Life Deco

The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton

Jill Crossland — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 21:20:21 +0000

The Forgotten Garden has been compared to Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden; even author Kate Morton writes veiled references to it in her book. If you expect that quality of narrative and characters you will be disappointed. However if you are looking for the perfect summer read that will whisper “make a glass of ice tea and take me outside for half an hour” this is the book for you.

The story has a charm that takes one from page to page effortlessly. The lives of Nell, Cassandra and Eliza weave around you as their stories unfold in three different time periods.

Morton also wrote some interesting male characters in Linus and Nathaniel and it is a shame that she didn’t allow them to play a more pivotal role in the story line especially as it drew to an end. Linus in particular would have made the conclusion more affective. Instead the ending was predictable and the last few pages insipid but you are so engaged by that point you suffer through the harlequin style dialogue between Christian and Cassandra. I get the romance but Christian was not crucial to the plot that we have been following for over 500 pages.

A woman’s search to find her real family, fascinating fairy tales and a walled garden at the end of a maze all play a key role in everyone’s lives. Underneath all this is the question “How is home defined?” It is the place where we are born? The house that we return to at the end of the day? Is it being with family or that certain someone? Will one unexpectedly discover home while travelling? As the book illustrates we know when we have found home, but we don’t know where or even how it may come into our lives.

Kate Morton talks about her book.

With Your Biscotti & Coffee

1 – An Interesting Woman: Maria Gunnoe
When you fight a big company, a town and a way of life the danger to one’s self and your family is real. Maria Gunnoe took on the big coal industry in Appalachia. Coal Country Crusade by Tamara Jones/More Magazine

2 - Nine of the most amazing bookstores in the world from The Huffington Post

3 - American Theatre Wing
An in depth look at what is playing on and off Broadway and behind the scenes.

© Jill Crossland for Life Deco, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: American Theatre Wing, Bookstores, Kate Morton, Maria Gunnoe, More Magazine, The Forgotten Garden

Migraines don’t make me very profound

Jill Crossland — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 20:39:57 +0000

Migraines are an ailment onto themselves. You get your full blown, you want to die ones. There is the mid-sized ‘I may make you take to a dark room, close to a toilet and not let you sleep or I might go away’ level and last is the mini migraine that I have had for awhile; the head pain is nagging and constant and your stomach is queasy but you can function.

Unfortunately though I choose this weekend to watch Shutter Island with Leonardo DiCaprio; not knowing that it has a very vivid scene that triggers a migraine for his character. That managed to kick my symptoms up a notch. I wonder too if anyone else finds that some of the commercials for migraine medication leaves them feeling slightly unwell?

Needless to say all this has left me quite ineloquent so let’s get to our …………..

With Your Biscotti & Coffee

1) A good nights sleep can be so illusive; two very busy women HuffPost’s Arianna Huffington and Glamour’s Cindi Leive decided to embark on a month long Sleep Challenge 2010 and they blogged about its successes and failures.

Huffington Post’s version

Glamour’s Posts

2) An Interesting Woman: Gayla Trail

Gayla Trail is a writer, photographer, and graphic designer. She is the creator of the popular gardening project, You Grow Girl and the author of You Grow Girl: The Groundbreaking Guide to Gardening as well as an in-demand gardening personality and spokesperson with a focus on urban gardening, growing food, sustainable living, and community. Her own line of pithy gardening products

O magazine recently featured Gayla in How to grow your own herbs

3) Afganistan remains a paradox as these three reports illustrate

Afghan women swap burqas for police uniforms By Daphne Benoit

Lyse Doucet reports on the Afghan women jailed for bad character

A garden can be much more that than it seems Growing gardens, independence and esteem by Terry Glavin

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Post tags: Afganistan, commercials, Gayla Trail, migraines, shutter island, Sleep Challlenge 2010

Must have a sense of humor

Jill Crossland — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 18:09:47 +0000

The following post should be read with the theme from the show Two and a Half Men in your head because this seems like the right time to celebrate …………..”Men men men men, manly men men men”

Let me share with you the qualities that I like in a man and the men who have them.

I love a quick sense of humor and Nathan Lane has that hands down. How a man speaks tells me a lot, which has to bring us to Sam Elliot, with that voice I’m surprised that my garage isn’t full of Dodge Ram trucks. Bill Clinton would be my choice for an evening of intellectual conversation; discussing everything from books to politics with a good bottle of Merlot. The element of danger and adventure is attractive. Lunch in Prague with Daniel Craig followed by a drive through the countryside in the Jaguar.

I am fascinated with people who are not only a great success but also are visionaries in their field. Male choices for a stimulating board meeting are Steven Jobs, Richard Branson and if he was still alive Henry Luce. Warren Buffet will have to come in his place.

Then there was my father a smart and ruggedly handsome man in that John Wayne kind of way, he had so many of the characteristics that I noted above. Through him I gained an appreciation for fine wine, good food and reading books of all genres. He passed on many things like the importance of a firm handshake, especially for a woman in the business world. Perhaps though it was through inheriting his foresight to take the road least travelled that I gained the most. This made me a traveller in life not a tourist.

The Fall and Rise? of Newspapers

Jill Crossland — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 21:56:44 +0000

I do it in the evening; Chris prefers to do it with his morning coffee. We have two delivered every day; the Calgary Herald and the National Post; when I am out & about I buy the Globe & Mail. In spite of all our efforts articles abound that the newspaper industry is in peril.

Is this slump in sales, partially due to different generational tastes yes, and it is also about lifestyle. Everyday I revel in, utilize and thoroughly enjoy the technology that puts the world at my figure tips. It allows me no limitations to where I can take both my coaching company and online magazine. However when it comes time to relax I prefer the print media format.

I don’t think we are seeing an end of print media so much as a time of rebirth. “We have a generation that is consuming information in totally different ways” says news anchor Kevin Newman in an interview that talks about his decision to leave his on air news job in order to explore the world of digital media. (Read Crossing digital divide, interview by Karen Mazurkewich)

Time’s Managing Editor Richard Stengel recently announced that ‘For the first time since the magazine’s birth in 1923, we will soon be delivering the entire contents of TIME to paying customers in a radically different way: as a self-contained application that you can download to the iPad. (From Ushering In a New Era)

Even though the competion for readership numbers is no longer about who has the news box on the corner of main and 1st street; the media companies are still choosing to handle the issues in a singularly autonomous fashion. Will the different media apps for devices such as the Blackberry or pay for content on the Internet prove to be the sustaining solution? Of all the articles being written on this subject, James Poniewozik sums up the current situation best in his editorial All the News That’s Fit to Mint

I think tackling the insatiable need for information and news in today’s world with a more united or partnering approach might prove to be the beginning of a solution for the media’s woes; in other words to go where no newspapers have gone before.

With Your Biscotti & Coffee

1) There was once a time when I would plow through any book, now I have to agree with Sonya Chung the list of books that I haven’t finished has increased. From her column in The Millions blog read Sonya’s post – It’s Not You, It’s Me: Breaking Up With Books.

2) Things are so troubled for the Roman Catholic Church that it is easy to forget that there are some truly heroic nuns and priests doing some remarkable work in the world. From the NY Times Who Can Mock This Church? by Nicholas D. Kristof

3) Does your dog like to rock to Bono or is your cat more of a jazz fan? If you don’t think that they have a preference check out the world’s first Music fof Dogs concert, article by Amy Coopes.

© Jill Crossland for Life Deco, 2010. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: digital media, iPad, Media, newspapers, Print media, Sonya Chung, time

Calling Spring

Jill Crossland — Sun, 30 May 2010 20:10:40 +0000

I looked pretty good at the beginning of winter; everything was new and colour coordinated right down to my gloves and hat. It is now May and oh my god it snowed yesterday morning. So when I dressed to walk the dogs there was very little enthusiasm which may have been a mistake. I ended up wearing the old winter jacket that Chris and I both use when we take out the garbage, gloves were those $1- ones that you get at the grocery store and my thumb was coming through and to complete the ensemble my favourite Victoria’s Secret yoga pants that have seen a few too many washes. And I hadn’t even matched the right coloured leases to the dog’s collars.

Perhaps the standards have slipped somewhat but I must defend myself and say that it is May 29^th. What was that? You saw me out walking this morning. No, that was another woman with a chocolate lab and Australian Shepherd – couldn’t have been me!

With Your Biscotti & Coffee

1) An Interesting Woman: India Hicks

She was recently intervewed by Nathalie Atkinson when she presented at the Canadian Fragrance Awards in Toronto.

Her website: http://www.indiahicks.com/

2) Lambeth Palace Library

If you are in England between now and July 23rd set aside some time to visit the Lambeth Palace Library. In celebration of its 400^th anniversary in 2010, the Library is showing its diverse collections of manuscripts, archives and books, some of which will be on display for the first time. Lambeth Palace is the official London residence of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

3) BP Oil Spill

LA GULF RESPONSE: “In the wake of the BP Oil Spill that is threatening our coast, local, regional and national conservation organizations are coordinating volunteers to assist in local, state and federal recovery efforts in Louisiana.

Our organizations – including the Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program, the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, the National Audubon Society, the National Wildlife Federation and The Nature Conservancy – are established, active advocates for the preservation and restoration of coastal Louisiana ………..’”

Please visit http://lagulfresponse.org/home.html to volunteer or make a donation.

© Jill Crossland for Life Deco, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: BP oil spill, India Hicks, Lambeth Palace, Spring