Now what? Heroes: build them up, then knock ‘em down

So on Monday, Charles Ramsey heard a woman crying out for help in his Cleveland neighborhood. He kicked down the door to what turned out to be the resolution to at least three missing persons cases more than a decade old. With his boot, he ended the torture and imprisonment of three young women who had been plucked off the street years ago by a very, very bad man, Ariel Castro.

Charles Ramsey went on to numerous television interviews and proved to be an engaging storyteller. He’s funny. He’s animated. He’s bright. And he feels terrible that he’s lived next door for more than a year while these women were cruelly abused by a man Charles Ramsey has barbequed with.

And today we learn that Charles Ramsey has served prison time for felony domestic abuse. He went to jail for beating his wife.

Now what do we do with that?

It seems we can put heroes on pedestals or fillet them to their sundry parts, some of which are bound to be ordinary or even sub-par. Disappointment, either way, is inevitable. Construct a superhuman image of a mere mortal and that’s arguably psychologically unhealthy for both the hero and the rabble left to worship an unachievable standard. Dredge up a hero’s less-than-heroic moments and somehow the triumph is diminished.

It’s a struggle to find the right temperature of love for heroism. We need heroes. Or more accurately, we need heroic moments. Then it seems against our nature to let these intersections of time and place stand on their own. We cast the hero into both the past and the future, and only in the mode of their moment of glory. When that doesn’t match up to what they’ve done or what they will do, we seem to find that the particular moment that gave us goosebumps and a lump in our throat is farther away in our mind than where we thought we’d put it.

We dig. We dig knowing that it’s too good to be true. And I don’t know whether it’s the right thing, knocking them back. Maybe it serves a purpose, avoids too much distance between ourselves and our heroes. In the end, maybe it keeps us in their company, increasing the odds that we may dare to join their ranks if needs be.

Or maybe, as it feels this morning, we need to be careful sawing off our heroes at the knees. We can ill afford to have it play into those seconds or milliseconds of calculation in an emergency. The thought if I do this, and it helps, every other thing I’ve ever done is going to be held up in comparison against this moment would leave a lot of people stranded on the cold side of assistance.

Here I Am, Stuck In The Middle With You (and you, and you, and you…)

So here’s the thing: since Three Graves Full launched in February, I’ve been keeping my fingers crossed for a speedy resolution to the contract negotiations between Simon & Schuster and Barnes & Noble. I’m not the only one. Author, MJ Rose, started the day with this.

The trouble with finding my book (and some wonderful others linked below) at Barnes & Noble right now stems from an upper level business dispute between two industry powerhouses. In tough economic times, both parties are working diligently to ensure their stability. What else would they do? It’s business. And sometimes there is fallout. At the moment, it’s a bunch of books and a lot of people’s hard work.

It became news this week with an article by Jeffrey Trachtenberg in The Wall Street Journal.This was followed up in short order by an article at The New York Times and a statement from The Authors Guild.

From the NYTimes article, here’s what’s happening, nutshelled:

A standoff over financial terms has prompted the bookstore chain Barnes & Noble to cut back substantially on the number of titles it orders from the publishing house Simon & Schuster, raising fears among other publishers, agents and authors that the conflict may harm the publishing industry as a whole.

Industry executives, as well as authors of recently published Simon & Schuster books and their agents, say that Barnes & Noble has reduced book orders greatly, to almost nothing in the case of some lesser-known writers.

I’m very grateful to Mr. Trachtenberg for mentioning Three Graves Full in his article. As a debut author, visibility is vital for connecting with readers. It’s almost all I’ve got. But I’m by far not the only one pinched between this rock and hard place.

Here is a list of some new (and very well-received) books that you probably aren’t seeing displayed right now at your local Barnes & Noble. That being that, browse here instead. If a title catches your eye and its cover your fancy, click the picture, follow the links and pick up a copy.

And, if you’re so inclined, please link to this article in social media so that your readerly friends can have a look at what they, too, might be missing.

           

           

           

All these years, and now… Tuesday

So it’s Saturday and I have my coffee and a few minutes and I’m a fluttery mess. I’ve had twelve years (with a three year hiatus tucked in there for other bits of life that pulled me away, both literally and figuratively) to write and learn and fail and learn and write a little more, fail a little more, learn and write and… holy hell, it came together. The tumblers fell (some being wrestled and hammered; it was ungainly, trust me) into their places and the lock was un-ed.

All these years. And now… Tuesday.

I’m under the impression that I might be quite busy over the next few weeks with the launch business of Three Graves Full. Maybe it won’t be that hectic. I don’t know. I’ve never done this before. But just in case, I wanted to have a place to add links to online milestones for anyone who might wander by and be interested.

And for any who fit that description, thank you and all the best to you.

And special thanks to everyone who hosted an interview, giveaway, or took their time to post a review. Thank you, thank you.

***

Firstly, and thrillingly, Three Graves Full gets a terrific little write-up in Marilyn Stasio’s Crime Books column in The New York Times. Eeeeep!

I thoroughly enjoyed writing a piece for the brilliants, John Scalzi, and his regular feature The Big Idea.

Who knew 10 Questions could be so much fun? Chuck Wendig at Terribleminds.com did the asking. I did the giggling and answering.

A soundtrack for Three Graves Full? Sure. I’ll give it a whirl. Largehearted Boy asked and here are the songs that came to mind when I gave it a good strong think.

***

American Gods by Neil Gaiman

I cannot tell a lie! (I mean I totally can, but decided not to this time.)

I didn’t not read five books in five days. I stubbed my brain on AMERICAN GODS. The fact is that I’m loving it, but five straight days of solid reading – a) made my eyes very tired, and b) left a bit too much workaday life unattended.

So on Friday, one of those unattended bits really put its foot down and demanded its due tinkering and then I found I had contracted an impressive case of vertigo, which happens if I shorten my focus down to screen or page distance for too long.

I had to take a break from reading.

But I’m back on it and I am loving AMERICAN GODS. I’m so glad to have revisited it. My first attempt was shortly after the birth of my second child and either hormones or sleep deprivation (or a combination thereof) had left me somehow not in the mood for what AMERICAN GODS was offering. I’m well in the mood for it now and enjoying every page. Every sentence, really. Gaiman is a terrific writer.

I just have to remember to stand up and look long every now and again, just to keep the room from spinning.

Tricky brain.

Shadow of a Dead Star by Michael Shean

Just as I’d hoped, the selections I’ve had from the contest are all over the place. I’ve had contemporary quest fiction, compelling non-fiction, a hard-boiled detective story, and now a sci-fi techno-thriller.

SHADOW OF A DEAD STAR, by Michael Shean is grim. A noir’s noir of the Blade Runner sort, which is pretty much outside what I can  thoroughly enjoy, but it does have points to recommend it. In fact, its relentlessness is probably exactly what has earned it the good reviews it’s enjoyed. Shean has vividly imagined the futurescape of Seattle and the gadgetry that runs the daily grind and entertains the people of tomorrow, and there is a good dose of very cool stuff in this element of the book.

But technology has underscored the worst in humanity pretty much across the board. The debauchery is inventive and somehow inevitable and the underworld isn’t as under as it seemed to be in gentler times, which leaves plenty for our dour hero, Tom Walken of Industrial Security, to do. Action and intrigue, rain and pain are in plentiful supply, and between good cops and bad cops, nothing ever changes, no matter how many centuries pass.

The Guards by Ken Bruen

Boo. Read-a-Thon fail — betrayed by technology.

I was enjoying this hard-boiled, Irish-grousing, detective and then– technoderail. The Nook version was corrupted, and about half the book was missing. Barnes & Noble customer service is on it and I’ll get a good file… someday.

*sigh*

Some days are like that.

The Golden Spruce by John Vaillant

In the main, I’d have to say that this is not a book to be read in a day. Not to mean that I’m not glad I read it, but it’s heavy history and doesn’t lend itself to a single sitting. THE GOLDEN SPRUCE is a documentary piece, spanning centuries and encompassing the European discovery and dominance of the Northwest coast of British Columbia. Fur-trading led to a logging industry that both developed and ravaged the continent, and basically eradicated a civilization. The title refers to a mutant Sitka spruce tree, sacred to the native people, and a rarity, if not a singularity, to botanists. At 165 feet tall, it probably germinated around 1700, and it’s luminous golden yellow branches and were unrepeated in its perfection – anywhere in the world as far as we know. In January of 1997, Grant Hadwin, a logger with a history of mental health issues, took a chainsaw to The Golden Spruce, nominally in protest of logging pollution and deforestation, and primed it to fall, which it did two days later.

We generally think of rare specimens of life as animals – an albino gorilla, a two-headed turtle, a bearded-lady. Vaillant does a great job conveying the unique aura, both literal and mythical, around this tree. The parts of the story that covered this act of eco-terrorism and Hadwin’s mysterious disappearance are riveting.

Mr. Penumbra’s 24 Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan

What a start to the Read-a-Thon of Distraction.

I hate that I have to be quick, because it would take more creativity than I have in this flash of minutes between the dinner dishes and having a little time with my family before bed to do justice to this terrific book. But I have another book to read tomorrow, so I’m pressed for time.

Just take our modern world, with its bustle and whiz-bang techno geekery, and add to it the guilty pleasure of quest books, just this side of sword and sorcery: secret societies, hidden codes, esoteric knowledge, and the alchemist’s quest for everlasting life.

Now, strip out the guilty part.

This is all reading pleasure. This is smart. This is clever. It’s fun and funny and simply one of the best books I’ve read in a long time.

Loved it. Thanks for the terrific suggestion, neednewspace. Thank you very much.

The Read-a-Thon of Distraction is Here! The Winners and My Reading List

So the randomizer has chosen from the entries I received and these five people will be my reading overlords for next week. In truth, I can’t wait. I’ve loved this idea since it first struck me way back when, six months and a different house ago. The best thing for me right now — really, the very best thing — would be to stick my nose in a book (or a series of books) and leave it there for an extended period of time.

I expect to come out on the other side having led five new mini-lives or filled to the corners of my hippocampus (Yes, my hippocampus has corners. I got it at IKEA.) with new information. I’ll be smarter and more well-rounded (corners notwithstanding) and refreshed after a hiatus from chasing my own tale, er… tail.

I’ve contacted all five winners and will add each book choice as they come in. Congratulations (and big thanks!) to:

Monday, January 21st  -  neednewspace  – Mr. Penumbra’s 24 Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan

Tuesday, January 22nd  -  Lorne Eckersley  – The Golden Spruce by John Vaillant

Wednesday, January 23rd  -  Sebastian Fernandez  -  The Guards by Ken Bruen

Thursday, January 24th  -  Melysah – Shadow of a Dead Star by Michael Shean

Friday, January 25th  -  Christina Brown  – American Gods by Neil Gaiman

I’ll read them in the order the randomizer commanded and post a little recap of each as I finish. Presumably you’ll forgive me if they aren’t full on, detailed book reviews — I’m busy! I’ve got another book to read tomorrow! Wheeeeeee!

(Pssssst! If you didn’t win and would still like an ARC of THREE GRAVES FULL, Gallery Books is hosting a giveaway of 40 copies on Goodreads thru January 31st. Click here to redirect to Goodreads!)

THREE GRAVES FULL & Jamie Mason’s Read-a-Thon of Distraction

Contest closed. Thanks so much for participating!

(Pssssst! If you didn’t win and would still like an ARC of THREE GRAVES FULL, Gallery Books is hosting a giveaway of 40 copies on Goodreads thru January 31st. Click here to redirect to Goodreads!)

Win a book, then assign any book for me to read

There are still a few Advance Review Copies of THREE GRAVES FULL left, and so the fun begins.

As you can imagine, I’m quite excited and preoccupied with the goings on here recently. That’s the nicest way to put it. What I am, actually, is a hepped-up hamster on a squeaky wheel of hyper-vigilance. It’s this |—| close to making me hate myself. And I hate hating myself. So in order to get my head out of my own… er… well, book, I’ve decided to stage a contest for readers, and a week’s worth of mental vacation for myself via some intensive reading – to the tune of five books, one each day, Monday thru Friday, January 21st to January 25th.

And I need your help.

Here’s how the contest will work:

- leave a comment – a nice or at least neutral one please, thankyouverymuch – here & make sure I’ll be able to find you again!

- I’ll put all the names into a randomizer and let it select five responders, each to win an ARC of THREE GRAVES FULL (these are books with shovel cover, in paperback)

- if you’re selected, I’ll sign a copy and send my book right off to you and, in turn, you get to pick one book – any genre, fiction or non – for me to read in my Five-Books-In-Five-Days Readathon (Please no 1,000 page epics, or impossible to find volumes – I’d like to be able to actually do this assignment.)

(Best if you have two or three in mind, just in case it’s something I’ve read before – AND DON’T TELL ME BEFORE THE SELECTION PROCESS IS OVER. I want the surprise.)

The contest is open from now (December 31st) until 11:59pm on Friday, January 11th, Eastern Standard Time. This should be good fun, and thanks for entering!