page 75 of my paperback novel

Here is an excerpt from Hollywood Sinner's, my novel that takes place in 1939: 

An hour later, after everyone’s ears had been numbed by a blow of showy Latin and unassailable facts, the time came for the press and for everyone else to sample cactus juice. Big blocks of ice were wheeled out from a truck, chunks were chipped off and dropped into tumblers, and a lime green juice was poured in.  After Carol had downed hers, not caring how it tasted, she decided it was time to get the press interested in her.  She wailed out a big high note, did some boisterous tap dancing in the sand, and added, “Mammy!  How I love yah!”   She repeated it a few times.

The photographer did not move to snap her picture for his paper.

She did it again and started sweating bullets, realizing she should have worked harder on planning her script.  It wasn’t everyday the likes of her was in the company of a camera and she was blowing it.  She danced bigger, and sang louder, “Love ya!  Love ya!  Where’d yah get those peepers!”  She heard a gasp.  She wouldn’t let that discourage her.  Then she realized that it was because she’d backed up into the coals and the back of her ridiculous dress had dragged into it and she was now a blazing column of greasy flames. She quickly pulled her fluffy sleeves off, pulled down hard on the corset, and kicked out of the skirts.  She kicked the pile of aside, and smiled like she had done it on purpose and was Houdini.  But everybody now looked above her head in horror.

“Your hat!”

She tossed it aside, saying, “Whoopsie!”

They still were in horror and she felt an intense heat on her head.  A furious orange greasy pillar of fire was shooting up off it.  Then people tossed the contents of their tumblers at her head. Some only had ice left.  It hurt, along with the growing second-degree burns.   Carol decided it was time to call it quits, so she wiped the juice out of her eyes, smiled one last time, and then sidestepped in the general direction of the streetcar line, forgetting she was only in her underwear.  But the woman who had snubbed her before the boring speeches now hurried up to her and took her arm.

“You’re brilliant,” she quickly said in Carol’s ear, and then loudly announced so her voice would be heard over all the commotion, “This was a brave but necessary demonstration of the potent power of cactus juice to treat burns.  I do hope you got all of this demonstration on film.”

The photographer nodded, wide-eyed and awed.  “I’m getting the Pulitzer!”

“If war breaks out in Europe, and we pray it doesn’t, but it will, there will be terrible burns to treat.  Burns are the most serious of all wounds.  Burns are the most difficult to treat.  Cactus has natural medicine in it that cools burns and promotes their healing.”  She turned to Carol.  “How do you feel?”

Carol lied.  “I was feeling very hot.  But now I’m as cool as a cucumber.  I mean cactus!”

They laughed and applauded.

Carol took a bow.  The woman pulled her aside and asked, “Are you really okay?”

“I’d like a very cold bath.  Can somebody drive me home?”

“No problem.”