My Favorite Dia

I'm a big fan of the Day of the Dead. Not just in the, you know, recently very popular way either. It started when I was wayyyy back in High School, and I promise you... that's been awhile.

Not even going to tell you how many years.

But you definitely couldn't by sugar skull decorations at Walmart yet.  In fact, you couldn't get ANYTHING assoiated with Dia de los Muertos here in the states unless you knew people who had relatives south of the border.

A few years later than that my family decided to take a vacation to Puerto Vallarta on Halloween without me.

With. Out. Me.

I've forgiven them, trust me. But they did ask if I wanted anything as a souvenir and I immediately started dancing around shouting: flower skeleton, flower skeleton. My brother did the noble thing and offered to book me a room in a special facility, so I had to explain.

He gave me a sideways look and said, "How will I find this? What if I get the wrong thing?"

I assured him that on Oct. 31st in PV he would not be able to miss my flower skeletons. I'm still pretty sure he thought I was nuts. When he returned with my hand carved wooden Dia de los Muertos dude. (still my favorite decoration of all) He understood. He told me he almost bought me the life-sized one, for which he gets major points, but he'd have had to get it a seat on the plane and didn't want to foot the bill for an extra fare. For which... well, I suppose I understand that.

Life sized.

Sometimes I still imagine him riding back on the plane with it.


So... the point of all this is that I LOVE DIA DE LOS MUERTOS.

and I have a free short story up on the Zharmae blog for y'all to prove it. 


https://zharmaeblog.wordpress.com/2015/10/22/kundalis-de-los-muertos/

It feautres the Kundalis dragons and makes a tidy bridge between book one (out now) and book two.
(coming very very soon)

I hope you all enjoy it.

Best
Frances