Articles

It's getting easier to check out e-books from U.S. libraries, now that Amazon recently announced that Kindle users could download e-books from 11,000 libraries. It's important to note that you don't have to have an actual Kindle to be a Kindle user; you can also use the free Kindle app available on many mobile devices, or the Kindle Cloud Reader from your browser.

We're having a blood drive at work today. I unfortunately will not be participating today, or ever again, because the American Red Cross refuses to stop calling me.

This is a strange predicament for me because I've been a fairly loyal donor for about 15 years. But due to the Red Cross' refusal to remove me from its calling list, I'm really not that interested in donating again.

Here are two recent releases to check out the next time you're in the need of a new book.

"Love Betrayed" is a nonfiction novel by author Karen Hinton. It's a book for traumatized wives who find themselves reinventing their lives after dedicating decades to their husbands.

I haven't had a chance to post much on my blog lately. I think most people know why I haven't ... baby on the way, new house, a bunch of new websites and a new book. Anyway, I don't want to quit on the blog completely, but I'll probably consider a new format at some point, especially since I will be contributing to the Spumoni Press blog as well. Until then, be sure to check out spumonipress.com, as well as my latest post - First year = crazy year.

I had expected this note would give you an exact date, preferably in December, to announce the launch of "Corporate Ties." Unfortunately, it will have to wait a bit longer. I've been slightly busier this fall than anticipated … we purchased a house, we're preparing for a baby in March, among other things. The good news is that once I have a decent block of time to devote to the book, I should be able to finish it.

Until then, here's a new excerpt from the book.

Fellow Baltimore writer Spencer Compton will be sharing commentary from his new book, "Get Real" at 7pm tonight (Oct. 26) at Red Emma's Bookstore and Coffee House.

As I attempt to find an agency to pitch my new book, I thought it might be a good idea to list some of the agents I have contacted. At this stage, I've run into issues where companies have listed communication methods, but they don't seem to follow through. I hope that my list will save the time of others who are attempting to find representation.

August 21 is National Spumoni Day. Did you know that? I seriously doubt it. But who cares? It's an entire day to celebrate Spumoni! If you don't know what Spumoni is, check out the Wikipedia page. Better yet, let me explain why you should care about Spumoni in the first place.

I know I've said this before, but I am getting closer to publishing my new book, "Corporate Ties." There was a bit of foundation work that I needed to construct, edit, tear apart, rebuild, pulverize, stack up, decimate and recompile. Well, the good news is that I'm getting closer to the end. How do I know this? There seems to be a light at the end of each paragraph now.

Google recently made a mildly surprising announcement (at least, to me) that the company is shutting down its online collaboration tool, Wave. Google does a lot of cool, neat and worthy stuff obviously, and I think Wave fits into this category. It's just that the actual marketing of it was rather peculiar.