Publicity is good even if its under the wrong name!

http://www.thevalleyvoice.ca/Voice%20Stories/October%202012/Chilliwack%20Books%20-%20Grey%20Redemption%20-%20Author%20Steve%20Covey%20-%20Oct%207%202012.htm

Just some local PR! Nice as other than a quick spot in the Langley Times newspaper the book has been getting very little attention in Canada! No idea why as I worked like hell to keep the spelling in Canadian english! But I guess I am in good company as the Surrey International Writers Conference was last week and it got very little mention in the local press and it had a book signing with trully luminary authors! SO while they got my name wrong they got the rest of the info totally correct and it is all about the book and having fun with it and not about me! Just a quick blog to keep you all in the loop.

An update on the writing! Chapter one is done in rough form and it has been difficult to write in the third person global perspective but I am learning! Along with some help from others and gentle pushes it is coming along.

The AudioBook is moving slowly. You'd think it be easy but far more hoops to jump than a regular book, Good news is it will be inexpensive for its size. Bad news is it won't be available in any format other than digital download!

October's New Beginnings

I have been doing a ton of research for Grey. I’d like to be able to keep the real feel of Grey Redemption with this new story. Part of the problem, as a writer, is not taking the easy way out. That is to ask the reader to suspend belief too often. As storytellers it’s easy to simply say; “ well in my world it’s like this.”  I remember all too well the sense of let down when one of my favorite authors wrote about the main character flipping off the safety of a .38 revolver.

            So how does Rhys work within the New World Order? Gone are the days of simple cipher drafts left unsent in anon mail servers. Money transfers? Not these days without some heavy company profiles. I don’t want to spoil the book for those only reading the blog, so yes I get he can do a lot more now at the end of Grey Redemption but what if he still wants to be off the grid? What if he still needs to work off the grid and further needs to work outside of his normal and ordinary associations? He can’t very well use the same master forger that Simon knows about can he?

            In doing this research I have come across the Dark Net or the Hidden Web. These are websites only accessed under P2P share protocols, or anonymous browser.  First off don’t go looking for this stuff. Really it probably isn’t the safest thing to do. Remember when all the talk was don’t read this book as it would lead to demon possession or play with this talking board as it could unleash evil…How many stories and films have been made along these plots? Well this side of the net is that dangerous! Really! I fully intend on removing the hard-drive from the computer I am using to do the research and burning it. Remember once seen things cannot be unseen. Temper this advice with the fact that I have little faith in humanity and am pretty jaded by my work. Seriously any drug, perversion or general felony can be bought or sold on this darker web.  Seriously, ANYTHING is available and seemingly permitted or at least tolerated by these tech savvy gurus. Remember when Narcoterrorism  was the scary buzzword of the nineties? The trench coat mafia was the image used to sell conformity and terrify school children. Well you know all the geeks and nerds that got teased and abused? They grew up. The trench coat mafia was a joke and Narcoterrorism did little but get certain groups elected, money, and power. But this Darknet or Dark web seems to be the nerds’ revenge and it is very real. It is incredibly slow, circa 1989 speeds, and it has tons of broken links, mislabeled content but it seems that the world of everything is Permitted is just under the surface of the mainstream.

            Imagine a Groupon style site that lists hits. Yes were talking contract murder. Where someone posts some bully, manager, boss, or politicians name. Then someone else posts a price. When the offered price is reached, you guessed it the HIT IS ON. Obviously the president was on it with a huge number. I didn’t look closely as I didn’t want to be privy to anything should it happen in the future. The close eyes, quickly hit the back button was employed as it often is on this darker trek.

            So how does one pay for this bag of pot, cocaine, assignation? In a new currency called Bitcoins.  Bitcoins seems to be the new Cyber Currency. Yes there is even an app for that! LOL! I have been researching how this currency works and could go into a long explanation but suffice to say it works and is virtually untraceable. So why no big headlines warning about this? Easy. Same reason the person checking your luggage and taking your nail clippers while the flight attendant gives you powdered creamer and long stem wine glasses. You only need to believe your safe as it would take far to much money and effort and personal resolve to really be safe. You don’t know about it, well you didn’t, and so “they” don’t need to come up with a way to “protect” against it. 

            So, October is a month of new beginnings and new stories. The prequel is going to be shelved for a while as I really think the sequel is a better way to move the story forward. Health scares are over and hopefully in the review mirror for a long time and as I gave up drinking I wont have to worry about messing up dialogue at 2 am after two too many vodkas and ice. Hopefully the creativity won’t suffer!

Thanks for reading, and remaining interested.

Cheers

Scott (now ready to channel RHYS again)
View from Fairmont Empress gold room 206. Where the plot was hatched! 

Grey Redemption and the AudioBook challenge

Hey Everyone,

    So, it has been another long while since I updated anyone on anything! Seems that I am saying that a great deal this year! It has not been for a lack of trying! I have been so incredibly engaged that staying on top of my blog is taking a back seat. Now I know why famous author types hire people to do this!

   This being said I think it is a little more honest the way I do it. We all have incredibly busy lives! Be it a stay at home mom, police officer, or writer. So we all know the challenges the day to day of life brings. Add to that the ups and downs and Facebook pokes and distractions, as welcome as they might be at times, and you get infrequent posts. Someone said Facebook is like jail. You waste a ton of time hanging around while getting poked by people you don't know well. I thought it was a funny perspective.

   My life has settled into a new normal, and while it is not without some new and different challenges, it is all good. I managed to steal a little bit of time to sit and reflect a little on what has been going on with the writing and the direction things are going. So lets break some news.

   I have a new Publisher and agent and together we have a new strategy for Grey Redemption and the prequel, that's working title is Grey Dawn.  Awesome and scary news as it means the white board timeline and the character lists have to be distilled into a new yarn! Been working on it a bit, less than I would like but it is hashing out ok. At issue is not messing up the original by confusing a content edit with a new fact that doesn't fit. I know I wrote it so it should seem like an easy thing. But in reality the original got so cut up that I have to be very careful with the facts of that edited reality! For example it would be cool to show how the old Regimental Sargent Major dies in the beginning of Grey Redemption as a great deal of readers liked the character. Editorial brevity had him simply die in the plane crash. Rhys never shares the cigar he was gifted by the man with Baal's eyes! Instead he smokes it alone in the back of a train car...So consistency with the published work's reality is a bit of a Leviathan! (Props to Rick M)

   Many readers and fans have commented as to the detailed imagery in Grey Redemption. Some good and some bad comments. Both are valid. This is to say that some people like the idea of reading how a mercenary moves through a large airport while others prefer the jumping timeline method. I have written before how I wanted the reader inside the mind of the main character. A 544 page book written in the first person perspective is a stylistic challenge. So I chose not to do the flash ahead. It would have been easier to simply start the next scene with:  Vancouver June Ninth, 18:15 hours. But I felt, and still do, that the effort of the reader to read through the minutia would pay dividends when the action ramped up. But like it or not almost all have agreed that listening to it on a Audiobook would be great.

    So let me be the first to tell you that it is currently in the works! Yes, the copyright and distribution issues looks to have been overcome! The script, as it is called when working in the audio format, is moving through first reading and the actor that is reading it has an awesome voice for the genre! I am truly looking forward to getting a full copy, putting it on my Iphone and sitting back to enjoy the yarn anew! It should help with some of the edit continuity challenges I've been having too.

     Distribution should be via Itunes and Audible. Two of the major players in the audiobook market. We are kicking around a few other options in addition to the major players, but nothing solid yet. The price point for this work should be pretty reasonable as well. I am actively trying to get it on the sites for around 4.99 or 5.99! I know the audio version will make people like my brother in law happy, and I hope it fits a niche for the others that have requested it!

    The timeline for this project is a little fluid and depends on a bunch of different factors, not the least of which is me finishing Grey Dawn! The plan as it sits is to release the Audiobook of Grey Redemption and then six months later release Grey Dawn as an Ebook only. Sales numbers of Grey Redemption are heavily weighted toward Ebook downloads so doing another three format release just doesn't make sense. I get that the Ebook can't be signed and the like but I have a fix for that as well. More on that later. Going with the single format release allows me to better control the price point of that as well. I promised fans  a cheaper version for Grey Dawn and I will come through!

    Following the release of Grey Dawn we will look at the numbers and see if we can do an Audio version as well six months to a year later. So that is the plan. You have no idea the amount of work that has gone into getting us here! Hopefully things go as planned and you can look forward to having a cigar and a pint, lying in the sun, seeing the world once again through the monster that is Rhys Munroe!

Farewell to The King. RIP Wiener

For those of you that might have missed the tweets and the Facebook updates the Correctional Service of Canada lost one of the best last week. This is what I read out for his send off. None of this is meant to be critical of the service in anyway.  It is simply an observational piece I wrote for a great man. 

 I lost a Good friend last week. Actually a very special person in my life. So how is it he could be only a good friend and yet a very special person at the same time?  Well, you see it was like this.   Wayne King, or Wiener as his friends knew him, was the 1^st partner I   had in   corrections. Wayne actually never called himself a Correctional Officer. He preferred the word guard, boss, line screw, or even  digger pig.  To him these were not words of slang or ignorant shouts, they were badges of honor he earned and wore proudly. This of course is at odds with the new and improved correctional environment but to quote Todd Bertuzzi “it is what it is.” I guess for Wayne the terms he used to describe himself better reflected his view of his job. Whether the now view or Wayne’s view is more correct I have no idea. Something probably best left to that of PhD profs to comment on in the years that follow. But what I do know is that Wayne’s view of his job and himself earned the respect of officers, inmates, and managers alike.

I don’t want to preach to the choir, but indulge me for just a moment for those here today that have never walked on a range. Jails are very different places with a language and culture entirely of its own. Words like Dad, Partner, Boss, and Goof have dramatically different meanings and weight placed on them. Behaviour and actions are viewed and judged far more critically than in normal society. Weakness could get you killed and sympathy could make you an easy mark. If you haven’t been inside it is almost impossible to relate and so most of us don’t. “Just another boring day inside”; we say and lie to those closest to us that have never carried a badge. “Piece of cake Dad.” We lie to each other and, after a time we believe it too. In doing so complete the circle and lie to ourselves. I believe this might be getting better with the new corrections, and I hope this is truly the case, as the cost is quite dear to all of us.

I met Mr. King on a lazy Sunday morning after my 10 days of familiarization training within the jail. I had already graduated from Staff College having been brought in on the military or university-educated program. This program hired ex-military of 10 years or better or university graduates.  I had neither qualification. Having only completed 4 years in military and 2 years of university I was on the B  list. Somebody else, possessing a Masters degree, got a better offer and dropped out 2 days before the course was supposed start. So I got the call, and started training on that day for what my parents had always tried to keep me from going into; Jail. Now after 23 years I do get there is a difference between one side of the bars and the other. But let me also state with 23 years of experience, that we are still both doing time. Within that understanding one of the old keepers had decided that it was best to put this college grad, as it was quite obvious I wasn’t seasoned military, with the Wiener. So I reported to F unit which was “The King’s Unit”,  put my lunch in the fridge introduced myself  as Scott and sat down opposite the heavy wooden desk. He looked over the pocket fox magazine he was reading, raised his eyebrows and said. “ Hey, my name is Wayne King but you can just call me the Wiener. Put your feet up and relax its Sunday brunch routine. Grab a book if you like.” He had nodded and a stack of various adult reading material. Having been briefly introduced to sales and sales techniques I  knew that gaining rapport was important. I also knew that one of the best ways to gain rapport was to do what other people do, or act like them. So I tossed 2 feet up on the desk grabbed the pocket Fox from the pile and flipped to some story in the middle of the book. This seemed to relax  the Wiener and I thought it odd way to start one’s correctional career. About an hour later I heard the large courtyard door lock bang to the open position. I looked quickly at Wiener  who could see the  mirror in the office that showed the internal sliding door. I raise my eyes questioningly while gesturing to put the book down or back in the pile. The  wiener just smiled and shook his head no while continuing to read his pocket fox. The large sliding door banged shut and a very tall man in a suit presented himself at the front door of the office, which was ajar. He looked at me raised his eyebrow slightly and then looked at the Wiener, as I followed his gaze.

“ Sir.” Said the wiener.

“ Good morning Mr. King. I see you have everything in hand and everything is running well in the unit today?  Said the unknown suited gentleman.

“ Yes Sir we got it under control.” Said the wiener.

  a trashcan.

“ Yes sir.  Don’t worry sir I will train him up.” Replied the Wiener, putting his book down for the 1^st time.

“ Great.”  The suited gentleman replied as he turned on his heel and walked out of the office and towards the sliding barrier.

 I listened as the sliding barrier slammed shut and the courtyard door banged open and then slammed behind the tall gentleman as he left F unit. Then I looked at the Wiener, raising my eyes in that way one does when asking what the fuck? I watched as a large smile spread across his face, his eyes sparkled in a fashion I would come to know and associate with Mr. King’s mischievous sense of humor.

“ That rookie was the old man, you know the Warden! Follow my lead since you made such a good 1^st impression I would suggest learning as much as you can and keeping your head down so that you don’t see him for at least another 2 years, till you’re off probation.”

That was a different world. A world before use of force reports, and endless ticky boxes of policy. It was in a word a Jail. We don’t use those words anymore. In that old world an officer was expected to deal with whatever happened in the unit by themselves and keep the ship moving toward the common goal of control and custody. It was that simple and that difficult. There were no after incident briefings, or Critical Incident Stress Management procedures to follow or to help. You did what you did and went home and dealt with it. We were the law, the Rule of law, and the buck stopped with us on the most dangerous patrol beat any officer could walk. We had to deal with death, violence, and the threats of both on a almost weekly basis. The inside crimes ran the gamut with everything you would find in regular society, with the added spice of the odd that no cop would ever encounter. I doubt RCMP get a course on how to handle adult self circumcision. Yet me and the Wiener had to do just that. In that world before manuals, and policy. Prior to the Situational Management Model, and introduction of mental health training. Before the days of media scrutiny and courses on ethics and values. How did we survive? How did we do it right? Well I guess the truth is we didn’t. Not entirely. Wayne always said.  A good day is when we win and they don’t and we all meet for a beer after shift; And don’t worry kid we got more guns than they have knives.” But in looking back over all these years we all paid a price. Lost a little, or a great deal doing our jobs protecting society. These officers that were old when I started had figured it all out and paid the price in doing so. Now I am the old guard, in this new world of Corrections and I know it is as different today for me as it was for Officers like Wiener. Yet as different as it is now, then, and before. The Kings wisdom holds as true today as it was then and I pass it along to each and every officer I train. Wiener Said:

Kid, before you do anything in here with a convict think what happens if he says NO!” Then ask yourself is what your doing or trying to do worth a punch in the mouth for? Once you know the answers to those two questions you’ll know what your doing is right and how to do it.”

Simple logic and logic that has yet to be replaced with any piece of policy I have seen. That was my partner, my Dad, OUR BACKUP, and my friend. Wiener.    

The Mechanics of Love.

Hey Everyone,
So much for me staying up to date on my blog. I see a few have dropped off the reading list and a few more joined. Welcome to all. So if your looking for an animated and fun read about the pro's and cons of the new 6.8 cartridge your going to be sadly disappointed. 


Is love being the only boy invited to your 10-year-old classmates birthday? Or is it wanting to follow your husband to the grave after 65 years? Neither of these situations have I had the pleasure or pain of experiencing. This is not to say that I've not felt love. I believe I have felt love and not only the fleeting "falling in love" and "brotherly love". But real love. It is sacrifice and understanding, understanding the perspective of a creature you can't understand. It  is believing the unbelievable and forgiving the unforgivable, it is to look and see past all the imperfections to truly view the soul of another human being and to become comfortable with that view. It is a trading of priorities. By this I mean it is the attempt to place your priorities beside or slightly  behind that of the person you love, while they attempt to do the same for you. It is a beautiful and difficult ballet to pull off, and I believe it is why two out of three marriages fail but educated people still engage in the folly. Because when it works nothing comes close to the joy it brings, equally, like most things in life, nothing comes close to the anguish it brings when it is out of sync and the pain when fails. I don't mean stray  into an area better served by poets and songwriters but perhaps following in my dad's footsteps as a Millwright. Talking about the mechanics of love. Yeah I guess that's what I'm doing, and in that a title. The mechanics of love.



Rhys Munroe, the main player in Grey Redemption holds firmly onto the notion to never get involved with someone you wouldn't walk away from in thirty minutes or less. He changes towards that magical connection we all  look for, and most fail. 


Happy Valentines Day. 


For a great video on 6.8 ballistics look up Davidkxx on Youtube with the search string 6.8. Great video. Problem is you can't find the rounds in any monkey strewn dictatorship worth kicking the shit out of. 

New beginnings and forced entries.

Hello everyone,

      It's been a while since I've updated my blog and a lot happened during that time. I have to apologize for my absence, but I really had to come to an understanding before I could let you all in on the happenings and goings on in my world. This year's Surrey international writers conference was in a word awesome. I met old friends from previous years and some new ones as well. The conference is always a great place to make connections and maintain motivation for writing because what we do is not easy. If it was easy everyone would do it, and while many would like to, few have the discipline to see it through completion. So I'm always amazed and enlightened to see the same people working on previous or new projects. They bring with them such a passion for the art and for the craft that one can't help but walk away feeling rejuvenated and inspired. This year was a special year for me in that my book Grey Redemption was not only for sale in the chapters outlet store that sells books at the conference every year. But, I was also included in this year's author signing. To be part of the author signing with such luminary writers as Jack Whyte,  Michael Slade, and Robert McCammon was a humbling experience. In fact, Jack Whyte bought my book and asked me to personalize it for him. So what do you write as a personal note for someone so incredibly skilled in the art of storytelling. Okay, now that you figured that out how to you write past the tears that are bound to come when one of your personal icons asks you to do so. This event coupled perfectly with Robert McCammon's keynote address about writing or rather storytelling. The main thrust of his presentation was that as writers we should write from the heart. That is to say reach down deep within ourselves and grasp that fiery spark that compels us, and allows us, to sit in front of a computer for 4 hours a day and be "creative". Writing is a passion, it's been said by far greater people than me and will be again, but as passion is an emotion we as storytellers need to be careful about our own personal emotional state before putting pen to paper. The characters in our books or manuscripts if they haven't been published tend to impact our personality far more than we would believe. They become part of us and if the character is rather strong or bent in a particular direction they leave a stain. The craft is a two-way street. We think and create characters and place them in a scene in which they interact with other characters we've created. We have a little conflict, perhaps a little drama, and try to tie it up neatly with a bow. But on the other side of the street these creations of our imagination latch on to our own psyche. They worm their way into our own personality and while we may or may not be aware of it, they create change. If you created a rather nasty individual like Rhys Munroe, as I did in Grey Redemption, the impact to your own soul or psyche can be exponential. By this I mean it starts off slowly like an addiction to cigarettes. At  first it's just one at the bar with friends, and then a couple more in the evening before bed. Pretty soon you're standing outside in a snowstorm huddling against the wall frozen like a corpse trying to inhale smoke that contains the lovely drug nicotine into your lungs. There was a study done, I believe it was in the UK that looked at how what we read as readers affected our personality. As with most studies it was far from conclusive but there was definitely a correlation between what we read and how we thought. Now whether that was a causal relation was unclear. Do readers pick books because they have a certain personality and these books appeal to them or do the books actually affect their personality. While it was unclear in the study, for me at least it is very clear. The characters and situations and scenes that I create most certainly affect my personality and outlook on the world. Consequently, I've gone through a rather dramatic life event. My spouse and I have separated after being married for almost 7 years, and together for 10. The official version to answer the why of it is "growing in different directions." But in reality the truth of it is Mr. Munroe dug in and held on a little more than I thought. I've heard of actors having this difficulty. So completely becoming the other character that they have to struggle to come back from that reality to the old reality of their own personality. I believe the same to be true for writers. We wrap ourselves tightly within a plot and character arc that we lose pieces of ourselves in doing so. It doesn't help that as soon as you write a book you move very quickly into the next phase which is promoting said book you just wrote. Believe me when I say that the writing and editing of the book is far easier than the dog and pony show of promotion. While it's very fun to fly to London England and stay at the wonderful Savoy hotel while attending the London book fair. It still takes a large toll out of your life. You very quickly move from dictating your own time to time being dictated to you. The quiet mornings of coffee, a cigar, and checking social media sites out of interest will rapidly swing to staying up-to-date with your blog and social media. I guess it's like my father said it's always fun until becomes a job and then it's just work. Although I don't like to use the word "just" within the context of writing. I guess that's probably the point of this blog. Writers just don't create great characters, storytellers just don't come up with great plots, and authors rarely survive the craft unscathed. We, and those close to us, really do bleed for the craft sometimes, and I've actually spent the last 8 weeks trying to determine if it was worth it. Robert McCammon has said on many occasions that writers and authors are very special people, that what we do is magical. I agree with Rick's statement and his belief in what we do is truly in a special realm. So with that firmly placed on one side of the scale I placed the loss of a friend on the other side of this scale and tried to come to terms with the outcome. It wasn't easy, and it certainly didn't come quickly as my absence in blogging shows. But with all things grief related there is a schedule to how things play out. It would be far easier if everything was a linear process but rarely is the case true when you add human beings, emotions, beliefs, morals, and such to the equation. But here we are, and I very proudly steal the statement, the call, the reveille; " This day we write!"

Thoughts on the Passing of Steve Jobs, Media softness, and the Surrey International Writers Conference.

So the sun has once again chosen to show itself in the Chilliwack district. So I guess with the bright sunshine I should come up with something equally as bright to blog about. As I have said in the past this is a little more than difficult since I really don’t know what readers would like to hear. That being said I thought I’d go over a little bit of the recent events and thoughts I’ve had about them. It was with great sorrow that we lost Steve Jobs. The man was a visionary and has left a significant impact on our world, not just for the tech savvy but also for just the general public. It was with the significant amount of sadness that I read how he wasn’t this kind of a man. At least this seems to be the case if you read some of the blogs and some of the comments after his passing. While, I understand there is a little bit of Internet toughness or anonymity behind the keyboard. I still felt that the comments made by many were inappropriate.  One such comment that jumps to the forefront of my attention was the idea that he was nothing more than just money making technology thief. That he somehow stole ideas from Windows and other operating software like Linux.  While I do not doubt for a moment that he borrowed some of the ideas on how to get a GUI, which was the first name for a window, to operate within a UNIX environment. This borrowing of ideas was hardly specific to Steve. Each operating system copied each other freely. The simple fact that there are 1.6 smart phones for every person in the United States speaks to this man’s visionary influence. The simple fact that I can blog from my iPhone to an audience almost too vast to comprehend provides more than a little evidence of this man’s global influence. Leonardo da Vinci influenced his society with wonderfully creative art that merged science and technology in ways that hadn’t been thought of before. In a very similar way, Mr. Jobs did the exact same thing. The Apple Computer has come such a long way from its meager beginnings.  I remember typing away on my Apple prior to having a numbered designation, looking at a cathode ray tube display of green letters. I remember thinking jealously when one of my good friends got his new Apple and it had an Amber display. Back then the word processing powerhouse was Magic Words, and it came with a 2nd disc, Magic Spelling. I wrote my 1st stories on the old Mac. It wasn’t all easy and wasn’t at all as smooth as writing is today. No, now I can sit mouse in hand finger on the delete key, and speak out loud and watch the letters magically appear on my screen. My concern no longer which big disk to stick in the drive, or how much memory I was using. No, now all I have to do is make sure that my stutter words or misspoken grammar doesn’t show up on screen as I’m speaking it. So to the naysayer and proponents that believe Mr. Steve Jobs was just some money grabbing lying geek thief, I say shame. For whatever sour grapes or product brand loyalty you feel, it is not okay to steal or hijack the accomplishments of one of the most visionary computer, and corporate, moguls of this century.

 I blame this partly on the media. No one wants to hear the good news story, as scandals sell so much better. What he died of supersedes and becomes more important than what he created. The sound bite short vision of today’s media outlets hampers the consumers understanding. For example, I remember listening with fascination to the O.J. Simpson trial. At that time it was being touted as the trial of the century. Really? Trial of the century? Funny, I already thought we had those back in Nürnberg. While the lethal assaults allegedly committed by Mr. Simpson were horrible, I don’t really think they compare to having several Nazis on trial for war crimes.  Now we have the Michael Jackson Dr. on trial for murder and the occupy Wall Street movements.  All of this dispensed in 30 second sound bites to a growing group of people with a 30 second attention span. It is very difficult to get a feel, or read, on an actual event occurring in a different part of the world. I have been to events similar to occupy Wall Street, and then watching them on the news later wondering to myself was I actually there? The viewpoint put forward was so dramatically different than my observations that the reporter and I could not have been at the same rally.

    So this is the week for the large Surrey International Writers Conference.  I look forward to this conference every year, as it is by far one of the best I have attended. The access to authors and other literary professionals is second to none. It is so very cool to meet your childhood writing heroes, men and women who shaped your early development into an adult. Visionaries and Masters at their talent that challenge you to look inward at yourself and outward as to how you shape the world you live in. Perhaps this was unintentional, I know in writing Gray Redemption that many people are reading more into the book than I originally intended. I think this is a good thing, I’ve said before that each person brings something personal to the reading of any book. What one person gets out of it is significantly different than what someone else may get out of it. What I took away from Boys Life, or Baal, was a great deal different than what my friends took away from the book. For me it was a personal space that allowed me to come to terms with and, create coping mechanisms for my severe attention deficit hyperactive disorder.  It basically got me through my teen years, raging hormones, and at the time a not correctly diagnosed disability.  I know the politically correct term is challenged, or disadvantaged. But a label is just a label, making it softer is akin to calling a psychopath morally challenged. This year the writing conference actually included me in the book-signing event. Being so included with such masterful authors is extraordinarily humbling. It also caused a resurgence of that author fear; What If No One Shows up!  I easily signed over hundred and fifty books at the Chapters event just a few months ago. So it is really hard to imagine that someone else has a book left that needs to be signed. But I posted it up on my Facebook page, and sent out a tweet. So we shall see if there is any real interest. I have got a couple of e-mails from people that are going to try and make it to the Surrey Sheraton, but I’m not holding my breath.  What I will take away from this event is far more important. The classes and course material, panels and keynotes, go such a long way to improving and inspiring the job that is writing has no equal. Nor are the contacts and friendships that develop at such a small and intimate venue. While missing the glitzy glamour and large venue of say the London book fair. It more than compensates for this by being so hands on, smoothly run, and delivered. It is a conference that I encouraged many to attend and will continue to do so. I believe hands down that it is impossible to get as much bang for your buck in your ongoing writers education.

 So with that I believe I will sign off, kick the soapbox back under the bed, and work towards completing my list of tasks before heading deep into the darkest Surrey. I look forward to seeing everyone at the conference.