Archive for category Travel

Knight Moves in Print!

Aug 20

Posted by john in Appearances, Business of publishing, Travel, Vampires, Writing | No Comments

Well folks, here we are a hair more than two weeks after the release of Knight Moves, and I couldn’t be happier with the results. The new book has already broken 500 copies sold, a figure that’s unheard of for me in the first month (or several) of a book’s release, and with a promo blitz going on this weekend thanks to The Bookish Snob, I think we’ll see that carry through the rest of the month. So here I’ve got a few announcements and a couple of updates for all of you.

Firstly, for the folks who still love paper books – yes, Knight Moves will be available in print. The proof copy has shipped, and if history is any indicator, it should get here Monday or Tuesday. I’ll look over the proof and try to get some copies in hand for Dragon*Con. I won’t have many with me, unless this THING happens that I’m trying to schedule. If the THING goes off, then I’ll probably get 40 copies or so to tote with me. Watch this space for more info on the THING.

But if you’d like a signed copy, and live in the US, you can order yours here. Just click the PayPal button and let me know who to inscribe the book to, and I’ll send it right along. NOTE – books will not ship until after the Labor Day holiday. But $15 will cover shipping and a signed copy of the book. If you live in the Charlotte area, and want to pick the book up, you can click the pick up option. You can do the same thing if you want to pre-order a copy for Dragon*Con (this would really help me know how many books to carry).

Shipping
Inscription (To:)

As always, the book will be available for $10 from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and wherever books are sold. I’ll also be doing a signing in October at The Last Word, a cool used bookstore here in Charlotte, so hopefully some of you folks will come out and say hello to me then.

And for my friends across the pond – I know you currently can’t get my books in print outside the US. I would love for that to change at some point, but I don’t really know how. So if you’d like to see my stuff over there, tell your friendly neighborhood bookstore to pressure the publishers to buy my international rights. Or stop by North Carolina on your next intercontinental vacation. We’ve got good sweet tea!

Lots of Updates

Aug 1

Posted by john in Appearances, Real Life, Travel, Writing | 3 Comments

Okay, there’s a lot going on, so I’m going to try not to ramble. I know, but I’m going to try.

First, The Irish Curse opens Thursday night, so I hope you’ll come check it out if you’re in the Charlotte area. It’s really a pretty good show, and by the time we open I should know all my lines!

Then Saturday, again for you Charlotte-area peeps, I’ll be teaching a workshop for the Charlotte Writers’ Club on Self-Publishing and Self-Promotion. If you’re interested in getting your work out there or getting more eyes on the work that you’ve already got out there, join me at the Providence UMC at 9AM. There’s more info to be found here. It will be a good time, and I think there’s plenty to share.

Knight Moves WILL be released August 14th, I’m happy to announce. This date is special to me for a bunch of reasons, most of which having to do with it being my 38th birthday. It also coincides with the first anniversary of me putting The Chosen on sale, so I’ll have managed to publish four novels in a year’s time, which is pretty good, if I do say so myself. Check out my Facebook page for more info on the online virtual release party I’m doing for the rest of August. I’m going to release the book at $2.99 through the end of the month, then it will go to its normal price of $4.99. I’ll also be taking pre-orders for the print version here as soon as I get it added to the Paypal widget over on the side of the page.

Just in time for Dragon Con I’ll have my next book out, so on Saturday night at Dragon Con I’ll be having a book release party! I’ll have some copies of Knight Moves with me, and some snacks and booze, so if you’re going to be at Dragon, let me know and I’ll get you the room number. I’ll also post it to Facebook and Twitter. Hopefully I can get one or two people to join me in this endeavor, so we can have a rockin’ part-ay!

Then in October I’ll be back in Columbia, SC for RoundCon 2011.1 – return of RoundCon! This will be the second RoundCon to feature a creative track, and I’m heading it up. That’s what happens when I open my big mouth! I’ve lined up some fantastic guests already, with more on the way, so keep your eyes peeled and if you’re anywhere near Cola-Town, come hang with us!

So that’s a lot of stuff going on, and somewhere in the middle of all that I have two books to finish and publish, and a 20th High School Reunion to go to!

John’s Schedule for Fandom Fest Weekend

Jul 21

Posted by john in Appearances, Real Life, Theatre, Travel | 1 Comment

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.

There you are!

Jul 8

Posted by john in Real Life, Travel, Writing | No Comments

I know, I’ve neglected this space all week. Sorry, I’ve been busy, and when that happens the first thing to go is this blog. Well, the first thing to go is exercise, but since that’s been gone for a while now I don’t think I’m allowed to even count it. Still plugging along at Return to Eden Book 1 – Genesis, with about 32K words done. I know I’m going to have to go back through and completely re-write the beginning, but that’s more an issue of voice than anything else, because the voice I’ve written most of the book in is significantly different than the voice I started it in last year.

Here’s some quick news before I bury the lede too much – TOMORROW at Barnes & Noble, 3400 Forest Drive Columbia, SC I’ll be on a pair of panels and doing a monster book signing with Kalayna Price (buy her new book, Grave Dance right now!), Faith Hunter, Rachel Aaron and Misty Massey. We’ll be doing a panel at 5, then a signing, then another panel later in the evening. Should be a lot of fun! You can sign up for the Facebook event here – we’re giving away a Nook!

Also, please don’t forget to donate to my 24 Hours of Booty fundraising page. I’d really love it if my readers came together and gave a big buttload of money to this great cause. You can really help people. Please do so.

Other news – I’m back in the theatre, but this time not on a ladder! I’ve been cast in the Queen City Theatre Company’s production of The Irish Curse. It’s a great little comedy about men, how we see ourselves, our body image, and who does or doesn’t “measure up.” And if you’ve never heard of the the Irish Curse, just ask any Irishman about it! I play a priest from Boston living in New York, and I’ve got some very nice moments in the script. I’m enjoying being an actor again, and will enjoy even more the check that comes along with it! Yep, for the first time in my 20+ years of theatre, I’ll be paid for my work as an actor! This is a real rarity in Charlotte, and I’m very happy for my buddies Glenn and Kristian that they have managed to build their company from nothing to a place where they can compensate their actors in just a few short years.

What else? I went to West Virginia last weekend, played some poker and wrote quite a bit. I won about enough to cover the trip, so the poker games made it a free writing vacation – always nice. At one point I was up over a grand on the morning of my second day, but I ran into some run-bad and some bad play and bled off until I came home with just a couple hundred extra. But that’s still enough to keep me going back there every few months to replenish the cash flow.

And I’m happy to report that June was another great month, sales-wise. I topped July by a few units shipped, thanks largely to the short story I published, but increased revenue significantly due to a price increase. I’ve seen no slowdown in sales since moving my novel price from $2.99 to $4.99, so that is likely where prices will stay for now.

In other news, I’m listening to a lot of Grace Potter & the Nocturnals. I blame Pauly.

Heroes Aren’t Hard to Find

May 30

Posted by john in Appearances, Real Life, Travel | 1 Comment

As a matter of fact, they’re on 7th Street most days, but this weekend they’ll all be downtown at the Charlotte Convention Center! Yep, it’s one of my favorite times of the year, time for the Heroes Con! With this year, I’ll have hit almost hit the cycle with this con, having worked the con as an employee, attended as a fan, and now I’ll be there with my booth selling and signing books!

I’ve got what I think is a killer booth location, Booth AA-65, right along the front wall of the show, on the end really close to the Silent Auction area. I don’t know who my neighbors are yet, but there are some awesome folks coming to the show from all aspects of comic-dom.

From the webcomic world, Chris Flick of Capes N’ Babes will be at the show, as well as Kevin Freeman of Subculture. Those are a couple of webcomics that I subscribe to, as well as Charlotte’s own Rich Barrett, creator of Nathan Sorry. Those are all worth checking out whether you come to the con or not.

In the print world, the lovely Chrissie Zullo will be there (Cinderella), Neal Adams (Green Lantern) will be there, Jeremy Bastian (Cursed Pirate Girl) will be there (and seriously, if you haven’t checked out CPG, what kind of nerd are you? Every year I go to the Heroes Con and give myself permission to be a total fanboy geek over one and only one artist or writer. Last year it was Bill Willingham, and I got lucky enough to get him to sign my Fables hardcover with no one in line. This year I’m so totally stoked at the chance to meet Terry Moore that it’s not even funny.

You don’t know Terry Moore? Jebus, how are we even friends? Go buy every trade paperback edition of Strangers in Paradise that you can find, because it is teh hawesome! Seriously, shut up. I know they’re expensive, but they’re that damn good. SiP is so good I bought the omnibus edition. Which is pretty much too big and heavy to actually read, but it’s still awesome! And his new stuff, Echo, is also awesome.

I’ll have all my books there, and a drawing to win a chance to name a bad guy in Book 3 of Black Knight Chronicles (don’t sweat it if you can’t make it to Charlotte, you’ll get a chance, too!). And thanks to the fine folks at Square, as long as I can get cell service (always iffy in the bowels of the Charlotte Convention Center), I’ll be able to take cash, Visa, Mastercard, Discover and American Express!

I hope I see you there!

Hittin’ the Road

May 11

Posted by john in Real Life, Travel, Writing | No Comments

The Virtual Road, that is. Next week kicks off my blog tour with Bookish Snob Promotions, so here’s a rundown on where I’ll be and what you can expect when I’m there.

May 16 – I’ll be doing a Guest Post over at Black Lagoon Reviews

May 17 – I’ll be doing a Guest Post at Karissa’s Book Review, along with a chance for folks to win a signed copy of Hard Day’s Knight!

May 18 – The fine folks at Urban Fantasy Investigations have done an interview with me.

May 19 – Another Guest Post, this one at My Bookish Ways

May 20 – A Guest Post at A Chick Who Reads

May 21 – Interview at Paranormal Opinion with another signed book to give away!

May 22 – I’ll be interviewed at Reality Bites
You can keep up with me on Twitter or Facebook, where I’ll update the tour daily, and you can always find info here or at Bookish Snob Promotions. Please come over and check out these guest posts and interviews, where I get a lot more into the writing process than I typically do here on my rambling blog. And please go support Belinda over at The Bookish Snob, who’s putting this whole thing together for me.

There hasn’t been much progress on Knight Moves, because I’ve been working on RENT and getting ready for the SC Book Festival, both of which are this weekend. Also, Suzy is in a different play, which also opens tomorrow night. So it’s been a little nuts around the Hartness household. But everything calms down for a couple of weeks after Monday, so that’ll help out with my productivity. And my sleep :) .

So please come visit me on tour, and if you’re anywhere near Columbia, SC this weekend, come visit me in Real Life. The Book Festival is free and features a big pile of authors, including me, Sam Morton, Faith Hunter and Kalayna Price.

Charlotte ComiCon Report

Mar 28

Posted by john in Comics, Travel, Writing | 1 Comment

I had bronchitis and was sick as a dog, but I made it down to the Crown Plaza hotel and hung out for the day with some cool peeps like the guy who got stuck being my neighbor, Bobby Nash. Bobby’s a comic writer among many other things, and he was gracious enough to snap the picture below and email it over. Check out his stuff and give him some love, he’s a great guy!

I sold a couple of books, but of course spent more than I made, thanks largely to finding the Sandman Dream Hunters hardcover, as well as the second and third collected editions of Echo by Terry Moore. If you’re not familiar with Terry Moore, then get on over to his website and snatch up as many copies of Strangers in Paradise as you can! SiP was one of those groundbreaking comics for me, in that it was a story of normal people (mostly) with normal loves, lusts, hates and issues (mostly). Okay, some of the issues were a little exaggerated, but it was a phenomenal comic, and I have the Omnibus edition sitting on my shelf at home. It has to sit on the shelf. I tried to read it on my lap once and my legs fell asleep for three days. The move towards Omnibus editions still leaves a little to be desired. But I digress. Anyway, Terry’s now writing and drawing Echo, and I’m way hooked. I’m not going to give away any of the story, but you should buy it.

But I had a good time, also chatted for a few minutes with the lovely Chrissie Zullo, who has done the covers for the Fables spinoff/limited series/whatever Cinderella. She’s cute as a button and incredibly talented, a real up-and-coming artist from right here in Charlotte! I think I heard she was moving to NYC, but she did mention she’ll be at the Heroes Con in June, along with Terry Moore and yours truly! I bought a small press table for the weekend and will be pushing books on unsuspecting comic book geeks June 3-5. This means that I won’t get to be at ConCarolinas, which would have been fun, but I think my profitability potential is greater at Heroes, so that’s where I’ll be this year at least. I’ve also submitted my applications to Dragon Con and the NY Comic Con, so that might book a lot of my travel for the fall. I dunno how those will shake out, but if Dragon doesn’t take me (they get a lot of movie and TV star types, as well as a ton of authors, so I’m only moderately hopeful on that front) I’ll probably grab a tent at the Decatur book festival, which is the same weekend. Either way I’ll be somewhere around Atlanta for Labor Day, and hopefully in NYC mid-October.

Started work on Knight Moves, Book 3 of the Black Knight Chronicles, last week. Should be ready to go sometime in June. Hope I get it finished before Heroes, but I’m not going to rush it. This book is going to add more characters, a new recurring semi-baddy, and see the boys actually contemplate something deeper than beer and blood bags.

 

And this is what I look like with bronchitis at a comic book show!

Listen to this – Sol Driven Train

Feb 27

Posted by john in Real Life, Travel, Writing | No Comments

Last night Suzy and I went to see Hayseed Dixie at the Neighborhood Theatre, and the boys were rockin’, as always. We had decided to blow it off, but at the last minute, an actress from the show Suzy’s working on (The Princess Bride for Citzens of the Universe) called us to see if we were still going, and since I’d managed a long nap in the afternoon, I said “fuggit, let’s roll.” So I threw on my cowboy boots, my Cross Canadian Ragweed (RIP to one of my fave Okie bands) and we headed out to drink cheap beer and yell WHOOOOO at a bunch of bluegrassed-up hard rock covers.

If you’ve not ever seen Hayseed Dixie live before, I’ll pause while you cruise on over to YouTube and check out the madness.

You back? Okay, good. Well, the Hayseed Dixie boys were all that we expected them to be, but the surprise of the night for me was the opener, a little band from Charleston called Sol Driven Train. These guys were awesome! They were kinda like what you’d get out of a love child of OAR and Little Feat, plenty of hot percussion, cool horns and just generally fun, bouncy boogie. I bought both their CDs before we left and am looking forward to rocking out to them as I drive south tomorrow afternoon.

Yep, headed back to the ATL after being down there all week last week. I’ll be at our open house for the new office Tuesday, then the Southeastern Theatre Conference Wednesday through Saturday, heading home on Sunday morning. Or early afternoon at least. I’ll try to update the blog at least a couple times through the week, because I do have some awesome books I want to spotlight, and I’ll have a guest post on Nyx Book Reviews at some point this week. Celine over there is giving Hard Day’s Knight a review, and she’s letting me do a spot on character development as well.

Got the proof in for the print edition of Back in Black, and wasn’t exactly thrilled with it. There were some hefty pagination and header/footer issues, but I think I have those all resolved and have ordered a new proof. Hopefully that can get going quickly and I can get hard copies in hand before the Charlotte ComiCon on the 20th, but if not I’ll have plenty of copies of Hard Day’s Knight and The Chosen with me. The ebook of Back in Black is moving a few copies, but it hasn’t been the meteoric rise that I’d hoped. So get off your collective asses and go buy a book! :)

As we wrap up February it looks to have been a decent month, with almost 90 total books sold. That’s going to be my best month sales-wise to date, although not as strong monetarily because of the price drop on Hard Day’s Knight. But with things moving steadily along, maybe next month I break 100 units delivered! Still not quit my job money, but almost enough to buy a tank of gas at today’s prices!

Back in Black update & Round and Round(Con)

Feb 22

Posted by john in Travel, Writing | 3 Comments

Before I get into the beginnings of my RoundCon update, I have BIG NEWS!

Back in Black is now available for purchase! If you’ve enjoyed the first volume of the Black Knight Chronicles, this one is sure to please. It’s even more ridiculous than the first adventure, with vampires, fairies, trolls and a dragon! Yes, a dragon! And for the first time ever, my vampires sparkle!

Don’t worry, they get over it.

So go to Amazon and get your copy now. If you don’t have a Kindle, go to Smashwords and get your copy for other formats. And if for some reason you haven’t picked up Hard Day’s Knight yet, get off your ass! It’s only a buck!

Now – RoundCon -

Back at the day job after a fun weekend at RoundCon 25 in Columbia, SC. It was nice to sit on panels all weekend with “real” writers and pretend to be one of them/us/whatever. I met some great folks, sold almost enough books to cover my food tab, and generally had a great time, so I’ll try to share my impressions of all that briefly here.

First – the people. Sean organized a very fun Con, even if there was a lot of competition for people on that particular weekend. He’s working on that for next year, though, and I think he and his team have a great event going. This was the first year they’d ever had a Creative Track, which consisted of half a dozen panels with myself and the other writers at the con. We had small audiences, but they were very appreciative and having the same couple of faces in all the panels throughout the day really did give us as writers the chance to bond with our readers a little, which was great. Listening to the other folks on the panel, they saw it as a welcome change to other cons they’d done, where the rooms were so packed they couldn’t really get a sense of the audience, and didn’t often have that chance to make a personal connection. For me, it was fun to be on a panel and not have to be the expert. Like I mentioned in one of our discussions, in my day job I’m one of a very small number of people in the world who do what I do. So if I’m on a panel, I’m an expert. It’s just how it goes. But here I was able to sit back and soak in a bunch of knowledge from the ladies I was on panels with.

Yeah, ladies. I was the only guy writer there, which I loved, because what’s better than being surrounded by a bunch of saucy, sexy writer chicks? And these girl are good at their craft, lemme tell you. I’ve already finished one of the books I bought this weekend, and I’ll be picking up the rest of the series as budget allows. Here’s a rundown on my co-panelists -

Faith Hunter – The official bio goes like this – Faith Hunter, fantasy writer, was born in Louisiana and raised all over the south. Her Rogue Mage novels, a dark, urban fantasy series-Bloodring, Seraphs, and Host-feature Thorn St. Croix, a stone mage in a post-apocalyptic, alternate reality, urban fantasy world. These novels are the basis for the role playing game, ROGUE MAGE. The Skinwalker series, featuring Jane Yellowrock is taking off like a rocket with Skinwalker, Blood Cross, and Mercy Blade.

Under her pen name Gwen Hunter, she writes action adventure, mysteries, and thrillers, and is tweaking a screenplay with a co-writer. As Faith and Gwen, she has 21 books in print in 26 countries.

The unofficial bit would have something to say about how charming and funny this chica really is. I had a great time getting to know her and her Renaissance Man this weekend.And seriously, get your ass over to Amazon and get her book, Skinwalker. It rocks!

Misty Massey – Misty Massey is the author of Mad Kestrel, a rollicking adventure of magic on the high seas from Tor Books. She has short stories in the recent anthologies Rum and Runestones and Dragon’s Lure. When she’s not writing, Misty studies Middle Eastern dance and is a member of the Beledi Beat dance troupe. Kestrel’s Dance, the second volume of Kestrel’s exploits, is in production, and Misty is currently working on a Weird Western novel. Misty is one of the featured writers on the Magical Words blog (magicalwords.net).

Misty was probably born in the wrong time, because I could totally see her as a pirate wench packing her own saber and pillaging the high seas with a bottle of run in hand. Oh wait, I’ve already seen her with a bottle of rum in hand!

Kalayna Price – Kalayna Price is the author of the Alex Craft Novels, a new dark urban fantasy series from Roc, and the author of the Novels of Haven from Bell Bridge Books. She draws her ideas from the world around her, her studies into ancient mythologies, and her obsession with classic folklore. Her stories contain not only the mystical elements of fantasy, but also a dash of romance, a bit of gritty horror, some humor, and a large serving of mystery. She is a member of SFWA and RWA, and an avid hula-hoop dancer who has been known light her hoop on fire. To find out more, please visit her at www.kalayna.com.

I just got started on the first Alex Craft book this morning, and am loving it so far. Her heroine is so wonderfully fallible that you can’t help but fall in love with her from the very beginning of the book. And seriously kids, when was the last time you saw a writer that was really as cute as her pictures?

Elysabeth Williams – Elysabeth Williams is the author of the paranormal/historical romance, DEVIL IN A RED KILT and the steampunk historical adventure, THE ELECTRIFYING EXPLOITS OF THE ENGLISH THREE. A retired LARPer turned avid WoW addict, Elysabeth lives and plays in the suburbs of Atlanta with her husband and two kids and two birds and two, no three cats. When she’s not writing, playing or chasing small children, Elysabeth likes coffee. Lots of coffee…oh. and sweet tarts.

I knew I was going to like her when she said one of her books was a Steampunk Charlie’s Angels. I was right, she’s a doll. Haven’t started the book yet, but if I can judge by the cover, then YUM!

So give these fantastic writers a minute of your time, and check out what I learned at RoundCon!

No Sunday Spotlight this week

Feb 13

Posted by john in Real Life, Travel, Writing | 1 Comment

On account of I’m le tired.

Almost done with the second proof of Back in Black (and Blue), and the more I type it, the less I’m nuts about the title. So do you guys have any suggestions? The criteria are – must reference a rock song and must use the word Black or Knight in the title. Leave me a comment if you have a better title for a snarky-funny vampire book that fits those criteria.

Georgia Thespian Festival was fun, I got to meet some nice folks and get an idea of the scope of the educational theatre scene in the state. I was blown away by the fact that over 3,000 people registered. That’s a whole bunch of little actor-kids. With that many actor children in one place, there were certainly a whole lot of show tunes abused over the course of the weekend. Think of it as twenty episodes of Glee running all over a convention center and a hotel, all at the same time. And I’m the token straight boy in the middle of it.

And in two weeks I get to do it again.

SETC is one of my favorite shows that I attend each year, because I got my job through the conference. This is the 17th conference I’ve been to in a row, going all the way back to 1994 in Savannah. I’ll be teaching three workshops at this year’s conference, or at least leading three panels. One is on Things I Wish I’d Learned in College, focusing on the important life lessons we learn AFTER we get out of school. Another is on how to take care of a lighting system and what to do when it breaks, and a third is a new products seminar for lighting equipment, where all the vendors get to show off their wares. It’ll be a lot of fun, and I’ll be in the bar every night networking.

Yeah, that’s what we call it. Networking.

Sunday Spotlight is probably moving to Mondays, because I get more readers during the week anyway, so I’ll try to be back tomorrow with a little more focus.