Editing by Elizabeth

February 23, 2011

Electric Barracuda by Tim Dorsey

Electric Barracuda by Tim Dorsey “Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself.” – Morpheus

Ok, that quote and Morpheus aren’t really in Electric Barracuda, the latest offering from Tim Dorsey in the Serge Storms series. However, I thought it an appropriate quote since that’s what I felt like as I sat down to write this review: No one can be told what the Serge Storms series is. You have to experience it for yourself.

Nevertheless, as this review is a part of Tim’s blog tour in support of the book’s release I figure they are probably expecting a little more than that, so here goes…

Serge Storms is a severely in need of medication serial killer who roams the state of Florida with his perpetually stoned sidekick Coleman in tow dispensing “justice” to anyone who offends his moral sensibilities. This dynamic-duo from Hell is rude, crude, and couldn’t find socially acceptable with a preprogrammed Garmin and a month to get there.

Where we do find ourselves in Electric Barracuda is dropped into the middle of Serge’s latest scheme: offering theme vacations on his travel blog. After all, as Serge points out to Coleman, “Florida is a theme park, and the theme is weirdness.” Serge is calling his particular brand of weirdness the “Tourist Fugitive” package, with the idea being to lure people to Florida for a vacation where they pretend to be on the lam from the law, visiting the fascinating “underbelly” of the state in the process. →

February 22, 2011

The Long Strange Trip of “The Sinister Mr. Corpse” by Jeff Strand

So, that pesky Jeff Strand is back with another takeover of my blog. This time he’s here to talk about the e-book release of The Sinister Mr. Corpse (you can read my review here).

The Sinister Mr. Corpse by Jeff Strand My introduction to the world of e-books was back in 1999, when author Pauline Baird Jones encouraged me to send one of my novels to an electronic publisher. My initial reaction was “Sure, or, in a similar vein, I could print out my manuscript, sprinkle a little Fresh Step on top, and let my cat defile it.” But after a little more research, I decided to give it a try, and in 2000 three of my unpublished novels came out as e-books. (Out of Whack was also supposed to come out that year, but its route to publication was hampered by the minor detail that the publisher sucked.)

Back then, you were an “e-book author” before everything else. Stephen King had given the format a bit of legitimacy with Riding the Bullet, but 99.999% of the e-book authors were not Mr. King. I could’ve played a drinking game with the number of times I heard “Let me know when it’s a real book.” Despite my insistence that my publishers provided cover art, formatting, editing, etc. there was still a very real perception that E-Book = Self-Published = Crap.

But, hey, I threw myself into e-books full force. I spent three years on the board of EPIC, an e-book authors’ organization, two of them as President, and emceed the EPPIES awards banquet (in a tux!) nine times. I continue to emcee awards banquets (in June, I’ll emcee the Bram Stoker Awards for the third time) but I will never, ever, ever, ever be on the board of a writers’ organization ever, ever, ever again. That way lies a descent into the gaping jaws of madness. →

February 21, 2011

How to Get a Book Published, in Four Easy Steps by Sara J. Henry

Right on the heels of reviewing her wonderful debut novel, Learning to Swim, I am very happy to welcome Sara J. Henry for a guest post. Think you can’t write a book? Well let Sara explain how writing is the ” great equalizer.”

Learning to Swim by Sara J. Henry The formula is simple:

1. Read a lot of books.

2. Write one.

3. Get agent.

4. Sell book.

Step 1 I began around age five, and kept it up pretty much nonstop. Step 2 I got through primarily because my writing partner, Mac, and my friend Linda were waiting for me to churn out chapters, and because I didn’t stop long enough to realize that I had no idea what I was doing or to talk myself out of it. Steps 3 and 4 were unexpectedly fast for someone who had girded herself for rejection – admittedly, so the opposite was a bit confusing. I’m still not quite sure I’ve adjusted.

Okay, I guess between Steps 2 and 3 I left out “Learn to rewrite” and “Revise like mad” and “Work until your fingers are so sore you have to wear Band-aids to type.” I also left out “Stick novel in a drawer for years because you know the middle is dreadful and don’t know how to fix it.” And “Go to writing conference and then not write for a year because some writers were so dismissive of you – and then stupidly and doggedly return the next year with the exact same material you had the year before, but this time your novel gets a lot of attention, so you decide you’d better rework it.” →

February 21, 2011

Learning to Swim by Sara J. Henry

“If I’d blinked, I would have missed it.” – Troy Chance

The blink of an eye. That’s just how quickly freelance writer Troy Chance’s life irrevocably changes in Learning to Swim, the debut novel from Sara J. Henry.

While on the deck of a ferry bound for Vermont, Troy sees what she believes to be a small child fall from the deck of a ferry traveling in the opposite direction. Instinctively Troy dives in and swims to where she saw the object enter the water.

Several frantic dives under later Troy discovers it was indeed a child, a boy about six years old, and she’s shocked to discover a sweatshirt tied around him binding his arms to his body; clearly the boy was meant to drown.

No one from either ferry saw the events, so Troy has to make an arduous swim to shore with the boy in the ice cold water. Upon reaching shore she can’t shake the feeling that taking the boy to the police is the wrong thing to do, and the decision she makes to take him home with her instead sets in motion a chain of events that turns Troy’s comfortably low key life upside down.

Living for the most part with no close friends, only minimal contact with the majority of her family, and involved in a relationship that’s more friends than lovers, Troy is used to moving through the world with minimal attachments. Therefore the strength of the feelings awakened in her when she saves the boy overwhelms and takes her completely off guard. In fact, Troy finds herself obsessed with the mystery of who tossed the boy from the ferry, so much so that even after the boy is reunited with his father and the police are finally involved Troy refuses to stand down on her own investigation, despite the increasingly dire consequences of her continuing. →

February 18, 2011

Late Rain By Lynn Kostoff

“At bottom, everything’s a question of character. Always has been.” – Stanley Tedros

Characters, and issues of character, abound in the latest offering from author Lynn Kostoff, Late Rain. The sleepy, second tier resort town of Magnolia Beach, South Carolina wouldn’t seem to be the ideal setting for a drama of Shakespearean proportions, yet that is precisely what Kostoff delivers.

Corrine Tedros, unhappy with her husband’s lack of a sense of urgency in persuading his uncle, Stanley, to sell his highly profitable soft drink empire, decides to speed the process along…by hiring a hitman to take Stanley out of the picture. →

February 16, 2011

“It’s No Sin to Love a Kindle” by Dave White

Today I am pleased to welcome author Dave White. Dave has a new collection of short stories featuring Jackson Donne, More Sinned Against, available on Kindle. I’ll let Dave tell you how Jackson and the Kindle got together.

I got my Kindle as a wedding gift.

Being honest, the thing was scary. It was one of those ideas that had been drubbed into my mind for so long, I had to believe. I loved the feel, the smell, the sound of books. I loved having the weight of it in my hands. I loved the anticipation as I turned the page, waiting to find out what happens next.

So, when I stretched out on the beach chair during my honeymoon, sun beating down on me, drink in my free hand, and turned on the Kindle for the first time, I was nervous. What if money was just wasted and I hated the thing? What if I didn’t even feel like I was reading a book, but instead someone’s unfinished manuscript?

Turns out, I was wrong. I loved the thing.

I still got the same sensations, while reading. The tension was there, the desire to know what was on the next page, the constant flipping. But here’s what I didn’t expect. →

February 14, 2011

The Terror of Living by Urban Waite

He just wanted someone to tell him he was a good man, that he’d done his job, that somehow it mattered. – Bobby Drake

Deputy Sheriff Bobby Drake is a man with a tremendous chip on his shoulder. Once a promising college football player, his life was turned upside down when his father, Sheriff at the time, was busted for running drugs across the US/Canada border. Drake returned home to his small hometown in Washington State and took a job as a deputy sheriff, determined to restore honor to his name and prove he’s a better man than his father. →

February 11, 2011

Friday Reads: Special Gift For Participants

Fridays Reads If you’re a reader and you’re on Twitter, chances are you already know about Friday Reads. But for those who may not haven heard of this great meme, here’s the low down:

Friday Reads is a community of thousands of people who come together each week to share whatever they’re reading. Our goal is simple: to raise reading’s visibility and encourage more people to join in!

The more people who share what they’re reading, the more people get excited about reading. And when people get excited about reading all sorts of incredible things happen…we get smarter; we think more; we’re entertained; we learn things…the list is endless.

Right now, 20% of American adults are functionally illiterate. The situation is not much better in the UK, with 18% of people illiterate. We all want to make the world a better place. Reading is one thing we can all do to achieve that lofty goal. This is why #fridayreads matters: it bands us together in the shared joy of reading and encourages us all to read more. →

February 08, 2011

Breach of Trust by David Ellis

“You take care of your own, or you can’t look at yourself in the mirror.” – Jason Kolarich

Jason Kolarich was once an up-and-coming young defense attorney at one of Chicago’s highest profile private law firms. Following a case in which his strategy was the key in securing the acquittal of a State Senator from federal murder charges it seemed as if the sky was the limit for his future. Except something went terribly wrong at the end of the trial.

While he was in his office late one winter night waiting for a phone call from an informant, Jason’s wife, tired of waiting for him to come home as promised, packed their infant daughter in the car and headed out for a planned visit to her parents. They never made it. Their car skidded off the icy road along the way, killing both.

Not able to shake the loss – and the thought they’d still be alive if he had been driving – Jason has hit a place in his life where he simply doesn’t care anymore. Not about himself, his business; only his grief matters. He hadn’t taken care of his own and they were dead because of it.

But when he learns that the informant whose call he had been waiting on the night of his family’s deaths was himself killed the same night, Jason is jolted back to life and into action. Believing there’s no way the timing was a coincidence, Jason sets out to learn the true circumstances behind the informant’s death. →

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