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Jul 29, 2011

Shush!!

I was trying to scale back on the arcs, with the San Francisco trip being next week (!)  But they just keep on coming.  And funny story, I did an offsite event this week at the main library.  The event itself went smoothly even my hasty primer on the mobile credit card machine - no problem.  The problem - the dolly - it wouldn't sit up, it wouldn't lay flat.  I jerry rigged it and got up to the room OK. Coming down, that was a different story.  The dolly was in errant shopping trolly mode so folks if you were in the library on Wednesday afternoon around 5.30 and wondered what that horrendous noise was.  It was me pulling a dolly that was acting more like an errant puppy and my goodness it was loud.  So sorry.

The hotel in SF has wifi so I'm going to try and photo blog while we are out there.  Looking forward to meeting Cara and visiting West Portal books and all the other fab things we can pack into a weekend.

Jul 25, 2011

In Other News

I have all the feedback from draft #3 so this week I have to cull some characters and even a re-assign a storyline or two.  I also have to brush up my public speaking skills as I'm doing the intro for Chris Ewan when he comes to the store for Good Thief's Guide to Venice but it isn't until August 13th so plenty of time to write and practice that.

Oh and can anyone suggest some mind mapping software that works with Windows - mindnode would be perfect but I don't have a mac.

7/29 Thanks for all the suggestions I went with sky mind as it works on the Ipod touch and its free.

Thoughts on All Cry Chaos

Leonard Rosen's book has taken me a while to finish and that's a good thing because its the first time for a long time that a book has made me put it down every few chapters because I had to ponder on a concept or a puzzle or even a set of pictures and get it straight in my head before I could move on.  All Cry Chaos is a thriller, a fractal lover's dream date, thought provoking, and a damn good read.  Coming in September, full review then.

Jul 20, 2011

Lanterns, Latin and Latte

So I'm finishing The Lantern by Deborah Lawrenson which is lush, gothic, a ghost story and French (again with the French)  The re-work of chapter 26 of my book was a success.  Our San Francisco trip is coming up very fast so a re-read of Cara Black's Murder in the Latin Quarter is in order as we're discussing the book and meeting with Cara - which is going to be a lot of fun.  Now I'm off to my local Beans n Brews (never fear they're local first) with my laptop for a frozen coffee hopefully with an added dash of inspiration.

Jul 14, 2011

Angels or Aliens - you decide

Just blurbed Covenant by Dean Crawford, it's a first novel which comes out in October - full review then.  If you want a tag line it's X-Files meets 24 in the middle of the age old Israeli/Palestinian conflict.  I'm hoping this is the start of a series.  Now I just have to re-jigg chapter 26 before I go in to work.

Jul 12, 2011

Original Sin by Beth McMullen


NB Don't let the pink (with a capital P) cover put you off. 

Lucy Hamilton (not her real name) meets Will on a diving holiday and its love at first sight.  A whirlwind courtship follows and 9 years later Lucy - mother of Theo - is the picture of suburban bliss.  And then Lucy’s former employer gets in touch and all hell breaks loose, because Lucy used to be Agent 26 codenamed Sally Sin and her former employer is Uncle Sam.  Lucy’s former nemesis has resurfaced and her bosses want to use her as bait to draw him out while Lucy’s agenda is a whole lot more family oriented.  Lucy is Sydney Bristow with the smart mouth of Izzy Spellman, she has a license to kill and Carpool.

Quiet House

Back to business, Vegas mugged me as usual but I did manage to get some reading done.  Death and the Maiden, the new Gerald Elias, Covenant by Dean Crawford and The Lantern by Deborah Lawrenson and waiting in the wings is All Cry Chaos by Leonard Rosen which - like Covenant - I requested.  One to watch for this month is Twice a Spy by Keith Thompson haven't read it yet but Once a Spy was brilliant.  Tomorrow I have to rework chapter 26 of Rollover and that will be the first serious writing - apart from solving the crossword every day - that I've done for a week.