Most "book blurbs" end up on the dust jacket on new publications. Here are some blurbs that didn't.
* Elaine Cannon, popular and prolific LDS author, has hit the national market - after visiting the supermarket. Several of her recipes appear in the "Chicken Soup for the Soul Cookbook," a companion to the "Chicken Soup" books that have gone No. 1 on the Times bestseller list. In the contributor's notes she says she's "Greatly blessed and having lots of fun."
* "The Lost Season" by Stacy Lynne Zabriskie is now available for $5.99 locally. The book began as a little in-house inspirational volume at the Rockland Group Financial Services but has slowly taken root in the community. It's a story of a ski injury that changed a family's life - as well as attitudes about healing, fear and fulfillment. If you can't find a copy, call David M Kadleck Jr. at 273-1060.
* For book buffs who like to be warm, now there's the Novel House Inn in Springdale, near Zion National Park. The 10 rooms at the inn are "theme rooms" that transport guests back to Charles Dickens' London flat, Mark Twain's Mississippi quarters or even Rudyard Kipling's colonial India. Jane Austen, Walt Whitman, Leo Tolstoy and others are available. Rates run from $75 to $95 a night. Call 772-3650 for details. I won't write more here. Come January, I plan to head south to file a full report on the place.
* Gerald Lund, the author of the "The Work and the Glory" saga, has just brought out "Praise to the Man," the latest installment.
And Lund knows he's walking on eggs with this one. The Steeds have to deal with the issue of plural marriage.
"It has been the most difficult volume of them all," says Lund. "Not just because it's the longest, but because this year has been a wild one for me personally. As for the plural marriage issue, I knew there was so much emotion about it - even today - that I couldn't win. So I just let the characters speak for themselves in the book."
And the Steed family's feelings about polygamy? They're split on the issue. Joshua, as loyal Lund readers will guess, feels bitter.
* And finally, one for the kids. Chances are you've not heard of Cindy Higham, but some know her as Salt Lake City's "queen of flakes." For years she's been cutting elaborate snowflakes from paper and pasting them in public places. Now she's sharing all her secrets in "Snowflakes Made Easy and Fun," a book of patterns for people who want to learn the art, then develop their own no-two-alike. She hopes to cause a regular "blizzard" of the things this Christmas. The book is around in stores, or call her at 263-2336.