Thank you

Thank you to everyone who stopped by my table at the Weird & Wired Expo in Scranton, PA this past weekend. It was a great event, full of energy and a sense of community. I was glad to be a little part of it.

Weird & Wired Punk Bazaar & Zine Expo

Lehigh Valley Punk Rock Flea Market

Another punk rock flea market! I've only done one in PA so far, so I'm looking forward to this one in Bethlehem. I'll be selling and signing copies of my book all day. If you go, be sure to buy some $1 CDs--all proceeds from the CD sales benefit the local public library.

More info here.

Trenton Punk Rock Flea Market - October 21, 2018

I'll be back at the Trenton Punk Rock Flea Market this Sunday, selling and signing copies of my book. This event is always a great time and definitely worth checking out. I'll be joined by Joyce Victor with her "death" book!

7 Seconds

7 Seconds was a mainstay of the hardcore scene in 80's and beyond--an inspiration to stay positive during a time when there wasn't a lot to be positive about.

I wrote this brief bit about them in my novel.

They have just announced they're breaking up, but we'll keep listening to what they had to say.

Now he lowered the needle onto the record. The first song began in a quick blur of guitars, the drums as fast as a blender. You wanna be the way I am but you could never understand. The singer's voice was earnest and fierce. He sang so fast the lyrics were a jumble of syllables run together, as if there were only so much time to say what he had to say before people stopped listening. 

Not Another Punk Rock Flea Market in Scranton, PA

UPDATE: Unfortunately, Joyce and I will not be at the flea market March 10 because we need to attend a funeral that day.

***

The name says it all! I'll be selling and signing copies of my novel this Saturday, March 10 from 1:00 to 7:00 in Scranton, PA.

I'll also be joined by Joyce Victor, author of a simultaneously funny and heartbreaking book about death.

Click the link for details:
Not Another Punk Rock Flea Market

Thank you

My "world" tour is over! Thank you to everyone who stopped by my table. I wrote my novel to memorialize a unique moment for the people who were there and bring it to life for the people who weren't. It was so encouraging and re-affirming to talk to everyone about their memories of City Gardens or about their own local scenes (no idea Wilkes-Barre had hardcore bands in the 80's!).

Thank you also to everyone who took a chance and bought my book. Hope you enjoy it!

Special thanks to the people who keep the energy going: Jeff Stumpo of Library Express in Scranton, PA; Joseph Francis Kuzemba and all the crew at the Trenton Punk Rock Flea Market; and Mark Campas, NEPA Punk Rock Flea Market.

And finally thanks to my great table-neighbors: GentlemenKilla of Philly and the pirates of Wilkes-Barre!

Fall 2017 World Tour! (well, my world, not *the* world)

It's going to be a busy fall! (Yeah, for me, four events in three months is downright overwhelming.)

I'll be selling and signing books in PA and NJ starting 9/1. Stop by and say hello.

Library Express at the Steamtown Mall in Scranton, PA Friday, 9/1 7:00-9:00: This is a cool spot for book browsing--great selection of off-beat and interesting stuff. If enough people show up I'll do a reading. Maybe I'll go meta and read the big climactic scene that takes place in a mall.

Trenton Punk Rock Flea Market at the Historic Roebling Wire Works building in Trenton, NJ Sunday, 10/22 10:00-5:00. This one is huge and always a blast. This will be my third time at the TPRFM. I may take a break from it after this while I work on my next book, so if you're in the area and would like to pick up a copy of "This Is What You Want. . . " or "The Night Bazaar," stop by my table.

NEPA Punk Rock Flea Market at the Kingston Armory in Kingston, PA Sunday, 10/29 12:00-8:00. Looking forward to finally doing an event in NEPA, where I now live.

Flemington Punk Rock Flea Market in Flemington, NJ Sunday, 11/19. Real close to my home town of Hopewell! Looks like a cool variety of vendors at this one (and also me).

Fascism

From my novel. The main character contemplates the aftermath of a skinhead riot at the club:

These guys were all the same. It wasn't muscle or even hair-trigger rage--it was sheer stupidity that gave them strength. They were never going away. They'd stay here forever, never changing, because they couldn't imagine anything else, or make any other choice. That was the only power they had. They were dumber than everybody else.

TPRFM (the sequel)!

I'll be back at the Trenton Punk Rock Flea Market, Saturday 4/8/17, selling and signing copies of my book. I had a blast at the last Flea Market: talked to a lot of cool people, ate great food, listened to all those underground songs I love, and even sold a bunch of books (thank you to all those brave people willing to spend their money and take a chance on an unknown writer!).

For more info, click the link.
Trenton Punk Rock Flea Market

The Night Bazaar

My short story "Weekly Pass" is in the new psychological horror anthology, THE NIGHT BAZAAR: Eleven Haunting Tales of Forbidden Wishes and Dangerous Desires (Northampton House Press).

Lenore Hart, the anthology's editor, was the eagle-eyed editor on my novel, THIS IS WHAT YOU WANT, THIS IS WHAT YOU GET. For this anthology, she's assembled eleven, clever dark fantasy stories that are all based in deep-rooted human desires, desires that can only be fulfilled by risking an invitation to the Night Bazaar.

My story came from years of commuting on SEPTA Regional Rail from Philadelphia to New Jersey, and the one evening I saw a child's pale hand waving behind a car window.

THE NIGHT BAZAAR is out now in trade paperback and e-book:
Amazon
Barnes&Noble

TPRFM!

The Trenton Punk Rock Flea Market!!!

I'll have a table Sunday, 10/30 selling and signing copies of my novel. I'm proud to be a small part of this event that's helping to revitalize Trenton. The TPRFM runs both Saturday and Sunday--check it out for the food trucks, the great community, and the scores of crafts and artistic works on sale you can't find anywhere else. I've gone to a bunch of these as an attendee and had a blast--this is my first time as a vendor. Looking forward to it!

Randy Now's Man Cave 12/20: NY Hardcore, Hip Hop and Rap, Death Row (the real one, not the record label) and my NJ punk book

I'll be signing books with a great lineup of writers at Randy Now's Man Cave in Bordentown, NJ Sunday, 12/20. Stop by and say hello! Randy's store is a home for anything weird and cool. I'd hang out there all afternoon even if I weren't selling books.

Go to Randy's Facebook page for details: Meet & Greet with Authors

Best reaction yet . . .

. . . to my novel (via my Facebook page): It's "like Fight Club set to music!"

Collingswood Book Festival

I'll be selling and signing books with my fellow Northampton House author Heather Harlen at the Collingswood Book Festival, Saturday, 10/3, from 10:00 - 4:00. Stop by and say hello!

For more info, here's their link:
Collingswood Book Festival

"Their liberty to choose"--a review by VOYA

A brief but perceptive review of THIS IS WHAT YOU WANT, THIS IS WHAT YOU GET from Susan Allen of VOYA magazine:

The punk music scene of Trenton, New Jersey, in the 1980s is the setting for this debut novel. In the fictional punk music Club 321, the nineteen-year-old main character, Nick Lablanche, seeks to escape from his “normal,” suburban life. He is not a punk/rebel stereotype; he is a regular guy, seeking help to overcome depression and trying to find a way to live life on his own terms. The reader shares Nick’s feelings as he walks into this counterculture portrayed by blood- and mud-stained floors, skinheads, raw sex, unfettered language, and loud, raucous music. Feelings include discovery, trepidation, exhilaration, and fear. The tension between the violent, yelling counterculture and the “suburban raised” Nick keeps the reader involved. The author kept journals of his punk-music-club-hopping days and used them in his writing to keep the punk scene real and vibrant. The writing is like the music of that time. It is stark, not many metaphors, with quick, short starts and stops. There are no long passages and the focus of the text is razor-sharp. The characters are real as well. They portray older youth and adults seeking ways to live their lives differently than what they know. They realize they have choices, some that will bring difficult consequences, but still show their individuality and demonstrate their liberty to choose. 

Liberty and individuality versus the comforts of conformity

Here's an interview I did with Kristen Gaydos of Citizens' Voice:

Punk background helps Wilkes grad pen novel

Dancing about Architecture

Here's a guest blog I did on my friend Heather Harlen's page. She's the author of the thriller HOPE YOU GUESS MY NAME, also published by Northampton House. Thanks for the invite, Heather!

Guest DJ: Dancing About Architecture

The Real Horror behind Horror Movies

My thanks to my friend, Nicole (see link just to your right to read some good poetry of hers) for suggesting I post my e-mail rant, apropos of seeing Hostel and attending the Philly Wizard con, all in the same week. Let the frothing at the mouth commence:

Yes you’re right. Halloween was freakin’ scary—that was the horror movie for our generation. But it’s different now, not just because there are very few restrictions.

It’s probably tmtt but it’s two things. one’s been mentioned a lot and is not that original. But in Halloween, what made it so scary was that you put yourself in the place of the victims. Like when Jamie lee Curtis is so scared she can’t even stand up and is half crawling half running across the lawn you actually feel it in your legs like you want to pick her up and run. But now the “sympathetic” character is the killer. All the attention and character detail is devoted to the killer, especially on the techniques or motifs (like "7" where the guy based his murders on the 7 deadly sins).

This is why CSI is so repugnant. Because it pretends to be about these heroic characters solving crimes, but really that’s just a guise to show elaborately orchestrated murders. Everything is focused on process, not personality or society or anything like that. And the victims are just props.

Why I’m so burned out about this is that this trend started in comic books about 20 years ago, but at least there was always some character moving through all this brutality with some kind of moral code (“Constantine” was a good example—the comic book was WAY more violent than the movie). But gradually what happened was as the writing detoriated the focus was more on the killer(s) themselves and their methods. Things got more and more insular and claustrophobic, to the point where you had stories about serial killers killing other serial killers.

And finally you get to movies like Saw and Hostel, where they don’t even bother pretending to tell a story set in the actual world (like Halloween does)—all the Saw movies happen in some fantasy underground dungeon. And there’s not even the pretense of having believable characters that act like actual people—you have either killers, who are always calm and witty and in control; and victims, who are always frightened and witless.

And the real subtext of this is: there’s no attempt at a believable setting because the filmmakers/writers already know that they’re audience is so far gone into this stuff they don’t need a conventional story, just get to the gore as quickly as possible. And the characters are always the same template (charismatic killer, inferior victims) because the writers know their audience identifies with the killers, not the victims.

So that’s the second thing that’s disturbing about it and I saw that all over the con [2010 Philadelphia Wizard convention]: that people accept this as just another form of entertainment (like the writer I saw at a panel who said “I try to think of different ways of killing people—that’s what I like to do”) totally divorced from the real world (none of these fans probably feel any compassion when they hear about a murder on the news). Fiction isn’t supposed to make people more isolated, but this type of storytelling isn’t just doing that, it’s encouraging it.

Life (the cereal)

Two middle-aged women in the cereal aisle of the supermarket. Mother and daughter, I think. The daughter walks up and down, reading the names of the cereals aloud. The mother leans her elbows on her shopping cart, her chin in her hand.

The daughter says, "How about Honey Nut Cheerios?"
"It's got a lot of nuts?" the mother asks.
"No. No nuts."
"Nah.”
“How about Wheaties?”
“Nah.”
“No Wheaties?”
“Come on.”
"How about Life cereal?"
"What?"
"Life. You like Life, don't you?"
"Nah. Not so much."