I got a bulletin from the North Pole (I have connections) warning me that there would be absolutely no fairies available for fairy-lovers this year because someone stole all wing-making materials, including the tools.
Frankly, I thought I would have to make this a sad warning to all that you'd better dust off even the mangiest of treetop fairies since you wouldn't be able to replace them anyway, but I do have some hopeful news. For the moment, anyway.
It was all the elves' fault from the start. They will argue over the silliest things, like whose jack-in-the-box jumps highest for instance. That was the problem this time. And the stupid little creatures took off from their workbenches, where they should have been hard at it given the way time is flying, to hold a jack-in-the-box jumping contest up on the reindeer practice tracks.
Well, guess what?
That caused Santa to leave his post to look for them and since his polar bear was in the castle kitchens helping Mrs. Clause with the popcorn balls, not a soul was around to see as much as an ugly hair of the intruders.
Disaster. Total disaster.
The elves rushed back to the castle with Santa, furious, clomping along behind them, only to discover that there had been a terrible accident. Polar bear had seen the signs of mischief in the workrooms and rushed out to look for the larcenous culprits. Not only the wing supplies were missing, but every toy making tool, every hammer and nail, every rubber band and piece of string, the lot.
So, the scene that greeted the returning miscreants was AWFUL. Bear had climbed the North Pole (which, for the uninformed is striped red and white--that's why we have candy canes) to take a loooooong look. He spotted a trail of something winding away just below the surface of the snow--figured it was the band of robbers (who were obviously quite short)--and got so excited he overbalanced and broke off the top of the pole.
And he broke one of his legs, too--not sure which one.
Although Mrs. Clause's sherry had barely taken the edge of the P. bear's pain, he was able to point Santa, the reindeer, and all the elves in the right direction. They set out at a great pace to rescue the essentials for filling the stockings of GOOD boys and girls all over the world.
And they caught up with those wretched thieves, they tracked them to the edge of an ice-covered lake.
Trolls! The same band the residents of Santa Castle, North Pole, have been fighting off for generations. There they were in high glee, falling around all over the ice with toys, tools and goodies to which they had no right.
Well, you think, that's that, then. Everything's fine. Not quite, my dears because you're overlooking a very important point: Trolls are short but elves are shorter and not nearly as strong. You should have witnessed the scene when the trolls noticed the elves and fell into a ragged formation to face off against their little enemies.
It was terrifying!
And that's where the communication I got stopped. I don't know what happened next, but we might want to cross our toes as well as our fingers and hope that if my source does make contact again it will be soon, and with good news. I'll try to let you know...
Yours, biting her fingernails,
Stella
Q: If you weren't who/what you are, who/what would you like to be?
Hey, all. I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. Mine was a lot of fun. We went to my oldest brother's house, where we visited with family, played Uno and put together a puzzle with the Trips, and as usual ate waaaaaay too much. I felt kind of sick by the time we came home, but boy was it yummy! As you can see by this pic of Hailey with her new baby sister, that tryptophan thing in turkey is true--it really does make you sleepy! Okay, Evie actually had breast milk, but work with me here.
Here's another pic of the triplets goofin' with their daddy The soulmate's been traveling for work a lot this fall and it looks as though it's going to continue well into the winter. He got home Tuesday afternoon and is leaving again Monday morning, so he and I are taking off for our place in the mountains this morning to have a little catch-up alone time. All of which is a long way of telling you that I'm not ignoring your posts this weekend--I'm gone, gone, ga-wan. :) Poor guy--the traveling gets old, but given the economic climate, we probably shouldn't whine.
Which brings me to: (drumroll please)
DadadadadadaDa!
I, too, am employed for three more books with HQN. YAY! My agent and I just agreed to a contract on Tuesday. This is a happy event, because I would have hated leaving Ava's story in the Sisterhood Trilogy hanging.
And on a completely different track, Bullwinkle, Heidi Betts' blog: WIPs and Chains received an I Love Your Blog award and was asked to pass it along to other blogs she loved and dadadadadadadaDA! (I know, I know, somebody's gonna take my drum away and probably bonk me over the head with it) she awarded one to us!! It's official. You gotta love us. Well, okay, you actually don't. But Heidi does! And she sent us the award to prove it. Pretty cool, huh?
And with that, my pretties, I bid you a groovy weekend. I'll see you all in RunningWithQuillsville next week, when I return bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.
Did you know that Ben Franklin thought the North American wild turkey should be the national bird of the USA? Of course, the turkey of his day was nothing like the domesticated descendants we are familiar with now. The wild turkey of Franklin's day was a brightly plumed bird of flight. Did you know that only the adult male turkey (the "tom") makes the gobbler, gobble sound? The female or hen turkey makes a gentle clucking or clicking sound. She never gobbles.
Did you know that after the first Thanksgiving in 1621, it took over 200 years before Thanksgiving Day was officially proclaimed a national holiday in 1863 by Abraham Lincoln?
Do you know how the turkey got its name? Some say Columbus thought the land he discovered was connected to India which had a large population of peacocks and assumed turkeys were part of the peacock family. He decided to call them tuka, which is the word for peacock in the language of India.
Others claim that the name turkey came from Native Americans who called the birds firkee, which sounds like turkey.
Some say that turkey name came from the sound turkeys make when they are afraid - "turk, turk, turk."
Did you know that turkeys will peck at just about anything, including each other?
And on that happy note, the Quills want to wish all of those who celebrate turkey day a HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
~EG (Thanks to the University of Illinois web site for supplying me with all the turkey news fit to print.:-)
Eloisa James is giving away five copies of books from THE DESPERATE DUCHESSES series to five lucky posters to this blog. And the winners are: ZEUSLY, JANE, RAVEN99, LAURA, and KRISB.
Congratulations to all of you and thanks for visiting RWQ. Please send your names and mailing addresses privately to my assistant jaynespa@gmail.com . She will take care of forwarding the information to Eloisa James.
Jayne, here, to introduce ELOISA JAMES, New York Times bestselling author of sparkling historical romance to tell us about her new book, WHEN THE DUKE RETURNS. If you like your historicals laced with scandal, humor, great sex and terrific dialogue — yes, she does it all and brilliantly — you're going to love Eloisa James.
As a special bonus, Eloisa will be giving away five copies of books from her The Desperate Duchesses series to five lucky people who post comments to this blog. Winners will be announced Tuesday afternoon, Nov. 25 here at RWQ.
Now, please welcome ELOISA JAMES:
~ THE SURE THING ~
Remember that classic John Cusack movie, The Sure Thing? Gibson is a virgin who sets off across the country hoping for a teenage male’s Holy Grail: an easy blonde in a bikini.
We romance writers deal with Sure Things all the time. In the course of writing seventeen historical romances, I've created an array of female virgins; unlike Gib, my heroines actually do end up with a female version of the Holy Grail— i.e., a muscled duke. Not to be sarcastic, but at this point I could write a virgin’s first sex scene in my sleep. Just choose your preference:
a) Door Number One: Ultra sexy and wouldn't you know it, she feels nothing more than a tiny pinch and follows that up with three loud and enjoyable orgasms?
b) Door Number Two: Ultra shy and prone to saying things like “That will never fit!” while trying to wrap her delicate fingers around something that is apparently bigger than a breadbox. Luckily it all fits and she achieves three quieter orgasms.
c) Door Number Three: Ultra curious but (alas) destined for a not-all-that-much-fun first time. This is the door my heroines generally hide behind, simply because I think it’s a lot more realistic, as well as more interesting.
Sometimes if I'm in a good mood, my heroine gets one orgasm—but I promise she makes up for anything she misses later on (*g*).
The heroine of When the Duke Returns, Isidore, is definitely more curious than shy. Married by proxy as a young teen, she’s now twenty-six and more than ready to lose her pesky virginity, if she could just coax her husband back from the wilderness:
“I'm tired of sleeping alone. If Cosway turns out to be a horrible sort of man with whom I don't want to spend time, well, then I might leave him and return to Italy. But at least I won't have this talismanic virginity any longer. And I might have a child.”
So far so good: her husband, the Duke of Cosway, is about to show up and he’s definitely the male counterpart to a blonde-in-a-bikini. Since Isidore's mother wasn't around to give her “the” talk, I had a lot of fun with her reaction to the (ahem) aftermath of love-making.
But to get back to the classic movie, what about the Gibsons of the virgin world? Male virgins aren't so easy to include in a romance novel. Just check out this picture of Cusack all those years ago. He’s young and naïve. Not sexy. I can certainly see why he needed a Sure Thing.
It’s my firmest belief that a writer – whether of romance or literary fiction – needs to keep challenging herself. I might joke about Doors One, Two and Three, but the day I find myself phoning it in is the day I retire. So how to raise the stakes?
When you have one Sure Thing – why not TWO? Here’s the opening of Chapter One of When the Duke Returns, which just published:
“He’s a virgin.” “What!” “He’s a virgin and –“ “Your husband is a virgin?” “And he won't bed me.”
So how’s that for turning a Sure Thing into double-the-fun?
One of my favorite male-virgin romances is an older book, Katherine Kingsley's No Sweeter Heaven. What do you think the best male virgin romance out there is?
And can you think of the Three Doors for male virgins? What kind of man ends up a virgin – and what can an author do to avoid having a hero with the sex appeal of a very young Cusack?
I got home from California midday on Wednesday. Shew. I am soooo tired - but I had a GREAT time! So since my brain is still melting, I figured I'd just do a recap of my California experience. Hope you're ready for lots of photos!
I started out in San Diego on Friday the 14th, my birthday, visiting the most wonderful writers' group!
I wish I had gotten a photo of everyone, especially author Judy Duarte who arranged my trip there, but I did more talking than photography.
Those are authors Sylvia Day and Helen Kay Dimon in the photo with me.
This is a slightly blurry photo that a reader sent me of Christie Ridgeway and Chris Green. They both took part in the booksigning with Helen Kay Dimon and me. I got a book from each of them, and after I've read them all, I'll offer them up in a grab-bag for Christmas! (Already read Helen Kay Dimon's "Hot as Hell" on the plane ride home and it was incredible!)
A highlight for me was meeting reader Debby from the RT boards. That's her in the blue, and she smiled like that the entire time I visited with her. Nice, huh?
I've been chatting with Debby online forever, but this is the first time I got to meet her in person.
She brought her daughter, Teresa, (in red) and a friend, Mindy, (in white), and they were all super-terrific!
Because it was my birthday - and a momentus big FIVE-OH at that - the lovely writers' group got me a cake. And not just any old cake, but a super-fancy wonderfully delicious cake covered in fruits and decorated with 2 fat candles that represented 25 years each.
After two fab days in San Diego, I hooked up with my friend, Shana. She lives in Huntington Beach, which wasn't too far away.
Now, you all know what an animal fan I am, right? I LOVE dogs and cats, all of them, all shapes and sizes. But boy, I was in for an adjustment. See the photo of me with MY dogs, and then the photo of me with SHANA'S dogs.
Too funny, huh!? My dogs are no bigger than her dogs' noses! LOL
Shana and I had a long list of things we wanted to do while I visited. Top of the list was visiting two MMA schools; Brandon Verra's and Dan Henderson's. They're both popular, respected fighters.
The fires and Santa Ana winds made it nearly impossible to get to Henderson's school, but we did get to Verra's, and we had a great time!
That's Shana with Gary Padilla, one of the fighters from the school. He answered all my questions, let us look around and take photos, and was super nice. I love that kind of research! And watching the guys practice was very enlightening.
Next on the list was visiting a store that sold MMA apparel. I found a lot of great gifts for my sons and grandson. We also visited the Disney store and I bought even more gifts there.
You can't even imagine what it was like to leave freezing temperatures in Ohio, and land in 90 degree weather in California. Heaven!
Something else Shana did was to take me to where she works. I got to listen in on 911 calls, which was fascinating. It seemed there were more wrongly placed calls than true emergencies, but more than enough was happening to ratchet up my respect for law enforcement AND for the dispatchers who handle the calls.
Funny story: One woman called (her name was Carmen) and she asked for a particular officer. Now remember, this is a 911 dispatch. Anyway, the operator asked her if it was an emergency, and she said, "No, but could you just tell him to give Carmen a call. He has my number." Flirting over the 911 emergency line!
Hilarious - to me. Frustrating for the ones who have to deal with that nonsense! But the operator was great, very patient and calm. I enjoyed meeting her.
After I listened to calls for awhile, Shana took me to the Long Beach Police Department, and I got to do a ride-along with Lieutenant Rick Colbert. It was already late, so the photo of the station didn't turn out too great, but you can see it still.
Talk about fascinating! There were many calls to break up gang activity, and we went to the scene of an assault, where a man had been hit in the head with something, likely a bat, and cut by something, likely a bottle. He was a mess, but still coherent as the ambulance tended to him. I also met the Lieutenent's son, who went the next day to one of the sites ravaged by fire. He took cadaver dogs with him to search through the destruction for anyone who might not have gotten out. Luckily, dogs found no one, meaning everyone had been evacuated safely. They did, however, locate the ash remains of cremated relatives - which proves just how amazing those dogs are!
Just for fun, here are some views from California!
Beautiful, huh? I loved watching the surfers - and they were everywhere, not just on the beach. If you drove anywhere near the beach, you saw men in wetsuits, barefoot, carrying their boards, crossing the streets, walking along the sidewalks, etc... It took a little getting used to.
Of course I collected some shells, and let my toes dip into the cold wake. All in all, it was a most remarkable visit.
When I got home, I discovered that my husband had a surprise - all my Christmas lights were up! They look fantastic. We won't turn them on until after Thanksgiving, but that sure saves me some time.
And now, I'll leave you with a smile. California is a much freer place than Ohio. Wonderfully so. While I sat near the beach with Shana, waiting to take photos of the setting sun, this dancer came along, so I video-taped him with my camera. You can hear me talking to Shana as I take the video - so to avoid having your ears accosted by my country twang, you might want to turn down the sound. LOL. Otherwise... Enjoy!
Did you like that!? FUN, huh? That kid looked like a real free spirit.
So... would you enjoy a quick trip to a warm beach right about now? If you got there, would you feel like dancing too? LOL
Or are you one of the lucky ones who lives in that climate year round?
Maybe the reverse is true and you'd like to experience our cold and snow? Shana wants to, so I told her to visit during the winter!
Hope you're all having a wonderful week filled with smiles. Don't forget...
Please welcome Ann Roth who has a wonderful new book out. SISTERS is a must-read. Good to have you with the Quills, Ann.
------------------------ Sister, sister
What is it about sisters? You love them, you want to strangle them, and vice versa. Regardless, you’re stuck with each other. Believe me, I know—I am a sister. The relationship between my sister and me, between all sisters, is a complex one.
That’s why I wrote My Sisters—to explore some of these fascinating complexities. I wanted to look into the lives of three estranged sisters, push them together when their mother dies, and see what happened.
The idea came to me after my widower father-in-law died and the family gathered at his house to empty it. As I watched our daughters sort through photographs and share loving memories, my heart felt so full. They are and have always been close. (A closeness I worked hard to foster.)
But what if three sisters could barely tolerate each other? What then? Enter Margaret, Rose and Quincy, so at odds and different from each other that they barely communicate. And yet, like it or not, through their blood and shared childhoods they are forever connected.
It wasn’t easy getting them to open up. Eventually though, they did. As the past unfolded through each sister’s eyes, as Margaret, Rose and Quincy wrestled with their demons, grew and changed, I hurt for them, sympathized and cried. When they finally figured what really matters most—I’ll let you read about that for yourself—I cheered.
In the end, I was glad for the chance to get to know these sisters and share their story.
What about you? Do you have a sister, and are you close?
Thanks for letting me visit, and looking forward to learning more about you and your sisters,
Responsibility. Guilt. Honesty. Okay, I need a good excuse...
Happy Monday Morning, My Flowers!!
That's a good start.
Yes, I'm responsible, have a horrible capacity for guilt, and I'm honest. But there are moments when the evil child within runs screaming free and demands to be released from all these demands. Even the ones she loves.
I'm at the very end of the first in a trilogy of paranormal stories set in New Orleans. This has been a blast but now it's just plain old "I gotta get it done in about three days and I know I've forgotten something really important."
All I can concentrate on is Marley, Gray, Willow, Gus, Boston Terrier Winnie and, of course, Sykes. Portals and fathomless lights, dangerous travels, do they see what they think they see, and is that a dragon, I see, or? . . . later. But I do just have to say that this had better work out or we're all going to be in mourning
So, I'm thinking about you and hope you think good thoughts for me. I'll do better next time. Meanwhile, anyone with a good recipe for de-sliming should send it along asap.
Happy Friday! And. Oh. My. Gawd. It's about to get even happier. (Like you couldn't tell by the blog's title) Guest bloggers Diana Holquist and Julie James come to us bearing men, my pretties. Sexy men. Please give em a big Quills welcome.
Take it away, ladies!
Ah, fall. Time to turn our thoughts to turkey dinners. Radiant foliage. And, most importantly, People magazine's Sexiest Man Alive 2008. Yes, the issue comes out November 21st and no one has given more thought to what makes the Sexiest Man Alive the Sexiest Man Alive than Julie and I. Why? Well, we both wrote books about it.
So we thought we'd put in our early predictions. Ready? Remember, you heard it here first: Sexiest Man Alive 2008…
Our husbands.
(Hi, honey! Hi, sweetie!)
Okay, are they gone yet? Good. Let’s get serious.
Frontrunner this year is a lovely young man named Patrick Dempsey.
Perennial favorite (and leader in our poll as of this writing) Mr. Depp.
There is always a strong pull among romance fans for Gerard Butler. Why is that, do you think? I mean, besides the obvious. He never seems to catch on in that huge way outside the romance community.
Romance fans don’t seem to like the next contender, Mr. Craig. Is he too cold? But this could be his year…
Or is it Will Smith’s turn? Or perhaps another African American will steal the honors. Don’t laugh, the only other non-movie-star Sexiest Man Alive is John F. Kennedy. Not even an athlete has won.
What do you think? Who should be the sexiest man alive for 2008? Vote in the poll:
And if you want to win a signed copy of either Sexiest Man Alive or Just the Sexiest Man Alive, visit our website blogs and find out how to enter to win (http://dianaholquist.com and http://juliejamesbooks.com).
So, tell us in the comments as well what you think: what is it that makes the Sexiest Man Alive so sexy? And who should be this year’s pick?
Shirley Jump is giving away a signed copy of MIRACLE ON CHRISTMAS EVE to one lucky winner from among those who post a comment to her blog. The winner will be chosen at random Thursday evening at 7:00 p.m. ET.
And the winner is ranurgis!!!!
Congratulations! Please send your full name and mailing address to shirley@shirleyjump.com and she will make sure you receive your copy of MIRACLE ON CHRISTMAS EVE.
Today my friend and fellow romance writer Shirley Jump shares some precious memories of her mother with us. She also shows us where the emotional inspiration comes from for her writing. Shirley's had 26 romance novels or novellas published since January 2003. Her current releases are CHRISTMAS WEDDINGS and MARRY-ME CHRISTMAS from Harlequin Romance. Please join me in welcoming Shirley to Running With Quills.
This week, my mother would have been sixty-one.
I had to write this blog two days ago, because I knew there was no way I could write it the day of her birthday (November 10) and make any kind of sense. My mother died three years and one month ago. I thought that it would get easier, but if anything it’s gotten harder--and easier in other ways. Easier, because I’m starting to accept it and recall more of the happy memories, rather than dwell on the grief. But harder in other ways that hit me when I least expect it. I’m 40, and before my mother died, I’d thought I’d outgrown the need for a mother. Sure, I called her when I screwed up making a pie crust or I was having a difficult day with the kids, but mostly, I’d figured I had this grown-up thing down.
After all, I had been on my own, married, since I was twenty-one. Running my own house. Raising kids, making dinners, shopping, trying to stick to a budget (ha-ha). Whatever could I need a mom for?
You realize pretty quickly what you need a mom for when you don’t have one anymore. My mother and I had our issues, our disagreements, but we were friends. Occasionally she’d call when I was working and I’d find myself wishing that she had waited an hour. Or I tried to get her off the phone because I was on deadline and the work seemed ten times more important than a chat.
Then a stroke took her voice and I spent three months at her bedside, tending to her most basic needs and I realized what I would give to have that voice back. For a little while, she seemed to recover and I could talk to her, sometimes calling her room at the rehab hospital, thrilled she understood me, but then her heart gave out and I lost her voice forever.
It’s been three years and I have yet to delete the phone number to her room on my cell. I know she’s not there, but I can’t erase this reminder of her. When I scroll past the number on my way to call my daughter or my husband at work, I remember I can still talk to her, in a one-way conversation with heaven.
As I raise my own teenage daughter, I realize now how much I need a mother. For the advice, for the sense that I’m not in this alone with the hormones and the mood swings and the joyful moments peppered between the frustrations. I need a mother to tell me I’m on the right path. To hold my hand when I’m sure I’ve alienated my daughter by laying down the law--and to reassure me our relationship will survive these years. Just as my relationship with my mother survived her rules, her protectiveness and most of all the love that circled around me like a blanket, shielding me from so much that could have hurt me during those same years.
But most of all, I need her voice. Her common sense, her wisdom, her soft compassion for bad days, her quiet pride on good days. She has missed a lot in the last two years, in my life, my husband’s, and my kids’, but I believe she is watching from up above. In fact, I’m positive.
At about my age, my mother lost her own mother, ironically, in the fall, too. My mother used to tell me she missed her mother talking to her, the two of them sitting around the kitchen table and talking for hours, long into the night. When my grandmother died, my mother told me Nana would always be watching from heaven. For an eleven-year-old, that became a sort of extra conscience. I’d think twice before I did anything, because I could just picture my Nana seeing me misbehave--and being disappointed.
So, today, I will raise a toast to my mother on her birthday and find a quiet place where we can talk. I’ll tell her all that has happened in the last year, and hope that if I listen very, very carefully, I can still hear the whispers of her voice.
I hope you, too, can share a special moment with those you love and give thanks this holiday season for the loved ones around you.
Hugs, Shirley
EG: Shirley is going to give away a signed copy of MIRACLE ON CHRISTMAS EVE to one lucky winner from among those who post a comment to her RWQ blog. The winner will be chosen Thursday evening at 7:00 p.m. ET. You can also visit Shirley at http://www.shirleyjump.com/.
'Morning, my flowers:
It was all the elves' fault from the start. They will argue over the silliest things, like whose jack-in-the-box jumps highest for instance. That was the problem this time. And the stupid little creatures took off from their workbenches, where they should have been hard at it given the way time is flying, to hold a jack-in-the-box jumping contest up on the reindeer practice tracks.
He spotted a trail of something winding away just below the surface of the snow--figured it was the band of robbers (who were obviously quite short)--and got so excited he overbalanced and broke off the top of the pole.
Remember that classic John Cusack movie, The Sure Thing? Gibson is a virgin who sets off across the country hoping for a teenage male’s Holy Grail: an easy blonde in a bikini.
The heroine of When the Duke Returns, Isidore, is definitely more curious than shy. Married by proxy as a young teen, she’s now twenty-six and more than ready to lose her pesky virginity, if she could just coax her husband back from the wilderness:
Since Isidore's mother wasn't around to give her “the” talk, I had a lot of fun with her reaction to the (ahem) aftermath of love-making.
He’s young and naïve. Not sexy. I can certainly see why he needed a Sure Thing.
I started out in San Diego on Friday the 14th, my birthday, visiting the most wonderful writers' group!
This is a slightly blurry photo that a reader sent me of Christie Ridgeway and Chris Green. They both took part in the booksigning with Helen Kay Dimon and me.
A highlight for me was meeting reader Debby from the RT boards. That's her in the blue, and she smiled like that the entire time I visited with her. Nice, huh?
Because it was my birthday - and a momentus big FIVE-OH at that - the lovely writers' group got me a cake. And not just any old cake, but a super-fancy wonderfully delicious cake covered in fruits and decorated with 2 fat candles that represented 25 years each.
Shana and I had a long list of things we wanted to do while I visited. Top of the list was visiting two MMA schools; Brandon Verra's and Dan Henderson's. They're both popular, respected fighters.
That's Shana with Gary Padilla, one of the fighters from the school. He answered all my questions, let us look around and take photos, and was super nice.
Next on the list was visiting a store that sold MMA apparel. I found a lot of great gifts for my sons and grandson. We also visited the Disney store and I bought even more gifts there.
Funny story: One woman called (her name was Carmen) and she asked for a particular officer. Now remember, this is a 911 dispatch.
The idea came to me after my widower father-in-law died and the family gathered at his house to empty it. As I watched our daughters sort through photographs and share loving memories, my heart felt so full. They are and have always been close. (A closeness I worked hard to foster.)
Happy Monday Morning, My Flowers!!
This week, my mother would have been sixty-one.
Then a stroke took her voice and I spent three months at her bedside, tending to her most basic needs and I realized what I would give to have that voice back. For a little while, she seemed to recover and I could talk to her, sometimes calling her room at the rehab hospital, thrilled she understood me, but then her heart gave out and I lost her voice forever.
