Writers Crushing Covid
From the book jacket:
From multiple award-winning authors, NYT and USA today bestsellers, internationally known and debut voices comes this collection of short stories, essays, and a heart-wrenching letter to a child in AUTHORS CRUSHING COVID-19. From the Piedmont Authors Network, the must-read anthology is now up for presale.
(Hey, that's me! The heart-wrenching letter to a child! Happy Father's Day!)
A wonderful writer named Lynn Chandler Willis invited me to contribute to this charitable anthology, and I'm so glad I did. I'm generally not the kind of person who...does anything, really. But I was so inspired by the early responses to the pandemic; by people sewing masks or making food or contributing money to causes. Unfortunately, I can't sew or cook and I'm usually pretty broke, so those weren't options for me. All I can do is write, and if that helps in some small way, then I'm happy to do what I can.
I wrote a letter to my son for this book, and it wasn't an easy letter to write. It was a goodbye letter, although I didn't realize this until after I'd written it. Don't get me wrong; I don't plan on dying, and I sure as hell don't plan on letting anything happen to him...but those are the words of the foolish.
One time I went to the Outer Banks with a girlfriend. Near dusk, we went swimming in the ocean, and we were playing in the water for half an hour or so, and realized we were further out than we'd expected. The beach was deserted, and the water was high, and worry started sapping our energy. I can still remember her panicked eyes as she struggled to stay afloat, and we barely managed to make it to shore. It was years before I could go back into the ocean, because I'd realized something terrible and frightening and empty about it.
That's what this pandemic reminds me of - the ocean that evening, a vast relentless approaching wasteland, and we won't all make it to shore. We'll try, we'll struggle to swim. And, to extend the metaphor, this essay was a letter in a bottle for me, something for my son to find and someday open and read. And realize that, when everything falls, what we held was each other, and that kept us afloat.
Writers Crushing Covid comes out on July 1st, and its available for preorder now. You can order it at the links in the image above.
Viewers' Choice!
The next Noir at the Bar I'm hosting is going to be VIEWERS' CHOICE. I'm really excited about this! I asked all of the attendees of the past seven Virtual Noir at the Bars to vote for their favorite readings, and have those writers return for one night, and they voted for Louis Bayard, Brad Parks, Sujata Massey, Tara Laskowski, and Kathleen Barber!
And then, during our last event, Crowdcast didn't play nicely and four writers didn't have the chance to read. So Ellen Crosby, Alex Segura, Alice Stephens, and Matthew Quirk will be joining the lineup as well. Which makes one of the strongest lineups I've ever had for an event!
And Sara Jones will be singing and Chantal Tseng will be slinging drinks, so it's definitely going to be a good time! Sunday night, June 28th, at 8 PM EST. In support of the wonderful Ivy Bookshop. You can register for it HERE.
And there will be more events throughout this fall, one per month starting in July. I'll post announcements in this newsletter, and you can also visit THIS PAGE for information.
But before this Sunday's event, I'll be participating in a Noir at the Bar in Toronto! Not really! But kind of! My friend Rob Brunet, a Canadianese, is hosting a Noir at the Bar this Thursday night and it should be a lot of fun. I'm a huge fan of every writer on that flyer, and it's worth noting that Peter Rozovsky is the person who came up with the concept for the whole Noir at the Bar series. It'll be a good time and I hope everyone can check it out! You can sign up for this event here: https://www.facebook.com/noiratthebartoronto/app/100265896690345/
One of the best things to happen to me, as a result of writing and reading, has been my friendship with Jennifer Hillier. If you've seen either of us at a conference, then the other one is usually close by. And there's no one in writing that I tell more to, or that I'm closer with. My friendship started because of a friend who recommended I read her books because "they're so fucked up!" They were (and are), but I became a huge fan, wrote her a blurb request / fan letter after my first book was accepted for publication, and our friendship grew from there.
She's a powerful writer and a powerful friend and powerfully wrong in regards to her misplaced enthusiasm for Red Lobster, and I'm honored that she's in my life.
And a writer Hillier recommends? Hannah Mary McKinnon:
Any chance I get to shine a spotlight on great domestic thrillers – which is my own genre – I'll take. Hannah Mary McKinnon's newest, Sister Dear, is about Eleanor, a woman who discovers she has a half-sister, who happens to have the exact life she wants for herself. As she works her way into Victoria's life – without ever telling her they're related – it becomes clear that Eleanor doesn't want to know her sister…she wants to be her sister.
To learn more about these writers and their work, click on the images above.
It's contest time! The monthly contest winner wins copies of the books listed in my "Two Writers You Should Read" segment. So, for this month, the winners of Little Things and Sister Dear is:
Virtua____@yahoo.com
Congrats! Check your e-mail for a separate note from me, and happy reading!
Oh man, I haven't written anything for anyone lately! Ack! I need to get on that.
But I did get some good news about something I wrote last year. My 2019 thriller, The Unrepentant, was just nominated for an Anthony Award for Best Paperback Original. This was so nice to learn. The Anthonys are nominated for, and decided by, writers and readers, and to have that support from peers is really nice. Those awards will be voted on in November of this year.
And The Unrepentant also won the Silver award in the Foreword Indie Book Awards which, again, is another terrific honor. I wrote that book hoping it would resonate with readers but, given the subject matter and nature of the book, worried it wouldn't. Awards aren't proof of anything about a book, mind you - we've all read books that deserved more acclaim than they received - but it's certainly nice to receive these honors. That book meant a lot to me.
Until next time, much love to all of you. Happy Reading!