Brian "Elvis" Lumley

Brian Lumley makes one hell of an Elvis. I love this guy!

Storming the Castle

My agent emailed me to "Have fun storming the castle." When I read the words, I heard the voice of the woman who said it in Princess Bride. So we did. And it was awesome. We stormed the castle today! Billy Crystal would have been proud. It's quite the amazing place. Loved the dungeon. Loved the inside room tours with all the period furniture and stuff. Absolutely loved the falcon and eagle demonstration. The two bald eagles and the seas eagles were about as impressive as anything I've... ever seen. Bought bus tickets for tomorrows return to London. About to go out to dinner at Catalans. Gonna have venison steak, I think.

In England!!

Part I. Brighton is a blast. So many cool people to spend time with and not enough time to spend. Shouts out to Mike McCarty, Bill Breedlove, Brett Savory, Gemma Files, Martel Sardina, Simon Clark, Monica Kuebler, Gard, Tim Lebbon, Michael Marshall Smith, Hank Schwaeble, Mike Cavillo, Paul Wilson and too many more to m...ention. Also props to Rio Youers, Vincent Chong, Matt Riley, and Jenni and Jon from Abaddon Books.

Part II. Did I tell you that they had advanced reading copies of EMPIRE OF SALT? Looks awesome. It feels amazing to hold this novel in my hands. They also have a six foot banner. Check it out in the pictures. Besides friends and my novel, lots and lots of English and Irish Beer, and a legendary consumption of Brighton Beach Dominoes Pizza by myself and Tim Lebbon capped a superb first convention night.

Part III. I did not win the Bram Stoker Award for Best Short Story, but I had a great time anyway. I presented the award for First Novel along with Sarah Pinborough. Her plan was for us to snog (she had to explain that to me. As it turns out, snogging would have resulted in a swift and final death for me at the hands of one Ms. Yvonne Navarro. I did however, when we were called, run op to the microphone. At the top of my lungs I shouted "Welcome to the First Annual Stephen Jones Elvis Impersonator Transvestite Brighton England All You Can Eat Fish Eating Contest!" I had raised hands and devils horns on each hand. The room was totally silent. Then I whispered, "Oops. Sorry. That's next week's speech." Hilarity ensued.

Later on in the evening I got Brian Lumley to wear my Elvis shades and got a picture of him beside me. It doesn't get better than that.

After that we left Brighton. Caught a ride with Tim Lebbon which saved us loads of time and money. He was heading to N. Wales and dropped us in Warwick. Found the B&B too easily. Great Tudor home. The town is perfect. Quaint. Castles. Cathedrals. And so much more. Taking lots of pictures, but having power issues over here. We had Indian food last night. Best Indian food I have EVER had at Golden Saffron. Yummers! Castle visit today. And the Dungeon! They have a trebuchet. How cool is that?

Interviewed at Abaddon

I've been interviewed by British author, Pat Kelleher, over at Abaddon Books. I talk about writing, horror, zombies, and the like. It's a pretty fun interview.

INTERVIEW

Hey all of You!

Pictures from the Tucson Festival of Books later. I left my camera in the car at the airport, so you'll just have to wait. Plus, since I can't post pics, I've decided to give you as much as a running video blog as possible. So far I have to links. My first day, and when I wake up to snow!



...and the next

Altar of All Elvis

My novel Blaze of Glory sold out in Limited Edition. Published by Bloodletting Press, it has supersoaker green end papers. Wish there were more to sell. Let me know if someone gets their hands on one.

Also, it's good to know that all is well in the world. I just sacrificed three of them a the Altar of All Elvis. What? Doesn't everyone have an animatronic Elvis?

SMASHWORDS HAS A DISCOUNT PROMOTION:

Special ebook promotion. 25% OFF. Use the code RAE25 at checkout
for 25% off during our site-wide promotion! (Offer good thru Mar. 13, 2010)

My novella BUTTERFLY WINTER now costs only $1.19

Through fields of dead flowers under a red-gray sky, the children dance, arms flapping like the wings of dying butterflies. Desperate to hearken in the city of Dali’s famed Butterfly Spring, they spin and jump as best they can, sometimes falling, sometimes staggering. No longer are they the children who rushed towards the survivors' downed plane. They are forever changed. They are undone.

Valentines Day 2010

Valentines Day 2010. It's a little late for the pics, but never a little late for Romance. I took a hot young thing out to dinner at a fancy restaurant. These pictures are the evidence you all can use against me.

Sonoran Dogs

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106366080
Sonoran Hotdogs. Mmmm.

"The Sonoran hot dog may take the phrase "with everything" to new heights. It starts with a hot dog wrapped in bacon. Then you begin piling on the beans, grilled onions, fresh onions, tomatoes, mayonnaise, cream sauce, mustard and jalapeno salsa. Add radishes, cucumbers, whole chilies and even mushrooms, if you want."

Tucson Festival of Books

I'm going to be at the Tucson Festival of Books this year. I was supposed to be there last year, but had to travel to Europe. I almost missed it this year too. I'll be there Saturday, but on Sunday I'll be scrunched into an airplane seat on my way to Romania. But here's my schedule on Saturday:

Vampires, Zombies and Monsters
Panel / Sat 2:30 PM - 03:30 PM
Koffler - Room 204

Here's more information about the Festival:

Every spring, the University of Arizona campus transforms into a platform for Arizona’s largest literary event, the Tucson Festival of Books. This annual function supports the advancement of literacy efforts in Southern Arizona through local sponsors, including the University of Arizona and UA BookStores. Their generous contributions directly benefit Pima County Public Libraries and local literacy programs such as the Reading Seed. Free and open to the public, this two day festival endorses the community celebration of reading and knowledge by featuring hundreds of authors, publishers, and exhibitors.

During its 2009 debut, Billy Collins, Diane Gabaldon, J.A. Jance, Elmore Leonard, and Luis Alberto Urrea were among the 450 authors who attended the Tucson Festival of Books. 800 volunteers assisted over 50,000 guests as they made their way through the 19 indoor and 5 outdoor venues. The 24 stages featured author conversations, panels, workshops, and entertainment for children as well as adults.

The Festival of Book returns March 13 and 14! Peruse the UA BookStores events via the navigation on the right, or visit http://tucsonfestivalofbooks.com/ for complete festival information.

The Tucson Festival of Books is sponsored by the Arizona Daily Star, one of the Southwest’s most honored newspapers, and the University of Arizona, the region’s leading public research university. It is planned and staged by an all-volunteer group of Tucson community, commercial, civic and educational leaders. Proceeds from the event benefit literacy efforts in Southern Arizona.

Event organizers have begun lining up authors, sponsors, vendors and volunteers for the sequel. Their goal is to top last year’s spectacular figures:

The 99 Stages of Writer's Anticipation

What do you do when your agent sends out manuscripts? Do you pray to something? Do you huddle in a corner with your favorite blanky and pray to the great god Bacardi? Maybe you just sit back and ignore the whole process, as if it's way beyond you and nothing you can do could help serendipity either way.

I go through 99 stages of anticipation every time this happens. Here they are.

Stage 1. There's a moment when I feel an unholy elation as if in a matter of seconds I will be transported to the mountaintop where all the real good writers live and I'll be told the secrets to publishing. Later, we'll sit around smoking a blunt, drinking red wine from bota bags, listening to Donna Summer and telling stories about when I was but a struggling writer.

Stage 2. Reality hits me square between the eyes and I remember that the odds of getting hit by a car are better than being published.

Stage 3. I act nonplussed, too-cool-for-school, what-me-worry, who's-afraid-of-the-big-bad-wolf-bad-ass and stare down my nose at the world like I'm French and you're not.

Stage 4. I begin looking at traffic wondering if getting hit by a car will make me feel as if the universe knows I exist.

Stage 5. I tell someone, usually Yvonne, who acts authentically pleased, but my mind creates a maddening cartoon visage over he face that says something like, "You poor poor sap. You want to be famous. Take out the garbage. That will make you famous. Write a note to the trash collector. You'll be even more famouser, asshole."

Stage 6. I believe in god for 7.2 seconds.

Stage 7. I email my agent, realizing that only an hour has passed, delete the email, retype it to try and act as if I'm not desperate, delete it, retype it again, the close out the email program before I can actually press send. Then I sit back feeling pathetic.

Stage 8. I play in traffic for awhile.

Stage 9. I consider praying to the dark gods, getting a fetish, learning a new religion, trying yoga, painting henna tattoos on my body, and running naked in the moonlight. I don't actually do any of these things because I'm dreadfully afraid that I might, in a moment of weakness, stumble into the one religion that actually works and be trapped forever.

State 11. I slam my head into a sink filled with ice water.

Stage 12. Fuck it. I grab a glass of wine and begin praying to all my writing fetishes. I pray to my statue of Grifter. I spin my dangly stuffed pufferfish. I touch my Velvet Jesus. I turn on my animatronic Elvis and pretend he's talking to me. I wobble my hula girl. And I whisper dirty little sex secrets to Shardik Jones and his Harem of Barbies, wondering if when become rich and famous if he'll still be the same old stuffed bear lech that he always is and act them out on the floor of my office.

Stage 13. I wake up in a pool of vomit, an imprint of B-H-N-J-M-K on my face. Wine bottles litter the floor. Barbies are splayed everywhere. Shardik looks satisfied. I feel strange and I can't find my underwear.

Stage 14. I throw up.

Stage 15. Three hours have passed since my agent submitted my novel. I email him and ask him if he's received anything yet. He responds a little too quickly with the word "no." I feel pathetic, but act French so no one can tell.

Stage 16. I write a blog about Writer's Anticipation.

Stage 17. I pick up the Barbies before someone actually sees them, but I can't look them in the eye. Shardik grins wickedly the whole time. I wonder if he has pictures.

Stage 18 - 98. Repeat some variations of the previous seventeen stages over and over again, until I either get arrested, my wife begs me to stop, or my agent emails me with news so I can move on, or some combination thereof.

Stage 99. By now I've literally forgotten what I wrote so if it's accepted it comes as a surprise to me that I even wrote it, and if it gets rejected, who cares because I forgot about it anyway. I continue to act French. I still can't find my underwear. But all is good in Weston Land. There's a new book to write and verbs to conjugate. Barbies are all in bubble wrap until the next submission. Shardik sits on the shelf and every now and then I can hear him whisper, "Hubba Hubba." My keys begin to clackity clack as my writing gets back on track. "Hubba Hubba," I whisper back to Shardik. Welcome to the Jungle jumps out of my speakers. Fuck anticipation. If it happens it happens.