Local author Alison Mackie pens sensual tale of gypsies
06/06/07
Punta Gorda Herald
"She was a gypsy lady ..."
So goes part of the chorus of a now forgotten song popular several decades ago.
For local author Alison Mackie, that phrase takes her back to her childhood in Seville, Spain, where she was cared for by an Andalusian gypsy named Ahalita who played flamenco records for her and taught her to dance.
As the About the Author section of her new book, "The Gypsy Chronicles," states, "I feel that the residue of Ahalita's spirit is somehow linked with my own. I may not have gypsy blood flowing through my veins, but I have something of Ahalita, that is a certainty."
That spirit needed a release, and she found it by writing a book chronicling the lives of a romantic gypsy matrimonial-bed maker by the name of Tzigany de Torres and his wife, Gitana, as well as the people for whom he made beds.
It is a sensual, even spicy tale that somehow manages to be devoid of sex. As Gitana, the teller of the story states, " ... we will fly from story to story; love to love; and bed to bed. However, if you were to assume this book is just about sex, you would be mistaken. There is no sex in this book, but something even finer: Love!"
Mackie said, "This book is very flamenco and very gypsy because it's an expression of what's in my heart. The message is that the heart has a lot to tell you and you should listen. But it speaks in a whisper, so you should listen very carefully. It should be read after you have taken a hot bath, drank your warm milk and been tucked into your bed with your jammies on. It's a bedtime story that makes you feel good."
Mackie's book is currently available at John's Pennywise Books in the Colonial Promenade shopping center at Burnt Store Road and U.S. 41 and at www.amazon.com. There is a link to the Amazon page on her own Web site, www.thegypsychronicles.com. At John's, Mackie, a wine connoisseur, is giving away a free bottle she made at the Gilded Grape with every sale.
Not content with selling her books impersonally through third parties, Mackie has taken the unusual step of selling her book door to door, complete with gypsy garb and smoking a cigar, her only bad habit.
If she should arrive on your doorstep, give the $14 book a try. Lavishly illustrated with drawings and vintage black and white photographs of gypsies, the book, at 172 pages, is just the right length and leaves you wanting more.
That you shall get. Mackie is already working on a sequel, "Charmed and Dangerous," this tale told by Gitana and Tzigany's daughter, Angicaro, and due out in December.
Read both, and perhaps you will understand the meaning of an old gypsy proverb Mackie quotes on the first page of "The Gypsy Chronicles" -- "The gypsy has three truths: one with me, one with you, and one with herself."
E-mail Gordon Bower at pgherald@sun-herald.com.
By GORDON BOWER
Punta Gorda Herald Editor
Punta Gorda Herald
"She was a gypsy lady ..."
So goes part of the chorus of a now forgotten song popular several decades ago.
For local author Alison Mackie, that phrase takes her back to her childhood in Seville, Spain, where she was cared for by an Andalusian gypsy named Ahalita who played flamenco records for her and taught her to dance.
As the About the Author section of her new book, "The Gypsy Chronicles," states, "I feel that the residue of Ahalita's spirit is somehow linked with my own. I may not have gypsy blood flowing through my veins, but I have something of Ahalita, that is a certainty."
That spirit needed a release, and she found it by writing a book chronicling the lives of a romantic gypsy matrimonial-bed maker by the name of Tzigany de Torres and his wife, Gitana, as well as the people for whom he made beds.
It is a sensual, even spicy tale that somehow manages to be devoid of sex. As Gitana, the teller of the story states, " ... we will fly from story to story; love to love; and bed to bed. However, if you were to assume this book is just about sex, you would be mistaken. There is no sex in this book, but something even finer: Love!"
Mackie said, "This book is very flamenco and very gypsy because it's an expression of what's in my heart. The message is that the heart has a lot to tell you and you should listen. But it speaks in a whisper, so you should listen very carefully. It should be read after you have taken a hot bath, drank your warm milk and been tucked into your bed with your jammies on. It's a bedtime story that makes you feel good."
Mackie's book is currently available at John's Pennywise Books in the Colonial Promenade shopping center at Burnt Store Road and U.S. 41 and at www.amazon.com. There is a link to the Amazon page on her own Web site, www.thegypsychronicles.com. At John's, Mackie, a wine connoisseur, is giving away a free bottle she made at the Gilded Grape with every sale.
Not content with selling her books impersonally through third parties, Mackie has taken the unusual step of selling her book door to door, complete with gypsy garb and smoking a cigar, her only bad habit.
If she should arrive on your doorstep, give the $14 book a try. Lavishly illustrated with drawings and vintage black and white photographs of gypsies, the book, at 172 pages, is just the right length and leaves you wanting more.
That you shall get. Mackie is already working on a sequel, "Charmed and Dangerous," this tale told by Gitana and Tzigany's daughter, Angicaro, and due out in December.
Read both, and perhaps you will understand the meaning of an old gypsy proverb Mackie quotes on the first page of "The Gypsy Chronicles" -- "The gypsy has three truths: one with me, one with you, and one with herself."
E-mail Gordon Bower at pgherald@sun-herald.com.
By GORDON BOWER
Punta Gorda Herald Editor
posted by Allie @ 7:38 AM
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