An Author's Whatnots...a blog of days gone by
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2019-08-26T01:15:40.749000Z
Werkzeug
REVIEWS: THE ASTEROID'S DAUGHTER AND THE SERPENT HANDLER'S SON
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/reviews-the-asteroid-s-daughter-and-the-serpent-handler-s-son
2019-08-26T01:13:21.422000Z
2019-08-26T00:45:00Z
Kate Thompson
<div><a href="http://twonewfs.com/new-halem-tales.html">Kate E Thompson's Novella</a><br/></div>
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<div><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/0df0a865-ee64-42c4-970b-5ca987b8edec/128d2ab4-b496-472b-9304-249c651486bf.png" /></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: bold;">Amazon Reviews:</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">From KH</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">5.0 out of 5 stars</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">New Halem Tales - You Should Read This Book! Congratulations to the Authors!</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">May 22, 2015</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">I really enjoyed reading this book. For sure my next vacation needs to be to New Halem (can you add a campground – not sure they will let me stay on the beach with the Parking Lot Prophet). The stories were full of interesting characters, just the kind of people you find in your own life. There was mystery, romance, sex, sci-fi fantasy, history, food, social issues, crime, detective work and more. I want to read the FishWrap Bugle, attend the many festivals, go to a play, have lunch or dinner at the Sea & Sky, visit the many shops, and every morning of my stay go to Sea Sprite Bakery for a cuppa along with a delicious sweet. Life does not get better than this. Enjoy your journey through this book.</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Maria of Arcadia</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">4.0 out of 5 stars</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">New Halem Tales - Northwest writers refreshing experiment.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">January 5, 2013</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">New Halem doesn't exist. Too bad because right from the beginning I wanted to move there! Snapshots from the life of interesting characters that earn a spot in this book. It is the product of the work of five different people, and as such is a very interesting experiment. The stories do not have beginning or end, they let you wonder what is next, what will happen just like life. You never know and yet you want more. One of the best things about this book is the languish is written. The authors are educated and I enjoyed the word flow. Obviously English is not my first languish but one that I love and I appreciate it when is used to its full extend without becoming scientific or boring. As far as I can tell, is very well edited too, but what the heck there are five writers there, they shouldn't miss much!</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Will</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">5.0 out of 5 stars</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">New Halem Tales - A Book of Treasures!!!</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">October 8, 2013</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">This book is filled with great writing. I have not finished all the stories yet but I have read about the PLP, the Parking Lot Prophet by Catherine Kigerl and I'm pretty well hooked on this character now. I will be looking for more books, stories from this author. I haven't read from the other authors yet but I will. Great stuff in here.</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Cjl</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">4.0 out of 5 stars</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">New Halem Tales - unique style of writing</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">August 22, 2014</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Great book, uniquely woven between five authors.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Great job.</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Susan L Fitzpatrick</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">4.0 out of 5 stars</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">New Halem Tales Secrets</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">January 2, 2013</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;">It was a fun read with many characters from different authors slowly converging to a fast finish. Love the bits of fantasy and interesting characters. Especially liked the local Northwest feel.</span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/New-Halem-Tales-Stories-Authors-ebook/dp/B00MDTQF28/ref=sr_1_3?crid=1T67VLLJJ6B4X%26keywords=new%2Bhalem%2Btales%26qid=1566780762%26s=gateway%26sprefix=new%2Bhalem%2Btales%2Caps%2C241%26sr=8-3" style="font-size: 11pt;">https://www.amazon.com/New-Halem-Tales-Stories-Authors-ebook/dp/B00MDTQF28/ref=sr_1_3?crid=1T67VLLJJ6B4X&keywords=new+halem+tales&qid=1566780762&s=gateway&sprefix=new+halem+tales%2Caps%2C241&sr=8-3</a></span></div>
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What's in a Writer's Name?
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/what-s-in-a-writer-s-name
2019-08-26T00:25:50.257000Z
2019-08-25T23:56:41Z
Kate Thompson
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-align: center;"><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.45;">What's in a Writer's Name?</span></div></div><div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-family: Tahoma;">Kate Thompson is a writer's name. My daughter-in-law sent me a photo she took in a Scotland train station that was selling books by a Kate Thompson. My grandson checked out a book from his school library by Kate Thompson. Neither was me. You see, I'm not alone. There are several.</span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-family: Tahoma;">British-Irish writer, Kate Thompson, writes children's books and clarifies on her Wiki that she is "not to be confused with Kate Thompson, the romantic novelist". There's a journalist/author Kate Thompson and a Kate Thompson who writes books about therapeutic journaling. The romantic author, Kate Thompson, mentioned above, is a former actress, lives in Ireland, and besides romantic, writes historical novels under the name of Kate Beaufoy. Well, there's no confusing her now. </span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">I'm</span> <a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/" style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px;">Kate E Thompson</a><span style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">, the E standing for Elizabeth, which, along with my first novel,</span> <span style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie</span> <span style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">and my novella,</span> <span style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">The Asteroid's Daughter and the Serpent Handler's Son, </span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">discerns me from the other Kate Thompsons.</span></div>
REVIEWS: BIGFOOT HUNTERS NEVER LIE
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/book-review-by-annalece-hunter
2019-08-26T01:15:40.749000Z
2019-04-30T00:36:13Z
Kate Thompson
<div><font style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-weight: bold;">REVIEWS: BIGFOOT HUNTERS NEVER LIE</span></font></div>
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<div><span style="font-weight: bold;">A novel by Kate E Thompson</span></div>
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<div><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/f7df0359-34aa-47b5-bcd7-a59776a48f94/98e79948-3bb1-47a4-a592-259d53228f09.jpg" /></div>
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<div>Review by Annalece Hunter</div>
<div>Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie</div>
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<div>"We have an oath." She pulls me into a tight hug and for the first time in hours, I feel like I’m going to be okay."</div>
<div>"Bigfoot Hunters forever," I say the same time she does.</div>
<div>This is a clip of dialogue from my friend, Seattle author, Kate E. Thompson’s book, Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie. It’s between the protagonist, Noah, and his childhood best friend, Charlee, who comes to his aid during his time of need, and together they set out to put his life back in order.</div>
<div>During their youth they’d made a pack–The Bigfoot Code. And when Noah finds himself in the middle of tough year, a mid-life crisis of sorts, being pulled in one direction by family and community expectations vs. what he wants, The Bigfoot Code formed in childhood essentially becomes his guiding force.</div>
<div>This thread, this theme of friendship, is what endeared me to this book.</div>
<div>Do you have someone in your life, who you are 100% confident will answer your call if you ring them at 2:00 am?</div>
<div>This is the relationship between Noah and Charlee, and is an area where Kate really shines: the friendship between these two is so convincing and refreshing.</div>
<div>We need people like this; people who have our best interest at heart, who are there when we need them, no matter what; people who will drive to the ends of the world to be with us.</div>
<div>But it’s also a story about forgiving and forgetting, a spiritual awakening, and the meaning of family.</div>
<div>A quick synopsis:</div>
<div>Noah Cathcart is Associate Pastor of his father’s church and is married to Grace "the pinup Girl of Pastors’ wives" (love this description, Kate). Everything is going to plan. They have an eight-year-old son, a chihuaha with three legs, and a mortgage.</div>
<div>Until…one morning Noah is awakened by his estranged brother, Anthony, who asks if he will help a friend, "Secret Agent" Mel, move into a shelter before he gets arrested.</div>
<div>Noah agrees, goes to the camp, and in the chaos of the bust, finds himself arrested. However, later, he discovers he can’t get his mind off some of the characters he met at the camp, not only Secret Agent Mel, but also the accordion player he met in the police van, and the little girl wandering through the homeless camp in her panda bear slippers.</div>
<div>In addition, things are not going well for Noah at church, or at home. So when Anthony asks for another favor, this one could seriously endanger Noah’s career, as well as his relationship with his father.</div>
<div>The novel asks the question: Will it take a tragic event to give Noah the courage to risk his plan and find out who he is, what he wants in life, and what it takes to be a father, a husband, a brother, a son, and a pastor?</div>
<div>But be warned. This book is a page turner. Kate’s effortless writing flows and draws you into the story; you’re going to want to keep the pages turning so you can find out what’s going to happen next.</div>
<div>Finally, Kate really excels at creating powerful characters. They are flawed, flawed, flawed, often acting horribly. Furthermore, she is an emotive writer, exploring, through her characters, the full range of human emotions.</div>
<div>Click on the link and buy this book. You’ll love it! Also, you may wish to visit her website: <a href="http://www.kateethompson.com/">www.kateethompson.com</a> where you can read more about her upcoming second novel: A Family of Forgetters, which is a story about Annie, a Danish Immigrant, and is set in Salt Lake City during the 19th century. It’s a story of courage, loss, family bonds, and growing up in a country that doesn’t feel like home</div>
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<div><a href="https://annalecehunter.com/bookstore/2019/4/29/bigfoot-hunters-never-lie-by-kate-e-thompson" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: medium; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 238); font-family: Tahoma; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal;">https://annalecehunter.com/bookstore/2019/4/29/bigfoot-hunters-never-lie-by-kate-e-thompso</a></div>
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<div>AMAZON REVIEWS</div>
<div>Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie, a novel by Kate E Thompson </div>
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<div>CTGraham</div>
<div>5.0 out of 5 stars</div>
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<div>Big Foot Hunters is a Must Read!</div>
<div>July 31, 2019</div>
<div>Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase</div>
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<div>A great story about the struggles many face when trying to figure out one’s calling and faith. The main character, Noah is conflicted with the pull between the wishes of his wife and his father (a pastor of a fire and brimstone congregation) and his work with his street ministry. Everyone has expectations of Noah which causes issues in his marriage, his ministry, and the community. The only semblance of normalcy comes from his childhood best friend (the co-creator of the Big Foot Code). The struggles Noah faces are very relatable. His wife cheating is not a surprise as her character doesn’t have many true redeeming qualities. She’s against Noah helping the needy and homeless, but wants to be seen as the perfect and dutiful wife of a pastor. Ultimately, the problems in the marriage spillover into their home life and their son runs away. Noah’s issues extend outside of his home, and when dealing with the community’s street ministry, he gets into legal trouble. Trying to do the right thing for everyone is his dilemma. Being all things to all people means no one’s expectations are truly met.</div>
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<div>Kate Thompson does an excellent job giving us characters with flaws, ethical as well as spiritual challenges. Making the right choice and being able to distinguish if it’s God’s will or others is something we all face and question.</div>
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<div>A well-told and enjoyable story. I look forward to reading more from this talented writer.</div>
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<div>foresme</div>
<div>5.0 out of 5 stars</div>
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<div>Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie - A great read!</div>
<div>June 22, 2019</div>
<div>Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase</div>
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<div>I immediately liked this book. Pastor Noah is such a realistic and relatable character. I think we've all known a person like this and have witnessed their inner conflicts. The author does a brilliant job showing the struggles with faith and how this plays out in people's lives.</div>
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<div>Ashley Fae</div>
<div>Amanda Scott</div>
<div>4.0 out of 5 stars</div>
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<div>Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie - True to Life Characters</div>
<div>December 11, 2015</div>
<div>Format: Kindle Edition</div>
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<div>Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie is a great novel about a man who is living life, and life can be a pretty dramatic experience if you really find yourself in the throes of it. That's what Noah does-- he finds himself in the middle of a really, really tough year, and we get to take his path with him to find out what exactly a Pastor does when he finds himself struggling with his faith, his family, and with what he thinks is wrong and right.</div>
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<div>My favorite thing about this book is that Pastor Noah is at the forefront of it and religion is a huge part of his life, but I never felt like I was being preached at. I'm not a religious person in the least, but I really enjoyed watching how Noah navigated his struggle with what God wanted from him and what he wanted from himself, in addition to what his family and the community all expected from him. I think it's an extraordinary feat to keep someone who isn't interested in religion intrigued in the lives of people who are so focused on it, but Kate Thompson did it flawlessly. I felt hungry for this novel once I got into it-- I was dying to find out what was happening with everyone.</div>
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<div>Another of my favorite things was that I didn't really like any of the characters. And I know that sounds like a negative thing, but I think for people, for all of us, when we're thrown into situations that bring out our struggles and our flaws, we aren't always likeable, and I felt that way about most of the characters here. They do things that are not admirable and react in ways that aren't honorable-- and that's a true testament to writing a real person. I know I certainly don't behave favorably all the time either, and especially when times are as trying as the experiences Noah and his comrades are experiencing in a world where profit is more important than spreading God's word, and appearances are more important than truly doing things that make your heart happy.</div>
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<div>Overall, I'll give Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie a solid 4.5/5 butterflies. I recommend it to anyone who's interested in reading about, well. Pretty much anything. There's not a lot better than being able to be intrigued by another human's experience. '</div>
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<div>Brett A Dent</div>
<div>3.0 out of 5 stars</div>
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<div>Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie - A touching story with a theme that resonates with most</div>
<div>March 24, 2015</div>
<div>Format: Paperback</div>
<div>I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.</div>
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<div>In Kate E. Thompson’s debut novel, "Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie," Pastor Noah Cathcart struggles to find happiness while doing everything he believes God wants him to do. I enjoyed the story, for the most part, but did have a few problems with the style, which I’ll explain later.</div>
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<div>"Bigfoot Hunters" is a typical mid-life crisis story, despite it happening at a relatively early age for Noah. He’s thirty-five with a young son and a beautiful, Pastor-perfect wife, and stands to "inherit the kingdom," so to speak, from his father – the heavy-handed evangelical head of the Rolling River Church. Throughout the novel, author Thompson does a nice job of pulling the reader down into Noah’s conflicted sense of self, trying to do what he believes is right against what his wife and father tell him God is calling him for. Noah’s desire to preach to and help the unfortunate through a message of Christ’s love and compassion for all is at grave odds with his father, who preaches fire-and-brimstone, and his wife, Grace, who has no room in her heart for the dirty, drug-addicted homeless.</div>
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<div>Every relationship he has outside of his father’s and wife’s plan for him pits him against the will of the Rolling River congregation. His best friend, Charlee – with whom he developed the Bigfoot Hunters code when they were children, which becomes Noah’s guiding principles toward the end – is either atheist or a non-practicing Christian. His brother Anthony is homosexual and wants Noah to marry him and his partner. The various characters of his street ministry demand his time and attention and end up getting him in trouble with the law on more than one occasion. All of these conflicts continue to eat away at Noah and drive him and his wife apart throughout the story, which ultimately drives the novel to the climax; Noah’s eight-year-old son, Gabe, runs away one stormy morning because mom and dad are always fighting.</div>
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<div>Noah’s struggles generally resonate true and are easily applicable to most people’s lives. He is a relatable character. We’ve all had to deal with well-meaning family and friends constantly pulling us in the direction they want regardless of how we want to live our own lives. His seeming complacency – he barely ever puts up a fight – masks a depression that is eating him up. "Bigfoot Hunters" is definitely an engaging story, and Thompson takes us through the whole range of emotions. Happiness when Noah is happy with his street ministry, sad when it all falls apart, frustrated that he can’t catch a break from his own family who claim to be Christians. Noah struggles with his faith far more than you might think a Pastor should, yet he’s the only one in his God-fearing family actually trying to live by the Gospel. All of these themes should resonate with any average person.</div>
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<div>I loved the relationship between Charlee and Noah. Thompson seems to really understand how to write two best friends. It’s believable and satisfying. Unfortunately, all of the other characters were a bit thin and predictable, and with them went the plot. To be clear, it was a page turner sometimes and I liked it, but I never had any doubt as to how everything would play out. That comes from the light character development. One line of description of Noah’s and Grace’s marriage and I knew where things were going. For example – technically, this isn’t a spoiler, but you’ll figure it out – Grace is on a committee where she has to have all day meetings and nights and weekends with a wealthy real-estate mogul. This is in chapter two, near the very beginning. Can you guess what happens?</div>
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<div>Really, though, the biggest problem I had with this novel was that it was written in first person present. I wish this trend would stop. It can be done, but out of the hands of a literary master it never brings the reader fully into the story. One of the joys of reading is putting yourself in the shoes of the main character, or multiple characters when the point of view changes. With the present tense it is impossible, because while the author says "I am putting the dishes away," you’re thinking, "No, I am reading a book." If you told me I put the dishes away yesterday, then I’m a believer. In this case, it sometimes made for choppy dialog, and often read like a draft. The more I thought about it, the more I believed that every part would have been better in the past tense. Better flow, better connection with the character.</div>
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<div>Another problem I think this style caused was some time flow problems. Present tense sometimes doesn’t lend an opening for descriptive narrative, and many times I had trouble figuring out when things were happening. Things that I thought were at night were actually in the morning, and scene transitions that should have been the next day were several months later. It was confusing.</div>
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<div>"Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie" is a touching story, and I did enjoy it. I think anybody that is torn between what they want and what others want from them will find something here that makes them root for the good guy. While the writing style wasn’t so enjoyable for me, the story itself kept me engaged enough that I can easily say, "I liked it."</div>
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<div><a href="https://smile.amazon.com/Bigfoot-Hunters-Never-Kate-Thompson-ebook/dp/B00SHZK0OQ/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=bigfoot%2Bhunters%2Bnever%2Blie%26qid=1566677242%26s=gateway%26sr=8-1#customerReviews">https://smile.amazon.com/Bigfoot-Hunters-Never-Kate-Thompson-ebook/dp/B00SHZK0OQ/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=bigfoot+hunters+never+lie&qid=1566677242&s=gateway&sr=8-1#customerReviews</a></div>
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<div>GOODREADS REVIEWS:</div>
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<div><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23876620-bigfoot-hunters-never-lie" style="font-size: 14.4px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: bold;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie</a><span style="font-size: 12px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal;"> </span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 11px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, sans-serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal;">by</span><span style="font-size: 12px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal;"> </span><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6645064.Kate_E_Thompson" style="font-size: 12px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal;">Kate E. Thompson</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: 12px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal;"> </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: 12px; color: rgb(170, 170, 170); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal;">(Goodreads Author)</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: 12px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal;"> </span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div style="float: left; width: 450px; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;"><div style="background-repeat: repeat-y;"><div style="overflow: hidden; width: 430px;"><div><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/1552692-peggy"><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/f7df0359-34aa-47b5-bcd7-a59776a48f94/e57b5e96-a0ae-4717-ac6e-83f74befef03.jpg" style="border: 0px; height: auto;"/></a></div>
<div><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/1552692-peggy" style="font-size: 13px; color: rgb(56, 33, 16); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Peggy</a><span style="font-size: 12px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">'s review </span></div>
<div style="float: right; font-size: 11px;"><span style="font-size: 11px; color: rgb(170, 170, 170); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jan 03, 2015</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 12px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Read in January, 2015</span></div>
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<div style="font-size: 14px;"><span style="font-size: 14px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">BFF We all think we will have best friends for life, but what does that really look like. Well, here is your chance to see. Noah and Charlee know what it is like to have your back. They are married, but not to each other. They have been friends since childhood when they formed the Bigfoot Hunters club. They have rules that they live by and roles to fulfill in their separate families. And they have each other, the one person they know will never lie to them. When life gets hard the Bigfoot Hunters find out what real friendship means. But be forewarned, after you have read the first chapter, you won't want to put it down until you have finished!!</span></div>
<div><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1153549235?book_show_action=false%26from_review_page=1">https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1153549235?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1</a></div>
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<div><font style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-weight: bold;">San Francisco Book Review by Glenn Dallas</span></font></div>
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<div style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Open Sans", arial, sans-serif;">Many believe that God has a plan for them. Pastor Noah Cathcart has embraced that belief his whole life, but his faith is shaken by struggles at home, and some unpleasant revelations that emerge during his volunteer work with the underprivileged. Noah finds himself at a fork in the road; one road leads to taking over his father’s ministry, the other into the unknown. Will following his heart lead to damnation, or a new beginning?</span></div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Open Sans", arial, sans-serif; font-style: italic;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Open Sans", arial, sans-serif;">is about meditating on faith, and how embracing faith means different things to different people. As the black and white nature of his father’s faith collides with the many grey areas of modern life, Noah is caught in the middle, and he becomes the lens through which the reader examines their own relationship with faith.</span></div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Open Sans", arial, sans-serif;">To be fair, many of the characters with whom Noah interacts are close-minded, sanctimonious pricks. But, intentionally or not, that encourages the reader to focus more on those in Noah’s life who ask questions: his lifelong friend (and fellow former Bigfoot hunter), Charlee, and his son Gabriel. This is to the book’s benefit.</span></div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Open Sans", arial, sans-serif; font-style: italic;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie</span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Open Sans", arial, sans-serif;"> is never afraid to ask hard questions, and let the reader decide.</span></div></div></div></div></div><div><br/></div>
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Print or Digital, No One Can Have Too Many Books
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/digital-and-print-no-one-can-have-too-many-books
2019-04-24T21:41:05.692000Z
2019-04-24T18:35:54Z
Kate Thompson
<div><div style="text-align: center; font-size: 12pt; margin-bottom: 0.5em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Merriweather;"><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/7135d531-01ad-4f9b-aed4-4d18b5441e76/afa40dd1-9565-4de4-b7df-7a08dcfda0b6.png" /></span></div></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 1em; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><div style="text-align: center;"><br/></div></div><div><span style="color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">I take my library to bed. I never leave home without it. One-thousand, seven-hundred and two</span><span style="color: rgb(24, 24, 24);"> books aren’t heavy. They fit in my purse. I started reading e-books the end of 2010. I was resistant in the beginning. I had a paper-book library big enough to wander through and after working on the computer all day, I wanted to pluck books off my shelves and thumb through the pages, not click or swipe on a reading device.</span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">My reading life changed the day I received notice that a book I put on hold months before was ready for pickup. I dropped whatever I was doing and headed to the library.</span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">I went to bed early that night. I fluffed the pillows and opened the book. I squinted. I brought it closer to my face. I shined the lamp on it. I couldn't read it. The library had sent me a "tiny-print" version! I didn't know they even made tiny-print books, large-print for old people, yes, but who would read this, a flea?</span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">I showed my husband. "What?" he asked. I pointed out the obvious and he read a paragraph out loud without moving off his side of the bed. I scowled and he shrugged and suggested checking out the large-print version.</span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">I bought a Kindle instead. When it arrived, I went online to buy ‘the’ book that brought me into the e-book world and it wasn't available. That’s right.</span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">I bought a 150 dollar Kindle and the 10 dollar book I wanted to read on it wasn't an e-book. However disappointing, it wasn't long before it became one and I learned the e-book world was far bigger than font size.</span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">But what would a life be without paperbacks and hardcovers? What would a town be without a library? What would a night out be without a bookstore? We don’t have to choose. We can have it all. Paper books or digital, no one can have too many.</span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(54, 54, 54); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/" style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Kate E Thompson</a></span> is the author of</span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"> </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">and a contributing author of </span><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html" style="font-size: 16px; font-style: italic;">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">.</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">She is currently working on her second book</span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">, A Family of Forgetters,</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">a historical novel set in 19th century Utah.</span></div>
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><div><br/></div></div><div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><div><br/></div></div><div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><div><br/></div></div><div style="letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><div><br/></div></div></div><div><br/></div>
They Maketh the Nose Red
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/they-maketh-the-nose-red
2019-02-25T21:56:03.193000Z
2019-02-25T21:58:00Z
Kate Thompson
<div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 2.81mm; text-indent: 0mm;"><div><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: italic;"><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/82767931-b1a8-416e-949a-708b48bb2f5d/807cedf2-2a17-4d87-9b29-7c2cb09b65a2.png" style="height: auto;"/></span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-style: italic;">"Corsets have always been worn, will be worn, and should be worn"</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Did</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">pioneer women wear corsets? I didn't think much about it until I began my second novel and my protagonist, a 19th century Utah woman, needed dresses and skirts and shoes. But what about a corset? Surely not, frontier women plowed fields. They built fences, shoveled snow off their roofs, planted gardens, hauled water, chopped wood, and scrubbed floors. It took a whole day just to do laundry and it was a backbreaking job. Who could perform those duties while wearing a corset? As it turns out, corsets were promoted as essential for work and play as they reportedly kept a woman's back straight and</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">many women wore them. Besides, wearing one was the moral thing to do. It was the Victorian era and women had a standard to keep, whether they lived in the big city or the emerging west.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Wearing a corset wasn’t governed by status, size or gender. High-brow women wore them. Domestic servants did. Men wore them, until the mid-19</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="font-size: 16px; vertical-align: super; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">th</span> century, when they went out of vogue and a man caught wearing one was ridiculed. Children wore them. Pregnant women did. Even women in prison and mental institutions. How do we know? Women wrote about their corsets in letters and diaries. They recorded their purchases and sewed their own. Some packed their corsets away and now they're housed in museums and family collections.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Corsets could reduce the waist to a mere 15 inches. Some feared they would cause consumption, curvature of the spine, rib displacement, cancer, hysteria, hunchback, abortion, melancholy, epilepsy, nervous headaches, feelings of sinking, back aches, side pains, indigestion, poor appetite, short breath, imperfect circulation, tuberculosis, liver disease, cold hands and feet and yes, red noses. And yet, 19</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="font-size: 16px; vertical-align: super; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">th</span> century women still wore them. Women in western society had, in fact, been wearing corsets or some form, for the last 500 years, excluding a few after the French Revolution, with the sole purpose of molding their bodies into the "perfect" shape.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">What about ultra-tight lacing, a practice that some physicians believed would cause severe organ displacement? A few researchers claim that lacing until your nose turned red was a myth and that most women bought corsets according to their waist measurement and wore them tightened within reason. Admittedly, a few may have gotten carried away, cinching their corsets as tight as they could, with a desire for a perfect hourglass waist. A woman, in a letter to the "Englishwoman’s Domestic Magazine", defended tight lacing, saying the corset was a necessity women had to get used to, the way a "barefooted Highland lassie" had to get used to shoes. The writer goes on to suggest that the secret to wearing the corset safely is to begin using it as early in life as possible. That way, growing bodies would adapt.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Ultra-tight lacing or not, corsets were a health concern. In 1869, Thos. W. Love and Co. introduced the Health Corset, which was, according to the ads, endorsed by N.Y. physicians. The new innovative design was touted to make women not only perfectly shaped, but also happier and beautiful, as well as more amiable, sweeter tempered and affectionate. There you go. The seller probably hoped the supposed benefits would outweigh the fears.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Most likely, not all 19</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="font-size: 16px; vertical-align: super; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">th</span> century women wore corsets all of the time, but the garment seems to have been widely accepted and was simply thought of as underclothing, the way we think of bras these days.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">I found a wealth of information about corsets and have provided several links. My favorite sources are magazines, books and advertisements of the day, and also letters and diaries, where women wrote down their thoughts concerning the corset, a commonplace garment that would, in the future, grow out of fashion and become a curiosity or a fashion statement to many 21</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="font-size: 16px; vertical-align: super; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">st</span> century women.</span></span></div>
<div><a href="https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015027389355" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">"Godey’s Lady’s Book and Magazine. On Tight Lacing"</a><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">. March 1869. P 288. Hathi Trust Digital Library. Google Digitalized. Public Domain.</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">All 1869 issues are available. Rich in social history of the time. Commentary on proper dress and health. Patterns. House plans. Games and puzzles. Stories and plays and more. Other years are available.</span> <a href="https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000050287" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Go to the index.</a></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">"Women's Fashions." Clothing through American History: The Civil War through the Gilded Age, 1861-1899. Anita Stamper and Jill Condra. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood Press, 2011. 79-154. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 9 Sept. 2016.</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Book includes a section concerning corsets and contains quotes from journals, newspapers, etc. Great resource. I got access through my county library.</span></span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://exhibits.hsl.virginia.edu/clothes/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">"Too Close for Comfort: 500 Years of Corsets."</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">University of Virginia. Historical Collections at the Claude Moore Health Sciences Library. Website.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://www.denisenadinedesign.com/Cinchin%20Up.htm" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">"Cinching Up in the Victorian Era - Corsets!"</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Denise Winter, Victorian clothing designer and researcher. Website.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://www.clothingthesaints.com/2012/11/how-to-dress-as-a-pioneer-woman/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">"Clothing the Saints. How to Dress a Pioneer Woman."</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Liz Clark. Website.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/c/crinolines-crinolettes-bustles-corsets-1860-1880/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">"Crinolines, Crinolettes, Bustles and Corsets from 1860-80."</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Website. Victoria and Albert Museum of Art and Design. London, England.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Following are books and advertisements published in the mid-1800s that 19</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="font-size: 16px; vertical-align: super; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">th</span> century women most likely had access to:</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://archive.org/details/savewomenchildre00durs" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">"Save the Women and Children with the Health Corset."</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Advertisement. Thos. W. Love & Co. 1869.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://archive.org/details/warnerbroscorali00warn" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">"Coraline corsets."</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Warner Brothers' Company. Bridgeport Connecticut corset makers, not to be confused with the movie makers. 18-page advertisement. 1870s.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://archive.org/details/corsetcrinolineb00lord" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">"The Corset and the Crinoline: a book of modes and costumes from remote periods to the present time."</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Lord William Barry. 258 pages. 1868.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://archive.org/details/healthandbeauty00caplgoog" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">"Health and beauty; or, Corsets and clothing, constructed in accordance with the physiological."</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Roxey Ann Caplin. 241 pages. 1864</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACruikshank_-_The_Cholic.png" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">The Cholic.</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Engraving. February 1819. </span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">George Cruikshank [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Quote:</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">"Corsets have always been worn, will be worn, and should be worn."</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">1869 Advertisement. Save the Women and Children. Thos. W. Love & Co</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;"><a href="https://www.pinterest.com/kateethompson/fashionable-19th-century-guide/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Fashionable: 19th Century Guide</a>. Clothes for men, women and children. Pinterest Board. Kate E Thompson </span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;"><a href="https://www.pinterest.com/kateethompson/accessorize-19th-century-fashion/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Accessorize: 19th Century Fashion.</a> Pocket watches, walking sticks, jewelry and more. Fashion extras for 19th century men and women. Pinterest Board. Kate E Thompson.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(54, 54, 54); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal;"><span style="transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; -webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/" style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal;">Kate E Thompson</a></span> is the author of</span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"> </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">and a contributing author of </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: normal;"><span style="transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; -webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html" style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: normal; font-style: italic;">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></span><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: normal; font-style: italic;">.</span> She's currently working on her second book, A Family of Forgetters, a historical novel set in 19th century Utah.</span></span></div></div><div><br/></div>
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The Saints are a Dancing People
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/the-saints-are-a-dancing-people
2019-01-09T18:54:15.064000Z
2019-01-09T02:44:05Z
Kate Thompson
<div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 2.81mm; text-indent: 0mm;"><div><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/62643590-1764-4804-b953-acf8145d20cd/12704698-264d-47c7-a96a-81602b0e5701.jpg" style="height: auto;"/></div></div><div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 2.81mm; text-indent: 0mm;"><div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">You're respectfully invited </span></span></div></div><div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 2.81mm; text-indent: 0mm;"><div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">In early Salt Lake City, the pioneers were quick to move their furniture outside on a cold winter night to make room for a dance. Dancing, after all, was the best exercise to drive away your cares, so said Brigham Young, the Mormon Church’s second prophet and president. He encouraged dancing and was known as a "</span></span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">famous dancer" himself, graceful and light-footed, and, according to journal accounts, he not only danced the hornpipe, but could "turn a pigeon wing with the best of them", and was never in want of a partner. </span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Brigham Young was raised in a home where music and dancing were sins. At the age of 11, he admitted to hearing and enjoying the "enchanting tones of the violin" and feared he was on the "highway to hell." He didn’t want his children to grow up as he did, without experiencing the pleasure of music and dancing, and he didn’t let them down.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">If there was an occasion, he encouraged the Saints to have a dance. They danced on Christmas, Valentine's Day, and at harvest. They held going away and welcome back dances, picnic dances, military, fire brigade, fund raising, leap-year, New Year's dances and grand balls. Most church dances were family affairs. No one stayed home, not even babies. President Young wanted a good time to be had by all and insisted that </span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">dances be "well-ordered and conducted with decorum and propriety." They began and ended with prayer. Rules of etiquette were observed and a floor manager was employed to keep civility. Refreshments were also served, of course.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">If you didn't know how to dance, you could enroll in one of the twenty dancing schools in Utah Territory. </span><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">What types of dances were popular among the Saints? Their journal accounts, family histories and dance cards report that figure dances were famous, formations like Les Lanciers, quadrilles, </span><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">French Fours, Copenhagen Jigs and Virginia Reels,</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">all dances that were in vogue for the time. The Crested Hen, a Danish folk dance, proved popular for the polygamists, as it required one man with two partners. According to </span><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">the Daughters of Utah Pioneers' Museum archive, The Crested Hen </span><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">was known as a polygamist dance, at least in Utah</span><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">. It's interesting to note that the admission fees took plural wives into account and charged accordingly.</span></span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">If dance classes weren't your thing, not to fear, for there were how-to books. </span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">The Prompter</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">and</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">Beadle’s Dime Ballroom Dance Companion,</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">circa 1868</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">,</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">were two of many, which included diagrams and directions to hundreds of dances. Along with step-by-step instructions, gentlemen and ladies</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;"> were coached in manners and protocol, how to plan a dance, what music was best, the ideal venue, and who to invite, plus suggestions for invitations. Beadle's book included proper dance attire. For young, single women, silk dresses weren't appropriate, but muslin and tulle were good choices. White kid gloves and patent-leather boots were musts for men. And please, a gentleman should never ask a lady to dance more than twice in an evening, unless they were well acquainted, then he may ask three times, four tops.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Try as they might, learning to dance didn't come easy to all. <span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Utah Magazine, 1869, attests to that in a tongue-in-cheek story, describing one gentleman whose feet danced in opposite directions and another gent who "unscrewed all his nerves and used no restraining force over his muscles". The writer admitted that to some, dancing came naturally, but to others, it was a "laborious exercise, worse than sawing wood on a hot day or packing sacks of wheat up four stories of stairs." He also noted, in a comment about wives, that the "more difficult and intricate the figure to dance, the better the ladies seemed to like it." He goes on to state that for the men, the more difficult dances came with greater blunders on their parts, which the "softer sex" took pleasure in watching.</span></span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="text-indent: 0mm; font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Knowing all the moves or proper etiquette or wearing the right shoes or dress wasn't as important as the spirit of the dance. The author of</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">Dances of the People</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">, 1913, wrote that one couldn't learn the true essence of a dance in a book, but dancers who caught the spirit would "laugh from sheer pleasure in the dance itself."</span></span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">President Young surely would have agreed. The Mormons were a dancing people and perhaps he was right in saying that dance took their cares away, at least for the night. The Saints suffered many hardships and he saw dance as a repose, but even more important, he understood that dances built morale and community, both of which lasted long after the last dance.</span></span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://www.loc.gov/item/musdi.002/"><b>Dancing and Prompting</b></a>. Bonstein. Dancing and Prompting, Etiquette and Deportment of Society and Ball Room. [White, Smith & Co., Boston, monographic, 1884] Pdf.</span></div>
<div><a href="http://www.kickery.com/2015/01/dancing-mormons.html" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>Dancing Mormons</b>.</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Jan 8, 2015. Capering and Kickery. Website</span></div>
<div><a href="http://walternelson.com/dr/quadrille-prompter" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>The Prompter</b></a><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">. Wm. B. DeGarmo. New York. Wm. A. Pond & Co. 1868</span></div>
<div><a href="https://www.loc.gov/item/musdi.101/" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>Beadle’s Ballroom Dance Companion</b></a><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">. 1868. Library of Congress. </span><span style="color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;">American Dancing Master and Ball-Room Prompter. Elias Howe. Courtesy of Google Digitalized Books. Public Domain.</span></div>
<div><a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=MnpXSj7Oo8sC&pg=PA61&lpg=PA61&dq=DANCE+STEPS+FOR+%22tHE+cRESTED+hEN%22&source=bl&ots=5g9S99OvQ4&sig=Q4PIZGow-B8VDvdvy69pyW4JOfU&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi51qXh2JvPAhUH9mMKHaEmBmIQ6AEIPjAK#v=onepage&q=DANCE%20STEPS%20FOR%20%22tHE%20cRESTED%20hEN%22&f=false" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>Dances of the People.</b></a> <span style="color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;">Elizabeth Burchenal. 1913. Courtesy of Google Digitalized Books. Public Domain. See "The Crested Hen".</span></div>
<div><a href="http://archive.org/details/utahmagazinesalt00unse" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>Utah Magazine</b>.</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">March 6, 1869. 283</span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);"><a href="http://archive.org/details/utahmagazinesalt00unse"> </a> Internet Archive. Public Domain.</span></div>
<div><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Old-Time-Utah-Dance-Party-Sheet/dp/0962397563" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>An Old Time Utah Dance Party</b></a><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">. Field Recordings of social dance music from the Mormon West.</span><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Old-Time-Utah-Dance-Party-Sheet/dp/0962397563" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(5, 99, 193);"> </a><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Folklorist, Craig Miller, spent a dozen years collecting many of the best-loved dances that have been passed down from generation to generation. He re-created a community dance party, like those typically held throughout the region before radio and phonographs introduced more modern styles of music. You can listen to short clips of many of the tunes at the</span> <a href="https://dp.la/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=An+old-time+Utah+dance+party" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;">Digital Public Library of America</a><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">.</span></div>
<div><span style="color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>Dancing the Buckles off their Shoes</b>. Larry Shumway.</span></div>
<div><span style="color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>Dancing as an Aspect of Early Mormon and Utah Culture</b>. Leona Holbrook.</span></div>
<div><a href="http://www.amherstvictoriandance.org/" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>Victorian Dance Society of the Amherst Museum</b></a><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">. 1837-1901 dance. Website.</span></div>
<div><span style="color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>The Life Story of Brigham Young</b>. Susa Young Gates. Susa Young Gates papers circa 1870-1933. Church History Library. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.</span></div>
<div><span style="color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>Brigham Young at Home</b>. Clarissa Young Spencer. Spencer Clarissa Hamilton Young, 1860-1939 papers. Church History Library. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.</span></div>
<div><a href="https://archive.org/details/selectdancingsch00unse" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>Select Dancing-School</b>.</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Flyer. Feb 14, 1856.</span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Church History Library. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);"><b>Invitation</b>. 1850-1874. Invite to a Military Ball. 1866. George A Smith Papers. Miscellany.</span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">MS 1322/b0011/f0034.</span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Church History Library. </span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;">Daughters of </span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Utah Pioneers’ Museum. Salt Lake City, UT.</span></div>
<div><a href="http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865607375/What-life-was-like-for-the-Mormon-pioneers-after-entering-the-Salt-Lake-Valley.html?pg=all" style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>What Life was Like for Mormon Pioneers</b>.</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Ben Tullis. Deseret News. Jul 23, 2014.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm;"><b>The Mirror.</b></span> <span style="font-size: 16px; text-indent: 0mm; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Image. The American Dancing Master and Ball-room Prompter. Elias Howe. 152. Courtesy of Google Books Digitalization. Public Domain.</span></div>
<div><span style="text-indent: 0mm; font-size: 12pt;"><b>Dance</b></span><span style="text-indent: 0mm;">.</span> <span style="text-indent: 0mm; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Image. Courtesy of</span> <span style="text-indent: 0mm; font-size: 12pt;">Lovelorn Poets</span><span style="text-indent: 0mm; font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">.</span> <span style="text-indent: 0mm; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1);">Flickr</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(54, 54, 54);"><span style="transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; -webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/">Kate E Thompson</a></span> is the author of</span><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498);"> </span><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); background-repeat: no-repeat;"><a href="http://twonewfs.com/bigfoot-hunters-never-lie.html" style="font-style: italic;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </a></span><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498);">and a contributing author of </span><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); background-repeat: no-repeat;"><span style="transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; -webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html" style="font-style: italic;">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></span><span style="font-style: italic;">.</span> She is currently working on her second novel, A Family of Forgetters, a historical novel set in 19th century Utah.</span></div></div><div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 2.81mm; text-indent: 0mm;"><div><br/></div>
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Armed, Legged and Winged and Fully Equipped for War
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/armed-legged-and-winged-and-fully-equipped-for-war
2019-02-01T21:04:35.230000Z
2017-01-13T17:52:07Z
Kate Thompson
<div><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/d8106d9d-72c4-4fb1-b8a5-822989e8102e/3229f375-9b35-4426-acb4-a6802d113c2b.jpg" style="height: auto;"/></div>
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<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">"The destroying angels are abroad", the Deseret News, the local Salt Lake City, Utah, newspaper </span></span><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">reported in June of 1877. The destroying angels were grasshoppers (Rocky Mountain Locusts), swarms of them, and reportedly, they could "darken the sky for three miles deep". A local woman described the day she went outdoors to see what was bumping against her windows and found millions covering her house, yard, garden and the laundry she'd hung out to dry. They ate the crops, window shades and paint, the bark off trees, shawls and muslin skirts and according to one account, they’d eat up a "fellow's pantaloons when the color suited them".</span></span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">In 1848, grasshoppers descended upon the new and tender crops of Utah settlers. They fought them off best they could, but grasshoppers were ruthless. You may have heard of the miracle of the gulls, a faith-promoting tale Mormon pioneers recorded in their journals, where all seemed lost, and suddenly, a cloud of gulls arrived and ate up all the invaders. Unfortunately, the gulls didn’t finish them off, nor did the event keep the grasshoppers from coming back.</span></span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Utah folks battled grasshoppers for years. Armed with willow bushes, men, women and children went out in the fields and tried to beat the insects to death. They swept them into coffee sacks and buried them in trenches. They trapped and burned them. They drowned them and still, they came in force. Utahans weren’t the only ones plagued with grasshoppers. Throughout the 19</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="font-size: 16px; vertical-align: super; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">th</span> century, they devastated crops in the plains states, in the west and south.</span></span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Grasshopper invasions continued into the 20th century</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: bold;">.</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">In the early 1900s</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">, the Rocky Mountain Locust went extinct. But they weren’t the last of the grasshoppers. In 1931, another species attacked the Midwest, leaving fields bare and in 2014, Albuquerque, New Mexico reported a swarm that descended after a dry winter.</span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">If you'd like to read more , check out "Pestiferous Ironclads: The Grasshopper Problem in Pioneer Utah" which gives a lengthy detailed account of the grasshopper problem, the far-reaching devastation and how they battled it, including journal entries from folks who experienced it firsthand, day in and day out. For another perspective, read "Mormons, Crickets and Gulls, a New Look at an Old Story". If you’re interested in what happened to the Rocky Mountain Locust, take a look at Jeffery Lockwood’s book,</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">Locust: The Devastating Rise and Mysterious Disappearance of the Insect that Shaped the American Frontier</span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">. </span></span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Do you have family storie<span style="color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold;">s</span></span><span style="font-size: 16px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">about grasshopper invasions? Interestingly, my ancestors lived in 19</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="font-size: 16px; vertical-align: super; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">th</span> century Utah and those who kept journals didn't mention grasshoppers once.</span></div>
<div align="left"><a href="https://heritage.utah.gov/history/uhg-pestiferous-ironclads-grasshoppers" style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">"Pestiferous Ironclads: The Grasshopper Problem in Pioneer Utah"</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Tahoma;">by Davis Bitton and Linda P. Wilcox.</span> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Tahoma;">Utah Historical Quarterly, 46 #4</span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://signaturebookslibrary.org/new-mormon-history-08" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Mormons, Crickets, and Gulls: A New Look at an Old Story</a><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">. William Hartley. Chapter 8. The New Mormon History. D. Michael Quinn, editor.</span></span></div>
<div align="left"><a href="http://bioscience.oxfordjournals.org/content/55/1/80.full" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">Locust: The Devastating Rise and Mysterious Disappearance</a> <a href="http://bioscience.oxfordjournals.org/content/55/1/80.full" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic;">of the Insect that Shaped the American Frontier</a><a href="http://bioscience.oxfordjournals.org/content/55/1/80.full" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">.</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Jeffery Lockwood. Basic Books, New York, 2004.</span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://www.hcn.org/blogs/goat/grasshopper-plagues-agricultural-nightmare-or-ecological-boon" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Grasshopper Plagues</a><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">: Agricultural Nightmare or Ecological Boon. High Country News. Krista Langlois. Jul 2014.</span></span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://archive.org/details/locustplagueinu00rile" style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(5, 99, 193); font-family: Tahoma; text-decoration: underline;">A Treatise.</a><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: bold;"> </span><span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">The locust plague in the United States: being more particularly a treatise on the Rocky Mountain locust or so-called grasshopper, as it occurs east of the Rocky Mountains, with practical recommendations for its destruction. 1877. Rand, McNally & Co.</span></span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=Aul-kAQHnToC&dat=18770611&printsec=frontpage&hl=en" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Deseret News</a> <span style="font-size: 16px; color: rgb(1, 1, 1); font-family: Tahoma;">Jun 11, 1877. p 3</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;"><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/internetarchivebookimages/14586315708/in/photolist-odWFtS-7UbYhH-d12mgu-tjFcHr-d12cJw-6C5WYr-yn5PNd-d1BTS5-d12mxs-nq6JQ-yynuXb-HgiUPm-8q9q4D-d12m7b-BWj3Dw-owpY5B-HJotZ8-eZWWz4-ouirBe-7cgChW-axvFeV-4j8coa-ococwR-5FWtNg-cph23j-bqTkAe-a2c8rg-cph1Xy-f1chrC-D3G6ax-f1cdRs-obV34r-4bTtiN-odWEZL-5HW8WK-D8AzoJ-cph1NJ-cph3GY-pmFCBC-ouxv3K-rJbuaY-orQyC9-8kGTxy-vbhBJ-oderaK-cph4ho-4KchvD-owpYjz-od9VYr-4hhcoU/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Locusts. Drawing from Flickr's Internet Archive Book Images. "Insect pests of farm, garden and orchard" 1915</a><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(0, 0, 255); text-decoration: underline;"> </span> </span></span><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">No known copyright restrictions. </span></span><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Public Domain.</span></span></div>
<div align="left"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(54, 54, 54); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal;"><span style="transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; -webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal;">Kate E Thompson</a></span> is the author of</span><span style="font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"> </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">and a contributing author of </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;"><span style="transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; -webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></span>. </span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: normal;">She is currently working on her second book,</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">A Family of Forgetters</span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: normal;">, a historical novel set in 19th century Salt Lake City, Utah.</span></div>
Was Your Ancestor Newsworthy?
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/was-your-ancestor-newsworthy
2017-09-29T21:02:52.538000Z
2016-08-16T00:28:55Z
Kate Thompson
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<div><span style="font-family: 'Yu Gothic Medium'; font-weight: bold;"><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/7a3d5157-87c5-4eaf-82fe-22d7a5dce5f6/da6df08e-3ef9-4226-af79-13a7d47743ca.jpg" style="height: auto;"/></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">My 2nd great grandfather, Charles Denney, started his first job in America at the Deseret News in Salt Lake City, Utah. Hired May 14, 1867 at the age of 17, he worked for a dollar a day, sweeping floors, fetching copy from the telegraph office, washing rollers, and sawing and chopping mahogany wood to keep the presses’ caloric engine going. He moved up to the job of compositor (setting type) and retired from the newspaper 33 years later. How do I know? He included these rich details and more in a letter he penned to the editor of the Deseret News 17 years after he retired. I discovered it when I searched his name in Google News, an archive of scanned historical newspapers.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Charles Denney wasn’t famous, he was a regular guy, for a Mormon, and yet, I found all sorts of information in news articles that spanned his lifetime. There were Denney birth and death notices, his marriage announcement and 50 years later, a story about his Golden Wedding Anniversary. I discovered that he was a member of the Beekeepers Association and Microscope Society, was awarded ‘best shot’ in the territory and grew Peerless potatoes on his farm, each weighing in at 3 ½ pounds. He was shot at, acted in plays, sang in choirs, was robbed at gunpoint and protested his taxes. In April 1886, he was arrested in a raid of the Eleventh Ward on charges of cohabitation (polygamy). The Tribune printed a scathing story about him entitled, The Lawbreakers. Several newspapers followed his trial where a guilty verdict was reported and a sentence of six months in the penitentiary.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Were your ancestors in the news? There is an ongoing effort across the nation to digitalize historical newspapers and make them freely available via the internet. Google News has digitalized newspapers dating back as far as the year 1700. Chronicling America is a growing archive of newspapers, made available from grants from The National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP). The Internet Archive is another place to check out. It contains newspapers from all over the world. Follow the links below, dig through a few historical newspapers online and see what you find.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">What if your family didn’t make the headlines? My 3rd great grandfather from Ireland isn’t mentioned once in his county's newspaper, but I learned from several local stories that folks didn’t much like the Irish. If you don’t find your ancestor by name, newspapers still offer a wealth of pertinent historical background and insight.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">One more tip or I should say warning – once you start reading old newspapers, you won’t want to stop. You're welcome to share links to free historical newspapers in the comment section. Until next time, have fun searching!</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Links: anyone can access the following via the internet at no charge:</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://news.google.com/newspapers" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Google News Archive</a></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/search/titles/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Chronicling America</a></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://archive.org/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Internet Archive</a></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://lib.byu.edu/collections" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Harold B Lee Library</a></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://digitalnewspapers.org/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">University of Utah</a></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="http://signaturebookslibrary.org/category/newspapers" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Signature Books Library</a></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;"><a href="https://www.pinterest.com/kateethompson/" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">My Pinterest:</a> 39 boards and 3.9 k pins that motivate writers, readers, history buffs... The Need to Read, The Danish Experience, Finding Family, Women did What?, Chihuahua Love, A Plant Based Diet, Gardening, Pamper Yourself, Early America, Irish Experience, Appalachia and More</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;"><a href="http://content.lib.utah.edu/cdm/ref/collection/USHS_Class/id/5932" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Image.</a><a href="http://content.lib.utah.edu/cdm/ref/collection/USHS_Class/id/5932" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: bold;"> </a>Salt Lake City tithing office and first home of the Deseret News ca. 1870s. It was located on the corner of Main Street and South Temple where the Hotel Utah (Joseph Smith Memorial Building) is now. In the early years of the LDS church, members would rarely pay their tithing (1/10 of total earnings) with money. More often, it was paid in livestock, dry goods, or a portion of their crop. This was all stored at the tithing office yards and distributed through the Deseret Store. Courtesy of Utah State Historical Society</span></div>
<div><span style="box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); color: rgb(54, 54, 54); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;"><span style="transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; -webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal;">Kate E Thompson</a></span> is the author of</span><span style="font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: bold;"> </span></span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">and a contributing author of </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;"><span style="transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; -webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></span>. </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: normal; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">She is currently working on her second book, A Family of Forgetters, a historical novel set in 19th century Utah.</span></div>
Psychobiography? Another way of looking at history.
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/psychobiography-another-way-of-looking-at-history
2017-09-29T20:59:12.780000Z
2016-08-08T19:23:58Z
Kate Thompson
<div style="font-size: 12pt; margin-bottom: 0.5em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 99, 93); text-decoration: none;">Psychobiography? Another way of looking at history.</span></div></div><div style="margin-bottom: 1em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/700930.Inside_the_Mind_of_Joseph_Smith" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 99, 93); text-decoration: underline;"><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/b16e91a6-7473-486b-b13d-2cee28da4ad1/c0d59a9e-6718-4a2e-a49c-cad70b408af5.jpg" alt="Inside the Mind of Joseph Smith: Psychobiography and the Book of Mormon" style="border: 0px; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; height: auto;"/></a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 99, 93);">Inside the Mind of Joseph Smith: Psychobiography and the Book of Mormon</span> by <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 99, 93); text-decoration: underline;">Robert D. Anderson</span></span></span></div>
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<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">The author offers a fascinating look into the mind of Joseph Smith, the founding prophet of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, through a psychobiographical study. Using science and academic history, Anderson hypothesizes that the Book of Mormon can be understood as Joseph’s autobiography and offers a diagnosis of Smith’s mental state. The perspective he presents is thought-provoking, one based on his study of Joseph’s early years, his family and neighbors, his homes, health, state of mind and the state of the nation including politics of the day, the revivalist and spiritualist movements, folklore, poverty and economics. Whether he’s right or not, Anderson’s psychobiographical study is what’s interesting, for he attempts to give a whole picture of Joseph through what historical evidence remains and includes mental health in that picture. The book is presented in a way I understood, and is a good read, save for repetition which became laboring – I skimmed bits of it - but understandable for a case study. I recommend.</span></div>
<div><span style="box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(54, 54, 54); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;"><font style="color: rgb(178, 33, 48);"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/">Kate E Thompson</a></span></font><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: bold; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(54, 54, 54); font-size: 16px;"> </span>is the author of</span><span style="font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">and a contributing author of </span><font style="color: rgb(205, 70, 84); font-size: 18px;"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><i><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></i></span></font><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 16px;">. </span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 16px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">She is currently working on her second book,</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 16px;">A Family of Forgetters,</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 16px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">a historical novel set in 19th century Utah.</span></div>
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Where Fictional Cats Come From
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/where-fictional-cats-come-from
2017-09-29T21:00:06.508000Z
2016-08-03T01:41:11Z
Kate Thompson
<div style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div style="position: relative; direction: ltr;"><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/1ebe3c55-81f3-49c8-a6a5-580d92fa624e/e1b88f08-8d5a-40f4-80e0-d15c16a2c99b.jpg" style="height: auto;"/></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Mitzi leaps onto my desk when I least expect it. She head butts me and lies on her back under my desk, her paws curled, the pose that makes me pause and say 'aw'.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Mitzi isn't the only cat in my life. Don't tell her. I have another who is rather surly. I doubt Mitzi would like him. His name is Bartholomew. He lives in my novella "The Asteroid's Daughter and the Serpent Handler's Son". Whether she likes it or not, Mitzi did serve as inspiration. She is a cat, after all.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Mitzi is a Norwegian Forest Cat. Well, we think she is. We rescued her from a shelter in Seattle, WA eight years ago. She was adorable, that's all we knew then. The giant paws, hairy toes and ear tufts, we learned, are typical of the Norwegian Forest Cat. If climbing the Christmas tree is proof, she is one.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">We like to call her Miss Fluffy Pants. All that thick curly fur, you can imagine. A cold-weather cat, yet, she's never set a paw in snow. Her ancestors may have served as mousers on Viking Ships sailing for Norway. Mitzi has never seen a mouse, but I'm pretty sure she dreams about chasing them.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(54, 54, 54); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;"><font style="color: rgb(178, 33, 48);"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/">Kate E Thompson</a></span></font> is the author of</span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: bold; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </span></span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">and a contributing author of </span><font style="color: rgb(205, 70, 84);"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><i><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></i></span></font><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">. </span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">She is currently working on her second book,</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">A Family of Forgetters,</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">a historical novel set in 19th century Utah.</span></span></div>
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Kate's Review:
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/a-book-review-i-couldnt-put-it-down
2019-08-26T01:07:56.846000Z
2016-07-22T19:31:30Z
Kate Thompson
<div><div style="font-size: 12pt; margin-bottom: 0.5em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(0, 99, 93); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none;">Kate's Review:</span></div></div>
<div style="font-size: 12pt; margin-bottom: 0.5em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(0, 99, 93); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none;">A Book Review by Kate E Thompson: I Couldn't Put it Down</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 1em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21467788-inamorata" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: 10pt; color: rgb(0, 99, 93); font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline;"><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/e81be927-2b0a-48fd-aac2-7ff27ad14c79/07048c35-211a-41a7-9479-fe6c31e5aaf4.jpg" alt="Inamorata" style="border: 0px; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; height: auto;"/></a></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/meganchance" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Inamorata</a> by Megan Chance was an amazing book. I couldn't put it down and now after finishing it, I can’t stop thinking about it. Told from the perspectives of four main characters, the conflict is revealed bit by bit, just enough to keep me wondering and wanting more. The story is dark, suspenseful, and the characters well defined. So well, I could see them and feel what they felt. I cared about them, even the antagonist. The fantastical aspect was a surprise and had I known, I may not have selected the book, but by the time I realized, I was hooked. The book was a complex and very satisfying read. I recommend.</span></div>
<div><span style="box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(54, 54, 54); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Kate E Thompson</a></span> is the author of</span><span style="font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"> </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">and a contributing author of </span><font style="font-size: 18px;"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html" style="font-size: 18px; font-style: italic;">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></span></font><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">.</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">She is currently working on her second book,</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;">A Family of Forgetters,</span> <span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498); font-size: 16px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Tahoma; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">a historical novel set in 19th century Utah.</span></div>
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Who Cooks for You?
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/who-cooks-for-you
2017-09-29T21:00:06.927000Z
2016-07-03T20:22:28Z
Kate Thompson
<div style="font-size: 12pt; margin-bottom: 0.5em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 99, 93); text-decoration: none;">Who Cooks for You?</span></div></div><div style="margin-bottom: 1em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 10pt; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/218b8891-05a3-43a4-a47b-3ac002c4ca51/0c97d5e6-7b87-4493-ab7a-aab6bec4a3d1.jpg" alt="Picture" style="border: 0px; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; height: auto;"/></span></span><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: Tahoma;">a true adventure</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">He flew on silent wings; one swoop and his talons grazed the top of her head. She didn't see him coming. She was walking down the forest path to her cabin after a hearty meal at the farmhouse. It was twilight, drizzly, and she was alone. Before she thought to run, he went in for a second swipe. This time, she left sprinting and even though her cabin was closer, she ran back to the farmhouse to warn us. This was my first night as a writer-in-residence at Hedgebrook, a retreat for women writers located on Whidbey Island, WA. The writers' cottages are tucked away in the forest amongst cedars and furs, pines and hemlocks and vine maples. In owl territory, it seemed. Funny, the packet I received when I was awarded the Hedgebrook residency, mentioned deer and bunnies, not attack owls.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">The victim, bearing minor scratches, burst into the farmhouse dining room and told us her story. We’d just finished dinner. Now we had to walk down the owl path to our respective cabins. We strategized. We had numbers; there were five of us and one owl. He was 2 pounds, we were 600. But wait, an owl perched in the tallest cedar can spot a tree frog at night and he can hear a pinecone drop a mile away.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">We needed an edge. A shield, breastplate and matching helmet would give us one. We settled for coats. We buttoned up to our necks, tucked in loose hairs and most important, covered our heads.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">There are many ways to protect a head. Flip up a hood, don a wide brimmed hat, tie on a red blinking light, or put tomorrow’s lunch in your pocket and wear the Red-Riding-Hood basket it came in, on your head, the handle like a bow. I put on my basket after I finished tying my hood. </span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">We turned on our windup flashlights and marched shoulder to shoulder into the woods. We walked a fast clip. And the owl, wherever he was, allowed us to pass.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">He woke me before my alarm</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: bold; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">.</span> <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">I rushed downstairs and opened the window. First light winked through the branches. I wanted to get a look at that owl. It was a frosty morning and I shivered. The fire I made the night before was ash. I wrapped in a blanket and waited.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">It wasn't long before I heard him hooting again</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: bold; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">.</span> <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">“Hoo-hoo hoo hoo. Hoo-hoo hoo hoo hoo," he called. Was this the crazy owl from last night? While he hooted, I peered into the branches. He was nearby, I knew it. But where? </span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">I opened my Pacific NW Guidebook and turned to the owl section. I learned that a Barn Owl screamed and clicked, the Burrowing Owl cooed. I read on. The Barred Owl’s hoot was unique. If he hooted words they’d be, “Who cooks for you? Who cooks for you all?"</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">Who cooks for you? I substituted ‘hoo’ for each word. I hooted out loud a few times. Yes, I found my owl! I studied the picture. He or she, the book wasn't that detailed, was about two feet tall, had a four foot wingspan and friendly eyebrows. He looked cuddly, not crazed.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">The owl had been quiet for a while. The sun was up; and yellow and red leaves glistened. I shut the window. I’d have to go out there later, in the dark, and walk to the farmhouse.</span></div>
<div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">I saw my lunch-basket hat on the table</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: bold; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">.</span> <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">The sandwich I left in my pocket was still cold, as if it’d been in the fridge all night. I thought of dinner the night before. An epicurean feast and the first meal I hadn't cooked in ages. Hedgebrook had a chef, a real chef who made mouth-watering dinners and lunches to go. The type of meals I would never prepare at home because, well, who has time for fancy stuff, when you had kids and jobs and messes to clean? I ate the sandwich for breakfast, roast beef, not bologna. Who cooks for you? I chuckled. I had almost two weeks left at Hedgebrook to write whenever I wanted and without interruption or obligation.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">That night after dinner, we walked back to our cabins together. I kept the picture of the owl in mind. I thought of his big brown eyes; I thought of his stripes. We had our hats on! One of the women wore a floppy one and I wore the hardhat I found in my cabin. I looked like a construction worker. Problem was, someone with a bigger head had worn it last and I hadn't thought to adjust it. As I walked, it slid down over my eyes, off the back of my head, to one side, the other.</span></div>
<div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">We arrived at the giant elm</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: bold; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">,</span> <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">the spot where we would split up. Two of us left the path and headed to our cabins. Not a peep out of that owl. Strange, I felt disappointed.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">We’d only walked a few feet when the owl swooped in and landed on a branch. We had high power flashlights this time, not the wimpy windups. We shined our lights on him. </span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">He didn't look as friendly as he did in the picture. Still, I felt a little giddy. Who cooks for you? I smiled. The chef made chocolate chip cookies for dessert. A rare treat; I never baked at home. She gave me extra on my way out. They were in my pockets.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">The owl blocked our way and he wasn’t budging. Then, with no warning, my companion marched up to that bird and started telling him off. I watched her wave her arms, whoop and holler. I’d never seen anything like it. The owl cocked his head. Apparently, he hadn't either. Finally, she put her hand on her hip and turned. “He’s not scared at all." She sounded surprised and held her flashlight steady.</span></div>
<div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">His eyes slid over to me</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: bold; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">.</span> <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">I thought of the cuddly owl. I saw a hunter. I remembered the bunnies I’d seen on the path earlier. I tried not to scare them, but a twig snapped underfoot and they scurried into the bushes. I turned off my flashlight. This was not a crazed owl. We were tramping through her territory during prime hunting hours and scaring her dinner away. She was probably a mom and had mouths to feed.</span></div>
<div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">The owl took flight</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: bold; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">.</span> <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">She made no sound; the branch didn't move. She glided. She flew in my direction. Several feet away she broke course. Whoosh! She soared up, up and over my head. I whirled around to see where she’d gone, but my hard hat slid over my eyes and fell to the ground. </span></div>
<div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">I looked up</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: bold; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">.</span> <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 16px;">A moonless night, the sky inky-black and the only sound was rustling leaves.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;"><a href="http://www.hedgebrook.org/" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Hedgebrook Farm.</a> "Hedgebrook isn't a retreat, it's an advance." Gloria Steinem</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma;">Photo. </span></span><span style="font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma;">Oak Cabin at Hedgebrook. K. Thompson ©2008</span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(54, 54, 54); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;"><font style="color: rgb(178, 33, 48);"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/">Kate E Thompson</a></span></font>, 2008 Hedgebrook Alum, is the author of</span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">and a contributing author of </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;"><font style="color: rgb(205, 70, 84);"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></span></font>. She is currently working on her second book, A Family of Forgetters, a historical novel set in 19th century Utah.</span></span></div></div><div><br/></div>
When your Imaginary Dogs Drool
https://kateethompson.postach.io/post/when-your-imaginary-dogs-drool
2017-09-29T21:00:34.782000Z
2015-11-01T21:40:51Z
Kate Thompson
<div><div style="font-size: 12pt; margin-bottom: 0.5em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 99, 93); text-decoration: none;">When your Imaginary Dogs Drool</span></div></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 1em; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 10pt; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><img src="https://cdn-images.postach.io/c16732dd-aea0-4bdd-a9e4-04577c44aa11/a20c38ff-9a6a-4db9-a1b3-8d7859879534/5e1fe316-3e03-4494-a0c0-55b65447ea60.jpg" alt="Picture" style="border: 0px; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; height: auto;"/></span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 15px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">"Hey Girl nudged Astra in the hip and Good Boy woofed. Astra sighed and she and Matthew looked down at the dogs. They’d gone for their leashes. They held them in their mouths. Their big friendly eyes, drool." </span></span><span style="font-size: 15px;"><a href="http://kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">The Asteroid’s Daughter and the Serpent Handler’s Son</a></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">Hey Girl and Good Boy are Sheriff Astra Billings’ best friends. Together they tip the scale at 300 pounds. They are Newfoundland dogs, Newfies for short, and they live with Astra in my novella, “The Asteroid’s Daughter and the Serpent Handler’s Son."</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">Gentle giants, and worthy of the name, Newfies make ideal companions. Of course, you remember Nana, the prim Newfoundland dog who, for the Darling family in J.M. Barrie’s, </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">Peter Pan</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">, proved to be a treasure of a nurse. That’s a stretch, but </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">Peter Pan</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);"> is fiction. The Newfoundland is a sweet dog, a work dog, a strong swimmer, brave and loyal. Did you know a Newfoundland survived the Titanic? This is true; and he didn’t take the lifeboat. He swam ahead and led survivors to safety.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">J.M. Barrie owned a Newfoundland, a Landseer he called Luath, who served as inspiration for Nana. I didn’t know much about Newfoundlands when I began my novella. Astra needed a dog and it was a Newfoundland that came to me, two of them, in fact.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">I’d met a couple Newfies a few years before. I admit I was alarmed when I saw giant dogs coming out to greet me and my daughters. My daughters were little then, the dogs full grown. As it turned out, I had nothing to fear. Gentle giants indeed, they were true to their breed.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">Maybe you’ve heard that writers ought to write what they know. This isn’t true. Writers have imaginations. I imagined Astra’s Newfoundlands. To go along </span></span><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">with my imagination, I had the one brief encounter and a reference photo, my girls petting the dogs and the threads of drool that connected them.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">In the early drafts, Astra’s dogs were like paper dogs. They would need a bit of fleshing out in the rewrite. I put the story on the shelf to age. By the time I got back to it, I couldn’t find the picture. In fact, years had passed, my daughters were practically grown, and in my mind, the one experience I had with the dogs was fuzzy at best. Hey Girl and Good Boy were minor characters, but no matter how small their part, they belonged to Astra; they were part of her. Besides, I liked them. I needed more than imagination to bring them to life.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">This called for research. I like research. It’s something I can get lost in and often, it’s hard to stop. I delved in and read everything I could find on the Newfoundland dog. I studied pictures, read heroic stories and dog manuals, watched YouTube videos and when I was out, I kept my eyes peeled for Newfies. You can spot one a block away. I began imagining two Newfies, always by my side. I mean, by Astra’s side. I imagined thick, satiny-black coats, their faces turned up, the trust in their eyes.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">One late November, I heard about a Christmas tree farm that was sponsoring a fund-raiser for the Newfoundland rescue club. Newfoundland dogs would be there carting Christmas trees for the patrons, donations welcome. I didn't need a Christmas tree; I had a nice one out in the garage in a box.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">The farm was an hour away. I didn’t need to go. I’d finished my research and I knew way more about Newfoundlands than I needed to know for the scope of the story. A few minor edits and the novella would be complete and I’d move on and Hey Girl and Good Boy would stay behind, with Astra, of course. I would miss them. Well, I could always go to the book and read the passages they were in.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">I went to the tree farm. The dogs were a friendly bunch, the way Newfies are. They gave me hugs and kisses, just like those Good Boy and Hey Girl gave Astra. They stood by my side and nosed my hand. I petted them. I talked to the owners.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">When I left the farm, I wanted Newfies of my own, real, not imaginary, dogs that were loyal and lovable, panting, shedding and slobbery. </span></span><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(24, 24, 24);">Thanks to my thorough research, I had to admit that they were big dogs with big needs. It was far easier to care for them in the pages of my novella than in real life and that's where they've stayed. </span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 10pt;">Newfoundland Carting a Christmas Tree. Photo by Charles Thompson. All rights.</span></span></div>
<div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(54, 54, 54); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;"><font style="color: rgb(178, 33, 48);"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/">Kate E Thompson</a></span></font> is the author of</span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">Bigfoot Hunters Never Lie </span><span style="letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); display: inline !important; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">and a contributing author of </span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.498039); font-style: italic; font-weight: normal; font-size: 16px; font-family: Tahoma; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;"><font style="color: rgb(205, 70, 84);"><span style="-webkit-transition: 0.1s ease-in-out; transition: 0.1s ease-in-out;"><a href="https://www.kateethompson.com/new-halem-tales.html">New Halem Tales - 13 Stories from 5 NW Authors</a></span></font>.</span></span></div>
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