Sue Vincent's Daily Echo

Hare and Lion…

Posted on February 23, 2020 by Sue Vincent

There once was a Lion who came to town.

“I want Man to be my brother,” said Lion,

“and by and by I will take him into my house.

“Very well,” said Man, and so Lion started visiting him.

Continue reading at France & Vincent

Posted in Art, Folk Tale, Stuart France | Tagged psychology, story, Trickster, writing | 2 Comments

Fragments of Light

Posted on February 23, 2020 by Sue Vincent

I was talking with my son about the way life works out. The daily round of events and occurrences great and small that seem to be scattered, like pieces of broken glass, across the table of time. Some events hit your life with all the destructive power of a truck at full speed. Caught in the emotions of the moment it is hard to see beyond the pain, the fear, or the grief. Some are joyous rays of light casting bright pools of colour in the shadows. Most are the simple small-doings of everyday.

Taken individually, like pieces of a puzzle, they can be difficult to interpret… a patch of featureless blue or indistinct green may be hard to place within the image… especially if you don’t know what the picture is to begin with. Yet with a little patience, the pieces can begin to fit together. A detail here, a match there, and you begin to see the sense in the colours, to get an inkling of what the picture may be.

I am reminded of this when I am wandering around the old churches with their beautiful stained glass. Look too closely and they are just fragments of colour, odd shapes and sizes with little meaning. Stand back a little and the picture becomes clear. You can see how the seemingly random shards have been pieced together by a master hand to produce a glowing jewel of an image.

Continue reading at The Silent Eye

Posted in Photography, Spirituality, symbolism, The Silent Eye | Tagged inspiration, light, mosaic, spirituality, stained glass | 9 Comments

Gold #midnighthaiku

Posted on February 23, 2020 by Sue Vincent

Deep within the heart

Beyond the reach of shadows

A heart of gold glows

Posted in Photography, Poetry | Tagged haiku, heart | 14 Comments

Revisions and Self-editing: repetition and inconsistency ~ Connie Jasperson #amwriting

Posted on February 22, 2020 by Sue Vincent

Reblogged from Life in the Realm of Fantasy:

I just finished reading book two of a three-part sub-series, set within a larger 21-book series. I enjoyed it but would have liked it more had the protagonist not repeated his back story aloud every time he was asked. That was a flaw that ran deep into book three. All that repetition just padded the word count.

All through this 21-book series, numerous proofing errors and random cut-and-paste-mistakes make it clear to me that few people other than the author see these manuscripts, and they aren’t professional editors. Yet, his work sells because he has marvelous characters and compelling storylines. He is now putting out four or more books a year and is published by TOR.

Continue reading at Life in the Realm of Fantasy:

Posted in reblog | Tagged #writetip, amwriting, making effective revisions, the revision process, writing | 2 Comments

Robbie Cheadle reviews Eventide by Mae Clair

Posted on February 22, 2020 by Sue Vincent

Reblogged from Roberta Writes:

Book reviews Today’s book review was a buddy read with prolific author, James J. Cudney. This was the first time I have read a book and then discussed it with someone else prior to writing my review and it was an interesting and fun process. I hope that Jay and I will read some more books together in the future. You can find Jay’s review of Eventide here: https://thisismytruthnow.com/2020/02/15/book-review-eventide-by-mae-clair/

What Amazon says

The darkness is coming . . .

The old house near Hode’s Hill, Pennsylvania is a place for Madison Hewitt to start over—to put the trauma of her husband’s murder, and her subsequent breakdown, behind her. She isn’t bothered by a burial plot on the property, or the mysterious, sealed cistern in the basement.

Continue reading at Roberta Writes

Posted in reblog | Tagged Amazon, book review, Books, Hode's Hill Novels, Hode’s Hill, mystery | 3 Comments

Perfect

Posted on February 22, 2020 by Sue Vincent

Na'ama Yehuda

spring SueVincent Photo: Sue Vincent

Finally, the light was right, the water mirrored what it ought, the sky spread silk above her head. Even the dotted white of sheep lent the necessary movement to what might otherwise feel a specter of a time too soon or too late.

It was perfect.

Stella pressed the sole of one foot against the trunk and leaned into the tree behind her, balancing the rest of her weight on the other leg. All through her childhood, this preferred pose of hers had driven her mother to distraction.

Though long passed, the memory of a particular exchange about it was yet to fade.

“God gave you two feet to stand on. Use them!” Her mother had demanded.

Stella must have been six or seven years old then. “I am,” she had countered, exasperated with the constant admonitions of what felt to her a perfectly reasonable way to…

View original post 313 more words

Posted in Photography | 1 Comment

The hand that feeds…

Posted on February 22, 2020 by Sue Vincent

Man and Hare became great friends.

They were always getting into scrapes together

and getting scolded by their mothers.

One day Man said, “let us do away with our mothers,

then we shall be free.”

Hare was not so sure, so he took a knife

and stabbed it into a plant with red juice.

Continue reading at France & Vincent

Posted in Art, Folk Tale, Stuart France | Tagged psychology, story, Trickster, writing | Leave a comment

Spring ~ Tina Stewart Brakebill #writephoto

Posted on February 22, 2020 by Sue Vincent

dreaming a new day

the sun rises over still life

awakening spring

Reblogged from Tina Stewart Brakebill

Posted in photo prompt, Photography, Poetry | Leave a comment

Mobile menace…

Posted on February 22, 2020 by Sue Vincent

Cartoons About Mobile Phones - Randy Glasbergen ...

It is a five-mile drive home from work. I nearly killed three people. Four, counting the baby I must assume was in the hooded pushchair. You can imagine the headlines, “Mother and baby killed by careless driver…”

Few would look beyond the surface. The driver would be condemned, punished, ostracised… and would live crushed by a burden of indelible grief and guilt.

Who would really have been at fault? The driver already halfway through a manoeuvre on the road? Or the heedless pedestrian, too busy talking on the phone to check before pushing their child into the path of a moving car?

In the case of this particular mother, she didn’t even turn her head or pause her conversation when I slammed on the brakes, mere inches from tragedy. Nor did the young man singing soundlessly to the music from his earphones… or the middle-aged woman in mid-business call, apparently haranguing thin air through headset and mic. All of them stepped into the road without a pause, without a look and without any thought for oncoming traffic or possible danger.

And it annoys the hell out of me.

Drivers who cause accidents by using mobile devices whilst driving are severely penalised. There are laws against it. But pedestrians can, apparently, cause accidents whilst using mobile devices with impunity… and no thought for the anguish of the driver.

No matter how careful you are, on foot or behind the wheel, accidents can and do happen. But they should be just that… accidents. Not the result of the blasé self-absorption that blinds us to where we are or even our own safety.