Announcing a month of book giveaways! Day 28

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Game of Cages will be coming out on the last day of the month, so I’ve decided to hold a special month of book giveaways. Every day (unless I screw up, which I probably will) I’ll give away a book or themed set of books to someone who asks for it. To enter, you have to comment on this blog or on my LiveJournal–email, Facebook, and Twitter won’t count, and if more than one person speaks up, I’ll roll a die to determine the recipient. U.S. residents only, please.

You get a new book every day, and on the last day of the month I’ll give away my own.

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A mystery/thriller sample pack! Anyone want them?

Update: These books have been won.

Aren’t I a fun date?

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Last night we had a surprise baby-sitter[1], which means it was date-night with my wife. We had a terrific dinner at Palermo’s in Ballard, did a little boring shopping, then walked around the neighborhood having an actual uninterrupted conversation.

It was nice, even if I was a little distracted. I’ll admit that I’m stressed about the release of Game of Cages and we talked about that quite a bit.

You know what? I am no damn fun at all. Other writers dance around and get giddy when their books come out. All that hard work finally coming to fruition, right? But all I do is fret.

I so very much need to get over this. I’d really like to be a person who was easy-going and optimistic, but damn, that just isn’t my response.

Comments are turned off because sympathetic or encouraging responses make me uncomfortable.

[1] How I define “surprise”: We scheduled the date with her and then got so wrapped up in our lives that we forgot she was coming over.

Announcing a month of book giveaways! Day 27

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Game of Cages will be coming out on the last day of the month, so I’ve decided to hold a special month of book giveaways. Every day (unless I screw up, which I probably will) I’ll give away a book or themed set of books to someone who asks for it. To enter, you have to comment on this blog or on my LiveJournal–email, Facebook, and Twitter won’t count, and if more than one person speaks up, I’ll roll a die to determine the recipient. U.S. residents only, please.

You get a new book every day, and on the last day of the month I’ll give away my own.

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A seven-pack of John LeCarre. If I had Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy to offer, I’d have the whole “Karla” trilogy. As it is, you’ll have to settle for these. They’re pretty wonderful, and not at all like Bond-style action-thrillers.

Writing, Health Care, and Job Lock

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I was going to write about this later, but I just had a woman cry on the phone to me about this, so I don’t want to put it off any longer.

I’m a writer. (No kidding, right? Check out the images of book covers all over my website.) As a pro, I get all sorts of things from Random House, my publisher: I get deadlines, and publication dates, and a smart editor who gives me fantastic notes, and a copyeditor who cares about the difference between “among” and “between”, and publicity, and front-of-store displays, and a beautifully-designed book (seriously, wait till you see the inside of GAME OF CAGES) and I get those covers. Did I mention the covers?

What I don’t get from Random House is health and dental benefits for my family. Continue reading

Announcing a month of book giveaways! Day 26

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Game of Cages will be coming out on the last day of the month, so I’ve decided to hold a special month of book giveaways. Every day (unless I screw up, which I probably will) I’ll give away a book or themed set of books to someone who asks for it. To enter, you have to comment on this blog or on my LiveJournal–email, Facebook, and Twitter won’t count, and if more than one person speaks up, I’ll roll a die to determine the recipient. U.S. residents only, please.

You get a new book every day, and on the last day of the month I’ll give away my own.

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Men’s adventure novels! Three “Killmaster” novels, two “Executioner” novels, and one “Dirty Harry” media tie-in novel. Does anyone want them?

Update: These books have been won.

Randomness for 8/25

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1) Hobo Superman, and the sad superheroes of Latvia.

2) Hungover owls. Tumblr has reached its apotheosis.

3) I don’t usually link to “books as construction material” items, mainly because I don’t see the appeal of having walls you want to read but can’t, however this mushroom garden, where the books are both structure and food for the mushrooms, is pretty compelling.

4) Occasionally I’ll see aspiring writers say things like “Don’t pro writers see all sides of a situation? Aren’t they a little wishy-washy?” Really, though, no. Almost all the writers I run into have very strong opinions, most of them dopey. (Warning, that link is aggravating.)

5) Former RNC Chairman and Bush campaign manager Ken Mehlmen comes out of the closet.

And:

6) Remember the “I’m Sorry” people at the last Chicago Pride Parade? The ones with signes that read “I’m sorry that Christians judge you,” “I’m sorry the way churches have treated you,” and “I used to be a bible-banging homophobe, sorry.”? Yeah? Well it turned out to be more “Love the Sinner, Hate the Sin” bullshit. Sorry, people who hoped for better.

7) On a lighter note: Library books thwart purse-snatcher. Good thing that old guy wasn’t reading books on his iPad.

Announcing a month of book giveaways! Day 25

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Game of Cages will be coming out on the last day of the month, so I’ve decided to hold a special month of book giveaways. Every day (unless I screw up, which I probably will) I’ll give away a book or themed set of books to someone who asks for it. To enter, you have to comment on this blog or on my LiveJournal–email, Facebook, and Twitter won’t count, and if more than one person speaks up, I’ll roll a die to determine the recipient. U.S. residents only, please.

You get a new book every day, and on the last day of the month I’ll give away my own.

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Six Matt Helm novels. Anyone interested?

Update: These books have been won.

The Game of Cages post

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My original plan was to place all book information into one convenient post. Hah! Turns out that doesn’t work very well; there’s too much! New plan: create a dedicated page for each book.

Game of Cages is the second book in the Twenty Palaces series. (Book one is Child of Fire which came out in September, 2009 and was named to Publishers Weekly’s list of best 100 books of 2009). Check out this Chris McGrath cover:

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God, I love that cover. You know what? The inside of the book is gorgeous, too.

The series follows Ray Lilly, an ex-con and former car thief press-ganged in to working for the Twenty Palace society. There are, scattered around the world, a small number of spells and spell books. The magic they allow people to do is often dangerous, but nothing is as risky as the summoning spells that let sorcerers to summon strange, extradimensional beings to our world.

These beings, which the society calls predators, view our world as a fresh hunting ground and see humans as prey.

The Twenty Palace Society hunts these creatures–and the people who summon them–with brutal, ruthless zeal. While Ray is not exactly the nicest guy in the world, he’s a saint compared to the society members he’s forced to work with.

In Game of Cages, Ray is given an emergency job–a predator is going to be auctioned off, and some of the wealthiest and most dangerous people in the world have gathered at a remote mountain mansion to place their bids. Unfortunately, the sale goes wrong and the creature escapes into the small town below with the bidders in close pursuit. Can Ray destroy the predator before it destroys the town?

It already has a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly. Read the first chapter here, the second chapter here and the third chapter here.

Order the book right now from:

| Amazon.com | Barnes & Noble | Book Depository (free int’l shipping!) | Books a Million | Borders | Indiebound | Kobo | Mysterious Galaxy| Powell’s Books |

And be sure to look for book 3 in the series, CIRCLE OF ENEMIES, out now.

Announcing a month of book giveaways! Day 24

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Game of Cages will be coming out on the last day of the month, so I’ve decided to hold a special month of book giveaways. Every day (unless I screw up, which I probably will) I’ll give away a book or themed set of books to someone who asks for it. To enter, you have to comment on this blog or on my LiveJournal–email, Facebook, and Twitter won’t count, and if more than one person speaks up, I’ll roll a die to determine the recipient. U.S. residents only, please.

You get a new book every day, and on the last day of the month I’ll give away my own.

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There is no excuse for combining these two books in one giveaway, but there you are. Any takers?

Update: These items have been won.

Randomness for 8/23

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1) Medieval copy protection: Sometimes people come to me and ask, “How did medieval filmmakers protect their DVDs from piracy?”

2) Choose (or create) wake up music for NASA astronauts on the last space shuttle mission. via @seattlegeekly

3) Reading, all around the world.

4) The Freedom of the Road wasn’t free for everyone.

5) Small countertop machine turns plastic back into oil Video. Put some solar panels on the top of that bad boy and I’m happy.

6) Why SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD bombed at the box office. “People say it’s become cool to be a geek. That’s not true. People have just started applying the word geek to cool people. Hipsters aren’t geeks and geeks aren’t rock musicians and rock musicians aren’t old school gamers”

7) Brandon Sanderson’s long-awaited WAY OF KINGS available at a charity auction. The charity benefits Doctors Without Borders. Spread the word!