Ethan Nahte of Examiner.com posted this article about this Saturday's event. What event? Well, the Vampire vs Werewolf smackdown between me and Gabrielle Faust, of course! Ethan set out to interview both me and Gabrielle, but the vampiress was already hiding in fear of the fur. Or caught up in deadlines, or something. Anyway, go read the article. It's pretty funny in places. Come out and see us on Saturday at Eerie Books in Wylie, Texas. And support Mission: Wolf by buying tickets!

I keep meaning to post this, then somehow forget. How does one forget that he's been reviewed in Cemetery Dance magazine? I dunno. Just getting old, I guess. But yes, my own Little Graveyard on the Prairie was reviewed on page 122 of Issue #60, which came out in the middle of June, actually. The review itself, written by Jack Lloyd, is just kind of lukewarm, but ends with "...a largely fun and fast-paced read." But hey, I'm in CD!

Speaking of Little Graveyard on the Prairie, I got my copy of the lettered edition today (mine is actually marked PC). It's very nice. I have to admit I didn't know what to expect, as I've actually held very, very few limited edition books. This is nice. It doesn't have a dustjacket, which kind of surprised me, but it has a nice foil picture on a deep blue hardcover, and the dustjacket image is featured within. Also include are the two extra pieces I wrote just for this edition. Sorry, but the lettered did sell out and those two pieces are not available anywhere else. You can still buy a numbered copy, though.

Remember: Two bucks and you could win four signed books AND help a very worthy organization.

So, I have had other stuff I wanted to post about besides the stupid literature pirates. Maybe my old brain will remember most of it. First, though, to the subject line. I wish I could post a picture, but I can't find the cord that connects my phone to my computer. Anyway, after weeks of him asking, I finally took my youngest son back to the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum today. Sadly, like most kids today, he doesn't really watch or appreciate Western movies like I did. He likes the play area and the Old West town recreation. And, of course, the gift shop. But, back on topic. There is a massive and incredible statue of Abraham Lincoln sitting in the museum. First Jake told me it was George Washington, but then he guessed it right. Then he looked at me and asked in his this-makes-no-sense voice, "Why is HE in a cowboy museum? He should be at the White House." Eh, maybe you had to be there. Personally, I was impressed that my 7-year-old son recognized Lincoln and could place him in the White House.

Last week was brutal! I was at an Advanced Placement workshop all week and worked my part-time job, too. The workshop was pretty draining, but I learned a lot I'll be able to use in class. Still, I didnt have much juice left for creative stuff when I got home.

The big thing at the moment is preparing for the first Vampire vs. Werewolf signing with Gabrielle Faust this Saturday. I did two interviews about the signing the other day, so we're hoping for a good turnout. I have to say that Gabrielle and I are both disappointed in the online response to the charity component of the "battle". The werewolves are ahead, but not by much ... because donations have been really slow. Come on, folks, you could win four signed books for a simple $2 donation that will go to help rescued wolves. Or bats, if you prefer.

Well, between my daughter and her boyfriend watching the (I'm sure crappy) remake of My Bloody Valentine and the smell of whatever my wife is cooking for dinner, I can't recall what else I had to say. Besides, I need to reserve this typing for the werewolves. There's a new character and I'm dying to know what part he's going to play.

In yesterday's post about story thieves I said I couldn't possibly contact all of those places that had "Unholy Womb" illegally posted. I did, however, contact djjeremy@gmail.com at winterrowd.com and told him to remove the story or pay me 3 cents per word for the privilege of having it on his site. He responded in typical pirate fashion:
Isn't that nice? He apologized ... after saying the entire story he'd had posted on his site for over two years isn't worth 3 cents in its entirety. Well, maybe he's saving his money for some mail order grammar and punctuation lessons. Douchebag.

Meanwhile, Stephen Evans (steve@thecryptmag.com) of The Crypt Mag (www.thecryptmag.com) still has my story online. Click the e-mail link and tell him what a putz he is if you want.

I can be rather forgetful sometimes. Fortunately the population at large is filled with dumbasses. Today I got a notice from PayPal informing me that one Stephen Evans of The Crypt Mag (www.thecryptmag.com) rejected my request for money. The request was sent on Dec. 20, 2004. I was demanding that Stephen Evans of The Crypt Mag (www.thecryptmag.com) pay me $38.85 for reprinting my short story "Unholy Womb." You see, Stephen Evans of The Crypt Mag (www.thecryptmag.com) copied the story for a Web site I did authorize to reprint the story and then Stephen Evans of The Crypt Mag (www.thecryptmag.com) pasted it into his online magazine.

Being reminded of Stephen Evans of The Crypt Mag (www.thecryptmag.com)'s thievery today made me do a Google search for my story. As you can see, a number of people have helped themselves to my copyrighted material. Of those, only Halloween Ghost Stories actually has permission to have the story online. I could contact every site that has it online, but there are pages and pages of them.

What the hell? Why do people think it's okay to steal and repost material that isn't theirs? I mean, I'm flattered that so many people like the story and want to share it, but come on! In most cases they even copies the hot link of my name that clicks through to an e-mail address of mine. Would it be so damn hard to ask permission?

The only good news here is that a Google search of the story's first line did not turn up even more sites hosting the pirated story. That's happened before, with this story and a couple of others. Some jackass actually reposted them under his own name. He stole a few of mine and some other authors' stories, and there was a big uproar. Even Brian Keene got involved in that one.

Back on topic. This is not good. But I don't know what to do about it. If it's stolen and reprinted a certain number of times, do I lose any rights to it? What if I wanted to adapt it to a screenplay? Is the story even still mine? This really blows. "Unholy Womb" was my first published story, appearing in The Midnight Zoo back in about 1992 or '93. I let Halloween Ghost Stories reprint it in 2001. Now, eight years later, it's gotten around as much as a cheap Webcam whore.

I killed a friend yesterday.

I'd known this person since 1993. I met him because of a creative writing course at Francis Tuttle Technology Center. He'd been a good friend, though always a little strange. He didn't deserve to die, but then life and death seldom play fair. I miss him already.

Fortunately, since he only exists in my fiction, I won't be charged with murder for killing him. Still, considering I can't name a single real friend I knew in 1993 that I still talk to today, I kind of feel like I killed a real person.

He's gone, though. This needed to be done. Knowing it had to be done kept me from really getting started on the next book of The Werewolf Saga. I didn't want to do it, you know. But now it's done and I can go on. He may reappear through the magic of flashback and ... I have three award-winning chapters and an outline of an historical romance novel that stars him, too. So, as Harley Shaw learned, "Dead ain't gone, and gone ain't dead."

I have 25 pages of the new werewolf book done. That's about 6,000 words. I suspect it will go pretty quickly now. Much quicker than The Girls Nobody Wanted to Date! This one is called Nadia's Children. If you don't know who Nadia is, you can find out by reading the history pages at The Werewolf Saga online. If you can't figure out who I killed ... you probably didn't read the ending of Ulrik.

In other news, the temperature here in central Oklahoma was about 100 degrees today. (Yes, Marcy, it's time to water the house again.) It'll be hotter tomorrow. I think our air conditioning is about to crap out, too.

Summer school is over! Of the three years I've taught summer school, this was the easiest. I got confirmation yesterday that, yes, I will be teaching the senior English classes again this fall. I expected as much. The second job is going well. I've met some very interesting people from all over the world doing this ESL testing.

Finally, just a reminder about the Vampire vs Werewolf "fight" between me and Gabrielle Faust. It isn't too late to make a $2 donation to Mission: Wolf for a chance to win all four signed volumes of The Werewolf Saga. Or, yeah, you can support the vampires and have a chance to win four books from Gabrielle by donating to her bat conservatory cause.

I remember going into my room one day in 1977 and finding this tacked to my wall


I still suspect my dad wanted the poster and just used my 11-year-old self as an excuse. No matter. I pretended I didn't like it because, you know, girls were still kinda gross at that point. But really ... Yeah. After that, any Farrah picture I could get went on the wall, and in that first year of "Charlie's Angels" there were a ton of pictures to be had. Somewhere I still have all my "Charlie's Angels" trading cards, the first set that had puzzle pieces on the back. Ah, summer days with Chuck Bumgardener as we'd rush to Holding's Food Store to buy another pack, tear them open, chomp the gum and ogle the cards. We both wanted a Mustang II Cobra like Jill drove on the show, too.

And now Farrah's gone.

This is big. I mean, I had three posters of people on my wall back then. There was Farrah, Roger Staubach and KISS. The 1970s, when the originals were in KISS, the Dallas Cowboys had class and Farrah was a goddess married to a six-million-dollar man. Good times.

Rest in peace, Farrah.

No, they don't. Fortunately, my wife is one of those people. She could have done better, but never learned it, I guess. Or maybe I'm her get-into-Heaven charity project. I don' t know.

It was 24 years ago today that she willingly walked up an aisle, stood beside me and agreed to stay with me come hell or high water. And I've given her both since then.

I still love you, baby.



Is Family Guy on yet? (Inside joke.)

Last week I got two rejections on Amara's Prayer. This manuscript has been a major disappointment. It's been just about five years since I defended the manuscript as my thesis project at the University of Oklahoma. I don't recall how many drafts it went through prior to that point. Two writing professors and another with who specialized in anthropology and mythology made up my thesis committee. They put the book through the wringer, making sure the research was right, the leaps from fact to fiction were plausible, the writing was good, etc.

Then two agents tied it up, one after the other, for a long time with minimal results. Another, upon recommendation from one of his clients, agreed to submit it to a certain editor at a major house when one of her authors told me it would probably work for her. Said editor never responded. At all. Even to follow-up messages from this very reputable agent. That was about three years

Since then I have tried numerous agents, all with rejections or dead silence, and various publishers, large and small, that take unagented queries and submissions. The two most recent, and the one that came a few weeks ago, were all from small publishers. The problem in all three of these cases? Here's a line from one of the rejection letters: You're certainly a capable writer, but the religious overtones of your material aren't quite right for us. Hmm. Here's another:  Despite your very well-written professional query, and an interesting plot.. words like angels, Christian duty, redemption, etc. are putting me off...  See the trend?

I'm not gonna go Jerry Falwell on you and claim there's an anti-Christian, liberal publishing establishment thing going on here. Now, I might point out that The Exorcist, The DaVinci Code, Rosemary's Baby and countless other published books also have "religious overtones" and words like "redemption" in them and they didn't do so poorly for their publishers.

I've considered the Christian/inspirational market, but ... unrepentant adultery is a key element of the book. I understand there's a new trend of "Christian erotica" publishing, and adultery is acceptable, but the adulterer has to feel remorse. So ... here I am, sitting on what I still feel is probably the best book I've written, unable to sell it because traditional publishers don't want the religion and religious publishers don't want to acknowledge that sometimes married people look elsewhere for sex when one partner doesn't want it. Oh, and then there's my tampering with the whole creation story, the origin of angels and other deities, etc.

In other writing news, I've finished reading/editing the not-so-super-secret project I wrote with a certain popular young adult author. I don't really feel like I held up my end of the editing process. I fixed one of the major issues her agent had, and at least made some improvements on others. The manuscript is only 1,000 words shorter now. I'd cut a little here, then add a little somewhere else. But then, length wasn't one of the specific issues he mentioned.

My summer school readers of The Girls Nobody Wanted to Date has fallen off. The boys who were reading it have stopped, and I'm back to babysitting them after making sure they at least do the written assignment of the day (I swear they can't carry on a conversation without every other word being either nigga or cuz!). Two of the girls are still reading it and one is enjoying it, anyway. The other doesn't talk much. Our incoming book club president read the manuscript and says she loved it. My biggest fear was that the plot would become predictable, but she assures me she never guessed what was coming next. Maybe that's a good sign. I don't know.

And finally, I've begun working a second job. I'm an ESL (English as a Second Language) tester for Oklahoma City Community College. The next three weeks, as I wrap up summer school then attend an Advanced Placement workshop, are going to be pretty busy. The testing is easy and the money's good. Testing will slack off when real school starts again in the fall, but it'll be a steady part-time income.

I meant to post about this several weeks ago, but life got in the way, then I just forgot. I'm old, ya know. Bifocals and all that. Anyway, my buddy Marcy Italiano has finally published her memoir Katrina and the Frenchman. Marcy and her husband, G, had just returned from their 10th wedding anniversary cruise and was spending a couple of days in New Orleans when hurricane Katrina hit. This is her story.

I had the honor of being one of the first to read this book. I read it in pieces as Marcy wrote it. It is raw, powerful, gut-wrenching stuff. You get to see the horrors of Mother Nature and human beings at their worst, but you also get to see people acting with compassion and love. It's a read you won't soon forget.

Here's a press release Marcy sent to promote the book:

KATRINA AND THE FRENCHMAN: A JOURNAL FROM THE STREET is now available!

On August 27, 2005, a Carnival cruise ship docked at the harbor of New Orleans. Amongst the arrivals were Canadian writer Marcy Italiano and her husband, G, wrapping a wild 10-year anniversary celebration in a city they dearly loved. But this was less than 48 hours before the levees crumbled, and the nightmare began.

Katrina and The Frenchman is a haunting, harrowing first-person account of the Hurricane Katrina disaster, seen from the perspective of two tourists trapped in a city gripped by terror, and coming apart at the seams. Repeatedly finding light in the darkness, and then watching the darkness swallow it whole. Finally forced to escape on their own, when the system broke down completely.

Mostly, though, this is a story about beautiful people, and what they become as their hope runs out.

“I love this book. It’s a riveting story, intimately told with skill, deep humility, startling honesty, and the kind of stark photographic recall most people only achieve when they find themselves suddenly slapped within an inch of their lives by death. Which is, of course, precisely what happened; and that profound revelation is delivered intact throughout the course of this beautiful, powerful work.”
-- John Skipp, bestselling author of Jake’s Wake and The Light At The End

Marcy Italiano is sharing their story so that donations from sales of Katrina And The Frenchman: A Journal From The Street can be made to Common Ground Relief, and to help the people of New Orleans.

Find out why the story was written, listen to the song and video, and buy the book for a good cause at: http://www.marcyitaliano.com

Thank you for your support.

A lot of lawyers get a bad rap in our society. Sometimes they deserve it. But I'm here to tell ya, there ain't nothing lower than a car salesman.

Today I received a letter in the mail that was marked "Cancellation Notice" on the envelope. Naturally, I was a bit concerned, so I tore it open to find a mailer from a certain local Chevrolet dealership. The mailer promises all kinds of stuff, like buying back the truck I bought from them about 18 months ago, and 2009 or 2010 trucks with monthly payments of $239, and $500 cash back, and free spray-in bedliners for every truck sold. There was even a scratch-off that said I'd won $10,000. Now, I'm happy with my 2003 Silverado, even if the salesman, sales manager and finance officer involved in that transaction were a trio of douche bags. Still, this sounds like a legitimate deal considering how desperate American automakers are to get customers, so I go to the dealership, mailer in hand.

I'm greeted in the driveway by a salesman who thinks he's guarding Camelot. He wants to know what I want. I tell him I want to talk to somebody about this mailer. He directs me to the used car building. That was the first red flag. The mailer said new vehicles. Well, maybe that's just where they want me to park. I'm waved into a parking space, greeting by a salesman who asks what I'm looking for. I tell him about the mailer and that I'm interested in a truck with an extended cab because I'll be driving my kids to school this fall. He first shows me an extended cab truck that is the same model as mine, with only 5,000 miles less. Uh, no. We look at a couple of others, and finally come to a 2008 Chevy Colorado. It's a good truck. Drives nice. But the back seats are missing. "We can get seats," he assures me. "Even if we have to take them out of a new truck."

Five mind-numbing hours later I storm off the lot in the same truck I drove in with. Somewhere in the haggling the dumbass salesman and his limp prick of a manager interpreted my "It has to have the back seats" to mean I'd be okay with no back seats. When did I learn this? After I'd filled out all the loan papers for a financial officer who left me sitting in his office for 45 minutes at one point. I was literally moving all my stuff from my old truck to the new one when I asked the salesman if they'd installed the seats or if I'd need to bring the truck back for that next week when he said I'd agreed to buy the truck without seats.

It took multiple "No seats, no deal" statements and two "Give me my title and key, I'm done" to finally get my truck back.

What the hell? I told them straight up that I wasn't all that keen to sell my truck, that I was only considering it because I need more passenger room ... and that means I'll settle for a truck without the back seat? The kicker is that I very well might have bought two vehicles from them because they had another truck that is pretty much just want my oldest son is looking for.

The new trucks advertised on the mailer? I was told that only applied to certain trucks, but was never shows those trucks. The free bedliner? Oh, they couldn't afford to do that with the deal they were making me on the truck I was looking at. Same for the $500 cash back. I didn't bother to ask for my $10,000 prize. They kept the mailer. Maybe they knew I'm the kind of person who'd send it and a printout of this blog to the Better Business Bureau and Department of Commerce, or whatever state agency deals with retail fraud.

In other news, the first week of summer school went without incident. I'm very surprised by the students who seem genuinely interested in reading and critiquing The Girls Nobody Wanted to Date ... the guys are more interested than the girls.

I train for a new part-time job this week. I'll be giving ESL tests for Oklahoma City Community College. The money's good and it's not too many hours.

Why has it been five days since my last post? Nothing has happened, probably. That, and I've been busy editing a certain not-so-super-secret-anymore project. Thanks to Gayleen for reminding me of an editing edict I was ignoring. I also found that I'm a better editor when I don't get much sleep the night before. No patience for extra words when I'm a little cranky.

I am very pleased to say that Silver Cliff, Colorado-based Mission: Wolf has graciously accepted my invitation to join the werewolves in battle against Gabriel Faust and her vampire minions at Vampire vs Werewolf.

Mission: Wolf is a wonderful organization that rescues wolves born in captivity, as well as wolf hybrids, and gives the animals a safe home in a remote part of Colorado's beautiful Rocky Mountains. They encourage visitors to come out, see the wolves, camp on-site and wake up to the song of the "children of the night." They also take wolves on the road to educate people about the truth concerning these majestic and often misunderstood animals.

And, to make it even better, Kent was very cool about coming on board. Good folk there in Colorado! Speaking of which, I need to thank my long-time friend Robyn Lydick for recommending Mission: Wolf.

This is all well and good, you're saying, then adding, "But what can I do?" I'm glad you asked! Go to www.vampirevswerewolf.com and read about the "battle" between the mighty werewolves and the dirt-sleeping vampires. Or, we can cut to the chase and you can just go straight to the donation page and start buying raffle tickets that will help support Mission: Wolf and put you in the running to win a full set of my Werewolf Saga books.

When you go visit the Mission: Wolf site, make sure you click on the Links page and read about some of the things being done for and to the wolves in North America. If that doesn't make you want to support an organization like Mission: Wolf ... well, I worry about ya.

Last word: Don't forget to come to the live "battle" between me and Gabrielle at noon on July 18 at Eerie Books of Wylie, Texas.

I'm tired. Maybe I'm just old. I don't know. I almost slept through my panel this morning, which would have been bad. I mean, like K. Hutson-Price kinda bad. Yeah. At least she had a good excuse for missing that panel, though. If, you know, excessive debauchery is a good excuse.

But I can't spend the whole blog picking on Kristy. She may return the favor, and she has a sharp wit better avoided. And, she was only one of several people it was good to see again.

Alan, Leonard and the crew put on another great SoonerCon convention with excellent programming. I wish I could have attended more panel and especially The Twisted Blades demonstration, but they kept me pretty busy. When I wasn't on a panel, I tried to hang around the Darkfaery Subculture Magazine booth because they were kind enough to let me put books for sale on their table. At the moment, I can't remember which of my panels was my favorite ... probably the "Vampires, Werewolves and Zombies, Oh My!" panel. I don't get to sit on too many panels with Selena Rosen, but when I do, they are always memorable.

Who else can I talk about? Hmm ... THE James K. Burke was there (sorry Jim, can't find a link for you) and gave me a fascinating lesson on aviation history. The biggest surprise was that Rachel Caine was there instead of in Germany. Her husband Cat Conrad was there, too, and I learned that he, not the family feline, likes to add hot spices to the food. Yes, for a while I thought Rachel had the smartest cat on the planet. Sherri Dean was there and, as always, was a pleasure to be around (Sherri, you don't have a Web site???) She made a parting comment about collaborating on a project for a certain magazine, and I think that'd be fun. The always-smiling Rosemary Clement-Moore was there, though I didn't get to talk to her all that much.

Okay, finding the links is taking too long. You want to know who was there, go look at the Guests page at the con Web site. I'm only linking to two more. You see, I'm looking forward to the online appearance of a photo in which I dunk Craig Wolf with one throw at the TrickConTreat dunking booth. Ah, that was sweet.

So, if you've never been to SoonerCon, you should start making plans for next year. They were able to confirm the guest of honor before we left this year, and you will not want to miss your chance to be in the presence of one Mr. Joe R. Lansdale.

Okay, well, back to that panel I almost slept through. You know, like Ms. Price did. It was about the fine art of collaboration. My collaboration partner wasn't there. She's back in Maine, where she probably assumed I was at home doing some revisions. So, like, I should totally get to work on that.

Can it be? I'm not sure. But ... yes ... it does seem to be.

I have finally -- no, FINALLY -- finished the first complete draft of The Girls Nobody Wanted to Date. Look at this:

Okay, well, this word meter won't let me show how I went over the original estimated word count which, you'll recall, was 60,000 words.

I was beginning to think this was the book that would never end. That was especially depressing considering the speed at which a certain still-kinda-secret project was written back in December. But now it's finished. I'll turn it over to my critique group this afternoon. And I have a voracious student waiting for the end, too. It'll be nice to see what someone in the target age group has to say about it.

The werewolves are waiting for me. And I am more than ready to revisit them. The Pack is gathering, after all.

Well, for those of you who are wondering about the post I made about an hour ago, (yes, both of you) this is a project Gabrielle Faust and I have been working on. I have to add the donation link to that site once the werewolf charity is established, so it isn't finished, but I needed to create the page so we could move forward with the design of the main site. What's that? You know you wanted this. It's your chance to join the battle at Vampire vs Werewolf. I'll post more details about what's going on when the site is finished, but I wanted to explain why that seemingly random LiveJournal page was there ... In short, Wordpress won't let us put a PayPal button on any page or sidebar.

All this ties into the July 18 signing I'll be doing with Gabrielle at Eerie Books of Wylie, Texas. We hope to see you there!

So, school ended. It was sad. Lots of hugs, then my seniors set off to see what the wide world has to offer them. There are a few I really worry about, but fortunately we're still communicating, and I'm still pushing them along.

I had a chance to buy a European DVD of 1984 with John Hurt, so I did it, thinking I could get the hack code and make one of my four DVD players play the thing. Nope. I was hoping I could show this to one of my classes, but now I seem to just be stuck with a DVD I can't play. Any suggestions?

I have one more work day to close out the school year, then three days off before the summer school prep day, which is the same day as SoonerCon.

How do you know when you're old? Other than the fact you can't hear that cell phone ringtone only kids can hear and that your eye doctor tells you to start wearing bifocals. Summer comes and you want to hear the songs you played when you were a kid. Right now I'm listening to REO Speedwagon's Decade of Rock and Roll: 1970 to 1980. Of course, I had to listen to something to drown out the [c]rap my daughter is playing on the front porch. I remember when Run DMC teemed up with Steven Tyler and Joe Perry for "Walk this Way" that I thought that kind of music would just be a flash in the pan, like new wave and disco were. Why won't it go away?!?!?!

My computer will not let me eject my flash drive. It tells me something is still open or running and that I must wait. And so I blog about random things.

Today is Memorial Day. Well, it was. The clock just rolled over to midnight. I don't know many veterans, really. A few here and there. There are -- or were -- some in my family, but I never got to hear their stories. Most of them died before I knew enough to ask. But, from what my mom tells me, they probably wouldn't have talked about their experiences, anyway. I suppose war is like that. If you've killed and seen your friends killed around you, can you really talk about it to people who haven't experienced it? I don't know. But I thank those who have done it, and with so many of my students looking at military service, I think about it a lot more than I used to.

Speaking of students, yesterday was our graduation. Our valedictorian, an incredibly sweet young lady who completely breaks all the rules of being a blonde cheerleader, cried during her speech. Two of the three salutatorians also cried. I knew the third wouldn't cry. Life has made her one tough cookie. There was a lot of hugging afterward. A lot of handshaking. It was bittersweet, and I guess it's supposed to be.

Well, there was something else I was going to blog about, but considering it's a legal issue, I suppose I won't. Okay, I did write it a couple of different ways, then deleted it.

I didn't finish The Girls Nobody Wanted to Date this weekend. I did make some progress, though.

I have a student reading it now, and we have three days of school left. Can I finish it in time?

You'll recall that the other day I suggested Gabrielle Faust and I might have something on the burner. Well, duh, it wouldn't have been mentioned if there wasn't something cooking. If you check out my Appearances page you'll see that it's been updated with several things, some past and some future ... but the one I want to bring to your attention is what's going on July 18.

Eerie Books of Wylie, Texas, will be hosting a Vampire vs. Werewolf smackdown. No, Gabrielle and I will not be mud wrestling, boxing, or trying to bite one another. But we are discussing making this a competitive signing. Details on that will come later. For right now, just mark you calendar and plan to be at the best bookstore in Texas on July 18.

In completely unrelated school news (since I still can't master the LJ cut) ...
( Completely unrelated school stuff )

What have we here? Vampires and werewolves, Okies and Texans working together again! The inimitable Gabrielle Faust has just posted an interview she did with me for the Austin Literary Examiner. This is for promotion of a big group signing that will take place in Dallas this October. You will NOT want to miss that.

If you are not a fan of Gabrielle yet, you should be. I know, I know, it's all vampire stuff, but good books are good books.

Besides that, there are rumors flying that she and I might be doing more tag-team terror.

Ya see that? I finally, finally broke the 50,000 word barrier on The Girls Nobody Wanted to Date this morning. I'm on page 207, chapter 21, heading into the climactic battle between Ashlie and her ex-friends Jenn and Anna. The final 9,000 words can't be that hard, right?