I get my first proof, and get very excited about some very local press.

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This is the sort of thing you could see all the time if you followed my author page on Facebook.

Remember how yesterday, I posted that my proof for the physical copy of Beware the Hawk was coming very soon? Well it did – I got it yesterday, and everyone who follows my Facebook fan page was forced to look at a crazy photo of me holding it.

It was amazing. I ran around the house like a little kid. I stared at it. I read it. I stared at it some more. I waved it at my husband. It’s right next to me now.

And then I talked to my father on the phone and he told me that this week’s issue of my hometown newspaper, The Town Times, ran an announcement about my upcoming appearance at the Watertown Library. Now, I used to work at a local paper. I’ve placed people’s announcements. It was no biggie. If there was enough space for them, I put them in. Nothing to get worked up about. I could understand people getting excited if a reporter wrote about them and someone came out to take a photo, but a press release? Not exciting.

Well, I don’t know when I got un-jaded.

When my father told me that my press release was in the Town Times I flipped. I freaked out like Time Magazine had named me Person of the Year. Why? I don’t know. Probably because when I was a kid, it was my great ambition to make it into the Town Times. Whenever a photographer from the Town Times went to anything, I tried desperately to look extra involved in whatever they were photographing so that they would take my picture. And then the paper would come on Thursday and I inevitably wouldn’t be in the photo and I’d sulk.

Clearly this attention-hungry child lives on within me.

You know, if I knew I’d get this much of a rush from being in the Town Times, I would have let my mom submit my wedding announcement.

Who knows? Maybe my desire to get into journalism came from my weekly desire to see myself in the Town Times. I knew that I’d be guaranteed a byline whenever the paper came out. All in all, today was a very good day to be a writer from Oakville.

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Scavenger Hunt, Day Six: The haiku challenge.

Before I share today’s challenge, a bit of news: I heard from my editor yesterday afternoon, and she tells me that I’ll be getting the proof for the physical copy of Beware the Hawk very soon!

I’m curious to see what that will look like, since Beware the Hawk is less than 50 pages long. I’ve been reading several of literature’s greatest short books lately (The House on Mango Street, The Stranger, Heart of Darkness, Turn of the Screw) and all of them are pretty slim volumes, but Beware the Hawk is shorter than all of them. That’s going to be one narrow book spine.

Because of all that shortness, today’s challenge will celebrate brevity with the shortest form of all: the haiku.

Write me a haiku about a bird of prey.

You know what a haiku is, right? Of course you do. Three lines of poetry. Line one has five syllables, line two has seven syllables and line three has five syllables. I realize this isn’t really a hunt. In fact I was planning to have you search for a haiku about a bird of prey, but writing haiku is more fun. (Although if you’d rather search for one, be my guest, just credit the poet when you submit.)

Tweet the poem to me (@ann_oconnell) with the hashtag #bewarethehawk. Or post it to my author page on Facebook.

Speaking of which, I have some neat iPhone apps to share from yesterday’s challenge.

UPDATE: Erin Skelly Cameron submitted Instagram, which is a personal favorite of mine. It’s like Twitter, but with photos. Unfortunately, it’s only available for iPhone users now, and Erin owns a Droid.

Alena Dillon of The Time is Write submitted this neat app, Star Walk. It’s a sort of augmented stargazing app. You point your phone the sky and the constellations appear. You point it at an unidentified object and it tells you what you’re looking at. That’s right – UFOs are a thing of the past. Your iPhone will ID every object in the sky. I think I might want it.

Ally Arendt of WordVagabond submitted a link to an app for writers, FIG. FIG stands for Fiction Idea Generator, and it’s a plot generator that lives in your phone. It suggests plots, genre, period, narrative voice and appears to have several other generators included including an emotion generator. That’s pretty neat, too.

Normally I just sponge off the free iPhone apps and tolerate all the advertising that comes with them, but maybe I should shell out the five bucks for these two apps. Any other suggestions, folks?

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The G-Chat Dispatch

You ever find yourself g-chatting* with a master?

You know what I’m talking about; you find yourself in a chat with someone who is really good at chatting; you just know that he or she cut their teeth on AOL Instant Messenger in school and has been honing those skills  – like Rocky, running up the stairs – by texting, ever since he or she got their first phone. I’m talking about someone who has a firm grip on grammar, an internal library of pop culture references and an impeccable sense of comic timing. Someone who combines the skills of typing, spelling and linking into one magical chatting skill set. Someone who is ready for the chatting Olympics, except that there isn’t one.

Sometimes I’m just sad that certain g-chats can’t have an audience. I was sad like that tonight, but then I realized that a chat can, in fact be witnessed by everyone, thanks to the miracle of blogging.

So without further ado, I present to you a new feature that I hope to post every few weeks: The G-Chat Dispatch. The first one is with MFA colleague Kate Gorton of Curses in Cursive. Kate is one of those people who has mastered the English language just so that she can smack it around and make it give her its lunch money. It’s only fitting that she’d kick off this series. Below is a short but sweet chat I had with her this evening.

It was prompted by my away message today: Meeting a very close friend’s baby today. Cue Elton John singing The Circle of Life.

8:04 PM             Kate: does your status mean you’re going to Simba that baby?
                             as in, hold  him/her out over the savannah? cuz…i approve.
                             …as long as all of the zebras and wildebestes bow.
                             me: I was going to do that, but I couldn’t find some guy to
                             sing “Naaaaaaaaaasivegna” or whatever it is.
8:05 PM             Kate: goddamnit. they should be on retainer.
                             me: You know, I’ve Simbaed every cat I’ve ever owned.
                             Kate: pshh, if you don’t, it’s just a waste of a cat.
8:06 PM             me: For serious. And everyone knows that cats loooove that.
                             Kate: it’s only their favorite thing. after baths and crinkly
                             plastic bags
                              me: And oral hygiene.
                             Kate: duhhhh
8:07 PM            okay. this 30 page paper is not going to write itself 🙂 Tty!
                             me: Laters!
*”g-chat” is Google’s chat program, if you’re not chat-savvy.
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Scavenger Hunt, Day 5: There’s an app for that

The iPhone plays a big role in Beware the Hawk. I know, I know. I’m perpetuating the Apple iCulture in which we all live.

I’m going to defend the inclusion of the iPhone in my plot by saying two things: a) Apple didn’t pay me to make their phone into a tool of fictional dissidents, and b) art imitates life. That is, art would imitate life if you could never turn your iPhone off and your employers used its GPS to keep tabs on you, which they don’t.

Or do they?

For day five of the hunt, tell me about the coolest iPhone app you’ve ever heard of and if you have it, share the link.

Then tweet the information to me (@ann_oconnell) with the hashtag #bewarethehawk. Or post it to my author page on Facebook.

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Scavenger Hunt, Day 4: Happy hour at the dive bar

That’s right. For day four of the scavenger hunt, I want you to take a photo of a bar, the seedier, the better. The sort of bar that might have served as inspiration for this song. Then tweet the photo to me (@ann_oconnell) with the hashtag #bewarethehawk. Or post it to my author page on Facebook.

Boston's Chinatown gate, photo found by the resourceful Ally Arendt.

As I wrote during yesterday’s Chinatown challenge, a lot of the action in Beware the Hawk takes place in Boston’s Chinatown, but a lot of that action takes place in a hole-in-the-wall bar.

Your bar doesn’t have to be in Chinatown (points if it is, of course) and it doesn’t have to be in Boston (once again, points if it is) but it does have to be a dive. I know it’s Tuesday and most of you good people don’t frequent dive bars in the middle of the week, but take one for the team, folks. Head down to the bar and have one for me.

Or maybe drankin’ is not your thing. If you’re one of those pure thoughts and clean living types, take a photo of a bar from the outside, which might not be as much fun, but still counts for something.

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Scavenger Hunt, Day Three: Chinatown

Yesterday, we talked about the Fung-Wah, and I was sent this fabulous account of a scary 2006 bus trip by Ally.

That was yesterday. Today I want you to go down to Chinatown.

You don’t have to go literally, but for day three of the scavenger hunt, send me a photo of Chinatown.

A lot of the action in Beware the Hawk happens in Boston’s Chinatown, where one of the protagonist’s co-workers spends all of his free time. For the purposes of this game, any Chinatown will do, but points if it’s Boston’s Chinatown and double points if you can photograph an establishment called Snowflower, the Chinatown Gate or the weird nasty stuff in the gutter, all of which are mentioned in the book.

So head downtown, grab some lo mein and snap away. Just beware the Fung-Wah.

Also, check out the ladies with hair of many colors who sent in pics on Saturday.

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Scavenger Hunt, Day 2: The Fung-Wah

UPDATE: I was sent a photo of a lady with colorful hair on Saturday and I missed it because I’m an eejit who clearly doesn’t understand how Facebook Timeline works.  I want to post her photo now. Behold! The aqua coif of Mary-Jo Bates, whose eloquent thoughts you can find here.

It's like she's a natural bluenette.

Now, on with the post for Sunday:

Oh, the stories we hear about the Fung-Wah. For those of you who do not live on the I-95 corridor between Boston and New York, the Fung-Wah is a bus line known for its cheap fares and the excitement of its rides, which is why my protagonist in Beware the Hawk likes it so much. It’s a literal cheap thrill.

For day two of the scavenger hunt, I want you to share a story about the Fung-Wah. Do do some Sunday Googlin’ and find the most amusing review/story you can about the Fung-Wah, or share your own harrowing experience.

Then share it on Twitter (#bewarethehawk) or on my Facebook author page. Or what the hell, share a story in the comments. Best story gets featured here tomorrow, which reminds me, I have a cherry-haired lady to share:

This is Michelle. Her photo was submitted by her friend, Ally.

No worries if you didn’t get a picture of a woman with colorful hair to me today. You can send one in at any time between now and March 20. So if you see a pink-haired lady, get out your phone, get up in her business and snap away!

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Scavenger Hunt, Day 1: A hair color not found in nature

It’s day one of the Beware the Hawk scavenger hunt and your first mission is this: Snap me a photo of a woman with a hair color not found in nature.

Okay, okay. I know that most colors are found in nature if you look hard enough. And I know that pink, the color of my protagonist’s hair, is found in nature. Quite often, actually.

What I’m looking for here is a photo (that you took) of a woman with a hair color not naturally found on humans. Points if the hair is pink.

Complete the mission by posting the photo on Twitter, with the hashtag #bewarethehawk. Or post your pic on my Facebook author page. The best submissions will end up on this blog tomorrow, when I post the next mission.

Good luck, agents, and this message would self-destruct, but I don’t think WordPress has a widget for that yet.

 

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Go on a Beware the Hawk scavenger hunt with me!

This blog is at least 70 percent better when when my readers participate and send me stuff.

So, in that spirit, I’m announcing a contest. Actually, it’s better than a contest. It’s a scavenger hunt to celebrate the release of Beware the Hawk, as a physical book! From tomorrow, March 10,  until the release of Beware the Hawk in physical form, I will be assigning “missions.” And I will be posting (I hope daily) the best submissions.

Here’s how it works: Each day, I will log on and give you a mission. Complete the mission by going on twitter, and tweeting your find with the hashtag #bewarethehawk. Or, if you hate Twitter, post your submission on my Facebook author page for all to see. The best submissions will end up on this blog.

Sometimes I will ask you to take a photo. Sometimes I will ask you to post some information. Sometimes I will ask for a clever bit of writing.

All the missions will be listed on the Scavenger Hunt! page on this blog, so if you’re behind and you need to catch up, you can. Where is this page, you ask? Look at the top of this blog. See the tabs up there? There’s one that says “A.J.,” one that says “Beware the Hawk,” one that says “The Blogroll” and so on? It’s up there.

See?

In some cases these missions will be easier if you live near Boston and New York, because that’s where the book takes place. But if you folks from other areas get creative, I know you’ll be able to participate.

The first person to complete all the missions will win a signed copy of the book and another prize: If the winner has an iPhone, he or she will get a Beware the Hawk skin for his or her phone. (I will post the image when I finish designing it.) If not, I will offer the winner a tee shirt of his or her choice from my store. Including the forbidden Lonely Mountain tee, which you can’t see anymore, although it is there. I’m also planning some more tees, so there will be more of a selection.

The first five people to complete at least nine of the missions will get signed copies of the book.

Anyone who submits is highly likely to have their submissions featured on this blog. Especially if those submissions are clever. Why? Because I love to madprop my homies. That’s why.

Stay tuned folks. The first clue will be posted tomorrow!

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I’m reading at the Watertown Library! (And not silent reading like when I used to do my homework there.)

Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to announce that I will be doing my very first reading in just a little less than two weeks at the Watertown Library in Watertown, Connecticut.

This reading, which will take place at 7 p.m. on Wednesday March 28, will be very special because Watertown is kind of my hometown.* Also special? My mother worked for the library when I was growing up. She worked at the Oakville branch of the library and did all the story hours there for years. So I spent most of my time there during grade school and middle school. I shelved books and did my homework and occasionally had to be told off for being too rowdy.

And that may be what happens again, because I’m hoping to draw a big crowd to the Watertown Library’s main branch on the evening of March 28.

Here’s the deal: Watertown Library included e-books in their collection on the first of March. Because my book is an e-book, I’m going to give a talk about my experience publishing an e-book and then do some reading. And then? We party. Responsibly, and in a literary fashion, of course. I have no idea where people go to party on a Wednesday night in Watertown these days. If I’m honest, I didn’t even know where to party in Watertown when I was living there. But no worries, we’ll figure something out.

Warning: Parents of young children, my book has language in it. Not language, but language. Also, it has situations in it, which cannot be bleeped out the way language can. I will do my best to read responsibly, but my book contains adult material and I don’t recommend bringing the kids to hear me read.

Hope to see you all there!

*Actually I’m from Oakville, which is a big neighborhood/”census-designated place” in Watertown, but to people who aren’t from there, it’s basically the same thing as being from Watertown.

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