Falling off the face of the net

Keeping a blog updated isn't necessarily a problem, provided you have a life that allows opportunity to do so. As a writer, the act of writing (a book, a blog, an article somewhere) should make it easy to post just another piece of worthless drivel in some shape or form. I guess that's what I'm doing here.

Between writing, edits, and formatting, I put together my novel HIDING BEHIND THUNDER in about 14 months. I'd like to think that's not too bad if one takes into consideration that I type with only my index fingers, my right thumb (space bar) and my right ring finger (backspace key... which I seem to use a lot). That leaves me with six other rather useless digits that tend to only get in the way, especially over the course of creating a 137,000-word self-proclaimed masterpiece.

Not that those phalanges are wasted in other ventures, mind you. I mean, it's not like I'm going to have them surgically removed just so I can write another book or add another blog here. That would have a detrimental effect on my being able to communicate my feelings about the behaviors of other drivers for their benefit.

Then there's that little issue of actually working a full-time job and having a full-time family. That will slow things down. Oh, and let's not forget the modern time-wasting monster called commuting, which eats up another hour and a half of potential writing time each working day (but doesn't seem to impact my ability to put those previously-mentioned middle fingers to use). So, where am I going with this?

Although HIDING BEHIND THUNDER isn't actually flying off the shelves at your local bookstore (which likely has a lot to do with bookstores not yet carrying the thing), I've already had people asking if I'm working on my next magnum opus. (Not to be confused with a really big cartoon penguin.)

Yeah, I'm trying to work on another novel, but I've found that promoting a book is almost harder than writing one. So, where am I going with this (you ask again)?

I'm wondering if I should take a break from writing and just work on the promotion. (Kind of what I'm doing at the moment.) You know, somehow convince enough people to buy my book so I can retire and just keep writing between attending lots of NASCAR races.

Resting upon one's laurels isn't really a bad thing, provided you have laurels to rest upon. Which I don't.

But, I never wrote my 60s-era NASCAR novel expecting to get rich... although it sure would be nice. No, I wrote it because of my passion for the sport and its rich history, threads that I've woven into a satisfying coming-of-age story. Really.

So, again I ask you --nay, beg you -- to at least check out HIDING BEHIND THUNDER, now specially priced at Amazon.com, and available for downloads to Kindle, Nook, and many other e-readers -- even your PC -- at Smashwords.com.

Who knows? Maybe you'll want to see me write another one, too.