Don Pendleton's Joe Copp Mystery Series Now At Kindle

The Joe Copp Mystery Series by Don Pendleton
Featuring Southern California Hard-Boiled Private Investigator, Joe Copp.

Now Available for Kindle at amazon.com

Reviews of the original hardcover editions of the six Joe Copp Thrillers

“Pendleton has a great new character in Copp. His style is fresh, the pace is brisk, and there are enough twists to please any mystery fan.” ~St. Petersburg Times

“This Joe Copp adventure reads like an express train. A throwback to the vintage Spillane era, Pendleton knows how to keep us turning the pages.”~Publishers Weekly

“Pendleton proves again he is the equal of Mickey Spillane when it comes to the hard-boiled mystery.”~Flint Journal

“Pendleton, author of the long-running paperback Executioner series, shows in his first hardcover that hardboiled writing can be insightful as well as action-packed.”~Library Journal

“Pendleton is a master of action and dialog and ‘Copp’ is a taut detective story.” ~Milwaukee Sentinel

“A roller coaster ride of mayhem, murder...rollicking fun.”-Publishers Weekly

“Gripping...Riveting.”~Publishers Weekly

“Pendleton deserves his popularity...A real whiz-bang of a story.”~Associated Press

“Action filled...Copp is a likable tough guy...An exciting, satisfying read.”~Booklist

“A fast-moving, even blurring, story of murder behind the floodlights.”~Book World

“Pendleton, author of the highly successful The Executioner series, knows how to write high adventure tales, and Copp In Deep is just that. Good reading!” ~Abilene Reporter-News

“...this mystery with a twist...unveiled in a riveting resolution.” ~Publishers Weekly


Copp For Hire, the first of the Joe Copp, Private Eye thrillers, is a high tension, fast-moving story all the way, with Copp always in the eye of the storm and about to be engulfed in it at any moment. Characteristic of Don Pendleton’s stories, the hero is never passively involved but is the catalyst for action in straight-ahead, hard-hitting pursuit of solutions, although forever at the point of being overwhelmed by the developing situations. This is classic hardboiled detective fare, and Pendleton is a master of the form.

Copp On Ice: Don Pendleton’s Private Eye, Joe Copp, takes on the world of corruption within a sprawling community in Southern California.

Copp In Deep: In a fast-moving adventure filled with high tension and intrigue, Don Pendleton’s ex-cop turned Private Eye, Joe Copp, sinks into a world of greed and corporate corruption, treason, professional sex, and murder on demand.

Copp In The Dark: Don Pendleton plunges his private eye character, Joe Copp into the dark shadows and lower depths of legitimate theater in this fast-moving story.

Copp In Shock: Private Investigator Joe Copp finds himself recovering from a bout of partial amnesia after being nearly blown away with his own gun. A woman is dead, and Copp’s riveting search for answers leads him from Los Angeles to Mammoth Lakes mountain resort where, in his darkest hour, he is in a fierce battle with his own mind and with those who want to eliminate him.

Coming soon to Kindle, Copp on Fire by Don Pendleton.

Don Pendleton is creator of the original The Executioner: Mack Bolan Series of Action/Adventure novels and is considered the "father of the Action/Adventure" literary genre.

The novels are also available in tradepaper.

Reviews of PI Novel, Shattered Lens by Linda Pendleton

Amazon.com (temporarily) has lowered the price on my novel, Shattered Lens: Catherine Winter, Private Investigator!

I’m pleased at the response I am getting from readers about my book. When the manuscript was completed, my friend, Richard S. Prather had asked to read it. The late Richard S. Prather was a best-selling author for many years. He wrote the Shell Scott Mystery Series of forty books, very popular during the 1950s through the 1970s, with the last two Shell Scott novels published in 1986 and 1987. Not too long ago, one of his non Shell Scott books was re-issued by Hard Case Crime. I’m involved with his estate in marketing his very last manuscript, The Death Gods.

So when Prather asked to read my book I was a little anxious because he was a stickler for pacing and especially for plot. And any critique from him was valuable, very much in the same way it would have been from my late husband, Don Pendleton, and from several other well-seasoned writers.

Well, Richard loved the book and loved my character, Catherine Winter. He gave me this endorsement, “Linda Pendleton’s first private-eye novel is a brilliant debut.” He said many good things about my book and also encouraged me to write a Catherine Winter series. At that time I did not think I would write a second book.

I know Don could pick up any book and read less than a page and say whether the author was a good writer or not. I’m not sure that I can do that in reading a page of someone’s work unless it happens to be so badly written that it falls apart at first sight.

Another friend, author Jon Guenther, who has written about thirty books now, most being Don Pendleton’s Executioners and spin-off Stony Man novels, and his most recent book, Soul Runner, wrote two great reviews—one he put up at Amazon.com and the other he posted to his blog. I was thrilled with what he said about Shattered Lens.

I think you may see why....

“The hardcore mystery makes a come-back! Too many mysteries these days are little more than watered-down thrillers. At last, a whodunit in the spirit of a Sherlock Holmes mystery has returned. Linda Pendleton busts out of the gate with her first novel of licensed private investigator Catherine Winter. Winter picks up a young girl for a client--a young girl wrapped up in the glitz, drugs, and porn of Hollywood life--who shortly thereafter winds up dead. And the list of suspects is neither short nor usual.

“What makes the book so pleasurable to read outside of the brisk pace is that nothing comes easy for Winter. She has to "earn" it in the same way that Linda has earned her right to sit at the top with today's other crime writers. The inside look at Hollywood and surrounding areas rings with authenticity. As a writer, I've often been disappointed in a lot of mysteries on the shelf but I knocked this one out in no time at all. Yeah, it was just that easy. Part police procedural, part hardboiled, and all entertaining, this one's a keeper.” ~Jon Guenther, Author, Soul Runner

Here is a review from a reader:

“Great! Another page turner I couldn't put down from Linda Pendleton. I really enjoyed the main character, Catherine Winter, Private Investigator. Interesting, no nonsense, but fun, well rounded older gal. She is just as interesting and sexy as the younger ones.

“She's also a great detective. Meets up with some interesting characters to solve this crime of murder. Of course things are never as easy or clear as they seem at first. Twists and turns, a new clue, a new character, you never know what's coming. You will definitely enjoy this one.” ~Anne Boss

Amazon does not seem to tell us authors how long our book may be listed on sale but apparently from what Amazon has told me, the periodically reduce prices, and in this case my book is now reduced more than $4.00. So you can now pick it up in tradepaper back for the sales price $10.76...and for you Kindle readers, it is $8.95.

Thanks to those of you who have read it—and I love getting the great comments and reviews! It is becasue of the response I have received that I decided to write a second Catherine Winter...and hopefully it will be completed over the next few weeks.

I’ve been away from writing the story for the last week or more as I’ve been busy formatting five of Don Pendleton’s Joe Copp Private Eye novels for Kindle. More about those soon.

~Linda

Hollywood Blacklist 1947-1950s

“How can you write if you can’t cry?” ~Ring Lardner 1885 – 1933), American sports columnist, short story writer, known for his humor and satire.

When I first saw this quote I had believed it to be the Ring Lardner who had been one of the Hollywood Ten, the Blacklisted screenwriters and entertainers of the Senator Joseph McCarthy era—the House Un-American Activities Committee. But that person was screenwriter, Ring Lardner Jr., son of Ring Lardner.

More than 300 artists—including screenwriters, directors, actors, and others in the entertainment industry were blacklisted by the studios.

I’m reminded I did met a few of those writers who had been blacklisted and had their careers affected by having to testify before the Committee. Of those were film and TV screenwriters, Alfred Levitt, who appeared before the committee in 1951, and his wife Helen Slote Levitt. For nearly twenty years following the Committee appearance, they were forced to write under the pseudonyms of Tom August and Helen August. Beginning in 1988, Levitt led an effort through the Writers' Guild to correct film credits from the blacklist era, in which it became common for the work of blacklisted writers to be uncredited, or credited using pseudonyms. Numerous films have now been correctly credited due to the efforts that Alfred Levitt led.

In 1995, Alfred and Helen Levitt were awarded The Morgan Cox Award by the Writers Guild, presented to that member or group of members whose vital ideas, continuing efforts and personal sacrifice best exemplify the ideal of service to the guild.

Helen passed away in 1993 and Alfred in 2002. They were a very nice couple.

~Linda

Gen. Colin Powell on Gays in the Military

Retired General Colin L. Powell, former Secretary of State, now, 17 years later, states the "don't ask, don't tell" restrictive legislation should be repealed.

"Attitudes and circumstances have changed," Powell said. "It's been a whole generation" since the legislation was adopted, and there is increased "acceptance of gays and lesbians in society," he said. "Society is always reflected in the military. It's where we get our soldiers from." He also stated, "we've had a lot of experience watching what other nations have done."

It would have been nice if he could have come to this conclusion 17 years ago when I wrote him, along with lots of other citizens, in hopes of changing his military mind to “allow” gays to serve our country.

It is long over due. And now Gates thinks it has be “reviewed for a year.” Why? There have always been gays in the military.

We all know that. Don’t they?

~Linda

Joseph Wambaugh, Master of the Police Procedural

A former detective sergeant in the Los Angeles Police Department, Joseph Wambaugh is considered the master of the police procedural. In fact, in 2004, he was named Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America. He has written numerous best-selling novels and nonfiction, including The Onion Field.

I read several of his early books, including the nonfiction, The Onion Field, but have to admit I have not taken time to read many his later ones.

On his website under his first book, The New Centurions, he has these words:

“The New Centurions is fiction, but everything in it is real.
The New Centurions: a novel about policemen by a policeman. Tough, but compassionate, it’ll make you understand--perhaps for the first time--what it’s really like to be a cop.”

That was in 1971 when I read The New Centurions and at that time I was happily married to a Southern California cop, raising our family. And because I was a cop’s wife, I found the book to be upsetting despite the fact the work was one of fiction—and well written. Too much of it was too real and threatening to a young cop’s young wife. It was like a disturbing look behind the scenes of what often went on in a cop’s life, and what happened on the streets of Los Angeles. Down and dirty, dark and ugly, dangerous and risky. Just the sort of things you want to think about every time your husband puts on his uniform, his gun belt and badge, and goes to work, day shift, or night shift, and sometimes a different shift nearly daily, and all the while you tend to your young children, pretending that all is really going to be okay. I had been a cop’s wife for about six years at that point. He became a reserve police officer in our third year of marriage and then a full time officer two years later. He was a patrolman, a detective, a Lieutenant, a Captain, and retired out after nearly 30 years. Also at times he was Acting Chief. We had been divorced a few years before his retirement after 25 years of marriage.

I had enough exposure to the police life in a small Southern California department only miles away from Los Angeles, that I often did not like what I saw happening with the officers and their families. A lot of marriages within the department were falling apart. For some, drinking became a problem, and for others, job stress led to emotional problems, including abuse.

But all of what I did experience during those early years of my first marriage actually gave me some great "fictional" material to use in my writing. I know when my late husband, Don Pendleton and I wrote Roulette, (a story about husband and wife cops in Southern California who are faced with a serial killer invading their community) some of my “cop” knowledge was invaluable and I believe those years were also helpful in writing Shattered Lens with my PI character, Catherine Winter, set in Los Angeles and Hollywood. I’m currently working on a second Catherine Winter novel.

So possibly you can understand how the “reality” of Joseph Wambaugh’s books could be a little unsettling to any police wife. Living in Southern California, already having the Watts Riot and a few other similar situations that happened in our “neighborhood,” it only re-enforced the reality of Wambaugh’s writing, the reality of a cop’s life on the streets, and even the political influences that had to be dealt with. I wanted to read Wambaugh’s books, but then again, a part of me did not.

Those early books, The New Centurions, The Blue Knight, The Choir Boys, and others, were discussed heavily among our social group of cops and wives. From what I recall, the wives thought a little differently about the stories than the men did. I say men, because at that time I believe we only had one police woman, a detective, on the department. Any other females within the department were civilian employees, such as dispatchers or secretaries.

Wambaugh refers to his books as police dramas. That they are. His latest books are a trilogy: Hollywood Station, Hollywood Crows, and Hollywood Moon.

Watch an inteview of Joseph Wambaugh by Keith Rawson, December 10th, 2009


~Linda

Publishing Industry Magazine

I have subscribed to the publishing industry magazine Publishers Weekly since 1985, and my husband had subscribed for several years prior to that.

But this year I do not plan to renew my subscription because it is expensive and the magazine has been cut down to 52 pages, and not worth the price in my mind. I’m going to miss it as I have read it over those twenty five years with the exception of two or three months. The print subscription is $250 bucks, well actually 51 issues for $249.99. Even the online subscription is close to $200 bucks. I can get 48 weekly issues of TV Guide for $20 and receive an additional 8 copies...yes 56 issues all for $20. Big, big difference.

I’m disappointed with Publishers Weekly magazine. In January 2009, Editor in Chief, Sara Nelson was laid off and four other staffers lost their positions as Reed Business Information restructured. Reed owns Variety and I understand there were heavy layoffs there, also. I don’t currently subscribe to Variety so not sure what impact that has had on the movie industry magazine.

Prior to 2005, the former Editor in Chief of PW had been there twelve years. I’ve not liked the changes to format that have gone on, and I do not like the lack of content in the current magazines. Even the advertising from publishers has been different. Maybe because the whole industry is in a “downturn” and not spending a lot on advertising, I would guess.

Hmm, could be even more reason for writers to self publish? Amazon’s Create Space and Kindle sounds more inviting every day to authors. Especially with all the cutbacks at publishers and then apparently agents not wanting to take on much, possibly assuming books are hard to sell right now.

I did notice that nonfiction sales (which are usually very good) came down a bit and fiction went up in 2009. Nielsen BookScan gave figures for sales in 2009 and adult nonfiction was down minus –6.4 %, and adult fiction was up 0.5 %. Both juvenile nonfiction and fiction were down a little, at -0.2 % and -0.6%. Consumers also went for trade paperbacks over hardcovers, a little more than 2 to 1. Hardly a surprise with hardcover prices as high as they are.

But it shouldn’t be much of a surprise in today’s world that fiction sales are up. People want an escape and good fiction will do just that. We can escape into the world of fictional characters and "ride along" with them as the story unfolds, and be entertained, freeing us of stress, and worry. Sounds good, doesn't it?

~Linda

Elvis Presley...75

He’d be 75 years old. January 8, 1935.....the day Elvis Presley was born.

It is hard to believe all those years have passed since Elvis first sang Heartbreak Hotel in 1956, and long after his movie, Love Me Tender, hit the theatres. Tends to make one feel old!

A Sacramento radio station announced today they are changing their music format, beginning at 6:00 AM, Friday, January 8, 2010, and they will feature Elvis for the day.
K-Hits 92.1 FM "All Elvis, All Day" will debut Friday at 6 a.m., according to the station.

I have written about Elvis before, HERE and HERE.

~Linda

No Boundaries on Planet Earth

© Copyright 2010 by Ted Grussing

On Tuesday, January 5, 2010 my friend, Ted Grussing took to the air from the Sedona, Arizona airport and flew over Marble Canyon/Grand Canyon and the lava flow from SP Crater, one of several cinder cones in the area of the San Francisco Peaks volcano field, about 25 miles north of Flagstaff, Arizona. A cinder cone is a steep conical hill of volcanic fragments that accumulate around and downwind from a volcanic vent. The SP crater is said to have erupted 71,000 years ago. The lava field that flowed from the cone extends out more than four miles. The SP crater is approximately 800 feet tall and has a 400 foot deep crater. According to geologists, several of the cinder cones surrounding SP Crater are even older, indicated by the erosion they show.

© Copyright 2010 by Ted Grussing

In 1969, President Johnson made Marble Canyon a National Monument. The Grand Canyon was designated a Forest Reserve in 1893, and named a National Monument in1908, and in 1919 it became a National Park. Then in 1975 Marble Canyon became part of the Grand Canyon National Park. Grand Canyon National Park covers 1,218,375 acres. The Canyon, deeply cut by the Colorado River, is immense, averaging 4,000 feet deep for its entire 277 miles. It is 6,000 feet deep at its deepest point and 15 miles at its widest. The South Rim is 7000 feet above sea level, which means snow in winter and cool nights even in summer. Summer temperatures along the Colorado River at the Canyon bottom can reach 120º F., and the North Rim is 8000 feet above sea level and can receive snow a good part of the year.

Marble Canyon marks the western boundary of the Navajo Nation, and a few miles to the east is the Hopi Nation. Evidence of occupation of the Grand Canyon goes back more than 11,500 years, and archeologists and geologists have studied the area for decades. In 2008, archeologists excavated two sites along the Colorado River and one of the excavated sites has evidence of as many as six different human occupations over a time span of 3,500 years. The Park is also an ecological refuge, and home to numerous plant and animal species—1500 plant, 89 mammals, 47 reptile, 355 bird, 9 amphibian, and 17 fish species.

This view of the river and Canyon that Ted captured from his vantage point with his camera, shows the geological wonder that it is, even more so than standing on the rim observing from that perspective.

Ted’s flight was obviously on a beautiful day, yesterday, to have captured such sights with his camera. This is what he wrote about his photographs:

“The flight north [from Sedona Airport] to the confluence of the Little Colorado River and the Colorado River and the landscapes were beyond belief with the snow highlighting variations in the texture of the earth. The water was running a beautiful turquoise blue the last several miles of the Little Colorado River and the Colorado was running green as usual; except for a portion of the river upstream from the confluence in Marble Canyon and there due to lighting conditions it was a bluish color with reddish reflections from the canyon walls in it. The shot was taken from 10,800’ over the Confluence looking upriver. The confluence is where going upstream the canyon is denominated as Marble Canyon and downstream the Grand Canyon. There are no such boundaries visible from the air and the canyons are simply one canyon broken into two for whatever reason. That is one of the beauties of flight; you get to see the earth with no boundaries or property lines of any kind; it is simply the surface of planet earth.”

“The SP photo is the polite name for a crater that geologists gave another name to. The lava flow which appears to be several hundred feet high trails from the volcanic crater base down to the lower left of the photo. You can also see the fields of volcanic craters everywhere on the landscape ahead of us. The San Francisco peaks are upper left. The air was uncommonly stable.”

Visit Ted’s website to see more of his photography.

~Linda

Happy New Year

Happy New Year!

Here's to 2010, and a new year filled with peace, love, health, prosperity, and happiness!

Linda

Amazing: Jeff Bezos and Amazon Kindle Reader

“Amazon Kindle is the Most Gifted Item Ever on Amazon.com
On Christmas Day, for the First Time Ever, Customers Purchased More Kindle Books Than Physical Books

SEATTLE, Dec 26, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) today announced that Kindle has become the most gifted item in Amazon's history. On Christmas Day, for the first time ever, customers purchased more Kindle books than physical books. The Kindle Store now includes over 390,000 books and the largest selection of the most popular books people want to read, including New York Times Bestsellers and New Releases.

"We are grateful to our customers for making Kindle the most gifted item ever in our history," said Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com. "On behalf of Amazon.com employees around the world, we wish everyone happy holidays and happy reading!"

On Amazon's peak day, Dec. 14, 2009, customers ordered over 9.5 million items worldwide, which is a record-breaking 110 items per second.”

Read these incredible Amazon stats.

I sold some of my Kindle books and regular print books during this holiday season.

For those of you who purchased a Kindle Reader and are looking for books to upload, check my variety out on my Kindle Page.

And for those of you without a Kindle, like me, take a look at my print books.

Happy reading....

~Linda

The E-Book Battle

This Sunday article in the Washington Post addresses some of the publishing issues I have written about, i.e.: e-books, book prices, the industry ignoring what readers desire, and what writers want in regards to fair royalties. You can also add Print On Demand to this as e-books often have POD availability.

Here are some excerpts from the article:

E-books spark battle inside the publishing industry
By Marion Maneker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, December 27, 2009

“The evolution of publishing from print to digital has caused a schism in the reading world. There are now two constituencies: readers (and writers) on the one hand, and the publishing world on the other. And they don't want to hear each other.”

“Readers want books that are plentiful and cheap, publishers want to preserve their profit, and authors want a larger share of revenue. The conflict has created a strident internecine battle inside the publishing industry.”

...”Publishers can no longer be vast containers of intellectual property distributed in paper form to bookstores, supermarkets and warehouse clubs. But they don't have to be: They can become highly selective distributors to bookstores, supermarkets and price clubs. That's the lesson of the television, music and movie businesses.”

“But if the publishers want a role in the e-books business, they'll need to get over it and get on with it, embracing lower-priced e-books with higher author royalties. That seems unlikely. Because it's now clear that publishers just don't want to listen to what their customers are telling them.”

Read the complete Washington Post article.

See my previous post on ebooks, self-publishing, Kindle.

Unease in the Publishing World

Pixels and Fonts, E-books and E-book Readers

Publishing With Kindle

~Linda

The Unease in the Publishing World

"Nothing endures but change." - Heraclitus

Many authors are moving away from traditional publishing and going to self-publishing. This last month there was outrage in the publishing industry because Harlequin and another publisher now have a branch of their companies dealing in self-publishing.

Kevin Weiss is CEO of Author Solutions, the company who owns the self-publishing companies such as Exlibris, Author House, and iUniverse (who I have published several books with in 2000 and 2002, in addition to putting 12 of my late husband, Don Pendleton’s books back in print with their program in association with the Authors Guild, Inc.).

I’m not necessarily recommending an author choose to go the self publishing route without doing some research of the idea, but as I have written I have been upset by the attitude of publishers and many agents who believe a self-published author is not worthy of regular, traditional publishing and is not a professional. And I am also perturbed by the same attitude of author organizations, such as the Mystery Writers of America, who will not allow membership in the organization unless an author has been published by a company they consider to be a traditional publisher. I consider those attitudes to be elitist and unreasonable.

I must say I agree with what Kevin Weiss states in his video, and in my last blog I talked about Jeff Bezos’ Amazon and the Kindle Reader.

Change is happening in the industry and there is resistance. I doubt we’re going to go backwards so everybody might as well surrender to it instead of fighting it. It is time for change. And readers who are not spending $30 on a hardcover book should be giving publishers a hint. And millions spent on advances, especially celebrity advances, are not being recovered.

Seems there is a message there.

Let's see what 2010 brings....

~Linda

Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and the Kindle Reader

Jeff Bezos has always intrigued me with his innovative ideas and visionary approach to his business, Amazon.com, which he launched in 1994. I previously wrote about him and his company here.

When asked in a December, 2009 Newsweek article (by Daniel Lyons) about the success and broadening of his business, Jeff Bezos stated, “We learn whatever skills we need to service the customer. We build whatever technology we need to service the customer. The second thing is, we are inventors, so you won't see us focusing on "me too" areas. We like to go down unexplored alleys and see what's at the end. Sometimes they're dead ends. Sometimes they open up into broad avenues and we find something really exciting.

Of course his latest exciting adventure is the successful Kindle reader, but Kindle didn’t happen overnight according to Bezos. He said this about the development of the Kindle: “It's been on the market for two years, but we worked on it for three years in earnest before that. We talked about it for a year before that. We had to go hire people to build a hardware--engineering team to build the device. We had to acquire new skills. There's a tendency, I think, for executives to think that the right course of action is to stick to the knitting—stick with what you're good at. That may be a generally good rule, but the problem is the world changes out from under you if you're not constantly adding to your skill set.”

You see what I mean about a visionary attitude, and the guts to take risks and move forward?

I was somewhat surprised by the stats he gave on the success of the Kindle and his comment that he was “astonished” by the success of the Kindle. “Two years ago, none of us expected what has happened so far. It is [our] No. 1 bestselling product. It's the No. 1 most-wished-for product as measured by people putting it on their wish list. It's the No. 1 most-gifted item on Amazon. And I'm not just talking in electronics—that's true across all product categories. We've spent years working on our physical books business, and today, for titles that have a Kindle edition, Kindle book sales are 48 percent of the physical sales. That's up from 35 percent in May. The business is growing very quickly. This is not just a business for us. There is missionary zeal. We feel like Kindle is bigger than we are.”

Apparently Bezos believes that physical books are on their way out...although he admits he does not know how long that will take but they have had a five hundred year run. He stated, “Given how much change there has been everywhere else, what's remarkable is how stable the book has been for so long. But no technology, not even one as elegant as the book, lasts forever.”

I personally do not have a Kindle yet....maybe one day, but I am so interested because I am now selling 10 items through Kindle (fiction and nonfiction). I am making sales in the two to four months that my works have been available in that format. To hear that the Kindle book sales are nearly half of the Amazon book sales, sounds pretty good to me.

I’ve always get a kick out of Jeff Bezos’ humor and laughter. Maybe his attitude has helped him to succeed and laugh at the obstacles, ups and downs, and challenges along the way.

He seems to be enjoying the journey...

He dares to risk...

Maybe we all need to do more of that.

~Linda

"Blue Christmas," Elvis Presley and Martina McBride

“Rock and roll music, if you like it, if you feel it, you can't help but move to it. That's what happens to me. I can't help it.” ~Elvis Presley (1935-1977)



Amazing what can be done with our technology.

Here is Elvis singing Blue Christmas with Martina McBride. Elvis’ performance is from the NBC TV 1968 “Comeback Special.” Copyright (C) 2008 Sony BMG Music Entertainment.

~Linda

Creating Fictional Characters

“The writer is always working from his own individual world view, whatever the subject, so an honest writer cannot conceal himself in the work no matter how hard he may try to do so.” ~Don Pendleton (1927–1995)

A friend asked me the other day if my new fictional character, Private Investigator, Catherine Winter, from my book, Shattered Lens, was modeled after anyone I know. My answer was, “Not really.”

Catherine Winter is a strong woman, dedicated to her work, trusting of her intuition, and has seen it all...horrific murders, corruption, the corporate evils, the drugs, illicit sex, and downfalls of well-known celebrities and politicians.

She’s in her early sixties, a Southern California Private Investigator who has been in the business for many years, working alongside her husband in their PI Agency. After he passed away seven years ago, she kept the business going and feels she couldn’t give up her investigative work and cannot even conceive of doing anything else.

She has said, “As long as arthritis doesn’t lock up my joints or cataracts don’t keep my eyes from hitting the bulls-eye with a .357 slug then my shingle will stay on my door—C. Winter, Private Investigator.”

She also said this: “In this business you try your best to harden yourself to looking death straight in the eye but every time you are forced to face it you realize how damn vulnerable each of us are.”

I like the fictional characters I put in my novels...even the bad guys I create. I am now writing a second Catherine Winter novel, and I never know what characters will pop in and want a role in the story.

My friend is the second person who has asked me recently about the characters in my books. The other friend asked if he was in my book, Shattered Lens. I laughed and told him he was not. He wondered if I put people I knew in my stories. Again I said, “Not really.”

But the real answer is the character or characters I create within my own mind and who find their way onto the pages of my books, may be nothing more than a spark of creation from my own view of life, or from pieces of others who may have come in and out of my life, whether it be in a passing glance, a momentary speck of passion, an irritation, a voice, a song, a smile, a frown, or even a word.

I also asked my male friend what he would like to be in my book--what kind of character? I failed to tell him I could envision him as a romantic lead, a hero, or a knight in shining armor astride a white stallion, galloping off into the sunset with the woman he has rescued.

But if he actually ends up in any of my books, he won’t recognize himself, that is, unless he notices the male character with a small dimple when he smiles, or a guy with a bit of a tease in his voice, or the tall, good looking man who wins the heart of the little kid, or the heart of a mistreated puppy.

But heck, if I gave him a bigger role than that it will ruin the mystery of it all. Won’t it?

~Linda

Pixels and Fonts...E-Books and E-Readers

In this last two months I have published two new books, Shattered Lens, Catherine Winter, Private Investigator and The Cosmic Breath: Metaphysical Essays of Don Pendleton, and I have also published several of our in-print books as Kindle Editions. All are available at Amazon, including the new ten Kindle editions for the Kindle Reader.

I read an article in the New York Times, E-Reading, in 2 Authors’ Eyes by Peter Wayner, after a Twitter reference to it by author, Joseph Finder one of the subjects of the article.

Joseph Finder, author of high tech thrillers, stated, “I read a lot of nonfiction, particularly for research, and since I read a lot when I travel, I like the convenience of being able to lug a huge pile of books in one slim device.”

He does make a good point here that for traveling it would really come in handy to use the Kindle or another brand e-book reader. But Finder also brought up the disadvantage of not having an index in nonfiction books, especially while doing research. It can be time consuming and frustrating trying to find particular information without an index.

Lee Child, also a best-selling author of thrillers, mentioned in the article how not having the actual physical book made one concentrate a little more on the actual text. Even though he seemed content with e-book readers, he mentioned that one company may become the dominant supplier of e-readers, but that could also include e-books.

It appears that could happen easily with Amazon and the Kindle. Having just published ten things to Amazon Kindle, I can see what the future may hold in that regard.

We now live in a world of electronics and the young are fully immerged in that world and as new advances in technology come along, e-books and e-reading are bound to become more the norm. We’ve already seen that happening more in these few years.

Literary Agent, Nathan Bransford did his annual poll this week on his blog, on e-books, and the results show the trend moving toward the acceptance of e-books.

The percentage of people who said you'd have to pry paper books out of their cold dead hands:

2007: 49%

2008: 45%

2009: 37%

I wrote an article in 2002 about e-books and a librarian we had in our town. Pixels or Fonts, Does it Matter? The Resistance to E-books by Some in the Library Profession. Even though more than seven years have passed, it pretty much still applies as I wrote it. (The librarian left the job not long after.)

As long as they keep the font size on the e-readers adjustable for those of us over the hill, we may give up the paper books and the dust mites (I'm allergic to those little buggers that love old books) that go along with them, for a slick, thin, light-weight e-reader. I’m sure when prices come down, most of us will have one.

I read that Jeff Bezos’ Amazon.com is working on getting the Kindle in Europe. I’m sure it will happen soon. I believe they have it worked out for Canada now. As authors, that will broaden our readership.

So if you are one who has a Kindle or will be getting one for a Christmas gift, consider some of my fiction and nonfiction Kindle Editions, or the regular old fashioned print books. And there is also my e-courses and e-books that can be given as gifts. Those do not need an e-reader as they are downloadable as PDF files from my publisher. They’ve sold all over the world.

~Linda

Joseph Finder, Author of Thrillers

“Writing is the only profession I can think of that requires no license, no certificate, no special training, and no special tools. Anyone who wants to can be a writer. All you have to do is write.” ~Joseph Finder, Author



Joseph Finder is a best selling author of thriller novels. Here in this interview he talks about his new book, Vanished, the first in a series featuring his new character, Nick Heller, a high-powered investigator with a private intelligence firm who was trained in Special Forces and “specializes in digging up secrets that powerful people would rather keep hidden.”

This video is Joseph Finder conversation with actor Holter Graham who did the audiobook rendition of Finder’s book, Vanished.

~Linda

Art is in the Eye of the Beholder

I watched the American Music Award’s Sunday night and although most of the music and entertainers are not my “cup of tea,” I watched it all including the “climatic” (no pun intended LOL) performance by the very talented Adam Lambert. I did not really care for his song much, but he performed as I thought he might: outrageously, sort of in the “creative” vein of what Madonna used to do, and what some of the newer entertainers are doing....sex....

Even one of my favorites, American Idol’s Carrie Underwood—a real beauty—has gotten pretty darn sexual in her presentations. Come on people, all I am now hearing is how Adam Lambert kissed another man and had another person’s face in his crotch and snapped a bikini type costume. And watching the performance it happened so quickly that it was hard to tell if the blond keyboard player was male or female. Yes, there where chains and ropes, sexual innuendos, and movements, but what was really any different than watching Sakira and the thirty or so female dancers with their display of pelvic movements that people used to consider vulgar, or watching rap singers grab or touch their crotches in a way made “popular” by Michael Jackson. Seems you have to have the “wondering hand”to rap.

Then there was the outrageous Lady Gaga who looked like she was supposed to be naked but her body suit had an opening that appeared to be fly-like such as in male boxers or tape of some kind on her pelvic area. Have no idea what that was all about. I found her performance of falling all over the floor, and breaking liquor bottles on a flaming piano, crazy—but apparently that is the way she expresses her talent.

So maybe Adam did get “caught up in the moment” as he says about the kiss but what about the rest of the performance that obviously had been rehearsed, probably several times, and producers, (Dick Clark Productions) and directors knew what his performance was all about. They also knew it would get reaction and viewers as they saved Adam Lambert for the last three or four minutes of the show, at 11:00 PM. East Coast and West Coast. (sure not family hour). If they thought his performance was not a problem then why didn’t they not put him on in the beginning of the show—instead of saving him to last?

Was I surprised by Adam’s performance? Not at all. He is so talented, outrageous, daring, outspoken, and most of all, accepting of his sexuality, and is REAL. I admire that in him. At his young age he already knows who he is and he presents his authentic self.

And for those who do not care for his performances, don’t watch, don’t listen. But in doing so, you may miss some darn good talent because Adam Lambert is going to be around a long time.

But what I am irritated about today is ABC’s discriminatory action against Adam Lambert by canceling his scheduled performance on “Good Morning America” Wednesday morning.

Lambert said that any criticism he received for the performance was demonstrative of a double standard in entertainment. He’s quoted in a Rolling Stone Interview:
“Female performers have been doing this for years — pushing the envelope about sexuality — and the minute a man does it, everybody freaks out,” Mr. Lambert said. “We’re in 2009; it’s time to take risks, be a little more brave, time to open people’s eyes and if it offends them, then maybe I’m not for them.”

I agree that there is a double standard. Rap singers have gotten away not only with risqué songs and dances, but violent songs, and a few bleeps later, they still perform on TV.

So why all the uproar now with a talented gay singer who does take risks and does get outrageous? Is ABC pulling a guest spot because people where offended by the sexual performance of a gay man but apparently are fine with similar behavior of scantly clothed women portraying sexual movements? One report was that ABC received 1500 complaints. With 14.2 million viewers of the awards show, it seems like the number of complaints was nothing to panic about. But apparently they did.

People still watch Madonna after some of her very sexual and risqué performances. And how about the Madonna, Britney Spears kiss? It may have lasted longer than Adam’s.

CBS is on the ball, though. After ABC announced the cancellation, CBS booked Adam for Wednesday morning’s “Early Show” where he will perform live and discuss his performance on the American Music Awards. Also his taped appearance will air on David Lettermen Wednesday night.

The artist must remain master of his craft, and bring his or her authentic self forward. That is how real talent blossoms and expands.

I wrote about Adam previously here, here, here and here..
I look forward to hearing his new album. Clips of it here at Amazon, Sounds like some good songs.

~Linda

Interview of Thriller Writer, Lee Child

In an interesting interview, Lee Child discusses writing, his books and his character, Jack Reacher. His thirteenth Jack Reacher thriller is Gone Tomorrow. His next book will be 61 Hours.





"All good thriller writers know how to build suspense and keep the pages turning, but only better ones deliver tight plots as well, and only the best allow the reader to match wits with both the hero and the author. Bestseller Child does all of that in spades... [He] sets things up subtly and ingeniously, then lets Reacher use both strength and guile to find his way to the exciting climax."
—Publishers Weekly, starred review

Read an excerpt of Gone Tomorrow

John Grisham Short Stories and Interview

John Grisham talks about his latest book, Ford County, his first collection of short stories. The seven stories are set in small fictional Mississippi towns. In the interviews he talks of the flaws and injustices that still remain in our justice system and are influenced by issues such as economics. He takes about wring novels vs short story writing. I found the interview very interesting.

Interview Part Two

Interview Part Three

Interview Part Four

~Linda