Banned Books Week 2010

In case you wondered, Banned Books Week is running from Saturday, Sept. 25 through Saturday, Oct. 2, 2010.

Check out the Web site. Among other things, you'll find a listing of events taking place throughout the U.S., a special event called Banned Books Week Read-out, a map of book censorship (places not to live? LOL) and things you (yes, you reading this blog :)) can do to encourage free speech and fight censorship.

And in celebration (sort of) of this week, here are the Top 10 books of 2010 (in terms of number of attempts at banning). It always alarms me to see titles like TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD (One reason: "Racism" -- well, duh) and TWILIGHT (One reason: "Unsuited to Age Group" -- um, wasn't it written FOR young adults?) on such lists.

And a hat tip to Buried Under Books for providing the Top 10 List. And not just because the blog will be a stop on my soon-to-be-officially announced blog tour for IDENTITY CRISIS. :) (Kind of the last hurrah before the sequel, LEAST WANTED, comes out in late fall -- I hope. LOL And you heard it here first, everyone.)

Quick plug: For more details about my "20 Questions Blog Tour," check my blog, My Life on the Mid-List. An official announcement is in the offing. And an awesome time should be had by all.

Oh, and here's a sneak peek at one of the awesome sauce tour logos (which, as a card-carrying techno-idiot, I can't figure out how to save and embed -- but, no problem, it will all be good).

Again, you lucky readers are the first to know. (And thanks to Missie at The Unread Reader -- another stop along the tour -- for designing the really cool tour logos! I'll, um, be in touch about the embedding thing.)

Thank you. :)

The 15th Annual Baltimore Book Festival

If you're going to be in the Baltimore area tomorrow, it's the last day of the Baltimore Book Festival. Turns out it's the fifteenth one. (Who knew? I thought it had been going on a lot longer.) The festivities will run from noon to 7 p.m. in the historic Mount Vernon section of Baltimore City on Sunday.

The festival has always struck me (as a local resident) as something of a fixture. I thought it had been going on for decades. Guess it just feels like decades. :)

This year's festival features (according to the Web site) "more than 225 celebrity, nationally known and local authors including Holly Robinson Peete, Rodney Peete, Barbara Bradley Hagerty, Nigel Barker, Ree Drummond, Michele Norris, Sherri Sheppard, Judge Glenda Hatchett, Jesse Ventura, Warren St. John, Amy Dickinson ("Ask Amy") and Matt & Ted Lee.

"Our Children's Bookstore Stage is once again packed with your favorite authors and illustrators.  Highlights include: Judith Viorst, Michael Buckley, Peter Earnest, Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier and Carrie Ryan."

And, even though it's not mentioned, I was there today. I went to sign and sell my novel, IDENTITY CRISIS. Here's my report on the day.

Okay, move along. Not much to see here. :)

The Top 10 Bestselling Vooks

Ever wonder what the top ten bestselling vooks "of all time" (yes, tongue firmly in cheek here) are? Sure you have, right? Well, here they are on Vook's blog. (Where else?)

Some of you may be wondering, "What the heck is a vook, anyway? I mean, I've heard of them, but just what ARE they???"

Well, according to Vook.com, a vook is "a new innovation in reading that blends a well-written book, high-quality video and the power of the Internet into a single, complete story. You can read your book, watch videos that enhance the story and connect with authors and your friends through social media all on one screen, without switching between platforms."

Got it? Yeah, right.

Perhaps pictures will speak louder than words about the whole thing.


Watch What is a Vook? Vook: Read it, Watch it. in Entertainment | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

Got it now? How very multi-media. However, even with all these technological bells and whistles, I'll never stop loving stories told in just words. Because words can have incredible power in and of themselves.

I'll admit the possibility of combining sound and images (static or moving) with text has a certain appeal. Even the ability to flip around to different texts "without changing platforms" has its pluses. But I see these abilities as being more beneficial for non-fiction than fiction.

I don't know. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned, but I can't help feeling fond of a plain, unadorned tale told with mere words (either printed or in pixels).

All those whirling images seem to create an ADD-induced lack of attention and focus that words alone demand. Rather than pull me into the material, the whirling images seem to create more distance.

Call me an old fogey, but I doubt a vook (bells, whistles and all) could ever create in me the emotional resonance a story told in mere words can.

Of course, vooks are pretty new. And I never thought I'd own a Kindle. :)

Will Ebooks End Book Burnings?

In this article about all the controversy surrounding International Burn a Koran Day, it's pointed out that you can't burn ebooks.


I suppose that technically you could douse a Kindle or iPad with accelerant and light it off. However, the act seems like something less than the grand symbolic gesture of building a huge flaming bonfire of books.

It also fails to destroy the ebook itself, since we're talking about a book made of electrons. You don't destroy the content by destroying the device that reads it.

Which raises the much more problematic scenario of simply wiping the book out of existence with the click of a mouse. Think back to the time when Amazon took people's ebook downloads of (ironically) 1984 away -- just like that.

Might not be as symbolic, but it's way more frightening, in my opinion.

'Dead Even': Tales of a Small Town's Finest and Most Criminal

Review: DEAD EVEN: A River City Crime Anthology (Gray Dog Press October 2010)
Author: Frank Zafiro

This short story anthology revolves around the denizens of the mythical River City, Washington. (River City being a stand-in for Spokane.) The collection is divided into sections about various characters the author, Frank Zafiro, has written about in his River City novels.

With his background in law enforcement, Zafiro tends to focus his attention on the officers, detectives and higher-ups within River City's police department. However, his stories also include an exiled New Jersey mobster, a few members of the Russian Mob and other shady characters.

The stories are like a series of vignettes about particularly significant moments in the characters' lives. For instance, the focus in the section about beat officer-turned-detective Katie MacLeod (who Zafiro confesses is his "absolute favorite character") is on the affect the promotion has on her professionally and personally – both for the better and the worse. Some scenes stand out due to their refreshing honesty, like the one where she gets a gag gift from her male co-workers to honor her receiving a detective's shield. In that scene, when MacLeod says, "You guys ... you're such ... assholes," it rings so true and funny. I say this as someone who's an ex-volunteer emergency medical technician, whose been married to a fireman for, well, decades. :)

Zafiro's ability to capture the small details of a cop's life are part of what makes these stories feel so real and give you a truer picture of police work than anything you'll see on CSI. Although some of the descriptive details could be cut back a tad, the overall picture is genuine and will capture you in both heart and mind.

In addition, Zafiro has a flair for creating tragic characters. His depiction of a fateful night in Officer Paul Heiro's life gripped me completely. Zafiro takes you along on a footrace between Heiro and a bad guy – one that left me feeling a bit breathless myself. The psychological stand-off between Heiro and the man he chases is electrifying. Unfortunately, what happens afterward, paves the way for Heiro's decline and fall.

While we get a taste of this in another Paul Heiro story, we never find out exactly how far down he'll go. Zafiro only tells us that "ultimately he will fall further." This knowledge only deepens the sense of tragedy related to this character.

However, not all is doom and gloom in this anthology. The characters include Detectives Finch and Elias – two men who comprise a kind of yin and yang of partners. While Finch is the reserved, "good cop," Elias tends to have more of a "bad cop" attitude. Zafiro uses these characters to show how cops tend to banter and use dark humor to deal with the ugliness and cynicism that comes with investigating crimes of all sorts (ranging, in this book, from a double homicide to the theft of a "bastard mummy" from a museum).

Finally, there's Dominic Bracco (the exiled New Jersey wise guy), who in many ways is the most intriguing character of the bunch. He's been banished to the Great Northwest by his Uncle Angelo for mysterious reasons. Bracco's stories seem to combine all the aspects found in the other tales and bring them to the fore in an entertaining and thought-provoking way. Bracco is not only funny, but he enjoys camaraderie with other hoods (like the local Russian mobsters). However, he has an air of failure and lost opportunity about him. One story in which he matches wits with gypsies is a bit hair-raising and spooky. And suggests that, like Paul Heiro, Bracco may have a less-than-desirable fate awaiting him. This is based in part on a painful decision in another story regarding one of his men.

The stories, in combination, give you just enough to get to know the players. They make up a diverse set of tales about quite different characters dealing with a variety of issues, woven together by location and involvement with the criminal element. As such, the characters occasionally interact with each other. Plus the stories make you want to read more about them in Zafiro's River City novels. Which, I suspect, is part of the point of this collection.

On all those notes, I'd say Zafiro can mark this one: mission accomplished.

Excuse Me, While I Kiss the Sky

I learned the most interesting thing this week. Did you know Jimi Hendrix was a huge fan of science fiction literature? A "science fiction book junkie," as GalleyCat puts it.

While this may not be terribly surprising, considering the way the man lived and the drugs he took, I thought it was most intriguing.

According to Brad Schreiber, one of the authors of a book (called BECOMING JIMI HENDRIX plus a really long subtitle :)) about the talented, but ill-fated guitarist, the book NIGHT OF LIGHT written by Phillip Jose Farmer had a profound influence on Hendrix. In fact, Schreiber says that NIGHT OF LIGHT "was a science fiction book that in 1966 inspired Jimi to eventually write 'Purple Haze.' Farmer's story had to do with sunspots having a disorienting effect on a distant planet's population. Jimi wrote pages and pages of lyrics for 'Purple Haze,' originally an epic tale of the history of warfare for the control of the planet Neptune."



Schreiber goes on to state: "Jimi had been obsessed with science fiction as a boy in Seattle. He always went to see the actor Buster Crabbe in the serial Flash Gordon that played at the local theater. In fact, his nickname during youth was 'Buster.' Once, he literally jumped off the roof of his home, so taken was he with Flash's ability to fly ..."

Great story. And it explains a lot to me about Jimi Hendrix.

B&N's Labor Day Ebook Sale

Barnes & Noble has been running an ebook sale this Labor Day weekend. I just found out about it this morning.

The sale runs until the end of the day today (Tuesday), so if you have a Nook or other e-reader that'll handle B&N's ebooks, get in on it while you can.

The article lists several titles, all in the $3.99 to $4.99 range. My own book, IDENTITY CRISIS, is available from B&N for $2.99. Just saying. :)

Best Authors on Facebook List

MediaBistro (which is part of my daily reading as an author) has created a list where readers can recommend their favorite authors on Facebook.

Many of my own favorite authors are listed here, especially when I scroll down to the comments. Elmore Leonard, Walter Mosley, Duane Swierczynski and James Ellroy are just a few.

I'm going to make my own list of favorites and add it to the comments. Feel free to do the same.

And, hopefully, I'm not tooting my horn too much in pointing out that someone was kind enough to list me. :)