Bell Bridge Books

A Sense of Place

By C. Hope Clark

I love a strong sense of place in my stories, as writer or reader, so when given the opportunity for a new mystery series, I leaped onto the chance to place my mysteries on Edisto Beach.

The hardest of hearts and the saddest of souls can find peace on the sand, waves lapping at their toes. How many stories have been written and movies made about the ocean, and how people have used that ebb and flow, soft breezy environment to get away, seek answers, and let go of life’s burdens if even for a few days?

In my Edisto Mystery Series, I take a broken main character running from an interrupted law enforcement career, and help her escape to the beach where she hopes to heal. But of course I do not let that happen, and what was supposed to be a long-term retreat turns into death, injury, mental anguish, and a vicious cycle of life-threatening events. Amidst the waves, gulls, swaying palmettos and salty balmy wind, danger abounds.

She is often her own worst enemy, and since she’s operated in Boston for years, she views the beach from a detective’s eye, so even where island residents don’t see danger, she does. Without that juxtaposition of locations – big city versus beach village – the magic wouldn’t happen nearly as well.

Setting can often assume the role of a character. When a tale can’t be told better anywhere else, setting has morphed into a player. Frankly, that’s my preference in reading material – those stories where even the very ground the character stands on has an impact on the plot.

Imagine Sherlock Holmes in other than England. Or Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum in other than New Jersey. Or Tony Hillerman’s western mysteries without the Navajo west? True, there are many mysteries that could happen in any urban setting, or any rural setting, or any country, for that matter. But doesn’t it enrich the storytelling so much more to know that where the players fight, love, live and die impacts how it all turns out?

BIO

C. Hope Clark inserts strong setting in both her award-winning Carolina Slade Mysteries and Edisto Island Mysteries, all set in rural South Carolina. When she isn’t writing mysteries, she is editor of FundsforWriters.com, an award-winning site to aid professional writers in their careers. She lives on the banks of Lake Murray in central SC when she isn’t walking the coast of Edisto Beach. www.chopeclark.com

Make sure you grab MURDER ON EDISTO only $1.99 through December! Happy Holidays! 

And make sure you also grab the second in the series – Edisto Jinx!

A Note from Wally Avett

I am grateful to Bell Bridge Books and my agent, Jeanie Loiacono, for getting my first two novels —MURDER IN CANEY FORK and LAST BIGFOOT IN DIXIE —  included in Amazon’s Holiday Gift Guide for the month of December.

My goal is to be a good storyteller, so both novels, works of fiction, are solidly based on a number of true incidents.  I’m thankful the partnership of BBB and Amazon can enable me to reach a wider audience for my books.

My wife(52 years and counting) and I will welcome children and grandchildren into our mountain home over the holidays, where we always share good food and good stories.  Merry Christmas to all and a Happy and Blessed New Year!

Seasonal greetings from the Smoky Mountain farm of the Wally Avetts.

Murder in Caney Fork by Wally Avett is on sale during the month of December for only $1.99! Click the cover below to purchase!

“Living in the N E GA/W NC mountains, I can certainly relate to these characters as if they were walking down the street in our small town. They come alive and realistically go about their days as you’d expect in a southern town in America. Wes, a wounded soldier coming home near the end of WWII, tries to settle back into his ‘normal’ environment on his return. Post war direction is needed and he chooses to become an apprentice in his uncle’s law firm. Being part of a southern lawyer’s cases delves him into suspense and mysteries, some surrounding those he loves…family. Justice is dealt with a little differently in the South and if the law doesn’t get the job done, then others will band together and take action deemed necessary. Certainly being thrust into multiple thrilling events opens the protagonists’ eyes into the world he is now surrounded by. Starting over can sometimes be thrilling, and call into focus that which you must deal with one incident at a time!”

Review posted by Rhonda Brigman on goodreads.com

Top 5 Things That Are Guaranteed to Get Me Out of My Jammies

By Susan Sleeman

A bomb. A submachine gun. A plane crash. The roof torn from a car. CSI investigation.

Sounds like a book right. Or movie. Or even something a writer might conjure up in her mind. Wrong. It’s a day in the life of a romantic suspense author. A day in my life. Several days actually.

Not my typical schedule, though. I write fulltime so I’ve become a real homebody, sitting in my comfy chair—some days not even bothering to get dressed. But then, there have been crazy, amazing days when research has pulled me from my chair to participate in things I never imagined myself doing. Here are a few of my favorite events.

1. Detonating a Bomb – Lest you think the FBI is coming after me for this, let me first tell you that I was with the FBI bomb squad at the time. As a participant in the FBI Citizen’s Academy, I joined agents for six weeks to learn about their job and mission. Some things I experienced first hand. What better way to experience the power of bombs than pressing the detonator in an empty field. The flash was blinding. The ground rumbled. And the explosion was deafening. AMAZING! Here’s a short video of one of the explosions. The video doesn’t have nearly the impact of the actual event, but it gives you an idea. As a bonus, you can also hear gunshots from the nearby firing range.

2. And speaking of guns, shooting a submachine gun—Same day, up the hill at the FBI firing range. We shot pistols, submachine guns, and a rifle. I’d only ever fired a weapon once before this
   day and let me tell you, the power behind the semi-automatic was incredible. Here’s the range and the targets we tried to hit, plus our instructors waiting to teach us how to proper procedures.

3. Tour a police CSI Lab – Don’t believe everything the amazing CSI labs that you see on TV have,  with state-of-the-art equipment in these bright, airy rooms. Not so much with real police labs. They are strapped for money and cramped in small spaces, but still, I learned so many things. One was how to process fingerprints, and then how to use a fuming chamber to obtain fingerprints from uneven surfaces and hard-to-dust surfaces such as bottles, knives, guns, etc.

4. Participate in a plane crash – What? A crash. Okay it was a mock disaster drill at the Portland International Airport, but hey, the emergency response workers didn’t treat it as a drill. They screamed onto the tarmac to help victims wearing gory makeup meant to simulate serious injuries. Mock family members arrived at the airport and were taken to special rooms to await the news of their loved ones. It all felt so real and gave me everything I’d need to write such a disaster. I’m just waiting for the right book. And as a bonus, I got a great t-shirt and medal for participating.

5. Using the jaws of life to remove the roof from a car – Okay, this one involved hunky firefighters, nuff said, but there was actual research here, too. The firefighters first demonstrated how to cut off the roof, then I was given the chance to step into turnouts and open up another car with my fellow participants enrolled in the local Police Academy.

So as you can see, being a romantic suspense author can be thrilling, and I try to put that realism and thrill into my books. For example, I have included a bomb in Web of Deceit.

Web of Deceit is the first book in a three book series featuring female FBI agents assigned to an elite Cyber Action Team. When agent Kaitlyn Knight’s brother-in-law, the notorious cybercriminal Vyper, kills her sister then goes on a murderous spree taunting Kait, homicide detective Sam Murdock must find Vyper before he takes another life. As the body count rises, Sam discovers the killing spree is really about striking back at Kait, and he must put everything on the line—including the relationship he’s developed with Kait—to ensure her safety. Vyper is waiting, watching her every move, and he won’t stop until he’s exacted his revenge and reclaims his rights to raise his daughter now in Kait’s custody.

Web of Shadows releases in December and Web of Lies in April. In honor of all three books, I’ve been giving away official FBI insignia items like the ones in the picture. These are official items purchased at the Portland FBI campus store. All my giveaways will be featured on my Facebook page, so stop on over and like the page to keep from missing any of the giveaways.

Web of Deceit by Susan Sleeman is only $1.99 today only! Click the cover above to purchase!

“Like Lightning in a Bottle”

by Anne Stuart

Every now and then a writer has something absolutely fabulous happen to her.  All the stars are in alignment, the gods are smiling, and life is good.

About twenty years ago I wrote what still remains possibly my favorite book ever, NIGHTFALL, and the circumstances were blessed indeed.

I’d been busy writing romances for the Harlequin American, Harlequin Intrigue, and occasionally the Silhouette Intimate Moments lines.  Series writing is always full of rules:  I had editors count how many times I said “bitch” and “bastard” (and if you’re familiar with my work you know my hero and heroine tend to think of their true love in such cantankerous terms).  I’ve traded two “bitches” for a “bastard” when I really wanted it, and made a mostly unsuccessful attempt at behaving myself.  As anyone will tell you, I’ve never been very good at being good.

I wrote books where the hero was the son of a mass murderer, or he thought he was the reincarnation of Jack the Ripper and the heroine was the reincarnation of a victim.  I had heroes pretending to be crazy, heroes who were unrepentant cat burglars, disfigured hermits, 1930’s pilots, shapeshifters before they were popular, ghosts from the Valentine’s Day Massacre, fallen angels.  I broke all sorts of rules and had a good time doing it, but everyone kept asking me when I was going to do a “big book.”  It was a time when most series writers were moving out of the category business, but I kept writing my edgy books and staying exactly where I was.  Whenever I came up with a proposal for a mainstream romantic suspense novel it was turned down and ended up going to Silhouette Intimate Moments (and both times becoming a RITA finalist – NOW YOU SEE HIM and SPECIAL GIFTS).  I finally gave up trying to please anyone and began writing historicals, having a wicked good time with them (literally) when out of the blue Jennifer Enderlin, then at Penguin/Signet called up my agent and offered a six figure contract for two romantic suspense novels.

After being flabbergasted for a few hours I said yes, and the idea appeared to me like manna from heaven.  I’d had no plans, no ideas, and suddenly it was all there before me.  I took all sorts of bits from the news – Norman Mailer got a murderer named Jack Henry Abbott paroled on the basis of his poetry (and his own ego) and Abbott ending up murdering someone.  There was a famous crime in Philadelphia where a teacher murdered a woman and her two children, though the two children were never found.  One of our endless Middle Eastern wars was on, giving me good role models for the father-in-law, and it all came together in a book so good it could cure cancer.

Now I’ve been told that’s a very offensive thing to say – that books can’t cure cancer.  But I’m basing it on Norman Cousins’s classic work, ANATOMY OF AN ILLNESS, where he discussed how laughter, watching Marx Brothers’ movies, cured him of a wretched disease.  It seemed completely logical to me – I think music or any art form can do the same thing.  When a book or a symphony or a movie speaks to you so exactly that you’re transported to another dimension then your body fills with all sorts of good stuff like endorphins.  Stuff that will heal you.  Personally I think that’s one reason athletes are healthy.  Not because they exercise, but because being a professional athlete requires you to get in “the zone” which is exactly where those endorphins etc.  lurk.

NIGHTFALL can cure cancer for some people – if it happens to speak directly to their fantasies.  It could, presumably, make other people ill with its intensity and darkness before the ultimate redemption.  I consider it a great gift to be able to write books that are that powerful.  Many reviews of my work say “Anne Stuart is not for everyone” or “not for the faint of heart,” and while I wish everyone could love my work I know that’s impossible.  At least I take comfort in the fact that few people are lukewarm about my work, and about NIGHTFALL in particular.

(BTW Norman Cousins was a good man, a peace activist but a sexist pig who believed women didn’t belong in the work force.  No one’s perfect).

A book like NIGHTFALL is like lightning in a bottle – no matter how powerful your will and your talent, you can’t make one happen.  It’s one of those rare, blessed times in a long career that carries you through the less inspired times, and reviews, sales, etc. mean nothing.  It’s my badge of honor, and I wear it proudly.

NIGHTFALL is a March Monthly 100 for only $1.99! Grab it today!

By Forris Day Jr. of Scared Stiff Reviews

Got Zombies? Dead (A Lot) does. Dead (A Lot) by Howard Odentz is fun book about a zombie apocalypse as experienced by a group of young teenagers. One day they are just doing the regular things that kids do then the next morning the world is forever changed when a strange virus is released into the world that changes most denizens of this Earth into slow moving and very hungry zombies. Unfortunately for our adventurers a shot to the head does not kill these decrepit bags of flesh as it does in most zombie stories. But a bit of fire seems to do the trick.

Odentz’s tale takes place during the fall season in New England. It is a time when people from all over come to drive the back roads admiring the foliage that this part of the country has to offer. Too bad many of the leaf peepers have now become a part of the landscape, dead like the leaves they came to view, searching for food to satisfy their never ending hunger.

Tripp Light and his twin sister Trina seem to be immune to the virus that has turned most of the world into a bad B-movie. As they go in search of their parents they meet up with other survivors who have their own strengths to add to their ever growing group. Alone they will die but together this ragged acne prone bunch of teenagers just might have a chance. Follow along as they travel from their destroyed home to go in search of their Aunts house where they believe their parents are hiding.

A fun and witty zombie apocalypse narrative that will bring a smile to your face as you discover (or remember) how the teenage mind operates in times of difficulty. The dialog is clever and the characters are realistic. The locations are based on real ones and that is pretty cool because they were recognizable to me as I am from New England and I know most of the locations really well. As a matter of fact the crew drives by the house I grew up in in Three Rivers, Massachusetts. Kind of a treat for me as I imagined the sidewalks that I rode my bike on as a kid, filled with all my neighbors turned zombie. I still think some of my neighbors I had as a kid were indeed zombies.

Dead (A Lot) is aimed at the “Young Adult” market but I feel it is an enjoyable read to anyone of any age who enjoys a good zombie story full of fun characters and entertaining zombies. Yes, I found many of the zombies funny and amusing because they could not get themselves out of many simple predicaments that us living folks take for granted everyday. For example turning doorknobs is beyond a zombies knowledge so if they are inside that is where they remain unless they can find some other means of egress. They are forever hungry and always have something up their sleeve…well the ones who still have arms that is.

Make sure you grab DEAD (A LOT) for only $1.99 through Friday!

And don’t forget about Howard Odentz’s new release –BLOODY BLOODY APPLE – available now!

Zombie stories are everywhere. Due in some part to the unbelievable success of shows like The Walking Dead,books like World War Z, and films like 28 Days Later andShaun of the Dead, everyone’s writing about the dead-but-ambulatory. Nice zombies, evil zombies, teenage zombies, Nazi zombies, zombie dogs, shark zombies, Jane Austen zombies. Zombies sell books. And movies. And television. And video games. It’s all out there.

The thing about the best zombie fiction, though, is that it’s not really about zombies, not primarily. It’s about the living. The Walking Dead, for instance, has gone entire episodes without showing zombies. This is true of most genre fiction, for that matter: The conceit of the story—what makes it “genre,” in other words—is just a clever way to “tell it slant,” as Emily Dickinson advised, of examining the human condition. Yes, zombies are cool and threatening, but what keeps us coming back to the story is the desire to find out how the people work around the threat.

Howard Odentz’s Dead (a Lot) does just this, coming at the zombie apocalypse tale from a slightly different perspective. Odentz tosses the reader directly into the story of Tripp and Trina Light, teen twins who’ve been left at home while their parents are away on a trip. Almost immediately, the Lights’ universe tilts, things go awry, and the dead, unsurprisingly, begin to walk, and to munch on the living. As the book’s narrator, Tripp guides the reader through the story of how the siblings set out to find their parents. These teens have never had to make it on their own, they barely know how to drive, and they’ve certainly never had to kill another human being, so they’re up against enormous odds here.

Since Dead (a Lot) features a first-person narrative, big picture revelations are few and far between, but that’s fine, since the characters and their ongoing conflicts are interesting enough to keep us satisfied. And when the larger revelations do come, Odentz finds interesting ways to reveal them. We know that the zombies–called poxers by the characters–are the result of Neropoxy, a parasitic disease that causes the zombie plague, and we’re also certain that the disease was created by humans. We know that some people appear to be immune to the disease, which creates yet another source of tension and conflict. And we know that the poxers can be destroyed, though it’s not an easy thing to accomplish. Good thing, that.

During their journey, the twins meet up with radio DJ Jimmy James (whose name, I suspect, may either be a nod to the station owner from the 90s sitcom Newsradio or just a happy coincidence), brother and sister Prianka and Sanjay Patel, and Andrew the Crow, Jimmy’s talking bird. Odentz imbues these characters with interesting qualities that make the story more interesting. Tripp already knows Prianka from school, and they have a ready-made adversarial love/hate relationship. Prianka’s little brother Sanjay is autistic and often consults a worn out stuffed animal, Poopy Puppy, obtaining and passing on relevant and often unbelievably detailed information to the group. Jimmy also has a limitation that I won’t reveal here, but I will say that it helps strengthen an already prevalent sense of reality and urgency.

One of the most interesting aspects of this novel, though, is that its characters possess an awareness of the zombie genre. Tripp, for instance, has played video games and seen films featuring zombies, and Sanjay refers occasionally to zombie films by name. A good deal of the conventional wisdom contained in the cited media turns out to be false, or at least not quite right, and the characters rarely call the walking dead “zombies,” but there are occasional references to George Romero and other staples of the genre. Is this unique? No, but it does lend Dead (a Lot) an interesting authenticity, making it seem even more plausible that these characters live in the same world we do.

Overall, this is a fun and quick read. The story is fast-paced with little room for breathing or lollygagging, and there are plenty of close calls and high stakes. After all, around every corner or behind every door lurks the possibility of death. Odentz deftly captures Tripp’s voice, and his narration is engaging and full of humor, much of it clearly deployed defensively. He’s not perfect–not by a long shot–but he’s certainly worth rooting for. He’s sarcastic, often to his disadvantage, but we’re nonetheless able to occasionally glimpse his vulnerability, giving us the feeling he’s never far from losing it. And who wouldn’t be?

There’s such a glut of zombie stories on the market that perusing the contenders can feel a bit like running a gauntlet manned by the unruly undead. So, as with most growing trends in genre fiction, unless you want to read the same zombie story over and over, it becomes necessary to look for writers who find a way to make it different somehow.

Dead (a Lot) is different.

Make sure you grab DEAD (A LOT) for only $1.99 through Friday!

And don’t forget about Howard Odentz’s new release – BLOODY BLOODY APPLE – available now!

BEING UGLY

by Nicki Salcedo

We aren’t allowed to say the word ugly anymore unless we’re talking about someone’s personality. Ugly is a way of acting, but you can’t call a face or body ugly anymore. In our politically correct world, we have “beauty” and “not quite” as beautiful. No one is allowed to be ugly. Ugly is dead.

I’ve been ugly my whole life. Do not fill up the comment box with false compliments. I don’t need them. I’m better than beautiful. More often than not, I am happy. When things get better, I am confident.  With age I have learned that I am not ugly. I have 10 things I do every day to feel beautiful.

10. Beauty is humor. I laugh as much as I can. Even at sad things. Even rainy and cold days.

9. I find something very small that is beautiful. Usually it is a leaf. It could be an acorn or a blade of grass. Have you ever looked at a single piece of sand? It is a crystal.

8. I become the beholder. Remember that Twilight Zone episode where they people had pig faces? I try to remember that when the hideously disgusting aliens land on Earth, they are going to think that we are ugly. A little mascara isn’t going to change that.

7. I hardly ever wear makeup. You know how the media likes to post pictures of celebrities without makeup? That makes me mad. Why don’t they leave those women alone? Don’t click on those stories. 99% of the time we see movie stars as perfect, but the paparazzi wait for the 1% of the time they aren’t. Not cool.

6. I do wear makeup once in a while, and you all act like I’m a movie star! You say that I’m pretty. The heroine in my novel ALL BEAUTIFUL THINGS has been brutally attacked and wanders the streets at night. She is scarred. She feels ugly. What’s one of her biggest fears? Mascara. I rarely wear mascara, but when I do I’m a rock star.

5. I confront stereotypes. I confront racism. Daily. Do you read books with characters from different backgrounds? A part of racism is alienating yourself from other races. The next time you walk into a waiting room, notice who you choose to sit next to and who you avoid. I’ve had security follow me around a store. I’ve watched women at the doctor’s office specifically not take the seat next to me. I get it. I am ugly to others, but here’s how I feel beautiful. I don’t just ignore it. I’m the queen of the friendly “hello!” when someone tries to make me feel invisible.

4. I love my ugly. I see myself as I am. I do have scars. I have a few extra pounds around my middle.  Warts, scars, stretch marks, and all. I accept my body without excuses. When I’m 80 years old, I’m going to wish I had this body and this face.

3. I look for beautiful things in other people. And I tell them. I see beautiful hands, legs, and smiles. That person may not think that they are beautiful. They might appreciate hearing it.

2. I let beauty grow.  When I’m not wearing makeup, I can rub my face against my kid’s face. That is beautiful. I hope I feel more beautiful tomorrow than I do today. I hope when I’m 80 years old I’ll think I look great in a swimsuit. Hope is another one of those beautiful things.

1. Instead of looking for beauty, I listen for it. I know lots of people, but I couldn’t tell you what they all look like. I couldn’t give you a police sketch of their faces. They might be gorgeous or plain by society standards. I don’t know. I’ve allowed myself to be blind. I know about them through their words and stories. We close our eyes, and our senses blossom. That kind of beauty lasts forever.

Nicki Salcedo is a graduate of Stanford University with a degree in English and Creative Writing. She was born in Jamaica and raised in Atlanta, Georgia. She is a member of Romance Writers of America© and a Past President of Georgia Romance Writers. Nicki is a two-time recipient of the Maggie Award of Excellence and a Golden Heart© Finalist. Her debut novel, ALL BEAUTIFUL THINGS, is a reversal on the beauty and the beast story with a touch of Southern Gothic and romantic suspense. ALL BEAUTIFUL THINGS is available now. You can find Nicki on Twitter @NickiSalcedo, Facebook, and at http://www.nickisalcedo.com.

 Make sure you grab ALL BEAUTIFUL THINGS from Amazon!

Just click the link!

“I don’t listen to music when I write. I like silence. My mind fills with whispered words from other writers. Sometimes the words are from books, sometimes music, sometimes poetry. I remembered my favorite poems as I wrote ALL BEAUTIFUL THINGS. This is my poetry soundtrack.”

–Nicki Salcedo

1. “We wear the mask that grins and lies. It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes.” Paul Laurence Dunbar, Poem: “We Wear the Mask”
2. “And then last night I tiptoed up to my daughter’s room and heard her talking to someone, and when I opened the door, there was no one there…Only she on her knees, peeking into her own clasped hands” Amiri Baraka, Poem: “Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note”
3. “We hailed, “Good morrow, mother!” to a shawl-covered head, and bought a morning paper, which neither of us read; And she wept, “God bless you!” for the apples and pears, and we gave her all our money but our subway fares.” Edna St. Vincent Millay, Poem: “Recuerdo”
4. “How you must have wondered to see me taking chances, dancing on the edge of words, pointing out the bad guys, dreaming your x-ray vision could see the beauty in me.” Lucille Clifton, Poem: “note passed to superman”
5. “Her terrified hands will lie still ringed with ordeals she was mastered by. The tigers in the panel that she made will go on prancing, proud and unafraid.” Adrienne Rich, Poem “Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers”
6. “And now the moon, earth’s friend, that cared so much for us, and cared so little, comes again—always a stranger!” Robert Lowell, Poem: “Public Garden”
7. “In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. He moves in darkness as it seems to me. Not of woods only and the shade of trees.” Robert Frost, Poem: “Mending Wall”
8. “Don’t look now. I’m fading away into the gray of my mornings or the blues of every night.” Nikki Giovanni, Poem: “Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day”
9. “I lay waiting on the gravel bottom, my brain darkening, a jar of spawn fermenting underground dreams of Baltic amber.” Seamus Heaney, Poem: “Bog Queen”
10.  “In the mirror, the angles of the room are calm, it is the hour when you can see that the angle itself is blessed, and the dark globes of the chandelier, suspended in the mirror, are motionless” Sharon Olds, Poem: “After Making Love in the Winter”
11. “I have slept with you all night long while the dark earth spins with the living and the dead, and on waking suddenly in the midst of the shadow my arm encircled your waist. Neither night nor sleep could separate us.” Pablo Neruda, Poem: “Night on the Island”
12. “Dying is an art, like everything else. I do it exceptionally well.” Sylvia Plath, Poem: “Lady Lazarus”
13. “They love each other. There is no loneliness like theirs.” James Wright, Poem: “A Blessing” 

Don’t forget to go grab ALL BEAUTIFUL THINGS from Amazon TODAY! 

Just click the link!

Today is National Weatherman Day and to celebrate, why not pick up a couple books written by an actual weatherman? 

After all, without them, we would never be prepared for all of this crazy weather we always have!

So show your appreciation for once upon a time weatherman – Buzz Bernard – today! 

In early 2009, after 13 years with The Weather Channel, Buzz Bernard retired from the network as a senior meteorologist. Prior to joining The Weather Channel, he served as a weather officer in the U.S. Air Force for 33 years, retiring with the rank of colonel and having received, among other awards, the Legion of Merit.

Prior to becoming a novelist, Buzz published five nonfiction books about weather and climate. He’s had first-hand experience with hurricanes, having penetrated the eyewall of such a storm with the Air Force Reserve Hurricane Hunters. That mission wasn’t nearly as exciting–or as terrifying–as the one described in Eyewall, but he did get an up close and personal look at how the job is done.

Besides his trip with the Hurricane Hunters, Buzz has flown air drops over the Arctic Ocean and Turkey, and was a weather officer aboard a Tactical Air Command (now Air Combat Command) airborne command post (C-135). Additionally, he provided field support to forest fire fighting operations in the Pacific Northwest, spent a summer working on Alaska’s arctic slope and served two tours in Vietnam. Various other jobs, both civilian and military, have taken him to Germany, Saudi Arabia and Panama.

A native Oregonian, Buzz attended the University of Washington in Seattle where he earned a bachelor’s degree in atmospheric science while also studying creative writing. After leaving active duty with the Air Force, he and his wife Christina lived in New England and suffered through its winters for two decades before heading for the warmer climate of Roswell, Georgia, near Atlanta. It’s much warmer there!

Make sure you go grab Buzz’s weather based novels – EYEWALL and SUPERCELL – off of Amazon TODAY! 

Just click the links!

BOOK TITLES: WHAT MAKES THEM GREAT

By Don Donaldson

It’s a constant surprise to me that I’m able to write books that are liked by people who aren’t my mother.   But I often can’t figure out what the title of a book should be.  Oh, I know when a title is great and so do you… It’s like the dealer at a flea market who once said to me when I picked up an expensive item to look at more closely… “You have good taste.”  Then, while I was secretly preening at his compliment, he added,  “Of course, it’s not that hard to spot quality.”   It’s the same with book titles.  Here’s a test:  What do you think of this title?  THEY DON’T BUILD STATUES TO BUSINESSMEN.

To me, it’s awful.  I’d think so even if I’d been the one to come up with it.  Actually, it was the famous writer, Jacqueline Susann, who crafted that one for a book that eventually became a mega best seller as VALLEY OF THE DOLLS.  Does anyone out there like the first title better?  Okay…. So there’s always someone who enjoys being a contrarian.  But all the rest of you I’m sure gave the right answer.

Let’s try another.  How about ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL?  That’s actually not horrible.  But it doesn’t sound like the sweeping saga the author wrote.  I certainly think the title it was eventually given, WAR AND PEACE, is soooo much better.

I once had an agent who told me that they had a consultant who was a “genius” at titling books.  I guess he was too busy to take a look at the book the agency titled for me.  (I’ll never tell which one it was, but will say that when BelleBooks reissues it later this year, it will have a new title.)

So, it’s easy to know a great title when you see it, but boy is it hard to come up with one.  I usually sit for hours playing with words and rearranging them in what I hope are creative ways.  No matter what title I eventually settle on for a book, I have this nagging suspicion that even if I really like the one I pick, there was a much much better one I could have used.  I just couldn’t find it.  My WAR AND PIECE was out there, just beyond reach.

Okay, a final test, and maybe you already know this one.  Which of these titles is better?  TOMORROW IS ANOTHER DAY, or the one that has become an icon: GONE WITH THE WIND.  See, even our contrarian from above picked the right answer.

Well, I’ve used up my allotted space here so all I can do now is be GWTW.

-Don

This month get Don Donaldson’s THE MEMORY THIEF for only $1.99 at Amazon Kindle!