A Break in the VBT for Announcements!

First announcement is that I need a Wikipedia editor. My Wikipedia entry, which was composed by someone else, is hopelessly outdated, and I don't have the time to learn how to make Wikipedia edits to fix it. If anyone who reads this IS knowledgeable about how to edit Wikipedia pages and is willing to update the page by mining my website, contact me there. For doing the update, you'll get a free autographed copy of Deadly Currents, and maybe some more books, depending on the effort you put into it.

Second announcement is that enough new subscribers have signed up for my email newsletter that I awarded another prize! Courtney from Ashburn, Virginia received an autographed copy of Deadly Currents as well as a mystery book written by another author I admire. I award a prize of one of my mystery books and 1-2 books by other mystery authors every time a hundred more subscribers sign up for my email newsletter. Those are great odds, so please sign up and encourage your friends to do so!

Third announcement is that Deadly Currents has received its first customer review on Amazon, and it's five stars! You can read it HERE. I couldn't be more pleased. What would REALLY please me is more people adding their reviews after they read Deadly Currents, so I hope you'll consider doing so!

Fourth announcement is that the new Winter Issue of Mystery Scene magazine, which should be hitting newsstands and mailboxes early next week, includes a New Books essay titled "Deadly Rsearch" written by me. Please pick up a copy and read about the research that went into the writing of Deadly Currents. A bonus is that handsome Robert Crais graces the cover. ;-)

Fifth announcement is that it's only THREE DAYS until the official release date of Deadly Currents!!! Are you excited? ... I am!

And now back to the regularly scheduled program, starting tomorrow, with the next stop on my virtual book tour.

Contest Winners!

In the month of August, I ran two contests on my blog. First was the one in conjunction with Tim Hallinan's guest appearance. He promised to send copies of his latest two releases, Breathing Water and The Queen of Patpong, to one person whose name I randomly drew from among those who commented on his post. The winner of that contest was Carolyn J. Rose, author along with Mike Nettleton of the Deadly Duo mysteries. To find out more about Carolyn, please check out her website. Also, she blogs with the other authors of MysteryAuthors.com at their group blog. I've put Carolyn and Tim in touch with each other, and I'm sure she'll be pleased with her prize.

The second contest was one I announced both here and on Inkspot, the blog for Midnight Ink authors. In an attempt to increase subscribers to both blogs, I offered a gift, in celebration of my August birthday, of free mystery books to one lucky winner whose name was randomly drawn from those who subscribed as followers of both blogs. The contest was wildly successful, more than doubling the number of Inkspot subscribers and raising mine to almost 200. I'm happy to announce that Patrick Balester, author of the mystery novel In the Dismal Swamp won that contest. To find out more about Patrick, please check out his website or his blog, Picks By Pat.

I'm pleased that all kinds of folks interested in mysteries, such as published authors, aspiring authors, and avid readers, read and follow my blog. It just happened that the two contest winners this time were both published authors. I will be running more contests around the time of the March release of the first book in my new Rocky Mountain Outdoor Adventures series, Deadly Currents. And, you know, I'm kinda hoping some mystery readers or aspiring authors come away with prizes from those! ;-)

In the meantime, there's one contest that's still ongoing, my email newsletter contest. If you aren't already a subscriber, please sign up at my website, on the Newsletter page. For every 100 new subscribers, I draw a name from the list of all my subscribers to win an autographed copy of one of my books and 1-2 other mystery books. Good luck!