September 2007 Blogs

The September Photo of the Month is one of my favorites of all time. That's New York Times bestselling author James Patterson and me. Jim was the recipient of the Grandmaster Award at Thrillerfest this year, and this photo was taken on the elevator while riding down to the awards banquet. (I think we were staying on the same floor at the hotel.) Can you tell I was excited?

Sunday, September 30, 2007

Hey folks,

It's been a great week. We did an event at Cameron Village Public Library Thursday evening that drew about 35 writers. Our panelists were sci-fi fantasy author James Maxey and Baen Publishing contributing editor Gray Rhinehart. The discussion really focused on the nitty-gritty details of how a publisher like Baen works in terms of acquiring manuscripts, setting pub dates, publicizing and marketing its books, and editing manuscripts to be published.

Then, on Friday, we filmed a new interview at the TV studio for The Artist's Craft to air on Raleigh Television Network Channel 10 later this fall. Marnie Cooper-Priest and Michael Graziano were directing, and this interview was with Cynthia Barnett, executive director for the 1500-member strong NC Writers' Network.

Today, I'm driving down to Wilmington, North Carolina to moderate a panel discussion with three other authors titled "How to Write a Book: From Idea to Completed Manuscript" at Pomegranate Bookstore for the Wilmington Write to Publish Group.

Stacey

Friday September 21, 2007
Busy, busy, busy... well we filmed another interview today and then I did an event this evening with the authors at Cameron Village Public Library in Raleigh.

The interview went very well, and I should have it available online within a couple days. I'll post it here when it's done.

Tonight's event was well attended, and I had a lot of fun.

Stacey

Saturday September 15, 2007
I've got a new interview online. This one is with author Christopher Irving. Enjoy...

Thursday September 13, 2007
Isn't this a great picture? It's just amazing to me that I have a son. Man, we are truly blessed...

Friday September 7, 2007
My life is busier now than it has ever been.

Last night, I had an event at a Borders Bookstore. We drew a crowd of about 30 people, and I managed to sell about seven or eight books and as many DVDs.

Today, I had an author-interview at the TV studio. It was an excellent interview, but it occupied my day from 8:00 AM until around 7:00 PM, when I finally had to pull myself away from post-production editing to have some dinner. I still have work that I could be doing on it right now (the audio isn't where I'd like it to be), but I'm going to give it a rest for the night.

Last weekend, I had an event on Thursday evening, Friday afternoon and Sunday afternoon. Add in teaching on Monday and Wednesday, and there just ain't a lot of spare time.

Also, I'm finishing up my tenth novel, and I've begun editing my next major DVD project. I hope to have the novel done within the next couple of weeks, and the DVD done within 4-6 weeks.

Additionally, I'm booking events for the rest of the fall, and may line up 6-12 bookstore events for the next two to three months. I would like to get on a regular circuit throughout the Southeast doing events once per month in cities like Charlotte, Washington DC, Virginia Beach, Wilmington, and of course, Raleigh. I managed to do this over the summer, but things are busier now and it makes regular touring a bit more challenging.

At any rate, I guess the goal is to just stick with the show this fall, keep writing, finish the novel, finish the new DVD project, tour as much as I can, schedule as many events as I possibly can keep up with, and enjoy it.

Should be a fun couple of months!

Stacey

P.S. I've uploaded the newest interview to YouTube in three parts...