No. 50 - Vespers

by Ed McBain

Started: November 8
Finished:

Notes: Sort of sticking with the horror theme, I'm now turning to one of the 87th Precinct police procedural novels. Why is this one sort of horror? Because it apparently has the detectives of the 87th dealing with murderous Satan worshippers. Oh, joy!

Mini review:

New tale of horror published

My very short short story "Forlorn" can now be found over at Deadman's Tome!

If you like stories where you get into the mind of a killer, this one is for you.

I'm being productive, I promise!

So, my blogging has dropped off of late. And I've not had many short stories published of late. In fact, I'm quite low on the number of short stories I still have that have not been published.

So what in the heck have I been doing, writing wise?

Quite a bit, actually.

Not too long ago I had to put together two different proposals for two different publishing houses. Haven't heard from either of them yet, but hopefully something will come through.

I've also just finished the second edit of a novel. I have one more edit to do, the quick-read edit, then I can begin circulating it to publishers, agents and possibly universities (this is a literary/mainstream novel).

All three books of my Kobalos trilogy are now available for the Kindle and at Smashwords.

Also, I've been working on something that I'm not going to talk much about just yet. It's something finished and something I'll be self-publishing online, but I'm waiting for Amazon to get their butt's in gear before I announce anything

See? I've been doing stuff.

No. 49 - Darkness, Tell Us

by Richard Laymon

Started: October 30
Finished: November 7

Notes: Just in the nick of time for Halloween, I'm getting into a horror novel. This particular author comes highly praised from other horror writers, including Stephen King and Ty Schwamberger, so I'm excited to finally get an opportunity to check out this author.

Mini review: Reminded me a lot of Dean Koontz, especially the plotting. The overall writing was a bit more literary than Koontz, and the characters more personable. However, this is just the first Laymon book I've read, so I'll have to check out more to get a better feel for his style. Will I read more? Sure. This book was a lot of fun and tense, though the real action didn't kick in until the last 30 pages. Then things got quite grizzly.

Geocities is dead

It's a sad, sad week. After years of service, Yahoo has killed Geocities where I had my old Web page for the last 12 years, including my pages about beer.

But all is not lost. My beer rankings have been saved and I have something special planned for them.

Expect an announcement in coming weeks!

No. 48 - How to Win Friends and Influence People

by Dale Carnegie

Started: October 21
Finished: October 29

Notes: My dad has been a fan of public speaking guru Dale Carnegie for decades, specifically this book, so I thought I would give it a try, especially since this is a motivational book of sorts. This non-fiction book was originally published back in the 1930s, but still has some following even today. My guess is it will be a bit outdated, but hopefully it'll still be an interesting read.

Mini review: The basic gist of this book is, "follow the Golden Rule." That's oversimplifying to some extent, but not too far off the mark. The writing style was dated, but not to the point of annoyance. The main ideas focused mostly on business relations, but there were also some chapters on marital relations, friendships, etc. Not a bad little book. Too bad not many people today seem to follow the advice given.

Final trilogy novel published

Dark King of the North: Book III of the Kobalos trilogy is now available in ebook form online and for the Apple Kindle. Check it out at Amazon, Smashwords and Scribd.