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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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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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Fabulous book news!

Last week I spoke to my editor at Vagabondage Press and she delivered some fabulous news: Beware the Hawk is coming to print on March 20!

This won’t come as a surprise to the people who follow my Facebook author page; they hear just about all my news just about as soon as it happens, thanks to my raging social media addiction and my possession of a smartphone. (Just another reason to “like” my author page, or stay the hell away from it.)

Beware The Hawk novellaI’m pretty excited. Beware the Hawk was planned as an e-book and an e-book only, so it’s exciting that a print edition is being released. Since it’s a novelette, it will be a pretty slim volume, but it will be fabulous to have it, to be able to do real book signings as well as virtual signings, to carry a bunch of books around in the trunk of my car so that I can peddle them.

Even better, it will be nice to have a copy of my book accessible to the folks who can’t read it on an e-reader, or who prefer not to. There are, actually, quite a few people who have approached me and said some variation of “I’d like to buy your book, but I don’t have an e-reader.” Well folks, save the date. On March 20, physical copies of Beware the Hawk will become available.

Another announcement: I will be doing my first actual event in my hometown, Watertown, Connecticut, at the Watertown Library. The date has changed from my original announcement. I will provide more information soon.

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After a brief hiatus, the blog tour for my novella continues.

The Beware the Hawk blog tour continues today over at Reinventing Erin.

It’s been a few weeks since I had a guest post, but now it’s time for Round Two!

The delightful Erin Corriveau invited me return to her Defining Moments series with a guest post. I’ve already guested on this series (I posted about having two names) and it was a thoroughly enjoyable experience, so I was pleased when she asked me back. My defining moment this time? The moment my book went up for sale on Amazon last month.

I decided to use the guest post to talk about some of my insecurities, because although the publication experience was amazing and positive, I still found that I was battling my fears on the day my book came out. That’s not what I expected to happen; publishing a book was to me as getting married is to a Disney princess.

You know, I publish a book, live happily ever after, and  nothing bad ever happens to me again. Except that’s a silly expectation.

So head on over to Reinventing Erin today and check it out. Also, tomorrow, she’s posting an interview we did about the book, so come back tomorrow and take a gander at that, too!

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Guest blog on Word for Words, and the winners of the giveaway.

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Alas, Spy Week has come to a close, but what a close! Today I did a guest post on Word for Words, the blog of fellow Fairfield University MFAer Adele Annesi. It touches on the worries I had about my first published book being genre fiction, especially right after my graduation from an MFA program which teaches the art of writing literary fiction.

Head on over and check it out, and then stick around to check out Adele’s blog. Also, take a peek at her short story “Last Kiss Before Customs,” recently published in Midway Journal. Adele writes quiet, poignant fiction, and it’s always satisfying for me to read what she writes.

Now – onto the winners of the giveway. Here’s the deal. I am off two copies of Beware the Hawk to people who told me yesterday about the most ridiculous thing they’ve had to do for work. I did the drawing this afternoon, throwing the names of the four entrants into the only hat I own that resembles a fedora. And here are the winners:Beware the Hawk giveaway winners.

That’s right! Dreampeddler, whose name is Jodie, and who once cleaned hotel rooms for a year and a half at an establishment where the other maids called her Katie (and the management made her clean the bathrooms with only the dirty towels) wins, as does Discourse in C Sharp Minor who spent her first day on the job filming a lecture on “nitrogen-pooping nematodes.” I love how excrement is a part of both the winners’ stories.

Our other two contestants were Cheese-borrowing Erin and Schnauzer-beard blow-drying Elizabeth.

Winners, please shoot me your emails and I will send you your prizes. And if one of you already has a copy and would like to cede your prize and give it to a contestant who doesn’t have the e-book, please let me know.

Thanks for playing!

 

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The book is out and the blog tour begins at Word Vagabond!

Hi everybody! So, it’s my official release date today – the long-waited 17th and I can finally consider myself a published author.

If that weren’t exciting enough, today my blog tour kicks off! I was interviewed last night by the awesome Ally Arendt over at WordVagabond, and the questions were quite comprehensive. We covered everything from the first book I wrote, to the first book I loved, to the differences between writing for a newspaper and writing fiction.

Head over to WordVagabond and check it out!

Thank you Ally, for taking the time to interview me. Also, I want to thank a lot of other people, because I’ve been touched by all the support I’ve been getting.

I belong to a large and wonderful community of friends and writers, and people have been so generous. I want to thank everyone who shared my links on Facebook and Twitter, and everyone who clicked a ‘like’ button on my numerous statuses on Facebook and Phil Lemos for including me in his blog post today.

I also want to thank everyone who’s bought the book. I really, really hope you like it.

 

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