Minnesota Prairie Roots

Writing and photography by Audrey Kletscher Helbling

Multi-genre Minnesota authors talking craft & more at Faribault library October 31, 2023

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 2:29 PM
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Book cover sourced online

A FEW DAYS AGO, I nabbed Jess Lourey’s The Taken Ones from the LUCKY DAY shelves at my local library. This is a section where new books are placed and, if you’re lucky to get a new release, then lucky you. Already I want to stay up late reading this Minnesota author’s latest thriller. Just as I did when I read The Quarry Girls, a fictional crime story set in 1997 in St. Cloud and winner of the 2023 Minnesota Book Awards in genre fiction.

My familiarity with Lourey’s writing stretches back many years to my time as a freelance writer with Minnesota Moments, a magazine no longer in publication. Back then I reviewed Minnesota-authored books for the magazine, including books in Lourey’s Murder by Month romcom series set in Battle Lake, a real Minnesota community where she lived at the time. I still remember the name of the main character, Mira James, in books like May Day and June Bug.

Book cover sourced online

But since I’m an appreciator of intense mysteries, I’m more drawn to Lourey’s suspenseful crime titles. That’s my go-to genre, reaching as far back as the Nancy Drew detective series.

The library’s promo for Thursday’s event.

All of that aside, Lourey will be at Buckham Memorial Library in Faribault at 6 pm Thursday, November 2, as part of Moving Words: Writers Across Minnesota series. Authors John Lee Clark and Nicole Kronzer will join her. How lucky we are to have three talented, award-winning, multi-genre authors here to talk about their craft.

Book cover sourced online

While Clark and Kronzer are unknown to me, their online bios reveal two gifted writers. Clark, a DeafBlind poet, essayist and actor, won the 2023 Minnesota Book Award in poetry for his How to Communicate: Poems. It seems particularly fitting that he is coming to Faribault, home to the Minnesota State Academies for the Deaf and the Blind.

Book cover sourced online

And Kronzer, a high school English teacher and former professional actress, writes young adult novels. In 2021, Unscripted was a Minnesota Book Awards finalist in young adult literature. Her second book, The Roof Over Our Heads, published in January.

I’ve already requested Clark’s poetry book and Kronzer’s Unscripted from the library. If those books were on the Lucky Day shelves, I missed them.

Now, time to take a break from writing to resume reading The Taken Ones. For it is also by reading that writers learn and grow their craft. And Lourey has that covered, too, in Rewrite Your Life: Discover Your Truth Through the Healing Power of Fiction, a book to first read then use as a writing guide.

© Copyright 2023 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

No candy at my house & the scary of Halloween (& life)

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:00 AM
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Many facets of Halloween are depicted in this quilt, “Olde Salem Black Hat Society,” pieced by Anita Johnson and quilted by Therese Dominas. It was displayed at the Rice County Piecemakers Fall Splendor Quilt Show in September. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2023)

FOR THE FIRST TIME in decades, I haven’t purchased candy to give to trick-or-treaters. It’s not that I’m a meanie. Rather, we have so few kids come to our house that it simply is not worth even flicking on the outdoor light. The candy I buy each Halloween typically ends up consumed by us. And we don’t need it.

Photographed outside Audre’s Attic in Lonsdale. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo October 2023)

Plus, some 15 area businesses, organizations, churches and schools are holding Halloween-themed parties for kids, enough to fill any kid’s candy quota for the year.

Pumpkins painted by Cindy are for sale at my local Hy-Vee grocery store. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo October 2023)

If you’re protesting, “but, Audrey,” I offer one more reason. Cost. Candy is expensive, especially the mini chocolate candy bars I choose. (Hey, I don’t like gummies or suckers or Tootsie Rolls.) Randy and I are living on a retirement budget. And we all know how costs have risen on everything. It’s a scary time to retire.

I spotted this cute skull rock and two other Halloween-themed painted rocks on steps at the Minnesota State Academy for the Deaf. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo October 2023)

I find the loss in investments, the price of groceries, the childish behavior in DC, the horror unfolding in our country and around the world much scarier than anything Halloween-related.

Original Gothic art for sale at Something for All Consignment/Thrift Store in Lonsdale. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo October 2023)

The scary of Halloween rates as fun fright. And maybe that’s what we all need right now—scary diversions not based in reality.

This face in a window at the Minnesota State Academy for the Deaf creeps me out for some reason. I have no idea who she is, but I expect no one scary, except to me. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo October 2023)

If a lounging skeleton, a swaying ghost, a face in a window, Gothic art or whatever can divert thoughts from truth, then good. For a moment or more, the mind has managed an escape.

A skeleton relaxes in a Minnesota Vikings chair at my local Hy-Vee store. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo October 2023)

So Halloween evening, I will escape into When Books Went to War—The Stories that Helped Us Win World War II. I’m only pages into this nonfiction book, but already the burning of books by the Nazis is scaring me. The book ties nicely with The Librarian of Burned Books, a novel I read a few weeks ago. If a trick-or-treater rings my doorbell, I won’t answer. My mind will be elsewhere, plus I will have nothing sweet to offer…except a handful of chocolate chips.

© Copyright 2023 Audrey Kletscher Helbling