Self-Help 101 or: How I Learned to Take Over the World Through Tolerating My Family by L. G. Keltner
Today I'm hosting L. G. Keltner, who is here to promote her new novella.
I’d like to thank Laura for hosting me today! It’s great to be here to promote my Christmas novella Self-Help 101 or: How I Learned to Take Over the World Through Tolerating My Family.
I’d like to talk to all of you about fruit cake. Poking fun at the ever-present fruit cake is a holiday pastime for many. Clearly plenty of people must like it, because it continues to sell. Businesses would stop making fruit cakes if they didn’t sell year after year.
However, if you’re one of those who doesn’t appreciate this fruity bakery item, there are ways to use the fruit cakes that vindictive family members may gift to you over the holidays.
Tip #1: Cut the fruit cake and dip the smaller pieces into melted chocolate. Let the chocolate cool, then serve the treats on an attractive platter at any family or office gathering. In my experience, when people see something covered in chocolate, they’ll tend to bite into it without too much additional thought. If people ask what they are, just call them truffles.
Tip #2: Make a sauce using your favorite hard liquor as a key ingredient and drizzle it over the fruit cake. People who may not otherwise enjoy fruit cake may be willing to try it to get to the boozy goodness.
Tip #3: If you end up with a bunch of fruit cakes, make a small wall outside. You can build a snowman in front of it and tell people your snowman is a comedian, or you can build a snowman peeking up from behind it and tell them that it built the wall to prevent being bombarded by snowballs. Neither one may be all that funny, but it will take care of your fruit cake problem.
Do you have any tips about what to do with unwanted fruit cake?
Now, here’s a brief snippet from my Christmas novella Self-Help 101 or: How I Learned to Take Over the World Through Tolerating My Family.
* * *
Ruth Ann beamed, and my dad, who’d been looking severe for the last twenty-four hours, cracked a smile. “You sure do know how to flatter an old woman, dear,” she said.
“I do try to be nice on occasion, even if it’s just to shock people,” I replied.
* * *
Dani Finklemeier has decided to write a self-help book about how to take over the world, but she’s not sure where to start. After all, she’s only seventeen and looking for a better way to make money than babysitting. She buys a self-help book that promises to teach her how to write a self-help book in the hope of getting the job done.
Not that it’ll be easy to get any work done this holiday season. Her family is staying at the house for Christmas, and fights break out almost immediately. Dani also has to deal with the fallout from an unexpected kiss with her best friend Seth and the feelings that go along with it. On edge around her family and unsure how to interact with the one person she’s trusted with everything in the past, she can only take what inspiration she can from the crazy circumstances surrounding her and see what happens.
One way or another, it should be an interesting holiday.
Title: Self-Help 101 or: How I Learned to Take Over the World Through Tolerating My Family
Author: L.G. Keltner
Genre: Holiday/Humor
Length: 27,000
Cover Art: L.G. Keltner
Release Date: December 1, 2015
Available from:
L.G. Keltner spends most of her time trying to write while also cleaning up after her crazy but wonderful kids and hanging out with her husband. Her favorite genre of all time is science fiction, and she’s been trying to write novels since the age of six. Needless to say, those earliest attempts weren’t all that good.
Her non-writing hobbies include astronomy and playing Trivial Pursuit.
You can typically find L.G. lurking around her blog, on Twitter, or on her Facebook page.
I am no fan of fruit cake in any form, but there are enough folk here that I need not worry. What I will say is that birds love it in the winter and it works rather well as a fire lighter on the wood burner, giving that authentic burning fruit cake smell that cheers folk up when the weather is cold and frosty.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the excellent tips! I may have to keep them in mind if ever I wind up with unwanted fruit cake.
DeleteHi L G, love the suggestions, especially the one about covering them with chocolate. Great idea, but you'd have to make sure you check around the house for unusual blobs of food that folks spit out instead of just swallowed. Or lots of half bitten blobs returned on the tray. Still make it small enough and most would just swallow. I hope. :) Merry Christmas!
ReplyDeleteMerry Christmas! I'd call those random blobs of regurgitated food Yuletide bombs. Maybe we could turn searching for them into a Christmas tradition!
DeleteI'm all for tip 2 and 3! You do tip 3 after doing ip 2. ;)
ReplyDeleteGreat ideas for fruitcake! Actually, some of the ones we've had are quite good. But your ideas would make them even yummier and the snowmen would appreciate the protection from the wall. They'd be the talk of the town!
ReplyDeleteI'm one of those weirdos who loves fruitcake, but your tips sound even better. Dani sure sounds like she has her hands full for Christmas. Congrats, LG!!
ReplyDelete