Categories: Uncategorized
Posts Tagged: the fall guy
Naturally, with a translation in a language I don’t speak, I have to put my faith in my translators that they’ll do a good job and I won’t suffer like NewsRadio’s Jimmy James at his book reading. This is every writer’s translation nightmare. 🙂
Categories: shelf life
Wives are great things, especially when it comes to pointing out your mistakes. Last year, my little Julie came to me and pointed to my books and said, “Notice the similarity?”
In my defense, my first three books may have come out in that order but they weren’t written in that order. ACCIDENTS WAITING TO HAPPEN might have been my first book, but WE ALL FALL DOWN was my second book, while PAYING THE PIPER was my fifth. NO SHOW and a couple of other unpublished books were in between these three and none of them featured car chases, so don’t go thinking I’m a one trick pony. Really…don’t. I am good at this writing thing. Just give me a chance.
Categories: shelf life
For keen readers of this blog will remember that I promised to donate the royalties earned on the eBook version of THE FALL GUY during the month of January to Karen Laubenstein’s family. She’s a writer, a great champion of writers and the committee that staged Bouchercon (aka the World Mystery Convention) in 2007 in wonderful Anchorage, Alaska. Sadly, her husband has been diagnosed with early onset dementia and the medical costs have wiped them out. The money raised will go towards covering a trip to see a specialist in St. Louis. Well, it’s February which means it’s check writing time. THE FALL GUY sold 642 copies in January, earning $360 in royalties.
I’d like to thank everyone who either bought the book or shared my earlier blog post on Twitter and Facebook. I really appreciate it and so does Karen and her family.
If you didn’t get the chance to pick up the book last month, you may want to consider a contribution to Karen’s GoFundMe page.
Thanks and I hope you enjoy the book.
Categories: shelf life
Categories: shelf life
Categories: Uncategorized
“Simon Wood is an up and coming mystery writer who writes like some mobster is standing over him with a cleaver, telling him to make a good story or else. He writes like his life depends on it.”
What made me very happy about the review is ColtsFan was 100% correct. I do write like my life depends on it. There is someone standing over me with a cleaver telling me to write good or else—and it’s me.
The reason for this outlook is because nothing is guaranteed in publishing. Several of my writing friends with books behind them now possess a certain expectation that everything they write will be published. I wish I shared their confidence. Despite numerous publishing credits, Magazines still reject my short stories and publishers have passed on manuscripts. Publishers and magazines have folded. Editors have changed their minds. There have been months with an R in them. The list of reasons/calamities is endless, but the result is the same—manuscripts I’ve been very passionate about have not made it to the bookshelf.
Currently, I’m very lucky to find myself in the fortunate position of having contracts with books still on them. However, that could all come to end when I turn those manuscripts in. Then what? Sure, I’ll do my best to find a new publisher or a magazine interested in my stories, but it still doesn’t mean they’ll get published. That means I can’t just write a good manuscript. I have to write the very best manuscript I possibly can and not just once, but every time, again and again. Those works still might not see publication, but I’ve given them best shot I can possibly give them.
Telling stories is my passion and my job. So yeah, I write like my life depends on it, because it does. Shouldn’t every writer think this way? 🙂
Categories: shelf life
“Simon Wood is an up and coming mystery writer who writes like some mobster is standing over him with a cleaver, telling him to make a good story or else. He writes like his life depends on it.”
What made me very happy about the review is ColtsFan was 100% correct. I do write like my life depends on it. There is someone standing over me with a cleaver telling me to write good or else—and it’s me.
The reason for this outlook is because nothing is guaranteed in publishing. Several of my writing friends with books behind them now possess a certain expectation that everything they write will be published. I wish I shared their confidence. Despite numerous publishing credits, Magazines still reject my short stories and publishers have passed on manuscripts. Publishers and magazines have folded. Editors have changed their minds. There have been months with an R in them. The list of reasons/calamities is endless, but the result is the same—manuscripts I’ve been very passionate about have not made it to the bookshelf.
Currently, I’m very lucky to find myself in the fortunate position of having contracts with books still on them. However, that could all come to end when I turn those manuscripts in. Then what? Sure, I’ll do my best to find a new publisher or a magazine interested in my stories, but it still doesn’t mean they’ll get published. That means I can’t just write a good manuscript. I have to write the very best manuscript I possibly can and not just once, but every time, again and again. Those works still might not see publication, but I’ve given them best shot I can possibly give them.
Telling stories is my passion and my job. So yeah, I write like my life depends on it, because it does. Shouldn’t every writer think this way? 🙂
Categories: shelf life
I have a few pieces floating around at the moment that you might not have come across, but are worth your time.
CrimeSpree Magazine’s: 5 Books/Songs/Films that Changed My Life
The title says it all and CrimeSpree asked my what things changed my life. The tough part was finding just five books, songs and films that have influenced.
Kindle Daily Spot:
Amazon asked me for a piece that described me as a person and a writer. Chaos Theory was the simple answer. 🙂
Mysteries in Paradise reviewed ACCIDENTS WAITING TO HAPPEN and they liked it. Read the review here.
Audible.com brought out HOT SEAT, book 2 in the Aidy Westlake series, came out on Audio and it picked up a nice review over at Book ‘Em Mysteries.
And talking of all things, audio book, my supernatural crime thriller, ROAD RASH, is also available from Audible.com.
Still on the review front, Toxic Graveyard gave THE FALL GUY a great write up. Read it here.
Enjoy!
Categories: Uncategorized
I have a thing about indiscretions, white lies, small crimes, because no matter how much we think those mistakes will remain hidden, they have a habit of coming back to haunt us. I’m sure Anthony Wiener, John Edwards and many others have thought their secrets would remain secret, but as Ben Franklin once said, “Three can keep a secret, if two of them are dead.” That is someone speaking with experience and with a few absent friends.
As I mentioned the other week, the inspiration for THE FALL GUY is based on college incident where a friend thought he could get away with driving into someone’s car and getting away with it. And I’ve mentioned other errors in judgment in connection with my other books. These mistakes and subsequent lucky escapes from them snowballing into something more serious have made me a more honest person—or somewhat more careful about the risks I take. You won’t see me texting anything or photographing anything and leaving it on my phone. You’d think people would have wised up to this by now.
Seeing as this last post in conjunction with THE FALL GUY, I thought I’d turn the tables. I’ve shared some of my past mistakes that I feel I can talk about in good conscience. Now it’s your turn. It’s time for you to fess up to some your minor transgressions. The ones that could have turned nasty and/or ones you’ve atoned for. Don’t worry, I don’t want you to share anything that’ll still get you in trouble. Just something where the statute of limitations can’t touch you. 🙂
So come on, what have you done? I promise not to tell.
This concludes THE FALL GUY‘s month in the sun. I hope my stories have piqued your interest to check the book out. I also hope that you’ll spread the word about the book too. You shouldn’t keep this book a secret. In the meantime, you can read this excerpt.
Categories: book of the month