Summer Reads, Death Penalty Cases and Kittens: an Interview with Stephanie Gayle

As a follow up to Monday’s guest blog, author Stephanie Gayle agreed to answer some questions had by myself and a couple of other readers. If you have any further questions please leave them in the comments below. Also if you have any interest in winning a copy of Stephanie’s book, comment as well. I will draw a winner on Saturday.*

Linsey: Your female protagonist and narrator in My Summer of Southern Discomfort shares a name with Natalie Goldberg, the writer, was that a coincidence? (Or just something you’re tired of people pointing out?)

Stephanie Gayle: This was semi-intentional. I had named her Natalie but she needed a last name. Goldberg met the Jewish requirement and paid homage to the woman who wrote Writing Down the Bones (a fabulous book for writers). Some writers suggested I change the name because of the coincidence, but I refused. I’m obstinate that way.

Linsey: You did a lot of research on the legal system for your novel both on the justice system and on Georgia. Did you have to guard against just dumping in all the info you found or did the infusion of knowledge into the narrative happen naturally?

Stephanie: Sometimes a situation within the narrative would lend itself to this information and sometimes a bit of set up was required, but I tried to work the legalese in organically rather than insert it as exposition to show what I learned about today in law.

Linsey: Natalie prosecutes a death penalty case despite her liberal Yankee background and her father’s civil rights work. What made you decide use the death penalty in her story?

Stephanie: It seemed like the biggest, toughest issue I could put on her plate. I wanted to give her a truly big conflict (because moving thousands of miles away and alienating family and friends and starting her career from scratch was minor conflict, really). Plus the state where she practices, Georgia, has been at the forefront of death penalty decisions.

Linsey: Did your personal research change your own opinions the subject?

Stephanie: No, quite the opposite. Having read about the death penalty’s application and enforcement, I am more convinced that the United States should abandon the death penalty as a punishment. Unlike Natalie, who was always opposed to it, I think I represented the ‘pro’ side in a debate on the death penalty in seventh grade.

The things you do when you’re twelve.

Linsey: I think I was involved in that exact same debate, except it was in Social Studies my freshman year of high school. Oh, the universal school experience. Would you recommend writing programs like that of Harvard’s to other budding novelists? Why?

Stephanie: I only took a few writing classes at Harvard. Both the novel class and the advanced fiction class were excellent. I know people from both classes who went on to get an MLA from the Harvard Extension School in Creative Writing. (They were willing to write a thesis, unlike me.) I think the class’s efficacy is dependent on the instructor and the students in your class. For me, the novel class was invaluable for motivation, critique and making connections with other writers. Aside from cost, I can’t think of a reason not to recommend it.

Linsey: Had you been involved in any other writing programs before the Harvard one?

Stephanie: I took a memoir writing class at Smith College and writing workshops through Grub Street, Inc.

Linsey: Speaking of Grub Street, Inc, I noticed it was mentioned on your bio as well; what is it?

Stephanie: Grub Street is a Boston-based writing center that offers classes taught by amazing writers. Grub also hosts readings, is involved in community-writing projects and holds an annual event called The Muse & The Marketplace where writers, editors, and agents all convene to talk the business of writing. I recently took a Master Fiction class through Grub Street taught by Ellen Litman, which was fantastic. Go Grub!

Linsey: What else are you (and your publisher) doing to help launch My Summer of Southern Discomfort?

Stephanie: Pony rides and free ice cream cones with the purchase of a book! (Kidding). We’ve been setting up local readings, getting the word out to the press (my novel just got listed as a best summer read in this month’s Redbook-bless the person at HC who did that!) I’ve been working locally with Haley Booksellers who are hosting my launch party on Monday. June 25th. They’ve also worked to get my name in local papers (BostonNOW and the Globe) and they’ve papered local neighborhoods with launch party fliers. I’ve been guest blogging here and gotten better about approaching bookstore staff (in a respectful manner, Linsey!) and asking about possible reading or signing opportunities.

Linsey: Regarding your next novel, 1000 Fluffy Kittens, do you know if this cat will be your cover cat or perhaps this one? Just kidding. What are you working on next?

Stephanie: Oh the kitties! Sadly, I didn’t follow my dream of 1,000 Fluffy Kittens. Instead I chose to begin a second novel, set in 1978, about a young woman who takes her parents to court after they have her kidnapped from a community they deem a cult. So I get to read lots about cults and kidnapping and deprogrammers. Next month I’ll begin editing the first draft. That’s the plan anyway.

Linsey: Wow, I think I would rather read about a possible former cult member suing her family than kitties anyway. What novels would you recommend to my readers to check out for their summer reading (after they’ve picked up yours, of course)?

Stephanie: Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell (How did I come to the David Mitchell party so late? He’s a genius.)

Any of the Peter Wimsey-Harriet Vane mysteries by Dorothy Sayers. (Strong Poison / Have His Carcass / Gaudy Night/Busman’s Honeymoon)

The Lady and the Panda: The True Adventures of the First American Explorer to Bring Back China's Most Exotic Animal by Vicki Croke

This is terrible, because I know I have more recommendations but I’m not at the computer with my ‘books read spreadsheet.’ Yes, I have a spreadsheet. Yes, I’m just that geeky. It also helps because I have a terrible memory and am prone to picking up (or buying) books that I’ve read before.

Linsey: I wish that I was organized enough for a spreadsheet. Currently I rely on my brain, faulty thing that it is. Probably why I needed y’all to help me come up with interview questions. Stephanie actually answered (with great speed) all of the questions posed on her original column, but I’ve copied and pasted them below for those of you don’t necessarily always read the comments.

Chris asked, “Have you ever lived in Georgia or did you just imagine what it would be like?”

Stephanie: I never lived in Georgia. I chose it for legal purposes (and because it has Piggly Wiggly stores). In part, I wanted a place where Natalie would be out of her element and a place with which I didn't have so much familiarity that I couldn't imagine it. I'm afraid if I set it where I live(d) I would have been tied to facts and what I know. This way, I was a bit freer to creatively imagine Nat's habitat. Though I also did a fair amount of research so that I had authentic details.

Miri asked, “How was the Harvard writing class formatted? What kinds of things did you do, exactly? And how many agents did you query before you found the one for you?”

Stephanie: The Harvard writing class was structured like most workshop classes. We'd read chapters submitted by our peers and then discuss them at the next class. We submitted 3 chapters per cycle as I recall. Our instructor, Stratis Haviaris, would also lecture briefly about novel structure, point of view, and tips on writing and publishing. The caliber of writers in that class was astonishing, and represents some of the best work in progress I've read. Stratis also insisted we get an agent, which leads me to question #2.

How many agents? You know, I have a spreadsheet somewhere. I think it was around 40 or so. I'd gotten some requests for full manuscripts in the very early query stages, but they all came back as "no"s. In the end, I think I have the right agent, so I'm glad I didn't get the first agent I asked.

Linsey: Thanks again, Stephanie, for taking the time to both interview and guest blog. I can always tell when a guest blog has been successful when my friends make mention of it while surreptitiously glancing around my apartment in search of the ARC to steal. You've garnered more than one comment and I've had to hide the ARC away for safe-keeping so I'll still have something to give away!

If you're interested in picking up Stephanie’s book, My Summer of Southern Discomfort, it will be available Tuesday of next week (according to the neat little widget below).

Get this widget!

(The widget is currently experiencing technically difficulties, but if you click on it will take you to an actual working version. Why it is not working here is probably a question for a greater being and the answer would probably be something like 42. This is what happens when I try to get technical.)

*Chris, you’ve already been entered, and Miri you’ve been excluded as requested.

Marketing Thrills and Chills with MJ Rose

I had first learned about Shelf Awareness and Author Buzz when a reader brought it to my attention in early 2006. I’d already been a fan of MJ Rose’s blog Buzz, Balls & Hype (even guest blogging on it in early March the same year) for some time, but had not put together the very obvious clues that she was also responsible for Author Buzz and other marketing tools to help authors reach a wide selection of booksellers, librarians and book clubs.

Around September, Ms. Rose asked if I would like to be part of an informal focus group of booksellers for her novel The Reincarnationist. Due to time constraints I was unable to follow up on the project, but the idea of book focus groups seemed so perfect for the publishing world that it stayed in the back of mind. Last month I contacted Ms. Rose to find out how the focus groups had gone, only to discover that she was now involved with putting together Thrillerfest as well as marketing class for authors to be taught at the event. Never one to miss an opportunity to pester someone about marketing, I shot off an email full of questions on all things Thrillerfest, marketing, focus groups, and why authors need to get their names out there in an efficient manner.

The following interview resulted from that email exchange.

Linsey (aka Bookseller Chick): You're involved with the Thrillerfest (July 12th-15th in Manhattan) along with James Patterson, Lisa Gardner, Clive Cussler, James Rollins and others, which is billed as "a four-day annual celebration of the fiction world's most popular genre." How are you involved?

MJ Rose: I'm on the board of ITW as well as being a founding member. I became involved after the first meeting in the fall of 2004 --excited at the idea of an organization whose goals including building readership. Strangely enough, we're the only writer's organization that has that goal.

Linsey: What makes it fictions most popular genre? What is it about the Thriller that appeals to readers world wide?

MJ: Since the beginning of storytelling, "then what happens" has been what’s kept people transfixed and that's the essence of our genre.

Linsey: What opportunities does Thrillerfest offer readers? Writers?

MJ: We're not an organization that helps writers get published , find agents or get legal advice. Those orgs already existed.

We are here to celebrate the genre. To get more attention via innovative and creative ways for our authors and their books with the press and with readers.

We're the first writers' organization that has a reader's newsletter. And we set up our convention, ThrillerFest, to bring readers and writers together with more than 85% of the panels aimed at readers. Our anthology, Thriller, is one of the best selling anthologies ever published and had met its goal of getting an enormous amount of attention for our authors. Our big name authors wind up introducing readers to our not yet big name authors. Its a great example of the generosity of our membership. And there's lots more to come.

Linsey: Your class at Craftfest (the writer orientated portion of Thrillerfest) is a bonus session focused on creating book buzz--your area of expertise--will you be focusing on internet buzz, reaching booksellers, reaching readers or all of the above?

MJ: All of the above.

Linsey: How can one go about defining the audience they are trying to reach with their book and then reaching them?

MJ: This is really complicated and part of the problem our industry is facing since publishers don’t do much research and don’t know a lot about our users – in other words - readers. It’s not an industry that spends as much time innovating as it does producing and in this overcrowded marketplace, that’s a problem for everyone, including every one of us.

I think if you are a writer you need to read a lot - both in your category and out of it and evaluate your work in light of what you read. That will help you get a sense of how to identify your own work.

Then your main goal should to identify the niche markets your book can reach, find them, and then connect to them, get to know them and help them to get to know you.

You can sell a lot of books by starting with identifiable groups and working outwards.

It doesn't help to say my book is for all readers everywhere. There's no way to reach them with a limited budget. But if you can say my book is for women who love mysteries and like to knit ... then we're getting somewhere. Or my book is for athletic men who like to scuba dive.

Knowing the niches you can start searching out listservs, blogs, sites, newspapers, magazines, venues where your target audience lives.

Linsey: How does Author Buzz--your marketing service--help simplify this process?

MJ: It's enormously time intensive to market your own book. It can take months and months of work. I found that I was teaching authors how to do it in my online class only to discover they'd come up with great ideas of how to market their books but when it came time to do the work, they didn't want to execute their plans.

And rightly so, we're writers. We want to write the next book! If we wanted to be marketers we'd be in advertising. (I know since I left advertising to be a novelist only to discover I had to stay in advertising to stay alive as a writer.)

I saw so much of this problem, and lived it myself, that I though up the idea of a one stop marketing solution for authors. Buy the program and reach readers and leaders of 7500 bookclubs, over 350,000 readers, 10,000 librarians and 3000 booksellers. Add another one of the programs and do a book blog tour or run ads on the top 1o blogs that cater to your audience.

It's four hours at the most of the author's time instead of four moths. So we can do what we wanted to do all along - write.

Linsey: For your book, The Reincarnationist, you used a focus group of booksellers. Why? What information did that group provide and would you do it in the future?

MJ: Back when I was in advertising I did a lot of focus groups and found that if used correctly the information was invaluable.

Objectivity is hard to come by for authors, editors, agents. Yes, there's expertise and it counts for a lot, but my agent and editor and I had all read my book three or four times each and I wanted to know what booksellers were going to say. What the overall impression of the book was going to be. I wanted to know early on, if the book met the goals I set for it.

I didn't do formal focus groups-though I would have loved to - the cost would have been prohibitive. But I did manage to get enough booksellers to read the book that I was able to get an early read on the manuscript that did provide the information I was hoping it would.

Not only would I do it again, I'd do it bigger.

I don't why people in our industry are so afraid of the words marketing or focus groups or research.

I wouldn't ask a group to tell me how to end a book or to judge a concept before it was written, but to take a finished book or a finished cover to a group of readers and/or booksellers and find out it the book meets your expectations -- why not? After all, you don't have to listen to what the group says.

Linsey: And since this is a bookselling blog, what thriller novels should readers check out right now?


MJ: I'm going on vacation and taking Lee Child's Bad Luck and Trouble & Barry Eisler's Requiem for an Assassin.

Thank you so much, MJ, for taking the time out of your busy schedule to talk with us today.

For your enjoyment--and because I'm strangely addicted to book trailers--here's the festival trailer for Thrillerfest. If you have any questions for MJ that you would like for me to follow up with her, please leave them in the comments section below or email them to me at the Bookseller Chick email address in the side bar.

Piecing Together Normal: An Interview with Sandi Kahn Shelton

When Dorothy Thompson approached me about having Sandi Kahn Shelton on my blog, I didn't say yes right away. Not because I feared that Sandi was a horrible writer (she most definitely is not), but because I try to host people on this blog that I would legitimately read (or be interested in reading) even if I don't get a chance to read over their book before I give it away. So armed with a name and the power of Google, I did a bit of research on Ms. Shelton, and discovered a woman with the power to look at the trials and tribulations that families cause with the humor necessary to make it through those moments.

Dodie Smith once called families "the dear octopus from whose tentacles we never quite escape, nor, in our inmost hears, ever quite wish to." They are our burdens and our loves, the sources of our deepest pain and our greatest amusement. In her books, Shelton acknowledges these lows and highs with humor and poignancy, making limoncellos out of life's lemons and offering up a perfect cool read on a hot day.

It's no surprise that her latest novel has been chosen as one of Target's Bookmarked selections and it's a pleasure to have Sandi join us today to talk about writing, families and books we love.

Bookseller Chick: Thanks for joining me, Sandi. Both A Piece of Normal and your first novel, What Comes After Crazy, revolved around families. How does Lily's relationship with Dana differ from Maz's relationship with Madame Lucille?

Sandi Shelton: Oooh, that’s such a good question. Nobody’s ever asked me that before, and it’s fun to think about. First I’d like to say that I love to write about families, because I think that’s where the real power that shapes us lies…and where we learn the essential truth that we can both love people and want to kill them at the same time.

In A Piece of Normal, Lily is the “got-it-all-together” sister whose life is sooo comfortable and sweet—she’s an advice columnist who tells everybody else how to live, and in fact, is still best friends with her ex-husband. (She won’t find a new lover until she finds somebody for Teddy, too!) When her little sister, the flaky punk-rocker Dana, blows into town after a ten-year tiff, Lily realizes that maybe there are just a few tiny little details about life she didn’t always have a handle on: like—hello? How did she miss the Huge Family Secret that was always right under her nose? The relationship between the two sisters goes from bad to awful—but in that way of families, they have to learn what’s worth saving and what can be walked away from.

Maz’s situation—oh, boy! She’s an only child raised by an itinerant, many-times-married fortune-teller, and somehow in her travels to carnivals with her mom, she learned how to make a decent gin and tonic and how to tell which of her mom’s many husbands was likely to stick around, but she didn’t get the essential skills of life, like how to make a home. When her own marriage falls apart, leaving her with two little girls to raise—and Madame Lucille comes back to town with her latest husband, Maz’s job isn’t to figure out how to continue being in her mother’s shadow, it’s to figure out how to stand her own ground and not let the past overwhelm her.

B.S. Chick: Speaking of family, how do you handle the responsibilities that come from being a mom and a full time writer?

Sandi: Well…it took me SEVENTEEN YEARS to write the first novel, if that’s any indication of that little balancing act! No, seriously—writing a novel was what I got to do when all the other things were done: the costumes sewed, the dioramas set up, and all the carpools carpooled. I was working—still am actually—as a feature reporter and columnist, doing magazine articles, as well as writing three humorous non-fiction books about parenting, but my real dream was to write this novel! I simply could not put it aside and forget about it, and—hey, I just realized that it finally got finished when my last child got her own driver’s license! My advice to Mom Writers everywhere: get driver’s licenses for your kids!

B.S. Chick: You've written for a number of magazines during your writing career. Is Lily's job as an advice columnist based anything you've written/done previously?

Sandi: Actually, no. That question makes me smile, because I first realized Lily was an advice columnist when she came to me as a character who was soooo smug about her life. I mean, this woman really knows the secrets of life—she even tells other people how to live. I thought it would be fun to write about somebody whose own life is kind of falling apart around the edges, meanwhile she’s telling everybody else what to do…and I figured her advice column would change to reflect her greater awareness of her own foibles.

My magazine writing wasn’t ever advice-driven; it was mainly humorous essays about parenting, which later became books in some kind of magical way. The “advice” in my books and magazine articles (if it could be boiled down into one sterling sentence) would have to be: Muddle through as best you can, and remember that no one else knows what they’re doing either.

B.S. Chick: On your website you have a feature set up for book groups to contact you about answering questions via email or setting up 30-minute conference calls, is this a new feature? Do you have any interesting stories about readers using either of these services?

Sandi: Oh, this has been very fun! Mainly this has been through phone calls. Book groups contact me, let me know when they are meeting, and then I call them at the appointed hour. We chat about the book, I answer their questions, and I’ve loved doing it. People ask such insightful questions. Sometimes we laugh, sometimes we get all analytical about human nature and writing—it’s such a great way to connect with readers.

B.S. Chick: Your books, both fiction and nonfiction, seem to contain a humorous tone. Do you believe that a good sense of humor is necessary to get through day to day life?

Sandi: Absolutely! My first book was called You Might As Well Laugh and it’s a collection of columns I wrote for my local newspaper (for ten years), many of which appeared in Working Mother magazine’s Wits’ End column. When I started writing this column for my paper, I was a single mother of two kids working in an office in which NO ONE had any kids whatsoever. Many had never heard of children. They would come in to work after having played tennis, for heaven’s sake, or just having had great sex. I, meanwhile, wandered in after just having fought with a 3-year old about why she couldn’t drink her milk out of the soy sauce bottle! The thing was, when I started my column, I just wrote about all the tragic and annoying things going on in my house, and I swear I did not know it was a humor column until people started telling me it was funny. That’s when I realized that daily life, in all its awfulness, can only be handled by laughing about it—hopefully with other people laughing with you.

B.S. Chick: Since at one time I was a bookseller and this a bookselling blog, what books do recommend my readers check out?

Wow! That’s a hard question. I love so many writers. I love Jennifer Crusie and Anne Tyler and Alice Munro and Lolly Winston and Elinor Lipman. Recently I’ve discovered the writer, Haven Kimmel, who writes the funniest and most breathtaking memoirs about growing up in Mooreland, Indiana. (Her latest is called She Got Up Off the Couch.) For those who like essays, there’s a wonderful anthology about what parenthood does to a romance, called Blindsided by a Diaper, that has essays that will make you laugh and some that will make you almost want to cry. (Full disclosure: I have one of the essays. But I’m simply in awe of the ones in that book that are not mine.)

Thank you so much, Linsey, for letting me come on your site and answer your very thought-provoking and insightful questions!

B.S. Chick: No, Sandi, thank you. If you want to hear more about Sandi you can read her blog, or catch her at any of the following stops on her virtual tour:

May 1, 2007 - The Writer's Life
May 2, 2007 - Trashionista
May 3, 2007 - Julie Kenner's Writes and Wrongs
May 4, 2007 - Night Owl Romance
May 7, 2007 - Alison Kent's Blah Blog
May 8, 2007 - Kathy Holmes' Fiction With Attitude
May 10, 2007 - Over the Hill Chick
May 15, 2007 - Bookseller Chick
May 21, 2007 - Alyssa Goodnight's On the Writers' Road Less Traveled
May 22, 2007 - The Book Pedler
May 24, 2007 - Susan Wiggs' The View from Here
May 25, 2007 - Fiction Scribe
May 28, 2007 - Blog About Romance
May 29, 2007 - Gypsy Psychic
May 31, 2007 - Pump Up Your Online Book Promotion

Like Gil, Sandi has offered up a copy of her new book if you're interested, so leave your comments below. I'll take comments on both interviews until Friday when I'll draw a name at random and send off the books.

Cleaning up the Aftermath: An Interview with Gil Reavill

Crime is big in our country, not only on the streets, but on the television as well. Nightly you can watch a CSI or Law & Order spin-off or catch any of the many other crime related dramas such as NCIS, Close to Home, or Criminal Minds. While many of these shows deal with the law aspects, CSI and NCIS tackle the crime scenes in all their bloody, stylized glory--Hollywood's take on what the end of someone's life looks like. These shows never deal with the after though. Who cleans up those bloated, week-old bodies and suicide splatters?

To this question, author Gil Reavill has the answer. He spent time working with the men behind Aftermath, Inc. a company that cleans the remains from crime scenes and works to find the best way to get blood out of the sub-flooring--jobs traditionally left to grieving families and church groups. He chronicled this time in his new nonfiction novel, Aftermath, Inc, about which PW said:

In this grisly, swaggering tale of gut-churning crime scenes and the men who clean them up after the forensics team is done, veteran true crime scribe Reavill (Beyond All Reason: My Life with Susan Smith) holds nothing back. From descriptions of crimes ("The fusillade of bullets tore through Johnson's body.... Blood, bits of flesh and bone fragments exploded everywhere") to hepatitis C "bleed-outs" ("All four walls of the bathroom looked like someone had taken a blood hose and turned it on them"), Reavill grabs the reader by the throat and doesn't let go. He follows the techs from Aftermath, Inc.—a bioremediation outfit in suburban Chicago—as they make the rounds of shotgun suicides, multiple murders and meth lab cleanups; dealing not only with the gross-out of the work but trying to stay sane doing it. While some black humor seeps in around the edges, Reavill mostly depicts a cadre of low-key, hardworking men doing a horrible job with respect and compassion. The narrative pace flags a bit in the last 50 pages when Reavill tries to connect Aftermath's work with larger moral issues, but otherwise, if anything can get CSI watchers to flip off the tube and pick up a book, this is it.

Gil, the husband of former guest columnist Jean Zimmerman, was kind enough to join me today to answer questions about his book, crime dramas, and what kind of publicity do you do for a book about cleaning up after the dead.

Bookseller Chick: Thanks for joining me, Gil. You've been a journalist, screenwriter, ghostwriter and the co-author of a parenting guide, how was writing Aftermath Inc different from your other projects?

Gil Reavill: In ghostwriting, which I’ve done a lot, I have a real sense of personal concealment. I’m not “me”; I’m the author to whom I’m giving voice. This is true to some degree in journalism and screenwriting as well. As a writer, I’ve always fooled around with voices and masks, with assuming other identities and characters, probably due to chicken-shit insecurities, false and otherwise. I’ve never been immersed in a subject to the degree I was working alongside the techs at Aftermath. At the same time, I’ve never been exposed personally in my writing to the degree I am in this book. I guess the two things — immersion and exposure — go together. Because I was immersed, because working with the techs remediating crime scenes had such an immediate intensity, I didn’t have any option but to wear my emotions on my sleeve. Going into the project, I wanted to appear hard-boiled, cool (in the Marshall Mcluhan sense) and “objective.” I wanted to be Hammett’s Continental Op. But I discovered I was totally unable to front in that particular way. I found the material too challenging. I needed to process these intense, jittery personal experiences through my writing. There wasn’t any other choice. I had to be me, to paraphrase Sammy Davis, Jr. So the experience of Aftermath was different from my other writing in the sense it brought me out somewhat from behind my protective journalistic smoke screen.

B.S. Chick: Once upon a time I thought I could hack it as a coroner, but having read some of the crime scene descriptions in your book I'm pretty sure I would have lost my lunch on the first day. What compelled you to follow along with Tim, Chris and their crew on their jobs?

Gil: I did lose my lunch on the first day! Literally! I come from a rationalist, humanistic background. In theory, what I was encountering — death, blood, the muck of mortality — was the most human stuff there is. So in theory, I should have been able to handle it. I could have merely accompanied the crews as a passive observer. That’s what they expected. But I felt to do the experience justice I had to strap on a respirator, climb into some Tyvek and work alongside the people who do this for a living. A line I quote in the book is from the Latin poet Terence: “Nothing human is foreign to me.” I’ve paid that line a lot of lip service in my life. Aftermath was my chance to measure my commitment to it. And as it turned out, there is quite a damn bit that is human and utterly foreign to me. You live and learn. Or at least, you live.

B.S. Chick: Was there any point where you wished you hadn't?

Gil: Plenty of times. You know that old Tooter Turtle cartoon? “Help, Mr. Wizard! I don’t want to be a crime-scene clean-up guy anymore!” I often had that feeling, “Get me out of here.” Not only because of the gore, either. Some of the scenes I encountered had a wrenching commonness to them. Up close, some lives and most deaths seem sucked dry of all romance. It’s disheartening.

B.S. Chick: How was what you experienced different from what we see on the TV crime dramas like CSI or Law & Order?

Gil: It’s the difference between the city of Orlando and Disney World. A crime scene on TV is a pretty stylized thing. Advertisers don’t want directors to get too graphic. So you see a pile of blood here and a smear of blood there. A real crime scene is a lot more chaotic than that. Blood makes it around corners and bounces underneath doors; body fluids drip into the subflooring. Hitchcock has a line: “In films murders are always very clean. I show how difficult it is and what a messy thing it is to kill a man.” On the other hand, one thing I liked about going out on jobs was measuring the differences and similarities between the world of Gil Grissom and the world of Aftermath. I’d ask myself, How might Grissom handle this? But it was mostly just a mildly amusing game. Grissom is a character played by an actor. Like most of prime-time television, shows such as CSI or Law & Order give only the most perfunctory of nods to reality.

B.S. Chick: Congrats on the great review from PW, but like Paul Bresnick I've got to ask: can anything get CSI-ers to turn off the television?

Gil: I’m a great believer in the book. You can pick up a copy of Aftermath, Inc. at JFK, fly to the west coast, and finish it by the time you land at LAX. I guarantee my book will twist your mind around in ways that the inflight movie just can’t do. I would also have no objection at all to anyone reading my book while they are watching CSI. During the commercials! There are so many! There will always be a solid core audience of reading devotees. Plus an editor friend of mine told me, “Publishers can always count on the gore fans.” I’m a great believer in the book, but I also have a couple of blogs, a MySpace page on the way and some virals on YouTube. No sense in not hedging your bets.

B.S. Chick: What are you doing for publicity given the nature of this book?

Gil: Among other measures, the owners of Aftermath (the company) are putting up a billboard beside a Chicago interstate that will be seen by a quarter million people a week. That’s a first for me. Gotham has promised a “killer marketing campaign.” There’s an understandable concern about public reaction to the subject matter. There are those who can’t get enough of it, and those who can’t handle any of it.

B.S. Chick: Thanks for taking the time to talk to us, Gil. What I've read of your book has been really interesting (I would even call it great, but given the subject matter that seems a bit inappropriate), and I'm kicking myself for offering up my copy as a giveaway. Still, a promise is a promise, so here's y'alls chance to get a free copy of Aftermath, Inc. Just leave a comment about this interview, answer whether or not you think CSI-ers will ever turn off the television, or ask a question of Gil (or hell, even myself) and I'll enter your name into the drawing for this brand new (only slightly read) copy of Gil's book.

If you still find yourself fascinated by all things Gil, visit his writing blog, and the website of Aftermath, Inc or check some of his other books j(those without a link are no longer available):

Hollywood (Compass American Guides/Random House)
Manhattan (Compass American Guides/Random House)
Beyond All Reason (Kensington)
Raising Our Athletic Daughters (Doubleday)
Smut (Sentinel/Penguin USA)
Ruthless (Simon and Schuster Spotlight Entertainment)
Aftermath, Inc. (Gotham/Penguin USA)

Coming tomorrow: an Interview with Gil Reavill

Tomorrow Gil Reavill, the author of Aftermath, Inc, will be joining us to talk about his new nonfiction book, dealing with bodies and who steps in after the CSIs go home. Here's a little preview of the story behind the book from his website:



I hope you'll join me for an interesting interview with an interesting man. I'll be giving away a copy of this title to a person chosen at random from the commentators, and I'm sure that Gil will be able to answer any questions you might have.

Author Interview: Shel Horowitz

When I was approached by Dorothy Thompson of Pump Up Your Book Promotion PR to host Shel Horowitz on my blog I’ll admit I was a bit leery. Shel’s book was self-published and my years as a bookseller concerned with processing returns left me not without my hang-ups in that regard (I’m working on them, I promise). Given the specialized nature of his title, however, I decided to give it a try.

Wow. Shel packs a lot of bang for your buck and offers a truly unique perspective that differs from all the other Author/Publisher marketing books that I’ve read.

Bookseller Chick: First off, tell my readers a little about your book. What are they getting when they buy your title?

Shel Horowitz: Grassroots Marketing for Authors and Publishers was described byMidwest Book Review as "An informed, user friendly, 'how to' book marketing seminar/workshop in a single volume...The ideal reference manual for anyone having to promote a book with little or no available capital for publicity and promotion."

Among the goodies: two actual marketing plans I prepared for paying clients (and a third one accessible online, included with direct orders)...seven different models for building a book-focused website... eight actual press releases--including one that got 63 major media!--and six successful media pitches. Not to mention a huge resource section and a full index so folks can find things again.

B.S. Chick: When I was starting my research into the world of author publicity, I read a lot of different books from John Kremer to Lissa Warren. How does your book differ from the other marketing books out there?

Shel: It focuses more than most on strategies that authors or publishers can implement without spending very much--and I think there's particular strength in the chapters on working with mainstream media and in harnessing the full power of online strategies beyond the Web. It looks at numerous overlooked but very powerful resources: as oneexample among many (page 66), I've gotten a lot of mileage out of starting correspondences with newsletter editors and other influential people, and I describe how I do that and how that translates to more books sold. It includes a whole chapter on theadvantages and disadvantages of various publishing models. There's another whole chapter on the dismal realities of working with bookstores, followed immediately by one on how to make bookstores work despite the odds. Google and Amazon each rate a chapter, exploring some of the lesser-known marketing strategies on those two sites...and it's the only book on book marketing I'm aware of that really looks at Book Expo America as a marketing opportunity for independent publishers and authors.

Also, it includes over 40 success stories from ordinary authors who were able to achieve something through unusual or persistent marketing.

And I think it's the *only* book to be endorsed by most of the top names in independent publishing--my "competitors": John Kremer (1001 Ways to Market Your Book); Dan Poynter (The Self-Publishing Manual); Fern Reiss (The Publishing Game series); Rick Frishman (Author 101 series); AND Marilyn Ross (Complete Guide to Self-Publishing--as well as several publicity and marketing experts (among them Joan Stewart, Marisa D'Vari, and TJ Walker) and various others. It's also getting very nice reviews. So far, in addition to Midwest Book Review, the book has been praised by Norm Goldman of Bookpleasures, Bob Spear of Heartland Reviews, John Culleton's Shortlist of Recommended Books for Self-Publishers, Armchair Reviews, Tom Nixon of the Small Press Blog, and another blogger, Ted Demopoulos. Not bad, considering it's only five weeks since publication. If my previous books are any indication, reviews will continue to come in for years. You can see them all here. (Midwest just came in today and hasn't been posted yet.)

Incidentally, the bit about turning your competitors into sales ambassadors is something I discuss at length in my award-winning sixth book, Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People First—which is all about harnessing attitudes of ethics, cooperation, service, and ongoing relationships to build a successful business. I took my own advice for that book and for book number 7, which is the author/publisher book. It's very good advice.

Oh yes, and I think it's one of the few books that's specifically designed to be useful to authors who publish traditionally, with a subsidy press, or with their own imprint.

B.S. Chick: What made you go the self-publishing route?

Shel: Each book has its own best path. As it happens, my first, third, and fifth books were published by traditional publishers, with an advance and the whole bit--and my second, fourth and sixth were self-published. If that had come about through any sort of pattern, I'd have had a publisher for my seventh book. But knowing how little marketing help I would get, and knowing how well-branded I am in my key market, it certainly made sense to self-publish this one. One of the biggest reasons to do a book with a traditional publisher is to establish credibility--but having already published with Simon & Schuster and other houses, I already have that credibility. There are other books I'd like to do that I would only write if I get a good publisher and a big advance, because they would require a whole lot of research and legwork, and because one of them in particular really needs mainstream distribution--but for this one it made sense to do it myself.

Interestingly, the book is actually jointly published by my own imprint and by Infinity. I sell my edition on the Web, through my newsletters, and personal appearances. Infinity's edition is on Amazon and is available to bookstores. This is my first time publishing with a subsidy house, and it came about because I showed the cover last year at BEA to two executives I know at Infinity—my hope was that they'd want to make a bulk purchase for all their authors. One of them, John Harnish, requested the manuscript and came back to me and said he really wanted to publish it-- but I also wanted to publish it. So, since I'm not all that good at selling through bookstores anyway and find it a big hassle, I gave them that market. And John made the numbers work for me; I will make out quite decently on any books they sell. However, I couldn't afford to get all my copies through them, as their edition is significantly more expensive to print than mine. Even printing as needed, I'm paying 2/3 as much per copy through my own sources--and if I went to offset I'd cut even that cost at least in half.

B.S. Chick: Do you think that is an option all writers should consider?

Shel: Yes, they should consider it. Each path to publishing has its own set of plusses and minuses, and each is right for some books and not others. I spend a whole chapter on this in Grassroots Marketing for Authors and Publishers.

B.S. Chick: Your book comes with lots of extras if they by directly from you: a free ebook, How to Write and Publish a Marketable Book; 20 Low Cost Ways to Promote Your Book on the Internet: Dan Janal interviews Shel Horowitz; How To Attract Customers To Your Website by Sean D'Souza; Framing by Kenrick Cleveland; The 7 Inner Secrets of Personal Achievement by Yanik Silver; Effective Online Marketing For Authors And Publishers; How to be a Great Radio Guest: 27 Tips by Brian Jud; and A Pirate goes Promotin' and Advice for Radio Guests by Jacqueline Church Simonds. What made you decide to provide so much more for your direct buyers?

Shel: Number one, I'm a big believer in giving a lot of value when someone buys something from me. In part, this is because I know a certain percentage of my readers will choose to hire me for copywriting and/or consulting on the basis of the quality of my books and supplementary materials. And in part it's just because as a shopper, I like to get more than my money's worth, and as an author/publisher, I want to deliver that experience for others.

Number two, I'd prefer that people buy the book directly from me, so that I can get the contact information (which I don't abuse--but some years from now when I publish book number 8, these folks will hear about it) and so that they can see and perhaps purchase the other fine books I offer on the same order page. The bonus package gives people an incentive to get it from me instead of Amazon.

Number three, I wanted to test out the "Internet marketing guru" theory that people will buy more easily with a lot of bonuses. This is not something I've tried before. It's really a winning thing all around: all I have to do is send one email with a link, and people can get whatever appeals to them. The people who supply the bonuses get additional exposure to new audiences, I provide and the reader receives more value. They're all electronic so there's no cost to me in postage, time, or anything else.

Number four, my wife, D. Dina Friedman, who publishes novels with big NYC houses, reviewed the manuscript and told me it was tilted too much toward self-publishers and not enough toward people like her. So I took five chapters that were about things like picking a title and getting a cover designed and separated them out into an e-book that I offer with every direct order, along with the other bonuses. And as it turned out, not printing those five chapters made the book much less expensive to print and to ship, and easier for customers to lift. As it is, it's over 300 pages counting front matter.

And number five, the bonuses and especially the e-book are mentioned all through the book--so this is one way to get people who bought the book elsewhere to go to my site and pay a nominal fee to get all the goodies.

And there's the ability to surpass expectations and provide instant gratification. There's one very special thing I include with the bonus link that is not mentioned anywhere but that I believe is very powerful, and provides that "oh, wow!"--which starts our relationship off on a good foot. And I very much believe in marketing by building real relationships (again, something I talk about in the ethics book).

Thank you, Shel for your participation.

I wasn’t Shel’s only stop, so if you’re interesting in doing more research into Grassroots Marketing for Authors and Publishers* you can visit any of the following stops in the virtual marketing campaign:

Tom Nixon, Small Press Blog (second appearance coming soon)

Ted Demopoulos, the Ted Rap

Denise Wakeman, The Blog Squad

Troy White, RichWriters.com / SmallBusinesscopywriter.com**

Books by Shel Horowitz:

Grassroots Marketing for Authors and Publishers (AWM Books, 2007)

Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People First (AWM Books, 2003)

Grassroots Marketing: Getting Noticed in a Noisy World (Chelsea Green, 2000)

The Penny-Pinching Hedonist: How to Live Like Royalty with a Peasant's Pocketbook (AWM Books, 1995--converted to e-book only in 2003)

Marketing Without Megabucks: How to Sell Anything on a Shoestring (Simon & Schuster, 1993--out of print)

Keep Your Money: How to Save Thousands in Advertising (AWM Books, 1985--out of print)

Nuclear Lessons (Stackpole, 1980--out of print)

*This link will also allow you to buy the book directly from Shel and receive all the really great extras he includes.

**Link coming soon.

Pass Those Dirty Sugar Cookies: an Interview with Ayun Halliday

My store first discovered Ayun Halliday sometime around the release of her travel memoir No Touch Monkey. We didn’t know anything about her beyond the small blurb in the book catalogue and the fact that she had a monkey on the cover of her book, but something called to us. Perhaps it was the monkey. In any case we ordered her in and then fell in love as did our customers. We couldn’t keep No Touch Monkey on the table, people were describing her as a female Sedaris, and it was the first time I really experienced the magic of customer-born hand-selling as they came back time and again to buy copies for their friends, neighbors and business associates.

Since our success with No Touch Monkey we’ve followed Ayun’s busy career as sole creator and artist of the East Village Inky (drawn entirely by hand), Mother Superior columnist for BUST (despite not being catholic), and mother to the most well documented children on the planet. We’re such big fans that when I heard that Dirty Sugar Cookies—her essays on food, pickiness, and questionable edibles—was coming out, the Boss and I immediately ordered copies for the store. And when I got a very polite email from Ms. Halliday asking if I wanted to be part of her virtual blog tour? Well, I may have screamed a little (email’s inability to transmit this probably saved her hearing), probably gushed in my reply, and definitely lost what little was left in my mind because what do you ask a woman who dares to be a heinie?

Well, you focus on her cool marketing technique and food porn; that’s the route I took at least. Whether or not I was successful remains to be seen…

Bookseller Chick: First of all, I have to admit that I love your virtual blog tour. What made you come up with the idea and has it been successful?

Ayun Halliday: Hey, thanks! I'm in an online group with several other writer mamas, one of whom, Andi Buchanan conceived of this brilliant way to promote her anthologies (The Literary Mama, It's a Boy, and It's a Girl) to an audience whose best laid plans to attend traditional readings are often thwarted due to babysitter problems, fevers, ear aches, general crankiness and other such unscheduled woes. Doing a blog tour makes a lot of sense, too, for an author with young children and no partner, or a partner whose schedule is fairly inflexible. I do enjoy the performance aspect inherent in traditional readings – gives me a chance to dust off my Northwestern theater degree – but with Greg's new play, Pig Farm, starting previews within days of Dirty Sugar Cookies' publication, there was no way I could hit the road and leave him holding the bag at this time.

I started digging around and found out that guys who write inspirational business strategy manuals have been rocking virtual tours for years! Who knew? Possibly Andi Buchanan. She's far more tuned in than I'll ever be!

I think the Dirty Sugar Cookies Virtual Tour has been helpful in getting the word out, and as much work as it's been on my end, it's a helluva lot of fun, too. I'm enjoy the freewheeling quality of the interviews and the fact that there's this small band of hardcore Dirty Sugarheads who've signed up to get daily notification of the blog du jour. I keep thinking that when it's all over, I should make concert t-shirts with all the tour dates listed on the back.


BSC: Dirty Sugar Cookies is your hilarious journey from picky eater to epicure, but was it hard to look back on some of your culinary disasters and then write about them?

AH: I far prefer writing about them to living through them. Take the Heart Shaped Waffle Incident. It was fairly stressful and unpleasant for all of the players as it was unfolding, but there was no lasting damage, and now it's ripe for the comedic picking! The great thing about failure is that it's interesting. Have you seen Lost In La Mancha, a documentary of the near-Biblical trials that plagued the set of this movie Terry Gilliam had dreamed of making since boyhood? On a human level, his failure to realize that dream strikes me as far more compelling than the film he wanted to make.


BSC: I agree, Lost in La Mancha conveys the quixoticness of Gilliam’s search better than the actual film ever would, and I think Cervantes would have been amused by it all. Now that you are raising a picky eater of your own are there any foods that you two are in agreement on or times where she reminds you of your youthful pickiness?

AH: Oh, sure. Sometimes when the cupboard's getting a bit bare and I'm not feeling up to the task, I'll serve some lame-o vegetarian dish that leaves me feeling as unenthusiastic as she does, so much so that when Greg starts to hector her into eating half of what's on her plate, I say, "No, lay off. She's right. I don't want to finish it either."

One thing that she does, that I used to do too, is, after taking a bite of something she's really unhappy about (tilapia comes to mind), she'll chew it to a paste-like consistency that's near-impossible to swallow without gagging. I remember the Promethean misery of that.

BSC: It seems that everyone these days is fascinated by cooking, but not necessarily doing the cooking themselves (I admit that I'm all about going out vs. staying in and creating sometimes). Thanks to the Food Network (or the Food Porn channel as my family likes to call it) and reality TV we have a culture that has created the uber-chef like Tony Bourdain, Emeril, Gordon Ramsay, Giada de Laurentiis and others. What do you make of the celebu-chef phenomenon? Does it raise the standards for everyday restaurants everywhere? Do you have a cooking show in the works that we should know about?

AH: I'm sort of out of the loop because I don't have cable. So, when one of these celebu-chefs takes a drubbing on one of the food blogs I follow, I have to glean what's so objectionable about this person from the comments alone. One thing that interested me is how Anthony Bourdain, in A Cook's Tour (which I read before Kitchen Confidential), owned up to gleefully savaging Emeril in his first book for the crime of being a rather cuddly Food Network star. Then, as he tell it in A Cook's Tour, he met Emeril and Emeril struck him as this really friendly, gracious guy, as well as an excellent chef. The greater a person's fame, the greater the likelihood that they'll find themselves the constant butt of snarky jokes. So, I guess I should be glad that I'm not very television-worthy. The hairy armpits, the lack of make up, the ragged nails, the fashion disaster couture and the Pirates of the Caribbean coiffure – I'm one big Glamour Don't.

As far as whether these shows raise the standards of home chefs, they probably do. Knowledge is power. Plus, folks who, left to their own devices, wouldn’t gravitate toward a Vietnamese cookbook, might catch Anthony Bourdain tooling around a backwater market in Vietnam and think, "Hey, I could try to make that kind of stuff." It's good timing, as every ethnic or rarified ingredient save produce can now be purchased on the Internet, often on Amazon. Because you know, Customers who purchased books by Ayun Halliday, might also enjoy Angelo Pietro Sesame and Miso Salad Dressing, the only bottled dressing the author can tolerate!


BSC: Mmm, Bourdain, love that man—love him more since A Cook’s Tour—but he’s made me rethink having eggs benedict with his talk about food preparation. In Job Hopper you touched upon your time working in the restaurant business, did those experiences make you more or less likely to eat out? Did they make you more or less likely to eat certain foods?

AH: Don't know that anything could quench my impulse to eat out, but yeah, there are things I don't order. Can't do glazed strawberries.

BSC: I’m afraid to even ask why. I love strawberries much too much. In the beginning of Dirty Sugar Cookies, you talk about your mom using Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking as her bible, but do you have any cookbook that you refer to above all else?


AH: Two actually.

The first, a rather recent acquisition, is Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet by Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid. It's kind of a shame because it's this beautiful coffee table book with glorious travel photographs and here I've done my usual number on it, broken the spine, stranded it on the sopping countertop, splattered it with fish sauce and oil... Apparently, I like my stuff to have that lived-in appearance.

For nearly two decades, I've relied on the Tao of Cooking by Sally Pasley. My stepbrother and his family live in Bloomington, Indiana, and his wife gave it to me for Christmas one year, because the author used to have some connection to the (now defunct) Tao Restaurant there. Susan rightly – and kindly - suspected that I would appreciate a present that acknowledged my hippie tendencies.

BSC: And since this is a bookselling blog, and I’m all about other people doing my job for me, what are a few books that you have loved (or loved lately) that you think everyone else should take a chance and read?

AH: My all-time favorite, more favorite even than The Grapes of Wrath or The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, is Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter.

I recently bought Jonathan Ames's What's Not To Love at a stoop sale, because I see him in my neighborhood all the time, and I enjoyed his novel The Extra Man, though I kind of had a bad taste in my mouth since overhearing him in a café telling an acquaintance of his how much he hates it when people recognize him and invade his privacy, though of course it was okay for her to do so since she was cute and she knew him. I didn't know him and after hearing that, thought that perhaps I didn't want to, but I tell you, he completely won me over with these personal essays. I was so sad to reach the end that I rushed out and bought his latest, I Love You More Than You Know, and it, too, is wonderful. There's a real charitableness in the way he describes people and his comic timing is just sublime.

Thanks, Ayun, for taking the time to answer my babble, and thank y’all for dropping by to check out the interview. You can find Dirty Sugar Cookies available to order here and here as well as The Big Rumpus, No Touch Monkey, and Job Hopper. You can also follow Ayun’s daily culinary triumphs and disasters at her food blog.

Hey Joe, What d'ya know: an Interview with Joseph Nassise

Two weeks ago Joseph Nassise wrote me to announce the upcoming podcast of his book Heretic (which launched today—the podcast, not the book), and I, the opportunistic chick that I am, took that as an invitation to hound him about doing an author interview. Despite the fact that I have never interviewed anyone in my life, with the exception of those seeking employment with my company, I wrote up a couple of questions for my victim—er, patient author and sent them out. What I expected was a “Please don’t email me again” in response, what I got instead were several thoughtful answers to my rather scattered questions. Whether it’s his book or his podcast that interests you, take a moment to read this over.

I know I feel smarter for it.

Bookseller Chick: Okay, I haven't had a chance to pick up your book, Heretic , and give it a thorough read—which pains my little research obsessed heart—but I did get a chance to read the first couple of pages on Amazon. Did you know that the excerpt cut off after page ten? I think I screamed a little. Here I was getting an intriguing combination of death, destruction, mystery and the introduction of a (possibly) bad ass character (Cade Williams), and then nothing. It ended in the middle of a sentence! I mean, I've heard to always leave them wanting more, but that was ridiculous. Still, I got enough to know that you've created a world where the Templars are not only still active, but still working for the Vatican. My question (and I do have one) is why did you choose the Templars as the organization for your book?

Joseph Nassise: The Templars have always been fascinating to me. You've got this small, militant order that grows exponentially over time, building enormous wealth and power from practically nothing. What started out as ten guys who'd vowed to guard the route from the Holy Land to Europe balloons into this immensely powerful Order, so powerful that the King of France and the Pope conspire to destroy it. But the Order is too smart for them. They scatter, taking their treasure fleet with them, and disappear into the pages of history, leaving behind myth, legend, and rumor.

It was on that framework that I decided to play the What If? Game. What if the Order had survived intact? What if they still played a role in today's world? What would they look like? Who would they answer to? You get the idea. From there, the concept of reconciling the Order with the Vatican in the wake of WWII was born.

BSC: I found out about your book when you emailed me about the Podcasts you are doing in conjunction with the Horror Network, and when I looked up your title, I found that it was commonly listed under horror. Do you consider your book to be strictly horror?

JN: Not at all. While it certainly has horrific elements – necromancers, revenants, what may or may not be an demon – it is also much more. It's part religious suspense, part police procedural, part romance, part techno-thriller. Bram Stoker award winner Gary Braunbeck said it quite well, I think…"HERETIC is cross-genre fiction at its very best."


BSC: Most large chain bookstores (I cannot speak for the independents) have sections specifically for horror fiction. Personally I tend to stay away from horror books because I tend to equate them with horror movies (long on the slashing, short on the plot) and I'm a big ol' wimp with a very active imagination who can't read scary things and then be alone by myself. Am I selling short the horror fiction genre? What would you say to someone like me to get me to buy your book? (That would be after you slapped me for the horrific grammar of that last sentence, of course.)

JN: I would say an emphatic YES, you are selling the horror genre short. To me, horror is anything that evokes a feeling of dread or fear. This means that many books that are not marketed as horror certainly have some horrific elements to them. Conversely, it also means that horror novels have a tremendous amount of room to live and breathe in and equating them with the dull and many times plotless slasher films of the last two decades doesn't give them the credit they deserve.

Certainly horror has its share of gore and guts, but it also has the lyrical symphony that is the writings of people like Peter Straub and Caitlin Kiernan, the evocative descriptions of Glen Hirschberg and Thomas Liggotti, the action and adventure of Tim Lebbon and Chris Golden. And I could go on in this vein for hours. A few years ago Alice Seibold won the Bram Stoker Award, one of horror fictions two highest literary honors, for her novel THE LOVELY BONES, in which a dead girl narrates the disintegration of her family following her rape and murder. Aside from the fact that the book is narrated by a ghost, there isn't a single element of the supernatural in the entire work, yet it was clearly seen as horror for the feelings it evokes.

Horror is much broader than most people realize and I think it behooves horror writers everywhere to help get that message across. I usually ask people to put aside their preconceived notions and talk a walk with me down the road for a bit, just past that last stoplight, where the light dims and the shadows start to gather, to see what we might discover there for ourselves…

BSC: The phenomenon of Podcasting is relatively new to me (and a lot of others), how did you come up with the idea? What made you hook up with the Horror Network to do this Podcast? What will each podcast entail and how can people access it?

JN: I had been listening to a number of technology related podcasts in my spare time and thought it might be interesting to listen to some fiction in the same format. Much to my surprise, there was very little to be had. I saw that as a window of opportunity, not only to fill that gap but also to reach a much wider potential audience than I could through the usual publicity methods.

Once I decided to do the podcast, I thought the impact would be much more significant if I had a corporate sponsor or two. I approached The Podcast Network as I knew they were the first commercial network for podcast content and had been listening to several of their shows on a regular basis. I knew their quality was excellent and that they would have the technical know-how I would need to bring my show to the public. I then needed a sponsor associated with the horror genre and the Horror Channel simply made perfect sense in that regard. Of course none of this would have been possible without the help of my publisher, Pocket Books.

Each podcast will consist of a fifteen to twenty minute show. We'll be doing a chapter a week from HERETIC, book one of the Templar Chronicles, so thirty weeks in all. Each and every show will also be archived on the official site (http://www.thetemplarchronicles.com/) so if you start listening to us partway through the project you can get caught up without any difficult. The site will also feature interactive message boards, contests, behind-the-scenes features and the like.

In order to listen to the show, you can either simply download each episode onto your computer, iPod, or portable media device manually or you can sign up for the podcast feed, which will automatically download each episode as it becomes available.

BSC: In a way, podcasting your book seems like a revival of the radio shows of old albeit in this new medium. Did you ever listen to radio shows? (If you did) Did that influence your reading of your book for the Podcast?

JN: I've listened to a number of old radio programs over the years, from The Shadow to others I think it's a tremendous shame that radio programs of this type have gone the way of the Dodo and I truly hope that podcasting will help revive this terrific medium.

BSC: In the comments you left on my post about your Podcast, you mentioned that you will be doing the reading. That takes some serious guts. How does it feel to hear your own voice reading something you put so much time and effort into creating?

JN: I've been involved in public speaking for years so recording my voice was no more difficult for me in that regard than getting up in front of a room full of people and giving a presentation. And thanks to editing software, I didn't really have to worry too much about any mistakes I made, as it was simple to go back through the recording afterward and clean up the errors. I've tried to make each show lively and interesting, and hope that I've succeeded. If not, I hope listeners will tell me about it so that I can make any necessary changes as we go along.


BSC: The Templar Chronicles are an ongoing series with Heretic as the first book. If your podcast is successful do you plan to do them for the rest of the books?

JN: Yes, I'd certainly like to do so. Books two and three, A SCREAM OF ANGELS and THE OTHER SIDE OF DARKNESS, will both be completed this year and I'd like to start podcasting them a few months after we finish up with HERETIC.


BSC: As a bookseller I'm always getting recommendations from people, besides your book (obviously) what are two books I should give a try, or at least recommend to my customers?

JN: There are literally hundreds of books I could recommend. I'll simply mention two that are being released this week - DUSK by Tim Lebbon and THE MYTH HUNTERS by Christopher Golden. Both are the start of new dark fantasy series, but very different from each other, and both authors are among my favorites.




That's it for my first author interview. If there is anyone else out there with some interesting marketing technique or just looking for some free publicity, let me know at bookseller.chick@gmail.com. I'd like to get a cross section of the genres if that's possible, and I love hearing about what's new and interesting in the book world.