First Bike Ride of the Year

We've had a long, cold winter in New York this year. I felt like a bear in hibernation. But finally, the warm weather is here! It's 60 degrees, and I have the day off of work. What better chance to get my mountain bike up and running, air in the tires, oil on the chain? It felt good to finally be out there riding on the Old Croton Aqueduct Trail again. I took a nice 46-minute ride (yes, I timed it), and my legs felt nice and rubbery when I returned home and got off my bike. Of course, I forgot to stretch my legs beforehand.

Saturday Update: Today it was a 43-minute ride. Really feels good to be back out there. And yes, I remembered to stretch before the ride today.

On Self Publishing

I'm a member of an online writers workshop. There is a very active message board, and occasionally the subject of self publishing comes up. It is usually hotly debated, with some people vehemently opposed to the idea, while others view it as a viable option to the long haul of trying to get something published by one of the traditional houses. I try to steer clear of these arguments, because it's rather pointless. Either you believe in self publishing or you don't. To me it's the abortion issue of publishing. You can argue all you want, but in the end it's useless. You're not going to change anyone's mind. Anyway, I thought I'd post my response here, too:

I self published my first novel, Into the Sunset, after several near-misses landing an agent. I was frustrated and worried that someone else would come up with a similar plot as my novel, which would have completely screwed any chances I had of landing a "traditional" publisher. I still believe my novel is good enough for a small publisher, or even a large house. Would it have benefited from another pair (or two) of editorial eyes on it? Of course. What wouldn't?

But that's not to say my manuscript didn't go through an editorial process. I had my former creative writing teacher read an early draft. She gave me extensive notes which were invaluable to me, since this was my first attempt at a novel. Later drafts were read by fellow authors, and I received some constructive feedback. I workshopped several chapters in my writing group. Additional comments I received from agents were also incorporated into the mss. Finally, before I went to print, I had someone who works in publishing proofread the manuscript (I'm proud to say I have only found a few typos in the finished product, much less than most hardcovers I read).

I am glad to see self-publishing making slow, but steady strides. There are even awards, such as the Writer's Digest Self-Published Book Awards. Not all self published books are crap. Tom's point in another thread was that readers just want a good book to read, and they aren't looking at who published the book. This is true to a degree; the problem, though, is if you have written and published a great book (or a good one, or a shitty one), how do you get that prospective reader to know your book exists? That's the rub. And there IS still a stigma against self-pubbed books, though I think that will slowly change as better books are published. Let's face it, publishing is in flux right now, houses want to go with the tried and true, and not many authors can actually make a living being a novelist.

I am seeking an agent for my second novel (as I work on my 3rd and 4th), but I have no delusions that I will score big and quit my day job. So, having that attitude, it doesn't bother me if I have to self-pub again in the future. At least I'll have complete control over the product, including cover design. I will not allow myself to put out something I don't consider ready.

So my advice to those considering self-publishing: Go in with your eyes open, expect to work hard, and put out the best product you can. This includes workshopping your manuscript, getting it proofread, and please, please get a professional to design the cover. You can judge a book by its cover. ; ) Oh, and don't expect to make money.

By the way, I consider these endless arguments about self-publishing absurd. It's the abortion issue of the writing world. If you don't want to self-pub, DON'T. If you are pro self-pub, then you can pursue that route if you choose.

U2 Does New York

U2 took NYC by storm this week to promote their new CD No Line on the Horizon. They played David Letterman's Late Show every night (and sounded awesome), had part of Broadway temporarily renamed "U2 Way," and gave a free concert at Fordham University on Friday morning. And they are due to announce their tour dates on Monday.

That's NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg on the left, thinking about his stocks.

As a U2 fan, it's exciting to see them out there doing all this promotion, sounding great, and getting exposure. Being the biggest band in the world, they almost don't need to do all this. People have been waiting for four years for new material. And besides, No Line on the Horizon is seriously one of the best CDs they have ever released. I'm too lazy to go through it track by track here, but I'll sum it up by saying it is one of those records that gets better with each listen. Better still with headphones. There is a lot of meat on these bones.

U2's setlist at Fordham: Get On Your Boots; Magnificent; I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight; Beautiful Day; Breathe; Vertigo.

John Lydon Likes Country Life

Country Life butter, that is. Lydon, who rose to fame as Johnny Rotten in 1977 as the sneering lead singer the Sex Pistols, one of the original punk bands, has made a funny commercial for the British butter company.

Rotten and the Sex Pistols have always been anti-establishment, anti-authority, and definitely anti-Royalty. Still. They didn't even show up for their own induction into the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame a few years ago. So is this a "sell out"? I don't think so. Just Lydon having some fun. And hell, even punk rockers need to butter their toast.

"People know I only do things that I want to or that I believe in and I have to do it my way," said Lydon. "I've never done anything like this before and never thought I would, but this Country Life ad was made for me and I couldn't resist the opportunity."

Tom Saunders, interviewed

Tom Saunders, author of the new short story collection Roof Whirl Away has been interviewed by Ian Hocking. Click here to read interview.

To read my review of Roof Whirl Away, click here.

The Boys of Summer Hit Spring Training

After the frigid winter we've had (are still having?), it's great to see baseball's spring training camps officially open. An exciting year is on tap for us Yankee fans, what with the new Yankee Stadium (below) opening in April, and the additions of starting pitchers CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett, not to mention first baseman Mark Teixiera.


(Stadium photos from http://slidingintohome.blogspot.com)

U2 to spend a week on "Letterman"

This just in...U2 will be David Letterman's musical guest for a whole week, from March 2-6. Their new CD "No Line on the Horizon" will released March 3.

Now I just have to stay awake.

UPDATE: Thurs., March 5.
So far I've been able to stay awake for the first three nights! U2 sounds awesome. In case you miised it, you can catch it on Youtube or Letterman's CBS page.

U2's Pop

U2's new CD No Line On the Horizon is due to be released March 3, so in anticipation, I've begun to listen to some of the older ones. Released in 1997, Pop has probably been the worst received CD in U2's catalogue. I've defended this disc from the beginning, but there was always something I didn't like about it, something nagging. But I couldn't quite put my finger on what bothered me.

The individual songs are good: "Staring at the Sun" is a slick guitar pop song that got tons of airplay, "Last Night On Earth" is a typical U2 anthem, "Gone" is a soaring Edge showcase. "If God Will Send His Angels" is a slower song that would fit well on many other U2 CDs. Then there are the more experimental tunes, like the electronic "Mofo" and "Discotheque," along with "Do You Feel Loved," "Please," and "Wake Up Dead Man." Good songs all.

So what's the problem? Seems like there are a lot of good individual songs there, that you can really sink your teeth into. Well, it's taken me nearly 12 years, but I think I've finally figured it out. The CD feels more like a compilation than a cohesive collection. Pop doesn't have that central theme, like the longing of The Joshua Tree with its religious imagery, or the crunchy sound of Achtung Baby's breakup songs, or the American folk/blues of Rattle and Hum. Plus the over-the-top PopMart tour put some people off. Even if they got the tongue in cheek joke of it all, it seemed too much for the U2 image to handle. The overriding question was, Why?

I think even U2 felt they misfired a bit, and on their Best Of 1990-2000 collection they remixed the songs from Pop, but they miscalculated again. The songs didn't need remixing, and in fact sound worse. The songs weren't the problem, it was all the songs together that didn't flow right.

After Pop U2 took three years off, regrouped, and returned with the classic U2 sound with 2000's hugely successful All That You Can't Leave Behind, followed by the 2004 release How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb. Now the follow-up to that is imminent and I can't wait to hear the new sounds they have cooked up.

Boomerang Kids

There is an article in the Boston Globe today about "Boomerang Kids." Boomerang kids are adult children who return home to live with their parents. This is a major subplot in my comic novel Into the Sunset (I also call them boomerang kids). My character Wayne is an editor who is writing an article on the subject. Basically, it is the same article as the one in the Boston Globe! Here is the link:

Boomerang Kids

Dodger and Me

Dodger and Me, written by Jordan Sonnenblick.

I loved this book. Basic plot: loser kid (Willie) sucks at baseball, has an overprotective mother, tries to avoid an annoying girl (Lizzie), and is lonely after his best friend moves away. Enter a possibly imaginary blue chimp named Dodger wearing surfer shorts and an eye patch, who may or may not be a genie, and who may or may not help him overcome his problems. Along the way, and under Dodger's watch, things get way worse for Willie before they can get better.

Will Willie improve his baseball skills and help his team win the championship? Will his mother stop fussing over him so much? Will Lizzie ever leave him alone? Will he survive Dodger's plans to improve his life? And more importantly—what will his three wishes be?

The thing that really makes this YA novel pop is the writing. Just before reading Dodger and Me, I read another YA book from the same publisher. Good plot, likable lead characters, but the writing was just awful. But I finished it, and moved on to Dodger. What a breath of fresh air! The writing is engaging, funny, and just plain readable. As a writer myself, I think the best compliment I can give this book is that it is one of those books you come across that you wish you had written first. You don't have to be a young adult to enjoy Dodger and Me. Go get it!

Dodger and Me

Lost Season 5-Destiny Calls

Here is the poster for Season 5 of Lost. The new season starts Wednesday January 21, 2009! Before this summer, I had never seen even one episode of this show. Then I took the first three seasons out of the library and watched them all obsessively—3, 4, 5 episodes a day. The library only gives you a week, so basically I watched three seasons in three weeks. Do the math: 21 days and 69 episodes. Season 4 was less stressful: I bought the DVD set, and there were only 13 episodes due to the writers strike. So now I am officially caught up, after completing Season 4 this past weekend. It's going to really suck having to wait a week between episodes now.

Lostpedia

John Lennon's "One Laptop Per Child" Commercial

Rock & Roll Hall of Fame-NYC Annex

Well, they finally just opened (yesterday) the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Annex in New York, on Mercer Street in SOHO. I checked it out today and want to share my take on it. But first, a rant.

I can't be the only person to wonder why the original museum is located in Cleveland, especially since the induction ceremonies have always been in NYC. I'm sure the city of Cleveland isn't happy about this fact, as they are losing a lot of tourist money. For instance, Major League Baseball has their Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. And guess where they have the induction ceremony? That's right, Cooperstown. They make a whole weekend out of it, with fans booking their hotel rooms months in advance, then descending on the town and dropping loads of cash while getting to see the new inductees, along with returning HOF members. But, whatever. At least NYC now has a branch of the R&R HOF and I don't have to go to Cleveland.


Photo: Richard Perry/The New York Times)

I bought my "preview" ticket online. It was $26.01 for the ticket, $3 service charge, and $1.50 extra because I wanted to pick up the ticket at the Will Call window. Total $30.51. Coat check was free. The tour starts in a room designed to look like a pub/rock club, with brick walls, wood floor, multi-colored stage lights, and stools arranged to face a large video screen. A history of Rock & Roll film is shown—all live performances—while quotes about the artist, concert posters, and accompanying footage are simultaneously shown on the other walls. The sound system is good, and loud, and I found myself tapping my foot throughout this segment.

When this part is over, you enter the exhibit part of the museum, and are given an iPod-like device with headphones. As you wander through the displays, music appropriate for each artist automatically plays. There seemed to still be some glitches here, because more than a few times the wrong artist played, or it stopped altogether and I had to hit the play button again. But all in all, it was OK, and a neat idea.


Photo: Richard Perry/The New York Times)

I don't want to give too much away, and ruin some of the surprises, but I will say the Beatles memorabilia was a little lacking, especially since two landmark events happened in NYC: the Ed Sullivan Show appearances, and the Shea Stadium concerts. These were not represented at all. They had one of Ringo's bass drum skins with the Beatles logo (see above), a prototype Vox hybrid guitar/organ of John Lennon's, some postcards the boys wrote to fans, and that's about it. Then elsewhere there was a studio piano Lennon used on some of his 70s records (but didn't own), but of more interest to me was his hand-drawn "Hair Peace" poster used during his and Yoko's famous bed-in for peace honeymoon (see pic below. Yes, that's the best I could do). I just stared at the poster, and envisioned John hunched over a table, or laying on the floor hand coloring the letters.


Bruce Springsteen fans will be happy, as a whole small room is dedicated to the Boss. Included is the actual 1957 Chevy Bel Air convertible that he owned in the 70s! Fans of the recently departed CBGBs will feel at home, with a small recreation of the famous club that includes the awning, some of the grungy bar tables and stools, graffiti covered doors, and even a urinal! No, you can't use the urinal.

Other highlights were an Elvis jumpsuit, Johnny Cash's cowboy boots (they were so high I wondered how he got them on—or off), a guitar smashed by Prince, and David Byrne's famous big suit.


The featured exhibit (in the large room before you exit) spotlights The Clash. Here they have handwritten lyrics, the outfits they wore on stage (including the military-style ones used for the Combat Rock album and tour), guitars, and even an old manual typewriter Joe Strummer used to write some lyrics. A live Clash concert is continually playing, and I stood there for quite a while just watching this exciting band do their thing.

Was it worth the 30 bucks? I think so. I spent nearly two hours going through all the exhibits, reading the handwritten lyrics, watching the videos, and listening to some good rock and roll.

NY Times article

Vatican forgives John Lennon for Jesus remark

In a March 1966 interview with Maureen Cleave of the London Evening Standard, John Lennon was quoted as saying, "Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue with that; I'm right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first - rock 'n' roll or Christianity. Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It's them twisting it that ruins it for me."

A teen mag in the US reprinted the quote in July and all hell broke loose. Southern radio stations banned the Beatles' records, albums were burned, the KKK protested their concerts, flowers stopped growing, the earth stopped spinning. Well, the last two things aren't true, but you wouldn't know it from some peoples reactions.

Now, 42 years later, the Vatican has forgiven John, saying that the "more popular than Jesus" remark was "a boast by a young working-class Englishman faced with unexpected success, after growing up in the legend of Elvis and rock and roll."

They have a point. On the other hand, at the time, the Beatles probably were more popular than Jesus with the kids. You're just not allowed to say it, I guess. Which led to Lennon's retraction/apology:
~
John: "If I had said television is more popular than Jesus, I might have got away with it, but I just happened to be talking to a friend and I used the words "Beatles" as a remote thing, not as what I think - as Beatles, as those other Beatles like other people see us. I just said "they" are having more influence on kids and things than anything else, including Jesus. But I said it in that way which is the wrong way."

Reporter: "Some teenagers have repeated your statements - "I like the Beatles more than Jesus Christ." What do you think about that?"

John: "Well, originally I pointed out that fact in reference to England. That we meant more to kids than Jesus did, or religion at that time. I wasn't knocking it or putting it down. I was just saying it as a fact and it's true more for England than here. I'm not saying that we're better or greater, or comparing us with Jesus Christ as a person or God as a thing or whatever it is. I just said what I said and it was wrong. Or it was taken wrong. And now it's all this."

Reporter: "But are you prepared to apologize?"

John: "I wasn't saying whatever they're saying I was saying. I'm sorry I said it really. I never meant it to be a lousy anti-religious thing. I apologize if that will make you happy. I still don't know quite what I've done. I've tried to tell you what I did do but if you want me to apologize, if that will make you happy, then OK, I'm sorry."
~
Check out the Beatles Number 9 blog for the full text of the original 1966 article.

Always and Everywhere

I want to tell you about an ambitious project, a benefit to help a family through a rough time. My good friend Laura Bowman, who is an Atlanta-based painter and artist, has written and illustrated a children's book to help raise money for her friend Margie, who is suffering from cancer. Always and Everywhere is a children's book featuring Margie and her 2 kids, Claire and John Mark. It assures us that mom is always with us.

The book launch and benefit will be held Thursday, November 20, at Mason Murer Projects, 325 E. Paces Ferry Road, Atlanta, GA. and includes a book signing and silent auction of the original artwork. All proceeds go to the Margie LaSalle Cancer Fund. If you can't make the event but would still like to help the LaSalle's by purchasing a book or bidding on the artwork, please go to the website at Always and Everywhere.

Roof Whirl Away by Tom Saunders, reviewed

I'm a fan of the short story. Written a few myself. So as a reader, I appreciate the form, and like to sink my teeth into a collection as good as the latest from Tom Saunders, Roof Whirl Away, which follows his 2004 debut collection Brother, What Strange Place is This?

26 stories in all, Saunders's characters are complex, real, flawed, and people you can either relate to, or feel that you know. And if you don't, you'll know them by the end of the tale. Saunders grabs you from the get go and doesn't let go. Here is the opener to the story "Bonny Craigallen," which leads off the collection:

I don't do the violence any more. I don't use my fists and I haven't touched a gun since the business with Garner. Anger flows through me nowadays, it doesn't get stoppered-up inside, an acid to burn and scar. It's no longer necessary to what I do. But I can still remember what it was like to be a dangerous man. The authority of it. The pride. The adrenaline. To front up another fledgling hard bastard and know you've gone further, oh so much further than he has.

Powerful stuff, and a strong voice.

There are many stand out stories in Roof Whirl Away, like the touching "Lasting," which is loosely based on the life of the 19th century English naturalist and writer Richard Jefferies; or the aging rock star of "Sunburst Guitar," whose prized Hofner guitar is stolen by a teenage street performer; or the hilarious "Big," which features adult star La Hooters McDade (Martha to her friends), who just needs a little R&R, some time off from being the larger than life La Hooters McDade.

I tried to pace myself while reading this book, so I could extend the pleasure as long as possible. But that didn't always work. I'd turn the page and be onto the next story without even realizing it. Roof Whirl Away is one of those books that makes me wish I owned a book store, so I could put it up front and spread the word about it. But I guess I just did! If you are a lover of the short story, do yourself a favor and get yourself a copy.

To purchase Roof Whirl Away, click on this link:
Roof Whirl Away

Ringo is very busy

And get off my lawn, you damn kids!!

Death Cab For Cutie @ Radio City

In my continuing Death Cab For Cutie obsession, I went to see them live at Radio City Music Hall Monday night. Here is a pic I took with my cell phone:

Even with a crappy, low-res cell phone picture, it looks like I was pretty close to the stage, right? Well how does FIRST ROW grab you? And the amazing thing is, I bought this ticket on Saturday. How did that happen? You got me. The seat was actually in a section they called "the pit," which consisted of about four or five rows that were actually in front of the normal front row. Maybe it was added at the last minute, I don't know. But hey, I'm not complaining.

Oh, and by the way, they were great!

I will possess your heart

OK, I've been obsessed with Death Cab For Cutie lately. If you're not familiar with them, check out this video for I Will Possess Your Heart, the first single off of their new cd Narrow Stairs.

Roof Whirl Away by Tom Saunders

Tom Saunders, one of my favorite authors, has just released his second collection of short stories, Roof Whirl Away. It follows his 2004 debut collection Brother, What Strange Place is This?

Spike magazine said this about Saunders's writing:
"One is tempted to view Saunders as a musician first and a writer second because his stories ring like fine crystal."

From the back cover description of Roof Whirl Away:
...The stories in this book are both varied and stylish, with a whole range of vivid characters caught in moments of reverie, indecision and drama.

Yeah! I just received my autographed copy in the mail, and I can't wait to dive in! I'll post a review when I'm done.

To purchase, click on this link:
Roof Whirl Away