Bored? Who me? Are you joking? I’m not fazed by dull dinner parties, awful waiting rooms, or chilly bus shelters. Why? Because I go off on journeys, travel into the secret places inside my head Yes, people do realize I’m not one hundred percent there, that I’m not paying attention to dull monologues, but do I care? No way.
I haven’t invented my secret places. I’ve been to all of them, I swear I have (although my imagination does add a few interesting details) and my wandering higgledy-piggledy life has led me to very odd places.
Once upon a time, I found myself in a clapboard, semi-ghost town in Nevada where an ever-buffeting wind dragged dust across the frozen ground, rattled low-lying grasses, and made loose boards tap. Rusted-out cars, trailers and abandoned shacks littered the low hills, and the countryside, dusty, bleak, and lonely, was strangely beautiful.
The hotel I stayed in was a has-been. Dating from the late 1800s, it was wonderfully shabby, and the lumpy wallpaper made me think of long-gone travelers, forgotten secrets, and ghosts. The grand downstairs rooms still possessed high ceilings and cornices, and in the shabby saloon bar, a talentless band whined out bad country music. Local residents were eccentric—how could they be anything else? Those who deigned talk with me dished up tall tales, wry humor, and suspicion. In short, this was a singular, even magical community, and I fully intended to return.
Years have passed, and although I’ve searched everywhere for that cranky, wonderful community, I’ve never found it again. Has it vanished completely? Has it developed into something more modern and unrecognizable? Could it have been a figment of my imagination, a ghostly apparition? I’ll never know. But having carried the place in my heart over such a long time, I finally put it down on paper. It is the setting for my three-book series: Blake’s Folly Romance.
I do love writing about odd characters and misfits, the sort of people who would never fit into neat houses with tidy gardens. My people are rebels, not by choice, but by character. Sometimes they’re ornery, nosy, or interfering, but I can guarantee they’re the real thing. And in all my stories, delicious heroes and very original heroines share the limelight with cranky secondary characters… and they often have the last word.
By 2023, the silver boomtown of Blake’s Folly, once notorious for saloons, brothels, speakeasies, and divorce ranches, has become a semi-ghost town of abandoned shacks and weedy dirt roads. But unusual settings attract unusual people, those forced to adapt to new circumstances in order to survive, and those who have never really fit into mainstream society. But none are humdrum. All have dreams and a chance to fall in love.
A Room In Blake’s Folly
In 1889, when Blake’s Folly boasted silver mines, saloons, and brothels, the adventurer, Westley Cranston, fell in love with Sookie Lacey a former prostitute. Their romance was doomed but never forgotten, and these six stories tell the tale.
Purchase Link: https://books2read.com/BlakesFollyRomance
Website: https://www.j-arleneculiner.com/a-room-in-blake-s-folly
All About Charming Alice
Alice Treemont cooks vegetarian meals, rescues unwanted dogs, and protects the most unloved creatures on earth: snakes. What man would share those interests?
Jace Constant is in Nevada, doing research, but he won’t be staying long. He hates desert dust, dog hair and snakes terrify him. Even if the air sizzles each time Alice and Jace meet, any romance seems doomed.
Purchase Link : https://books2read.com/Charming-Alice
Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6l2VyHtsY7A
Website: https://www.j-arleneculiner.com/all-about-charming-alice
Desert Rose
Rose Badger is the local flirt, and settling down is the last thing she intends to do. Geologist Jonah Livingstone is intriguing, but with his complicated life, he’s off limits for anything other than friendship.
Jonah Livingstone is fascinated by the sparkling and lovely Rose Badger, but she doesn’t seem inclined to choose a favorite, so why fret? Jonah’s secret life keeps him busy.
Trailer: https://youtu.be/tHPrIciT0XU
Web: https://www.j-arleneculiner.com/desert-rose
Purchase links: https://books2read.com/RosesDesert
https://mybook.to/RosesDesert
Writer, photographer, social critical artist, and storyteller, J. Arlene Culiner, was born in New York and raised in Toronto. She has crossed much of Europe on foot, has lived in a Hungarian mud house, a Bavarian castle, a Turkish cave dwelling, on a Dutch canal, and in a haunted house on the English moors. She now resides in a 400-year-old former inn in a French village of no interest and, much to local dismay, protects all creatures, especially spiders and snakes. She particularly enjoys incorporating into short stories, mysteries, narrative non-fiction, and romances, her experiences in out-of-the-way communities, and her conversations with strange characters.
Website:
http://www.j-arleneculiner.com
Blog:
http://j-arleneculiner.over-blog.com
All sites: https://linktr.ee/j.arleneculiner
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/jarlene.culiner/
Storytelling Podcast: https://soundcloud.com/j-arlene-culinert
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