Holidays are divine, as far as I’m concerned. While spending time with family always tops my list of great things to do, spending time with family in the kitchen surrounded by scrumptious appetizers warrants a spot one cloud away from heaven.
Suffice it to say, my taste buds were thrilled this past weekend. And now, thanks to Jenny Hansen, my appetite has been stimulated again.
Following in her footsteps, I’ve taken the A-Z Challenge. During the month of April, I will blog my way through the alphabet, taking only Sundays off for good behavior. If you are as crazy as me, you can join the fun by clicking on this link and signing up for a month of blogging madness before the end of today.
If you’re only semi-crazy, you can follow my journey and that of other insane and talented bloggers for the next thirty days. A list of their blogs will appear here. And don’t fret, not all of them are geared toward writing. Check the codes next to their name to see if one fits your interests.
For instance, I have a (WR) listed next to my blog which stands for writing. Other categories include things like crafting, cooking, gardening, gaming, movies, books, education, etc. You name it, someone is blogging about it. So, please, check out the list and see if any names tickle your tweeter.
In the meantime, I will do what I do best–tie together writing and real life!
APPETIZERS
The whole purpose of an appetizer is to get you hungry. Chefs have long ago figured out that stimulating the appetite with a tasty morsel can have you begging for more.
Writers are no different. We spend oodles of time crafting the perfect literary teaser for our works. We do this in the form of the elevator pitch, the query letter, the back cover blurb and the synopsis.
Like great chefs, we condense entire meals into delectable phrases and enticing sentences. We give our potential readers a tiny taste of what’s to come in one compact creation.
A is for Appetizer: that small portion of perfectly blended words that whet the literary appetite.
Perfect it like your favorite dish and stimulate your reader’s hunger.
My top five apps are, in no particular order:
- Homemade guacamole. Add a margarita and I could die happy.
- Chili conqueso. Simple, not pretty to look at, but incredibly delish.
- Cucumber dill dip. Nothing says spring like a fresh scoop of this!
- Buffalo chicken dip. Scooped up with celery…yummmmm.
- And a plain old veggie tray complete with cukes, mushrooms, cauliflower and peppers of every color.
One of my favorite literary appetizers is from a quaint MG novel by Ingrid Law. Savvy has a supercharged cover for young readers and a jacket blurb that had me hooked.
Mibs Beaumont is about to become a teenager. As if that prospect weren’t scary enough, thirteen is when a Beaumont’s savvy strikes–and with one brother who causes hurricanes and another who creates electricity, it promises to be outrageous…and positively thrilling.
What’s your favorite appetite teaser?
Curious minds want to know.
Words from the Woods 