The past month has been like a whirlwind, although even as I type that I realize it’s only been about three weeks, not even a full month. See? Crazy busy.
First of all my friend Viet Hyuhn stayed with us for a week while he was a feature performer at Zanies Comedy Club here in Chicago. It’s always great to hang out with him, not just because he’s a fun guy but because we always end up brainstorming and talking about ways that creative folks like us can help promote ourselves and, for lack of a douchey-sounding term, “build our brands.” Well, most he talks and I go “Yeah, yeah, that’s a great idea.” It’s invigorating.
After that it was C2E2, which was a whirlwind of an event. It’s my favorite comic show to go to as it’s a great mix of comics and other things, not to mention the fact that it brings in friends from all over the country due to its centralized nature. Not only was it a good time but I had an opportunity to moderate two panels, one for Mystery Writer and the other for Science Fiction writers. Both were really interesting and informative and all of the authors were great folks and I learned a lot from them. On Sunday was the big Super-Fly Podcast panel which went amazingly well and we had a blast doing, but unfortunately only half of it recorded. While that’s a bummer you can’t take away the memory of doing the show in front of a live studio audience (which now that I type this, I should’ve put a clip of me saying that in front of the episode, like the good sitcoms of yore).
It’s finally here! C2E2 happened and that means the long-awaited live Super-Fly Podcast recording and panel at the midwest’s greatest comic convention is here. Unfortunately there were some recording problems with both the things we used to record the show, but most of it is here. We talk about the Diamond Retail Summit, Jared’s time DJing at the show and more. Sit back, take a listen and gird your loins for next year.
Intro/Walk-in Music: Girl Talk – Oh No
Outro Music: Queen – One Vision
Not only that, but I also did some interviewing an reporting in the form of this article for Panels on Pages: Counter Culture Special – Comic Retailers at C2E2.
After that Gwyn and I headed back to Yellow Springs for our friend Jason and Mary’s wedding. Not only was the wedding and the after party with Adam WarRock and Viet at Super-Fly great, it was kind of nice to see the the town, show Gwyn where I’d lived for nearly 15 years and answer the question “How’s Chicago treating you?” over a dozen times (seriously, everyone phrased it like that. It was weird.) I also got a chance to see my daughter and have her and Gwyn meet which was really nice. I get to see my kid so rarely that the times that I do see her always end up with me being a big mixture of happy and sad. Then again, this is why we have phones and text messages and all that stuff. Being back there was enough to almost make me want to give up city living and live on a lot somewhere there in the sweet ass Gulfstream trailer I saw someone selling. Of course, I would require internet.
All in all this whirlwind of three weeks has finally dropped me off and I’m sort of back onto my regular schedule, or at the very least rebuilding it. I’ve suddenly become someone who goes to be early and wakes up at 6am to do writing and actual internet chores. It’s weird but at the same time I’m finding I’m getting a fair amount of stuff done and that’s led to me feeling more positive about life and my future than I’ve been in quite some time.
Armed with all that, I’m very excited to see what’s coming next. The latest Winston & Churchill story A SHADOW UPON THE SCENES debuted yesterday on Smashwords and Amazon and is only 99 cents. If I had my say, I’d have you buy it on Smashwords rather than Amazon, seeing as how I make $.81 from them rather than the $.35 I get from Amazon.
Lexie Winston & Henry Churchill are closing in on the person selling dangerous magical items to the desperate and deranged. Hiring some new help, Henry concocts a plan that should expose the sellers identity but instead leads them into a trap endangering all of their lives, jeopardizing their partnership and exposing secrets Henry would do anything to keep hidden.
This story was a little bit more difficult to write than the others, but ultimately I’m pretty pleased with how it turned out. The one thing that does bug me about it a little is the fact that it’s not entirely “new reader friendly.” It references the four Winston & Churchill stories before it (the ones in SUMMER OF SINS) quite heavily, but I’ll just have to let that be. This begins the second of three seasonal themed quartet collections, that’s just going to be the cost of doing business until this series of stories is finished. Now that we’re back to publishing again there should be a new story every month. If you’re reading this I encourage you heavily to buy it, or at least give the first story NEVER LET GO a try. NEVER LET GO is free (and probably always will be) so getting it is easy. I would love to see more reviews for it on both Amazon and Smashwords, as that’s one of the only ways that I’ve got to entice strangers to pick it up. It’s real quick and real easy, just click on how many stars you want to give it an voila. If you really, really enjoy it, share it with a friend. It’s the only way folks who make a living doing art can, well, make a living doing art.
All that out of the way, I’m looking forward to and am positive about what happens next. It’s been a while since I’ve been able to say that…
The first Winston & Churchill story, NEVER LET GO, is featured this month on Costa Koutsoutis’ monthly fiction site, 
