Snow Globe Excerpt and Book Trailer

Happy Friday the 13th, folks - to celebrate this unluckiest of days (with a full moon scheduled for tonight, no less), please enjoy an excerpt from my debut novel Snow Globe and its book trailer.

December 13, 1912

            Dearest Diary,

Oh, the worst thing has happened! Someone stole all our livestock and killed our hound dog. Papa (of course) blames our neighbor but I have spent all forenoon trying to convince him not even Alain would act so low. He's mean and he's drunk and he's gone soft in the head (oh please don't let Doug ever know I wrote ill of his kin!) but he wouldn't try to kill us. Never-Never-Never!

Likely to blame is a strange man who's been coming round the house these past few months. He claims he's a land developer who wants to help Papa expand his interests but he looks part Indian to me with his long black hair and strange manner of speech. Or worse, he could be a Gypsy. Charlie and Jake told me they heard Gypsies have been spotted roaming this part of the country.

            This man and Papa have been setting in the parlor, talking until all hours. I can hear them sometimes through the floorboards. It sounds like serious business.

But now, disaster! Our animals all vanished as if they'd never been and our poor cellar violated as well. Someone is out to get us and we can't even get to town because of all this wretched snow!

            Mama said she's seen snowfall like this once, back around the end of the war when she was itsy-bitsy. It snowed so hard for days that the drifts come right plumb up to her windows, and she slept on the second storey! She calls a hundred-years' snowfall because it only happens once each century.  

            Oh, Dear Diary, what in Heaven are we to do?

December 14, 1912

            Dearest Diary,

            Second straight day of snow. Already we are hungry. We had some cornmeal and beans in the pantry, but scarce enough to feed us all as well as we are accustomed. With no beef or fresh milk, my belly is grouchy. I hope this snow stops soon so we may perhaps dig out the auto and make a trip to Mr. Darrow's General Store.

Papa is quiet today and I can tell he feels helpless without being able to make good for his family the way he always has. He has been staring out the window at the house across the way. He says he is watching the weather, but this is false. Oh, why cannot we all live in peace with one another? I miss love greater by the day.

December 15, 1912

            Dearest Diary,

            I have just finished breakfast which saw the last of the cornmeal. A half-sack of rice and a few beans remain. Charlie and Jake have been away since dawn hunting rabbit, but with all the snow I feel their luck may be stretched.

            The sky cleared for a bit this morning and I allowed myself hope that an end may be imminent, but it began again in earnest. Papa has closed himself in his study and is hard at work on something (aside from the small cask of Christmas glogg he stashed away in there). He will admit no one to see him, not even Mama who has spent many hours these past days in her rocker either knitting or watching the snow. She tells me Charlie and Jake will bring back some game for supper; rabbit or squirrel most likely but perhaps even a buck to skin for venison. Oh, Diary, it does sound wonderful!

December 16, 1912

            Dear Diary,

            No luck for Charlie and Jake. They saw a few rabbits, but the creatures were too swift. Jake lost his rifle when he dropped it in a snow bank and was unable to find it even after half an hour of digging. My brothers' faces are so chapped they practically seem like they're wearing masks.

            We had only rice and black beans for breakfast and supper; no lunch to speak of.

Papa set a strict ration for our remaining food, but since then has not unlocked his study door since late last night. His boots clunked around for awhile as if he might be pacing, then I heard him leave by the front door only to return after quarter-hour's time. I wonder what he's up to, Diary?

            I watch Douglas's window by night. It has been dark these past three days. I dread the day I shall have to tell him my secret. What will he say to that? Will he still love me? I've verily put it out of my mind in recent weeks. I've not written of it until this minute…but, Dearest Diary, how do I tell my beloved? Do I dare?

December 17, 1912

            Diary, this is nothing like how Christmastime should be. The snow has finally stopped falling, but it is so deep we have no hope of making it to town before a thaw. We are so hungry. So hungry.

            When Papa poked his head out of his study today, Mama told him he ought to pick his way across the road to seek some Christian charity, but Papa said he would rather die than commit such an act. Then he pulled Charlie, Jake, Donald, John, Tommy, and Stevie into the study for some time. I think they might be planning a raid on Douglas's house! I can only hope that is not the case. I could not bear if Douglas were hurt. Or my brothers, of course.

December 19, 1912

            Dearest Diary,

            Success! Some, at least. Jake came across a wounded fox and killed it with a rock. We're going to have meat tonight! I never would have thought I'd be excited about eating fox, but the thought of hot juicy hanks of meat makes my mouth wet. I can't help it.

            And Charlie found a bottle of our rendered syrup in the barn…I am going to positively drown my food in it. Oh, tonight is going to taste so wonderful!

            Mama's calling! Supper is ready!

December 19 (later)

            The fox wasn't good even with the syrup. Very little meat on its sickly bones and what it had was stringy. Gosh, but I'm hungry.

December 21, 1912

            We've run out of food completely, even after Papa's careful ration. Not even a grain of rice or drop of syrup remains. I bundled into my parka and galoshes and spent ten minutes making my way out to the granary, but it was just full of feed-corn. Couldn't eat it. I tried, but it hurt my teeth. I ate some of this horrid snow but it did more harm than good, I fear.

I'm so hungry.   

           

December 23, 1912

            Papa and the boys tried the raid, but were turned back. Douglas's people were waiting. They are always waiting, have always been waiting. Where is Douglas? Where are our cows? I would do any-thing for a taste of true meat. Any-thing. My belly feels shrunk and swollen at the same time, somehow.

            I hate to put this to paper, but in Papa's silly raid Thomas sustained an injury. No one fired any shots, but Thomas busted his ankle somehow in all the snow and came back bellering like a cow too heavy with milk. He's been screaming for hours. I wish he would quit.

December 24, 1912

            If I could make one wish this night, I'd ask St. Nicholas to come down our chimney and take us with him on his sleigh. I'd forfeit the rest of my Christmas presents forever and ever if jolly old St. Nicholas would take us from this house.

If he hasn't any room in his sleigh, perhaps when we wake in the morning he will have left us honeyed hams and golden turkeys and sweet yams and plum puddings and crocks of cream beneath our tree! Perhaps our socks will be full of candied apples, juicy oranges, and plump, ripe strawberries like the ones Douglas and I ate from Mama's garden when we were small! Oh, please St. Nicholas, please send us some Christmas cheer!

December 25, 1912

            I love my Lord and Savior for He shall deliver me from evil. Amen.

December 27, 1912

            Papa decided Thomas's foot ought to be cut loose because the boy won't stop making noise. He and Charlie did it quick and poor Tommy blacked out from the pain. The foot set there for a bit before Mama got the idea to boil it.

December 30, 1912

            I keep watching the window of the man I love. It remains dark. I wonder if Douglas is dead…as dead as I feel.

            Still no way to town. Blocked completely.

            Tommy's grown worse. Papa keeps quiets him with sips of whiskey, but my big brother will never walk again. Not without that foot.

            But, my land, it tasted so good. I'm sorry, Tommy.  

January 3, 1913

            We ate more of Tommy, after his leg went bad. He died of shock, Mama said, so he wasn't using his meat any-more. So we used it. I feel sick and sad but we have no choice.

            Lord Jesus, please don't be mad.

January 6?

            The snow and cold are terrible. If I ever get out of this, I'm heading to California where it never snows and I can sit by the sea.

            Oh, Douglas! Where are you! Please come!

           

January 7?

We lost Celia. My sister, my lord, my LORD. She just gave up this morning, the shock of it all being too much for her.

It only took Papa a few hours to decide to carve her up. My heart is empty but at least my belly is full.

January 8?

            I am having terrible pains in my belly I at first mistook as hunger (because hunger is a real thing…like a demon. People who never felt it don't know). But now I know these pains are not hunger.

It's the baby. I hope it's all right. Please God, please let my child be all right.

No one stirs any-more. The house is silent. Papa has been living out in the barn. I haven't seen but Steven these past two days. I don't know where every-one else went. I keep my door locked in case they decide to come for me. I don't know who is alive and who has been eaten. This has become a house of ghosts. Hunger makes everything go quiet and no-one stirs any-more.

The snow is still up to my window pane and it is so, so cold.

January 9?

            The Lord forgive me! Last-night our child was born too soon in blood. So much blood I knew not if I would live to see morning. I birthed it alone without aid from Mama, if Mama's even still alive.

The poor dear scarcely looked human. More like a skinned squirrel, pink and bloody.

         O, Dear God, please forgive me, but I could not stop my mouth from filling with spit at the sight. I still can't, even now as I boil broth on the hearth. The last thing I will do, after my meal, is burn the pages of this Dearest Diary. I'm sorry, sweet baby. I'm sorry, Douglas. But I'm just so hungry.