Doing a lot of tours lately - 5-8 a week. I love doing it. Every time I'm on the bus, telling stories, it's the only time my brain calms down from stressing about book stuff.  Most of the rest of the day I just drive myself nuts with it.

Starting some new book projects this week, though. For I am a glutton for punishment.

Today I was crossing the street when I saw the person I was meeting up the block, going the other way. I turned around and ran to meet up with her. The guy in the car nearby laughed and said "Run, run, faggot!"  It took me back to high school. Ah, memories.

And last night I got a pretty good taste of what it would be like to run a ghost tour for the cast of Jersey Shore. The 7pm tour was great - one of those nice crowds where no one's obnoxious, no one seems dumb, and everyone's there to have a good time on the tour, not to shout "woooooo" out the windows or bug me to go to a bar. The 10pm tour, though, had a group of 21, of whom 19 seemed to think they had booked a private pub crawl and behaved accordingly. Lots of yelling, lots of threatening to leave bad reviews on Yelp if I didn't take them to some bars, etc. There were some good people in the group, but the rest of them ruined the tour for everybody. Very good thing there were no kids on that one.

It's sort of a personal weakness of mind that I have very little tolerance for people like this. I do not really consider douchebags to be my equals. When confronted with an aggressive, obnoxious drunk, my instinct is to want to grab their back of their head and slam it into the nearest blunt surface. Hard. Probably because it was guys like that who were always calling me a "faggot" in high school.

Today I gave an all-day private tour to a novelist from South Africa, and we managed to talk our way into the Fisher Building - one of the neatest skyscrapers downtown. Once offices, it's now condos, but the doors still have the frosted glass window with the names of whatever office used to be there on them. So someone's living in an apartment with a frosted-glass door that says "Thiel Detective Service" on it. Whoever has that place wins at life. I would spend all day in that place just sitting at my desk, dusting the debris off of my 38 and wondering where the next case was coming from. I'd call my wife a "dame" and talk about how long her legs were a lot. I'd be the coolest guy EVER.

It's called The Fisher Building. One of my favorites in the city already, but now I think it tops the list.

Man, I've been busy lately! Here's some of what I'm doing:

 - finishing up a book called "Speaking Ill of the Dead: Jerks from Chicago History"

 - Doing more podcasts - we did a new one for Chicago Unbelievable the other night, tromping around the abandoned graveyard once used by the old asylum (and where one of the jerks in the "jerks book" was dumped. It was really spooky! I'm now engaged in a new "Ghosts of Chicago" book (publisher TBA very soon), so I've been kicking up my ghost-busting schedule a notch. I never seem to FIND much on a ghost hunt, but I'm enough of a skeptic that I don't really expect to. I don't want to write about places I haven't been, though!  This old graveyard extended clear out to the grocery store parking lot nearby, and is estimated to be home to about 38k bodies, most of which are probably still there. Here's a pic from our trip there - they yellow streak is just a falling snowflake, but this is one creepy snowflake pic. 
In somewhat related news, there's a new Chicago Unbelievable ebook about "The Curse of HH Holmes." Rumors have gone around for years that everyone involved in the trial of Holmes (the "Devil in the White City" guy), died or came into misfortune after the trial. I thought that was probably just something pulp writers made up years later, but it really was a big story in papers in the years after the execution; papers identified about 30 victims (in addition to the guy who ratted him out, who was later shot to death in Chicago and buried in - you guessed it - the old asylum graveyard pictured above!) The mini ebook is only a buck. My next Holmes project is going to be reconstructing his 1895 trial (I'm about halfway done; it'll be a full-length legal thriller) and speaking at an event with his great great grandson at the end of the month.  I'm of the opinion that stories about the guy are greatly exaggerated (his estimated number of victims goes up by another hundred or two every Halloween), but researching him is one heck of a rabbit hole. 

Oh! And there's fiction news! My attempt to write all this ghosty-business into a funny middle grade book has finally resulted in a full manuscript, which my agent will be sending out soon. I also have a YA book about a rock and roll banshee out on submit at the moment that I hope someone really lets me have fun with - I want to make videos of the band and pretend it's a real thing and see if we fool anybody.

So, I'm keeping busy. I have 3-4 more books that I NEED to write this year, and I'm doing 4-5 ghost tours a week (and having a blast on them)

We weren't political at my house when I was a kid. When I asked my mother if we were Republicans or Democrats, she thought for a second, then said, "Well, we're registered Republicans" in a tone that made it clear that she wasn't that into being a Republican. They sure as heck aren't Republicans now.

My memories of politics in general are pretty vague. I remember seeing Reagan on TV when I was six or so. Someone was asking him if he was firing anyone, and he said "No, I'm not firing anybody!" in a cheerful voice. I thought he seemed like a nice guy.

I remember that in 1988, in the run up to the caucus, we went downtown one day when a million people were handing out buttons. My parents were for Jesse Jackson at the time. I was confused when my mom explained that he was quitting the race and wanted everyone to vote for Dukakis now. Wasn't that who he was running against? My parents were for Dukakis that year.

The whole time I was a kid, Terry Branstad was governor of Iowa. When he came out at a minor league baseball game and was roundly booed, I felt like I ought to join in, but my parents told me I should boo if I didn't know what I was booing about. Good advice.

Meanwhile, when he was up for re-election when I was in fourth grade, I heard a kid say "Branstad wants to tax the poor and let the rich get off." This may be the first moment I had an opinion about politics - I thought that sounded stupid. I didn't believe it, though. This guy was the governor, not the Sheriff of Nottingham. Who was going to say that we should tax the poor and let the rich get off?

I was still only vaguely aware of politics in the mid 1990s, still formulating opinions. My parents stepped back and let me. I remember a few occasions when I expressed some political opinion and they told me why some people thought differently (in a way that made me think THEY must have thought differently, though I now know they certainly didn't).

Even at 14, I only had a general idea of what the difference was between a liberal and a conservative. It was right around this time that Newt Gingrich went on a program called "Newt: Raw" on MTV. In this program, he discussed politics with a small cross-section of people (most, if not all, young) and the usual MTV news anchors. MTV could get serious when it wanted to. I had just moved to Georgia, just a district or two away from Newt's stomping grounds.

Over the course of the program, I seem to recall Newt noting that he was against both abortion AND welfare. This did not compute with me.

Further, he seemed to be in favor of corporal punishment in schools. I believe he said something along the lines of "in my day, it was just a given that if you got out of line, you'd get a whipping."

"Wow," I thought. "This guy is a jackass." If he was a conservative, I was a liberal. A few years later, when he was up for re-election, Gingrich nearly lost to a guy who sold cookies at the mall. Then he resigned in disgrace and I thought we were rid of him.

Maybe I'm remembering it wrong, but I'd like to see how a clip of him saying he was in favor of corporal punishment would play today. This would have been right around the time he advocated bringing orphanages back. Together with his recent notion of getting rid of child labor laws and I'm starting to get the notion that we don't need to argue against this guy - you just have to read Nicholas Nickleby.

Newt: Raw is not readily available online. I can't find it on youtube, I can't find a place to download it, and I don't see any torrents - just a handful of vintage newspaper articles.

Meanwhile, Newt has opened a headquarters in my old hometown of Urbandale. The GOP nearly shut down the government and defaulted on our debts in order to keep from taxing the rich. Branstad is governor again, and in a book of mine that Flux published last month, the characters have a plan to plant a pressed ham on the window of his mansion. That'll show 'im.

A discussion with the creative crew and cast of THE ADVENTURES OF PETE AND PETE. In the DVD commentary the creators mention that they wanted every episode to be "funny, sad, strange and beautiful," which has pretty much been my mantra ever since. I have those words framed on the wall above my desk, along with "ragged glory," another thing they mention in the commentary. I think I pretty well nailed it in the new "Extraordinary." If a big climax where they shout out the "St. Crispin's Day" speech from Henry V while rolling a Wells Fargo Wagon full of unicorn crap through the streets of Des Moines isn't funny, sad, strange and beautiful with a sense of ragged glory, I don't know what is.

See the video.

I particularly enjoy "Arty"'s story about the Des Moines Register. I remember "The Big Peach" well.

Meanwhile, I'm reading Vanity Fair by Thackery for the first time and enjoying it tremendously. Snarky good fun. There's a great quote along the lines of "Some there are, and very successful too, mere quacks and fools: and it was to combat and expose such as those, no doubt, that Laughter was made."

Aidan (my stepson) is in town for Thanksgiving. Last night when he arrived I asked where he wanted to eat, and he immediately said "Harold's Chicken Shack!" He picked a local joint over McDonald's! I've waited a long time for this day.

I don't think I've mentioned that we now have THREE cats - my other two were joined by Fi, Ronni's old cat from Columbus, who is now about 12 years old. It's now 3 against 2 most of the time, and they know it. I started giving them canned food daily about a year ago (it's easier for Crookshanks to digest), and now they won't leave me alone. All morning they climb all over me until I give them a can, then in the evening they start campaigning for a second one (despite the fact that they've never gotten one). Fi and Helena beg at the table during dinner, and as soon as we go to bed, Crookshanks will howl at the door until we let him in. Fi is probably the best-behaved of the lot; the worst he gets is the table-begging, and he's not as brazen as Helena (who will grab an empty chair and sit even get on the table if you step away for a second). Naughty, naughty cats.

I have two books out on submit right now, and a couple of approaching deadlines for nonfiction, but the huff and hiss of having two books out on the same day two weeks ago took a lot of the wind out of my sails. I'm having trouble getting motivated to work on anything new this week at all. This is one of those months where I feel like I'd be better off changing my name to Big Jake and becoming a truck driver instead of keeping up this career as a writer.

Still working on a series of Smart Aleck's Guides to Shakespeare, though. I was initially hoping to have guides to Hamlet, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet and Julius Caesar out this month, but I'm not happy enough with them yet to put them out. They'll be e-book exclusives, but NOT exclusive to amazon. They're starting to pull a lot of dirty tricks in order to get authors to be "amazon exclusive," but I don't like them enough to do that. I'd like to see indie stores do a better job of getting into the ebook world than just aligning indiebound with google books. I avoid even linking my "traditional" books to amazon anymore. Some of the new "Smart Aleck's Guide" series may come out via traditional publishers, but I feel like authors who aren't trying to establish a niche in the ebook world right now (especially us midlisters whose books aren't at Target) aren't thinking ahead.

I might even put out a novel as an e-book exclusive. My "Satanic YA" novel is a good candidate there - I can't really imagine any publisher putting that one out and marketing it properly. They'd all make REALLY sure that none of the title/marketing mentioned the "great for kids who worship the devil" angle in order to get it into Barnes and Noble, and then when Barnes and Noble didn't carry it anyway, I'd feel like I watered it down for nothing. Kinda like how Obama bent over backwards using bits from old GOP health care plans to make his plan acceptable to them, but still didn't get any of their votes. I really wish the two new books had been titled "Fairy Godmofo" and "Debbie Does Detention," the original titles, instead of "Extraordinary" and "Sparks," but those titles were both non-starters with sales and marketing. I can't help but wonder if they'd have an easier time finding their niche with the originals. Same goes for "I Kissed a Zombie and I Liked It," which I wanted to call "Dead Guys Have No Reason to Live." The title they used got us a lot of attention, but I'm not sure it was all the right KIND of attention for the book. One benefit of e-publishing is you get more say in who you market to.

Being back in the ghost tour world has been fun - it's also pushed me headlong into research again. Yesterday on Chicago Unbelievable I posted the long-lost Philadelphia North American article that was the source of several famous H.H. Holmes quotes (which I think that paper probably invented).

Today at Windycon in the Chicago burbs (I forget which one) was the first Back Row Hooligans live show! Featuring Eric Coleman on drums and Amy McNally on violin, it was completely unrehearsed (Eric and Amy had never heard half the songs) but was possibly the most fun I ever had playing music.

Setlist:
Uncle Herbert's Extra Rowdy Funeral
My Aunt Judith Smokes
Pirates Always Cheat at Bingo
She Lets Me Watch Her Mom and Pop Fight (song from MAD magazine)
Axl Rose is Coming To Town (song From MAD)
Glumpy the Elf Who Got Drunk and Sawed His Leg Off
Heavy Metal Vomit Christmas Party
Ebenezer Walked
Doorbell Ditching at the Pearly Gates (Woody Guthrie version)
The Three Bean Casserole War
Song to a Bratty Sister
Straight Outta Daycare (rap)
A Batman Villain
Stay Out of the Toilet
The Old Lady Who Drank Old Milk
Things Were Cheap in Grandpa's Day
The Burning of the School


Now I want to write up a bunch more songs just so I can record them with Eric and Amy! This band will definitely be back. More info on the Back Row Hooligans page.

It's here!

I've always found that the best way to keep from freaking out on book release week is to have something else to focus on. So, hence, I've spent all week driving poor Ronni nuts by recording an album of children's songs (for really, really well-adjusted children). I haven't decided for sure whether to put it out under my own name or as The Back Row Hooligans. But it's fully produced - drums and bass and horns and strings and everything. Copies will be available at Windycon after my 2pm set (after which I'll have to bolt back to the city to run a couple of tours) and up for download shortly thereafter. Haven't' decided whether to get it on iTunes and everything or just make it a website download, either. Decisions, decisions!





Tentative track list:

1. The Burning of the School (Glory, Glory)
2. Uncle Herbert's Extra Rowdy Funeral
3. Pirates Always Cheat at Bingo
4. The Three Bean Casserole War
5. The Old Lady Who Drank Old Milk
6. My Aunt Judith Smokes
7. Straight Outta Daycare (rap)
8. Straight Outta Daycare (ballad)
9. Drink Your Juice (Or You'll Get Scurvy)
10. Things Were Cheap in Grandpa's Day
11. Song to a Bratty Sister
12. Stay Out of the Toilet
13. Midnight in the Schoolyard
14. Heavy Metal Vomit Christmas Party

One of these ("Uncle Herbert...") has been released before, but not in a fully arranged version, like this one. "Midnight in the Schoolyard" was recorded twice - once at my first session in a studio back in 1998, and once in the Suburban Post Modernist sessions, but never released. Most of the rest were written a couple of years ago in one big burst, except for "The Old Lady Who Drank Old Milk," which I made up in first grade, and "Heavy Metal Vomit Christmas Party," which I made up this week.

So, what is it like to have two books coming out on the same day? It's kind of nerve wracking. My hopes that either will be a big seller are not high (I've been around the block enough by now), but, still. Reviews are slowly starting to filter in. All good so far, which means the bad ones must be around the corner. All signs so far are that they'll be a couple more "great reviews, low sales" titles to add to my resume, but you never know. One or both of them could surprise me.

I can't focus on anything. Haven't finished reading a book or watching a movie in weeks. It was a massive act of will to sit through an episode of Star Trek: Next Gen last night.

Fortunately, though, I'm back to running ghost tours for Chicago Hauntings, the local company that DOESN'T cater mainly to drunken douchebags who complain that I don't do "puppetry of the penis" tricks on the bus. Just straight up history, ghost stories, and jokes in the greatest city in the world. It's Halloween, which means I've got work just about every night to keep my mind off all the rest of the stuff (and a steady cash flow for the first time in a long time). There are also new CHicago Unbelievable podcasts and plenty of research to do.

Meanwhile I'm working on the Smart Aleck's Guides to four Shakespeare plays. I was intending to put them out next month, but they just aren't quite where I want them to be yet and probably won't be next month, either.

There's also a third "Leon" book written (set four years after the events of "How to Get Suspended" and "Pirates of the Retail Wasteland"), but books like that are so far outside the scope of what's marketable in YA these days that I'm not sure what to do with it.