Beth Carpenter Books

Have you ever had one of those encounters where someone wounds you with a cutting remark, and you’re tongue-tied? You know they’re wrong, that you should be able to defend yourself, but you can’t think of anything to say that doesn’t make it worse. Then later your think of the perfect comeback? I know I have. One of the perks of writing fiction is the ability to use these moments, to rewrite life so that this time, I come out on top. And in my writing, I can capture other missed opportunities. Photography is a long-time hobby of mine. My father taught me to use a twin-lens reflex camera with manual focus and light settings. It produced a 2 1/4 inch square negative that made developing and printing a breeze. But I missed a lot of shots trying to adjust the focus and aperture/shutter speed on that camera. Besides, the thing was huge, not something you’d carry around casually. Nowadays, the high-quality camera in my cell phone means I can snap a picture whenever something catches my ...

I believe I've mentioned a time or two that I love dogs, both real and fictional.  Some of my earliest memories of reading involve dogs. The dog in my first grade reader was named Tip. I don't remember the names of the children in the story. Old Yeller ,  Savage Sam , White Fang , The Call of the Wild , and Where The Red Fern Grows  were all favorites I read again and again.  I'm still a sucker for a good dog story. Five of the six stories in my  Choices  series feature dogs as significant characters. So do three other stories I've written since, but s o far, none of my dogs has made it to the cover of a book.  Eventually, that has to change, because I'm suffering from cover envy. I look at the beautiful covers like the ones below, and I want one. I have an idea percolating in the back of my mind right now involving a pair of inseparable dogs who will bring two people together who normally wouldn't have given one ano...

Today is  International Kissing Day photo credit: I only dream of you via photopin (license)

Happy Solstice! AKA First Day of Summer Hanging Baskets It's officially summer, and while vacations are great, some of the best things about summer happen right here at home. As of today, we have nineteen hours and twenty-one minutes of daylight in Anchorage, and the other four and a half aren't really dark, so there's plenty of time for summer fun. Here are a few  of my favorite things about summer.  Summer Fruit Wildflowers Duckings, all in a row Reading on the Deck Sun Tea  And Roxy loves summer, too. Hope yours is just as joyful!

It's lilac time here in Anchorage. In yards all over the city, the bushes we ordinarily never notice are covered in floral plumes, diffusing their distinctive sweet scent that even smells purple. Lilacs spend fifty weeks a year as an ugly duckling, tall, scraggly, and awkward. It's a little like those old movies where the girl wears ugly glasses, baggy clothes, and pulls her hair back into a tight bun. But then one day Carey Grant removes her glasses, and says she has beautiful eyes. That's the budding phase of the lilac.  Then in the next scene, dressed for the ball, she's breathtakingly beautiful, sweeping the hero off his feet. And somewhere along the way, she gains confidence and grace and you know she'll never again be that ugly duckling. Now she's a graceful swan. And that's were the similarity ends. Lilacs live a long, long time, but they don't live happily ever after. Once they finish out their blooming cycle, they revert to the backgroun...

 It's summer again, and if it ever stops raining, I have work to do in my garden, and a mother's day gift of two new garden gnomes to introduce. I've been gardening on this lot for twenty-four years now, and over that time, the garden has changed and evolved. The former owner had established a perennial bed out front with globeflowers, campanella, cranesbill, and lilies. The lilies have started to fade away, but the others have self-seeded over the years, filling the bed, and I've added new flowers.  The one rhubarb plant in the backyard is now five huge clumps in different locations around the house. Ferns have multiplied to fill the shady spots. And there are more shady spots than ever, as the trees have grown and spread. Not long after we moved in, we build a fence, which created an awkward little pocket on the side of the house. I made that pocket my secret garden, a little private oasis filled with lacy foliage and pink and blue flowers, where I could escape an...

I recently had the pleasure of a visit with a remarkable woman. She has ninety-one years of experience on this earth, and seems to have lived each one fully. She showed me a map of all the places she and her husband traveled in their Airstream trailer, and it included every state except Hawaii and several places in Canada. Pictures and souvenirs of their life together cover the walls of her house. I asked her how a farm girl from Illinois happened to meet a boy from the Texas panhandle. It seems she was in St. Louis, working as a secretary for the Air Force (Army Air Corp then, I believe) and they needed a typist to accompany an investigation team to Amarillo. She was single, and so eligible to go. She went to check into the hotel for the first time in her life. In the lobby, a good-looking airman tried to strike up a conversation, but prudently, she wouldn’t give him her name. He convinced her to go to dinner across the street, though. She wasn't sure who he talked to, but he...