Dear Reader,
There is much to talk about.
I will try my best to be brief.
I will be signing books once
again at the Waldenbooks in The Village Mall located in Danville,
Illinois at 1:00 this coming Saturday December 1. I thought it was a
little over-kill myself, but the manager thought it was a good idea.
Maybe she just likes my sparkling personality. So if you haven’t gotten
enough of me, come out and say hello. You can get some free
mini-Snickers out of me if nothing else. And Snickers are the best
candy bars in the world.
The Janitor got a
five-heart review from Crystal Adkins. It is very thoughtful and well
written. A special thanks to her. You can view her reviews on her
website or on
Amazon or
Barnes & Noble.
I’ve had several inquiries
about the audio book competition for The Janitor, but still need
several spots filled. There are some difficult voices to speak,
including Carl Stumot and Agent Johnson. I also need younger voices for
some of the teenage characters. If you know of anyone who would be a
good fit feel free to pass this on to them—drama clubs come to mind.
My next novel, Feel No
Pain, is going quite well. If you remember, it starts at the end
and goes to the beginning. I had to break down and map out a timeline
for this one. I feel when I write, that a timeline constrains the story
a bit, but without it I would be lost, as am I writing the story just as
how you will read it—backwards. This is a dark one—not quite the happy
days of Roman Swivel at Collingston High School. But we’ve all had our
bad days, times when we’ve wished we had a missile launcher on the top
of our vehicle so we could vaporize the guy in front of us, who is
coasting at 20 mph. Ultimately, this is about a guy who snaps after a
day that doesn’t go right for him. On a basic level, I think everyone
will be able to relate. It takes place in Collingston. The Tavern is
in it. Carl Stumot is mentioned.
I’m also writing two short
stories. High Wire—let’s just say it has to with very high places that
you don’t want to be in (my hands started to sweat as I wrote that).
And Planet 3B—an exploration of a deserted alien planet by one
scientist, set in the future.
I was a bit worried about The
Janitor download sales until I discovered that my publisher’s site was
malfunctioning. Who knows how long it was down (months), and how many
sales I lost. So I decided to just run the sales myself. Everything is
working now; you can buy both the
book and ebook
through my site.
I've been doing a lot of reading lately. I just finished For
One More Day by Mitch Albom. This should be required reading
for all teenage sons, and moms might like it too. I'm currently
reading Cormac McCarthy's No Country For Old Men (I always,
always read the book first). McCarthy is a strange cat--he refuses
to use quotation marks and most commas. But it is very good, and
maybe some of it is attributed to the way he writes. A good
non-fiction book that's knocking my socks off right now is Lies My
Teacher Told Me by James W. Lowen. It goes through and
corrects every wrong thing you ever learned from a history text.
It's a great read for anybody who is interested in U.S. history.
Lowen also just happens to be from Decatur, Illinois. If you've
read all my stuff (wink, wink), then you have my permission to proceed
with any of these.
I think that’s it. Have a
good one. Hope to see you soon.
Happy reading,
Adam
