Work It!

Being an adult student is hard. Ask anyone who has ever embarked on the learning curve (willingly) post-varsity - we feel as though we signed up for something paralleled to stocks-and-ladders: We know we did it because we want to develop a skill/pursue a goal/ do well in our field/follow a dream...but it is just so darn hard to climb the rungs of learning whilst living an adult life with all its demands and pressures, to the point of torturous! As if our daily stresses, with its traffic jams, missed appointments, broken hearts, family dramas, monetary strains, failed attempts and spreading waistlines weren't bad enough, we go and throw a nice little self-inflicted exam in the mix? Way to go to hammer the self-doubt home.

Three years ago I decided to finally do the thing I had always wanted to do and learn to play the piano. I thought I had a little raw music talent to help kick things off, some time on my hands, and a loving Husband who would let me practice to all hours at home - what could go wrong? Easy! I'd be playing Rachmaninoff in no time. I'm a grown up, after all. I had worked my way up in the corporate world from nothing to a National Brand Manager, spent a year in a part of Zambia not many are willing to go, overcame a deadly disease in my late teens and lived through the tragedy of losing a loved one to an untimely death. Learning to play the piano was going to be a piece of red-velvet cake, surely as easy as it was going to be fun!

But, of course, there was no cake in my immediate future. I had no idea what a rollercoaster ride I was about to embark on. First the rush, the fun, the sheer pleasure of it all. Then the fear, the doubt, the hard work of it all. The past few years have been measured in hot flushes swinging between happy reward and sweat-drenched frustration. Yes, I learned the difference between a major and a minor chord. Yes, I learned to play pieces of Billy Joel and bits by Beethoven. Yes, I can now transpose from simple-duple to complex time signatures. But mostly, what I have learnt - really learnt, is that work, work and more work is the only way to play the piano.

I have to be honest - I don't like the work. It's great when things are clicking into place and a song is erupting from the keys, but the rest of the time, I am filled with destructive internal questions. Questions such as; 'Isn't it easier for a child to learn this stuff? Why am I even trying?!', or 'Doesn't it take a full ten years to reach the last school level in music? Will I ever get there?!' and even 'Don't kids absorb more and learn easier? What's the point?!' These are questions I use when I feel the hardness and injustice of it all, that I am in my 30's and thus unlucky enough to only be learning my ABC-Majors now. But the answer to all of that, I'm sorry to say, is 'No. Suck it up, buttercup. You gotta work.'

So then, after running through a few scales, arpeggio’s and some finger exercises, I think, 'Oh well, maybe my talent will help me get to the next level.'  Wrong again. Talent can help me play a melody from memory, just as the ability to walk upright will get me from point A to fifteen km's later. But work will help me construct a chord progression around that melody, work will teach me to read the sheet music to play the fullness of the song, just as work will help me develop my ability to run five, ten , twenty km's without stopping! Imagine no one ever pushed harder in training for a marathon than past the point of sweat. As soon as you are out of breath, then stop, because that is too hard. No, we keep working, pushing past the boundaries of our weaknesses, and complete those twenty km's.  Imagine we walked away from relationships the first time we found that it wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows? No one would ever stay together. It takes work to be happy in relationships, work to go the distance. The same goes for learning to play an instrument. This isn't guitar-hero, friends. This is hard, cold, finger-numbing, brain-squeezing, ear-assaulting, hours and hours of work!

Perhaps the question I should be asking myself when the doubt or laziness arises is 'What made you do this in the first place?' My answer would be that I love music, and I love to create. The combination is a powerful form of self-expression that I simply cannot get in any other way. Listening to music gives me a lot of pleasure and helps me feel a release of this self-expression, but to truly experience my inner most feelings and abilities, I need to be able to play it myself. That's just me. If I want to be able to do that, then I better work.

I think the best thing about being an adult learner is that I am beyond the competition and beyond the parental 'thou-shalts’ of it all - I am doing this for me and me alone. It isn’t about a grade, or getting the top mark, but rather that I want to know how to play beautiful music so that I can play what I am feeling, and possibly pass the love on to another. I want to be able to read music so that I can play what others, composers of the past and present who have lived through times and lives that I could not even possibly imagine, have felt. But the only way I will ever be able to experience this bond to both history and self, is through work.

The moral of the story is that hard, consistent work is the only way to learn to play the piano. But it is the most rewarding work I have ever done, and I plan on doing it for a long time to come.

Love, lust and fairy-star-dust

Cherry Blossom

Miley alla Moderato - Cherry Blossom does Sexy

Did you see what Miley Cyrus did now? This seems to have been the underlying (or blatantly in-your-face) theme of the internet over the past few weeks. Ever since the VMA awards, Miley has come in like a wrecking ball and commanded attention. In a society that brought us Honey Boo Boo and Kim Kardashian, it is no surprise that naked, lurid behaviour with a few 'f' words thrown in for effect, is one of the best ways to rise to stardom, or simply to get our attention. 

Miley's recent acts have sparked off a heated debate of women’s sexuality, their rights in general, and the ongoing argument of slut-shaming. First Sinead O’Connor told Miley that she should not allow herself to be prostituted for the sake of "men making money". Then Amanda Palmer encouraged Miley to own it, and let her freak flag fly. I have since read countless blog posts and articles written by mothers, daughters, struggling musicians and even a few men on the subject, (my favourite of which being this) all talking about the rights a woman has, or doesn't have, to flaunt her own body. 

I have to say, I tend to agree and disagree with all of them, from all angles. Yes, we have come a long way from pearls and aprons (the non-Pintrest version), but the world still feels the need to single out female musicians, female fighter pilots, girl gamers, or girl fly-fisher peoples as though they are a separate entity entirely (even I make that mistake). It is a male dominated world, no matter how you look at it. They still make more money for doing the same jobs, they still head up presidencies and they still tell us what to do. Well they can't tell us what to wear. Or can they? (I bet the boys over at Dolce and Gabbana have a few opinions on that matter!)

I think we have been so busy painting our bare breasts with protests against rape-culture, and streaking for freedom from men, that we may have forgotten what sexuality really is. Sex is an act to propagate the species. Our animal urges, if you will. It all boils down to making more of us, to keep the world populated and the human race moving forward. It is an 'anti-extinction' clause built into the core fiber of each and every person on the planet, both male and female, equally. Each one of us own and have all rights to our own individual sexuality, and have the right to do with (our own sexuality) as we please. In short, sex is completely natural, completely human, and completely necessary. But is bending over and twerking it in everyone’s face necessary?

Saying a woman should use her sensuality to get ahead in the world, seems to me to be on a par with saying a man should use his muscles and testosterone-laced aggression to further himself. We can't have our boys taking swords to school to ensure their teachers give them straight A's, or packing guns in their back pockets to win the girl over, or discussing business deals over a nice blooddied fight in a cage - looser dies, winner takes all! No, we have developed as a species and come a long way from that. We all agree that little Johnny should not punch Jessica in the face to get the toy he wants away from her just because he can. Then why don’t we apply that to ourselves too, and say maybe Jessica shouldn't bat her lashes to get the toy away from Johnny, or even to get Johhny to buy her all the toys?

But then again, men do use some of that inner-motivating testosterone to help themselves do better, go further, climb higher up the corporate ladder. And when done right, it is admirable, and deserves to be rewarded with a promotion, or closing the deal, or selling the product he built for millions. Why not? He worked for it. Sometimes the man who has the guts (which is just ego manifesting itself, if you think about it) to try a pick-up line, deserves the (willing and able) girl. But it is still so much more socially acceptable for men to go out there and flex those animal instincts than it is for women to do the same. And this double standard is the conundrum we find ourselves in. How can we as women use our sensuality to get that competitive edge, to Miley it up, to grab the internet by the sledge-hammer without being labeled a slut?

I don't have the answers, but I do have this little tidbit passed down from my Granny, the wisest woman on earth: Everything in Moderation. Eating a red-velvet cupcake for breakfast is an awesome way to celebrate ones birthday, but if one had to eat red-velvet all day every day twenty years in a row, one would soon find one's BMI shooting through the roof, ones organs will be under massive strain, and one would have an obesity problem, at the very least, on ones hand . Moderation. A little bit of make-up to highlight features can be very attractive, but caking the stuff on so thick that it needs to be scraped off with a spatula is neither flattering nor comfortable for the skin. Moderation. A glass of wine at the end of a long day can help take the edge off, but drinking constantly and copiously will eventually end in vomiting, dehydration, mild concussion and a hangover from hell. Moderation. It is one thing dressing with a little tease, but quite another leaving the house like sex on a stick. There is always room for having a little fun with our sexuality, but nobody wants their daughter’s Hannah-Montana themed birthday party turning into a mass orgy.

So I think I will use that wise word from my Granny when it comes to presenting my sexual self to the world. I'll not let my freak flag fly, but rather keep that flag tucked closely around me, synched in at the waist, of course, to accentuate my fabulous covered-up bosoms and CrossFit shaped ass. I'll reveal my sensuality moderato - and I'll leave the tweaking up to Miss Miley.

Love, lust and fairy-star-dust

Cherry Blossom

P.S. Please forgive me for the obvious wrecking-ball and sledge-hammer reference-play; I know it's being done to death right now, but as a writer, I just couldn't help myself.

The Not So Spring Chicken

Happy Septermber all! Down here in the southern hemisphere, spring has sprung! The tree’s are budding, the birds are singing…but wait? What is that I see advancing over the ocean from my kitchen window? Another cold front? Winds so strong and grey that their life-consuming colour swells up and blasts the living sparkles out of all those well meaning early budding blossoms? Well how nice, given that I am sick as a dog in bed.

This dreary, ghosts of winter day has got me thinking. Spring this year, thus far, is a bit like me this year, thus far. Many still consider me a ‘spring chicken’ of sorts, but I assure you that lying here, swathed in the dregs of flu, my thirty-three years of spring chicken has found me a little less chickeny lately and a lot more old-farm-hen. My chicklet feathers are not quite so downy, my fluffy tail is not quite so pert and my cute little baby hen claws have developed the ability to not so much tickle adorably as tear the rooster a new one. I don't like being sick one bit, and so, what did I do? Deny deny deny.

I have realized that no matter how far from the chicken facade we come, we will always need a Mother Hen, even if that mommy is your own self (or Husband) looking out for you. Being sick in your 30’s is a great way to slap you up side the head and say ‘Grow up! You’re an adult now, act like one!’

You see, I did not act like an adult at all preceding my demise. Because sick isn't something that happens to me, sick is what happens to other people; People who don't live a balanced lifestyle; People who work too hard, people who don't look after their bodies or eat healthily; People who are too stressed, too tired - not me! I live my life-party on a daily basis, complete with mood-enhancing heels and matching sparkly dress, and the flu monkeys are not on the guest list. But now, the result is this horrible virus confining me to the gloomy dust-ruffles of my bed, and those flu monkeys are throwing their own party in my head!

I was feeling a ‘bit’ under the weather a few weeks ago, but not too bad. Not ‘too bad’ to simply deal with it the way I used to back in the day when I would pop a sinutab and drink a sugar free red bull and be ready to go again. Not ‘too bad’, to stop me from getting up and doing my CrossFit avidly and enthusiastically, and laughing off Husband’s heed when he warned me of all the germs going round like last seasons shoes at a half-off sale. Not ‘too bad’ to stop me from going off to teach my piano students, having after-work drinks, going out every night in the week, staying out way past my bedtime with a friend visiting from the UK, staying up all hours with Husband even when I was at home, never saying no to any offered event, taking myself with Husband fishing and wading in the ice cold mountain water, and walking around at home with no shoes or socks on, even though my feet were cold. The little voice in my head (my Mother, or perhaps inner mother hen) kept saying ‘Your feet are cold! You‘re going to get sick. Your head is sore! You should be in bed. Your ears are hurting from being in this loud place! Your lungs are hurting from being in this smoky place! You should not be here!’ But did I listen? Of course not. No, the spring chicken in me thought she could handle this snivel, this mere head cold that it surely was.

But as it turns out I could not. Perhaps when I actually was a spring chicken I could, but not anymore. Two rounds of anti-biotics, a course of cortisone and one big fat needle injection later, I have finally succumbed to the flu, and the voice in my head simultaneously. So yes Mom, you were right after all. I am staying in bed, allowing Husband to look after me in his sweet way. And the only spring chicken in my immediate future is the one in my soup.

Love, lust and fairy-star-dust

Cherry Blossom

The Funeral and the Peep-Toe Shoes

Funerals, thankfully, are not something I have needed to attend all that often in my life. But sadly, earlier this week, my old English teacher passed away. I was homeschooled, so when Uncle Neil started working for my parents, he was roped into the task of taking me through a year of high-school literature and poetry. A retired teacher himself, he embraced this new role as private tutor to a starry eyed me, who loved to write, loved books and stories, but also loved shoes and was (and still am) a slow reader, and thus used to give up quite often on finishing any literary project and turn to fashion pages when my brain hurt. But he managed to keep me completely focused. I remember long afternoon sessions sitting in our sun-filled lounge, reading from the classics, discussing imagery, laughing and arguing. He didn’t like cats (his only true flaw) and so it never went down well between us when I wanted my cat on my lap during lessons. We once had a big fight where he kicked my cat out, and I told him in no uncertain terms that my cat lived in my house and he did not, and therefore had less right to be there than the feline member of the family! Sigh. I shudder at my past brattiness and disrespect! (I did write a formal letter of apology in the end…)

But besides his peculiar aversion to cats (like, who wouldn’t like cats?!?) he was an amazing teacher and had the most wonderful, deep, melodic voice which would suck me in while he read, transport me to another world and warm the cogs of my imagination. He introduced me to e e cummings, and encouraged me when I then began using little ‘i’s in my own personal work (while explaining over and over again why I couldn’t do that when it came to actual school work or exams) I used the little ‘i’ for a further 15 years or even more! His main objective for me was to enjoy the English language in all its richness, and make it part of me.

Along with my mother and my grandmother, Uncle Neil was one of the biggest influences in my life-long desire to write – even though he only taught me for a year.

I have long since lost touch with him, but when I found out that he passed, I knew that I owed it to him to go to the funeral and pay my respects. Which raised a very important, very obvious question: What should I wear?

And that was the thing of undoing for me. I did not cry when I heard the news – yes it is always sad when someone dies, but he was very old (82), had been quite frail and sick towards the end, and had suffered a few heart attacks in his last days. The news was sad, but happy too in that the suffering was now over for him – something I would much rather think about than good old hearty Uncle Neil withering away in pain. I didn’t even cry at the actual funeral, even when his nephew stood up to speak and could barely read the words on his typed out page as he was overcome by emotion. No, the moment when I was reduced to tears was when I stood in front of my cupboard, wrapped in my fluffy bamboo-thread towel, and could not find a thing to wear.

And so I did what any girl would do. Composed myself, and called my mom. She assured me that all-black was no longer necessary, but that the outfit should be somber in its essence (as it turned out I needn’t  have worried at all, as people arrived in all sorts of clothes, amongst them sweat pants and hoodies!). Gone are the days, it would seem, where black, black or black was the only option.

I chose a fold-layer knee-length dress with abstract floral patterns of black, white, grey and splashes of red. Then it came time to choose the shoes. You would think that someone with as many pairs of shoes as I have, would own something appropriate to wear to a funeral. Nope. Not me. (Note to self: Go shopping!) But as I had no time to go to the nearest shoe store, I had to settle with the only shoes that matched the dress – black peep toe high heels. Normally I love these shoes – my Pre-Louboutins, as I like to think of them, and the way they showed off my cherry red toe-nail polish was perfect. For any other circumstance than a funeral, that is! I kept thinking, worrying, are cherry red toe revealing high heeled peep toe shoes appropriate?! Even though my mother repeatedly assured me that they were fine, I did feel a little ‘skaam’ walking into the church.

Skaam, and horribly shallow. How could I be so concerned with my dress and shoes and the colour of my toe-nail polish at a funeral? I told myself to suck it up and get over myself.

But then two things happened. The main speaker, while eulogizing Uncle Neil’s life, got to the part where he was, in his younger years, and long, long before I knew him, apparently famed to have always said of himself what a ‘snappy’ dresser he was – always making sure to be current and up to date with his wardrobe. That made me happy. A part of him I never even knew about, and here I am concerned about my attire being appropriate or not for his funeral. Suddenly, I felt that perhaps my moment in front of the wardrobe was a connection to him, a thread of the unspoken, a strange way of saying goodbye in a language he understood.

But then just as I was patting myself on the back for not being a calloused, materialistic philistine after all, I spotted the back of a man’s head sitting 2 rows in front of me. We’ll call him SL. Another ghost from my past – SL once told me in my teens that, and I quote, ‘A girl who wears jeans and boots is asking for ONE thing…’ Jeans and combat boots made up about 95% of my teen-age uniform, and at the time I had been highly confused at his criticisms as I was a late bloomer and certainly did not have that on my mind at all! It is a comment that has plagued me ever since, but I have come to adult terms with it, that it said a lot more about SL than it did about me (and without being too judgey or pointing fingers, maybe go read my sister’s take on the recent Blurred Lines debate and other posts on rape culture to put it all in perspective…)(OK a bit judgey).

So there I sat, in all my cherry-red-tipped-peep-toed glory, and I think Uncle Neil must have had a good giggle looking down from heaven as the proceedings came to an end, we sang the last hymn, and I made the quickest break out of there possible so as not to be seen by SL! I can just imagine what he would say had he seen my shoes (the word harlot comes to mind…).

Wardrobe bonds and potential catastrophe’s aside, I am so glad that I got to go to Uncle Neil’s final good bye. I learnt so much more about him, remembered everything I once knew about him and felt a stronger connection to him in my now no-longer-a-bratty-kid self, peep-toes and all. I only wish I had got to know him more when he was still here.

Good bye Uncle Neil. You have left your legacy in my memories, and in my writing – and for that I thank you. Say hello to Granny for me, and I hope you two have great fun discussing books in heaven!

Love, lust and fairy-star-dust

Cherry Blossom

In Love with Love

"Bianca: There's a difference between like and love. Because, I like my Skechers, but I love my Prada backpack.
Chastity: But I love my Skechers.
Bianca: That's because you don't have a Prada backpack!"

...10 Things I Hate About You

Love is a word I use a lot. Not because I can’t distinguish between like and love. I just love to love. I love to fall in love. It's something I do very often, and on many different platforms. 

There is, of course, my ultimate Love, Husband, and I am a lucky girl because he's one of those men you can fall in love with over and over again. 

Then there's the obvious shoe Love I have - this one is easily quenched with a bit of scouting, shopping or even just gathering pictures off the internet of beautiful creations that I couldn’t actually wear (or buy). 

Some of my Loves need no explanation. Some of my Loves should never be explained. (Don’t even attempt to understand them because even I don’t get it...ahem...like this song)

But then some Loves come into my world in a whirlwind of romance! Complete with wining, dining, butterflies, bubbles and all things intoxicating! I Love Jennifer Lawrence – serious girl crush. I'm crazy in Love with my giant cat and his purr-filled snoring! I Love CrossFit. I Love watching Husband cast out a fly line with expert ease, uncurling it onto the water with delicate precision. Or even better, when I make the perfect cast myself! (or as close as I am going to get at this point, that is) A new Love came to me in the form of a pink ‘Sage’ fly fishing rod he bought me, and I know this one is going to stand the test of time because I just keep thinking about it. I have even been mulling over the name Sage in my brain so much so that it has become the first name of one of the characters in my latest manuscript in progress.

Another Love arrived as a book. It was Love at First Read, and I wrote a blog post dedicated to the fiery fling we had, even though the reading was over too quickly. Isn’t that just the way it goes? The thing with books, however, is that they are never jealous when you find the next one, the new one, the one that keeps your bed warm as you lie in it reading on your kindle. (I Love my kindle!) And so, in the very happy after glow A Girls Guide To Fairy Tales left me, I found another Love of a book. This one involves vintage teacups! I'm hooked :)

And this week, my newest Love was a moment, sitting in a coffee shop with a dear friend. I fell, not only for the honey and cinnamon banana French toast, but while we were talking about loves (a pink scarf, an unpublished book, an upcoming wedding) I spotted a ceramic bowl amongst the shop decor that was filled with little matching ceramic ducklings, and fell instantly head over heels in love with that moment, right there and then.

The Loves that I love the most are the ones that are worth it. Don’t you just love that kind of Love?

Love, lust and fairy-star-dust

Cherry Blossom

BOOK NOOK: A Girls Guide To Fairy Tales

A Girls Guide to Fairy Tales

 What a pleasure to be able to kick off the newest feature on my blog, Book Nook, with this wonderful little gem! And it is even MORE of a pleasure, and an honour, that I get to interview the author herself right here on Cherry Blossom Boutique!

I found AGGTFT via a twitter/facebook page dedicated to chicklit. Having been burned before when purchasing books based on on-line recommendations, I swore I would never do it again. But when I saw this sparkling temptation (at a great price), I thought, oh why not.

What a great find! Not only is A Girls Guide To Fairy Tales fun and charming, but it is so enjoyably constructed I couldn’t put it down! (even though I was meant to be practicing for a piano exam…)

The book is about 4 girl friends, the English variety (not Manhattanites), who are each going though their own daily issues – love, work, self esteem, wardrobe dilemma’s, kick-starting a career as a Broadway star…you know, the usual. I loved that even though Laurey captured each of the different women’s unique personalities, I could find something in all of them to relate to. OK, maybe not taking the stage – naked – for a very important role in a very important play…but I definitely felt akin to every one of the women in the story at some point or another in their own personal journeys.

I loved that each chapter is written from a different viewpoint, of one of the friends, and that each chapter ends with you wanting to know what happens next! The beauty of the flow of this book, is that you then have to read 3 more chapters to get to the next part of ‘insert-protagonista’s-name-here’s story. Oh, Laurey, you crafty scribbler you ;)

When the girls get together, it’s as though I am there. I have BEEN there, only the group of girls is my own little cluster here in South Africa. How rare that a fun and heartwarming book captures elements of reality in a way that transcends continents!

I found myself laughing out loud at both Issie’s and Clare’s blind dates, having been in similar situations myself, ranging from the socially awkward to a particularly cave-manish face-palm specimen who had a very special way of charming the ladies. I felt deeply for poor Sophie who felt immediately less than worthy when she found out about her boyfriends newest employee, the drop dead gorgeous and can’t-blame-her friendly potential other woman; All the while, Sophie’s teenage language filled with OMG’s and WTF’s endeared her to me even more, and the scene where she hides eating a chocolate from her boyfriend is SO me - I couldn’t stop laughing! Maddie’s desire to open her own cake shop is one I would never have the guts to do myself, but one I would always encourage. Go Maddie! And of course, any book that has a ‘glittery shoe’ incident is right up my alley – fairy tale style!

Without further ado, I would like to introduce the lovely lady who made this gorgeous novel happen - Laurey Buckland. Take it away, Laurey!

***

Thank you so much Pami (aka Cherry Blossom) for hosting me on what I can only describe as a powerful-punch-of-pink blog which I love.  What I don’t want to do is bog your dear readers down with reams of rambling statements of what ‘inspired me’ or ‘why I decided to write the novel’. That will bore them senseless. What I will simply say is that I thoroughly enjoy being creative and was inspired by my own life and those of my girlfriends.

However, what I feel I should explain (briefly) is why I chose a fairy tale theme…..

I felt that the stories from our childhood related to those lives we live and the problems in them. How many of us are always looking for faults in ourselves before someone else can point them out? How many of us pretend to be something we’re not and adopt a false persona just to get by from day-to-day? How many of us would rather believe the worst than hope for the best? And how many of us believe our worlds are topsy turvy and should be something more? If you’re not one of these women, I envy you. A lot of us are shaped by society to want the mythical perfect man and to want to be perfect ourselves. Believe it or not, our fairy tale heroes and heroines have all been there before us: The Ugly Duckling; Pinocchio; Snow White; Alice...

There’s no need to go into too much detail about each of my character’s problems right now. For $1.16/£0.76 I’m hoping you will not feel it an expensive burden to discover them for yourself. However, I do hope you will relate to one of their experiences. I wanted them to be the Every Women of chicklit. I want their stories to resonate somewhere in each of your perfectly formed, feminine physiques. And if you’re wondering about happily-ever-afters, let’s just say I’m a huge romantic.

Pami has set a few questions for me to answer, so here goes:

Tea or Coffee?

Despite being British, it's coffee all the way for me. I would never wake up otherwise, although I've heard that half an apple is just as likely to help wake you up in the mornings. Think I'll stick with my cuppas though.

Sparkly heels or ballet flats?

Depends on the occasion. However, if we're talking about what I feel super special and sexy in, then it's sparkly heels every time. In fact, the sparkly heels I mention in A Girl's Guide to Fairy Tales were based on ones I'd bought the day I wrote the chapter they feature in. Oh, I felt like Dorothy herself wearing those beauties but instead of "there's no place like home", it was a case of "there's no place like a dance floor".

Diamonds or pearls?

Diamonds. Diamonds. Diamonds. After all, they are a girl's best friend.

Red or White? (wine of course)

Neither actually. I'm a rosé girl! And if there are bubbles on offer I'll take them, even though they do strange things to my brain. 

Audrey or Marilyn?

Hardest question of the lot! But after careful deliberation I've decided it has to be Audrilyn!!

If money wasn't an issue, where in the world would you live and why?

Wherever my family was....but seeing as money isn't an issue in this scenario, I'm guessing they could come with me. Therefore, I think I'd go back to Italy. I lived there when I was very young and have extremely fond memories of my life there. It is rich with history, which I would appreciate now I'm older (and wiser I hasten to add) and finally, with it being the most romantic country in the world (stereotypically or not) it would be the perfect setting for another chicklit venture.

What is your favorite book of all time? (or top 3 if you cant choose) (or, if you are like me, top 5)

I very rarely read a book more than once but if the story has gripped me, then I don't need to; it's embedded in the brain. I'm a hopeless romantic but love a bit of fantasy fiction too. Therefore, my top 3 are:

1)Jane Austen's Persuasion. I love P&P too, but the love between Anne Elliot and Wentworth is (dare I say it) more romantic than Darcy and Elizabeth. Controversial! 

2)Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. This is where Rowling's world starts to turn truly dark and interesting. What an imagination that woman has.

3) Roget's Thesaurus - gotta love a book that can turn dark into tenebrous and light into resplendent.

Who should make the first move? Man or woman?

Another cracking conundrum here. But I'm going to go with *insert drum roll here*....the man. I believe men bounce back from rejection better than women and let's face it, when would a guy refuse anything with breasts and a pulse?

For those of you who do want to learn a little bit more about me (you just might) then you can visit my blog http://laureybuckland.blogspot.co.uk/p/about-me.html

However, my answers to Pami’s questions should have told you everything you need to know.

And finally, for those of you who are still reading this far, here’s my novel’s synopsis in a bit more detail.

For daydreamer Maddie, obsessive compulsive Clare, over dramatic Isobel and happy-go-lucky Sophie, life is more a world of tragic than magic.

For Maddie it’s a constant battle against the monotony of a job she hates while her heart aches to follow her dreams of setting up her own cake-making business and turn her talent into a career. But will she escape to the world where she feels she truly belongs?

Clare's inability to banish the image of the ugly duckling she remembers hampers her ability to believe she is good for anyone or anything. After being coerced by well-meaning friends to sign up to an online dating site, she soon starts to realize that looks aren’t perhaps everything and that she is just as quick to judge a book by its cover.

Isobel has the looks, the figure and the confidence – or so it appears. After landing the lead role in a new play written and directed by the beastly Guy Edmundson, she follows her mother’s advice to find a gorgeous hunk in time to escort her to the after-show party. But it’s only when she cuts herself free from the ties of a fake persona and stops living up to other people’s expectations that the unexpected happens.

Sophie has the perfect job and the devoted boyfriend who worships the ground she walks on. But when she chooses to doubt her own worth and believes in a poisonous rumour, it tears her fairy tale world apart. Can she find the magic to piece it back together?

Links:

Amazon.com

http://www.amazon.com/Girls-Guide-Fairy-Tales-ebook/dp/B008E315NG/ref=cm_cr_pr_pb_t

Amazon.co.uk

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Girls-Guide-Fairy-Tales-ebook/dp/B008E315NG

It is also available on iTunes.

Feel free to get in touch and tweet me @LaureyBuckland

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How gorgeous is Laurey's cat!? And the sparkly shoe that inspired some of the fairy tale...I love that it exists in real life :)

That's it from me for now. I hope you are inspired to buy and read the book - and let me know what you think! 

Love, lust and fairy-star-dust

Cherry Blossom