Newsletter & Book Announcement

By /

Typically, my weekly newsletter is only available to newsletter subscribers.  But this week, I decided to post it to my blog as well, to give people an idea of what it contains and to see if they might be interested in subscribing. The entire contents of the newsletter are below.

Weekly roundup

To everyone new here to the list: Welcome to my newsletter! In the newsletter, I’ll share a link to some of the things I shared on social media that I thought were interesting. I’ll also include book news, cover reveals, and more goodies.

I have some exciting news this week: the fifth book in my Ghost Oracle series is now available at your favorite online retailerIt’s entitled “Camping with a Ghost” and here is the blurb:

Nick is out camping with his friends, and the last thing he expected was to encounter the ghost of someone he knows from school. After the trip, the spirit continues to appear to Nick, leaving him no choice but to investigate his classmate’s disappearance and attempt to discover what happened to him.

As he zeros in on the mystery surrounding his missing classmate, Nick uncovers several secrets surrounding the ghost’s demise, which attracts some unwanted attention from the murderer. As Nick gets closer to uncovering the truth—and finding his dead classmate’s body—the threats become increasingly more severe, and Nick soon finds himself in a deadly situation.

Meanwhile, the Shadow Demon has upped its game, and Nick has another encounter with the creature. This time, the demon has made its intentions clear to Nick, which means Nick must do everything in his power to not only protect himself and his boyfriend Gabe but his family as well.

Camping with a ghost

This was such a fun book to write! The last and final book in the series will be forthcoming. If you haven’t read the other books in the series, you can check them out at my website here:

If you enjoyed this newsletter, feel free to share it with your friends, and family. I would really appreciate it.

Okay, enough book chat. On to this week’s roundup!

Weekly Round-Up – Some Things I Thought Were Worth Sharing

  1. I love time travel stories so I may have to watch this: ‘The Adam Project’ review: A flashy time travel adventure with an all-star cast I also haven’t heard of this animated time travel series before – will definitely have to check it out as well – Undone: Season 2, Prime Video This April
  2. For my writer friends: Short Story Tips: 3 Successful Strategies to Write a Short Story. There’s also this: If You Want to Write a Novel, Start with a Plan: Stephanie Gangi on Writing Her Debut in Her Late 50s
  3. I stumbled across this article by Chris Guillebeau entitled “36 Ways to Live Differently” Lot’s of great wisdom here.
  4. Right now books are in danger – one can go a step further and say that imagination and ideas are in danger: The Power—and Necessity—of Reading Dangerously. Speaking of danger, here’s an article entitled, Why Stories Are Dangerous — And Why We Need Them Anyway. You might also be interested in this article about book banning: Brad Meltzer on how a community fought a school book ban in Pennsylvania and won: My book was banned. Here’s how we fought back
  5. Eye Candy – some of these are amazing! The Winners of Sony World Photography Awards for 2022. Oh, and let’s not forget about The Winners of the 11th Annual Mobile Photography Awards
  6. Well this sucks: HBO hit with class action lawsuit for allegedly sharing subscriber data with Facebook.
  7. Here are 10 women photographers and organizations that use their art to raise awareness and make a difference where they can.
  8. How a viral tweet turned into a queer coming-of-age graphic novel. Also, three authors recently targeted by the religious right and Republicans spoke out about being at the center of controversy: LGBTQ authors of banned books speak out on why their stories matter.
  9. Crime writers talking writing routines, research, putting in the work, and keeping caffeine levels: David Heska Wanbli Weiden Takes His Craft Seriously and His Coffee Very Strong
  10. Privacy Watch: 5 Easy Ways to Improve Privacy on Your iPhone Right Now
  11. Some writing tips: How to Pitch a Story: 10 Killer Pitch Tips. There’s also this article which some writers may find helpful: Don’t Overthink It: The Argument For Just Starting to Write. And if you suffer from self-doubt, then this may help: Dealing With Self-Doubt And Writer’s Block With Dharma Kelleher.
  12. Just for fun (and cuteness) 20 Photos Of Pets Proving That Nature Has A Great Sense Of Humor. And if you’re looking for something funny to read, here’s a breakdown of The Best Comedy Books of 2022 (So Far).
  13. Interesting article about the internet’s relentless deluge of images: The Empire of the Archive: On the Relentless Contemporary Deluge of Images
  14. A new series of Dr. Seuss-inspired books will feature diverse authors and illustrators.
  15. The Books Will Keep You Warm – A celebration of small-town libraries and retro mysteries.

Oh, and in case you missed it, Ernest Shackleton’s Ship Found After 106 Years

Camping with a ghost 2

Newsletter & Book Announcement Read Post »

Norian’s Gamble is Out!

By /

Norian's Gamble book coverYou’ve been hearing me talk about my werewolf novel for the past couple of months. Well, the wait is finally over. Norian’s Gamble is finally out! However, it’s available only on Amazon at the current time. I’m experimenting with their Kindle Unlimited feature, so for the next 90 days, it will be exclusive to Amazon. I’ll most likely publish wide after that — though if the Kindle Unlimited experiment is a success, then I may run it for another 90 days. We’ll see.

Anyway… Norian’s Gamble is the first book in the Wolves of Norbury series. There will not be a continuous plot thread like there was in my Ghost Oracle series. Every novel in the Wolves of Norbury series will stand alone, so you can read them in any order.

Below is the blurb for Norian’s Gamble:

©2022 Rambling Wordsmith Press

Prince Norian spends his days training with the courtesans and studying his lessons, preparing for the day when he’ll eventually be king. But all that changes one evening when, in an act of spite by a vengeful sorcerer, he’s bitten by a werewolf. As a result, he now bears the curse of the wolf.

When he learns that there’s a haven for werewolves in a town called Norbury, Norian sets out, hoping to find a cure there. What he didn’t count on is the handsome and charismatic Kalen, the current leader of the Norbury pack. Both men are confused by their odd physical reaction to each other until they learn that they just might be each other’s one true mate.

But all thoughts are mating are pushed aside when the sorcerer makes another offensive move, leading Norian to have to make one of the most important decisions he’ll ever have to make — one that will affect Kalen, his kingdom, his new wolf pack, and his very life.

Note: This story contains explicit love scenes between adult males 18 years and older and is intended for mature audiences.

Norian’s Gamble is the first story in the Wolves of Norbury series, taking place in a fictional world where kings still rule, werewolves are real, and sorcerers run amok. Each book in this series is a standalone and will contain no cliffhangers.

Purchase Norian’s Gamble from Amazon (free with Kindle Unlimited)

Norian’s Gamble is Out! Read Post »

Combatting Email Spam

By /

Spam, Spam, Endless Spam….

It is just me, or is email spam getting worse? Last week, I noticed that I received a couple of hundred spam messages every day. It might have been especially bad because of Christmas, with vendors desperately trying to part you from your money. Of course, a few recent data breaches may also be to blame. But regardless of the cause, it seems to be getting out of hand.

Though it seems like a losing battle, there are some things you can do to minimize the amount of spam that you receive. One thing I do is have a fake “throwaway” email address that I use for those sites that require registration. It’s an address I never check and only use it in those instances where I don’t want to give out my actual email. I believe Apple’s iCloud mail now has an option to generate fake email addresses as well. If your provider doesn’t, then consider creating a new email address with one of the free services, such as Google.

Another thing you want to do is never respond to a spam message, and that includes unsubscribing (according to “spam experts”). All this does is let the spammer know that they’re sending to a valid email address, resulting in only more spam. As an alternative, add the user’s address/domain to your email client’s spam filter list. Most email programs offer the ability to add addresses of spammers to a spam list which then automatically moves any messages received from that address to the spam folder. That means you never see them — unless you check your spam folder.

My favorite method for eliminating spam — or at least my exposure to it — is using mail filters. What this does, is performs an action on a message that meets specific criteria. For instance, if a message subject contains a particular word or phrase, you can have your email program automatically delete the message or move it into your spam folder for you to verify later. I have a bunch of words and phrases that I use to filter my messages. Whenever an incoming message contains any of these phrases, it’s moved to my spam folder, and I never see it. Here are a few that I use (and I’m constantly adding to the list):

Sale
Bargain
Free
Last Chance
One Day Left
Black Friday
Cyber Monday
Time’s Running Out
Hurry
Deals

You can also use filters to automatically delete messages from specific senders so that they never show up in your inbox. Using filters, spam lists, and fake email addresses, I actually never see the majority of spam sent to me.

So though you’ll probably never eliminate spam entirely (I get a couple every day that manage to sneak in), using a few methods, you can significantly reduce the number of sales/phishing messages you receive.

Combatting Email Spam Read Post »

A Return to Physical Books (for the moment)

By /

Last year, the majority of books that I read were ebooks. This isn’t anything unusual for me. Ever since I purchased my first Kindle many years back, I’ve been reading books in this format. I read a few Apple Books here and there on my iPad, but mostly, I use Amazon’s device to consume novels.

However, this year things may change a bit. As I mentioned in a couple of previous posts, I’m doing the PopSugar and the 52 Book Club reading challenges. One of the main reasons I decided to take on the challenges was to get through some of the books on my bookshelves that I’ve purchased. Like many of you, there are a lot of unread books on my shelves that I keep meaning to get to. So with only a few exceptions, all of the books that I’ll be reading for the challenges this year are actual physical books that I own.

Now, this isn’t to say that I never read physical books as I do get quite a few of them from the library throughout the year. But they account for only about 20% of my overall reading. Historically, almost all my reading consists of ebooks.

This is funny because I constantly extol the virtues of paper books and talk about how much I love them, how there’s nothing like the feel/smell of an actual book, etc. Yet, when I examine my reading habits, I see that physical books make up only a tiny portion of my reading and the main reason for that is convenience. For instance, rather than carrying around a heavy book with me whenever I go to the doctor’s or another appointment, it’s easier to tuck my Kindle in my jacket pocket, and I have my entire library with me. I also don’t have to lug 15 books with me when I go on vacation, which is especially an issue given that I take a lot of vacations on my motorcycle. This all makes me think that perhaps I’ll write up a future post on paper books vs. ebooks. But that isn’t the purpose of this post, however. Today, I just wanted to mention that I’ll be making a massive change to my reading habits which will entail mainly reading paper books in the coming year.

I’m curious how I’ll take to it again. No doubt I’ll miss the convenience of my Kindle as well as the ability to quickly lookup words on the fly. But I will say that whenever I do read a physical book, I tend almost always to enjoy the experience of it. I love the feel of the book in my hands, the subtle noise of a page turn, and the immediate physical representation of how much of the book is remaining.

This isn’t to say that I won’t be reading ebooks this year, as I’m sure a few electronic ARCs will cross my path (though I plan on not requesting as many ARCs as usual). But my main focus will be on clearing out some of those titles from my physical TBR on my groaning shelves. I think it will be kind of fun to watch the number of books on my shelves dwindle as the year progresses.

A Return to Physical Books (for the moment) Read Post »

100 Things We’ve Lost to the Internet

By /

Today I wanted to share a book with all of you that I came across a few weeks ago that I simply had to pick up. It’s called, “100 Things We’ve Lost to the Internet” by Pamela Paul. This is a nostalgic look at all of the things that have disappeared from our lives — some good, some bad — because of the Internet.

What’s funny is that I’ve actually been thinking about this a lot lately, before the book ever came to my attention. We’re considering downsizing and moving to a condo which means we have to get rid of a lot of the crap we’ve accumulated over the years. Given that I grew up in the pre-Internet days, I’ve come across a lot of stuff that is no longer relevant such as a cordless telephone, a cassette player, a walkman, a paper address book, and empty photo albums. How about an old fax machine? I also stumbled across boxes of blank printer paper that I no longer use. It’s been years since I’ve used my printer except for printing out my Profit and Loss Statement each April for my accountant. Additionally, there’s a drawer full of binder clips, clipboards, paper clips, a paper cutter, and even a box stuffed with empty three-rings binders. It tickled me to see many of these same items mentioned in Pamela’s book.

Overall, if you’re a person of a certain age, you might enjoy this little excursion down memory lane to a time of kitchen telephones, Rolodexes, Filofaxes, handwritten letters, checkbooks, and the TV Guide. Oh, and how can we forget the blind date?

I thought this book was so much fun, and I believe young people will also get a kick out of this fun, light-hearted jaunt down memory lane — though a lot on this list has disappeared only recently. 100 Things We’ve Lost to the Internet is a jarring reminder about how quickly things change and lose their relevance.

While I think there are some things whose loss I regret — such as glossy, paper magazines — there are others that I’m glad are gone (like getting lost, for instance! I love my GPS).

How about you? What things do you miss that the Internet has taken away?

100 Things We’ve Lost to the Internet Read Post »

Why I’m Moving Away from TV Shows

By /

Man watch TV image

I’ve mentioned a few times in various posts that I don’t watch a lot of television. In fact, I find myself watching less and less of it each year. Oh, there have been a few series that I’ve enjoyed and looked forward to, like The Wheel of Time series and Ted Lasso. But what’s funny is that I have to almost force myself to watch TV these days. It’s as though my brain is fighting me on it for some reason.

And I think I finally figured out why.

A little over a year ago, I watched season 1 of a new Netflix series entitled “Julie and the Phantoms.” I loved this series so much and thought it was tremendous fun. So the other day, I was searching online to see when the next season was coming out, only to disappointingly discover that it was canceled. That’s when it hit me — this was the reason I’m pulling away from TV series. It’s not that I’m bitter that networks cancel shows (though I am). It’s that my brain is full of unfinished stories.

I thought about all of my favorite shows that have been canceled and how all of these unfinished stories are still rattling around in my brain, waiting for their denouement.

I’ve mentioned a time or two that I’m a completionist, so being unable to finish a story — to not have it nicely wrap up — really bugs me. As a result, I’ve been extremely hesitant to start any new series — especially on Netflix, which is notorious for canceling shows after only a season or two. Instead, I’ve noticed that I much prefer to sit down with a good book where I know that if I soldier on, the story will conclude.

Same goes for movies — they (most of the time) tend to have a conclusion, leading to a feeling of satisfaction at the end. This is why I have more of a tendency to watch a film than get involved in a series. I’m guaranteed the movie will properly conclude. I’m not guaranteed that with a television series.

This revelation amused me, and I didn’t realize just how much those unfinished stories irritated me. It seems like such a waste of time to watch and invest myself in only part of a story — a story that abruptly ends without a conclusion. I guess that’s why it’s rare that I DNF (do not finish) books. Even if it’s a crappy story, I still like to see how it all turns out.

I recalled the other day when I went through my Netflix queue and deleted a bunch of shows I hadn’t started and no longer had any desire to watch. Now I know why.

So does this mean I will never watch another series? Not really. If a series is over and was concluded by the network, I might check it out. Or if there’s a series that I’m already involved in, such as Wheel of Time, then I have no choice but to continue on with it.

But as for any new shows — unless it is something that I really, really, really want to watch — the answer is probably no.

Especially if your name is Netflix.

Why I’m Moving Away from TV Shows Read Post »

Scroll to Top