The New Yorker

Before we grab our coffee's and visit with my guest today, I want to mention that my young adult novel, Friends Forever, is free for the next three days. This is what one reviewer had to say about the story, "Ms. Miller captures the trails and tribulations of 13 year-olds very easily. She talks their lingo and keeps the book interesting with enough twists and surprises to keep younger readers turning the pages to the very end."

Now, help me welcome Elaine Walsh as today's Wednesday's Guest, as she shares some amusing thoughts on the difference between etiquette in the North and in the South. Enjoy....

My daughter shudders when we pass a certain McDonald’s in town.  “I can never go back in there,” she laments, remembering the trauma she suffered there when she was ten after a visit with her New Yorker aunt.

 “New Yorkers are so misunderstood,” I’ve told her many times, not wanting her to overlook the content of their character since she can’t get past the directness of their approach.

I’ve been a stealth New Yorker, living undercover in Florida’s Tampa Bay area for over half my life. Because I grew up north of the five boroughs, I didn’t pick of the Bronx accent that gives away the origin of the upbringing of my father and his siblings whenever they open their mouths. A co-worker once told me, surprised to learn about my northern background, “You don’t seem like you’re from New York.”

It was his nice way of saying, “You’re not loud and obnoxious.” Sorry my fellow New Yorkers but that is how many in the south see us.

Southerners say things that at first glance seem more socially acceptable. Think about it. Doesn’t "hush" sound nicer than “shut up” or even better than the cleaned up version, “be quiet”. But is it effective? Can you imagine saying “hush” in New York? How long could you survive in New York on southern charm?  Maybe a nanosecond? Just  turn around in your seat in Yankee Stadium and say that to the loud-mouth from Boston who just yelled “you can’t hit what you can’t see Jeter.”. Hush? Really? The people around you would think you were throwing up a hair ball. Hush. Hush. Hush. They might even level a Heimlich maneuver on you to help you extricate it.

I’m an ambassador of sorts for my southern and mid-western raised friends. I have to translate at times.  I tell them, don’t confuse  a New Yorker’s directness with manners. While the southerner might have developed the ancient Irish trait of telling someone to go to the devil in such a way that they look forward to the trip, the New Yorker isn’t going to mince words. You know where you stand with them. There’s no confusing the point of what they’re trying to say.

So back to the calamity that unfolded at McDonald’s. My Bronx-born aunt relocated south a few years ago and now lives near me. She took my daughter out for a Happy Meal one afternoon. My daughter waited in the dining room while her aunt ordered their food. She heard a commotion coming from the front of the restaurant. A few minutes later her aunt showed up and plunked down in the seat across from her. Moments later a man walked up to her aunt and told her, “They don’t make enough money to put up with people like you.”

Her aunt turned in her seat, mouth gaping open, and flung her hands and arms open as if she was just shot in chest. “What,” she bellowed back at him, dropping her ‘r’ in typical New York fashion, “I’m the custa-mah.”

And the customer is always right.

My daughter wanted to crawl under the table. Instead, she vowed never to show her face in that McDonald’s again.

Fast forward to this summer where I’m with my daughter on a tour boat taking us around the New York City skyline. The guide narrating the tour had my aunt’s familiar accent. As he educated us on the history of New York and pointed out various sites, tourists on the boat would rush the rails to snap their pictures. Many lingered too long. Our guide minced no words telling them to take their picture and sit down so others could partake in the photo op. I didn’t know how my daughter would react to his direct approach. After one sharp scolding, I glanced at her and she said “What? He’s being nice. He wants everyone to have the same chance to get pictures.”

And I thought, ahhh, she finally understands.

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Elaine's novel, Restoration, chronicles Tess Olsen’s challenge to restore her life, relationships, and dreams back to the promise they held before her mother abandoned the family to marry a convict, Randall Wright.

Elaine grew up in upstate New York against the backdrop of the flowering women’s rights movement with different ideas from her mother as to what life as a woman should be.  In college, she majored in psychology with the intent of being a “death & dying” counselor. Instead, she moved to Florida and became a  successful business executive by day and women’s fiction writer by night. She says, "Being a daughter, mother, friend, and soul mate is the most powerful influence in my life and my stories."
  
Visit Elaine at Goodreads, or her website. And you can follow her on Facebook and Twitter. 

Book Review - Restoration by Elaine Walsh

Restoration
Elaine Walsh
Print Length: 333 pages
Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0985566337
Publisher: Barks Out Loud (September 15, 2013)
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
Language: English
ASIN: B00F82A59G

The tagline for this book reads:  "When your life is shattered you can live damaged or choose to repair it." That is a fitting tagline, and the story tells how Tess Olsen chooses to repair hers, which was broken when her mother abandoned the family to marry a convicted killer. The author made a clever choice in giving Tess a job as an art restorer. There is a parallel between the meticulous care that has to be taken in restoring great works of art and the care it takes to put one's life on the right path.

Tess believes that the execution of Randall Wright will erase him and his influence from her life and then everything will be okay. It is in her reluctant sharing of feelings with Francesca, a co-worker, and Ben, the man she could love if she would allow, that she realizes it is not that simple. She is the one who has to wipe Randall Wright from her life, not the justice system or anyone else.

When the story opens, Tess is working in New York and has just met Ben. She has avoided any contact with her mother and is alarmed when her mother calls. At first the reader does not know why. And Tess's fear of Wright seems a bit off to me. Why is she so afraid of him? That question is answered later in the story, but I would have liked some hint of what he had done to terrorize her a bit earlier. I understood the emotional devastation of having her mother abandon her, but I didn't know why she was hiding from her mother and Randall Wright. He was in prison so he couldn't hurt her. That confusion was cleared up when I found out what he did to the artwork her mother made her create for him when Tess was much younger.

Because of her fear and her pain, Tess keeps herself emotionally detached from her co-workers and others she meets, and there is an emotional detachment to much of the narrative, reflecting that disconnect. Again a nice parallel in the writing; one that worked well on most levels, but I was hoping that when Tess was alone, thinking about all the trauma she had experienced, we might have been privy to whatever emotion she was feeling in private. Since readers and characters connect through emotions, that would have helped me care more about Tess. Not that I didn't care. I just didn't want her to be quite so distant.

Still, those minor issues I had were not significant enough to keep me from enjoying the book. There was much to like, including the supporting cast of characters who were all deftly presented. I particularly liked Francesca, Tess's mentor at the studio. Francesca helps Tess sort out her feelings for Ben, the New York Times art critic, who challenges Tess to step into a real relationship. That prospect scares Tess, as she is more comfortable with men like Kenyon LeMere, an artist who is more interested in sex and isn't afraid to show that preference to the world in his paintings. When Tess first meets him they parry about his rumored affairs and he says, "It's true that I love what I paint, and sometimes I paint who I love."

She counters, "Those with many partners love what they're doing, not who they're doing it with."

That was an interesting observation on her part, since her relationships up to this point involved many partners with no emotional entanglements, but it was a sign that she was starting that emotional shift that needed to happen. The exchange is also an example of some of the terrific dialogue in the book. It was all so real and natural, I enjoyed listening to these people talk.


Overall this is a good read, and I was cheering Tess on as she restored herself.
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Elaine Walsh will be my guest on Wednesday with a post about a visit to McDonald's. Please do come back and make her feel welcome. Maybe we can all get a McCoffee, but don't tell the folks who own the local coffee shop. I do get my latte fix at their place most of the time. (smile)