The Worst Blogger of 2008

I always thought it odd that magazines and newspapers ran features on the top news stories of the year in December. I mean, what if the world blew up on Dec. 31? They would have missed the biggest story of the year.

That’s why I waited until today to announce the winner of my very own “Worst Blogger of 2008” competition. The word “competition,” by the way, is merely a convention. There was no competition. I was the sole contestant, and I won, hands-down.

Certainly there are lots of bloggers out there who posted less frequently than I did or as inconsistently as I did during the past year. I don’t know all of those bloggers. But I do know me, and I was the one who selected the winner. So there.

Here’s the thing: I tend to retreat at times, especially when I’ve been in the public eye a lot. And I was in the public eye during most of 2008 when I was promoting We the Purple. A few weeks after the election, all that publicity got to me, and I began receding into the shadows again. I’m more of an introvert than people might think.

I’m going to try not to repeat this prestigious win in 2009, but you never know. If Stephen Colbert comes calling, I may just stop blogging. For a while, anyway.

Oh, that’s me up there with all those books…some of the books I’ve written in the past 10 years. Hey, you should be impressed that I had any time at all to blog. No?

Cross-posted on all my other blogs. As if I can post three fresh blogs today. Please. I’m so out of practice.

Write or Die!

Surfing the web isn’t always the time-waster people say it is. Sometimes you go down that rabbit trail of links and discover gold. Or Dr. Wicked.

The evil Dr. Wicked has developed a writing tool based on negative reinforcement. He calls it Write or Die, and it’s a web-based program that motivates you to just do it: keep on writing or suffer the consequences.

It works like this: Go to the Write or Die site, enter a few customized choices into a dialogue box (word-count goal, time goal, level of “punishment”), click “submit” and start writing. Here’s what happens if you stop writing, depending on the mode you select:

• Gentle Mode: A certain amount of time after you stop writing, a box will pop up, gently reminding you to continue writing.
• Normal Mode: If you persistently avoid writing, you will be played a most unpleasant sound. The sound will stop if and only if you continue to write.
• Kamikaze Mode: Keep writing or your work will unwrite itself

I know more than a few writers who could use this. I’m the kind of writer who keeps on writing and worries about editing myself later. Some of my writing friends insist on editing as they write, and they’re the ones who have trouble producing 500 words a day.

As Dr. Wicked puts it, this program puts the "prod" in productivity. I love it.

If you give it a try, let me know how it works for you. I’ll do the same.

Shameless Plug

But not for one of my books. This is a plug for Garlic-Free Gourmet: Be Your Own Personal Chef by Andy Ward.

Okay, I know what you’re thinking: garlic-free gourmet? That’s an oxymoron, isn’t it? To me, garlic is its own food group, just like coffee. And the only time I entertain the notion of putting the words “garlic” and “free” together is when my local natural foods store overbuys and puts out a basket of free garlic bulbs. I live for those days.

But Andy and his wife, Donna, have an adverse reaction to garlic, so Andy developed several dozen recipes that use other flavorings to take the place of garlic. I’ve tried a couple, and they really are good.

Only for Andy, though, would I forgo garlic, even for a meal or two. We’ve known each other for…um…many, many years. We first met in Miss Radcliffe’s fifth-grade class at Sensor School in Millville, New Jersey, in 1960. My earliest memory of him dates back to one morning when I was basking in the glow of having just won the class spelling bee. Andy piped up and challenged me to spell “antidisestablishmentarianism.” Quite the precocious guy, he was.

To this day I maintain that even at the age of 10, I could have spelled that word correctly. But he threw me off my game. I turned bright red, blinked back the tears and wanted to run out of the room. Miss Radcliffe, bless her heart, chided Andy and told me I could sit down.

I have no doubt that this is why Andy has been deprived of enjoying one of life’s finest culinary pleasures. Let this be a lesson to all males everywhere: Before you make a young girl cry, consider the karmic consequences.

Enough. Now I’m in withdrawal. I’m going to go sauté a whole bulb of garlic just for the heck of it.

Our long national nightmare is (almost) over

There's not much I can add to the eloquent and emotional words so many have spoken and written in an attempt to express what Barack Obama's victory means to them. What I can add is a personal perspective and a few memories of growing up during the civil rights movement and witnessing segregation first hand.

When I was a child, our family visited the South every few years. My mother was born in Georgia and had family in Florida; my produce-selling father had lived and worked in Florida seasonally and met my mother there. I don't have any race-related memories of the times we traveled by train from Philadelphia to Gainesville, but traveling by car was another story.

Car trips meant stopping in Southern states and being exposed to segregated restrooms, water fountains and restaurants. Those memories are hazy; I can mostly remember this vague sensation that Negroes, the term our family used, were lesser people, diseased and dirty and definitely to be feared. This impression didn't come from my parents. It came from simply walking the streets of Georgia or South Carolina in the 1950s and 1960s.

Even in the North, I can remember using coin-operated public restrooms (remember those?) in train stations and especially on the Boardwalk in Atlantic City, and hearing women admonish their children not to use a toilet that a Negro had just used. A child couldn't help but absorb some of that trepidation.

Then came the race riots. I won't go into that history; all I will say is that if you didn't live through that time, you cannot imagine the terror people felt.

In April of 1968, I visited Paris on a high school trip. Race riots were the furthest thing from my mind---until the day before we were scheduled to return to New Jersey. The news was all around us: Martin Luther King Jr. had been assassinated in Memphis. The fear returned. I recall looking out the window of the plane as it descended toward Philadelphia International Airport; I fully expected to see Philly and Camden, its neighbor across the river, engulfed in flames.

Today I heard someone mocking Jesse Jackson for crying as he listened to Barack Obama speak the night before. I don't care who your presidential preference was; I don't care what you think of Barack Obama---if you can’t understand why people were crying and taking to the streets in sheer jubilation last night, then you're far too cynical for me.

Our long national nightmare, the one that's (almost) over, isn't our history of racism. I'm hopeful about the future, but I'm also realistic about the deep racial divide among some segments of our society. Racism isn't the nightmare I'm referring to. The nightmare is the Bush administration. Free at last, free at last---thank God Almighty, we're (almost) free at last.

UrbanFaith.com goes live

Anyone who has worked with Ed Gilbreath can attest to his journalistic integrity and professionalism, as well as his deep faith in God. And he’s an all-around great guy, the kind of person who makes you feel good inside whenever you think of him.

He’s now the editor-in-chief of UrbanFaith.com, which launched on Oct. 30 after what I’m sure was a long and arduous process. Any major online startup is a challenge, and given Ed’s commitment to excellence, I’m sure Urban Faith was no exception.

I’ll let Ed tell you what the site is all about:

Today, urban culture transcends racial boundaries and covers many different socio-economic backgrounds. For some, "urban" may evoke images of hip-hop and BET. For others, it might suggest inner-city poverty and injustice. Still others will associate the term with savvy, cosmopolitan sophistication. The truth is, an "urban" spirit can be just as vibrant in the suburbs as in the heart of the city. What's more, Christians who are engaged in the exciting call to urban ministry come from all races and walks of life.

UrbanFaith.com will embrace "urban" in all its diversity. It will be more about a way of looking at the world than where folks live or the color of their skin. It will be both for those who make their home in an urban setting and for those who simply care about the people, culture, and issues related to urban life.

Every day, you'll find thoughtful articles and conversation about issues such as politics, pop culture, and theology. You'll read commentaries, journalistic reports, and reviews.

Every day, we'll take on the hot topics everyone's talking about, offer insight and inspiration for your daily Christian walk, and provide a forum for honest, real-life questions and opinions.

Enthusiastically,

Ed Gilbreath
Editor-in-Chief
UrbanFaith.com

I wrote two articles for the site, one about black independent voters and a growing coalition of black political groups and white independent voters. It’s a fascinating phenomenon that’s in its early stages and was prompted in part by the Democratic Party’s failure to deliver on its promises to blacks, whose support the party has long taken for granted. The other is a guide to what you can do to ensure that your vote is counted on Election Day—something everyone needs to be concerned about.

I hope you’ll visit the site, register and comment on its content. It’s a project of Christian publisher Urban Ministries.

Not bad, not bad

Tyndale House, publisher of We the Purple: Faith, Politics and the Independent Voter, just posted this video interview of me talking about the book. It’s on the book’s Web site, wethepurpleonline.com.

Check it out and let me know what you think. Personally, I expect all the major networks and cable outlets to come calling.

From charismatic to crucifer

(Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.)

Oh man, this guy nailed it. There's no doubt about it—that's me up there, or rather a male version of me. My transformation from crazy charismatic to Episcopal acolyte comes to fruition later this month when I'll don the appropriate vestments and assist in liturgical worship for the first time. Was my journey all that predictable? It appears so, though I think not. I know lots of crazy charismatics who still look like that guy to the far left.

The comma as a sign of respect

Liz Wolgemuth, who covers careers and business etiquette and all that jazz for U.S. New & World Report, asked a question on her blog today that is near and dear to this English major's heart: Does Grammar Really Matter Anymore? It's so near to my heart, in fact, that just hours before Wolgemuth's article appeared in Google Reader, my husband and I had been bemoaning the state of communication today in the U.S. of A.

That should be enough to alert you to our grammatical crisis, because my husband is not exactly a stickler for grammar. He's been saying "have went" for all of our 26 years of marriage, despite my stellar grammatical modeling and my occasional, pointed, maybe-a-bit-too-loud "have gone" by way of correction. And yet, he gets irked by the instances of grammatical looseness he encounters every day.

Here's the thing: I became reconciled to the fluid nature of language some time ago. I realize that language is an ever-changing factor of human life that shifts according to a multitude of influences, not the least being the ever-changing nature of human nature. Language evolves naturally.

But linguistic and grammatical changes become problematic when people make them intentionally and carelessly, without regard for the rest of humanity. Or English-speaking humanity, in this case.

The point of language is communication, but our ability to communicate with each other is severely diminished when we make up our own rules for grammar, spelling, usage and word definitions. (I'm OK with some forms of shorthand, by the way, if you're texting someone who understands the shorthand. This is why I don't ever text or IM. And yes, I know I just used "text" as a verb. I hate myself for it, all right?)

But here's the bottom line for me, as both an editor and a writer: Following the rules for punctuation and spelling and all the rest is a sign of respect for the reader. I remember hearing such great things about Cold Mountain, but after a few pages I found it was just too annoying to try to read dialogue that had no quotation marks. Plus, I had a hard time suppressing the urge to mark up the book. By all accounts, it's a wonderful book. I'll never know. I felt as if the author had ignored convention for an artistic purpose with little regard for the reader.

That's really what it comes down to—respect and regard for the reader. As an editor, I'm required to follow the dictates of The Associated Press Stylebook when I'm editing news, The Chicago Manual of Style when I'm editing books, and the style guides my clients have developed to supplement those two books. Even so, there are cases in which the style guides just don't make sense, and that's when I break the rules in order to make a particular sentence more readable and understandable.

What do you think? I really don't believe I'm off-base in suggesting that we need to consider our readers, whether we're writing an email, a blog or a book. Or am I?

Remembering Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

I've hoped for a week now that I would be able to come up with a brilliant, poignant tribute to Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, an author whose impact on my life has been immeasurable. Others have done far better than I could in the week or so since he passed away. But I can't let his death go unmentioned, especially after reading a New York Times article about the absence of a national outpouring of grief in Russia, a country that owes him so very much.

I was in my 20s when the great writer was forced to leave his homeland. This is a portion of what I wrote about him in 2005 in God Between the Covers, an annotated bibliography of the books that had a significant impacted on my life:

Several years after his exile, he emigrated to the United States, where he proceeded to alternately enchant and offend the media and the masses. At first he was a media darling and a trophy émigré for the American government: “Look! A Russian who found faith in a prison camp and got out and chose to live where? In the U.S., of course!” But he fell out of favor when he began criticizing the West for its complacency, lack of moral courage, and legalistic attitudes.

I ignored the backlash and concentrated on what Solzhenitsyn had to say, mainly through One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and his monumental work, The Gulag Archipelago, a disturbing account of life in the Soviet labor camp system that was based on his observations as a prisoner as well as the experiences of other prisoners. The Soviets did not take kindly to this exposé, which is why he was finally booted out. The combination of the depth of his faith and the courage it took for him to stand up for his convictions stood in marked contrast to what I saw in the church at that time (and, well, what I saw in my own life). I thought we could use a few more troublemakers like him. I still do.

God, send us more troublemakers like Solzhenitsyn. He stands apart as one of the true heroes of the 20th century.

The Photoshopping of America

I realize this is nothing new, and I'm pretty late to the game in writing about it. But I had a conversation the other day with a guy who uses an online dating service, and we got to talking about women (and men, I'm sure) who are less than honest when they give out information about themselves on Internet sites. Like many men, my friend has wasted time online with women who turned out not to be who or what they said they were.

Just as bad is all the altered photos. I personally know a woman who Photoshopped herself right into disfigurement, and she just can't see it. Even to the untrained eye, her online photo makes her face look distorted. To the trained eye, it's downright laughable; one of her eyes in no way matches the other, and one cheekbone looks as if it's swollen—but in a really odd way, not the way it might naturally swell up if she was injured.

This woman has fallen prey to one of the greatest deceptions to befall women in recent decades with regard to their appearance: that it's OK to deceive men by altering their photos, because once those same men are introduced to the woman's stellar personality, it won't matter that she's 10 years older or 20 pounds heavier. But it will. Because deception is crummy foundation for a relationship, which is presumably what some of those men, at least, are looking for through an online dating service.

I don't get it. Sure, my photo over there on the side of this post may not make me look so hot, but that's me. Not so hot, but honest. (Oh, and happily married...not on the dating market.)

Words and More Words

As you all must know by now, I love language. I have this ongoing love affair with words, and I'm so enchanted by them that I don't even care what language they're expressed in. So here's my current slew of words and word-related interests:

1. Out-woman. Isn't that delicious? It means exactly what it says. It dates to the 16th century, I believe. Can't you just see two brazen hussies going at it outside some remote rural pub in the Cotswolds, one of them shouting to the other, "I can out-woman you any day!"

2. New words. Merriam-Webster is finally adding "edamame" to the dictionary; edamame are immature green soybeans, and many of us have been eating them for years. Also to come in the next edition: "soju," a Korean vodka distilled from rice, and "prosecco," a dry Italian sparkling wine.

3. The Adventure of English. History International is currently airing this 2002 series, and I've TiVoed every episode. I especially enjoyed the one in which the host credited America with standardizing the language, much to the admiration of the Brits. Who knew? I figured they always thought we were the ones who botched it up.

I keep a running list of my favorite words, and it's getting ridiculously long. Do you? If so, what are your favorite words?

The International Christian Retail Show

I'm a bit late with this, but I don't much care. It took me three full days to recover from a recent 10-day trip to Florida, mostly to visit my daughters and the friends I left behind when I moved to Colorado last year, but also to attend the annual event known as ICRS, or the International Christian Retail Show. I'm only now sufficiently awake to post this.

I began attending the show in the 1990s when I was editor of Christian Retailing magazine. In those days, I had appointments on the trade-show floor every half hour or so during the day, early morning breakfast meetings, luncheons, dinners, and late-night events or appointments. I averaged four hours of sleep each night.

After I left the magazine, I attended as a representative of a freelancing client like Publishers Weekly or FaithfulReader.com, or as an author with one of the publishing companies. Over the years, my participation waned—as did my interest. This year, I attended three dinners that I wouldn't have missed for the world (thank you, Christy Awards, Baker and Tyndale), a seminar my literary agency held (thank you, Alive Communications), a women-in-publishing event (thank you, Guideposts, Sara A. Fortenberry Literary Agency, FaithfulReader.com, Nunn Communications, and the B&B Media Group), meals with industry friends, and a booksigning for my very own We the Purple: Faith, Politics and the Independent Voter.

That was it. I never "walked the floor"—which at an event like this means spending untold hours going from one vendor's booth to another, checking out excellent, mediocre and truly horrible books, the plethora of what we call "Jesus Junk" (cheap products, often ridiculous, with something religious gratuitously slapped on them) and the myriad services offered to booksellers.

Apparently, I wasn't alone in my lack of interest in the show. Attendance dropped to just under 7,500—the lowest number in decades. As recently as 1999, some 14,000-plus people attended.

So is it the economy, increasing travel hassles (which nearly did me in, I admit), the consolidation of mom-and-pop stores into large chains, meaning fewer representatives, or simply a lack of interest? For me, it's that last factor. With each passing year, I feel less of an affinity with the Christian marketplace and more with the general market.

That doesn't mean I don't appreciate Christian retailers, who work harder in a day than some people work in a week, or Christian publishers, who have been incredibly good to me. I just think that maybe this show has run its course. Back in the day, we faced an uphill battle getting our books into general market stores, and we needed our own show to give our books and other products exposure to retailers.

But no more. Religious sections in general market stores have expanded, and while they'll never compete with Christian stores in knowledge or depth or breadth of titles, they do offer exposure to Christian authors and let readers know there's more to Christian books than they may have realized.

Will I attend next year? Sure. It's going to be in Denver, a mere hour or so from my home. And the following year? Probably. It's in St. Louis, a much more manageable city to tolerate. Other venues in recent years, and to which they may return, have included Dallas (nope), Atlanta (no way), and of course Orlando (well, my daughters are a factor there). If they ever add Portland or Seattle, I'm in.

But no matter where it's held, it's unlikely that you'll see me walking the floor looking for the latest and greatest product. I'll leave that to the other 6,000 or 4,000 people there, or whatever attendance drops to in future years.

In Memoriam: Linda Pryor

"I'm Done" (Linda's caption, after summitting her final Fourteener a while back)

Early Saturday morning, the unthinkable, the unimaginable, the seemingly impossible happened: Linda Pryor, an experienced climber who had summited all of Colorado's 54 14,000-foot-plus mountains, died while climbing Crestone Needle in the Sangre de Cristo mountains in southern Colorado.

I am still in disbelief.

While Linda was climbing Mount Kilimanjaro in Kenya last fall, I began attending the same small church she did --- and expected to feel intimidated by this nearly legendary mountain climber when she returned. But no. Instead of meeting a tough, aggressive, muscular show-off, I met a gentle spirit who lived to love, to serve and to climb. Her smile, her sense of humor, her faith, and her wisdom were all infectious.

Unlike Thoreau's men of quiet desperation, Linda lived a life of quiet inspiration. To me, she defined serenity.

Linda was careful, conscientious, and safety-conscious. She was a meticulous climber who planned and thought through every step of her climb before she ever left the house. On Saturday, she and her climbing companions had with them all the safety equipment they needed. Her fall was simply a freak occurrence. The photo below was taken the morning she died.

I would have trusted her with my life. Her climbing companions did just that.

I can't help but feel cheated; I knew her for such a short time. Tonight at her memorial service, though, I found not just comfort but also cause for celebration in this verse from Isaiah, which Linda and her fellow climbers shared in their tent Friday night:

For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.

That's an image I can live with now, the image of Linda's beloved mountains bursting into song and the trees clapping their hands as she made her final ascent, straight into the arms of God.

Linda died doing what she loved, but just as important, she lived doing what she loved. We should all be so fortunate.

The Caged Virgin and Willful Blindness

How's that for a matchup? Actually, those are the titles of two books on my must-read list. Both examine Islamic beliefs and practices but from distinctly different perspectives.

I've read enough excerpts of Ayaan Hirsi Ali's The Caged Virgin to know that I want to read the entire book. Her more recent release, Infidel, provided a fascinating look at her life as an Islamic woman and traced her journey from Somalia to the Dutch Parliament. In The Caged Virgin, Ali offers a rebuke of Islam's treatment of women as well as a critical analysis of fundamentalist Islam and how it is perceived in the West. Her perspective is that of an insider who escaped being forced to marry her cousin and who lost her sister to the emotional aftereffects of genital mutilation. Hers is a compelling story, and that is an understatement.

My knowledge of Willful Blindness stems entirely from an interview by Hugh Hewitt on BookTV with author Andrew McCarthy, the federal prosecutor who brought the "Blind Sheikh," Omar Abdel Rahman, to trial for the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. What struck me most about the interview was McCarthy's vulnerability about the mistakes he made and his shallow understanding of Islam. And then there were the many revelations about the lack of communication among government agencies and other lapses in national security measures that allowed the Blind Sheikh to carry out the attack — and that paved the way for the 9/11 attacks. An equally compelling read in a different way, I suspect.

A.J. Kiesling and 'Skizzer'

I read a lot of books. I don't mean a skimpy one per week or anything like that; double or triple that, and you're in my ballpark. I read both multi-genre fiction and multi-category nonfiction. I'm not only an avid book reader; I'm also a highly critical book editor and writing instructor. And I will say this without apology or qualification: The very last thing CBA (shorthand for the Christian book publishing industry) needs is another crummy or mediocre or wannabe writer. You have to kiss a lot of toads to find a prince, or princess, among the mass of Christian writers.

One such evidence of CBA royalty is Angie Kiesling, who writes under the name A.J. Kiesling and is one of the best writers I've ever edited. She is also a friend, which makes me appear less than objective in my assessment of her writing skills. But before I launch into a glowing review of her first novel, Skizzer, let me assure you that our friendship grew in part out of a mutual respect for each other's writing skills. I wouldn't praise her book just because she's my friend; I wouldn't subject her or you or the publishing industry to that kind of deception.

Here's what I love about Angie's writing: She's a wordsmith through and through. After reading dozens and dozens of Christian novels so far this year, I am so utterly tired of lazy writing, which made Skizzer such a refreshing and
even recuperative read; I found myself breathing more deeply as I settled into a book that reminded me why I love the English language so much. Angie's word choice is always precise; her metaphors are always fresh; her descriptions are always visual. If you can't "see" the scenes in Skizzer, the problem is not with her writing.

Okay, enough about Angie. I'm guessing it would help if I told you a bit about the book. In Skizzer (the way one character pronounced "sister" as a toddler), protagonist Claire Trowling's sister, Becca, has disappeared, leaving only a few cryptic clues behind. Claire's quest to find her sister uncovers a long-held family secret and takes her from North Carolina to England, where the mystery behind an unusual pendant, the celebration of a sacred ritual and the reason for Becca's disappearance all come together. It's a compelling, suspenseful and ultimately satisfying read.

Reading Skizzer made me wonder why CBA editors don't demand this level of writing from more of their authors. Maybe the problem is that there are plenty of writers in love with stories but not enough in love with language and stories. Readers should be given both — a page-turner of a story and just the right words to tell it. Budding writers and veteran authors alike would do well to read Skizzer and learn from it.

You can buy the book here as well as in brick-and-mortar stores, and you can read a great interview with Angie here. I heartily recommend both.

John Hodgman and "We the Purple"

Becky from somewhere or other is one of my new, very best friends, and all because of John Hodgman, the resident expert on "The Daily Show" and PC Guy on the "Get a Mac" commercials.

Maybe not all because of him, but close enough. Becky and I stayed at the same hotel in L.A. during BookExpo America and met at breakfast one morning. We got to talking about the reason I was there, the release of We the Purple: Faith, Politics and the Independent Voter. As it turns out, Becky is a committed independent, so she stood in my autograph line later that day to pick up a copy of the book.

Beloved Becky, God bless her, then went to John Hodgman's autograph line, got a copy of his book* — and handed him her own copy of We the Purple, talking it up and encouraging him to read it. He received it graciously and seemed genuinely interested, Becky tells me.

How cool is that?

"The Daily Show" staff already has a copy of the book; my publicist made sure they got it along with a media kit. Even if nothing comes of it — even if Jon & Company don't come calling — I'm so grateful to Becky. John Hodgman has my book! That's good enough for me.

Things you probably don't know about PC Guy:

• He used to work as a literary agent.
• He edits the humor section of The New York Times Magazine.
• He plays the clarinet.
• He's a contributor to NPR's "This American Life."
• He's a 1994 graduate of Yale.
• He writes a mean blog.

* I couldn't make it to Hodgman's signing. Ergo, I did not get a copy of his book, More Information Than You Require, or what I assume was an excerpt from it since it doesn't release until October. Whatever he was signing at BEA was titled Taxonomies of Complete World Knowledge; I'm guessing it's a chapter title. Anyway, if the good people at Dutton would like me to get my facts straight, maybe they wouldn't mind sending me a copy of Taxonomies and put me on the hot list for a review copy of More Information.

Cross-posted on my other blog.

My First Time

That's me over there, firing a gun for the first time ever. Michael, my favorite and only brother-in-law in the entire state of Oregon, came to Colorado for an extended visit and brought about half his arsenal with him. Since I had gone public on 43 Things with my desire to shoot a gun at least once before I die, I didn't have any excuse not to try out some of his weaponry.

So I did. We went to the Rampart Range Shooting Range, and I got to shoot three pistols and a couple of rifles, including an AK-47. Michael tells me that in this picture I was shooting a 22-caliber bolt-action Marlin, but you could have fooled me. Oh, and I'm not pregnant. Hey, it may have been May 27, but it was cold and cloudy and windy, and I was heavily layered.

There you have it. I've done yet another of the 43 Things I want to do before I die. Now I don't have to do it again. But I suspect I will, especially if BIL Michael shows up at our door again.

Where's "We the Purple"?

Good question. If you go to a Barnes & Noble store looking for We the Purple: Faith, Politics and the Independent Voter, good luck. You won't find it in Politics, or Political Science, or even Current Affairs.

Nope. You'll find it in...um...Christian Inspiration.

Never mind that the faith content is, oh, less than 20 percent. Or that the distinctly Christian content is even less than that. And the inspirational content? I'm flattered that B&N finds my writing so inspiring, but really. Inspirational, in the religious sense? I don't think so.

And apparently, never mind that the political content is 100 percent. Or that my publisher, Tyndale, correctly categorized the book as political. Or that the B&N's own web site categorizes it under "United States Politics & Government."

The official explanation?

• Tyndale is a Christian publisher.


• The book contains a faith element.


• All the other books I've written are shelved in their religion section.

I particularly like that last one. What if I wrote a novel, published by a Christian publisher, that contained a faith element? Would that be shelved in the nonfiction religion section, rather than Christian fiction, because that's where all my other books are shelved?

I've been in the publishing industry for 30-some years and the Christian bookselling industry for 10-plus years, and I have to tell you, it gets more bewildering with each passing year. The more inside information I learn, the more confused I am.

Unless I'm totally off my rocker here, I do believe the purpose of both publishing and bookselling is to sell books. I mean, to make money selling books. A B&N employee tried to comfort me—yes, I needed some serious comforting—by reassuring me that the staff would be able to find my book for any customer requesting it. Uncomforted, I asked him 1) Would anyone browsing the shelves for the latest and greatest book on independent politics think to check out the Christian Inspiration section? and 2) Would anyone looking for an inspirational Christian book have a clue what We the Purple is about?

Tyndale, God bless 'em, tried again to get it shelved properly, as did a B&N rep. But no. The corporate powers-that-be overruled reason. And I doubt that B&N is alone in making decisions like this; I just haven't looked for the book in any other stores yet.

Moral of the story: If you're looking for a political book during this highly charged political season and you happen to wander into a bookstore to find one, go straight to Christian Inspiration. You never know what you'll find there. (Hint: I'm shelved just to the left of Richard Foster.)

(Cross-posted on We the Purple.)

How Not to Do a Booksigning

Friday night I went to an event at a local mega-bookstore billed as a discussion led by a certain nonfiction author. I won't embarrass the author or mention the book title, which was clever enough to attract my attention. Since I'd like to do a similar event to get the word out about We the Purple, I left my cozy little mountain enclave, reluctantly drove down the pass, and took the Evil I (Interstate 25) to the bookstore.

Big mistake.

At 7 p.m., when the author was scheduled to begin her talk, a videographer was still fiddling with the A/V equipment, which he continued to do for the next 10 minutes. Meanwhile, a dozen or so people in the audience politely waited for the technical drama to end and the book event to begin. Finally, the videographer was good to go. Everyone readjusted themselves in their seats and turned their attention toward the author, who stood behind the podium and appeared ready to talk.

But no.

She just stood there. For the next 10 minutes. Not saying a significant word. I had invited a friend to go to the event with me. "I'm losing it," she said. "Me too," I said. Those proved to be the most significant, and perhaps only, words spoken for the next 5 minutes.

Get that? It was now 7:25, a full 25 minutes into a one-hour event, and nothing had happened.

The bookstore support person, who had been standing at attention for the entire 25 minutes, did not do or say a thing. You have to visualize this scene. A videographer in the back, waiting. An author at the podium, waiting. A staffer on the sidelines, waiting. A dozen people in the seats, waiting.

And then the author took a breath, as if to speak. We sat up straight, anticipating the best—the beginning of the event, finally. "I'm still expecting two people," she said to the staffer, holding up 2 fingers in case, I suppose, the staffer mistakenly thought she meant "too people."

Whatever. We left.

At first I was ticked off, having left my cozy little mountain enclave, reluctantly driven down the pass, and taken the Evil I (Interstate 25) to the bookstore.

But then I reminded myself of the cardinal rules of any event:

• Start on time.


• Set up the bloody A/V equipment well in advance.


• Start on time.


• Don't wait for latecomers.


• Start on time.


• Show the people who are already there that you value their time.


• Start on time.


• Don't depend on the bookstore staff to do your job, which is to:


• Start on time.

So now we all know what's going to happen the next time I have a booksigning: something is going to prevent me from starting on time. But I can guarantee it won't be because I'm waiting for latecomers. And I can guarantee that instead of standing at the podium looking clueless, I'll be explaining the delay to the audience. I may still look clueless, of course, but at least the audience will be clued in.

Mountain of Authors

That's the name of an event I'll be participating in on Saturday (April 12) in Colorado Springs. It's a regional event that gives book lovers and aspiring writers an opportunity to hear local authors speak. (I'm now a local author...) I'll be serving on the nonfiction panel and signing my most recent release, We the Purple: Faith, Politics and the Independent Voter, which is getting lots of media attention in this election year. Here's the official information:

Pikes Peak Library District will host its 2nd annual regional authors’ event, “Mountain of Authors” to showcase authors of the Pikes Peak region, and offer presentations about writing and publishing.

The free program will be held from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., Saturday, April 12 at East Library, 5550 N. Union Blvd. No registration is required.

This event will inspire new and established writers, and offer book fans a chance to meet and discuss their favorite titles with local authors. Panel discussions will be offered by nonfiction, fiction, children’s and teen authors. A free lunch and booksigning will also be held at the event.

Program Schedule
10 - 11 a.m. Nonfiction Author Panel (moderated by Tim Blevins)

Beth Barrett
Marcia Ford
Karen Scalf Linamen
John Stansfield

11:15 a.m. -12:15 p.m. Fiction Author Panel (moderated by Kirk Farber)

Kevin Anderson
Kacy Barnett-Gramckow
Beth Groundwater
Rebecca Moesta
Robert Spiller

12:15 -1:30 p.m. Lunch (food will be provided)

1:30 - 2:30 p.m. Children’s/Teen Author Panel (moderated by Karin Huxman)

Mary Peace Finley
Donita Paul
Katherine Pebley O’Neal

2:30 - 3:30 p.m. Author Showcase: meet authors from the Pikes Peak region, and purchase your favorite author’s books

Pikes Peak Poet Laureate reception following program.

If you come to the event and found out about it here, introduce yourself to me, okay?

(Cross-posted on We the Purple.)