by john | Jan 9, 2013 | Appearances, Real Life, Theatre
With apologies to Scalzi. But not really. He doesn’t own the term, no matter what the Google machine might think :). I hate titling blog posts. Frankly, I hate titling anything, which is why I rip off song titles for almost all my books and story titles.
First off, the Help Peter David contest will keep going until next Monday! You have more chances to win a t-shirt, but the real reason the contest is going to keep keeping on is because the awesome Davey Beauchamp is donating some signed Peter David comics! So I have more prizes for more winners! You don’t need to buy anything to win, but the whole point is to get people to buy Peter’s books to help him and his family deal with the bills from his recent stroke. So don’t be a cheap-ass, go buy something to help one of my favorite writers.
If you have no idea what I’m talking about, either scroll down or click here. According to his blog, which his wife is keeping updated, he’s been moved to rehab, which is way less cool when you’re not a rock star drying out, and will be living there apart from his family for a month or more. That’s gotta suck eight ways to Sunday, and is going to be hell expensive any way you slice it, so reach deep and buy his shit while he’s sick. Hell, buy his shit when he’s well, too. Peter is a giant in the comics industry and I’ve been a big fan of his almost as long as I’ve been able to pay attention to the writing in comics. I think after Chris Claremont, Peter David was the second comic book writer name I learned to recognize.
Moving along, because this can’t all be a blog about me being charitable and nice, otherwise it would fuck up a carefully crafted reputation. I got an agent! Not a literary one, which might make a few people shake their heads. Some of y’all know I’ve been an actor for a long time. It’s what I went to school for, it’s been a passion of mine for many years, and now I’m taking steps to make it a secondary revenue stream. Hell, it wouldn’t hurt my feelings if it became a primary revenue stream. But don’t sweat it, I’m still writing, I’m still editing, I’m still designing. I’m still doing all the things I’ve been doing, I’m just trying to add a little acting on top of that to help pay the bills. But I’m excited about the prospect of doing some commercials, maybe some small features. Who knows, maybe I can get a little spot on Homeland? After all, it shoots right up the road!
Come see me this weekend at Illogicon! Here’s my Schedule!
The State of Short Fiction: (Friday, 5 PM, Reynolds)
Comedy in Sci-fi/Fantasy: (Saturday, 1 PM, Reynolds)
Reading (Saturday, 7 PM, Crescent)
Ebooks: (Sunday, 11 AM, Smith) (M)
Humanizing Your Villains: (Sunday, 2 PM, Smith)
Self Promoting Without Going Broke: (Sunday, 3 PM, Reynolds)
Other times I can be found somewhere drinking, so come look for me!
by john | Oct 24, 2012 | Theatre
Not really, but since I’m performing In the Heat of the Night at Theatre Charlotte starting Friday (get your tickets now!), and I’m nuts-deep in tech and dress rehearsals this week, I figured I’d at least try to knock out a blog post for y’all.
This show is a bag of awesome, and I’m having a hell of a good time working on it. It’s tough, and there’s one costume change in particular that I barely make each night, leaving me panting a little when I come back onstage, but the acting overall is very, very good, and I’ve enjoyed getting back onstage in a show that makes me stretch a bit.
I don’t act much. It’s not just a time thing, there are a lot of reasons. Not the least of which is that I know I’m not the best actor in my age range in town. I’m pretty good, and I work hard, but I don’t have as much innate talent as some other folks. Which makes auditions a little tougher. Once directors work with me and understand that I work my ass off on a show, I can get cast. But auditioning for a new director is hard. It doesn’t help that I’m overweight and have long hair, both of which tend to narrow my “type.” I shaved for this show, though, which I hope shows a willingness to alter my appearance that people weren’t aware of.
But the fact of the matter is that I’m a very good lighting designer, and I can usually find plenty of work doing that to keep me busy. And it pays, while most folks in Charlotte are acting for free. So lighting gigs take precedence over auditions. But I love acting, and I love getting the chance to stretch myself as an actor, which this show does.So if you’re around Charlotte for the next three weeks, I hope you’ll come out and tell me how I’ve done. And feel free to mock my clean-shaven mug. I do.
by john | Feb 24, 2012 | Appearances, Theatre
I’m in a play right now called Almost, Maine for Ballantyne Community Theatre, a fledgling theatre company here in Charlotte. We have our last two performances this weekend, so I thought I’d put up a few photos from dress rehearsal to give you guys a little of the flavor of the show.
by john | Feb 6, 2012 | Theatre
At least this time it was only a ten-footer. Spent a big chunk of yesterday hanging lights for Almost, Maine, the show I’m in that opens this Friday night. Pretty simple rig, only a few lights with one special effect, but we had to put everything in the air including dimmers and cable, so that took a little more time than normal. I also picked up a design gig for later on in the year and one for next year as well. I had really intended to be finished with design after RENT, but now that I’m leaving the day job I feel like I’ll have enough time to do a few shows a year without killing myself.
I’ll be designing The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee for Theatre Charlotte in May, and another show that I can’t talk about yet because it hasn’t been officially announced. But it’s a director that I’ve worked with several times before, and he and I get along famously, so it’s pretty much a done deal. I think I can probably do 3-4 shows a year without burning up too much writing time, and the extra income is always nice. Plus I’m good at it, which certainly doesn’t hurt :).
I didn’t write yesterday – I gave myself the day off. I hammered out almost 5,500 words on Saturday across two projects, and I feel pretty confident that the Cindy Slaughter thing will be finished this month. Paint it Black will be done next month, and I need to get a Bubba story knocked out in February as well, so I’ve got plenty to do. I also have some more work to do on Genesis before I move on to Exodus, which is due at the editor’s in May.
Watched most of the second half of the Super Bowl, and was happy to see Eli win another one. I’m far from a Giants fan, but I thought they were the lesser of two evils, so I enjoyed the outcome. And isn’t it about time that people start asking Peyton about his brother, rather than the other way around?
After the game I watched The Voice for the first time and I really enjoyed it. I liked the format, I liked most of the judges, and some of the contestants had good stories. So I’m pretty well hooked on that, which is all I need. Suzy and I have now watched all of the Burn Notice on Netflix, and just started Stargate: SG-1. With ten season of that, it oughta keep us occupied for a good long time. And all I can say is that Amanda Tapping looks downright juvenile with blonde hair. And fifteen years younger. She’s much hotter on Sanctuary.
by john | Sep 8, 2011 | Appearances, Business of publishing, Real Life, Theatre, Writing
Or whatever most closely approximates reality for me these days. Looks like September will be the calm before the ridiculousness that is October for me, as I think I’m home most of this month, and gone most weekends next month. I spent a large portion of the morning looking at regional cons and trying to figure out which ones I want to attend next year, and then looking at budgeting for all that travel, which is no small feat.
Cons are one of those things that some people love and others loathe. I’m still trying to figure out where I need to be at a con, and what makes the most sense for me. There are almost always at least a couple of panels that I can get some valuable information out of, but frequently only a couple. I went to close to a dozen panels at Dragon*Con and actually took notes at two. It’s certainly not that I think I’m such a great writer that I don’t need more information, but with an hour-long panel most of what people go over is going to by nature be very basic. I did pick up some recommendations for good resource books and some networking sites that may prove useful, but that was more me grabbing little nuggets of wisdom out of the air than the panel itself being hugely useful.
So I’ve looked at all the remotely local cons that I could find, from as close as right here in Charlotte to as far away as Memphis, and tried to see which ones are worthwhile. I’ll definitely do Dragon again, and ConCarolinas would be a good one. I made back my table rental at Heroes Con, so we’ll give that one another shot, and since I’m kinda putting together the lit track for RoundCon in Columbia I figure I should plan on attending it. ChattaCon looks good, as does MidSouthCon, but damn, Memphis is a long way from here! Fandom Fest is a yes for me for next year, and the SC Book Festival is a maybe, if I can share a booth with someone and get a better location. Being all by myself and way on the back wall made it very hard to make any sales. And if I can’t get on any panels it won’t be worth attending.
But that should be easier, now that I have a publisher behind me. That’s another major reason I wanted to sign with a publisher – it’s a lot easier to get on panels and things like that if you’re not self-pubbed. So having BellBridge in my corner will give me a legitimacy in a lot of eyes that I can’t get on my own. Ugly truth, but truth nonetheless.
Obviously I still plan to self-publish some stuff. The money is really good, and some of my stuff just doesn’t fit, even in the small press world. Plus there are only so many publishing slots out there in a year, so just like no writer can keep up with the speed of a reader, no publisher can keep up with the speed of a fast writer. So now I’ve got a foot in both worlds, and we’ll see how it all works out. I can’t wait to get my first massive revision letter so I can go through all the cursing, weeping and drinking that my friend Misty describes. I’m sure I’ll be just as distraught as she was, because after all, how could anyone not LOVE my Black Knight Chronicles books?
Heh. I got that answer in spades this morning when Hard Day’s Knight got its first 1-star review on Amazon, and it was pretty ruthless. Unfortunately, there have been enough recent incidents of sock-puppet reviews that the first thing I did after reading it was to check the person’s other reviews and see if it looked like a fake review. Even more unfortunately, it looked like the review was legit, just from someone who hated the book.
I thought it would hurt more. You know, getting the first bad review was supposed to have me all devastated and stuff, right? Nah. I’ve gotten bad reviews before, because you can’t do theatre for any length of time without getting them. So I’m used to seeing people in print say I suck. But I did find a great trick for dealing with bad reviews. Other than ignore them and not read them at all, which is the best advice that I try to follow (and fail miserably). I went to one of my favorite books, Book 1 of The Dresden Files, and read one of his 1-star reviews. Yep, no matter how much a lot of people like something, somebody out there will hate it. So now I’ve gotten a 1-star. Won’t be my last, and I lived through it.
On a completely different note, the nominations for the annual Metrolina Theatre Awards are out, and both Suzy and I got nominated! I got a nod for my lighting design on Rent, and Suzy got nominated for her costuming of The Princess Bride and King Lear. So I guess we’ll break out the monkey suits on October 9th and go see who takes home the lucite statues. That is, if I’m not in rehearsal for another show. I did mention October was a little nuts, right?
by john | Jul 21, 2011 | Appearances, Real Life, Theatre, Travel
I’m driving halfway to Louisville today, stopping off in Charleston, WV for a hopeful repeat of my last few trips there – in other words a little extra green in my pockets (and I need it after dusting off three buyins in our home game last weekend). Then Friday I finish my trek to Kentucky.
I’ll be doing a short reading Saturday night at 10PM – probably a brief segment from Hard Day’s Knight and maybe a piece from The Chosen. Then Sunday morning I’m on a panel about finding alternative sources of writing income, which I’ve certainly done plenty of in my day. That panel’s at 9AM (ouch!), then I’ll hang around the con for a while before driving back to West Virginia, crashing for the night and finishing the trek on Monday. My plan is to spend every morning writing, then be at the con all afternoon and evening, so you can probably find me wherever cheap, crappy beer is served.
I also have to spend a couple of hours each day drilling on my lines for The Irish Curse. Rehearsals are going very well, and I think it’s going to be a great show, but our off-book date is Sunday, so since I’m not there I’d damn sure better have my lines down when I get back on Monday night. I also have Tuesday written off as a vacation day, so if I still have line issues I may stay home and work on them all day Tuesday. Probably not, though, because if I have a spare vacation day I should save it for opening week, when I know I’ll be absolutely exhausted.
This has been a great time, working on the show, but my word count is in the toilet. I just don’t have enough energy for three things – work, writing and theatre. So writing has been relegated to a back seat until the show opens, which I’m less than thrilled with. Lesson learned – if I’m going to do a show, pick a time when I don’t have a book in progress.
Knight Moves is at the editor’s right now, so I’m looking hopefully at an August release. If I can get the edits and rewrites done, and a cover done I’m going to push to have it out by my birthday, which is August 14th. That also marks one year since I release The Chosen, so I’d have released four books in my first year, and I think that would be pretty good output. I also have a couple of other exciting things percolating, but they’re not quite ready to talk about publicly yet, so I’m gonna go try and hammer out a couple thousand words, then pack and drive for half a day.
