Over and Out (For a Little While!)

For the next two weeks I shall be... 

... beach holidaying in Kei Mouth...

... and wineland holidaying in Stellenbosch.

I know, I know. Poor me, right? He he he :-)
In moments of boredom (which I hope are few and far between!) I'll be checking the blogosphere on my not-so-fabulous BlackBerry. But until mid-January...

Happy New Year, 

Everyone!

Book Review: Revolution, by Jennifer Donnelly

BROOKLYN: Andi Alpers is on the edge. She’s angry at her father for leaving, angry at her mother for not being able to cope, and heartbroken by the loss of her younger brother, Truman. Rage and grief are destroying her. And she’s about to be expelled from Brooklyn Heights’ most prestigious private school when her father intervenes. Now Andi must accompany him to Paris for winter break.

PARIS: Alexandrine Paradis lived over two centuries ago. She dreamed of making her mark on the Paris stage, but a fateful encounter with a doomed prince of France cast her in a tragic role she didn’t want—and couldn’t escape.

Two girls, two centuries apart. One never knowing the other. But when Andi finds Alexandrine’s diary, she recognizes something in her words and is moved to the point of obsession. There’s comfort and distraction for Andi in the journal’s antique pages—until, on a midnight journey through the catacombs of Paris, Alexandrine’s words transcend paper and time, and the past becomes suddenly, terrifyingly present.

(Summary from GoodReads)


I REALLY enjoyed this book, particularly the way in which it was written. The author makes use of short sentences which, when coupled with the present tense, make the story feel very immediate. The style of writing also seems to perfectly reflect the state that the narrator, Andi, is in.

Emotions come across well in this story. Andi is at times apathetic and at times incredibly heartbroken, and I was drawn into the story enough to feel whatever she was feeling. And the romantic parts just seemed so sweet and innocent compared to the life Andi experienced in Brooklyn -- I wish there were more of those parts!


I found the history of France a little tedious at times, probably because history isn't one of my main interests, but I learned a lot about the Revolution in France that I didn't know before, and I'm grateful for that.

The other part I LOVED about this book was all the music jargon. Andi is very talented and music is the only thing left in her life that she cares about. Having been a music student myself at school and having learned the history and the terminology, I really enjoyed being transported back into that world of music. That world where sometimes the only thing that can make anything right is to sit alone with your instrument and play your heart out.

Some books have a great story and some books are really well written.
This book is both :-)

Best Blog Award

Thank you SOO much to Ellie Garrat for passing on this award to me! I really love this one, the little picture is so cute.






So. What to do...
1. Thank and link back to the person that gave this award.
2. Answer the ten questions.
3. Pass the award along to other bloggers who you think are fantastic.
4. Contact the bloggers you've picked to let them know about the award.


1. If you blog anonymously, are you happy doing this; if you are not anonymous, do you wish that you had started out anonymously so that you could be anonymous now?

I did start out anonymously. My blog was just a book lover's blog and my name was FictionFaerie! But I looked around and saw a lot of other aspiring authors actually admitting to the fact that they were aspiring authors and using real names (either a pen name or their own name) so I decided to be brave like them :-)

2. Describe an incident that shows your inner stubborn side.

8th grade bonding tour. We were all in pairs and had to do this obstacle course thing. I did NOT want to do it, and I didn't like someone trying to force me to do it, which made me refuse even harder! In the end I got my partner to do it twice (she loved it. She was the outdoor, sporty type!).
(A similar thing happened on orchestra camp -- yes, I went to orchestra camp. I told them I was going to the bathroom and just never came back!)

3. What do you see when you really look at yourself in the mirror?

First I see something that could pass for attractive ;-)
Then I put my contact lenses in.
Then I see a nose I don't like and too many lines around my eyes and skin that's so light in colour it's transparent in places!

4. What is your favourite summer cold drink?

Iced water with slices of lemon. (Go ahead, tell me I'm boring, I don't mind!)

5. When you take time for yourself, what do you do?

Read/write/blog/watch a TV series.

6. Is there something that you still want to accomplish in your life? What is it?

Many things. Become a published author, become a wife, become a mother, become stylish and fashionable... (not sure how achievable that last one is...)

7. When you attended school, were you the class clown, the class overachiever, the shy person, or always ditching?

A mixture of both the class overachiever and the shy person. (I ditched class once and felt so guilty the entire time that it really wasn't worth it!)

8. If you close your eyes and visualise a very poignant moment in your life, what would you see?

Hmm... Does the moment I decided to quit my studies and look for a part time job so that I could write properly count?

9. Is it easy for you to share your true self in your blog or are you more comfortable writing posts about other people or events?

I'm comfortable with both, though I imagine sharing my true self gets a bit boring for others after a while so that's why there are more posts about other things on this blog!

10. If you had the choice to sit down and read a book or talk on the phone, which would you do and why?

Read a book. Every time. I just find that far more appealing than talking on the phone!


For passing this award on, I have chosen blogs whose layout and look (as well as content, of course!) I love.

Katie @ Call Me Crazy
Miss Page-Turner @ Miss Page Turner's City of Books
BayleeD, Marmar & Cleo @ Booklopedia
Tawni @ The Book Worms
Nicole Zoltack @ Where Fantasy and Love Take Flight

There are many other beautiful blogs out there, but in the long list of blogs that I follow I couldn't remember them all!

Teaser Tuesday (7): The Red Pyramid

Title: The Red Pyramid
Author: Rick Riordan


I just love family meetings. Very cosy, with the Christmas garlands around the fireplace and a nice pot of tea and a detective from Scotland Yard ready to arrest you.












Anyone read this book? Or have you read the Percy Jackson series? I haven't got too far with this one yet, but if you're thinking that it's the same as Percy's story except with Egyptian gods instead of Greek gods, well, it's not! So far though, I think I can say I enjoyed the Percy Jackson books more.


Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme hosted by MizB of Should be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read.
• Open to a random page.
• Share two "teaser" sentences from somewhere on that page.
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! Make sure that what you share doesn't give too much away! You don't want to ruin the book for others!
• Share the title and author too so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR lists if they like your teasers!

Just for Laughs (4): South Africa's Version of Google Earth

I so love this picture!

South Africa's version of Google Earth

Source

In case you can't see it clearly, the markers are all over the township and point to Your TV, Your Car, Your Mobile and Your DVD Player. Hee hee hee! Unfortunately, it's too true...

If you've ever lived in South Africa then the label in the corner, Google-letu, will make sense to you. (For those who don't get it, there is a township outside of Cape Town called Guguletu)

Got something funny to share? Post it on your blog and leave a link in the comments below. Or, if it's short, just share it in the comments :-)

The Christmas Story, Part 4

Wishing all my blogging buddies a very 

happy and blessed Christmas :-)

... God sent the angel Gabriel to the town of Nazareth in Galilee with a message for a virgin named Mary. She was engaged to Joseph from the family of King David. The angel greeted Mary and said, "You are truly blessed! The Lord is with you."

   

Mary was confused by the angel's words and wondered what they meant. Then the angel told Mary, "Don't be afraid! God is pleased with you, and you will have a son. His name will be Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of God Most High. The Lord God will make him king, as his ancestor David was. He will rule the people of Israel forever, and his kingdom will never end."

   

Mary asked the angel, "How can this happen? I am not married!"

   

The angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come down to you, and God's power will come over you. So your child will be called the holy Son of God. Your relative Elizabeth is also going to have a son, even though she is old. No one thought she could ever have a baby, but in three months she will have a son. Nothing is impossible for God!"

   

Mary said, "I am the Lord's servant! Let it happen as you have said." And the angel left her.

(Luke 1:26-38 CEV)

Joseph was a good man and did not want to embarrass Mary in front of everyone. So he decided to quietly call off the wedding. While Joseph was thinking about this, an angel from the Lord came to him in a dream. The angel said, "Joseph, the baby that Mary will have is from the Holy Spirit. Go ahead and marry her. Then after her baby is born, name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." So the Lord's promise came true, just as the prophet had said, "A virgin will have a baby boy, and he will be called Immanuel," which means "God is with us."

   

After Joseph woke up, he and Mary were soon married, just as the Lord's angel had told him to do.

(Matthew 1:19-24 CEV)

About that time Emperor Augustus gave orders for the names of all the people to be listed in record books. These first records were made when Quirinius was governor of Syria. Everyone had to go to their own hometown to be listed. So Joseph had to leave Nazareth in Galilee and go to Bethlehem in Judea. Long ago Bethlehem had been King David's hometown, and Joseph went there because he was from David's family.

   

Mary was engaged to Joseph and traveled with him to Bethlehem. She was soon going to have a baby...

(Luke 2:1-5 CEV)

... and while they were there, she gave birth to her first-born son. She dressed him in baby clothes and laid him on a bed of hay, because there was no room for them in the inn.

That night in the fields near Bethlehem some shepherds were guarding their sheep. All at once an angel came down to them from the Lord, and the brightness of the Lord's glory flashed around them. The shepherds were frightened. But the angel said, "Don't be afraid! I have good news for you, which will make everyone happy. This very day in King David's hometown a Savior was born for you. He is Christ the Lord. You will know who he is, because you will find him dressed in baby clothes and lying on a bed of hay."

   

Suddenly many other angels came down from heaven and joined in praising God. They said:

   

"Praise God in heaven!    

Peace on earth to everyone

who pleases God."

   

After the angels had left and gone back to heaven, the shepherds said to each other, "Let's go to Bethlehem and see what the Lord has told us about." They hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and they saw the baby lying on a bed of hay.

When the shepherds saw Jesus, they told his parents what the angel had said about him. Everyone listened and was surprised. But Mary kept thinking about all this and wondering what it meant.

As the shepherds returned to their sheep, they were praising God and saying wonderful things about him. Everything they had seen and heard was just as the angel had said.

Eight days later Jesus' parents did for him what the Law of Moses commands. And they named him Jesus, just as the angel had told Mary when he promised she would have a baby.

(Luke 1:6-21)

 

Writing Tip (4): Comparison

My second blog interview is up over at Marieke's Musings!

Comparison

Taken from "The First Five Pages", by Noah Lukeman...

A picture is worth a thousand words, and when you use a comparison (by 'comparison' I mean analogy, simile or metaphor) you draw a picture, often with the goal of helping the reader grasp a difficult idea. Comparison is one of the few devices that really puts a writer's skill in the spotlight because it offers the most room for a writer to 'turn it on', to indulge the limits of his creative expression.

Exercises:

• Take an object in your room and come up with ten comparisons for it. For the first five comparisons, use similes; for the next five, use metaphors. For instance, 'The dresser, tall and narrow, looked like an upright coffin'; and then 'The dresser, tall and narrow, was an altar.' Don't let yourself use cliched comparisons, and make sure each on is truly enlightening, teaching us something we don't already know about the object.
• Now come up with ten comparisons (similes and metaphors) to describe the action that same object is taking. For instance, 'The dresser leaned against the wall like a bored security guard'; and then 'The dresser, leaning against the wall, was an abandoned baseball bat.'
• Now do the same exercise, but instead of an object, use a person. Do it again for a person's characteristics, his demeanour, his mood. Then do the exercise for settings in general, for moods in general. Finally, do the exercise for anything at all in your manuscript that you've been wanting to describe with greater precision, anywhere you feel you haven't quite said all you wanted to say, or anywhere you had a strong visual image in mind and didn't quite convey it.

Warning: you definitely don't want to overdo it though!

~ ~ ~

Okay. Don't judge. Here are some of my own attempts at comparisons!

- The pencil case bulged like a ready-to-pop seed pod.

- The pencil case, long and bulging, was a slug on my desk.

- The curtain fluttered like the wings of an injured bird.

- The curtain, white and billowing against the black night, was a ghost.

- The hatstand stood solemnly in the corner, like a butler waiting with an umbrella on one arm and a hat on the other.

- The hatstand, with its odd assortment of garments, was a scarecrow in the corner.

Quadruple Award!

I received an award today, another a few days ago, another last week and (gulp) another several weeks ago that I've haven't officially said thanks for!!
*guilty*

Thank you so much to Michael Di Gesu @ In Time for the Versatile Blogger award.

[I have received this one before so I've already passed it on...]


Thank you so much to Kittie Howard @ The Block for the Cherry on Top award

[I have received this one before so I've already passed it on...]


Thank you so much to Madeleine Maddocks @ Scribble and Edit for L'Aussie's Fair Dinkum award.

By accepting the award I need to tell you what Fair Dinkum means to me.
So... um... to be perfectly honest I had never heard those words before this blog award came along (and for some reason the word "dinkum" is making me think of mini doughnuts!).

In Fair Dinkum spirit (whatever it is!) I'm passing it on to:

Kittie @ The Block
Colene @ The Journey
RaShelle @ A No. 2 Pencil, Stat!
Megan @ The Write-At-Home-Mom
Karen @ Coming Down the Mountain
Stina @ Seeing Creative
Hafsah @ Icey Books

Thank you so much to Catherine Johnson @ Kangaroobee's Blog for the Christmas Blog Award

In the spirit of Christmas and friendship, I'm passing it on to:

Marieke @ Marieke's Musings
Quinn @ seeing, dreaming... writing
Rach @ Rach Writes...
Ellie @ ELLIE GARRAT
Jenn @ Jenn Musing
Mary Mary @ Diving Secrets of the Writing Sisterhood

THANK YOU AGAIN! I FEEL VERY LOVED :-)

Teaser Tuesday (6): Revolution

Title: Revolution
Author: Jennifer Donnelly

I'm not sure how to feel about this. Embarrassed? Pissed off? I mean, I just sang him a song I wrote myself, a song that's really important to me, and he fell asleep.

I am really enjoying this book. I saw it in the bookstore, picked it up and read the back and thought, Hmm, looks interesting. So I pulled out my phone and went to GoodReads to check out what people thought of it and when I typed in the title this is the picture that came up:

And I thought, Ohhhhhh, now I recognise it! 'Cos I had seen this cover on several blogs recently. So that decided me :-) (and the positive reviews...)

QUESTION: the one cover says Jennifer Donnelly's the author of A Gathering Light, the other cover calls it A Northern Light. Are these two covers referring to the same book?

~

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme hosted by MizB of Should be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read.
• Open to a random page.
• Share two "teaser" sentences from somewhere on that page.
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! Make sure that what you share doesn't give too much away! You don't want to ruin the book for others!
• Share the title and author too so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR lists if they like your teasers!

Be Jolly By Golly Blogfest!

Introducing... AN AFRICAN CHRISTMAS!

(Well, partially, we do have a number of Western-style decorations...)

I'm doing "minimalist"decorations this year since more than half my family has deserted me for the UK. (Well, they're actually currently hanging out in Cape Town, as the big FREEZE overseas has kinda delayed the Northern leg of their holiday :-( )

The wire Christmas tree with beaded (and other random) decorations.

The three angels - wire, metal and beaded. (What's that you say? It's supposed to be three wise men? Ah well, the angels are cool...)

I love this carved nativity scene of Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus. It's one of my favourite Christmas decoration sets.

(Sorry I didn't photograph the fabulous pottery nativity set I made yonks and yonks ago in art class! You have to really special to see that one ;-) )

And then there's my stocking made for me by my godmother when I was very little :-)

One of my favourite holiday (actually anytime!) treats is chocolate filled shortbread.

210g butter

1 tsp boiling water

4 tsp castor sugar

250g flour

200g slab dark chocolate

Mix the butter, sugar and boiling water. Add the flour and mix well. (Add a little more butter/flour if the mixture seems to dry/moist for handling). Break the chocolate up into its blocks. Cover each piece of chocolate in some shortbread mixture and form into a small ball. Bake at 120 degrees C for 20 minutes. Roll in castor sugar (yeah, I know, the picture has icing sugar, sorry...) while still warm. And if you eat them while they're still warm then the chocolate will be melted in the middle! YUM! But they're rockingly awesome when they've cooled down too.

Okay, so I don't really have a favourite holiday drink, but I have a substitute for this section!

Right. It's mid summer. Super hot. You're in the pool cooling off, and someone brings you a large piece of watermelon. The sun beats down on you and just looking at that cold, juicy, slightly crisp, pink watermelon makes your mouth water. You lean on the edge of the pool and bite into it, refreshing and delicious, juice dripping down your chin. AWESOME!!! One of my favourite parts of summer :-)

HAPPY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!

And thanks to Melissa and Jen for hosting this most scrumptious blogfest!

The Christmas Story, Part 3

... God sent the angel Gabriel to the town of Nazareth in Galilee with a message for a virgin named Mary. She was engaged to Joseph from the family of King David. The angel greeted Mary and said, "You are truly blessed! The Lord is with you."

   

Mary was confused by the angel's words and wondered what they meant. Then the angel told Mary, "Don't be afraid! God is pleased with you, and you will have a son. His name will be Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of God Most High. The Lord God will make him king, as his ancestor David was. He will rule the people of Israel forever, and his kingdom will never end."

   

Mary asked the angel, "How can this happen? I am not married!"

   

The angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come down to you, and God's power will come over you. So your child will be called the holy Son of God. Your relative Elizabeth is also going to have a son, even though she is old. No one thought she could ever have a baby, but in three months she will have a son. Nothing is impossible for God!"

   

Mary said, "I am the Lord's servant! Let it happen as you have said." And the angel left her.

(Luke 1:26-38 CEV)

Joseph was a good man and did not want to embarrass Mary in front of everyone. So he decided to quietly call off the wedding. While Joseph was thinking about this, an angel from the Lord came to him in a dream. The angel said, "Joseph, the baby that Mary will have is from the Holy Spirit. Go ahead and marry her. Then after her baby is born, name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." So the Lord's promise came true, just as the prophet had said, "A virgin will have a baby boy, and he will be called Immanuel," which means "God is with us."

   

After Joseph woke up, he and Mary were soon married, just as the Lord's angel had told him to do.

(Matthew 1:19-24 CEV)

About that time Emperor Augustus gave orders for the names of all the people to be listed in record books. These first records were made when Quirinius was governor of Syria. Everyone had to go to their own hometown to be listed. So Joseph had to leave Nazareth in Galilee and go to Bethlehem in Judea. Long ago Bethlehem had been King David's hometown, and Joseph went there because he was from David's family.

   

Mary was engaged to Joseph and traveled with him to Bethlehem. She was soon going to have a baby...

(Luke 2:1-5 CEV)

Photo Friday (3)

Old suitcases at a random antique shop in Howick, KwaZulu-Natal.

Old stuff is cool. I love just looking at old things and imagining the story behind them. Imagining a different time... Old stuff can prove to be a pretty awesome source of inspiration sometimes...

Want to join in? On your blog, post a photo you've taken and tell us what it's about. 

Leave a link in the comments below.

Writing Tip (3): Fixing Excess Adjectives, Adverbs & Modifiers

Last week one of the tips talked about getting rid of adjectives and adverbs, and some people thought that was a little strict. Of course, the dude wasn't saying get rid of all of them, just the excess. Here is a little more advice on exactly what one can do to fix up the too-many-adjectives-adverbs-and-modifiers problem...

• Strengthen your nouns and verbs so that they don't need adjectives and adverbs. You could say "He was a brutal man," or "He was a tyrant"; you could say "She was a kind, charitable woman," or  "She was a saint"; you could say "It was a torrential rain", or "It was a downpour"; you could say "He was running quickly," or "He was sprinting." In the same way that you can find better adjectives or adverbs, at least some of the time you should be able to come up with stronger (or more precise) nouns or verbs that can make adjectives and adverbs unneccesary to begin with. You will be able to cut scores of adjectives and adverbs just by strengthening their subjects, making for a much tighter manuscript.

• Occasionally substitute a comparison (analogy, simile or metaphor) for an adjective. You can say "He ran a clean, well-organized office," or "He ran his office like a ship"; you can say "The man was tall, heavy, overgrown," or "The man was built like a bear"; you can say "He ate ravenously, without any decorum," or "He ate like an animal". You don't want to replace every adjective or adverb in your manuscript with a comparison, but occasionally it works well, further reducing the number of modifiers and simultaneously filling your manuscript with visuals. It may also reduce the sheer number of words, which makes for a tighter read.

~ The First Five Pages, by Noah Lukeman

Happy writing, writers!

Teaser Tuesday (5): Nevermore

Title: Nevermore

Author: Kelly Creagh

"Isobel."

A chill ran through her at the way he said her name, the way he gave each syllable its own moment, making it sound so regal, so proper.










Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme hosted by MizB of Should be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read.
• Open to a random page.
• Share two "teaser" sentences from somewhere on that page.
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! Make sure that what you share doesn't give too much away! You don't want to ruin the book for others!
• Share the title and author too so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR lists if they like your teasers!

Just for Laughs (3): Reasons to Stop Writing

If you can still laugh at these after all the countless hours of writing you've struggled through, congratulations. You still have a sense of humour :-)

Source

Graceling vs Fire

For anyone who read my teaser on Tuesday and asked/commented about which of Kristin Cashore's novels was better, well here's my opinion now that I've finished reading...

I liked the first half of GRACELING better than the second half, and I liked the second half of FIRE more than the first half. So... I think I have to say that I enjoyed them both equally!

Heroines
I loved Katsa (GRACELING) as a strong female MC, but I found it easier to identify with Fire, mainly because Katsa was a killing machine who was totally uninterested in the getting-married-and-having-a-family thing and that's... well... not me at all! And Fire had a passion for making music -- she knew how to lose herself in her instrument -- and that I can understand.

Love Interests
I think I liked Brigan (FIRE) more than Po (GRACELING), though I won't go into the reasons (other than that I'm really not keen on the name Po!) because they could be spoilers for anyone who hasn't read either or both of the books.

Story
Both books had a bit of a twist where I kind of wasn't expecting it, and I always enjoy a twist :-)

So. Bottom line. I'm recommending them both!

The Christmas Story, Part 2

Midwinter Blogfest below this post.

... God sent the angel Gabriel to the town of Nazareth in Galilee with a message for a virgin named Mary. She was engaged to Joseph from the family of King David. The angel greeted Mary and said, "You are truly blessed! The Lord is with you."

   

Mary was confused by the angel's words and wondered what they meant. Then the angel told Mary, "Don't be afraid! God is pleased with you, and you will have a son. His name will be Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of God Most High. The Lord God will make him king, as his ancestor David was. He will rule the people of Israel forever, and his kingdom will never end."

   

Mary asked the angel, "How can this happen? I am not married!"

   

The angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come down to you, and God's power will come over you. So your child will be called the holy Son of God. Your relative Elizabeth is also going to have a son, even though she is old. No one thought she could ever have a baby, but in three months she will have a son. Nothing is impossible for God!"

   

Mary said, "I am the Lord's servant! Let it happen as you have said." And the angel left her.

(Luke 1:26-38 CEV)

Joseph was a good man and did not want to embarrass Mary in front of everyone. So he decided to quietly call off the wedding. While Joseph was thinking about this, an angel from the Lord came to him in a dream. The angel said, "Joseph, the baby that Mary will have is from the Holy Spirit. Go ahead and marry her. Then after her baby is born, name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." So the Lord's promise came true, just as the prophet had said, "A virgin will have a baby boy, and he will be called Immanuel," which means "God is with us."

   

After Joseph woke up, he and Mary were soon married, just as the Lord's angel had told him to do.

(Matthew 1:19-24 CEV)

 

Midwinter Blogfest

Marieke is hosting a Midwinter Blogfest!

The question: What does your main character do in Midwinter?

Lissa wrapped the scarf around her neck and pulled her coat on over her pyjamas. Everyone else had gone to bed. The merriment was over, the kitchen cleaned up, the wads of torn wrapping paper gathered into a black bag and left by the back door.

Another Christmas over.

She stood on tiptoe and fumbled in the cupboard above the fridge, her fingers searching until they wrapped around the waxy, ridged egde of a candle. She knocked a box of matches down too and dropped it into her pocket.

Outside the icy air bit into her cheeks and she lifted her shoulders against the cold, burying her chin in the prickly warmth of the scarf. She crunched her way across the snow to the end of the garden and stopped by the low wall. She could see the river on the other side, black water rushing and tripping over itself.

This was where she'd last seen him, four years ago. She'd leaned over the wall, cheeks flushed from the exertion of dodging and throwing snowballs, and shouted at him that she didn't need the stupid hat he'd knocked off her head. They could look for it in the morning.

She'd still been shouting when he slipped into the water.

Lissa gathered a mound of snow on top of the wall, compacted it with her shivering fingers, and pushed the candle in. It took her several tries to light the match, but on the fourth time she got it. The candle flared to life and she dropped the blackened match onto the snow.

I miss you, Damon. I wish you were still here.

The flame wavered back and forth and she watched it, contemplating the past, thinking of all the things that could have been. It was a dangerous path to go down, but she allowed it, just once a year. She couldn't let Christmas pass without remembering him.

The night grew colder. She turned back to the house, leaving the candle burning.

Go check out the other entries at the bottom of this post!