Have You Met...? Monday (#5): Carly Slater

This week's spotlight falls on another fantastic person I know - the indefatigable Carly Slater! 

I first met Carly through our mutual time working on staff for Seattle's Emerald City Comic Con, where she made a powerful impression on me. She's a great example of the kind of resolve and focus you have to have to make your way through a popular industry - determination, quick-thinking and strong elegance. As I've made my own way from college slacker to semi-professional professional, I can tell you in no uncertain terms that this is no easy feat. 

Her list of accomplishments and accolades are too long to mention here - so I'll direct you to explore her impressive credentials chronicled here. And for the more personal side of her, here's her website - - check it out. If you're curious to see the face of one of our next business leaders, she better be one of them. If not her, then hopefully her clone. 

In short - - if you need something done, if you need to find a networking connection, Carly should be the first person on your list. If she can't do it, she'll know someone who can. And if she doesn't already know someone who can, just give her a minute. 

Most Important Advice?

Okay, I'll be the first to admit I'm not the most veteran author/publisher in the room; but one of the questions I get is for what advice I'd give to new or aspiring authors. It's a fair question, if not a bit broad. My answer....well, it's many answers, all depending on where you are in the process. In light of that, it made me think it's time for a new list. 

Yay lists!

1. Stop using the word "aspiring" in this context. An "aspiring author" just means you'd really like to have a book published someday. Now, all things being equal, twenty years ago the phrase "aspiring author" made a lot of sense. You could be a writer but, not yet having found an agent or a publisher, your options were incredibly limited. Today, however, with the self-publishing offerings available, anyone can get their material published. So, please stop aspiring. Do it. Don't make me quote Yoda, because I totally will.

2. You should be writing. In the famous advice of, well, pretty much everybody, "Write, Write, Write!" Don't just send your manuscript off and wait impatiently for the phone to ring. Take a little bit of time to appropriately celebrate that big milestone, and then get back to work. Always look for ways to improve your writing skills, and never be too afraid of self-examination. A little fear, sure, is natural. But don't let it stop you.

3. Take it Seriously. Being an author is just like being any kind of other thing which is roughly job-shaped. It requires work, discipline, and, these days includes things like business savvy, networking skills and the ability to engage in "people time." Don't expect anyone else to magically do it for you. Nobody's going to be your sherpa. 

4. Don't take it TOO seriously. It's not a race, it's not a contest, and if you don't end up becoming the next J K Rowling or Charles Dickens, don't let it crush you. The fact is, there's already been one J K Rowling and one Charles Dickens, so be content to be the next YOU. And if you don't manage to create the next Great American Novel... well, honestly, I hope that's not your actual aspiration. Write what you enjoy. Or, if your goal is commercial success, write what will make you money. But either way you go, it's essential that you accept that you might not make the sort of commercial success or general recognition you may have as your goal. The number of variables in having the right book at the right time, delivered in the right way... well, I'm just saying a lot of us authors haven't yet quit our day jobs. Think long, plan well, be patient. 

5. Get to know...everybody and everything. The new key to getting things going in this age of the internet is getting yourself out there. Meet other authors, meet other artists, learn the business and offer your services. Also, do your homework. A lot of what I've learned was gleaned right off the internet, through a variety of help sites and instructions from the pioneers who had gone on before, but also a great deal of it was through fantastic and miraculous mentors and friends who I've been privileged to know as I've gone along. 

6. Live. One of my college professors gave me the advice which would later (and since) become my life's motto: "Experience everything." When you feel the cold, dead fingers of "writer's block" start to creep around your heart, get away from the business of expressing and get out into the world and drink it in. Watch the sun come up, watch it go down. Do the same with the moon. Smell the rain. Dance. Close your eyes and listen to the world turn. Talk to a stranger. Watch people. Go someplace you've never been. Look into silence, and breathe in that which looks back. Yeah, be a little zen in your being. The stories are there, you just have to let them wash over you. You're the pen. Life is the ink.

Whatever your medium, telling stories is the distilled essence of any artform. Being an author just means you've had that artistic work created. Being published is just one form of construction, whether it's through a corporate publishing house, using a structured service provider, or doing it all yourself. Whether you want to write your story and share it with family and friends, keep a copy all to yourself on your bookshelf, or put it out into the world for all to see, decide what it is you want and get it done. Just like every path starts with a single step, every story starts with a single word.

Write it.

Have You Met... Monday (#4): Jenny Dantes

Today's post is for the fabulous Jenny Dantes! Ever meet those people in some random fashion and just realize that they're incredible, like in the first two seconds? Jenny is one of those people. If you've EVER met her, you know what I'm talking about. Also, she knows her sake - that alone is worth taking the time to get to know her. But, as the game show voice says, that's not all!

Jenny is an artist, whose focus is on nerdy pop culture. I'm a fan of nerdy pop culture in general, and in Jenny's case, she pretty much covers all my favorites. So, yes, I'm automatically a fan of her work anyway.

Go check her Inferno Creations Etsy site out if you're not local to the Pacific Northwest (or even if you are), and or also go check out her FaceBook page to see her schedule of appearances at local markets and more deets about the Amazing Dantes! 

What do you want to be when you grow up?

I can't even remember the first time I was asked that question. I know I can't remember it, because my mom wrote about it in my baby book. I was clearly pretty young, but she asked me about it, because I guess that's what you do to your kids as a way to figure out exactly how grown up they already are. Sort of a mental calibration similar in concept to marking off their growth progress on the wall with little tick marks.

"Walk? Check. Toilet trained? Check. Tie shoes? Check. Knows what they want to be when they grow up? Hmm... okay, still working on that one."

My father was a fireman. He's retired now, but I remember him coming home from his 24-hour shifts, looking so much more exhausted than I thought I'd ever be personally capable. He was always (and remains) my own personal superhero, and he was a fireman for many years. It was his job. It became his career.

It was a wildly different world, then - after your education, you eventually found your way into a job, which you often pursued until the day you retired. Many people had that one job for a lifetime. Me, I've had several jobs - two of which have lasted nine and 12 years, respectively. Writing, on the other hand, has been something I've pursued since I was much, much younger. Well back before I even realized people would actually pay you to write down your stories.

I'd thought back then it was going to be comic books - and perhaps someday it still could be. But I've told stories in a variety of mediums - music, acting, drawing and so on. But writing, well, it just stuck. Sometimes, that's just how it works, I suppose.

All the same, I don't feel so much like I've grown up as much as I've just grown. I'm older, but still learning, still figuring these things out, still a bit impatient, still somehow managing to find silver linings in every cloud. And I'm all right with that. It's an adventure, this life of ours. Might as well spend every available moment soaking it in.

Oh, and in case you were wondering what I told my mother when she asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, it's simple.

I wanted to be Spider Man.

Have You Met...? Monday (# 3): Sonya Lea

... Sonya Lea? 

When you're any kind of artist, every so often you come across someone who is so faithful and meticulously skilled at their craft that you have no choice but to at least momentarily ask yourself what the hell you're doing trying to call yourself an artist. Sonya was that person to me. She's absolutely, simply, and non-hyperbolically a fantastic writer, and, in addition to that, a wonderful person. Her focus currently is in screenplays, but her writing in all mediums is... well, is breathtaking a hyperbole? Probably. But it still fits, so I'm standing by it.

We crossed paths a few years ago, and I was introduced to her story, which I won't share here so much as direct you to her site so you can learn about it from her own words. Simply put, Sonya does with words what a ballet dancer does with the laws of gravity. For you fellow writers out there, you are no doubt familiar with the old advice of "write what you know" - well, Sonya has taken that to a fantastic level, having culled the depth and breadth of her own deeply personal adventures and challenges into brilliant and living writings.

Also, she's involved with a fantastic crowdsourced project that you should look into. It wraps up on June 19th, so waste no moment more! Go! Go!

Free! Free, I tell you!

So, one of the great things about having digital books as an available format is that they don't take up any space in a warehouse and cost next to nothing to distribute. And that gives authors a wonderful option of being able to practically give the darn things away as a promotional thing.

So this weekend - in light of it being father's day tomorrow and being about a week plus change from one of my many birthdays (I only have one each year, but I've still had a few of them so far), I've offered a couple of my books as FREE this weekend.

First up is Hollow, a short story from the "Into the Dust" collection I created with Miss Marvel herself, Kiri Callaghan. It's part of our Dark Fantasy Peter Pan series - this one is about Faeries. Yeah, that's right. Faeries. What are you still doing here? Click the darned thing!

The other is none other than Reaper's Return , a full novel I first wrote which started the whole Steampunk series, Chronicles of Aesirium. In this book, we first meet Rom, learn about Oldtown-Against-the-Wall and we discover some of the issues facing this small down of exiles in a world where they're just trying to survive. I can't help but look fondly on this book; it's where I first got to share that world with everyone, and most importantly, where I got introduce you all to Rom, Kari, Cousins and Mulligan. Oh, and it's the first appearance of Favo Carr himself, that rogue and charming bastard. If ever there were a nerfherder, that man was it. 

So, anyway, I know it's my birthday coming up, but I got you a little something. I know I shouldn't have, but that's probably why I did it. Enjoy!