This is the second part of the picture journey through my novels. Love of a Stonemason is the sequel to An Uncommon Family. Since both my novels take place in different countries, I thought it would be fun for readers (both past and prospective) to see some of the places which inspired me and made their way into my books.
More information about the first book, An Uncommon Family, as well as the pictures to it, you can find here.
Blurb for Love of a Stonemason:
The young painter, Karla Bocelli, is all too familiar with loss. When she was five years old, her mother died in a car crash in the south of Switzerland. Her Peruvian father lives at the other end of the world, and a year ago, her aunt and guardian passed away. Now, at age twenty-four, Karla almost gets hit by a speeding car. As if this wasn't fateful enough, Andreas, the driver, turns out to be a sculptor and carver of tombstones. In spite of his profession, Andreas is anything but morbid. Quick-tempered and intense, he exudes a rough-and-tumble energy. After a tumultuous start of their relationship, Karla comes to see in Andreas the "rock in her life," the perfect antidote to her fears of abandonment and bouts of depression. Andreas, however, wrestles with his own ghosts: an alcoholic father who abused him as a child and his own fits of anger. Together, the two artists must confront the demons that haunt them.
Love of a Stonemason is the story about the struggle of two artists with their past, their family, their creativity, and their love for each other. It takes the reader on a journey full of sights, smells, tastes, and sounds from the south of Switzerland to Italy and the Peruvian Andes.
And now, sit back, relax and enjoy:
Love of a Stonemason - a journey in pictures
My Books
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
A picture journey through my novels, part 2, Love of a Stonemason
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Mrs. Dubeli goes to America—or does she? German/English/Confusion Galore
I’m having writer’s block, or something similar. After finishing two novels, I have been working on a third one. I figured I’ll make the series “Family Portrait” a trilogy with “An Uncommon Family” and “Love of a Stonemason” as part one and two. I wrote about 70 pages of part three, only to realize I’m running out of steam. The first part of the novel went really well, but now I’m stuck.
So, I figured perhaps it’s time to put it aside for now and write something totally new. Since I’m in Switzerland and have been doing a lot of German reading and writing, I thought about writing something in German for a change. I began a story with the title “Mrs. Dubeli goes to America” or, in German, “Frau Dübeli geht nach Amerika.“ It’s about an older Swiss lady whose husband worked in California off and on. During one of the trips there, he was found dead at the bottom of a cliff overhanging the Pacific Ocean. After getting over the initial shock and grief, Mrs. Dubeli begins to have doubts about the official version of her husband’s accidental death. She knew that he was extremely afraid of heights and would never even think of stepping that close to a cliff where he could fall down. Something was fishy here and the feisty and resolute Swiss woman decides to travel to California to find out for herself what happened to her husband.
Possibilities:
1) He was pushed, because he was a danger to someone? Whom? Why?
2) He had an affair, fathered a child, and killed himself out of desperation?
3) He had an affair, fathered a child, and someone killed him? The lover? The lover’s husband?4) He was involved in some shady business and ???
5) ???
6) ???
On top of it, I keep switching back and forth between English and German and when I come to a point where I’m more than confused and afraid I’ll never write another decent story again, I flee from writing all together and keep on reading novel after novel. In the middle of reading a novel, I have a panic attack—but I’m supposed to write, damn it. I wake up in the middle of the night, sweating and screaming. HELP.
I try traveling, visiting friends, enjoying the beautiful landscape here but as far as my writing wasteland is concerned, nothing has helped so far.
Hey, does that sound familiar to anyone?
Well, cheers anyway!
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
I learn by going where I have to go
I have been talking to my friends from all walks of life and reading other author's blogs and the one question that keeps coming up in various forms can perhaps be summarized as follows: "Am I on the right path? Should I turn left or right? What if I find out after several years that I took the wrong turn, that I should've done this or done that instead of wasting my time on this or that?"I guess we'll never know, if we don't start walking. It reminded me of the following poem by Theodore Roethke:
The Waking by Theodore Roethke
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.
We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Of those so close beside me, which are you?
God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
And learn by going where I have to go.
Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?
The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Great Nature has another thing to do
To you and me; so take the lively air,
And, lovely, learn by going where to go.
This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go."
Have a wonderful day!
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
Monday, August 8, 2011
Indie authors--a reality check!!
2) Publishing books the traditional way. That’s even harder, unless you have at least ten years to find an agent and the agent will need another ten years to find a publisher (if the agent lasts that long and doesn’t decide to quit and go bag groceries—there is nothing wrong with bagging groceries by the way). Okay, so perhaps I exaggerate a little. I haven’t tried that route for very long, so I’m not an expert here.
3) Publishing books as an independent author—fairly easy these days. BUT here is the clincher: promotion. It can be done BUT IT TAKES TIME. And that’s where many indie authors dive into a world of illusions. You write an excellent novel or two (that’s the bottom line), you do everything right, hire an editor, spend some money on a cover design, post in Amazon, B&N or other venue, blog about it, go on Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, Google+, collect reviews and expect to sell books like hot cakes, quit your day job (big trouble), and live happily ever after. It doesn’t happen that way.
The competition is fierce. There are thousands of independent authors fighting for a spot in the limelight and on Amazon bestseller list. I’m not saying it can’t happen. There are independently published authors who are successful and are able to support themselves that way and there will be more in the future. I personally know of a couple, one of them is Scott Nicholson, my editor. If you study the background of the authors who made the jump successfully, you will notice several common elements.
1) Most of these authors have written and published many books, anywhere from 10 to 20 or more.
2) They tend to write in a popular genre (thrillers, romance, YA).
3) Some have been published traditionally before going indie.
4) They know something about promotion and if they don’t, they are willing to learn.
5) They work their butts off and have been doing it for many years, often without much external or monetary reward.
6) They got lucky (important factor).
So, what are we newbies who have perhaps one or two novels under our belt and published them last year and perhaps this year supposed to do? Well, I can’t tell you what you have to do; I can only tell you what I plan to do.
I don’t depend on my writing to make a living, at least not yet. That doesn't mean it couldn't happen one day, but I am not holding my breath. And not depending on the income from my books gives me more freedom to explore and experiment with my writing, and it takes that awful pressure away of having to sell books all the time. I make my money as a freelance translator, I do odd jobs, I work temp jobs at a university. I know, I know, I hear you. Then you don’t have enough time to write. I wrote and published two novels and I translated one into German. I get up at five in the morning (okay, so sometimes it’s six), I don’t watch much TV, I have no social life, at least none to speak of. If you write one page a day, you have a 365-page novel in one year (which is much too long for readers with today’s limited attention span).
I sell a few books here and there, get some royalty checks that make me feel great. And I am the happiest person on earth if someone likes my books. That’s the greatest feeling of all. That’s why I try to write reviews of books I like to tell other authors that they made a difference in my life, that they touched me in a deep way.
And isn’t that what writing is all about, what art in general is all about? To go beyond the surface of things, to dig a little deeper than the glitzy veneer of “success,” and to share something meaningful with others. Do I sound like an old-fashioned fuddy-duddy idealist? Perhaps.
See, my background is in poetry, so I am used to not making any money as a writer. Poets—even famous poets or poet laureates—can usually not support themselves through their poetry alone. They either have a university job, they translate if they know more than one language, they teach, they have workshops, they bag groceries.
But there will always be times, in spite of all the wonderful things I just listed, when we feel down, misunderstood, discouraged, just simply rotten. IT’S CALLED LIFE. Get it? If we feel that way, it helps to connect with other authors, blog about your whine fest. It’s always good to know, we are not alone. Perhaps do something nice for someone else, it makes us feel better. Perhaps read a book—writers are supposed to read! And then let’s get back to work.
Happy writing—and reading!
 |
I have been talking and emailing with some of my fellow independently published authors about the problem of making it in the writing world, about selling books, getting some cold cash, climbing up the ladder of the giant Amazon or whatever other venue we have chosen. I can tell you, it has been a sob & whine fest (not wine, that would be a lot better), to say the least. I think we all need a reality check.
1) Writing books is hard. We are confronted with our demons of inferiority, doubt—does anybody really want to read this crap? Then there are moments of elation. Yes, yes, yes, I did it, I like it. If we don’t have these occasional warm feelings pulsing through our veins and arteries, we would give up sooner or later.
2) Publishing books the traditional way. That’s even harder, unless you have at least ten years to find an agent and the agent will need another ten years to find a publisher (if the agent lasts that long and doesn’t decide to quit and go bag groceries—there is nothing wrong with bagging groceries by the way). Okay, so perhaps I exaggerate a little. I haven’t tried that route for very long, so I’m not an expert here.
3) Publishing books as an independent author—fairly easy these days. BUT here is the clincher: promotion. It can be done BUT IT TAKES TIME. And that’s where many indie authors dive into a world of illusions. You write an excellent novel or two (that’s the bottom line), you do everything right, hire an editor, spend some money on a cover design, post in Amazon, B&N or other venue, blog about it, go on Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, Google+, collect reviews and expect to sell books like hot cakes, quit your day job (big trouble), and live happily ever after. It doesn’t happen that way.
The competition is fierce. There are thousands of independent authors fighting for a spot in the limelight and on Amazon bestseller list. I’m not saying it can’t happen. There are independently published authors who are successful and are able to support themselves that way and there will be more in the future. I personally know of a couple, one of them is Scott Nicholson, my editor. If you study the background of the authors who made the jump successfully, you will notice several common elements.
1) Most of these authors have written and published many books, anywhere from 10 to 20 or more.
2) They tend to write in a popular genre (thrillers, romance, YA).
3) Some have been published traditionally before going indie.
4) They know something about promotion and if they don’t, they are willing to learn.
5) They work their butts off and have been doing it for many years, often without much external or monetary reward.
6) They got lucky (important factor).
So, what are we newbies who have perhaps one or two novels under our belt and published them last year and perhaps this year supposed to do? Well, I can’t tell you what you have to do; I can only tell you what I plan to do.
I don’t depend on my writing to make a living, at least not yet. That doesn't mean it couldn't happen one day, but I am not holding my breath. And not depending on the income from my books gives me more freedom to explore and experiment with my writing, and it takes that awful pressure away of having to sell books all the time. I make my money as a freelance translator, I do odd jobs, I work temp jobs at a university. I know, I know, I hear you. Then you don’t have enough time to write. I wrote and published two novels and I translated one into German. I get up at five in the morning (okay, so sometimes it’s six), I don’t watch much TV, I have no social life, at least none to speak of. If you write one page a day, you have a 365-page novel in one year (which is much too long for readers with today’s limited attention span).
I sell a few books here and there, get some royalty checks that make me feel great. And I am the happiest person on earth if someone likes my books. That’s the greatest feeling of all. That’s why I try to write reviews of books I like to tell other authors that they made a difference in my life, that they touched me in a deep way.
And isn’t that what writing is all about, what art in general is all about? To go beyond the surface of things, to dig a little deeper than the glitzy veneer of “success,” and to share something meaningful with others. Do I sound like an old-fashioned fuddy-duddy idealist? Perhaps.
See, my background is in poetry, so I am used to not making any money as a writer. Poets—even famous poets or poet laureates—can usually not support themselves through their poetry alone. They either have a university job, they translate if they know more than one language, they teach, they have workshops, they bag groceries.
But there will always be times, in spite of all the wonderful things I just listed, when we feel down, misunderstood, discouraged, just simply rotten. IT’S CALLED LIFE. Get it? If we feel that way, it helps to connect with other authors, blog about your whine fest. It’s always good to know, we are not alone. Perhaps do something nice for someone else, it makes us feel better. Perhaps read a book—writers are supposed to read! And then let’s get back to work.
Happy writing—and reading!
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Wickedly funny and delightfully entertaining - 5 stars for LIGHTHORSE MAGIC & OTHER STORIES by Lindsay Edmunds
In CEL & ANNA Lindsay Edmunds created a twenty-second century world full of fabulous events and fascinating characters. Her book LIGHTHORSE MAGIC & OTHER STORIES is a series of poignant stories about some of the quirky characters we meet in CEL & ANNA. These are companion stories to CEL & ANNA but they are fascinating enough on their own. In the first story, we meet Anna Ringer, the heroine in CEL & ANNA, and her mysterious and creepy employer Lighthorse Magic, a company that spies on humans for supposedly scientific research. The second story deals with Tamara Klugman, whose dull life transforms into a fascinating quest to save the world and the third story deals with Joan Holland, another character from CEL & ANNA, who is faced with the choice of protecting innocent people from the cruel and preying Public Eye, aka the Government.
Lindsay Edmund's writing is different from anything I have read in the science fiction/fantasy genre. She does a great job of mixing reality with fantasy. I love her original and refreshing style, the vivid images, and the wonderfully wicked humor. You don't need to be a science fiction fan to enjoy these stories. A fast-paced, brilliant read. Highly recommended.
Lindsay Edmund's writing is different from anything I have read in the science fiction/fantasy genre. She does a great job of mixing reality with fantasy. I love her original and refreshing style, the vivid images, and the wonderfully wicked humor. You don't need to be a science fiction fan to enjoy these stories. A fast-paced, brilliant read. Highly recommended.
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Love Binding Creative Souls
I enjoy an author that can use description to carry me away and place me in locations that I can enjoy within my mind's eye. Christa Polkinhorn does just that in Love of a Stonemason. From Switzerland to Italy to Peru, I enjoyed vistas I will never see; felt breezes across lakes and through valleys I will never personally feel; was surrounded by local scents from exotic dishes and fields of flowers that I will never smell.
The title of her book first intrigued me as my grandfather was a stonemason and her Andreas brought back many memories of watching the way 'Grampa' could press his will upon a piece of granite.
Her Karla is an artist and I understood her challenges when approaching a blank canvas. Once upon a time I painted and Christa tweaked my mind with the scent of turpentine and the feel of paint on the brush as it made magic on the easel.
But more than a romance between creative minds, this story digs deep into the early trauma of each and follows their struggle in resolving their individual demons.
This would be the perfect book to tuck in your suitcase or add to your kindle for that "myself" time this summer. Pick your own special spot - perhaps in the shade of a maple tree beside a secluded cove at the lake. Ah, sounds of waves lapping gently on the shore, glass of wine and Love of a Stonemason.
Elizabeth Egerton WilderAuthor of The Spruce Gum Box
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
Sunday, July 24, 2011
5 Stars for "All for One" by Ryne Douglas Pearson
The cruel school bully gets killed. Six children discover his body, one of them may have murdered him. Detective Dooley Ashe, the Kiddie Catcher, tries to uncover the truth. Mary, the children’s teacher, would do anything to protect them. With different goals in mind, Dooley and Mary form an uneasy alliance. As the story progresses to its tragic end, both Dooley and Mary are confronted with demons from their past.
As one of the reviewers pointed out, All for One is in part a story about choices, choices we have to make, sometimes under pressure, and how these choices have results that determine the rest of our lives. It deals with psychologically complex and terribly flawed human beings. It is also a story about childhood abuse, injustice, and about good people who try their best and sometimes succeed and sometimes fail.
All for One is one of the best psychological thrillers I have read in quite a while. The characters are convincing and portrayed with great sensibility. A fast-paced and well-crafted mystery, it leads the reader through a maze of events and flashbacks and unexpected twists to an amazing surprise ending. However, is not one of those contrived surprise endings of less successful thrillers. This ending, as unexpected as it is, is foreshadowed and makes total sense in retrospect.
Highly recommended. I look forward to more of the same author.
As one of the reviewers pointed out, All for One is in part a story about choices, choices we have to make, sometimes under pressure, and how these choices have results that determine the rest of our lives. It deals with psychologically complex and terribly flawed human beings. It is also a story about childhood abuse, injustice, and about good people who try their best and sometimes succeed and sometimes fail.
All for One is one of the best psychological thrillers I have read in quite a while. The characters are convincing and portrayed with great sensibility. A fast-paced and well-crafted mystery, it leads the reader through a maze of events and flashbacks and unexpected twists to an amazing surprise ending. However, is not one of those contrived surprise endings of less successful thrillers. This ending, as unexpected as it is, is foreshadowed and makes total sense in retrospect.
Highly recommended. I look forward to more of the same author.
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
Monday, July 11, 2011
Launch of "Four Hundred Days" - Part Two of the fabulous Lor Mandela Series by Lisa Carroll
I read the first part of the Lor Mandela series: Lor Mandela - Destruction from Twins and I LOVED it. I look forward to the second part, which will be released July 15!
Here is a brief synopsis:
When Audril, the heiress to the Lor Mandelan throne, sneaks away to Earth to save one of her dearest friends, she finds that a power hungry tyrant from her own world has begun systematically obliterating towns and cities to get her to turn herself over to him.
On Earth, she meets a wildly eccentric old lady named Teedee Venilworth whose imaginary butler/fiancé supposedly holds the key to her success. But how can someone help if he doesn't exist? Could it be that creatures who dwell in shadow are not exclusive to Lor Mandela?
Book number two in the Lor Mandela Series, Lor Mandela – Four Hundred Days, is an action-packed whirlwind of intrigue and fantasy. Join the extraordinary characters from the first book, (both the good and the evil), as they traverse the haunted corridors of Alcatraz Penitentiary, travel via portal to an ancient castle on the cliff shores of Ireland, and meet a foreboding race of mystic warriors known as the Solom.
Soar on the back of a large horse-like creature to the Northern High Forests and discover that on the picturesque world of Lor Mandela, your friends can become foes, your enemies your allies, and just because someone dies, it doesn’t always mean that they’re dead.
Click on the image on the left to find out more about Part One of the series.
Links to books and author:
http://www.lormandela.com/
http://www.lormandela.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Lor-Mandela-Series/169357859780493
http://twitter.com/#!/lormandeladft
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Hot off the press: "An Uncommon Family" - Book One of "Family Portrait"
Just published my new novel An Uncommon Family, Book One of the Family Portrait series. Book Two, Love of a Stonemason was published in 2010. In other words, I wrote the second book before the first. I do things backward sometimes.
The novels, however, can be read in any order. The link between them is the main character, Karla, the young painter. Here are the blurbs to both novels:
An Uncommon Family:
A chance meeting between a middle-aged woman, a widower, and a semi-orphaned child in the city of Zurich, Switzerland, brings together three people who grapple with a past of loss and betrayal. Six-year-old Karla, whose mother died in a car crash, has a hard time accepting the loss. Anna, her aunt and guardian, struggles with her former husband’s deception and her shattered confidence in men, and Jonas, artist and teacher, mourns the death of his wife.
While trying to help Karla, a talented but troubled child, Anna and Jonas develop feelings for each other that go beyond friendship. The budding romance, however, hits a snag when Anna discovers a sinister secret in Jonas’s past. While the two adults have come to an impasse, young Karla takes matters into her own hands. Together with a friend, she develops a plan to bring the two uncooperative adults back together. The plan, however, creates havoc and as it begins to unravel, Karla is forced to learn some difficult lessons.
An Uncommon Family is a story about loss, lies, and betrayal but also about the healing power of love and forgiveness. It takes place in Switzerland, New York City, and Guadalajara, Mexico.
If you want to accompany Karla on her way to becoming a painter and grow as a person while struggling with turbulent love relationships, try Love of a Stonemason:
The young painter, Karla Bocelli, is all too familiar with loss. When she was five years old, her mother died in a car crash in the south of Switzerland. Her Peruvian father lives at the other end of the world, and a year ago, her aunt and guardian passed away. Now, at age twenty-four, Karla almost gets hit by a speeding car. As if this wasn't fateful enough, Andreas, the driver, turns out to be a sculptor and carver of tombstones.
In spite of his profession, Andreas is anything but morbid. Quick-tempered and intense, he exudes a rough-and-tumble energy. After a tumultuous start of their relationship, Karla comes to see in Andreas the "rock in her life," the perfect antidote to her fears of abandonment and bouts of depression. Andreas, however, wrestles with his own ghosts: an alcoholic father who abused him as a child and his own fits of anger. Together, the two artists must confront the demons that haunt them.
Love of a Stonemason is a story about the struggle of two artists with their past, their family, their creativity, and their love for each other. Told from the point of view of Karla, it depicts the world through her painter's sensibility. It takes the reader on a journey full of sights, smells, tastes, and sounds from the south of Switzerland to Italy and the Peruvian Andes.
For a limited time only, both novels are available at Amazon for the Kindle (click on the cover icons on the right), at Barnes&Noble.com for the Nook and at Smashwords for multiple devices for ONLY 99 cents each. Get your summer reading at an affordable price!
Lindsay Edmunds granted me an interview at her lovely blog. Check it out!
Check out Neal Hock's great review!
More reviews on Amazon.
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
An Uncommon Family - Preview
Blurb and Chapter One:
A chance meeting between a middle-aged woman, a widower, and a semi-orphaned child in the city of Zurich, Switzerland, brings together three people who grapple with a past of loss and betrayal. Six-year-old Karla, whose mother died in a car crash, has a hard time accepting the loss. Anna, her aunt and guardian, struggles with her former husband's deception and her shattered confidence in men, and Jonas, artist and teacher, mourns the death of his wife.
While trying to help Karla, a talented but troubled child, Anna and Jonas develop feelings for each other that go beyond friendship. The budding romance, however, hits a snag when Anna discovers a sinister secret in Jonas’s past. While the two adults have come to an impasse, young Karla takes matters into her own hands. Together with a friend, she develops a plan to bring the two uncooperative adults back together. The plan, however, creates havoc and as it begins to unravel, Karla is forced to learn some difficult lessons.
An Uncommon Family is a story about loss, lies, and betrayal but also about the healing power of love and forgiveness. It takes place in Switzerland, New York City, and Guadalajara, Mexico.
Chapter 1
Karla licked the crispy cone, trying to catch the sliding droplets before they hit the ground. The raspberry ice cream was a dark purple, her favorite color. She wrinkled her nose as she caught another whiff of exhaust from the busy street along the Limmat River in the city of Zurich. It was August and hot in Switzerland. The six-year-old girl scanned the scenery in front of her with dreamy eyes.
A longish canoe was sliding by a tourist boat on the river. People with funny-looking sun hats and dark glasses sat on the benches of the boat. Along the river on the other side, the built-together stone houses looked like a row of uneven different-colored teeth, gray, yellow, white, and some with a tint of orange. Behind the houses, on top of the hill, the linden trees at the park shimmered in their pale-green foliage and a curtain of dark-green ivy hid part of the gray granite wall.
Karla took another lick from her ice-cream cone, then turned around and peered through the window of the art shop, where her aunt picked up two framed pictures. When she looked back at the sidewalk, her breath caught.
“Mama?” she whispered.
She saw the woman only from behind, but the bounce in her step, the long, reddish-blond hair flowing down her back, swaying left and right, the tall, slender figure—it must be her mother. She tossed the rest of the ice cream into the trash can, got up, and ran after the woman.
“Mama!” she called as the woman got ready to cross the street. The light turned from blinking red to solid red, just as the woman reached the other side. Karla rushed after her, barely aware of the honking around her or of the shrill warning bell of the blue-and-white streetcar. She heard someone yell at her but by then she had arrived at the other side. The woman was walking along the river toward the Lake of Zurich.
“Mama, wait!” Karla bumped into someone.
“Watch it, kiddo.” A man stepped aside.
“Mama . . .”
The woman finally turned around and looked back, scanning the people behind her, then walked on. Karla stopped dumbfounded. It was the face of a stranger.
A wave of despair washed over her. Not believing that she could have been so wrong, she started to run again. She didn’t see the slight indentation in the pavement. As she fell, she barely noticed the searing pain in her knees; the disappointment hurt more. She covered her face with her hands and sobbed. Mama would have helped her. Mama would have picked her up, hugged her, and even sang a little tune to her to make her feel better. But her mother was gone.
“Are you hurt, honey?” a dark voice said. Karla felt a hand on her back. “Come on, let me see.”
A pair of strong arms lifted her up. She looked into a face with a gray-white beard and kind, blue eyes below thick tufts of eyebrows. The man was tall and sturdy. He had wildish white hair. He reminded her of Saint Nicholas. But it was summer and Saint Nicholas only appeared in December.
“Are you here alone?” he asked. “Where’s your mother?”
The question brought a new flood of tears. “I thought it was Mama,” Karla managed to say, her chest heaving with sobs.
“Karla, what happened? Why did you run away?” Aunt Anna came rushing toward her, clutching her purse and a large package. “I thought I’d lost you. Jesus, what happened to your knees?” She bent down, put the package on the concrete and examined Karla’s legs. Brushing a strand of wavy brown hair out of her face, she peered at the man with gray-blue eyes, the color of ice. “What’s going on here?”
“I just happened to walk by when she fell,” he explained. “She said something about looking for her mother. Are you her mother?”
Anna shook her head. “No, I’m her aunt. Her mother . . . died half a year ago.”
“I’m so sorry.” The old man gently touched Karla’s cheek. “But she thought she saw her mother.”
Anna sighed. “She still hasn’t accepted the truth.” She turned to Karla. “Tell me what happened, sweetie?”
Karla told her between sobs that a woman had walked by who looked exactly like her mama.
“But you know that’s not possible, don’t you?” Aunt Anna hugged her. Karla leaned her face against Anna’s chest and poured her sorrow into her sweater. It was soft but didn’t smell like her mama’s. Anna waited for her to calm down. “We have to take care of your knees.”
“There’s a pharmacy right over there. I’m sure they have something to clean the wound and some bandages. May I?” Saint Nicholas gave Anna an inquiring look.
Anna nodded and the man lifted Karla up. His thick hair tickled her cheek. Karla wrinkled her nose. He gave off a faint whiff of smoke, which reminded her of Anna’s woodstove. It felt a little comforting.
At the pharmacy, a friendly lady took care of Karla’s knees. She wiped them clean, trying not to hurt Karla, who flinched and gave an occasional sob. “Sorry, hon, but we don’t want it to get infected.”
While the woman bandaged Karla’s legs, Anna unwrapped the package she had been carrying. She handed Karla one of the pictures and held the other one up for her to see. “Don’t they look beautiful?”
Karla nodded with a weak smile. They did look nice. She barely recognized them again behind the glass and surrounded by a fine wooden frame. One of them showed a woman, sitting on a chair and holding a little girl in her arm. The woman had long reddish-brown hair and the girl’s hair was black. They were sitting in front of a house. The stones in the wall had an irregular shape; they looked a little bit like cobblestones. It had taken Karla a while to make them look right. The other picture showed a tree with large purple and cream-colored blossoms. It was the chestnut tree in front of Karla’s old home. She had painted the pictures with her favorite pastel pens.
“They’re gorgeous,” Saint Nicholas said in his deep voice. “Who painted those?”
“Karla did,” Aunt Anna said.
Saint Nicholas stared at her, then at the pictures, then at Karla. “How old is she?”
“Six,” Karla said, brushing the last tears off her face. Anna handed her a Kleenex.
“And she painted those by herself, without help?” The man squinted as he scanned the pictures. The wrinkles on his forehead and around his eyes deepened. He truly did look like Saint Nicholas.
“Yes,” Anna said.
“This child is very talented. Does she get any instruction?”
“I’m actually looking for a teacher for her. She loves to draw and paint. If it was up to her, she’d do it all day long. And it seems to help her with . . . you know, the loss.”
“Amazing.” Saint Nicholas shook his head and continued to scan the pictures. “Well, I happen to be a painter myself. I also teach a few children.” He looked at Karla and Anna with a serious face. “I’d love to have her as a student.”
“I’ll think about it. That would be great,” Anna said.
“Why don’t you check me out?” The man pulled his wallet from his back pocket, opened it, and took out a small gray card. “Here is my address and phone number and on the back a few references.” He handed Anna the card. “Whatever you decide to do though, you don’t want a talent like this go to waste.”
Anna studied the card. “Very interesting, Mr. Bergman.”
“Call me Jonas,” the man said.
“Anna,” Karla’s aunt said as the two shook hands.
“You’re not Saint Nicholas?” Karla asked, surprised.
Aunt Anna and the man laughed. “No, I’m sorry. You think I look like him?” He brushed through his wavy white hair.
Karla nodded. “But you wouldn’t come in summer, would you?” She looked down at her neatly wrapped knees. The talk of drawing and painting had pulled her out of her deep misery. “Are you going to teach me?”
The man smiled at her. “You talk this over with your aunt, all right?” Then he glanced at his watch. “Oops. I guess I missed my appointment.”
“I’m so sorry,” Anna said. “We caused you all this trouble.”
“Don’t worry. No problem at all.” He bent down and put a hand on Karla’s shoulder. “And, Karla, I know how much it hurts. I lost my dear wife a few years ago. We were together for over twenty years. I still miss her. But I can promise you, things will get better with time.”
Karla took a deep breath and nodded. She had heard the words many times before. “Maja lost her mother, too.”
“Maja is a friend of hers, a girl from Croatia,” Anna explained.
At home, in their house in a small town near Zurich, Aunt Anna fixed lunch. She heated up the leftover bean and vegetable soup and made grilled cheese sandwiches with tomatoes. The smell of food awakened Karla’s appetite. She was quiet and thoughtful but no longer desperate.
“He was a nice man,” she said, folding the colorful paper napkins she had made herself with potato stamps. She put them on the blue-and-white place mats on the oak-wood table in the kitchen.
“Would you like to take drawing and painting lessons from him?” Anna poured the soup into bowls and slid the toasted sandwiches onto the plates.
Karla nodded. “Yeah, that’d be cool.” She smiled and traced her finger along the spots on the tabletop, where the sunlight, filtered by the leaves of the magnolia tree in front of the kitchen window, had sketched a pattern of light and shadows.
“Cool, huh?” Anna smiled and gave the girl a hug.
Christa Polkinhorn, originally from Switzerland, lives and works as writer and translator in the Los Angeles area, California. She divides her time between the United States and Switzerland and has strong ties to both countries. She is the author of five novels and a collection of poems. Her travels and her interest in foreign cultures inform her work and her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, she is an avid reader and a lover of the arts, dark chocolate, and red wine.
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