Archive for the ‘Words Words Words’ Category
The Courtship of Julian St. Albans
Tuesday, July 9th, 2013
The Courtship of Julian St. Albans by Amy Crook
I wrote a book! Okay, this is actually the fourth novel I’ve written, but it’s the first one that’s polished to my satisfaction. I self-published it using Amazon CreateSpace, so it’s only available on Amazon. Traditional publishing is undergoing a huge change right now and I’m really too busy being an artist to also put a lot of effort into being an author. But, I love writing, and I wrote a book, so look! I made this!
Alexander Benedict is a misanthropic thirtysomething magical consultant, working with the Agency’s top homicide detective, and perfectly content with his life, thank you very much.
Julian St. Albans is the youthful heir to his family’s fortune and affiancéd to his beloved Cecil Mandeville, a family friend as well as Julian’s lover.
When Mandeville is murdered using magical means, Alex is brought in on the case. It’s the worst day of Julian’s life, but until they meet, it’s just another case for Alex. Neither of them have any idea how their lives are about to change.
Alex has to disentangle the magical threads until he can catch the murderer, and to do that he has to put himself right in the thick of things. His long-denied family connections get him invited to participate in Julian’s Courtship as a Suitor, where he can observe the suspects firsthand. He just has to stay alive long enough to figure out which of the competition thinks Julian is a prize worth killing for.
Want to win a signed copy?
I’m giving away a signed copy to one lucky winner who comments here on this post! The one in the photos is my proof, but I have a few real copies on the way and you’ll get one of those.
I’ll close the contest in a week, and announce the winner on Wednesday.
You can also get the ebook free!
If you’ve got Amazon Prime, you can borrow it for free anytime. But, just through the end of today you can also get the Kindle version free, period.
Horace & The Courtship of Julian St. Albans,
both by Amy Crook
Categories: Daily Art, Words Words Words
Tags: consulting magic, courtship, giveaway, i made this, julian st albans
14 Comments »
Random Recipe: Ice Cream Bread
Thursday, May 23rd, 2013
That’s right, ice cream bread. This is actually the simplest recipe I’ve ever posted or probably even made, so it’s ridiculous that I drew three pictures for it, which is why you’re getting this extra text at the top. Seriously, super easy.
The result is a bit like a cross between a quick bread (eg banana bread) and a cupcake. Fluffy, sweet, and really delicious.
Preheat oven to 350F. Lubricate a loaf pan with spray oil or butter or whatever. There, now you’ve prepped.
Take one pint of slightly melty ice cream, add to 1.5 cups of self-rising flour. The self-rising is very important here, or else you will not get delicious fluffy bread. If you don’t have self-rising flour you can readily google the way to make your own by adding baking powder/soda and salt in the appropriate quantities.
I used my Kitchenaid Mixer to mix it all up, because the ice cream was still pretty frozen at that point. Mix until the flour is all wet, into a rather cold, sticky, thick batter. Put that in the pan you already oiled up. Bake for 45 minutes or so, until the top is starting to get golden brown and delicious. Cool a bit before you try to turn it out of the pan, or it will all fall apart.
One caveat in choosing ice cream flavors is to really think about the fact that this is going into a hot oven. Cookie dough ice cream, for instance, will probably not be so great once the cookie dough gets half-baked inside the bread. Ben & Jerry’s Peach Cobbler, however, was awesome.
Seriously, awesome.
Bread made out of ice cream. What more could life offer?
To recap:
- Preheat oven to 350F. Oil or butter a loaf pan.
- 1 pint of ice cream added to 1.5 cups of self-rising flour.
- Bake for 45 min or until golden brown and delicious.
- Awesome.
Categories: Daily Art, Words Words Words
Tags: food, nfs, recipe, sharpie
2 Comments »
One Cracked Tooth Later…
Wednesday, May 8th, 2013
I’ve been to see the quite nice endodontist, and he feels that my cracked tooth needs a root canal, which will also necessitate a crown, for a total dental bill of about $4K, including the $1K I’ve already spent. Unfortunately, that still leaves me about $1K short, even with the financing I managed to arrange, so I’m not sure what’s going to happen with it, other than it’ll ache at least a little longer.
If you’ve got a piece of art you’ve been sighing over, now is a good time to support your favorite starving artist and her poor teeth. Or buy some cards, commission art for yourself or your business, or just send good thoughts my way that I’ll manage to make it all work somehow.
Categories: Daily Art, Words Words Words
Tags: words
Squid and Octopi
Wednesday, April 17th, 2013
I went through all of my cartoon tentacles and framed all the originals I had, and now they’re cheerfully gracing a wall in my apartment.
My wall o’ Squid
Starting from the top left:
- Baby Squid
- Tying the Knot
- Thank You Squid
- Octopus Loves Boba
- Squid With Mittens
- Sad and Sorry Squid
- Lucky Squid
- Party Octopus
- Squid Hearts You
- Squidtini
- Squid in a Scarf
- Octopus’ Gift
- Squid Inked
- Get Well Squid
Happy Squidsday!
Categories: Daily Art, Words Words Words
Tags: is it octopuses or octopi anyway, octopus, squid
1 Comment »
Licensing: Ear to the Wall
Wednesday, April 10th, 2013
Ear to the Wall by Carrie Causey,
cover & interior illustrations by Amy Crook
It was over 2 years ago that I posted my Victorian Wallpaper design, with all its scribbly whimsy. Recently Google brought the post to Jason from Ampersand Books, and he wrote to me asking to use the art for the cover & interior of one of their little poetry chapbooks. They went with a gorgeously intense (and hard to photograph!) red and blue for the cover, with faded greys inside and pure black and white in the inside covers.
I haven’t had time to read any of the poetry yet, but the book itself is very cool looking, in my totally biased opinion. Sherlock seems to find the titles intriguing, anyway!
Ear to the Wall, detail of cover art
Above you can see the rich color and linen texture of the printed cover art, with my tiny skulls still just visible in the design. You can get your own copy of Ear to the Wall by Carrie Causey here at Ampersand Books.
If you find yourself interested in licensing any of my work for commercial use, feel free to contact me here.
Categories: Completed Commissions, Daily Art, Words Words Words
Tags: all rights reserved, licensing, words
4 Comments »
Letters and Light
Wednesday, March 6th, 2013
Illuminated Alphabet by Amy Crook
It’s hard to believe it’s done, but my whole alphabet from A to Y & Z is complete. It’s amazing to see it all together, from the things I love to the ones I might’ve done a little differently. Some of the letters make me wish I was a better photographer, because the Q and ampersand are so much cooler in person than they photographed, and some of them just make me want to redo them until I can refine the idea, or go a totally different direction.
I decided to start the series on a whim, taking my new spiffy nontraditional art materials and combining them with the classic art form of calligraphy, which I’ve been doing for many years. Choosing the themes was an interesting challenge that gave the project a lot of structure, though there was also a lot of panicked googling (and how happy am I that xerography is a thing?) to try to fill in some of the letters. I learned new techniques, got new supplies, and revisited a lot of things I hadn’t done in years.
You’ll see a few more letters cropping up here and there — tomorrow’s post uses the design for my heraldic H to make a B for Baker Street, and I’ve already got one commission in the works for a different version of the J.
I got my code monkey to set up a page so you can see the whole alphabet together in clickable thumbnails, so if you’d like to go revisit your favorite letters, have at. You might even decide you need one of them to come home with you.
Categories: Daily Art, Words Words Words
Tags: alphabet, info, words
Random Recipe: Mulled Wine
Wednesday, December 26th, 2012
Happy Boxing Day! Yesterday I made mulled wine for the third time this season, and I thought I’d share my recipe with you all, in lieu of actual content. There’s as many recipes for mulled wine as there are people who make it, so make sure to tweak this to your own preferences. And yes, I got lazy and used a photo instead of drawings, because, Christmas.
Amy’s Mulled Wine
- 1 bottle cheap, sweet red wine (I’ve used various, but Yellowtail’s Sweet Red Roo worked well this last time)
- 1 orange
- 1 apple
- 1 pear, still crisp
- about 1/3 cup turbinado sugar, which I am perpetually too lazy to measure
- 2 sticks cinnamon
- 2 cloves
- 4 cardamom pods
- 5 slices candied ginger
- 2 dashes nutmeg
- 1 dash allspice
Chop the apple and pear into bite-sized pieces, and slice up the orange however you prefer, and crack the cardamom pods. Dump everything into a pot and simmer on low heat, stirring occasionally, until it tastes awesome, usually about an hour to an hour and a half. Don’t let it boil. Drink hot, with some of the apple & pear floating in your cup.
Don’t throw away the leftover apple, pear & ginger, which have now become a wonderful dish of stewed, spiced fruit for later, though the orange can go and you really don’t want to accidentally bite down on the cardamom pods or cloves.
Enjoy during the long winter! 1 bottle of wine yields about 2 cups of mulled wine, so double or quadruple as needed for gatherings.
Categories: Daily Art, Words Words Words
Tags: recipe, words
2 Comments »
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