Tag Archives: Jack Beck

She was Young, Lithe, Long-tailed…

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cat romanceJack’s weekly guest blog

The other morning I idly watched our two staff kittens, Owen Meany (male) and Nike (female) rolling around in a clinch (heated embrace) in front of the paperback romances. And I was struck by a thought.

We have far too many romances and are having trouble shifting them, despite every conceivable (hah!) kind of discount or clever bundling. But my wife the author is always laughing about something known as “kitten cover theory.” Basically, the fastest way to sell a book is to put a kitten on its cover.

And we know for a fact that ‘cozy’ mysteries that involve cats or kittens fly off the shelf. . .

. . . so I wonder if paperback romances involving love-struck kittens mightn’t be a sure-fire seller? Nike tends to come off worst from her encounters with Owen – frequently with a scratch or a bruise. Hickies, in essence.

Titles began to appear in my imagination. ” Catermauling Lover,” “Kitten Canoodle,”  “My Highland Wildcat” –  –  –

Then cover art with muscular toms and shapely tabbies rolling around in each other’s paws.

The blurbs on the back of romances have always amused us and so I began to write them in my mind –

“She was young, lithe, and long-tailed. He was lean, mean, a real street tough whose whiskers quivered with desire….”

Well, that will be quite enough of that.

What makes this all a bit academic, though, is that Owen Meany isn’t quite the man he used to be and Nike is, even as I write, having a small ‘procedure’ carried out by Dr. Beth. So all future clinches will be purely platonic for both of them. Perhaps that adds to the romance?

Wayfaring Strangers

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 Jack’s weekly guest post –

Regulars will probably know that I have a certain interest in traditional music, which for me anyway, means music of particular cultures that has stood the test of time even while it is evolving and developing. It can be purely instrumental or ballads and songs and can be from anywhere, although my personal specialty is Scottish songs.

When I used to sing with my old band ‘Heritage’ we traveled ’round Europe over fifteen years playing festivals and doing regional tours and we heard wonderful music from all sorts of interesting cultural corners.

While I’ve been presenting my weekly music program ‘Celtic Clanjamphry’ on WETS.fm from Johnson City in TN for the last five years, I’ve also been developing an understanding of the links between Appalachian music and its Celtic forebears. For six years I was a staff member on the Swannanoa Gathering Celtic Week at Warren-Wilson College near Asheville NC and that was a wonderful opportunity to engage with others, all of whom had an equal enthusiasm for those links.

More recently I’ve been fortunate to be part of the team organizing ‘Big Stone Celtic’ – our annual celebration of all the Celtic nations modeled on small town traditional festivals back in the ‘auld countries’.

So, what do I think this has to say to us in the age of electronics and fifty years after the last ‘folk-boom’? Maybe that there is still an appreciation for  music and songs that aren’t designed carefully to pick your pocket, or that do chime with a basic human need, or maybe that resonate with a distant memory buried deep within us.

Perhaps you can see from the above that I’m quite passionate about this. So I’m planning a weekend retreat down here from Friday April 25th through Sunday April 27th at the beautiful farmhouse of friends who live just outside Big Stone Gap. The focus will be Scottish ballads and songs and we’ll be working on repertoire, program balance, accompaniments, sources, sound systems and lots more. There’ll be comfortable accommodation, great food and a ceilidh at the bookstore. Although it’s aimed at singers we’ll make sure that non-singers will have plenty to interest them as well.

If you would like to know more – jbeck69087@aol.com or 276-523-5097