Now. Thirteen words that equal a whole

1. The
2. Snow
3. Around
4. Here
5. Is
6. Melting.
7. I
8. Am
9. Sad
10. to
11. See
12. it
13. Go

Happy Thursday Thirteen, gang! And welcome spring!

Or he thought he had a private spot until, blonde under one arm and hotel room key in the other hand, the noise of Mitchell’s thundering stopped them. From the sound of the big idiot, he had a full head of steam on. Hardly a time to bring a girl into the room.

The blonde shrank under Trevor’s arm. Not that Trevor blamed her; Mitchell had shifted shape into the dragon, and no one with sense wanted to be near him when he got like that. Not even Trevor.

“Did you fucking hear me?” Mitchell snarled at whoever he was talking to.

Trevor turned his blonde so she faced him. He kissed her forehead. “Go wait for me in the bar. I’ll detonate the asshole here.”

There was something almost relieved in her nod. Trevor told himself to take a better look at her so he’d recognize her again — soft nose, blue shirt, black heeled boots. Girls got pissy when you forgot who they were and wound up with someone else. You heard about it later on, and that was the sort of shit Trevor didn’t need. Ever.

Neither was this scene with Mitchell, but what the fuck. It wasn’t like he had much choice.

He dawdled, watching his blonde speedwalk toward the elevator. If Mitchell had permanently fucked this up for him, he thought, the asshole was going to spend an awful lot of time in the near future dealing with whatever had him so royally pissed.

He took a deep breath and pushed into the room. Acting casual and uncaring took some effort in the face of the tornado.

Mitchell was a tornado, all right. Pacing around the room, raking a hand through his hair, so red in the face, you’d think he was covered in the stripped-off paint from some barn.

“I don’t fucking care,” he snarled some more. “No more college twits.” He spoke each word slowly, precisely. His pissiness came off him in waves. They hit Trevor square in the face, making him want to blink it away.

“JR,” Mitchell said as Trevor flopped onto one of the two double beds in their shared hotel room, landing on his elbows and crossing his motorcycle boots at the ankle. It was his best approximation of Mitchell Cool.

Mitchell didn’t even fucking notice. “Stop fucking talking long enough to fucking listen to me, will you? I don’t give a shit how important promoting the band is. Answering questions about what sort of pasta I’d be, or what I’m fluent in, or any of that other wanna-be intellectual shit is not going to keep up. Got it?”

Trevor frowned and rolled onto his left elbow, freeing up his right hand so he could grab a cigarette. He didn’t blame the big idiot. Not this time, anyway.

What sort of pasta would he be? Oh, shit, that was a loaded question.

With another snarl and a growl that made the hair on the back of Trevor’s neck stand up, Mitchell slammed the phone down. “Fucking A!”

“I don’t think her name started with an A,” Trevor said as blandly as he could. “But,” he said and perched the cigarette on the corner of his lip, “I didn’t exactly get the time to find out, ifyouknowwhatImean.”

Mitchell stared at him, mouth slightly slack. After a long second, his lips started to work, but it was like all the sound had disappeared with the end of the phone call.

“So,” Trevor said, trying to stay cool even as he bunched up his muscles and got ready to dive for the floor, “what are you fluent in?”

“Rock and roll, fuckhead,” Mitchell said, slightly calmer somehow. The return of his voice must’ve brought some peace with it.

Trevor nodded, not sure if he was relieved Mitchell wasn’t getting violent on his ass. “Good answer.”

“I thought so.”

“I was going to be fluent in a blonde until I found your hairy ass here.”

“Oh,” Mitchell said and sat on the edge of the other bed as if his legs had just given out from under him. “Well, go get her, then. I’ve got to go deal with another fucking college kid. One question about pasta and I’m fucking history.”

“You’re not fluent in pasta?”

“No fucking way,” Mitchell said. He actually cracked a smile. “I’m fluent in rock and roll, remember?”

“There’s hope for you yet,” Trevor said and got off the bed, hoping he’d shortly be fluent in a blonde in a blue shirt.

Hmm. I think I’ll have to wait for Demo Tapes: Year 4 to make this really zing. As it is, today’s Monday and I wrote this for this week’s SUNDAY scribbling prompt. Guess that’s your incentive to keep supporting the Demo Tapes project, huh?

Used to be, if I went two DAYS without books arriving, it was weird. But in an attempt to make the TBR mountain range here in my office shrink, I’ve been VERY disciplined about limiting what comes into the house. (within reason; I still get a nice share of RABCK — random act of BookCrossing Kindness — surprises)

So, in addition to the three party-hardy, beer-soaked books that showed up here on Wednesday, I got…

Searching for Tina Turner, by Jacqueline E. Luckett

Nope, this isn’t a rock book, believe it or not if you judge by the title. (And don’t give me that. Tina could teach ANY rocker a thing or two!) It’s just something that I wanted to read.

Still personal is the arrival of Lori G. Armstrong’s Blood Ties. Lori rocks, pure and simple. I know her as both Lori and as her alternate, erotic counterpart. I DIG Lori, hear? You would, too, if you knew her. She’s just that awesome.

And since she’s awesome, that means I need to read her awesome books, too. So, I shall.

Yes, it IS this easy in my world.

Except for when my books get to party harder than I do. That’s just WRONG.

Be sure to stop by The Printed Page, where Marcia is hosting Mailbox Monday, and The Story Siren, where Kristi hosts In My Mailbox. I’m sure other people got better-behaved books that don’t party as hard as those still-unnamed three did.

Read an E-Book Week began bright and early Sunday morning and YOU (yes, you) can get in on the fun. If you’ve never read an e-book, it is time.

Here. Start with The Demo Tapes. I’ve made them half-off at Smashwords, on top of that already ridiculously low price point I am experimenting with. Then, surf around. Find the other Read an e-Book Week partners and see what sort of great stuff you can find.

Wait! It’s Monday and I’m feeling left out of the all attention being given to the freebie books. So… Both Demo Tapes anthologies are now free at Smashwords. If you’d like to get them in print, use the handy buy links here on the site and use coupon IDES. That’ll work until March 31 — and give you 10% off the cover price.

It may not be as big a discount as free, but it’s a start!

Load up your hard drives, your flash drives, your e-readers. Even if you don’t get to read them this week, you’ll have them. They don’t go bad. And then, you can spread the Read an e-Book Week goodness year-round.

Join me. Read an e-book, even if it ain’t mine.

Even if you’ve never seen it, you need to. Ten years later, it still cracks me up. The Tour Manager and I used to mimic the Cartoon James and announce “Beer! Good!” Hell, to this day, I still say, “Fire! Bad!”

But we’re talkin’ beer here. And books. Because, while beer is the booze I prefer, beer and books just don’t get along.

See, here’s the deal. I went to the post office on Wednesday. It’s a small post office, and the two women who work there know me. So it was with some chagrin that a package was handed to me. It had arrived that morning — and it was wet. Another package had erupted in the mail sack, and wouldn’t you know, but this 9×12 catalog envelope headed for me had gotten the worst of it.

By the smell, it’s beer.

Now, it turns out this is a very very bad thing. Not merely because inside this package is a book I’d been expecting and intending to review. But because the author was kind enough to send me THREE COPIES so I could give them away.

All ruined.

My postmaster tried to get some restitution for me. But… the post office is buried under layers of legislation protecting their profits. They aren’t going to pay to replace my books, even though this happened while the books were in their hands. And they aren’t going to try to track down the sender of the beer, even though if you hunt around the USPS.gov website long enough, you’ll find that you’re not actually supposed to mail beer.

To add insult to injury, there was the implication that this was partially the author’s fault, for throwing three books into a 9×12 catalog envelope and not wrapping the books better. Like he was supposed to know some schmoo was dumb enough to mail beer?

Now, this is where it gets good. No, not that I contacted the publicist who’d set this whole thing up and she was quite understanding and wonderful.

It gets good the very second that I tell you that these books are about the 80s glam metal frontmen — a group of Aqua-Netted, bleach-blonde men who were known for their copious beer consumption. You know: who partied hard and lived to tell the tales.

These books certainly partied hard, whether or not any of us wanted them to. Lived to tell the tales? I’m not so sure.

Still. Who mails beer?

You can also enter to win a few copies of The Demo Tapes — one is print and two are digital downloads. Get ‘em now. Read ‘em during Read an E-Book Week.

1. Last year, I posted about Read an e-Book Week.

2. This year, YOU (yes, you) can read BOTH of my books.

3. They are listed at Smashwords.com, as part of their special Read an E-Book promotion.

4. Yeah. That link won’t actually work until the 7th.

5. Or you can visit my profile page there now.

6. If you’re savvy, you’ll notice I dropped the price on the books.

7. And if you’re even savvier, you’ll hang tight for the 7th. The books will be discounted a FURTHER 50%.

8. If you want to make me extra royalties, or want a print copy, go to Lulu.com.

9. Use coupon code IDES between now and March 31 for a 10% discount on the print or download (it’s a .pdf download) copy.

10. But be sure to visit Read an E-Book Week’s home site.

11. You’ll find links to other e-books.

12. But they won’t be as good as mine. Or their authors as friendly as me.

13. Discover a new author this upcoming week. At the prices many of us are charging, you can REALLY load up and let the fun last beyond one mere week.

Yeah, that’s right. Chelle dreamed big and found a way to make it happen. And now she writes these here columns, and the Trumpet makes sure them columns get into the paper so you can spend your precious money just to read what Chelle’s gotta say.

Chelle’s got a doozy for you today, boys and girls. Seems those goofs over in Europe are at it again. I swear, have you ever seen a crazier bunch of music lovers than the Europeans? They put us over here to shame. To shame. Ya hear Chelle on this one? We gotta do better. We just do.

But we ain’t gotta do it this way. Nope. Know why? ‘Cause this latest one makes them music fans over in Europe sound like they off their rockers. Maybe they are. Chelle here’s gonna let you all decide.

Seems there’s a couple-a groups now who think the best way to show their metal sides is to make heavy metal a religion. A real religion. One recognized by governments and all that.

Now, you and me, we know that metal’s already a religion. There’s rules you gotta follow or you don’t fit in. There’s dogma that makes no sense, like why jerks gotta kick the cool outta mosh pits. There’s guilt if you don’t follow them pit rules, even that stupid one that lets the jerks run the joint. I heard talk of makin’ a sacred text, full of … song lyrics, maybe. I s’pose if the Psalms fillin’ up the Bible at the church Chelle used to go to is poetry, so’s song lyrics. Wasn’t them Psalms songs once upon a time?

What Chelle don’t see there bein’ is a sacred being in this new religion of ours. Who’s it gonna be? My honey Mitchell Voss? The old-school but still rockin’ Sammy Spencer? Maybe the very dead Soul Bendorff? And what sort of teachin’ is this sacred being gonna spread? And how’s we all supposed to follow one person, when metal’s so big already? Them death heads ain’t gonna wanna follow someone like my honey. And that cutie of Chelle’s would laugh at some of them black metal types. In their faces laugh. Chelle knows. She’s seen him do it.

Chelle here ain’t the brightest bulb. She knows that. She cool with it. That don’t mean she can’t see issues with this here idea.

You heard it first and you heard it here: Metal’s way too personal to ever fill a bunch of pews and make people sit all proper like. Metal’s for rockin’.

So go rock on and leave the religion for the rest of ‘em.

***
Be sure to see what other people are Sunday Scribblings about. This week’s prompt was Big Dream.

So let’s talk books this week, shall we? On Monday, I found that my friend Megan, of Leafing Through Life, sent me a book from my wishlist (the shorter one posted at BookCrossing, not the 2000 or so I’ve got in an Excel file). It’s Dinner with Anna Karenina, and it was written by Gloria Goldreich.

I love wish list books. And I love seeing them show up in my PO Box even more.

I’m still on the prowl for books about rock stars, and another one found its way to me this week: What the Librarian Did, written by Karina Bliss.

This will NOT linger on the TBR mountains for very long. Promise. Keep an eye on Rocks and Reads for the review.

In the meantime, check out The Printed Page and The Story Siren for more Mailbox Monday/In My Mailbox and see what others are intending to read.

It’s called Metallica: All That Matters, and it’s written by Paul Stenning.

Like always, anyone who’d like to buy me a gift or send me a review copy is welcome to.

I don’t think I need to say much more than this, huh?

But to change things up a bit. Sort of. Not really, I came across Olivia Brynn’s Falling Star. It seems to ONLY be an e-book and the only link I’ve got is to Liquid Silver books. Yeah, I should probably suck it up and buy it; Lord knows, it’s not terribly expensive. But the aspiring book blogger in me wishes all these books would show up on my doorstep so I can pretend I’m an important reviewer and all.

(btw, the link for Falling Star will take you to Liquid Silver books, not to Powells. So if you click through and then buy something, I won’t get the pennies I would if you bought through Powells. Just so you and the FTC know what’s up here.)