Part business, part personal

First of all, please excuse my absence. I've been--um, a little busy. I have changed publishers, which means re-releasing all 14 of my novels. It isn't all bad news, though, as Star Publish is doing a fantastic job on them, giving several of them brand new looks. You can see the 9 books that are already out. Yes, in just a little over 3 months they have gotten 9 of the 14 books available!

In addition, they have named me as their Marketing Director. That means that instead of just peddling my books, I am responsible to help a whole bunch of other authors make their books successful. So far, it seems to be working, and I'm having a blast. As I have said many times, this book business is the hardest job I've ever done, but it is sure the most fun one too!

One of my not-so-brilliant ideas as the Marketing Director for Star Publish was to put out a weekly online newpaper. In just over 2 months we have had over 700 viewers. You can find it here: http://starpublishnews.tripod.com . A new edition goes up every Sunday morning.
This morning, when I went to check on it to make sure everything was OK, I was delighted to see one of the ads on the site. I'm not sure how long it will stay there, but in the upper left hand corner, there was an ad for the New York Times! I laughed, thinking that none of the Star authors have made it onto the New York Times best-seller list, but we can honestly say that the New York Times came looking for the Star authors! They even PAID to get their name up there on OUR website! It's sort of like when I turned down WalMart and Sam's Club when they agreed to sell my books in their stores in our region. Why? Have I lost my marbles? Some of you would surely say so. The bottom line is that there was no bottom line. They required such a huge discount, plus all books returnable and the shipping paid both ways by the author or the publisher, so basically, the more books I sold there, the more money I would end up owing them. It's been a long time since I've taken any kind of a math course, but even I could figure that one out.

And now, to move onto the personal news. Our youngest son, Kevin, is returning to New Orleans. He will be fixing up a house that was damaged in Katrina for a fellow artist he knows who has moved on to Texas. He is also negotiating with a high class Italian restaurant there to be a chef. He has a friend (female) who wants to go back with him. They are both in the Orlando area now. She wants to work as a volunteer to help people rebuild their houses. I don't know that I like the idea of him returning to New Orleans, but a part of me is downright proud of that kid of mine!
Anyway, the other night when we were talking on the phone, he said, "Mom, I'll bet you can't guess what the gal's name is." I told him I had no idea. He said, "It is Jasmine, but everybody calls her Jazz." He laughed like mad, then said, "Look out New Orleans! Chef Kevin Smith is coming back, and he's bringing Jazz with him!!!!!" Hey, Louis Armstrong had nothing on my kid!!