Paws in the Piazza! By Jerilyn McIntyre... You know what that means...Cats! Lots of Them! Come Visit Venice!

Oh, you're wondering how I happened to be in Venice, so far away from my home? Well, that's a long story. My family had some sort of business that required them to come here for an extended stay. So they brought me with them. Scott and Cassie, I mean. And their little girl, Kimmy.

I don't remember much about how I got here. As a matter of fact, I'd rather not think about it. It started with my being forced into that awful carrying thing they put me in whenever we go on long trips. And then somebody gave me something that made me sleep. I woke up here, in a strange new place...

Back home, I was content just to be an ordinary house cat. I didn't get out much. But it's different here in Venice. I think Kimmy may suspect that. When she leaves for school in the morning now, she always cups my chin with one hand and scrates me behind my ears with the other. "Stay safe, Harley she says... She probably doesn't know how easy it is for me to go pretty much wherever I want to while she and Cassie and Scott are gone...

~~~

Paws in the Piazza

By Jerilyn McIntyre

Illustrations by Ken Shuey

It didn't take Harley very long to start cattin' around Venice! Everywhere he looked there were cats! And nobody bothered them; in fact, seemed to welcome their being there! He later found out that they were all good mousers and with the nearby canals, the residents were happy to share their homes,  as mouse-free as possible

At  first Harley took the time to know all the places around his new home. but he could see a large area up ahead and one day decided to check it out... Almost immediately he noticed the tall column with what looked like a flying cat...well, a very big cat--a lion actually! In fact, he had seen quite a number of the statues in the city but he would never have thought he'd see him down off the tower, just to talk to him! Wait until you find out why!

He'd been able to make some friends with cats who hung around the Piazza:
Scruffly and Scrawny, and Fatty and Mooch are his friends...and would you believe that, before very long, even the pigeons had become friends! Who knew what would be happening?! 

                          

This was to be a big night because carnival started and there would be lots of food being dropped or accidentally taken...LOL But while they were waiting, Harley caught sight of her!

She's beautiful. Pure white fur. Lips that curl into a provocative pout. An exquisite, twitchy  little nose,  Her eyes are a brilliant blue, but I catch only a glimpse of them. She glances down, suddenly shy as she sees me staring at her. Someone has dressed her in a satin cap trimmed with some sort of bright glassy stone. Completely unnecessary, in my opinion. She doesn't need any fancy drape. She is the most exotic, glamorous, gorgeous Angora I have ever seen. I think I am in love...

                                                                                      ~~~

Couldn't resist sharing an old-fashion pic of the
Piazza

Off to the side, there are some tables at an outdoor eating place in the great square. I decide to take refuge under one of the empty ones...one of the things I like most about Venice. The food... Soon all the noise and the aromas lull me to sleep.

What happened next is a new experience for me. I don't often have strange dreams. As a matter of face, I don't remember very many of my dreams at all... But this one is filled with images so real I think I am awake....a man in a cape...Angela runs away from me, and I try to follow her...

Slowly, all of these figures are replaced by the winged lion, his paw raised, his noble gaze fixed on me, swooping down from his place atop the pillar in the great square... landing only paws' lengths away from me... I can't tell if he is a friend or an enemy. All I can tell is that he is huge, and his roar echoes in my head.  He bends down and lets me hop on his broad back, nestled between his shoulders, next to his wings. Shaking his great, shaggy mane, he leaps up and starts to fly over the great square, out over the water and up the big canal that meanders through the city...

Harley's friends soon told him that he was "in love" with a very important Venice cat named Angela and then proceeded to talk about her being a long line of cats that always lived in the home of the Doge's Palace! Wow, Harley soon began wondering if that was why she ran from him...he was a commoner, of sorts... 
nevertheless, every time, he was out he was always looking to see if he'd get a chance to see her at home...

The guys had also told him the story of the first Doge who had loved his cat so much and that ever since there had been a cat at the Doge... They also told him about carnival and told about the elaborate costumes he would sometime see, especially the Doge who always wore red... Should I tell you about the time Harley met the ghost of the Doge?!  Naaah, you'll have to read the book!

Because now's the time for the magic to begin... Check this one out...If you like cats, you'll enjoy this... Children will be delighted with the beautiful and colorful pages. Enjoy and see what happens when the cat fight starts!



GABixlerReviews

"Paws in the Piazza," a novella for middle grade readers, now available at Vroman's Bookstore in Pasadena, California; The King's English Bookshop and Weller Book Works in Salt Lake City, Utah; and Pearl Street Books and Jerrol's in Ellensburg, Washington. "Paws" is still available at Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble and on Kindle as well.

"Death in Florence," personal essay published July, 2014 in The Ultimate Writer.

"Fur Ball," humorous short story published August, 2013 in Epiphany Magazine. http://www.epiphmag.com/EpiphanyepiphmagFictionissue20.html#jmc

"Harley Finds His Voice," humorous short story published November, 2012 in Conceit Magazine (The Enchanted File Cabinet).

Alena by Rachel Pastan Not What I'd Recommend...

Works at 54th Venice Biennale,
 special edition for the 150 Anniversary
 of Italian Unification, 2011-2012

"...the highlight of Louise's life was the Venice Biennale, to which the museum did not send her but which they encouraged her to attend--on her own dime--no doubt in part because it was restful having her away from the office. I started working at the museum in October, and the following spring Louise announced that she had a treat for me. She invited me into her crepuscular office, thickly hung with frame exhibition posters from her shows, and pinned up invitations to openings, and dusty shawls, and a special rack where she kept several pairs of expensive shoes, and she announced that she was taking me with her to the Biennale.

The Crucifixion of Rimini

"You've been to Venice? No? To Italy? Heavens, and you an art history major! What a crime--never to have seen the Giottos.
""I felt such contradictory feelings--the thrill of the idea of Venice (Italy, travel, glamour, the Biennale) and the sting of her false sympathy that was really scorn. Dismay at all the time I would be forced to spend with Louise, dread of the obligation I would be put under, shame that I didn't have anything decent to wear. But mostly the thrill. I was twenty-five years old and I had never been on an airplane! I would have to get a passport. I would step into a gondola in the golden light and watch the fabled facades drift by. I would dazzle my eyes with the riches of Saint Mark's and stroll down narrow byways overhung with flowers where a handsome Italian with a cigarette would follow me with his smoldering eyes.
"And so I found myself, in the last week of June, in a small room adjoining Louise's large one in the Hotel da Silva in Venice--crowded, hot, smelly, bedazzling Venice, city of water and glass. We spent the first days of that trip in a whirlwind of parties and pavilions. Never having been to Venice--hever having been anywhere--I would have liked to spend a day in St. Mark's Basilica, to visit the Accademic and the Peggy Guggenheim Collection. But of course, we were here to see the Biennale, which along with the other exhibitions, programs, and special events that spring up in its shade every odd-
numbered year, spreads its tentacles out from the Giardini and hold the city tight in the grip of glitter and celebrity.
"Nothing could have prepared me for the way all of Venice was possessed by the passion for art, for the new, for the most outrageous. I had seen a lot of strange disturbing art in New York, of course, but in Venice the work seemed bigger and stranger: giant insectlike forms hulking in marble rooms, heavy canvases thickly smeared with what looked like bloody footprints, video projections showing image of glaciers cut with bodies crowded into hovels, crystalline constructions shattering the dazzling light, monoliths made of counterfeit money, collages of naked superheroes tumbling through space.
There  was no quiet art in sight--no understated painting, no delicate sculpture of spun thread, no place the eye could find rest. Or maybe it was partly the crowds, the echoing cries as people greeted each other, the constant jockeying and air kissing and insincere murmuring and sizing up...

~~~

Alena

By Rachel Pastan

It's funny how different people can perceive the same novel so differently, don't you think? For some earlier readers, and perhaps even the author[?] it was felt this story was "homage" to Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca. Oh, there were a few comparable issues that readers may pick up, but, for me, the gothic atmosphere was nowhere to be seen... The romance just was not there, especially since the lead was gay and showed no interest in changing... Perhaps there was the obsessiveness between the two--the deceased female and the lead male. And certainly there was obsession on the part of the older female friend and co-worker, but the setting, the players and so much more is so contemporary that I saw nothing significant that you should plan on, if you enjoy gothic suspense... When a classic loved by many is chosen to emulate, it must be great in all ways... Just my opinion, of course....

At the same time, the story was interesting, if only for the many questions I had while reading...

It didn't matter to me that she, the narrator, was never named, as in Rebecca. Frankly, for the majority of the book, I would have forgotten her name even while talking to her; in fact, I wanted to slap her a couple of times to wake her up! Dare I say a wimp! Some people would call me a country girl from way back, but at 25, this lady had apparently done nothing except go to college and get a dead-end job with a woman who does not need help except for a gopher. In fact, when they arrived in Italy, that became even more so as she ran after her boss, getting things, etc... I wouldn't have been surprised if she had been a nun in college; she was so backward, it was, quite simply, unbelievable...

"My mouth was dry. She continued toward me
down the hall, growing larger, blocking out the
light, her starburst of keys jamgling on their
leather strap.
"Do you want to know what's behind there?"
She asked. She was so close that I could smell
her: the burnt chemical odor of her hair, and the
sweetness of incense, and the pungency of old
cigarette smoke and cloves.
"I shrugged. I didn't care what was behind the
door, not anymore. I wanted to get away from
her, but I knew I had to stay.
"Why don't I show you." Agnes drew nearer still.
Heat radiated from her body in the cool hall.
She was standing far too close to me. I took a
step back and she took one forward, and now I
was pressed up against the door. There was
nowhere to go. She chose a key from her dangling
bundle and shook the whole bunch at me until
my slow brain understood that she wanted me
to move aside.
~~~

When she gets there, she happens to catch the eye of a well-known small private museum owner, who is presently the brunt of constant gossip because his former curator has disappeared and assumed dead... murdered?

They meet because of her expertise and involvement in the art works when she has been able to escape from Louise and get into deep conversations. This time in their lives is quite enjoyable and perhaps is the best part of the book since their discussions were also informative...

When Louise becomes ill, however, she wants to go home and the girl, woman, assistant who is nameless (sigh) goes running  to Bernard Augustin. His museum is on Cape Cod and when confronted with "her" desire to remain in Italy, he impulsively suggests she stay with him and then come to become his curator...

Perfect!

Not!

Once they got there, Bernard left  for other activities. Although hired as the curator, age 25, she allowed the business manager to intimidate her, not providing her a key, not even providing what would be considered the first thing, which would be a tour of the entire facility.

In turn, instead of taking over as she should have, she tried to find out more about the past curator...

Really, it was just toooo much! Of Nothing... The last part of the book finally got into the details of it all and, if better presented, the book could have been finished in about half the size of the novel...

Disappointing to say the least because the conceptual under-story is sound. The main female character was a complete flop...

I am aware that my personal experience as an administrator and facilities manager formed my bias; however, nobody these days would hire somebody and retain her given her actions. She "allowed"
 everything to happen to her, which is just not the ways of contemporary women in today's world. Unfortunately, in allowing this to go on and on, the author prevented any potential suspense and atmosphere to develop simply due to lack of action by that character. The parts that she did finally do in relation to getting an exhibit started seemed hurried, unprofessional, and indeed, was done without any consultation with anybody...Duh... 

A shame really... 


GABixlerReviews

Spotlighted Author Julia Madeleine Reviews Novel

Midwife Salome (fresco in monastery of Latomou) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Midwife Of Venice 

by Roberta Rich

Doubleday Canada
Reviewed by Julia Madeleine (originally published in 

The Streetsville Village Times, 

Evening Out Magazine, & Port Credit Village Times

Had I seen this book on a shelf in Chapters my eyes would certainly have drifted over it, I wouldn’t have even given it a second glance. Historical fiction isn’t something I’ve ever sought out. The title especially wouldn’t have interested me. But I have to say, I’m so glad I had the opportunity to read The Midwife Of Venice.

The novel is set in 16th century Venice where the main character, Hannah Levi, is a midwife living in the Jewish ghetto. Her husband is a merchant who has been kidnapped and sold into slavery in Malta. One night a Christian Count comes to Hannah desperate for her to assist his wife who is in a difficult labour. But a Jewish woman helping deliver a Christian baby is against the law and not only would it put her entire community at risk, it’s a crime punishable by torture and death. But with a large sum of money offered to her for her efforts, enough to buy her husband’s freedom, Hannah decides to risk everything for the man she loves.

The Midwife Of Venice, is more than just a slice of life novel from the past, it’s a fast-paced suspense story that’s not only beautifully written, but a genuine page-turner.

Roberta Rich has created a fierce heroine in Hannah Levi, whose character leaps off the page. The descriptions of life in the 16th century are so vivid and rich in detail I found myself getting lost in the landscape depicted before me. The brutality of that time period, and the sensation of life and death always hanging in the balance throughout the story is compelling. 

The only thing about this book that I found disappointing was the fact that it wasn’t twice as long, because it certainly felt epic. Highly recommended.

visit Roberta's Website to learn more: http://robertarich.com/

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