Tuesday Guest Feature is taking a two week break. Today I bring you a shoutout for my upcoming novel
The Oath
coming soon
Marry the baronet, or vulnerable parents face la prison des pauvres
France 1895 – Seventeen-year-old Françoise abandons her carefree life and sails for England to marry distant cousin Charles Dubois. On arrival she finds her groom aloof and evasive.
Draped in expensive silk brocade, she yearns for her homeland and comfortable gowns, and when she discovers the baronet’s clandestine visits, it is her cheery maid she turns to, her new confidante and friend.
BETRAYAL – HEARTBREAK – FRIENDSHIP
The Oath: A heartbreaking, coming of age, historical fiction saga from the author of House of Grace family saga trilogy.
Watch this space for snippets and updates
The Oath
Cover Reveal coming very soon
Surely, she could be a prize for any wealthy French man. Why did she have to go all the way to England?
Patricia’s Pen is delighted to welcome poet, Merril Smith, all the way from New Jersey. I got to know Merril via Black BoughPoetryTop Tweet Tuesday on Twitter. Without further ado, it’s over to Merril to chat about her writing.
My Writing
Merril Smith
Thank you very much, Patricia, for inviting me to Patricia’s Pen! I appreciate this wonderful opportunity to discuss writing and my work.
I have considered myself to be a writer for many years, but a poet for only a few. After the publication of my first book, Breaking the Bonds (NYU Press), I wrote/edited several non-fiction books–monographs, edited volumes, and reference work on history, gender, and sexuality published. However, writing and editing these books did not fulfil me the way writing poetry does. I think I needed a creative outlet, but it needed to be at the right time. It’s hard to explain, but I began to write poetry in a type of stream-of-consciousness outpouring on my blog, Yesterday and Today, like the muse just took over and decided now. Gradually, I began responding to online poetry prompts and working on learning how to craft poetry. I believe my first poem was published in 2018.
I compiled my full-length collection, River Ghosts(Nightingale & Sparrow Press) during the summer of the COVID lockdown. It was a scary, bleak time. One week in April of that year, one of our cats died suddenly on a day that began with storms and tornado warnings and ended with clear, blue sky and spring flowers. Then at the end of that week, my mother died. Because of the lockdown, we could not be with her. The deaths of Mickey, my mom, COVID, despair, love, and the beauty of April will always be linked in my mind. In that spring and summer, I walked and saw beauty all around me, even while people were dying. I began my own sort of mourning ritual during my morning walks, where I tossed a stone into the river.
Some of the poems in River Ghosts are about death or witnessing horrible events, but there are also poems of love, family, and nature’s beauty. The collection combines poems written earlier (some published) with some written for the volume. That said, I think my style has changed and improved since the publication of River Ghosts. I believe this is because I’ve concentrated on writing more imagist poetry. So—a shoutout to Matthew MC Smith, his Black Bough Poetry and @TopTweetTuesday, and also for the supportive online poetry community!
There are geniuses in all areas, but for most people, like me, writing poetry is a combination of creative spark, a way of seeing the world, and learned skills. I think River Ghostsworks, but I really didn’t know anything about putting a collection together then–almost three years ago. This month marks the one-year anniversary of its publication. I still walk by the river, I still think of my mom (and dad), but I know they would both be proud of me and this book. My older child created the cover art, so it’s a book that carries family and memory through its pages. The new collection I’m working on will have some of those themes, but I think it will be very different.
About Merril Smith
Merril D. Smith lives in southern New Jersey near the Delaware River. Her poetry has been published in journals including Black Bough Poetry, Anti-Heroin Chic, Acropolis, Humana Obscura, and anthologies, such as the recent Our Own Coordinates: Poems about Dementia (Sidhe Press). Her full-length poetry collection, River Ghosts, was published by Nightingale & Sparrow Press.
As there’s no Tuesday Guest Feature today, I thought I’d give a little background information about what inspired me to write Spirit Mother: Experience the Myth published by The Hedgehog Poetry Press. Now seems the appropriate time to share as copies have recently landed on Hedgehog Poetry Pressmembers’ doorsteps as part of the Cult of the Spiny Hog quarterly bundles.
Spirit Mother was a follow on from my debut poetry pamphlet, Taxus Baccata, which originated from my MA Creative Writing dissertation researching myth around trees. Discovering myths was fascinating, I loved discovering wonderful stories, so much so, I decided to extend the research, not only to trees, but to flowers, birds, butterflies, dragonflies etc. In fact if I see a photograph, I’m particularly inspired by Mike Powell’s photography, I check out to see if there’s any myth around that creature, flower or tree.
Amaryllis is one of my favourite poems from Spirit Mother. It retells a Greek myth of how the flower got its name.
Although the collection is nature themed it has an essence of darkness uncovering the mythical tales. For instance, my poem, Lavender, portrays a myth of a young girl, raped, and her tears germinating blue and purple seeds.
Spirit Mother opens with White Lily a poem inspired around a myth about Hera, the Greek goddess, breast feeding her baby. This poem has since appeared in Black Bough Poetry’s, A Duet of Ghosts.
I was flattered how a fellow writer, also artist, Oormila Vijayakrishnan Prahlad, was inspired to use my poem as a prompt for a painting, and later a poem of her own. Do check out the artwork Oormila created over on her Instagram page. Oormila’s poem also appears in A Duet of Ghosts.
Numerous books were used for research but in researching myth around trees, Jacqueline Memory Paterson’s Tree Wisdom became my bible. I’d highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the subject.
PRAISE for Spirit Mother: Experience the Myth
“Spirit Mother is a sensory voyage of discovery and delight through a rich landscape of Greek, Celtic, and Native American mythologies. The poems are by turns delicate and earthy, juxtaposing the sensual and sublime with the sharp and shocking to remarkable effect. The ancient feels at once eternal (‘Galanthus’) and starkly contemporary (‘Lavender’), and the senses are fully engaged by a heady palette of shades, scents, sounds, and sensations. Patricia M Osborne has created a collection to be treasured – each poem imprints itself on the reader, and many will never leave.”
Mary Ford Neal
Writer and Academic
“Spirit Mother offers the reader a compelling journey through a subtle plurality of viewpoints; a cumulative, unified and immensely powerful, life-affirming lens. Osborne employs all the writing skills which have earned her regular five-star accolades for her work over many years. You render yourself a clear disservice if missing out on this outstanding volume of poetry. Don’t let that happen.”
Brian McManus,
Reviewer, Writer, Pushcart nominated poet.
If anyone would like a limited edition of Spirit Mother or any of my poetry collections, they can be purchased safely from my website shop HERE using PayPal for payment.
The Hedgehog Poetry Press cult has just re-opened its doors – if anyone wishes to join – go HERE
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On another front, I’m really pleased that my short story, Seascape Children’s Home was published online yesterday by CafeLit. You can read the story HERE
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Next week the Tuesday Guest Feature resumes with the lovely, talented poet, Merril Smith, all the way from New Jersey, chatting about her gorgeous poetry collection River Ghosts. Sign up to my blog to ensure you don’t miss this fabulous article.
Please join me in congratulating poet Andy Breckenridge on the launch of his brand new poetry collection The Fish Inside, published 31st March 2023 by Flight of the Dragonfly Press
Praise for:
The Fish Inside (Andy Breckenridge)
Andy Breckenridge sets scenes from his native Oban and adoptive home in Brighton with evocative economy and inventive imagistic verve. He can be wryly laconic and lushly lyrical; matter of fact and metaphysical; a realist both deadpan and magic. Popular culture – music, fashion, food and drink – is captured with almost eerily tangible recall. These are poems not merely to read but to inhabit; he celebrates, mourns, consoles and notices for us all. The Fish Inside is a debut certain to dazzle and delight. It feels like a big book and deserves to make a correspondingly large impression.
Donny O’Rourke – poet, teacher and broadcaster
The Fish Inside is a beautifully crafted debut collection. Andy Breckenridge’s poetry takes us right to the heart of what it is to inhabit this land, sea and all the metaphorical in-betweens. From poems of love, friendship and family, Andy takes us on a journey of exile, memory, grief and wry humour. This is a collection you will want to return to again and again – a masterclass in poetry ‘for luck and love and light’
Lynn Valentine – poet
About Andy Breckenridge
Andy is a Secondary English teacher living in Brighton but originally from Oban. He writes about self imposed exile, place, relationships, cultural identity and memory, and his poems are likely to include fish and water.
His debut pamphlet, The Liquid Air, was published by Dreich in July 2021, and the Chris Riddell illustrated version came out in August 2022.
His poetry has appeared in several print and online journals, and he has been a featured poet on Flight of the Dragonfly Spoken Word, and with the Northern Poets Society.
He is an honorary member of East Kilbride rock group, The Moes.
Patricia M Osborne 