Janet Mason, author

April 20, 2024 by Janet Mason

When I heard that the I Heart Sapph Fiction website was featuring books that spoke to the topic of addiction and that my novel Loving Artemis, an endearing tale of revolution, love, and marriage (Thorned Heart Press; 2022) was being published, I decided to post an excerpt. This is from the ending of the novel which tells the story of Art, short for Artemis, who was a drug dealer in high school, got caught, went to reform school, and then a few years later deals again, is caught, and sentenced to prison. After a few years, she gets released and eventually marries the love of her life, Linda, and goes on to lead her lesbian life. I have always believed in second chances, and this is Art’s story.

I am reading the excerpt from Loving Artemis below on Youtube and have pasted the words on my blog below.

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In the end, it was Linda who saved her. She started coming to visit when Art was in the County Jail. Art still remembered their first visit with the glass window between them when Linda was fighting back tears. Linda said that she left Tommy after he told her he and Cal set Art up the first time she had been busted. “They had the whole thing planned,” Linda had said. “Tommy polished off two six packs the night that he told me this, and he acted like he thought it was funny. Then he demanded to know if you and I were ever lovers. I told him we were, and that I was still in love with you. He said he suspected as much because things were never right between us. I packed up our things and took Clio with me back to my mother’s house that night.” Then Linda held her hand up against the dirty glass window between them and said she was sorry for leaving her, that she had been young and stupid and just doing what she thought she should be doing. Linda named her daughter Clio after one of the Muses. She told Art she chose the name from Greek mythology so that she would think of Art whenever she said her daughter’s name. After Linda came to visit, Art signed up for auto mechanic classes in the prison. Linda came every week, and when Art pressed her hand against the glass opposite Linda’s, she remembered being a teenager and wishing on the evening star to marry Linda and spend her life with her. 

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This is Janet Mason reading from my novel Loving Artemis, an endearing tale of revolution, love, and marriage published by Thorned Heart Press.

For more information on my most recent novel Loving Artemis, an endearing tale of revolution, love, and marriage, click here.

To read another excerpt from Loving Artemis, click here.

A Cash Cow

I wandered back to my place next to Spice’s side and before she could ask me how it went, I said to her matter-of-factly, “Tell me what you know about money.” She blinked her big eyes in surprise. The fringe of her thick lashes seemed to lengthen. “Money?” she asked. “What makes you ask about that?” “I heard Sunflower talking about it one day,” I replied. “I had never heard the word before, but it seemed important.” I didn’t tell Spice that Sunflower had mentioned money in terms of having to borrow some to get Spice’s illness treated. I didn’t want to remind Spice that she had been ill. She had been doing so well lately. She was almost back to her old self, but I could tell that she was a little wobbly. “’Sunflower?’” “That’s the name that I gave to the farmer. She named us so I thought I would name her.” Spice regarded me levelly and nodded. “’Sunflower,’ I like that. Maybe you were right when you said the farmer had a lot in common with us. I became close to her when I was sick. I heard her talk about money a few times. It seems like she is always worried about it.” Now it was my time to nod. “Was she talking to you?” I asked, my tail flicking a fly from my side. “Yes, she was. But I don’t think she knew I understood her. Do you want to learn about money or not?” I looked at her expectantly and held my long tongue. “Well one time she – I mean Sunflower – was talking to me about money and another time, I heard her talking to one of the farm hands when she was on the way to come see me when I was still in quarantine.” “And?” 

“I was just getting to it. Please be patient.” I wondered which farmhand, Spice overheard Sunflower talking to. But I didn’t want to ask too many questions. I inhaled deeply and exhaled. The air in the pasture smelled like us – like cows and cow dung. There was probably a little cow pee mixed into the scent. It also smelled like the fresh grass that had been planted there just for us. It smelled like home. “When I overheard her talking to the farmhand, she mentioned that she couldn’t pay him on time because the property taxes had gone up. The farmhand seemed to understand.” It must have been Jimmy, I thought. Ham Sandwich would never accept not being paid on time. “Property taxes?!” I asked. “You mean they charge money to live here?” Spice nodded. “Money” – explained Spice – “is something that humans made up. Sometimes their self-worth is based on it – you know their self-importance.” I widened my eyes. “I didn’t know this,” I replied. Well, now you do,” retorted Spice. “When humans have more money, they feel superior to other humans who have less money.” This didn’t make any sense to me. I couldn’t hold my tongue any longer. “Why would anyone want to feel superior to anyone else?” “Don’t be silly. There’s always a pecking order – even among cows,” Spice replied. “Not to mention the fact that we used to be money.” “Be money! Us!?” I could barely contain my curiosity. She looked at me coolly and chewed her cud. “I meant what I said,” she said finally. “An old cow told me that in ancient times the kings valued their worth on how many cows they owned. They even invaded other lands and took the cows as their own. Haven’t you ever heard the expression ‘a cash cow’?” I shook my head. “I never heard of such an expression. It sounds ridiculous. We don’t exist to make some king wealthy.”

This is Janet Mason reading from my novel Cinnamon: a dairy cow’s (and her farmer’s) path to freedom (published by Adelaide Books in New York and Lisbon). Cinnamon is available as a traditional book and as an e-book. You can find it where books are sold online, and through your local bookstores and libraries. This reading is for YouTube and Spotify.

To read my post on being intersectional, click here: Being many things at once and a new novel: #intersectional #LGBTQ #Animalrights #amreading | Janet Mason, author (wordpress.com)

My most recent novel is available on the publisher’s website: CINNAMON: a dairy cow’s (and her farmer’s) path to freedom | Adelaide Literary Magazine (adelaidebooks.org)

and on amazon.com: Cinnamon: A dairy cow’s (and her farmer’s) path to freedom: Mason, Janet: 9781958419786: Amazon.com: Books

THREE FIGS

Direct from the store on a hot July morning

you bound brilliant and sunny through the front door

in your hands

three green plump figs

wrapped in leaves

the first of the season

brought into the grocery from a neighbor’s tree

It’s still too soon for our backyard tree

to bear its large purple figs we will pick in September

you in the yellow Italian soccer shirt, I in the matching blue,

delighted with the figs and each other 

we laugh as though we still were the teenagers

we were when we first met

You say

as long as we are together

we will always be fifteen

It is high summer now in a light filled dining room

we savor and share three green figs on two china plates.

As I was saying recently to a friend, after five years of being a healthy vegan, it makes sense to me that what we eat affects our health, that the animals deserve not to be eaten and not to suffer in any way, and that we all need to be concerned about the planet. Despite my decades of conditioning (some would say brainwashing), going to a healthy plant-based diet opened my eyes and changed my life.

I initially went to a healthy vegan diet because of a health condition (the results have been remarkable) and then went through a consciousness-raising about the animals and the environment, which inspired my novel Cinnamon: a dairy cow’s (and her farmer’s) path to freedom published just recently by Adelaide Books.

So, I am also a vegan for ethical reasons. But when it comes to old friends, I am concerned about the human animal. Recently, when an old friend suffered a very serious heart attack, which rendered her unconscious for two weeks, I ordered UnDo It! written by Dean Ornish, M.D., and his wife, Anne Ornish.

I was impressed with the explanations of the science and the proof supporting healthy plant-based eating. The book also talks about the importance of having a gratitude practice, something that I’ve recently incorporated into my life.  After telling us that a gratitude practice has been proven to lower blood pressure, and reduce stress, along with offering other health benefits, the authors write:

“Gratitude often naturally bubbles up when you’re feeling upbeat, happy, and well. Yet when you consciously practice gratitude—especially during hardship—it can actually improve your health while breeding deeper contentment and love in your life.

…

Letting your heart open to acknowledge the grace around you and to savor the preciousness of your life is the first step. This means shifting your awareness so that you can begin to notice the small, subtle things that spark joy and nourish your heart, such as your warm cup of morning tea, the splendor of the sunrise, or simply feeling blessed when you wake up and get to greet a new day.”

When I read UnDo It by Dr. Dean Ornish and Anne Ornish (published in 2019 by Ballentine Books), my life was greatly enriched, and I knew it was the right book to send to an old friend who needs it.

This is Janet Mason reviewing for Book Tube and Spotify.

My most recent novel is available on amazon.com: Cinnamon: A dairy cow’s (and her farmer’s) path to freedom: Mason, Janet: 9781958419786: Amazon.com: Books