Bell Bridge Books

An Attitude of Gratitude

by Sparkle Abbey

We recently had an opportunity to chat with some readers about family traditions. Our biggest take-away from those conversations was, it’s all about attitude. So many talked about how, though they love family traditions, things were going to be different this year. For some, they’d become empty-nesters, for others they’d lost someone dear, and for still others, there were new additions to their families.

We’ve both had our share of life changes this past year and the stories these readers shared reminded us that whether a happy change or a sad one, change requires adjustments. And the main thing you have to adjust is your attitude.

There is joy in remembering times past and in making new memories.

There is joy in carrying on traditions, but perhaps adapting them to include new family members.

There is joy in beginning new traditions—maybe enjoying a quiet dinner, catching a movie, or taking a drive to see the holiday lights.

Or maybe your quiet get-together has become a rollicking feast with new little ones, or new in-laws, or outlaws. There can be joy in that change too.

As 2015 comes to a close and we reflect on all the changes (both good and bad) we’ve experienced this year, we hope to remember the stories that were shared.

And we hope we remember to find the joy.

Sparkle Abbey is the pseudonym of mystery authors Mary Lee Woods and Anita Carter. They write a national bestselling pet themed mystery series set in Laguna Beach. The first book in the series Desperate Housedogs, an Amazon Mystery Series bestseller and Barnes & Noble Nook #1 bestseller, was followed by Get Fluffy, Kitty Kitty Bang Bang, Yip/Tuck, Fifty Shades of Greyhound, and The Girl with the Dachshund Tattoo. Downton Tabby is the latest installment in the series. Up next is Raiders of the Lost Bark. www.SparkleAbbey.com

Downton Tabby is currently a

Kindle Daily Deal at $1.99

www.amazon.com/ B00VVOYB86

COLD CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS

By H.W. “Buzz” Bernard

I’m kind of a sucker for Christmas traditions: cold weather, warm homes with flames dancing in a fireplace, trees drooping with tinsel and lights, carols filling the air.  Thus, there are a couple of scenes early in BLIZZARD, my newest novel, that depict a Thomas Kinkade-like ambience in the suburban Atlanta home of my protagonist, J. C. Riggins.

I designed the bucolic, perhaps nostalgic, backdrops to provide a biting counterpoint to what happens to J. C. later in the book when he’s hurled into the teeth of a historic Southern snowstorm . . . and a few other things.  You know, outlaw bikers, characters who aren’t who they initially seem, and a pack of wolves (escaped from captivity).

But back to the Christmasy introductory settings.  Among other things, they’re developed against frigid conditions that bear “a touch of the Yukon.”  You may wonder if it really ever gets that cold in “Hotlanta” around Christmas.  The answer is yes, it does.  I’ve lived there almost three decades and remember plenty of chilly Christmases.  Often the day will dawn frosty with the mercury later struggling up only into the 40s.  Okay, you’re right.  Not quite arctic conditions.

But there have been such times.  Shortly before I arrived in the city, December 1983 delivered three consecutive days with single-digit lows: 3º on Christmas Eve morning, a flat zero on Christmas morning, and 5º the following a.m.

Just before Christmas 1989, I recall a stretch of four consecutive days when readings failed to top freezing, even during daylight hours.  Christmas Eve day dawned with the mercury sitting (and shivering?) at 4º.

These Christmas excursions into tundra temperatures aren’t common, of course, but I made sure they performed a curtain call in BLIZZARD.

And if you want to talk about really cold Christmases, let me tell you about Christmas Day 1980 in Boston.  It’s one I’ll never forget.  Perhaps it was stuck in the back of my mind as I wrote the holiday scenes for the novel.   At any rate, as darkness fell on Christmas Eve over eastern Massachusetts that year, temperatures were chilly but hardly cold, at least by New England standards.

The reading in Boston at midnight registered 32º.  That was prior to the arrival of screaming northwest winds (yeah, a major league cold front) that likely boosted the airspeed of Santa and his reindeer to around 400 mph.  Anyway, the mercury tumbled to below zero by Christmas morning and remained stuck there all day.  I’m certain that windchills dived into the 30- to 40-below range.  I know for a fact the temperature inside my condo that day never topped 59º.

That was a little too much nostalgia for me.

Hope you enjoy BLIZZARD.

Blizzard by H.W. “Buzz” Bernard is on sale for $1.99 today only! Click the cover below to purchase! 

#Tradition

By Lindi Peterson

One of my favorite aspects of the Christmas season is the memories it evokes. The memories of Christmas when I was a child, a teenager, a young mom. I have always had a huge family, so when I say memories, I have a lot of them. Memories of many people, much laughter and a whole slew of fun.

My Christmas Eve memories involve my Grandmu—my mom’s mom. It was a known fact that she spent $10 dollars on each grandkid. I’ll never forget the year my brother opened his gift and said, “This doesn’t look like ten-dollars worth.”

My other brother and I laughed until we cried while my mom cringed in embarrassment. Oh well, life went on, Grandmu kept her $10 budget for each grandkid and no one ever commented on it again.

Christmas day memories consist of a full day at Grandma and Grandpa Aebi’s house with the whole family. Cousins, aunts, uncles, great aunts and uncles, people who weren’t blood related, but somehow they garnered the aunt or uncle title as well, were frequent visitors. My little girl eyes remember the table with tons of food, my total lack of understanding when my teenaged-cousins were thrilled when they opened a package that held a slip, and how I stood on a chair drying dishes as my grandma washed them and my aunt put them back in the cabinets. And all so we could do it all over again about the time we finished, because by then it was suppertime and there were amazingly somehow leftovers to be eaten.

I reminisce about those days this time of the year. I think about how our world has changed. Some things have changed a lot. Some things haven’t changed at all.

The way we communicate seems to me to be the biggest change. My Grandma Aebi had a party line. If you know what that is, great. If you don’t, think party. Enough said. Now we have phones that can do almost anything. Computers that make our life easier. (For the most part!) We also have communication mediators, as I call them. Facebook, texting, Twitter. Ah, Twitter, which has brought new meaning to the term hash tag. No longer only used to divide scenes in our manuscripts and in front of numerically ordered items, it now has brought the world into categorically organizing what we say. #itistrue

But family hasn’t changed. I still look forward to Christmas Eve with my mom. I love Christmas Day spent with our children and our grand children. We have a ton of food, I’m now the one who is thrilled when I receive a slip, and although the dishwasher has replaced the standing on a chair drying job, there is still the clearing of the table, and all the great conversation that takes place during that time.

Enjoy your Christmas Season. Eat well, laugh hard, love all those around you.

Do you have any Christmas memories you would like to share?

#MerryChristmas