/

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By Sharon Zukin

Taking a position on Las Vegas is like taking an option on a company’s stock: if you like the place, you’re betting that free markets, human power over nature and boundless shopping opportunities will continue to rule the world.  If you don’t like it, you’re a killjoy…or a sociologist.

I made my first trip to Las Vegas in early November when the mood in America was sour.  Political candidates’ billboards shouted “Not the Incumbent!” and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was locked in a nasty battle for re-election against a Tea Party candidate, Sharron Angle.  I was prepared to show East Coast tolerance toward libertarians and to be agnostic about the casinos’ glitz and raunch, but I wasn’t prepared for the gigantic scale of the hotels, the almost total absence of a place to stroll along the Strip and the sense that there was no city—no urban “there”–there.

I had expected to find dark romance.  What I found was mega-hotels with 3,000 to 4,000 rooms dominating the skyline, multi-story parking garages for hotel guests and staff taking up a large portion of the “backstage” land and a growing reliance on shopping and dining to compensate for declining gaming revenues.

It was all tawdrier than I had imagined.  I came looking for James Bond but found suburbia.

Locals told me that when the Forum Shops at the Caesars Palace Hotel and Casino opened in 1992, it was the first high-end shopping center on the Strip and attracted residents as well as tourists.  It offers the same luxury brands as any upscale shopping mall, from Gucci and Tumi to 7 for All Mankind and my own New York favorite Scoop (eek!).  Until now it hasn’t had much competition, but since the opening of City Center down the Strip in 2009 the Forum looks even less exclusive.

In contrast to the weird appropriations from imagined landscapes that other newish hotels feature—the imagined Venice of the Bellagio, underscaled Eiffel Tower of the Paris Las Vegas and cockeyed iconic structures of New York New York—City Center offers cutting-edge design by some of the best contemporary architects, from Daniel Libeskind and Rafael Viῆoly to Kohn Pedersen Fox.  Libeskind’s jagged edges are the “point man” for the project as a whole, fronting the Strip and startling anyone who approaches City Center from the kitsch on either side.

More than a work of public art, though, City Center is a private-sector New Deal for Nevadans.  Promoted as a “center of gravity” for a city that has none, this giant construction project contains two luxury hotels (one without a casino, how exclusive is that?), office towers and shopping mall; it cost about $12 billion to build.  When it ran over budget and risked being shut down, Senator Reid stepped in to defend it, saving, it is said, 22,000 jobs.  Typical for all such projects, City Center benefits from large tax abatements from the state.

Though the critic Paul Goldberger has praised the quality of most of City Center’s buildings and its grand interior spaces, domesticating Libeskind’s wild imagination in a shopping center emphasizes how Las Vegas tends to make everything into an accessory of capital accumulation.  More than New York or London or Paris, Vegas is a city shaped by and for economic speculation.  Gambling

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A new HBO series, Boardwalk Empire, premiered this weekend. Worlds away from what we see on Jersey Shore, it has reignited interest in New Jersey history and culture. Bryant Simon (author of Boardwalk of Dreams: Atlantic City and the Fate of Urban America and Professor of History at Temple University) has been interviewed for the accompanying HBO documentary, and here we ask him some questions about the “dreamlike” place that is AC.

You’ve described yourself as a native of South New Jersey. What drew you to writing the history of Atlantic City?

When I was growing up in the 1960s and 1970s in Vineland, Philly was not the place that drew us; it was more Atlantic City. That was where we went for splurge meals, special occasions, amusement parks, parades, and shopping. In fact, that’s where I got my bar mitzvah suit! Years later, my family moved just outside of Atlantic City and I watched, while riding my bike in the morning on the Boardwalk, as gambling woke the place up and irrevocably transformed it. I was transfixed by the city, by people’s nostalgia for it, by its nervous energy, and its aching sadness and painful poverty in the midst of plenty. Really, it had everything I wanted to write about it – it was like a Springsteen song, a place that could be mean and cruel, but a place of romance and possible redemption. How could I resist?

Compared to places like Las Vegas or Coney Island in its heyday, how did/does Atlantic City epitomize the urban playground?

All of these places share something in common – they are each the tale of two cities. They are places built in the interests of visitors, not necessarily residents; they sell (or sold) fantasies – fantasies that put tourists as the center of the narrative and allowed them to slip their daily skin and imagine themselves not as they were, but as they wanted to be. That is what people paid for when they went these places – they paid for fantasies.

As you researched the book, what memorable anecdotes did you come across that really captured the heart and history of Atlantic City?

One of the first things I learned about Atlantic City stayed with me throughout the project. I remember looking at a postcard from the 1920s or so. In it, the benches on the Boardwalk were pointed away from the beach. I asked if this was a mistake. “No” an expert on the city told me, “That’s how it was.” That was my first lesson that Atlantic City was essentially a stage and the visitors were both actors and audience.

You’ve been interviewed for a documentary that’s set to run in conjunction with the HBO series, Boardwalk Empire. What do you make of the series’ take on Atlantic City, and what to your mind does it say about public perception of the city?

If the show is a success, it will no doubt draw tourists to town, looking for the romantic, if still violent, past the program surely mythologizes. Yet the real Atlantic City Boardwalk of today has little relationship to the past except its common geography. Most of the dreamlike hotels – buildings that looked like French chateaux and Moorish palaces – have been torn down. The amusement piers are long gone or covered up and turned into air-conditioned malls. The crowds of people dressed in their Sunday – really their sleek and elegant Saturday night best – have been replaced by people in t-shirts and flip flops. Except for the ocean and

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Top notch casinos, over the top hotels, world class restaurants, mesmerizing sights and vibrant nightlife awaits you in Nevada. Home to the gambling capital of the world, Nevada is an experience of a lifetime. Besides all these sights, attractions and activities, Nevada is also the home to some of the wackiest laws in the world. Sit back and enjoy these dumb laws that were supposed to protect its citizens but unfortunately turned hilarious.

1. In no matter how rich you are, please don’t ride you camel on the high way, unless you want to be jailed.
2. Did someone shot you do on your property! In Nevada you can hang that person because it is 100% legal! All dog shooters beware!
3. In Nevada do go out without you mask as it its illegal to walk the streets without wearing a mask.
4. In Nevada you can be jailed for buying drinks for more than three people.

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