I already told you that today I was at the Charles Carroll Middle School in New Carrollton, MD to help launch its first annual 25 book campaign. 

That, of course, was a private event for those students. The public will be able to find me tomorrow at Borders Books - that’s Saturday from 2 pm to 4 pm - I’ll greet book lovers in the store at 931A Capital Centre Blvd, Largo, MD.

 Can’t get there?  Order my novels at http://www.intriguepublishing.com/order/ordering.html

Tomorrow I’ll have a rare opportunity to spread the gospel of writing to an important youth audience. Charles Carroll Middle School in New Carrollton, MD is hosting its first annual 25 book campaign. All of their students will be expected to read at least 25 books by the end of the school year. This campaign will kick off Friday, and the school has asked me and a few other authors to help them celebrate reading by attending their assembly and sharing our experiences as authors.

We’ll address the 7th and 8th grade students about our love for reading, why we became authors, and what inspires us to write. After the assembly we will have lunch with a select group of students. After lunch I’ll visit language arts classes and answer questions that students may have. I intend to read a couple of short stories aloud for them too. I have to admit that I am both flattered and honored to get this opportunity to address and maybe inspire a whole school full of future readers and writers.

In this blog I like to share good additions to your library, or places to find them.  Bookroom Reviews is one such place, a blog that offers quality reviews of published books.  They accept submissions from authors, publicists and publishers.  Once complete, the reviews are published on the website where they are permanently viewable and searchable by their readers.  New reviews are also publicized in their bi-weekly free newsletter. 

Publishers also often send extra copies so the site offers lots of giveaways.  Readers are invited to leave comments to be entered in giveaways.  So, you get solid book reviews, a chance to win free books, and you can give authors some real feedback.

When I address writers’ groups like the one I spoke to Saturday I spend very little time on theory or on the traditional wisdom of the writing business.  Almost everything I tell them is based on my personal experiences in the trenches of writing, publishing and marketing.  And in that process I share another important lesson. 

Writers as a group are pretty generous with their advice, especially with stories about their careers, and less experienced writers should always take advantage of that.  To succeed we must learn from the mistakes of others.  You won’t live long enough to make all of them yourself.

Yesterday I made the trek across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge to the Eastern Shore of Maryland, a place that could culturally be another state or perhaps even another country.  It’s a place where people are gracious and open to strangers, and courteous to a fault.  And a place where quiet is valued for its own intrinsic worth.

There I was welcomed by the members of the Eastern Shore Writers Association (ESWA) who listened to my talk on constructing a plot and asked lots of great questions.  They also bought me the best Angus burger I’ve had in quite some time and took home quite a few of my books.  It was an altogether rewarding way to spend the middle of a Saturday and I was home well ahead of dinner time.

Then today I had a very successful book signing at the Borders Express at Dulles Town Center.  The heat outdoors must have driven a lot of people into the mall - good news for me!

I already told you that today I’ll give a presentation - to the Eastern Shore Writers Association -  at 11 am at the Waterview Grill in the Easton Club, 28449 Clubhouse Rd., Easton, MD. 

BUT I won’t slight my Virginia fans this weekend.  Sunday I’ll return to the Borders Express at Dulles Town Center for a book signing from noon to 4 pm.  So if the Eastern Shore of Maryland is too far away, catch me at this store at 21100 Dulles Town Circle, Dulles VA.

 Tomorrow I get to meet with some old friends on the other side of the Chesapeake.  The Eastern Shore Writers Association (ESWA) invited me to be their speaker at this month’s meeting.  The ESWA exists to support those who write or enjoy writing.  As such, they are a very diverse group of poets, novelists, writers of stories, essays, articles, and memoirs, plus a few editors and small publishers.  Each year this same team of creative talents produces the one of the best writers conferences anywhere, Bay to Ocean.

My presentation Saturday will be on “How the Plot Thickens: Plots that put your characters through their paces.”  We’ll get started at 11 am at the Waterview Grill in the Easton Club, 28449 Clubhouse Rd., Easton, MD.  Naturally I’ll be signing books after my talk, but there will also be a few given away as door prizes to some lucky attendees.  So come join me if you can.

Apologies to Stephanie Plum but I don’t usually like my mysteries with a lot of humor in them.  That having been said, I do make exceptions for the local talent, especially when they’re gifted writers.  For both those reasons I CAN recommend that you add the novels of Northern Virginia author Donna Andrews to your personal library.  Donna’s Meg Langslow series manages to be consistently hilarious despite the fact that each book is a solid traditional mystery.  And you gotta love the titles:  nine books with titles like We’ll Always Have Parrots,  No Nest for the Wicket, Owls Well That Ends Well, and her latest success, Cockatiels at Seven. 

In the newest book a friend drops her son off for Meg to baby-sit and never returns.  The mystery only starts with Meg searching for the missing mom.  The lady is in great trouble and the plot is wonderful, but the fact that Meg has to do her sleuthing with a toddler in tow pushes it all to another level.

Do yourself a favor and read Cockatiels at Seven.

I overheard a conversation recently between an airline pilot and a passenger.  The pilot was trying to reassure the nervous passenger that he was in no danger flying in a commercial airliner.

“How can you say that?” the passenger asked.  “I just read that there were 136 crashes just last year, resulting in 965 deaths.”

“That just proves it,” the pilot said with a smirk.  “Flying isn’t dangerous. Crashing is what’s dangerous.”

I’ve already told you that tonight at 5 pm I have a book signing at the Borders at 8518 Fenton St., Silver Spring, MD.  TOMORROW I’ll be at the shopping capitol of the Mid-Atlantic, Potomac Mills.  Books-A-Million is the site of that book signing, starting at noon.  The address is 2700 Potomac Mills Cir, Woodbridge VA