Today my book signing is at Borders in Ronald Reagan National Airport from 1 pm to 5 pm.

Then Saturday I head north to the Borders Express in White Marsh Mall.  I have high hopes for my first visit to that store, at 8200 Perry Hall Boulevard, Baltimore, MD.  I’ll start signing books at 4 pm.

SATURDAY - I’ll close out the weekend Sunday at the Borders Express in Columbia Mall.  That signing will run from 2pm to 5:30pm.  The store is at 10300 Little Patuxent Pkwy, Columbia, MD.  I hope you can visit me at one of those stops.

It’s another big Borders weekend for me. It starts Friday when I return to Ronald Reagan National Airport. If you know anybody flying to DC let them know that I will sign my novels for afternoon travelers there from 1 pm to 5 pm.

Erik D. Kiessling is the author of a thrilling urban fantasy called “Bury them at the Crossroads.” He promised me a review of Russian Roulette but got caught up in his own writing after reading it. On the second reading of my novel Erik decided to send a comprehensive review.

Despite an overwhelmingly positive review, Erik did have honest criticisms. He mentions my having an Algerian offer Hannibal a ham sandwich. In my mind the character had good reason for fleeing his Muslim heritage and perhaps I should have made it clearer. Also Erik didn’t like the many references to rock music lyrics. He may have a point, but the lyrics in this book are tied to important plot points.

Are they worth it? I’ll let you be the judge when you read the book. Meanwhile, I’ve used an edited version of Erik’s extensive review as the featured review on my web site. Thank you, Erik, for your thoughtful and detailed comments.

Between Bouchercon and a big Halloween party I’ve seen lots of people in the last couple of weeks who are generally just names on e-mails for photos on Facebook.  We stay in touch and on those occasions that we get face to face it’s wonderful to shake hands or hug and fall into conversation just as if we had been sitting in a coffee shop together the day before.  Distance seems irrelevant to these relationships.

Good friends are like stars.  You don’t always see them, but you know they are always there.

I attended the Halloween book signing at Borders in Arlington, VA dressed as Hannibal Jones and saved the Hawaiian hula hula boy outfit for the party later that night. Denise was a hula girl, complete with grass skirt.

But there was lots of other great news this week besides partying. For instance, my review of Karl Alexander’s new book, Jaclyn the Ripper, is in this month’s The Big Thrill, the newsletter of the International Thriller Writers. This is the sequel to Time After Time in which H.G. Wells chased Jack the Ripper through time. This time Jack is a girl!

The big news for you Kindle owners is that my publishers have reduced the price on all my downloadable novels. They’re pretty popular already – in fact The Troubleshooter is ranked #20,745 which puts it in the top 5% of the 360,000 books available for the Kindle. And now you can get each of my novels onto your Kindle for $6.95… except Blood and Bone which Echelon Press is selling for an even $6 bucks!  Download my novels onto your Kindle now!

Those of you who are curious about what I was doing at Bouchercon can see a detailed report of the panel I moderated on “Big Beat From Badsville,” a super blog written by a red headed charmer named Donna. Badsville, BTW, is the home of Scottish crime fiction, and if you like my work you should be reading it regularly anyway.

And on Pop Syndicate, fellow Echelon Press author Beth Solheim posted a marvelous review of my latest novel Russian Roulette. Take a look at why the book is doing so well.