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Show C6 The Emery County Review, Tuesday, September 30, 2008 New Business Portrait Express Captures the Smiles of a Lifetime James L. Davis Finding a way to get a child to smile is not always the most difficult thing. Sometimes it’s getting the child to smile and hold still long enough to capture that smile in a photograph that is the real challenge. Elmo native Ashley Downard is up for the challenge, which is probably a good thing, since it’s her business to not only get children to smile, but to photograph those smiles. The manager of Portrait Express in Price, Downard admitted that capturing just the right photograph of a young, energetic subject is sometimes a challenge that takes a good deal of imagination (and patience) to accomplish. But as technology has developed over the years, the opportunity to let customers know immediately if you have just the perfect picture is far easier than it ever was and that fact is one of the greatest benefits Portrait Express offers -- you see your pictures immediately and can walk out the door with them in your hand the same day they are taken. “We saw a need in the area,” said Marie Bowles, owner of Portrait Express. “There have only been three choices: big box stores that are cheap, but not very creative; full service studios with great quality, but ones that families can only afford once every couple of years. The third choice has been to spend the time and gas going to Provo to a mall store. We saw a need for a good quality children and family studio that is fast, affordable, fun and creative.” Marie and her husband David, owners of Bryner Photography, envisioned Portrait Express as another service for customers of Emery and Carbon Counties. Whereas Bryner Photography would be more suited for high quality family portraits that may only be taken every year or two, Portrait Express is more suited for young families who want good quality portraits that show the many changing stages of a young child’s life. “Portrait Express is more for the mom who may want a picture of their child’s new outfit or may want to get a picture every six months,” Marie said. According to Marie, Portrait Express offers a variety of packages suited for almost any budget and with their Tiny Tracks program they have packages available to help you track your baby’s growth, starting with birth announcements and growing with your baby through the years. Portrait Express also produces passport photographs as well as portraits for the entire family. They also offer scrapbook pages, complete with digital art to help you make the perfect scrapbook page. Other services include Christmas cards and Christmas ornaments. According to David one of the greatest benefits to Portrait Express is the fact that immediately after the portrait sitting you have the opportunity to see the photographs and can have the prints in your hand by the end of the day for sizes up to 11 inch by 14 inch or smaller. Photo by James L. Davis Ashley Downard encourages Karly Bowles to smile (and hold still) for the camera. Since opening last week Marie said the response by the community has been great, although she admits that opening a new business is no easier the second time around. “I don’t know if I would call it stress as much as terror and complete insanity,” she said. Portrait Express is located at 264 South Carbon Avenue in Price and is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Walk in customers are welcome but appointments take priority. For more information on Portrait Express call 637-7499. Author Christopher Reich Plays by His Own ‘Rules’ Continued from Page C3. She asked him, “Do you have a bunch of short stories hidden in a drawer that I don’t know about?” No. “Did you take even one English class in college?” No. But he’d read a lot of books, and colleagues always enjoyed his “deal memos” at work. His father had told him he would be better off if he could be his own boss; he saw writing as a way to get there. They had enough money in the bank for him to spend two years trying. He wrote “Numbered Account,” and through a friend of a friend got it into the hands of James Patterson -- yes, that James SURPLUS PROPERTY SALE Emery County School District Maintenance & Bus Compound 855 North 175 West, Castle Dale DAY: SATURDAY, OCTOBER 11TH TIME: 9 AM – NOON The Emery County School District is offering to the general public a number of surplus items. One-of-a-kind items will be offered through silent auctions. Other items will be sold on a first come first served basis. All sales are final. All items are sold “As Is” with no warranty, refunds or returns. A partial list of the items to be offered to the public includes: • • • • • • • • • • VCR’s Computers Shelving Chairs Large Kitchen Appliances Piano Tables Miscellaneous Furniture Lunch Trays Scrap Metal • • • • • • • • • • TV’s Monitors Standing Chalk Boards Desks Industrial Steel Kitchen Equipment Books Exercise Equipment Lunch Tables Drafting Tables Old Forklifts (Need Repair) • Tires • Engine Emery County School District reserves the right to withdraw any item from the sale. Buyers must pay cash or check prior to removal of items. Sale items will be available for inspection at 8:30 on the 11th. Patterson -- who liked it enough to recommend it to his agent, Pine, who sold it for $750,000. Not bad for a first-timer. There’s a reason Patterson is known in the Reich household as “Saint James.” “I wrote a book that came out at the right time, about Swiss banking when Swiss banking was very much in the news,” Reich said. “Napoleon always said, ‘I want my generals lucky, not good’ and I subscribe to that.” But he knows luck was only part of the equation. He brought a banker’s discipline with him to the keyboard, going to the office early every morning and working until night. “As a writer, you can never wait for the muse to land on your shoulder,” he said. “It never happens. You just have to slog through it.” To make sure he stays on the right track now, he regularly consults a definition of the thriller written decades ago by John Buchan, a British author (“The Thirty-nine Steps”) widely considered the father of the genre. In it, Buchan says that the hero has to be in his (or her) 30s and needs to be accomplished in some field. Then, he is put into circumstances beyond his or her control -- a fish out of water. There has to be an element of betrayal -- someone the hero thought was trustworthy turns out not to be. And there needs to be a ticking bomb, some crisis to be averted. “The secret to being a good thriller writer is to follow those rules, but to do it in a way other people haven’t done before,” Reich said. The success of “Rules of Deception” has him eyeing that slice of the market that Ludlum and Frederick Forsyth used to own. “Nobody is really writing that old-style kind of book anymore,” he said. “The kind of book you get totally immersed in, you shut the door and you say, ‘Do not bother me.’” Reich, 46, is a voracious reader of newspapers and magazines. They’re the fuel for the engine of his imagination. It’s why “Rules” is so firmly rooted in the here-and-now, with plotlines involving terrorism, nanotechnology and Iran’s nuclear aspirations. The danger in making it current, though, is that people attach agendas to your work, Reich said. Some have accused him of being anti-Christian, for example, because one of the bad guys is evangelical. They’ve accused him of being anti-government, too, which makes a recent letter he received all the more interesting. It arrived at his home with the words “The White House” in the upper left corner. Inside was a handwritten letter from President Bush, praising “Rules” as fast-paced and well-written. Reich said, “Regardless of your politics, it’s the president of the United States!” He ranks it as one of the highlights of his life, right up there with meeting David Cornwell (aka John le Carre). Each of Reich’s books has featured a new protagonist, but halfway through “Rules” he decided Ransom might be a strong enough character to carry a series of stories. He’s almost done with a sequel, “Rules of Vengeance,” that digs deeper into Ransom’s life and relationships. Reich said he’ll be going to London soon for research on the police department’s surveillance program. “I feel a lot more pressure to get things right,” he said. “When your fiction is based on real events, you have to be careful. I don’t want to make mistakes. I go to every place I write about. I want to know: How does the street look? (Copyright 2008 Creators Syndicate Inc.) Huntington October 10, 11 • 2008 7:00 PM • Star Theatre Huntington, Utah •Short Films •Castle Valley Funniest Home Videos Film entry deadline is October 5, 2008 All Submissions must be in DVD format Admission $2.00 |