02/27/09

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***FOR MATURE READERS (not recommended for readers under 16 years)***

What it's all about:

A WHISTLING GIRL AND A CROWING HEN ALWAYS COME TO NO GOOD END

By Paisley Parks

SUMMARY 

This is a character driven two part tale of a daydream that degenerates into a nightmare.  This is that nightmare you can never re-visit or escape from.  This is that nightmare, which is simply your hilarious life. 

The major setting is in the mind of a burned out Human Resources executive who is ironically a former “recreational” cocaine user and binge drinker.  This is her head trip as a result of being consumed by her career and office life and her fall from the wagon.  It puts a spin on the saying “at least I don’t have to live with the people I work with.”  But what if you did? 

Donna is pushing 35 and living large in a decent suburb in New Jersey as a boomerang kid back home with her mother. 

Donna’s mother is a kitsch-smut-romance novelist whose pen name is Ryman Chadwick.  She is not too pleased with her daughter’s return.  She’s been living a life that daughters generally don’t want their mothers to engage in after being divorced from their fathers.  She’s so much more vibrant and adventurous than her daughter.  The only one that can keep her to her writing deadlines and her gusto for a walk on the wild side, in check, is her editor. 

Ryman’s ex-lover, Catalina Mosher is her editor.  They are contemporary middle aged ladies still holding a torch for each other.  They were a stunning interracial couple back in the day when Catalina was a former chanteuse.  Ryman has moved on with her life since her break up with Catalina and divorce from Donna’s father, Doug.  Unbeknownst to Donna, her mother has been in a romantic relationship with her former college roommate, Leslie who is a gifted composer of music.  They have a true May-December romance and a song that Leslie has written especially for Ryman. 

Donna and Kim are high school friends.  Kim was always the “underdressed and overused” one.  They get together upon Donna’s return to reminisce about their wild past together.  As per usual, Kim gets high and rowdy and out of hand.  She hasn’t changed since high school.  Kim is now Donna’s father’s live-in girlfriend. 

Doug, Donna’s father is. a former professional doubles tennis player.  He knew Donna’s mother, Ryman had lesbian tendencies when he married her.  That’s one of the reasons he was attracted to her.  When Doug’s career hit the skids he wanted Ryman all to himself but she was too far gone in love and in bed with Catalina.  Upon Ryman and Doug’s divorce, for the sake of his ego, Doug forbade Ryman to associate with Catalina sexually and to never tell Donna anything about their true grounds for divorce.  Otherwise, Doug would make her life a living hell by exposing her true identity to the proper literary world and her legions of horny book fans.  To ensure this agreement, he connives to pay Leslie, the struggling artist to keep Ryman from Catalina and pays his girlfriend Kim to keep Catalina from Ryman.  More than revenge, this is all a sick thrill for Doug.  This all backfires when his girlfriend Kim falls for Catalina and Leslie breaks up with his ex-wife Ryman and she confesses all to his daughter, Donna.

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The second part of the tale is the flip side of the record yet there are distinct similarities and parallel lives.  This is where the real time relationships are defined in Donna’s actual corporate life.  It’s the kooky life—the backstabbing corporate life.

 The names are pretty much the same but the relationships have changed a bit. 

Donna is the boss and everyone reports to her except Doug.  He is head of the division above them all and a skirt-chasing-cheating husband.

 Catalina is actually married to Doug.  They have a very open relationship and therefore, she and Millie (formerly Ryman) are lovers.  Furthermore, Millie and Leslie have hooked up.  It’s all a very free wheeling charged up ride.

 In an ironic comedic twist, Kim is a polished Drug Testing Account Representative by day and moonlights as an internet porn star.  She is in lust with Catalina but doing her best to get her hooks into Doug, now Catalina’s husband, all for financial gain. 

Then, there is the office mole, Bishop.  He’s a temp.  This time around Catalina conspires with him to set up Doug for a fall. 

All the lies, voracious loving and deceit run deliciously rampant throughout the book. 

In the end, no one knows the real truth but Donna. 

The adage of a whistling girl and a crowing hen always come to no good end suggests that proper women don’t whistle like men and hens don’t crow like roosters. 

Hey folks, it's about some lesbians being girls!

        Excerpt One      

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