Vilage Books Event (4/19/2014)

A couple of weekends ago I had my first speaking event at Village Books in Fairhaven.

I gotta say, that was a cool experience.  For a guy that doesn't enjoy public speaking -- I go out of my way to avoid them, mostly -- it was a lot of fun!  Best part?  The Favorite was sold out! 

If you live in or near Bellingham, visit Village Books and pick up a copy.  If not, you can order it here. 

Also, take a look at the reading from the event!

Part 1
Part 2

Laughably shameless

First of all, I'd like to very belatedly wish you all a happy new year.  I've been so busy the last couple of weeks that I haven't had a spare moment to write in this blog.  For those of you who don't know, my new novel, The Favorite recently became available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble and I've been shamelessly plugging it for all who can see and hear.  Seriously.  Shamelessly.  It's embarrassing.

I mean, really, how many of my friends didn't know this was coming?  I've only been talking about my novel, The Favorite, self-published with the help of iUniverse, Inc. for six, seven months now?  You had to believe that at some point, I would release my novel, The Favorite, available wherever books are sold online so I could finally stop talking about it. 

Anyway, the thing I've learned about this whole experience: I'm really bad at advertising.

The Favorite... Cover Reveal and Sneak Peek

Okay, I don't have a hard release date yet, but this is the cover to my upcoming novel, The Favorite, which will be available online wherever books are sold.

This is the cropped version of the front.  Classy, huh?

And this is the full-on hardcover dust jacket.

And... here's a sneak peek of the prologue.  Enjoy!!

Prologue

Last night…

The tapping of the smooth silver ballpoint pen against the notepad sounded like a metronome gone out of control.Crumpled balls of paper littered the handsome wooden desk, a graveyard of bad ideas growing larger as the pad of paper in front of him grew thinner. The paper’s watermark – a green-tinged lion’s head

logo – stared at him, mocking him, daring him to try again to write something poignant. Or even just intelligent. In fact, at this point, the lion would even have settled for something merely coherent.

He reached for the tiny bottle of vodka from the mini-bar and emptied the last of the clear, caustic liquid down his throat. He felt his face flush as the liquor burned a path into his stomach. He closed his eyes and enjoyed drifting off to drunkenness. When his mouth and throat cooled he reopened his eyes. The

lion still looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to begin this manifesto, this great work that would make her understand why. He tentatively put the pen to paper and scribbled out the letter’s opening line.

To whom it may concern…

He had barely formed the final “n” when he tore the page from its pad. To whom it may concern, he thought. Brilliant. Just brilliant.

He tossed the balled up sheet of paper to the side and started again, dating the top of the page. He went over in his mind how letters were supposed to start, with Dear Someone, or Dearest Whomever. He wrote: I don’t even know your name.

He smiled as he finished writing that one line. He cracked open another tiny bottle and sucked it down. He was drunker than he had been in a long time, but at least the words were flowing.

My name is Michael Dane. I’m your father. A little Darth Vader-esque, he thought, but it worked. If you’re reading this then I’m dead. 

He paused a moment after he wrote that; the finality of those words made his stomach gurgle. Doubt, nervousness and fear crept into his mind for the first time since this crazy thing started. He wondered if this whole deal was such a good idea after all.

Drunkenness helped him rediscover his resolve. He had no choice after all. He wrote: And of course you’re reading this, because I know I’m going to die.