Best-selling Author Catherine Coulter Book Signing

I recently attended a book signing by best-selling author, Catherine Coulter at a local used bookstore in Roseville. Nancy had alerted me to the fact that Coulter would be appearing. Nancy reads her books and was looking forward to the latest FBI Thriller, Double Take, featuring husband and wife special agents, Dillon Savich and Lacey Sherlock.

I decided to attend to get Nancy an autographed copy of the hardcover for her upcoming birthday.

Catherine writes historical romance and contemporary suspense thrillers. Her publishing career is rather impressive. Her first romance was published in 1978 and she has written more than fifty books. Since the publication of her first FBI thriller her books have been best sellers.

I may have read some of her earlier books, I don’t know, but I have not read any of these thrillers. I did get an autographed copy for myself, and one of the early ones in the series. The bookstore had brought in new copies of every book she wrote so there was a big choice of her writing.

Coulter spoke for 45 minutes or more before signing. She’s an attractive, petite woman and had on a nice stylish brown suit and brown pumps with a 3 or 4 inch heel. Her skirt was much too high above the knee, inches, and should be left to those under 30 years of age. (She’ll be 65 in December, but does look damn good for her age...my age). She is apparently known for "her legs" as she was recently voted "Best Legs" at a Romance Writers Convention in San Diego. She was interesting, humorous, and answered questions from her fans. I say her fans, because many of the group of 30-40 people knew her characters in several of her series well. Although I do not call myself a fan, I do respect the success of any writer and always want to know more about his or her creative drive and writing process.

She stood and moved around as she spoke, and even remained standing throughout the book signing. By the way, I think she did a very nice personal inscription for Nancy, wishing her a Happy Birthday.

But as I found myself envious of Catherine before long. I’m not an envious person at all, but I was envious and irritated as time went on. Why, you ask? Was it her success as a writer? NO. Her obvious wealth from collecting all those royalties? NO. Was it her appearance? NO. It was her SHOES! Every time I looked at her SHOES it irritated me. Why, you ask? Because I was standing in sandals with sore feet and a bad low back. I was in pain, and for minutes I would forget my pain as I concentrated and enjoyed what she was saying. Then I’d see the high heels again, the shoes! I was envious of her ability to wear heels of that height and be on her feet for more than two and a half hours, and looking very comfortable the whole time. Although the bookstore had refreshments and bottled water (great for a 100 degree day) they failed to provide CHAIRS. So there we all were, standing, shifting from one foot to another, holding our backs, and I was not the only one very uncomfortable. At least part of the time I had the frame of the plate glass window to lean against (hoping we did not have an earthquake roll through Northern CA). I’ve never been able to wear high heels, even in my younger days, and have always loved heels with jeans.

The woman who had arranged for Catherine’s signing there, Kim, had her own used bookstore here in town until a few months ago. I did a book signing there with my friend, author Evelyn Fuqua about three years ago. I told Kim for the next author signing they have to have chairs, and if not, I will not be there!

I did meet two other authors there who had come for Catherine’s signing. Brenda Novak who has published a number of romance and romantic suspense novels and Robin Burcell who will have her fourth novel published early 2008. Both are award winners. I liked them both. I wish we’d had more time to have discussions about writing. I would have enjoyed that. They both live in the area and Coulter lives in Sausalito, above San Francisco.

For future book signings, NO HEELS ALLOWED! Only sandals, boots, flats, tennies, and oh, slippers.

~ Linda

I Promise You a Rose Garden

Every year in early April I am amazed how fast my roses bushes have grown in the few short weeks since their drastic pruning. When pruned in the last week of January or first week of February the barren bushes, trimmed back to a few stalks, appear they will never recover to bring fourth again the beautiful roses.

While growing up we had rose gardens and I hated those things...stickery thorns...which seemed to outdo the beauty of the blooms, and I didn’t want anything to do with them. But that all changed. My late husband, Don Pendleton loved flowers and every spring we would visit the nursery and come home with a load of flowers for our patio and garden. During the hot summer months, Don would faithfully and enjoyably water the pots and our garden at least once if not twice a day. When we bought our home in Sedona, Arizona in 1994 we added rose bushes after discovering how well roses grew at the 4500 elevation. Sedona is a Planting Zone 6. Surprisingly, they did well in the summer heat and the summer monsoons (late June to September) may have helped along with the cooling off in the evenings and nights. Before Don passed away, we had planted about eight rose bushes among our lava rock landscaping and in the next two years I added to that number and had 28 roses, including an area of miniatures, all planted in direct sun. I really hated to leave my beautiful roses when I sold my home and moved back to California.

I now have ten rose bushes here in Northern California (Planting Zone 9) in their third year. And I have to say, the roses do not tolerate the heat here as well as in Sedona or even in Southern California. At this time of spring and after the first early blooms that are usually not too perfect, they are pretty and will do well until the heat arrives. July and August are not good for the roses here at all, and blooms can scorch in those hot afternoons of 100 degrees or more. The rose bushes are on automatic watering drip systems, but I have to admit that I do not give any of my patio flowers the attention that Don would have given. It’s just too darn hot. So this year I will not spend my usual one hundred dollars at the nursery but instead will pot a few more geraniums which seem to tolerate the heat and don’t need the constant watering that other potted flowers need. The potted geraniums even made it through the frost this winter just fine.

A couple of my favorite roses are the Brandy Rose, above, and the Peace Rose, below. I took the photos a couple of days ago.

~ Linda