Come See Me at Awesome Con

So what are you doing the weekend of April 26-28th? If you’re planning to be in D.C., you should check out Awesome Con downtown at the convention center. If you’re not planning to be in D.C., you should plan to be in D.C. and come check out Awesome Con downtown at the convention center

I will have a table (Q-09) in Artist Alley with three other local writers: Nick DeWolf, Slade Grayson, and E.J. Wenstrom. We’re going to be planted across from Wild Bill’s Olde Fashioned Soda, which I’ve never heard of, but I think it’s reasonable to assume Wild Bill knows how to party. I mean, his name is Wild Bill. We’ll also be adjacent to Dark Horse Comics, which, cool!

Friday evening, Nick, E.J., and I will be on a panel of local writers with Neil Cohen, David Salkin, and Alton Simpson, so you should come ask us questions. “Ask us questions” may also be read as “heckle us.” Earlier that day, E.J.’s on another panel, and then Neil has one on entrepreneurship on Sunday. Mostly, I’ll just be hanging out, enjoying the con, and hoping I get to meet some cool people (and hopefully sell a few books).

If you decide to come, please swing by and say hello. Mention this blog post, and get a free bookmark!

D.C.-Local Author Panel at Awesome Con

This Sunday, at Awesome Con in Washington, D.C., I’ll be on a panel of local authors at 11 a.m. I thought a lot about how to get people as interested in coming as I am in participating, and I realized the best thing to do was provide the basis for why I’m excited to hang out with five other D.C.-local authors: they’re all intriguing writers and people that you should get to know, and I think if you know a little bit about them, you may decide to come hang out with us.

So, please humor me while I say some nice things about my friends.

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Pulling Strings by Nick DeWolf

PULLING STRINGS is easily one of my favorite novels of 2017. Not only is it smart and meaningful, but it’s also fun as hell. It is a novel in that place where genre fiction and literary fiction blend, a novel you might see a literature professor and his or her student run into each other and discover they have something in common.

The synopsis goes something like this: Agent Colt has a psychic ability to fire kinetic mind bullets from her fingers. She’s a legend at the Department of Scientific Investigation (which doesn’t exist … but it could!), and she has led a storied career that the new recruits talk about in hushed tones. Now, however, she’s approaching retirement, working a cushy detail out of a field office in Middle America. It’s boring compared to her heyday. Then a new case comes in, and she thinks it could be her swan song. Little does she know the target she’s hunting is the most dangerous psychic she’s ever encountered.

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Frightfully Ever After by Nick DeWolf

Frightfully Ever After

Concept: Everything from Western fairy tales, fables, and myths is real. The powers of good and evil, light and dark, are locked in an eternal struggle that goes all the way back to the beginning of time. A modern day woman finds herself wrapped up in the war as she discovers she has the power of influence, to command the light and the dark, but the other side of that coin is she has become a target.

Execution: Do nothing that is obvious. Subvert expectations time and again. Build a rich, alluring world that incorporates fantastical elements of old Anglo-Saxon cultures to modern urban contemporaries. Create unique characters based on familiar ideas. Entertain. Stimulate the intellect. Cut the fat and reject nonsense. Tell a simple, powerful story that’s never been told before.

My experience in reading Frightfully Ever After by Nick DeWolf had a recurring theme, which was to be continually impressed by how incredibly imaginative it is. Originality and creativity are planted firmly in the driver’s seat. In trying to analyze the experience, I kept thinking of words like “alluring,” “captivating,” and “immersive.” I’ll no doubt use those words multiple times as I write this.

Though not a tome—and by fantasy standards, it’s relatively short—it secretes imagination. Cracking this book open, breaking its spine for the first time, I had to wonder if this thing was bound in the bone marrow of Beowulf or Edgar Allan Poe.

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