I CAN'T SPORT RIGHT (Video)

#MarchMysteryMadness | Challenge #5: The Syndicating Spell-Caster

(Taken from my Goodreads #MarchMysteryMadness post announcing my choice for this challenge.)

With the beginnings of every series comes a personal story. Comes a reason why we pick them up. And another reason why we decide to keep reading book after book. A lot of that dedication has to do with our interest in the character. And sometimes, we don’t even have explanations of how/why we connected.

I found this happening with Madelyn Alt’s witch character, Maggie O’Neill.  I decided to pick up the first book back when I was shelving books at this bookstore. It was a mystery involving a witch–which was intriguing enough. But then I thought it could help me with my own writing, seeing how Alt was another cozy author blending genres. It’s taken some years, but I’m slowly making my way through this series about this low-key witch solving murders in a small Indiana town. Maggie is not exactly flashy and quick-witted like, say, Kinsey Millhone. She doesn’t have the legal brains or athleticism of V. I. Warshawski. And she certainly doesn’t have an ugly/dark past like Eve Dallas (though it looks like her family is making a profound appearance in this fourth book). But I like Maggie. Maybe because she isn’t all those things. Yet she’s a witch in the subtlest sense because she doesn’t look at herself in terms of power. She’s just a woman who happens to be able to do small, little witchy things that helps her solve these murders she falls into.

The books are harder and harder to come by, and I think Alt no longer has a contract. But I had to use this Challenge to order and read the 4th book, NO Rest for the Wiccan. If anything, I want to see more of Maggie (and secretly find out how she’ll resolve her relationship issues with two men.)

Relate with me; does anybody have a series you love diving in and out of but isn't sure what is it that resonances with you?

Mystery Madness
26 members 2016 March Mystery Madness Challenge Group. More details to follow.

Books we've read

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Akiba'Strip: Undead & Undressed LIVE STREAM

"AKIBA'S TRIP: Undead & Undressed is an open-world action RPG in which players undertake numerous missions in a virtual recreation of Akihabara, Tokyo's popular ”Electric Town” district. The player's goal is to identify vampires called “Synthesizers” with the help of an in-game smartphone app, then engage them in battle to strip their clothes off so their bodies are fully exposed to sunlight. Boasting a unique combat system in which everyday objects become weapons, multiple story routes, a varied cast of characters based on common anime and video game tropes and a narrative dripping with social satire and subtle nods to Japanese pop culture, AKIBA'S TRIP is a present-day supernatural adventure for the gamer in all of us."

~ Amazon

I have no idea what I'm playing. Heard about the game. Was interested in it when it released in the West. But just didn't quite get it. Finally I ate my curiosity, buckled down and bought the game. The girl who checked me out at Gamestop insisted on repeating (quite loudly) that the game was about stripping vampires of their clothing. She told me that about four times–within the crowd–before I finally swiped my card and gave her that tight-teeth grin (you know, the 'I know and get it' grin.) The whole stripping thing I already got via my research of the game.  I guess she just wanted me to feel some type of way for buying the game. 

Now I'm really not into fan service anime/manga unless the guys get a dose of the humiliation too.  Which happens in Akiba'Strip! So, bored out of my mind, I got the game and am now streaming pieces of my gameplay. All I can say is that it's... well... frankly Japanese.

Spring Cleaning Sale | Behind the Books on the Bookself

Spring Cleaning!  Something I need to do more often than just in spring.  No, seriously, I’ve got to get rid of some of this stuff.  It was nagging at me to reach behind the books on my shelves and grab the forgotten treasures stashed in the shadows.  DVDs.  Boxsets.  Video games.  Even a PC gaming controller that’s never been opened!  What the hell could I do with any of this stuff?  Other than throw the SOB’s onto Amazon Marketplace and see if they’ll sell their way out of my door!  Everything in the above image isn’t listed yet (when did Amazon get a limited posting policy on media items?).  Even so, if anyone’s interested, you can visit my Amazon Marketplace store to see what’s there.  Meanwhile, I have to get a rag and start dusting elsewhere.  I need some serious book space, I would attribute the rise in digital streaming to the lack of necessity for actual movie/TV show discs.

Yet.  Books will always be.  There must always be room for books!

#MarchMysteryMadness | Challenge #4: The Rule of True Crime

First time going for Ann Rule (RIP). I’m going to be reading A Fever in the Heart.  It’s a collection of her slimmer written cases. As opposed to those massive books by her you find bowing bookshelves. I had the intention of reading the last quarter of the book where all the small case are. I mean, because the first case is 283 pages out of this 424 page book. But then I thought, “Hell no. If I’m gonna go into this, I have to have my full curiosities met!” Along with a little OCD realized. My initial intentions were to do the #MarchMysteryMadness challenges down the line. But now I’m skipping my re-reading of Poe to use this week to tackle The RULE. (High-five for knocking out the first two challenges in a week.) 











It’s funny because I feel like I’m going to get a Lifetime Movie feel from these cases, but just a touch bloodier. Along with the catch that these stories are about real people–real tragedies. I can only wonder how far along I’m willing to go before I do like I did the TV show The First 48 and drop it. I’m a believer in inviting realities and energies (if you will) into our own. And I know y’all are probably like “oh but you read all those murder mysteries.” Lol. Yes. Fiction. But believe me, the processing is totally different. 



A few years ago I read this amazing book  From my very first childhood inkling of the Jonestown incident I’ve always, always had an interest and fascination with the case. And this was the book I needed as an adult for answers. And while I highly recommend it, the problem was I couldn’t sleep the night I started the book. I had a nightmare about the Jonestown incident. I finished the book, all right. But I walked around with this weird, pondering “sickness” for at least a week. And that’s what I mean about inviting certain realities into your energy. We’ve all been there where we hear about a murder, and then spend time with the details chewing at our imaginations for some time. But NEVER would I thought the same thing would happen from a book! Lol.

For those interested, I’ll share my written blog post on A Thousand Lives HERE:http://www.comictowel.com/2014/02/las...

But at the end of the day, I'm a person who likes to make sense of real things. Who likes information. Who likes to keep an open-mind and see what I can pull from places unforeseeable (so I pray) from my own reality.

Will that happen in Rule? Challenge accepted! 

(I jacked this post from the #MarchMysteryMadness Goodreads page.  You, reading this, SHOULD be there!  Link below.)

Mystery Madness
2 members 2016 March Mystery Madness Challenge Group. More details to follow.

Books we've read

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GUEST POST: Raking the Dust by John Biscello

The Zharmae Publishing Press Presents:

Raking the Dust by John Biscello

Title: Rakingthe Dust

Author: John Biscello

Genre: Erotica, Sci-Fi

Length: 341

Release Date:March 10, 2016

ISBN:978-1-943549-54-2 ($14.95)

Publisher: Zharmae Press

Cover Artwork:Cris Qualiana Basham

Synopsis: In this rogue’s tale, full of sound, fury and erotic surrealism, we meet Alex Fillameno, a writer who has traded in the machine-grind of New York for a bare bones existence in the high desert town of Taos, New Mexico. Recently divorced and jobless, Fillameno has become a regular at The End of the Road, the bar where he first encounters the alluring and enigmatic D.J, a singer and musician. Drawn to her mutable sense of reality, the two begin a romance that starts off relatively normal. When D.J. initiates Alex into the realm of sexual transfiguration their lives are turned inside-out, and what follows is an anti-hero’s journey into a nesting doll world of masks and fragments, multiples and parallels, time-locks and trauma; a world in which reality is celluloid and what you see is never what you get.

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Interview with John Biscello on Raking the Dust

What drove and inspired you to write this particular book?

I moved to Taos, New Mexico from New York in 2001. It was quite a dramatic change in culture, tempo, and way of life.  I never would have imagined fourteen years later I'd still call this "black sheep" of a high-desert town home. The energy and character of this place is rich and challenging; its vibe eclectic.  It was only a matter of time before I tried to capture and reflect its spirit (or how it has impacted and influenced my spirit in myriad ways) in a book or collection of stories. 

Most of my novel is set in Taos–with strains of autobiographical fiction.  Yet it veers into the realms of the mythical and surreal.  And one of the driving catalysts behind that is the character, D.J.–who becomes the love interest of Alex (the protagonist). D.J. was supposed to be the main character in a play I was writing, but she disappeared when no one was looking and reappeared in this novel.  Here, she has found a home of sorts. 

Which were the hardest areas to write?

Perhaps the last section, where the novel changes locations from Taos to San Francisco.  In a sense, it almost become a different book. A new setting, a new set of characters (with D.J. and Alex still at the heart of it all); and having to trust in the strange or surreal directions inspired by Les Etoiles de Diables ("Stars of the Devil").  Which is the name of a mysterious club on San Francisco's Embarcadero waterfront. 

This summer, when rewriting the novel, I rewrote the S.F. section in trying to streamline and concentrate the storyline.  Furthermore, manage the intense build-up or break-down between D.J. and Alex. 

What makes your book standout?

Well, an urban-bred Brooklyn boy's perspective of high-desert living is one slant. Also–about a quarter of the way into the novel–what seems like a "straight" love/obsession story between an alcoholic writer and mercurial musician takes a sharp, unexpected turn.  Into a playscape that could be called ... anatomically reconfigurative (Cue old-time-radio suspense music). 

What advice do you have for the struggling writer?

If this is your deep-down passion, if you truly love words and stories and your relationship with them, then putting them down and getting them out means you are actively living your dream. There will always be a million and one alibis ready to sidetrack and derail us. Ignore them. Live the yes. Stay the course.

Author Information & Links

John Biscello is the author of the novel Broken Land, a Brooklyn Tale, which was named Underground Book Reviews 2014 Book of the Year, and a collection of stories, Freeze Tag. His fiction and poetry has appeared in numerous publications, including: Art Times, nthposition, The Wanderlust Review, Ophelia Street, Caper, Adobe Walls, Yuan Yang, Kansas City Voices, and the Tishman Review. A poet, performer, author, playwright, and drama teacher for young people, he is originally from Brooklyn, NY, and now lives in Taos, NM.

Amazon Author Page

Facebook Author Page 

Blog (Notes of an Urban Stray)

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#MarchMysteryMadness TBR (Video)

*****T H E C H A L L E N G E S & B O O K S*****

My TBR (all links are Amazon affiliate) mixed with written reviews of related material:

1.  The Food/Craft/Hobby Cozy ~ I chose is Susan Wittig Albert's Witches' Bane (Book 2 in her China Bayles series).

2.  The Person of Color in Lead ~ I chose Blanche Among the Talented Tenth by Barbara Neely (Book 2 in her Blanche White series).

3.  The Christie/Poe Complex ~ I'm going with Poe again.

4.  The Rule of True Crime ~  I'm going with the queen of True Crime, Ann Rule.

5.  The Syndicating Spell-Caster ~  Madelyn Alt sounds good for me with the 4th book in her Bewitching Series, No Rest for the Wiccan.

6.  The Whispering Pet Whisper ~  My girl Rita Mae Brown is at it again.  I'm taking her on with the first book in her Mag Rogers series, A Nose for Justice. 

7.  The Baggage Claims ~  Oh how I love Elizabeth Peters' Amelia Peabody series.  It's about time I got to the 3rd book in her series, The Mummy Case.  

8.  The Not-So Kid Gloves Sleuth ~ Going with Nancy Drew on this one