Back to Basics - Punctuating Dialogue

IN MEMORIAM

The victims in Las Vegas 

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 Hurricane Update

The "Low" in our area did not develop into "Nate," but it rained enough to send flood waters back up in low-lying areas. A storm in the Gulf of Mexico did grow into Nate and is poised to go ashore as a strong Cat 1 around the mouth of the Mississippi River around 7:00 p.m. tonight (Saturday). Harvey, Irma, Maria, Nate (and Katia which hit Mexico). Not a good hurricane season in North America.

In the Orlando area, three photos illustrating "low priority": 

If a tree isn't blocking a road, crushing a roof, truck, or car, then it's still lying there, three weeks after Irma, waiting until crews get around to cutting it up and carting it off. These two trees are down between a busy shopping center and a lake.(I'm going to keep track of how long it will be before anyone gets around to turning these magnificent live oaks into sawdust.)

BACK TO BASICS 

Punctuating Dialogue 

Examples are from The Blackthorne Curse 

(Blair Bancroft - online late fall 2017)

1. Actual words spoken are offset by double quotation marks (in books published in the U.S.).

Example:

“All my friends are having London come-outs,” I declared, struggling to keep my voice to a lady-like calm. “Even those who have long-standing betrothals are being allowed to gain a bit of town bronze before they marry.”

Grace note: The only place single quotes are used is within the body of another quote. When you need quotes while writing narration, double quotes must be used.

(Not finding an example of this, I made up a couple.)


Examples:

Mary sighed. "He said quite clearly, 'I will not do it.'"

The word "blithering" is late 19th c., not appropriate for the Regency period. 
[NOT 'blithering']

 

Repeat:  Do not use single quotes anywhere but within double quotes. 

1. Dialogue tags with commas, questions marks, and exclamation points. 

The "tag" following a comma (a), question mark (b), or exclamation point (c) begins with a lower case letter. 

Examples:

a.  “That you will not,” he roared back. “The whole county’d be up in arms. Passing over my own kith and kin to leave Blackthorne Hall to a bastard.”

b.  Grandfather and I stared at each other. “You remember?” he asked, his voice no more than a hoarse whisper. 

c.  “Now go on, scoot!” she added in a tone that reminded me all-too-sharply of Prudence Cogswell. “The Mister’ll be having an apoplexy.” 

2.  Punctuation within a continuous dialogue sentence.  

Commas are used to offset the tag within a continuous sentence.

Example:

“But now that you’re back,” Grandfather continued, “there’s but one solution." 



3. Tags before the quote.

 If a tag followed by a comma comes before the quotation marks, the initial letter of the dialogue must be capitalized, just as at the beginning of an ordinary sentence.

Example:

I looked him straight in the eye and declared, “Your promise was long ago, Clive."  

4.  Full sentence tags. 

If your tag is a full sentence, whether in front of the quote or behind, it must be separated from the dialogue by a period.

Examples:

Right:  “Indeed, my dear, I can show you the letter, if you wish.” Lady Talbert offered such a benign and understanding look that I burst into tears right there in the drawing room.  

Wrong:  “Indeed, my dear. I can show you the letter, if you wish,” Lady Talbert offered such a benign and understanding look that I burst into tears right there in the drawing room.  

5.  Inserts in Dialogue.

There are several ways to insert a comment into Dialogue. Two of the most common are: a dash (a) or ellipses with separated sentences (b).

Examples:

a.  “I only know I felt the push. Someone”—or possibly some thing—“was there, but I know not who.” 

Grace note: the above is my personal way of using the dash to insert dialogue; there are those who position the dash differently. 

b.  “I only know I felt the push. Someone . . .” Or possibly some thing. “. . . was there, but I know not who.”  


6.  Speaker Identification. 

When a single speech contains multiple sentences—particularly when there are more than two people present—the speaker must be identified in the first line. Do not write three or four sentences before you identify who is speaking.  

Example (three persons present):

“You may speak with Lord Rolfe, Miss Blackthorne,” Miss Marston decreed. “I shall, of course, remain. Any future calls by Lord Rolfe will be conducted in the parlor under the usual restrictions. I trust that is satisfactory to you both?”

Wrong:
“You may speak with Lord Rolfe, Miss Blackthorne. I shall, of course, remain. Any future calls by Lord Rolfe will be conducted in the parlor under the usual restrictions. I trust that is satisfactory to you both?” Miss Marston said.


7.  Keep action, introspection & dialogue together.

Although I have seen books where the dialogue is written on a separate line from the character's actions or thoughts, most people find that style confusing. Since change of paragraph usually indicates change of speaker, it can be very difficult to figure out who is speaking. I strongly advise keeping a character's dialogue in the same paragraph with his/her actions and/or thoughts. The only exception - if the speech is long and needs paragraphing to make it more readable.

~ * ~

For a link to Blair Bancroft's web site, click here. 

For a link to Blair's Facebook Author Page, click here. 

Thanks for stopping by,

Grace

The Tale of Irma, Part 2

The "spaghetti models" a couple of days before Irma struck Florida. We were rooting for the two on the right. The 7th & 8th from the right are closest to the path Irma finally took.

Before the 4x 4, my neighbor's fence was leaning at about a 45° angle. I like to think my vines helped keep it up when nearly all other wood fences in the area have been smashed to kindling.

When I went to my daughter's house on Monday night, Mike & girls had finished picking up branches and were relaying flagstones - or maybe just playing in the mud after a long, hard day

Although there was still some wind & rain on Monday morning, there were birds sitting on the wrought iron fence wondering what happened to their birdfeeder. So up it went, even before I made coffee on a Sterno stove. Shot taken through the screen to keep from frightening the birds - with neighbor's debris in the background.

THE TALE OF IRMA, Part 2

 Special note: I set out to write a personal story of what it was like when Central Florida was threatened by a major hurricane, and I am going to do just that. But with apologies to all those who lives were shattered so much more thoroughly elsewhere - from the floods in Houston, fires in the American west, earthquakes in Mexico, and the utter devastation in the Florida Keys and the Caribbean islands, most particularly Puerto Rico and St. Martin's. (Murmurs of the Apocalypse have been heard.) The personal pleas, day after day since Maria struck, have been agonizing as the large PR population in the Orlando area tried to contact friends and relatives and couldn't because not only was all the power out, all the cell towers were down. The latest wrinkle - seen on the noon news on Thursday, September 28 - there are hundreds of containers full of supplies sitting on the docks in San Juan, none of them being off-loaded! (Excuse: lack of gas for the necessary trucks to haul the goods where needed.)

~ * ~

Grace's Personal View of Irma

Monday evening, September 11:  My daughter had no power, but they had a generator for basics and an outdoor grill, and I was happy to accept an invitation to supper. But oops! It was dark and I hadn't gone half a mile when I saw cars from both directions slowing down, taking turns driving the middle of the road through a flooded area, maybe fifty yards long. No place to turn around, so I did what the others did, even though most of them were vehicles with better clearance than mine. Next obstacle - no light at the intersection. Fortunately, traffic was light and I made the turn without incident. But when I entered my daughter's neighborhood, I had to negotiate an obstacle course, with just a narrow path cleared between the piles of debris (cut logs & branches  on both sides of the road). 

My daughter, son-in-law, and the three grandgirls had worked nine straight hours that day clearing debris. Piles of tree limbs, mostly evergreens, rimmed their yard. They lost about a third of the screen panels in their pool cage. Supper, however, went off well, with about ten family refugees eating together - except every time Susie used the microwave to heat up side dishes, the generator blew, and someone had to run around turning off as many lights as possible so the generator would come back online. 

Later, when I tried to think of an alternate route home to avoid the flood, I was stymied, because both routes involved major roads with multiple traffic lights. None of which were working. I braved the flood, arriving home about as tired as I'd ever been in my life.  Stress, pure stress. My sympathy for people with severe damage was strong. I vowed I wasn't driving anywhere until the water was down, the traffic lights were back on

Tuesday afternoon: my daughter brought the girls over to clean up my yard - an easy job compared to their yard. Naively, I still thought my debris would be picked up on the usual Yard Waste day, Wednesday. It is now two weeks later, and everyone's debris is browning in front of their houses. One giant tree is down two houses east of mine. It may be weeks before our debris is gone.

Meanwhile, TV is doing 24-hour news coverage, and I learn the damage is extensive. Even if we didn't get the brunt of the storm. Central Florida is a land of lakes, lakes, and more lakes, with one major river, the St. John's, and many smaller ones. There were trees and power lines down everywhere, many blocking roads. Some houses had their roofs shattered by falling trees. The storm surge was less than expected on our Atlantic Coast since Irma went north closer to the west coast, but boats still suffered, many of them breaking their moorings, sinking, or being tossed everywhere from on land to miles away. 

And the inland flood problem was growing worse, as the 16-23" of rain we had in our area poured into the rivers and lakes, plus the rains from south Florida pouring into the St. John's, which flows north. People whose homes had survived the storm now had three feet of water on their floors. Roads and bridges washed out. Sinkholes began to open up, some just gaping holes in the ground, some swallowing houses and causing a new round of evacuation orders.

Thursday, September 14: I ventured out for the first time since Monday night, getting groceries at Publix, where the shelves were almost back to normal. There was still little traffic on the roads, but the stoplights, thank God, were working. I still had no phone or Internet, but since I had power, I wasn't complaining.

Sunday, September 17:  Church was held in the gym of the church school, since churches were low priority for power. (Not restored for 13 days). The lakes and rivers continued to rise, many well over flood stage.

Monday, September 18:  I'd been checking my Internet two or three times a day for the last eight days. At 3:30 that afternoon, to my astonishment, I discovered I was back on line. I lifted my phone, got a dial tone. Which meant my cell phone could now update without my leaving the house.

The flooding on the St. John's and other rivers and lakes was beginning to go down, but not by much more than an inch a day. As of today (the 29th), flood conditions are still in effect.

Meanwhile, Hurricane Lee turned north into the Atlantic. Maria did not. News of Florida and its problems was suddenly replaced by news of Hurricane Maria obliterating Puerto Rico and St. Martin's. And today they tell us a tropical low is forming just off our Atlantic Coast, and then it's likely to move west directly across the state, perhaps developing into "Nate." Sigh. I have not put my lanterns away, or my bottles of water. The porch is still bare and uninviting. The yard waste still lies out front, turning brown. But every time I think, "I'm really tired of this," I see pictures of what's happened in Puerto Rico and understand why Father Paul, on Sept. 17—only partly with tongue in cheek—absolved the congregation from "survivor guilt" for having come through the storm as well as most of did here in Longwood.

Sunday, Sept. 24:  Services back in church, but the church school gym where we met last week is closed due to enough rain leaking in that black mold is feared. So tarp on the roof, inspections, cleansing - it'll be a while before all is back to normal.

Tuesday, Sept. 26:  The Orlando Sentinel said that 176 trees came down in our local botanical gardens (Leu) and a large tree fell on Dr. Leu's historic home, causing water damage to one wing. It is indicative of the massive amount of damage in our area that the disaster to our beloved Leu Gardens—much like churches being at the bottom of the list for power—was not reported until more than two weeks after the storm. Which reminds me, there's an Eastern Orthodox church about two miles from me with a mound of browned debris (logs & limbs) about fifty feet long and six feet high.

Wednesday, Sept. 27:  The TV news reported that black mold is already settling in in every house and business that was flooded. 
The weatherman announced that the series of violent storms we suffered in September broke all previous weather records.  

Friday, Sept. 29: The news at noon today announced the closing of a five-story waterfront condominium in Titusville (home to the Space Program). The roof came off in Matthew last fall and again in Irma. The water damage has led to black mold, a severe health threat.

After the news, I had my hair cut and met the Irma disaster up close and personal. My hairdresser lives on the St. John's River and lost her house. Permanently. She was on the phone to FEMA for the umpteenth time just as I arrived. And no, the house isn't salvageable. Two trees fell on it during the storm, prompting her to rent a storage unit and call a truck to move her furniture out. (To the amusement of her neighbors who told her she was overreacting. Two days later, as the water rose to engulf her neighbors' homes, she was helping them pack up.) There was no flood insurance on the house. She is living in a rental. (But her furniture was saved.) FEMA is offering nothing more than a loan when her expenses have already soared sky high.


And, of course, you can multiply the story above by the thousands if you count Harvey, Irma, and Maria. I keep telling myself we re-built western Europe and Japan after World War II. We ought to be able to rebuild the damage from three hurricanes. It's just that this time, the devastation is closer to home. And no amount of political diplomacy can keep it from happening all over again. 

Friday evening news: 350,000 claims for hurricane damage have been submitted to FEMA in Central Florida.

Friday evening, 8:40 p.m.: Regular TV programming was interrupted while the weatherman detailed the movement of a tornado in south Brevard county - on the shoreline some 30-35 miles away. The new storm front, the one that wasn't supposed to be anything more than a rain event, was showing hurricane quirks, such as leading with a string of tornadoes. Enough, already! Yet they tell us this one will be with us through Monday. Sigh.

I'll shut up now, but not before expressing the hope that this is it for the year. That flooding from this new Low will be minimal and not afflict more pain on those who already have holes in the roof, ruined appliances, molding couches, etc. Survivor guilt again - I am so glad I live on top of one of Florida's excuses for a hill!

~ * ~

 Likely topic for next week: Back to Basics, a look at some of the most common writing mistakes.

If you missed the Citrus Singer's second video, the parody of "These Are a Few of my Favorite Things," here's a link.

For the Citrus Singers' new video, click here.

Thanks for stopping by,

Grace 

A Tale of Irma, Part 1

A surprise addition to this week's Mosaic Moments. The Citrus Singers have come up with another video, this one very much "off the cuff," as they wanted to coordinate with the Girl Scouts' current fund-raising campaign that will end in October. It's a parody of "These Are a Few of My Favorite Things" from The Sound of Music. No costumes, no studio with AC - just a whole day "street side" in the 90+ sun and heat following Irma's departure. (Ironically, hurricanes sweep all the moisture from the air, leaving days of bright sunshine behind.) The Hispanic couple (experienced performers) who were to play the roles of customers couldn't make it - their car wouldn't start. And when Susie (the director) still hadn't found the young man needed as another customer, the teenage deliveryman for a nearby pizza place was pressed into service, as were some of the girls' parents. My eldest granddaughter also appears as one of the "cool" customers, the one requesting food with "no calories." Anyway, you'll find a link below to another GS video, scripted by my daughter, with all three of my grandgirls performing.

The Citrus Singers meet a genuine Drill Sergeant

The "cool" crowd asks for GS items with "no calories"!

For the Citrus Singers' new video, click here.

~ * ~ 

Grace note: Residents of Florida and Texas can stop reading. Been there, done that. But there are a lot of people who have NO idea, so . . .

HURRICANE IRMA, Part 1

Most of us spent the last week of August and the first week of September being horrified by the news out of Texas. A Cat 4 hurricane, followed by record-breaking rainfall - in one place 51.2 inches! Flooding, a Dunkirk-like fleet of private boats rushing to help local first responders, some from states as far away as Florida. Homes and normal lives destroyed, but relatively few deaths due to excellent forecasting and lessons learned about shelters from the disaster in New Orleans when Katrina hit.

But oops! There was something else brewing in the Atlantic, a storm so big it became a hurricane shortly after it was born. Here in Florida we began getting daily bulletins about Irma. Our specially trained rescue workers and their air boats came back from Texas just in time for a couple of days rest before they had to do it all over again at home.

On Monday, September 11, word came: it looked like Irma, a Cat 5, was headed straight for Florida. When I went to the grocery store the next afternoon, there was already almost no water or bread left on the shelves. The evening news said the same of generators. And of course the rush became worse as the week progressed, stores struggling to restock and not quite managing. Peanut butter, jelly, cheese vanished. Along with every kind of battery and stoppers for bathtubs! (For those who don't know the drill, bathtubs have to be filled so toilets can be flushed when the water pumps shut down.) Three tankers made it into the port of Tampa, bringing much-needed gasoline, as of course there was a huge rush to fill up.  

Weather bulletin: Irma was 500 miles wide, its "eye"winds 185, with gusts to 200. I had grave doubts about my 1970s-built villa withstanding such ferocity.

The governor made numerous appearances on television, issuing warnings: residents on the barrier islands and those living in mobile homes must evacuate. Those living below the giant dike at the southern end of Lake Okeechobee as well. (The dike was expected to hold, but it was possible excessive rain and wind would whip water over the top. All tolls were suspended, so evacuation traffic would flow as smoothly as possible. Everybody else needed to stock up on food, water, lanterns, and flashlights, and hunker down. Frankly, I've never liked Florida's governor, but in this emergency he was superb. If he hadn't reached his term limit, he'd win the next election in a landslide.

On Tuesday, I moved all the container plants on my stone-walled embankment onto the ground, counting on the rise of land behind to shelter them. I uprooted down tall wrought iron plant holders, laid them flat, and put the flowers hanging from them onto the ground. (The birdfeeder I left up - not taking it down until after Sunday afternoon.) I stripped my porch, folded up tables, took tablecloths & decorations inside. Also, the cat climber (which Squeak never uses). I damaged my big begonia getting it through the opening in the sliding glass doors (narrowed by the cat door), but it spent the storm safely on my dining room table and is now back outside, still blooming happily when all my other plants were destroyed.

Wednesday Weather bulletin: Irma destroyed 90% of the Caribbean island of Barruda and was expected to skim north of Puerto Rico. After that . . . look out, Florida.

  On Thursday, when it looked as if Miami would take the brunt of the storm, the roads north were bumper to bumper with those trying to escape. Schools were canceled, beginning Friday, even in our area - not because the storm was imminent, but many schools needed to be prepared for use as shelters. On Friday afternoon, I baked up a big batch of scones. With those and the aid of my little Sterno stove, I would at least have my morning fix of coffee and something to nibble on.

Weather bulletin: Irma was angling more west - the so-called "spaghetti models" were shifting from Miami and the east coast to a track up the center of the state. Namely, Orlando. And Longwood (where I live). Yikes!

In the midst of all this the Episcopal Diocese in Orlando announced that the convocation ceremony for new deacons in Central Florida would go ahead as planned on Saturday morning at the downtown cathedral. Most of us in our choir, who had promised to sing, had an "You've got to be kidding" moment. Sunday services had been canceled, but not the convocation?? So there we were, driving a deserted I-4 into town at 9:30 a.m. (Everyone was supposed to be off the roads by 5:00 p.m., but most sensible people were already safely shut up at home.) Really strange to have a major superhighway almost to ourselves - and to discover that every billboard between Longwood and Orlando had been stripped down to its wooden frame. To save the advertisements, or to allow wind to pass through the boards, saving the frames? Truthfully, I have no idea.

As mentioned in a previous post, the convocation ran over two hours. Two choirs never made it all - one, the choir from Okeechobee - and another choir sang without robes, because when they went to pick them up, their church had already been sandbagged and they couldn't get in. Believe me, by the time I got home around two o'clock on Saturday afternoon, I can't ever remember being so tired. The strain was getting to me.

Sunday morning. Quiet - really strange, since I live only about forty feet from a busy road. Maybe five or six cars passed by between dawn and noon. Then . . . nothing.

Weather bulletin: Irma's track kept inching west - it was beginning to look like it was going to pass over Key West and go up Florida's west coast. A little better for Orlando but not good for my many friends who live in the Naples, Fort Meyers, Venice area. 

At the last minute, shortly before the power went out - and just as our area was beginning to breathe a bit easier - it was announced that Irma had shifted back to the east. She was going to travel INLAND, up the peninsula between Orlando and Tampa; i.e., CLOSER. The only good thing—going overland would reduce the storm's strength. 

Sunday, 2:00 p.m. The deluge came, the rain descending like a waterfall on steroids, making me very glad I live on top of what passes for a hill in Central Florida. The winds came later - but at minimal hurricane force - predicted for 75-90 mph in our area. I  think we ended up on the low end of that.

At 10:30 p.m. the power failed, but that was, of course, expected. The wind continued to howl against the east side of my house for several hours, but just as I was bracing for it to come from the other way, it began to fade. Amazingly, the eye passing over land had reduced Irma to a tropical storm. 

I went to bed, still expecting the storm to worsen, but it didn't. I woke to light rain, downed trellises, the neighbor's fence leaning into my yard, minor tree debris scattered over my lawn, and that was it. There were birds waiting on the wrought iron fence near where my birdfeeder usually sits. Even before making my coffee, I put the birdfeeder back up. 

Even more incredible, by 3:30 that afternoon, my power came back. Days before I expected it. No phone, no Internet, but I had power. Wow! Which meant not only light and stove but AC, computer, and TV - which made me aware of just how lucky our area was. I also had phone & text capability on my cellphone, thanks to AT&T, just no access to Internet services from home. but I had to use it sparingly as I had no way to recharge. (When I ventured out twol days later, my cellphone was able to update email and Facebook from wifi systems that were functioning.)

Monday, September 11: the curfew was lifted in Seminole County (where I live) at 11:00 a.m. All other counties kept their curfews in place until 7:00 p.m. The main problems: debris, including huge trees down, blocking the roads and lack of stoplights. Dramatic photos paraded across the TV screen 24/7. ranging from destruction in the Caribbean islands to Key West, the south Florida coast, and our own local pockets of disaster. 

Weather bulletin: Jose, following on Irma's heels, was predicted to turn north short of the Florida coast. The Carolinas and New England, however, should keep a close eye on Jose. Local joke as Jose turned north: "They wouldn't let him in." [Told to me by one of my half-Hispanic granddaughters.]

No way, Jose! But oh-oh! - Lee and Maria were coming off the African coast . . .

To be continued 

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For a link to Blair Bancroft's Facebook Author Page - with a new post - click here.

For a link to Blair's Website (which may not have my latest book, as my web guru lives in Texas!), click here.

Thanks for stopping by,

Grace 

 

THE BASTARD PRINCE - now online

IRMA UPDATE
September 18, 2017, 4:30 p.m.

I just got my Internet access back after 8 days! I can't really complain because power was back at my house 15 hours after the storm, and I had relatively little damage beyond small branches and the loss of every flower in the garden. (The perennials will eventually recover - the others are already in the trash.) But there is so much debris everywhere that it will be months before all of it is picked up. But I know I am lucky. Many people here suffered much worse damage, including the results of 51 small tornados and flooding lakes and rivers, yet nothing here compares to the near total destruction in the islands and the Florida keys. 

I am hoping to be able to post a new blog by the end of this week. Perhaps the saga of what it was like to see a Category 5 hurricane aimed directly at you—the preparations, the evacuations, the "hunkering," the aftermath, which is still very much with us . . .

 

IRMA Bulletin

Friday, September 8, 2017:
Last week Harvey, this week Irma - and this one is headed straight for the Orlando area. Not good. I've been laying in supplies for several days and just put all my potted plants into the lee of a stone wall. I also stripped my porch - folding tables & chairs, bringing what I could inside . . . Beginning tomorrow night we hunker down and ride it out, certainly much better off than those in the Keys and South Florida and those along both of our very long east and west coasts. Most are under mandatory evacuation, with the roads north bumper to bumper. Power will likely go out everywhere - the storm is huge compared to the width of Florida, so no one will be spared. Mosaic Moments will return when my computer is up and running again. Fortunately, all should be well for my usual Saturday post.

P.S. Jose - chasing Irma through the Atlantic - just strengthened to a Cat 4. (I'm sitting here, shaking my head.) 

Saturday, September 9, 2017:
I actually went to downtown Orlando this morning with other choir members to sing for a 2-hour convocation (for Central Florida deacons) at St. Luke's Cathedral. Five choirs were scheduled to participate - two didn't make it (one from Okeechobee, which is under mandatory evacuation because of fear of water coming over the dike at the bottom of Lake Okeechobee). And one choir had no robes because when they stopped to pick them up, the church had been sandbagged, and they couldn't get in. All went well at the service, but most of us really wanted to get home for final preparations for Irma. And of course I wanted to post my blog before the power went out!

~ * ~

 

Now live on Amazon

In a world of dashing spaceship captains, a brilliant but cynical sorcerer, princesses as deadly as they are beautiful, and the daughter of a king who has been mistress to powerful men on both sides of the rebellion, The Bastard Prince (Book 3 of my Blue Moon Rising series) features K'kadi, the Psyclid king's youngest child and only son—psychically gifted, socially inept, and mute. In this book K'kadi metamorphoses from dreamer and sometime screw-up to warrior, from stumbling boy to lover. Except, following his own path as usual, his approach to both may be a trifle unorthodox.

The Bastard Prince also continues the story of the rebellion against the Regulon Empire, with appearances by a number of old friends: Tal, Kass, Jagan, M'lani, B'aela, T;kal, and the Regulon admirals, Rand Kamal and Vander Rigel. New characters include: K'kadi's mother, a merchant rebel and his entire family (one of whom throws a monkey wrench into a number of well-laid plans), plus the entire planet of Hercula (hopefully, a new ally against the Regs).

Blurb:

What to do with K'kadi Amund, the youngest of four royal children—the one who doesn't talk? The young man of almost twenty-one who can still lose himself in moments of beauty, or moments of disaster. "Unreliable" and "weird" are some of the kinder things said about him. So why does S'sorrokan, leader of the rebellion against the Regulon Empire, consider him one of his most vital assets? And even when K'kadi comes into his own and gets what was once his greatest desire, he discovers that growing up comes with a price.*

[*Hint not in official blurb: a price K'kadi may not be willing to pay.]

 ~ * ~

Because of the great popularity (world-wide) of the Citrus Singer videos, I am repeating the links below. If you haven't seen them, all I can say is, "Don't miss it!" And that's not just proud mother and grandmother talking.

So here it is: The Citrus Singers of Central Florida performing "All About That Badge," their parody of Meghan Trainor's "All About That Bass."

For a link to the Citrus Singers' parody, "All About That Badge," click here.

For  "Before the Shoot" videos, click here.

For  "Day of the Shoot" backstage videos,  click here.

Grace note: For an in-depth interview with the director of The Citrus Singers, keep scrolling down to last week's post.

~ * ~

And I'd be delighted if you would check out my Facebook Author Page. 

Blair's Author Page 

Thanks for stopping by. I'll be back when Irma lets me.

Grace 

Tale of a Music Video

HARVEY

Wednesday, August 30, 2017:
Before beginning a "feel good" post, I must acknowledge the terrible disaster this week in Texas. Those of us who live along the East Coast know something about hurricanes - I survived one in New England that killed 700. But the scope of flooding in Houston, our country's fourth largest city - an INLAND city - plus vast areas around it, is almost beyond belief. One area broke a rain record - 51.2" in 3 days, and the storm is still bringing rain, with water up to the rooflines in many areas.

The only blessing, the death toll is low, particularly compared to the 2300 killed by Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans in 2005. The nation is rallying to help, but it will take years to recover. And untold amounts of money. And all because Nature stalled a hurricane in one place for nearly a week.

The outpouring of help has been amazing - some have likened it to Dunkirk - because in addition to Coast Guard, firemen, policemen, and National Guard, ordinary citizens have converged on southeast Texas from far and wide, towing their boats behind their pickups and plunging into day after day of house-to-house rescues. Among the many going to help from Central Florida: urban search and rescue teams, helicopters & crews, electrical linemen, National Guard, a local contingent of firefighters, complete with airboats, and a another team from Brevard County is flying in their special water purifiers (each machine - flood water to drinking water for 1000 persons a day). The First Baptist Church of Orlando has fifty specially trained members who will go to Texas after the flood to help people clean up and rebuild. (And now the weathermen tell us, we could be next. Hurricane Irma is building fast and heading our way.) 

Friday update:  72,000 rescued, 136,000 homes destroyed. Estimated damage: $100 BILLION, the highest storm damage total in U. S. history.

 Our hearts and prayers go out to the people of Texas.

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TALE OF A MUSIC VIDEO

The "Shoot" begins

As most of my blog readers know, my daughter, Susie Reale, directs the Central Florida Girl Scout Chorus known as The Citrus Singers. They have had many videos of their performances posted to YouTube by parents, grandparents & friends, but this summer it was decided they would make a REAL video. And here is the story of how it came about. (Link to the finished product, plus some "behind the scenes" videos at the end of the post.)

To give you the "behind the scenes" scoop, I asked Susie a series of questions. I have summarized some of the answers; others are verbatim.

Susie tells me she had the idea for the video ever since she saw Meghan Trainor's original, "All About the Bass," but serious planning for a Girl Scout parody of the video didn't begin until June 2017. Here is Susie's response when I asked, "Why do it?"

"I want the country to know what Girl Scouts can do, and I wanted to have a fantastic video which would go viral and get the attention of Girl Scouts USA and perhaps even Meghan Trainor! The Girl Scout organization now wants to use this as a recruiting tool."

Susie wrote the words for the parody, trying to keep as many of the original lyrics as possible. If you watch both videos, you will see the extremes to which the Citrus Singers went to imitate the original set. (Believe me, it wasn't easy!)

Fortunately . . . Susie's husband Mike owns a production company called Millennia 3 Media Group (www.m3mg.com), and he allowed the Scouts to have audio and studio time. He also directed, which was, I quote, "sooooooo very handy!"

Grace note:  The video was very much a family affair, with Mike's mother, Gloria, giving her time to arrange the girls' hair, and Susie doing all the make-up. I confess my only contributions were gluing on badges, providing transportation on occasion, general support, and, oh yes, waiting not too patiently outside GS HQ in Orlando on my birthday while the Archivists found an old-timey GS leader uniform for Susie.


How did they create all those moves? Susie tells me they hired a choreographer from a local dance studio to help the girls who Susie describes as mostly "beginner dancers." She adds: "We copied the movements of the original dancers and made up some moves of our own."

In response to my question about how they acquired the props, the painted pink set . . .

"To get the bed, dresser, nightstand and pink chairs, all of the moms and I went to many different thrift stores in the area. We bought some things cheap and got other things donated. We then went and got paint and turned everything pink, with some blue! The biggest job was actually the painting of the studio wall and floor. We had to acid wash the virgin concrete, put down primer, then roll out the pink wall to about 14' tall, plus the entire studio floor. It took several layers and several days of drying and re-coating. One of the fathers made the pink and blue backdrop 'walls,' delivering them in the back of a pickup truck."

When I asked how long they'd been preparing the song, I was told the girls had been singing it for three years at various performances, but the audio for the YouTube video was recorded in studio in June 2017. The visuals were shot over two days in early August. (It took the time between June and August to make all the preparations.)

In response to my question, "What were your feelings as you watched it all take shape?"

"When you're directing, you already have the vision in your head of how it will turn out. But when the final edits were done and the whole thing came together, we were just beaming. Husband and I felt like we'd just given birth to a new child!"

Susie tells me only one person from the Citrus Council was liaison during this project, but when the entire Council saw the finished produce, they were "over the moon with pride" and are planning a whole slew of press releases to the media.

Final question:  Why do you volunteer to run this chorus program?

"The motto of the Citrus Singers Chorus program is to 'Instill Confidence Thru Performance.' I was bullied as a kid and didn't find my strength until I realized I could sing and that I liked to perform. As soon as people started applauding me, I was hooked. So I now give girls an opportunity to perform and find their confidence. Some have gone from whispering and hiding to out front and asking what others solos they can do! It's been amazing."


So here it is: The Citrus Singers of Central Florida performing "All About That Badge," their parody of Meghan Trainor's "All About That Bass."


For a link to the Citrus Singers' parody, "All About That Badge," click here.

For a "Before the Shoot" video, click here.

For a "Day of the Shoot" video,  click here.

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For a link to Blair Bancroft's web site, click here.


Thanks for stopping by,

Grace