Tag Archives: Denver Museum of Nature and Science

Going a Viking

19 Monday Jun 2017

Posted by in History, RW Out and About

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The latest special exhibit at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science is Vikings: Beyond the Legend.  I was looking forward to seeing it.  When I first began researching different cultures for my book, I had no idea where to begin.  I visited the children’s non-fiction section of my local library and pulled off the shelf every cultural and historical book that looked remotely interesting.  I remember reading a few books on Vikings but, as my attention was quickly diverted to the cultures of the Ancient Mediterranean, my reading on Vikings quickly fell by the wayside.  I was looking forward to re-acquainting myself with them.

I began said re-acquaintance by attending a lecture at the museum before purchasing a ticket to the exhibit.  The lecture assured me I would see the Vikings in a new light; show me proof they were much more than raiders and killers portrayed by history.  Maps shown at the lecture did make me aware that Viking ships made it far further into various lands than I knew and that was interesting.  However, as another slide showed archaeological evidence that victims of a raid had been neatly buried in one mound with all their heads neatly buried in one adjacent, the lecture didn’t do much to dispel the raider image.  I had hopes the exhibit would do a better job.

It did.  The artifacts on display are incredible.  I learned Viking culture was so much more than swords and raids.  Metallurgy did involve the forging of swords but it also resulted in fabulous jewelry the intricacy of which, the exhibit tells me, is almost impossible to replicate today.

 

More details on gold jewelry. I’d wear it.
The workmanship is so delicate
A jewelry box?

I was able to see Viking ingenuity at work in the inner workings of a lock.  The spring mechanism, activated by pressure from the teeth of a key, was brilliant.  I wish I had been able to get a photo of it.  The exhibit did tell me that the penalty for theft where the goods had been locked away was higher than if they had not.  An interesting facet of law.

The role of women in Viking culture interested me.  I had always thought that only men went a viking but, apparently, this isn’t so.  Women too, went on these travels.  Women had a great deal of authority in the home, more so than most other women of their day, and this role and power as household manager is symbolized with the keys found in some burials of women.

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Of course, Viking raids did definitely happen and were brutal.  And yet, the Vikings were also accomplished traders, dealing in goods as far away as China.  There was a replica of a Buddha found in a burial but, try as I might, I couldn’t get a clear photo of it.  I did manage to get a picture of a glass beaker, something I would have thought would be unheard of in Viking lands.

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I left the exhibit with a desire to know more and I decided to go straight to the source.  What did the Vikings have to say about themselves?  To find out, I purchased The Sagas of the Icelanders from the gift shop.  I look forward to reading it and learning more about this fascinating culture.

A caveat:

I googled tips for taking photos in a museum and did try to put them to good use but I still have a long way to go. 🙂  These are the rest of the salvageable photos.  The exhibit will have to come back…

The workmanship is so delicate
More details on gold jewelry. I’d wear it.
A jewelry box?

 

 

A Work in Process

11 Friday Mar 2016

Posted by in Writing

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What is my writing process?  Apparently, all writers have them and all are unique.  Do you write standing up?  Write Drunk and Edit Sober or vice versa? Devote an hour a day?  Don’t stop until at least three pages are finished?  Don’t even think about your book until you’ve accomplished a half hour of free-writing?  I enjoy reading about other writers’ processes and there is a sense of community as I find writers share many of the same struggles, but though I’ve been working on my book for years, I still don’t have a process.  It’s constantly changing and has yet to be nailed down.

I try.  “I’m going to write an hour a day. Period.”  I begin with that goal but then I’ll have a day where I’m so tired I can’t string words together verbally much less type something other than gibberish.  Then there days when my arm will hurt and I can’t type or write by hand and, before I know it, days have passed with no progress on the manuscript.  That doesn’t mean I’m not writing if by ‘writing’ I mean thinking about my book and characters, plotting what happens next, or reading a bit by way of research.  In many ways, my process is to work on my book every waking moment-and some sleeping moments-even though words don’t always make it onto paper.

I hear advice like; don’t edit yourself-get it down on paper and then edit.  That makes sense but that doesn’t work for me.  I’ll be writing away and then I realize that both plot and characters feel dry and that a change needs to be made; often four or five chapters ago.  If I don’t go back and make the change, I CANNOT continue writing.  It’s like all creativity dries up.  So, I edit myself I great deal while working.

One piece of advice I have taken to heart is don’t throw anything away.  I have a dump file and, whenever I hit a situation mentioned in the above paragraph, I take the scene that isn’t working and stick it in the dump file.  This has been crucial for me.  There have been so many times I plopped something that wasn’t working in the file and forgot about it until I found I needed it; often years after first setting it down.  I recently copied in work I’d done in my earliest draft-almost ten years old now-into my current draft and was thrilled not to have to re-write the scene.

“Taking a long time” is definitely part of my process but my story arcs over seven books and I don’t want to make the mistake of introducing something in Book One that is utterly contradicted in Book Seven.  I hate it when authors do that.  I’ve had authors I like reference an instance from an earlier book that I remember happening differently and, sure enough, I scrounge up the appropriate book and find I’m correct.  Why does that happen?  Is it easier to tweak the facts for the current book?  I don’t know but it’s annoying.  I also have a hard time continuing to read an author that changes a character’s name in a later book.  Is the name unimportant because the character is a minor one?  No.  If you’re going to bring the character back in later books, make sure you use the same name!  I don’t know if that’s an author or an editor mistake but, again, it’s annoying.

I respect authors that go that extra mile in research and attention to detail.  The Denver Museum of Nature and Science recently had a Sherlock Holmes exhibit.  Sherlock Holmes is one of my favorite characters and I enjoyed immersing myself in that world.  The exhibit had plenty of hands on activities and there was a mystery to be solved as I moved through the different displays.  Great fun but I enjoyed reading the letters written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.  One such letter was to his publisher and Mr. Conan Doyle was requesting a copy of an early manuscript as he couldn’t remember all the details he’d set down and no longer had a copy of his own.  My writer spirit felt camaraderie with that: a writer respecting both his characters and his readers enough to research his early work.  Such an eye for detail and a respect for research-as well as great writing-keeps Sir Arthur Conan Doyle on my shelves.

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My Sherlock Holmes Collection

 

I knew Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote other books: I’ve seen The Lost World even though I haven’t yet acquired a copy of the book.  I did find a collection of stories I’d never known Conan Doyle wrote and I was especially interested in the Preface to The White Company written by Conan Doyle’s wife.  It begins:

My husband was intensely thorough in all his literary work.  He took enormous pains to have everything right.  For instance, before writing The White Company, he soaked his brain with a knowledge of the period he intended to portray.  He read over sixty books dealing with heraldry-armour-falconry-the medieval habits of the peasants of that time-the social customs of the higher fold of the land, etc.  Only when he knew those days as though he had lived in them-when he had got the very atmosphere steeped into his brain-did he put pen to paper and let loose the creations of his mind.  (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Historical Novels: Volume One; Preface to The White Company)

This, also, I deeply respect.  I do write a bit differently than this; I soak my brain in the period I’m writing in but there are things I don’t realize I should be researching until I’m already in the writing process.  For instance, merely having a character attend a public bath isn’t enough.  I need to know what the baths in both Ancient Rome and Ancient Arabia were like.  How did they differ from one another? Were there different rules for men and women?  Were there castes of society not allowed to attend at all?  What did one do with his or her clothes when bathing?  Fortunately for me, there are historians with these same interests and I can scare up a book or a documentary that will tell me what I need to know.

Maybe my writing should be more disciplined.  Maybe I take too much time.  Maybe I shouldn’t be getting wrapped up in these little details until a second or even a third draft.  Maybe, but it doesn’t seem to be part of my process.

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My Historical Volume Collection

 

Behold, Here’s Poison

24 Wednesday Feb 2016

Posted by in RW Out and About, Writing

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Poison book

Of course I picked up a book at the exhibit

My membership at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science is so useful to me.  I do a great deal of research for my books at the different exhibits and I was able to make a long visit at the Poison exhibit when it was in town.  I haven’t planned on any of my characters using poison to off another character but I never know when information will come in handy.  I try to take advantage of opportunities like the Museum’s special exhibits and I have a growing file full of bits of information I find interesting.

This exhibit was one of the best I’d visited.  I spent hours wandering through the displays, trying to stay out of the way of other museum goers while I took copious notes.   An avid mystery reader, I’ve been aware of how various plants can be deadly in the right doses.  As someone who lives on a plant-based diet, I pay close attention to the fact that some plants are both edible and deadly, depending on what part of the plant is used.  I couldn’t wait to find out what more this exhibit could teach me.

I was not surprised at the presence of foxglove at the exhibit.  Agatha Christie’s books first introduced me to the fact that digitalis, derived from foxglove, could be beneficially used by people with heart problems and as a deadly poison by those with nefarious purposes.  It’s such a beautiful plant and I marvel at how something so beautiful can be at once to useful and so deadly.

Books also introduced me to cassava, a staple among some cultures.  What I did not know is that cassava contains cyanide and can be deadly.  It is only dried and ground into flour that it can be safely used; something that may end up in a book someday.

I was not fully aware of the part plants have played in the medical field and this aspect of the exhibit was fascinating.  I know of curare being used as a poison but had no idea it was used as an anesthetic.  It’s effect wasn’t fully understood and I’m thankful I’ve never been subjected to a surgical procedure under its influence.  However, according to the exhibit, curare can be used as an antidote for strychnine poisoning.  If I can ever come up with a valid reason why one of my characters would have curare on hand and then be poisoned by strychnine, I’m using this.

I learned that an extract of the yew tree is still being used as a cancer treatment, although it’s made synthetically now because of the ecological cost.  I thought it amazing that a derivative of yew bark could help treat cancer and was curious what other plants were being studied..  I learned that scientists were turning to plants like sweet wormwood and the opium poppy in search of medicinal uses.  And, scientists aren’t just studying plants but animals as well.

What makes a person look for cancer treatment in the venom of the Deathstalker Scorpion?  Pain relief in the venom of a black mamba?  Can the monocled cobra point researchers to a new arthritis drug or the Brazilian pit viper reveal an ACE inhibitor?  I took my notes, went home, and began googling.  Sure enough, the exhibit wasn’t lying to me: these animals and many more and being looked at for everything from tumor paint to anticoagulants.

I learned so much from this exhibit though I don’t know how much of it I’ll be using in the series I’m currently writing.  Still, I have all sorts of ideas for stories to write when I’ve finished this series.  I like knowing my file of facts is there for the gleaning.

 

Note:  My title is also the title of a mystery by Georgette Heyer.  Want to know what was used?  You’ll have to read it!

A Day at the Museum

22 Sunday Feb 2015

Posted by in RW Out and About

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My .45C postcard from the gift shop.

My .45C postcard from the gift shop.

I have a membership at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. I’ve always squeezed my budget to be able to afford it as I love being able to go, enter through the member express lane, get my card scanned, and spend the day wandering the exhibits. My membership also grants me access to the DMNS library which is an amazing, amazing place. Reference books I’d never be able to walk out of a public library with have made it into my home for my perusal. I may have gone a little overboard the first time I used my library access but that’s a story for a different time.

I try to hit the special exhibits when they come through. The Genghis Khan exhibit was awesome, made more so because of the contortionist hired to perform on a little stage inside the exhibit. I also loved wending my way through the Pompeii exhibit. Again, there were actors hired to dress like ancient world characters AND a gentleman running a mini ballista.   This was set up to fire ping pong balls rather than stones to the relief of nearby parents.  I kept my soul in patience and finally had the change to fire it myself.  Let me just say, I have to future in siege warfare.

In the last room of the Pompeii exhibit, I found the molds taken of humans and animals found under the layers of pumice and ash. This was heartrending and I had to find a quiet corner to cry a little. Even though the remains of people and dogs were long gone, I could see agony burned into the lines their bodies left and the expressions of terror and pain as they died. It was a difficult room to get through but the exhibit was well worth attending. I felt like a different, softer person when I left.

I tell you all that to mention the Whale Exhibit recently at DMNS. I made it on the next to last day of the exhibit and dragged my mother and step-father with me. I’m glad I did as the parking garage was full. My step-father has handicap access and we found rockstar parking right in front of the member’s entrance. Without them, I wouldn’t have been able to see the exhibit. I half-jokingly told my parents they have to come with me from now on. When they’re tired and ready to sit down, I’ll set them up in the T-Rex cafe with pizza and books while I continue on my own. Half-joking…

The Whale exhibit was worth seeing but, I admit, I left with a bit of a meh feeling. Why? Because, in this respect, the exhibit was too sterile for me to completely enjoy it. I don’t feel the same way wandering through the Egyptian exhibit or the Gemological exhibit but I don’t spend a great deal of time in the wildlife dioramas and wasn’t transported by the Whale exhibit. I think that’s because I prefer the real thing. I love hiking and Colorado provides some of the best opportunities for getting out into nature and seeing actual, living, wildlife. Why stare at a stuffed eagle when I could get outside and perhaps see the real thing? I felt the same way at the whale exhibit.

Not that it wasn’t worth seeing. There were interesting specimens in the exhibit and, again, I had to restrain myself from adding fun facts the exhibit failed to mention. For instance, there was a computer generated sperm whale hunting a giant squid. The images showed the sperm whale using echolocation and I had to squelch the impulse to share that, in a documentary I watched, divers who’ve encountered sperm whales say experiencing those sound waves feel like getting kicked in the chest by a donkey. Why didn’t I share it? Because I have a tendency to get a little teachy and I’ve learned to err on the side of caution. I did, however, manage to share my fun fact with all of you. Ha Ha. I do feel better…

I enjoyed the exhibit but I did not leave transported and I think that’s because I longed for the real thing. Whale-watching isn’t easy in the Denver Metro area but I attended University in Juneau Alaska and experienced something magical with whales; something no exhibit could ever duplicate.

The road leading away from Juneau and Auke Bay is riddled with tiny inlets. I often drove out to one of these and would sit on a rock, listen to the water (and nothing else!) and let the peace and calm enter my spirit. I can’t remember exactly how it all happened. Was I with someone? I had to be because I didn’t have my own car. Had I or we not headed out until late or had we been there a while and the sun started setting? Was it late in the year when the sun sets at 4PM and that’s why it happened? I can’t remember. I remember the whales.

I was sitting on a rock in half-light. My attention was focused on the rhythmic rush of the tide as it passed back and forth over the rocks in front of me. The tree covered arms of land enclosing the inlet were little more than vague shadows and thus, at first, I didn’t notice the dark shapes in the water. There were two, far across the water at the entrance to the inlet. I thought they were rock formations jutting out of the water and I’d simply never noticed them before. Then I saw a third rock formation in the center of the inlet. I hadn’t seen it appear but I swear it was moving. If it was, it was moving so slowly I could almost imagine it. It couldn’t be…I hadn’t heard that pop of air and water that happens when a whale surfaces. These had to be rock formations and I’d simply never noticed before. These inlets couldn’t be deep enough for one whale much less three. I couldn’t even tell what kind of whales they were.  And, they couldn’t be whales. Just rocks in the water.

But that middle rock formation was moving. It was alive. It was a whale. I couldn’t believe it. This was the reason I’d come all the way to Alaska and I was actually seeing whales. I had to be with someone because I remember asking if I was seeing what I was really seeing and I swear I remember that someone insisting I was. We were.

And then there was no space for words. The whales started humming. Not singing like I’d heard on so many different recordings. This was deep, more feeling than sound. I could feel my breast bone vibrating in the same frequency as that hum. And I sat there, mesmerized.   Even now, when I remember this happening, I don’t recall any sense of the passage of time.

I remember getting cold and having to leave but I don’t remember leaving. The entire memory feels like a dream but it wasn’t. I was there. I remember. And no exhibit with specimens and massive whale skeletons can ever compare.