I subscribe to a very few newsletters, among them Dense Discovery. This is a weekly dose of graphic design, tech skepticism, and climate awareness leavened with grace, warmth, and humor.

One feature of Dense Discovery that I particularly enjoy is the Worthy Five, which asks five questions of an individual whose biography might be “graphic design survivor and mother of twins….” or, “cartographer and bread baker.” The emphasis is not on what the contributor has accomplished, but on what they’ve learned along the way. One week’s worthy five might be an interesting quote, a worthwhile podcast, a great recipe, a light bulb concept, and a website that is truly worth a visit.

Treasures picked up along the way are shared in one or two sentences with fellow wayfarers around the digital campfire. It’s helpful, great fun, and highly personal to each contributor. I got to thinking about that notion of light bulb concepts as it applies to my own experience.

One insight that has cut across many of my domains is the distinction between expressive language skills and receptive language skills, and how the people who talk the best game might actually be deficient when it comes to the other side of the coin. What do I mean by this?

An example: I’m sitting in a big session at a writer’s conference listening to a Top Dawg expound about book marketing. She’s confident, she’s citing data, she’s poised and relentlessly articulate, even has a few funny asides. Then somebody who is just a regular dawg asks a question, and gets a beat of silence in response followed by a pivot to a pitch for the presenter’s next session or marketing book, or some other non-answer. This scenario is not unusual.

Somebody who talks a great game doesn’t necessarily have the receptive language chops that a much less flashy or “successful” person in the same field might bring to the table. The big dawg might struggle to comprehend what you’re telling her, to make sense of symbolism and metaphor, to integrate old and new information, to pick up on subtext and body language. They can send brilliantly, but they frequently drop the ball when it comes to receiving.

As glib as they are, as confident as they seem, their human insights are often limited. Precisely because they are so readily affirmed for their expressive skills, they are likely unaware of their shortcomings.

Once I caught onto this pattern, I spotted it everywhere–in publishing, in the courtroom, in the social services hierarchy (especially as you progress up that hierarchy), and in myself. I have to work hard at reflective listening, I can be impatient with people who can’t defend their opinions with facts. I do love to prose on for thousands and thousands of words, though. Ask me anything about writing a book and then try to get me to hush later the same day.

Have you collected personal insights into human nature? Relationships? Dealing with difficult people? A worthy one or two? Do share!

PS: Lord Julian’s third mystery, A Gentleman in Challenging Circumstances, is now available as an audio book.

I am putting this blog on hiatus for most of July in part because in this end of June/early July transition, I scheduled myself back-to-back weeks of (for me) high activity. This past week was five straight days of riding camp (kids on ponies, what could be more wonderful?), and next week I will be a camper on a pony. (We’d better get to paint rocks, too, just sayin’).

With a few other logistical planets refusing to conveniently leave or slow their orbits, I am in the middle of what I call a compression phrase. Life should ease up and simplify in a week or two, but I also know that I take longer to bounce back from exertion of any kind than I used to. If I was up at 5 am for nine out of ten consecutive mornings, I will need more than one day to get back to more and better sleep.

If I was out in the heat for nine out of ten days, I will be heat-zonked for more than a day, no matter how much I hydrate, use sun screen, and wear a hat. If my step count averaged 15k per day… and so forth.

But just now today–the one day out of ten when I don’t have to be anywhere or do much of anything–I am stockpiling as much rest and refreshment as I can. This has involved a day of solitude (so far, fingers crossed…). A day to stay home and not set bottom in driver’s seat or foot off home turf. A day when I can wear my jammies and flip-flops until noon (so stylish with my writing-day compression socks). A day when I can spend hours just reading my current Lord Julian work in progress (still have to write the denouement). I can drink three cups of de-caf tea to slowly, slowly get my engine turning over as I start the day at the computer.

By way of reward for a week well done and another challenging week on deck, I have busted out my stash of special occasion Highland Chocolatier’s Sao Tome dark chocolate truffles. This evening, I will probably go on a deadheading spree among the daisies, roses, and cone flowers. I should scrub the floors soon–nothing like humidity for making dirt stick to floors–but today is not that day. (Tomorrow might be.)

I could use several of these re-charging days back to back, but right now, I only get the one, and I am loving it. When I report for duty early tomorrow morning (duty I signed up for, which involves getting breakfast served to a bunch of horses), I will do so fortified by my version of a lovely day.

What is your version of a lovely, re-charging day after enduring a challenging schedule? To one commenter, I’ll send $100 Vera Bradley e-gift card.

PS: Look for my next blog post around July 20th or 27th. I’ll post about it on social and in my news feed, and send out a newsletter thereabouts. Until then, happy summer, happy reading, and may you all enjoy plenty of wonderful days!

I’m coming down the home stretch with the first draft of A Gentleman of Unreliable Honor. This will be Lord Julian’s sixth adventure and once again, our hero will be told to take his clues and get lost just as he’s growing certain more is at stake than missing ear bobs. Why am I so bent on inflicting on his lordship rejection of his sleuthing, the very thing he does best?

The answer is pretty simple: I want to hit him where it hurts, a lot.

When the last horse that I leased (dear old Santiago) went literally out to pasture, I cast around for another riding situation. Nobody I asked was interested in adding me as a student to their lesson program when I am not keen to buy another horse, I no longer have any interest in showing/competing, and I don’t care to clinic with the big names. My ambition is and was  to continue fostering a connection with a horse, period.

Buck and Grace, both of us about age 14

Barn doors were all but shut in my face as I attempted to find a way to do that, and man, that hurt. “Before I played the piano, baked brownies, or wrote in a journal, before anything else, I was a horse girl,” says me.

I practically memorized the World Book Encyclopedia article on horses. The only thing I taught myself to draw was the profile of a horse. Every year for my birthday and Christmas, I asked for a horse, and when my Barbie had no horse of her own, I stole my brother’s Johnny Quest horses for her to ride.

Horses helped me distinguish myself from a lively heap of accomplished siblings. Horses helped me move away from home as an adolescent, because to spend time with my noble steed, I bunked in with my godparents and their offspring for days at a time. Horses were how I dealt with pretty serious depression in my mid-thirties, and how I formed a lot of those middle-distance, low-stress relationships that can yet be a source of comfort and support on a bad day.

Stretch and Grace
Both of us middle-aged

Horses have been a lifeline between me and my daughter. And those… those people who gave me the bum’s rush were trying to convince me that I wasn’t a horse girl any more? That my horse girl identity had reached its expiration date?

I think not. Hence I knocked on the door of a therapeutic riding program whose motto is, “Love, Trust, Respect.” The experience of being rejected though, of being told I was surplus to requirements, not fit for duty, no longer welcome in a milieu I’d moved in for decades, stuck with me.

Lord Julian has turned to solving mysteries as a lifeline back to dignity, self-respect, and a valued place in society, however marginal. When he’s told to run along before his efforts bear fruit, he’s cut to the quick. Skills he risked his life to develop, lessons learned the hard-and-dangerous way, contributions he’s uniquely suited to making, and he’s supposed to run along?

Delray and Grace,
both of us having fun (I hope)!

He can’t. He can’t and he won’t, because he is a sleuth. It’s not a hobby, not diversion, not a job. It’s who he is.

Have you ever been told to take your hard-earned wisdom and sweat equity and just run along? Have you been tempted to take your sold gold marbles of experience and go home? To one commenter, I’ll send a $100 Amazon gift card (or Apple, Kobo, or B&N if that’s how you roll).

PS: I’ll be putting the blog on hiatus for a few weeks in July, because his lordship has some Christmas sleuthing to do, and I need to get cracking on that tale (along with a few other projects)!

I know not why, but for me the month of June often brings an extended case of the grumpy-blahs. This makes no sense. As a kid, school was my personal purgatory, and June should have been the high point of the year. I should be in the dumps come September if ancient history is still driving my year, but instead I tend to perk up when the weather cools off.

For whatever reason, I am the opposite of perky this time of year. I’m more anxious and down, more susceptible to the intentional evils of social media, despite how diligent I am about avoiding troll farms, doom scrolling, and so forth.

And yet, these annual clouds notwithstanding, there are also aspects of June that I find absolutely delightful. I have been purposely focusing on these glories lately in hopes of beating the blahs sooner rather than later.

Day lilies amaze me. A patch in even modestly favorable conditions can bloom every year for a century, and yet we name the plant based on the brief display made by each individual blossom. A flower with so much philosophical symbolism has to be worth appreciating.

Fireflies. They apparently tootle around in the soil doing Good Things for a two-year larval stage before they put on their magic show, and it is magic.

Verdure. Before the heat cranks up, and sometimes even if the heat cranks up, June present an embarrassment of greenery. Lawns, fields, forests, mountains… around me, it’s all green, and that is about the best anti-anxiety medication I know. As a gardener, I’m also reassured by the sheer tenacity of weeds. No matter how often I pull ’em up, and how many I toss on the compost heap, the weeds never give up. Blessed are the weeds.

Fresh air. Even though my house is powered with renewable energy, I avoid using air conditioning. Last  year, I resorted to a window unit for exactly twelve nights, turning it on for a couple hours to cool down my bedroom and then (usually) turning it off. I do, however, open up my house for the cooler hours–windows and doors, both floors, big fans whirling. Every way I can get fresh air into my space, I do it, and this is good for my mood and mind. I like a chilly, rainy day as well as anybody does, but a few of those back to back, and the air in my house feels manky. June is robustly a fresh air month.

The best showers of the year. Very little in the way of hedonistic pleasure compares with a cool shower at the end of a hot day, especially if I have been doing yard work or barn work. That sensation, of finally, finally getting cool and clean is utter, absolute bliss.

I could go on. Root beer popsicles (eighteen twin pops for $4.47 at my local Weis!) are proof of a benevolent deity, family summer picnics should be reason enough to fund our state and municipal parks. Birdsong in the  morning, cricket lullabies at night… this can be a lovely time of year.

Is there a season that seems to challenge you? A time of year when you seem to have more natural joie de vivre?

I am re-reading The Captive (re-released as The Captive Duke, because keywords rule the world). This exercise is in aid of cutting 15,000 words at the request of a foreign language publisher, and is frankly Not Going Well.

One thing I notice though, is the extent to which my protagonists, Gilly and Christian, grow closer by admitting to one another, essentially, “I can’t do this simple task right now. I need help. I am overwhelmed.” Both have a history of making those admissions to people who should have cared but absolutely did not. Both can hear the subtext from the other even when couched in innuendo, irony, and silence.

I am very fond of this book (and much prefer its original Jon Paul cover, above).

I also happen to be reading Supercommunicators, by Charles Duhigg. The author, whose earlier work largely informed thinking presented by James Clear of Atomic Habits fame, turns his sites on how we communicate, and specifically on the characteristics of those people we consider, “Easy to talk to.”

The easy-to-talk-to conversationalist makes a great hostage negotiator, juvenile parole officer, guidance counselor, therapist, grandma… They are an asset to almost any situation. Duhigg’s analysis of the research suggests that such people share an ability to decipher very quickly what the conversational subtext is.

Whaddazat mean? Duhigg says that most of the time, we’re having one of three different types of conversations, asking to be either helped, heard, or hugged. A conversation asking for assistance focuses on practical issues and problem solving. Hearing another person out often involves relationship or social identity issues, and somebody asking to be hugged is looking to clarify and validate emotions.

All three types of conversations can start with, “Thank heavens it’s Friday!” but the supercommunicator will quickly decipher whether what’s sought is assistance, reflective listening, or emotional engagement.

I am good at offering assistance, at thinking through resources and limitations, looking for critical paths and critical gates. This is more of my top-down thinking in action, but my strong suit also informs how I am most comfortable listening. Oddly enough, I am terrible at asking for practical help myself. Once I understand that somebody needs a sympathetic place to vent versus an experimental design consultant, I can be abundantly sympathetic, but I don’t always change the channel fast enough.

I’m even slower to pick up on conversations that probe relationships and social identity–Who are we? Who am I? Who are you? Can I trust you? What do you believe will always be true about yourself? Where are your boundaries and how do you enforce them?

Duhigg notes that supercommunicators listen more than they talk and listen actively. They will frequently loop back over old ground to ensure meanings and emotions were accurately interpreted. They are quick to use humor to create connections or signal their own vulnerability, and they have the courage to be genuine.

When I think about Gilly and Christian, and what they earned by listening to each other, being brave, taking time, and patiently clarifying signals and subtext, I am inspired to try harder at this easy-to-talk-to business. When I run across a gifted listener, my whole soul is more peaceful and I end the conversation feeling like a more interesting, worthwhile, and articulate version of myself.

Who listens to you? For whom do you make the effort to truly listen?

PS: The web store $.99 discount this month is my Highland Holidays novella quartet, because the day lilies are blooming and that means summer vacay is here at last!

I spent my morning volunteering at the barn today, and the weather was exquisite. By early afternoon, I was ready to go home and do jig saw puzzles or maybe think up a blog post, or just enjoy the glorious weather. I noticed, though, that our program director was sparkling about the barn aisle, arranging flowers, positioning a poster board on a wrought iron stand, assembling goodies, and generally preparing for Something.

Upon inquiry, I was told that a Silver Spurs occasiou was in the offing. A lady in the 97th year of her age had expressed a desire to reconnect with horses, a source of much joy in her earlier life. Her family took the request seriously, and Loudoun Therapeutic Riding agreed to collaborate to make “a dream come true.” The poster depicted this lady in her prime, and cited her accomplishments with one of her memorable equine partners.

She brought an entourage of family and friends, and a good time was had by all. I stayed for the part where she was driven around the farm in a two-wheeled one-horse cart. She even took the reins for a few moments herself. I don’t know if she ended up in the saddle, but the festivities looked headed in that direction.

What I thought as I drove home, was how marvelous to be in the business of making dreams come true. The occasion was joyous, great memories were made, and many pictures taken. The love for this woman was palpable, and I know I wasn’t the only person thinking, “When I’m 97, (if I’m ever 97), I hope I’m still dreaming, and I hope my dreams are still coming true.”

But then I got to thinking about the dreams of mine that already have come true. I passed the bar and was admitted to the practice of law. Lordy, that took a lot of work and years of studying, but I got to be a lawyer, and in a lot of ways, that was a good fit for my abilities.

I am a full-time published author. So many deserving people with so much talent haven’t been able to grab that brass ring, try though they might. I’ve hit the New York Times bestsellers list. Once upon a time, I had lunch with Mary Balogh, and if you’d poked me on that auspicious occasion, nothing but sunshine would have poured forth from my person.

I have traveled to marvelous far-off lands, and once, in 2016, I even traveled with a group of readers.  I rode on the beach in Ireland, and next time I have that good fortune, I am going to canter.

Probably the first dream of mine that ever came true was when my mom bought me a horse. She saved a few dollars from this grocery run, and a few from that birthday budget, and eventually had enough to secure ownership of Buck (who lived up to his name). How great was my joy that day, and how equally great when I gave my daughter her first horse, a venerable old campaigner named Pasha.

All of which is to say, that I am profoundly grateful to each of you, who read my books, chime in on my blogs, and make it possible for me to do this published author gig with joy and meaning. A dream comes true for me every day I get out of bed and sit down to write.

Are you still dreaming? Have you made some dreams come true?

PS: For those who enjoy audio books, Lord Julian’s second mystery, A Gentleman of Dubious Reputation, is now available in audio from the web store. James Langton has done another wonderful job, if I do say so my own humble self!

I’ve asked Nick Kolenda,  a digital marketing expert and all around swell guy, to look at the sales functions on my web store, because I know nuffink with a capital Nuff about e-commerce, but I am very sure that readers deserve the smoothest buying experience I can give them.

In the course of our discussion, Nick mentioned that we have two kinds of attention. One is referred to as top-down, meaning I’m on a web page or in a physical store because I have an objective in mind: Buy half a dozen good quality, dark green, washcloths. On other occasions, I might wander around with what’s called bottom-up attention: Drop by the Home Store and see what catches my eye. Might walk out empty handed, of course, but we all know how probable that outcome is in a well designed store.

This distinction, between top-down and bottom-up attention struck me as having a lot of relevance. Fr’instance, there I was in the saddle, riding Arko the Magnificent. The objective was a maneuver called a leg yield, in which the horse moves both forward and sideways. The result is a little like a grapevine, with the equine facing forward, but moving diagonally.

I was not getting through to Arko, and the harder I tried to rider-splain at him, the more he just put his head up and charged forward. I got so fixed on the objective–get the horse to do the movement–that anything else, like the impact of my shouty riding on our relationship, the cat scampering along the mounting ramp, the horse’s increasing frustration with me–could not penetrate.

I focus top-down a lot. What’s on the to-do list? What’s the critical path for getting it done? What’s the easiest step I can take in the direction of the objective?

But top-down attention is problematic in many situations, such as my ride on Arko. A more bottom-up approach–How’s the horse doing? What feedback am I getting from the instructor? Is it time to take a break or change the subject?–might have resulted in greater progress toward the objective, and in Arko not dreading my next ride, regardless of what we work on.

Relationships are probably better for liberal doses of bottom-up thinking. The early stages of vacation planning, putting together a menu, creativity in general… all benefit from strong bottom-up focus. Lord Julian, by contrast, needs both top-down and bottom-up attention to solve his mysteries.

The part of writing a novel that I struggle with the most is plotting. What is the real, substantial, interesting thing keeping the protagonists apart? What choices has this character blown in the past? What would engulf them in despair? What’s the compelling evidence they are pre-programmed to ignore or misconstrue? These are all bottom-up questions that require a broad, open-minded approach on a schedule of my imagination’s choosing.

Once I know where the story is going, I can write the livin’ peedywaddles out of it, but all that peering under rocks and watching clouds… it’s hard for me. Other writers love the sifting and what-if-ing, and for them, getting the words on the page takes unrelenting discipline.

I suspect a lucky few of us can move between top-down and bottom-up focus with instinctive ease, but for me, top-down, especially in new situations, is the default mode, and that is sometimes a spectacularly wrong approach (just ask Arko). Do you have a default mode when it comes to how you focus your attention? Does your default ever get you in trouble?

I’ll send a signed copy of A Gentleman in Search of a Wife to one commenter, not limited to the US, because my lovely readers are from all over the map!

I recently finished reading The Man Who Broke Napoleon’s Codes, by Mark Urban. This very readable book recounts the progress of one Major George Scovell both as Wellington battled his way across Spain, and as George battled something called the Great Paris Cipher (code) while serving under Wellington as an assistant quartermaster. Wellington won in large part because George won first, but His Grace was parsimonious in praising Scovell. When peace meant Scovell fell on hard times, Wellington apparently did not even acknowledge his cryptographer’s one plea to his old boss for help.

Wellington had a bias against any military system that promoted officers based on merit, and most particularly against officers who had come up through ranks on the basis of outstanding performance. When Scovell widgied his way into an officer’s billet, he had left behind the august position of tailor’s apprentice.

Wellington’s argument was that elevating men who had no connection “with the land,” (meaning ownership of real property), would result in revolution. Exhibit one, of course, was France. Give these base-born guys a taste for power and authority, inure them to violence, and next thing you know, the scum of earth, as Wellington referred to his largely Scottish and Irish recruits, will be breaking down the palace gates.

Throughout the Peninsular campaign, Wellington had first-hand evidence that officers drawn from the peerage could be disastrous in command, and officers risen through the ranks quite talented (and somewhat conversely). Still, he did not change his mind about who should be an officer, and how they should get the job (essentially by buying in). The fact that the French army, with its merit promotion scheme, was pretty much beating the breeches off everybody else was also insufficient to give His Grace pause.

Credit:: Wikipedia

Nothing changed Wellington’s mind, no matter how deadly the bungling of his less competent aristocratic officers (much less his own bungling) became, no matter how great the contribution of his officers from humbler origins.

I contrast Wellington’s intransigence with an exchange I had on social media, on the topic of Wellington’s traffic cones. In downtown Glasgow, you will find an equestrian statue of His Grace, and usually, somebody has put a traffic cone on the duke’s head. His horse gets a few from time to time as well, and sometimes, as many as eight cones will be stacked atop the ducal bean. The constables regularly remove the cones, and in the dark of night, somebody replaces the duke’s millinery.

A commenter was offended that anybody who risked his life to defend his country (Wellington, and he absolutely was in mortal danger on many occasions) should be the subject of ridicule, When it was explained (by me) that this was a Scottish context, that serving under Wellington was much riskier than being Wellington, and in point of fact, the Scots had always been deployed to the scenes of the worst fighting and taken horrible casualties under His Grace… well, the commenter modified her stance. She still didn’t find any humor in the tradition, but she understood why, from a Scottish perspective, traffic cones might have some validity.

She changed her mind. Not radically, not on a major issue, but she could admit of more than one valid perspective.

On the one hand, I don’t expect I will change my values very easily–be kind, tell the truth. You won’t get me to budge very far off that prime directive. But my opinions? My theories of human behavior? My cherished prejudices? I would like to be more like my Facebook friend, who could yield a little in the face of new data, who could accept that reasonable people can differ.

When was the last time you changed your mind? Have you succeeded in changing a mind set on some fixed belief?

PS: A Gentleman in Search of a Wife goes on sale at the retail sites Friday!

I was put in mind this week of a scene from one of the Beethoven bio-pics. Immortal Beloved, perhaps. (Some music history major, you are, Grace Ann.)

Ludwig is going deaf, and yet, he continues to compose. He’s picking fights with friends and family, scared of approaching deafness, charm-free, and hitting middle-age hard. And yet, he composes, and even–against the advice of friends–conducts the premier of the Fifth Symphony (or maybe the Ninth?). In the film, as the final movement is reaching its ultimate crescendo, the sound fades, and we’re left with the image of this un-handsome guy, flailing around with his baton, while the violins saw away, and the tympani thump along… in silence.

The piece concludes, and Beethoven stands there, staring at the last page of the score, apparently unable to make himself leave the stage or close the score or anything. One of the musicians takes him by the shoulders, and turns him around, and all unbeknownst to Ludwig, the entire gargantuan Theater an der Wien has erupted in wild applause. The crowd is going wild, but first we get several silent seconds of Ludwig, watching this response and trying to process it, before the sound cuts back in.

And you cannot watch that scene without your heart breaking for old Ludwig. He was a difficult uncle to his nephew, ungracious to some of his patrons, a demanding friend, tight-fisted, and cranky, but by god, he earned that applause. Precisely because he was difficult, lonely, and insecure, he deserved to take to heart every bravo and “Bis!”

But he couldn’t. I was put in mind of that scene when a family member reported winning the top prize in her industry this week, one decided by her peers, and her response was, essentially, “I’m honored. This is very nice. Now something bad has to happen, right?” She, who has toiled for decades in a difficult and often cut-throat vineyard, reported a version of imposter syndrome that sent me shooting around the room backward with flames coming out my nose.

I understand that we should remember hurts and harms, the better to guard against them happening to us again. That’s sensible, within limits, but where is it decreed that we should brush aside accolades, minimize them, and even mistrust them? Invariably, when I am having a bad writing day, and my book hates me, and the whole manuscript is the worst draft of anything ever to ooze out of the fictional swamp, a reader will email me out of the blue: I have read everything you’ve written and please don’t stop writing. I re-read your oldies until they fall apart in my hands and then I buy a new copy.

Heaven help me if the day ever comes when those emails can’t grab my heart. May the day never arrive when I shrug and hit delete when somebody has taken time to appreciate my work and encourage me to keep going. And yet, if you tell me I look good? Shrug. I look like me, right? If you tell me my yard flowers are pretty? Erm, thanks. We sure could use some rain, couldn’t we?

I still have work to do, catching the compliments, to use the title of one of Donna Ashworth’s recent poems. I’m better at keeping the kind and encouraging words close than I was earlier in life, but it’s still tempting sometimes to heed the societal tapes that say, “You are not one of the cool/smart/attractive/interesting/charming kids and you never will be.” It’s tempting to be like Ludwig, staring at that magnificent score in silence, heedless of the applause.

How do you do with compliments and encouragement? Easier to give than get? Easier from some people than others? I’ve sent out the first batch of Gentleman in Search of a Wife ARCs, but you can email me at [email protected] if you’d like one. (Also, print version available here.)

I woke up Tuesday morning in an inordinately good mood. The alarm wasn’t due to go off for an hour, I’d slept badly, and my right ankle was hurting, but my outlook was rosy. The sound that had awakened me was my upstairs cat, Augustus, purring next to my pillow. How could I not love that guy?

Because the weather has warmed up (90F on Monday), the windows of my house are now open pretty much 24-7, and Monday night I’d fallen asleep to the sound of the neighbor’s cows, shuffling around in tall spring grass and munching it down to size. A lovely lullaby.

Where am I going with this? Welp, I recently came across a study on how our mode of waking affects blood pressure spikes, which are a factor in stroke prediction. One of my siblings had a stroke at age 57 while out on his morning jog (yes, he was religious about taking his BP meds, and as a nutritionist, extremely careful about his diet). I’m thus aware that blood pressure generally does spike first thing in the day. Up we shall get, and our BP rises sharply when we do.

But an increasing body of medical evidence adds a footnote: If you are awakened by a sudden, jarring sound, your fight or flight response is triggered, and your morning BP spike will be higher than ever. Your whole day could be more anxious and less healthy because of that fire truck siren that wailed you to consciousness. From a cave-dwelling perspective, that makes perfect sense to me.

Authors are encouraged to include sound as a part of any scene setting, because it’s a simple way to foreshadow action or signal conflict. A piano out of tune in the upper register, a footman bellowing a naughty drinking song, a violin drilling minor scales… readers pick up on the potential cues in all of those aural details even if they don’t immediately think, “That out of tune piano means Aunt Sniffy will refuse to grant our struggling heroine a  loan!”

As Wellington’s army advanced across Spain, his night pickets were always careful to keep some grazing horses nearby. The soldiers on guard duty could not hear French snipers skulking in the undergrowth, but the horses could. The soldiers knew that if the horses stopped nom-nomming at the grass, that was a change in the soundscape even a sleepy private would notice.

All of this has me thinking about how conscientious some people are about managing their soundscapes. From noise-canceling headphones, to commuting playlists, to custom ring tones, and workout shuffles, some of us are apparently aware that what we hear can have a significant affect on our health and outlook.

I don’t have playlists and so forth, and realize that in not taking a hand in what I hear, I’m bypassing what could be a useful tool in protecting my health and my good spirits. So this is me, looking for a birdsong morning alarm, and some peaceful tunes to sign off with as I go through my nighty-nighty routine.

What parts of your soundscape do you manage? Are there any sounds in particular that drive you ’round the bend? (Looking at you, neighbor guys, and your Saturday morning lawn-mowing festivals.)

The time approaches when I need to make my ARC list for A Gentleman in Search of Wife. If you’ve recently sent me your email addie, I still have it. If you’d like an early peek at Lord Julian’s next adventure, email me at [email protected] (quietly, of course).

Also, the first print edition (and probably the cheapest) of Gent in Search is available on Amazon. More print links to follow shortly!