Passionate About Purple

Purple Pansies in my flowerpots.

  

Purple happens to be one of my all-time favorite colors. Why? I haven't a clue, except that the color seems to call to me. So you see, I'm passionate about purple.

As an artist, which is something I do when I'm not writing, I love to paint, which means I love colors. So I love using purple in all its many shades in my landscapes, seascapes and florals.

One of my favorite childhood books is Hailstones and Halibut Bones by Mary O'Neill. It's a book of poems about colors. I still have the book my mother gave me all those many years ago. It was a favorite which I shared with my daughter when she was young and which I now share with my grandkids.

Another kid's book that I've always loved is Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson.

One of my very favorite books is Zane Grey's Riders of the Purple Sage. Lassiter is a to-die-for-hero. And I swear I can smell the purple sage. I've read this book more times than I can count. It's simply awesome! Amazon offers a free Kindle version of Riders of the Purple Sage, but some of the original story was edited out when it was first published back in 1912. The Leisure Books Edition, if you can find a copy, is the restored version before those edits. I've read both. The Rainbow Trail  is the sequel, published in 1915. The Desert Crucible  is the Leisure Books Edition, also hard to find, which is the restored version.

If you want to know more check out:  Zane Grey and Riders of the Purple Sage (on Wikipedia)

Another one of my all-time favorite "purple books" is John D. MacDonald's A Purple Place for Dying. This is the third novel in the Travis McGee series. This is an awesome series of books, definite keepers. Unfortunately, the series is quite pricey in eBook or paperback editions, so you might want to check your library or used book stores first. In a previous post I listed all the Travis McGee novels in order (see post dated 11/1/12, "Florida is a State of Mind").

If you want to know more about this great series check out: Travis McGee (on Wikipedia)


Tiny purple and orange Violas in my flowerpots.

Now back to my passion about purple. I happen to love the color in all its varying shades. I particularly love purple flowers, so I currently have purple Pansies and purple and orange Violas in my flowerpots (see flower pics in this post).

I have a neighbor with a purple Dodge Charger, so obviously I'm not the only one who is passionate about purple. I haven't gone to that extreme with the color purple, but I do have a purple cover on my Kindle Fire and I have purple t-shirts, socks and even purple undies (Oh, my!). I'm also a big-time NFL football fan and have two favorite "purple teams": the Minnesota Vikings and the Baltimore Ravens. Hey, what can I say? I love the color purple.

Now for those who regularly read my blog posts, I usually add a list of books. This time it's a list of fiction that has purple in the title. Some of the books are well known and others not so well known. Although I haven't yet read any of the books listed below, they all sound like great reads. All of them are available as eBooks.

Purple Fiction (in no particular order):

The Color Purple by Alice Walker
Purple Roads by Fleur McDonald
The Purple Cloud (Classic) by M. P. Shiel
Purple by Graham J. Sharpe
Night of the Purple Moon (The Toucan Trilogy) by Scott Cramer
The Purple Shroud (A Novel of Empress Theodora) by Stella Duffy
Purple Heart by Patricia McCormick
Knight of the Purple Ribbon by Jennifer Wells
Purple Moon (Shadow Guardian Trilogy) by Judith P. Vaughan
Kiki Loweinstein and the Purple Passion (Short Story) by Joanna Campbell Slan
Talking Dogs, Aliens and Purple People Eaters (Ellora's Cave) by Shelley Munro
Purple Shroud (A Yorkshire Dales Mystery) by Susan Parry
The Meaning of Purple Tulips by Blaithin O'Reilly Murphy

Purple Non-Fiction (in no particular order):

I Shall Wear Purple by Linda Mather
If It's Purple, Someones Gonna Die: The Power of Color in Visual Storytelling by Patti Bellantoni

If you've enjoyed my "Passionate About Purple" post, you might want to check out my "Seeing Red" post (posted 1/24/13).

Once again, thanks so much for stopping by. Since I love colors, I'll be doing other color posts from time to time. A special passionate shout-out for the color purple. GO PURPLE!