An Abject Apology to my Readers

I have been busy with stuff outside of writing.

I love harps, and harpists, and have played and supported harpists for many years. By ‘supporting harpists’ I mean that I helped to set up and run the Jerusalem Harp Circle in Israel. I studied the harp for a few years (just long enough to learn that I will never, ever, find work as a concert harpist or even a very poor performance player.

But I do love harps, and harp music. And right now I do not own a harp. While I was caring for my mother in her last few years of life I found myself unable to work; I was spending much of my time caring for her and driving her to clinics and hospitals and no employer can put up with much of that, no matter how good an employee you might be. So one month the mortgage came due and with nothing in the bank to cover the bills and I was forced to sell my harp for far less than it was worth to cover the debts.

That was back in 2008. Now I have a 2-car garage and am slowly building workbenches and moving equipment in to build harps. In my spare time, of course.

I am a writer, for better or worse. But I spent much of my life as a woodworker, restorer and finisher. Should you be curious about this, please visit the Photo Gallery at my web site for samples of the kind of work I have done. I hope soon to post some photos of my new workshop.

“Lonesome Cove” is back in the works, though it won’t be in final manuscript form until early next year. But I can tell you that I am very excited about what is happening in the story.

“Twisted Key” is due for release at the end of September. I’ve gotten queries from bookstores asking when they can expect to receive copies, and I am telling them that will be some time in early October. I hopehopehope to finagle an earlier release date, but that really isn’t up to me at this point.

Unfortunately, this means that I will probably be at the Florida Heritage Book Festival in St. Augustine on the 24th of September without copies of “Twisted Key” to sell. That is a very depressing thought, indeed.

On the plus side of the ledger, however, is that all of the events I have scheduled during October should see me with plenty of copies of “The Big Bend”, “Hog Valley” and “Twisted Key”.  At these appearances I will be selling a ‘Gift Set’ of all three copies for a reduced price ( to be announced later).

Again, please accept my apologies for not writing sooner.

An Abject Apology to my Readers

I have been busy with stuff outside of writing.

I love harps, and harpists, and have played and supported harpists for many years. By ‘supporting harpists’ I mean that I helped to set up and run the Jerusalem Harp Circle in Israel. I studied the harp for a few years (just long enough to learn that I will never, ever, find work as a concert harpist or even a very poor performance player.

But I do love harps, and harp music. And right now I do not own a harp. While I was caring for my mother in her last few years of life I found myself unable to work; I was spending much of my time caring for her and driving her to clinics and hospitals and no employer can put up with much of that, no matter how good an employee you might be. So one month the mortgage came due and with nothing in the bank to cover the bills and I was forced to sell my harp for far less than it was worth to cover the debts.

That was back in 2008. Now I have a 2-car garage and am slowly building workbenches and moving equipment in to build harps. In my spare time, of course.

I am a writer, for better or worse. But I spent much of my life as a woodworker, restorer and finisher. Should you be curious about this, please visit the Photo Gallery at my web site for samples of the kind of work I have done. I hope soon to post some photos of my new workshop.

“Lonesome Cove” is back in the works, though it won’t be in final manuscript form until early next year. But I can tell you that I am very excited about what is happening in the story.

“Twisted Key” is due for release at the end of September. I’ve gotten queries from bookstores asking when they can expect to receive copies, and I am telling them that will be some time in early October. I hopehopehope to finagle an earlier release date, but that really isn’t up to me at this point.

Unfortunately, I will be at the Florida Heritage Book Festival in St. Augustine on the 24th of September, probably with copies of “Twisted Key” to sell. That is a very depressing thought, indeed.

On the plus side of the ledger, however, is that all of the events I have scheduled during October should see me with plenty of copies of “The Big Bend”, “Hog Valley” and “Twisted Key”.  At these appearances I will be selling a ‘Gift Set’ of all three copies for a reduced price ( to be announced later).

Again, please accept my apologies for not writing sooner.

Way too hot and way too tired

But nobody cares, since most everyone else is in the same boat, except, of course, for folks who work in air conditioned offices. I used to, and at the time I had no pity in my heart for all those folks sweating away in the heat and humidity. I guess it’s karma, because I’m right back to sweating. And it’s really hot. And humid.

I wonder if it’s any better in Caspar, Wyoming? I know it’s far worse in Leaky, Texas.

Last weekend we rented a U-Haul truck and made two trips from the old apartment to the new house.  I was so wiped out from that that I blew off two scheduled meetings during the week so I could recover.

Today we filled up a van and two cars with more stuff. I have no idea where all of this stuff is supposed to go; this house is more than twice the square footage of the old apartment, but every nook and cranny is filled with boxes of stuff. We are gonna have a really big yard sale, some time real soon now.

On 09 August, the New York Times carried an article by Julie Bosman titled, “Publishing Gives Hints of Revival, Data Show”.  Without differentiating between eBooks and printed books, recent statistics developed by Book Stats show that in 2010 the publishing industry ended up the year with a net revenue of $27.9 billion dollars. That’s an increase of 5.6% over 2008. 2.57 billion books in all formats were sold in 2010; a 4.1% increase over 2008.

Good news for writers, huh? Here’s a reality check for those nice folks who boost eBooks over paper. In 2008, eBooks made up 0.6% of the total trade market. By 2010, that percentage grew to 6.4%. That is a growth of 1274% in three years.

Traditional publishers don’t seem to be all that worried, though. Or maybe they’re drinking their own koolade again.

In May of this year, Amazon stated that eBook sales passed print books for the first time.

I’ve got two events in this week:

16 August - "One Book, One Putnam" Putnam County, Fl, Woman's Club of Palatka, Inc., 605 South 13th Street (on the corner of Crill Ave. and 13th St.), Palatka, FL 32178, 5:30 - 7:30 PM. Multiple authors will be present

17 August – member of 3 - person panel  (with Lydia C. Filzen, and Susan D. Brandenburg) at the meeting of the Clay County Writer’s Group to discuss writing as a second career. The event will be at the Fleming Island Library Meeting Room and starts at 6:15 pm.

Stop by if you’re in the area. And have a good week.