If you have been following our travels, you may already realize that we managed to visit America's "five corners" (Southwest California, Northwest Washington State, Northeast Maine, Key West and the Brownsville/Padre Islands area of Texas, the latter of which we are currently enjoying. I think since leaving Colorado two years ago and living full-time in our fifth wheel, we have visited 32 states. But this is not a travel post, nor is it one of my "Reasons to be Happy."
One underlying theme across every state we've seen the past two years is the obvious distress or demise of America's small towns. At one time, soon after the Interstate Highway System was built over 50 years ago, there was a migration to the suburbs from the many urban jungles. Now there's a great migration away from small towns for a variety of reasons. Nadyne has lived in a few tiny villages, mostly in Arizona. I grew up in the Los Angeles area but spent many years in Eastern Washington State, where I used to enjoy outings to hamlets throughout the Cascade mountains. Enjoying regional museums and cute Main Street storefronts has always been an enjoyable diversion for both of us. Most successful small towns have one of two advantages. First would be a natural feature that feeds a large tourism economy, such as Yellowstone or Arches National Parks. The other would be a major employer that keeps the bulk of its citizens working. In each case, the dependent town often has all their eggs in one basket. If a natural phenomenon stops enthralling the public or is lost due to a catastrophe, the small town's workforce must find other sources of income. Likewise, purely out of the control of a nearby town, a corporation can close down or move a facility, leaving workers scrambling. These towns cannot sustain their basket disappearing and a blight replaces the thriving business they once enjoyed. In town after town we've seen Main Streets with 50%-90% of the shops closed and boarded up. Towns often don't have the legal right or the financial ability to keep their primary storefront avenues looking presentable, so they are usually shabby and unseemly. Just outside of town, one can witness nature reclaiming large warehouses, factories, farmhouses, barns and smaller box stores. It's a snowball of major proportion rolling down from the economic hilltop. 
Worse, the neighborhoods in and around these towns can be extraordinarily poor. Often we are amazed when what looked like an abandoned or even condemned house with overgrown hedges and grass sported a satellite dish, a late model car and sometimes newer plastic toys strewn about in the back yard. In one section of Louisiana, these were the majority of neighborhoods.
When we lived in Western New York a couple of decades ago, one of our weekend pastimes was driving to and strolling through quaint bergs scattered throughout the state. "Main Street USA" funding had helped rebuild and enhance old downtowns and they were a pleasure to visit. After moving to Kansas, our jaunts through the countryside regularly brought us to villages obviously in the beginning stages of financial struggle. It wasn't until the past two years of travel, however, that we saw the almost incomprehensible scope of the problem. The scourge doesn't have to continue. Major funding or tax incentives are awarded to large corporations and mid-size businesses all the time. At some point a governor may see to it some are spent to support their declining towns. Circumstances may be be cyclical and a rush back out of crowded cities might be the next large population migration. Retired communities, which do not need active jobs to survive, might sprout where dilapidated towns used to sit. We can only hope that the unique style of living that small towns can provide will draw residents and be thriving communities once more. 
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It is with a heavy heart that I confirm my observations of the past two decades -- the death of non-partisan politics is official. Time of death, 8:00 pm EST, November 8, 2008. The election of our 44th President, Barack Obama, signaled the beginning of the end of non-partisanship and the election eight years later of Donald Trump dropped the last shovel-full of dirt on its grave.
Before I explain my reasoning, let me say that I rarely publicly delve into politics online, since I am primarily using my social media presence to market my poetry, novels, blogs and photography. Being seen as a Trump-lover or Trump-hater does me no good, nor did I love or hate Obama. Any of these could alienate half my target audience. In addition, I am not a political expert nor do I desire to become one. However, I am a human being and an American, and what has happened in US politics is disheartening. I am not Republican nor Democrat as neither have enough "planks" in their platforms to represent my feelings and beliefs. These planks, or political ideals, used to be decided upon by each party's constituents. That is no longer the case, as only ten states still caucus, the now-archaic method of choosing political party nominees and platform planks. Interestingly, back when Washington State held caucuses, I was up for election to become a Republican delegate and I lost that election because I couldn't truthfully state that I could vote for faith-healer and 700 Club profiteer Pat Robertson if he were to become Washington's presidential nominee. Robertson did win that nomination but in no other states besides Washington, so that was a waste of Washington's electoral votes. A party's platform is now determined by the candidates themselves, and they pander to and receive funding from the groups and Political Action Committees (PAC's and Super-PAC's) who are promoting any particular opinion. For example, the religious right has several organizations who are dedicated to overturning Roe v. Wade and will give large amounts of money and other backing to any candidate that promises to move that ideal forward once elected. There are just about as many groups and PAC's who espouse the concept of "women's right to choose" and equally fund the candidates who promise to fight any attempt of overturning that landmark decision. Polls regularly show that 65-69% of Americans want the decision to stand, but since there are only two parties equally funded for and against the court decision, there will continue to be a deadlock. Despite ramifications for or against, this is an example of how most political ideals have fared since non-partisan politics died. That's why there hasn't been political negotiation or crossing of party lines except in rare cases. Today's politicians were elected with a huge number of ideals to champion and almost no vote is on a topic outside of those promises. Alas, because I have now explained that I try to be politically non-committed in public, I'll probably be ridiculed from both sides of the aisle. 
As the oldest of seven kids and having several children and grandchildren frequently showing off, well, let’s just say it takes a lot to impress me. Oliver Mars, a duo of dedicated musicians, does just that. Not too many duets can create the sound and complexity of a six-piece band, and this funky band provides entertaining chord progressions, synthesized sounds and elaborate vocals to create an interesting, if not hypnotic, experience. The principals of Oliver Mars, Jade Nelson and Kaitlyn Mahoney, are also creating a love story.
Jade is a Colorado native, though he spent a couple of his childhood years in Belize, and came from a family of musicians. He was making music before he could walk, and his repertoire grew though his teenage years. When accepted into a prestigious Denver school, he and his parents bought the nickel and silver cannonball sax he still uses today. He formed his first band when he was just 23. Kaitlyn took a more common route to music, having played different instruments and sung through her St. Louis high school years. It was there that her interest grew to what she knew she would be doing the rest of her life: pursuing her own sound and perfecting her vocal performance. Jade and Kaitlyn met in the spring of 2016. They fell in love fast, and moved in with each other in Denver and formed a new band within a month of meeting. They played together in several Denver area bands, including the Lincoln Street Project and The Dusty Butts. They moved to St. Louis in 2018, where they started Oliver Mars, and became engaged in 2019 during a visit to Amsterdam. They plan to marry in the world-famous Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Colorado. The band’s moniker came from adding his cat’s name to that of her black lab. As I mentioned, they write all of their own music and play all of it together, utilizing both of their abilities to play multiple instruments. Incredibly, with the aid of various loop pedals they are able to create the illusion of a larger band. They are in the process of releasing their first album, Synesthetic Symphony, and are touring the St. Louis music scene, playing their new sound for their fans. 
It’s not just their story that I appreciate. I am not a musician, nor an expert in the field (but I’m pretty good in karaoke), but I especially admire real, live, gifted artists. I would describe their sound as a blend of jazz and experimental music. Their songs available online are a good mix of both.
Hesitate (Assimilate) uses repetition and hip-hop variations to create a mesmerizing canticle. It is quite different and more modern than most of their recordings. Anthem is more traditional jazz, reminding me of the sound coming from smoky coffee houses in the 60’s, a very experimental era in that genre. Enter is bit more empirical than some of the other tracks, with a jagged intro settling into a repeated, friendly vibe. Another nice blend of a sax melody and synthesized instrumentation can be found in BUTTERFLY, which transitions to piano just before its finish. I get a Herb Alpert vibe from Sax Over Board. I like how it starts softly and slowly evolves into a simple chorus. Getaway is the opposite; it starts fast and finishes with a mild musical refrain. I am so happy that I happened across this creative couple and have been enjoying their artistic endeavors. I think they could benefit from a good producer, one who could enhance their work and give a third professional voice to the process. Regardless of where their professional careers take them, I’m certain I'll be seeing them exceeding their own expectations and achieving artistic and personal success. You can listen to their music free on their website, olivermars.com, or download songs for a small fee.
The single largest issue with the book industry is that readers are deluged with mostly mediocre work by a myriad of self-published writers.
How is an author to know if they are any good? Readers flock to receive free books, seemingly addicted to free reading, and move on to get more, no matter how much they enjoyed the read, and never leaving reviews. Traditional publishers are no longer able to find and sign excellent authors among the millions of pedestrian writers on the market, and it seems as though they aren't all that interested anyway, unless the work is from a celebrity. I have sold and given away thousands copies of my books 1 and 2 (with only a few dozen reviews left on Amazon), spent a ton of cash building a mailing list and countless hours creating and sending out newsletters and notices. After publishing seven novels in five years, I still only make about 10% more than I spend on advertising. I have recently cut that back with the expected results. Social media is filled with authors connecting with other authors, or with companies selling book promotion services, when what we really need are readers. I am going to write and publish books 8 and 9 of my Pat Ruger Mystery Series in the next several months and I'll continue to send out interesting (hopefully) newsletters each month. But I'm starting to feel a bit hopeless that the market will ever come around for me. After book 9, I will have to decide what comes next. Will I finally be able to carve out a niche in the mystery genre? How much money should I spend to promote my work? Should I see what genres are selling and abandon my modest mystery reader base or continue to tell the stories I want to tell? What if I'm just not that good, no matter what my loyal fans say? I lament this industry, but it's not like it was ever easy. Carrie by Stephen King was rejected thirty times before it was published, and Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell was rejected 38 times. Even Harry Potter was rejected. But now it's an impossibility to land a book contract unless you are already famous (or have a million Instagram or Youtube followers). Don't worry -- one really good month of sales will cheer me up. 
Those that follow me on Facebook know that Nadyne and I had to have our Cairn Terrier, Lucy, put to sleep this past week. About three weeks earlier, she had shown some symptoms of something wrong, but at that point we chalked them up to her older age. She was twelve years old and of a breed that has a 12- to 15-year average lifespan. Having her thumb her nose at dinner, something that was one of her favorite things in the world, was concerning. But she did eat her food later in the evening, so we thought maybe she changed her mind about liking that particular brand of dogfood. She had done that before with different treats and dry food. We changed brands but she didn't seem to like those either. Then she started eating again.
When she started to throw up her food a few days later, we thought that she had a bug, something that feeding her chicken and rice had resolved in the past. It didn't this time. We were camping in "The Middle of Nowhere," Wyoming, and decided to cut our stay short so we could have her examined in Wichita, our next stop. In the meantime, things seemed to get back to normal and we held off having her seen until symptoms returned. When they did, we took her to a vet and x-rays showed a mass growing in her abdomen. They recommended surgery, about $5,000, with no realistic reason for optimism. On top of that, they would keep her in the hospital alone over the Labor Day weekend before they could further assess her. We decided to keep and watch her while we cancelled our next stop in rural Illinois and moved up our stop in Michigan near civilization, in case things got worse. They did. We took Lucy in for a second opinion, which resulted in a terrible choice of having her put to sleep painlessly or risk a rupture of the mass and having her bleed out in excruciating pain. Her advanced age for a Cairn meant she likely would not recover well from any major surgery and there was little hope for a better outcome regardless. The doctor whole-heartedly supported our decision and cried along side of us while the drugs took effect. Nadyne and I hadn't cried this much and this long for any human we've known, even parents. I suspect if we had lost a child, the pain would have been comparable. Someone that loved us unconditionally and who required our care to survive was looking for us to make her pain and discomfort go away. Instead we had to make the terrible choice, the only choice we could make. It's obvious that even knowing that you did the right thing doesn't help heal you emotionally. Only time can do that, a lot of time. I remember the lyrics from Mr. Bojangles: "His dog up and died, he up and died, and after twenty years he still grieves." Most people we have talked to that have lost beloved pets fall into this category. Maybe it's worse for us that Lucy was our only pet when all of this occurred, but Lucy would not allow another dog in the house. When we tried, we ended up re-homing the interloper, twice. Other couples with multiple dogs seem to be able to recover more readily. At least that the way it feels. Lucy had an interesting life. She was born in Wichita, Kansas, to a family that didn't want her on top of the family Boxers they already had. We hadn't intended on a long-haired dog but went to meet her anyway and it was love at first sight for her and us. She came home and we started her adventure. She was house-trained but very quickly learned to potty on command and we knew she was very smart. Eventually she learned the meanings of a couple hundred words, which was sometimes difficult for us. At that time we were both working and Lucy was home alone all day. We felt like a companion might make this time better for her and adopted a young blonde girl, a miniature schnauser mix. Bella was a sweatheart but Lucy just wouldn't have it. She pouted and became depressed, and after a few weeks when she stopped doing anything with us, we decided it was time to re-home Bella. After a few months the pound called that they had found Bella and we picked her up and tried again. Again Lucy became depressed. The second time we re-homed Bella, it stuck and Lucy was happy again as the queen of the house. I am an avid photographer and Lucy got to smell the odors of a hundred locations in Kansas before we moved to Colorado. There we bought and began camping in a fifth wheel and she experienced many more new locales. In Denver, she also got to have her daily chase of the local squirrels, running all day from front deck to back yard and back again, almost from sun up to sun down. We had to increase her food because the sheer activity was making her lose too much weight. Twice a year, at her birthday (the same day as mine in September, we decided) and at Christmas, one of her all-time favorite activities- opening presents. We would buy toys and treats and wrap them in tissue paper, then one at a time, she would exitedly open them and hoard her haul. I never saw such glee on a dog's face before that. She was so intelligent that she could tell when her holiday was approaching when we started removing the older toys from her stash. In April, 2018, we sold our house and moved into our fifth wheel, hitting the road permanently. Lucy was never a fan of riding in the truck and, despite our hopes, she never did get used to it. At each campsite, where we could, I put up a large pen with three wire fence sections, about 36 feet in overall length, making a fenced area of about 10' by 12', and installed a doggy door in our screen door. That meant Lucy could go outside anytime the outside door was open, and she was outside nearly every minute the weather was nice. Since she disliked car travel so much, we were happy we were able to compensate for that, at least in part. We circled the country and half way again before she passed. She personally set foot in 30 states, and I can't imagine how big her sensual database of smells must have been. We will survive. We are looking into adopting rescue dogs, hopefully this time a pair, and some of the void we feel can be lessened. We don't expect any dog to replace Lucy, but we can love them and remember her. Her are a few photos of Lucy from throughout her life:
Keep checking back. I'll be adding photos and videos as I come across the,...
There are many aspects to bucket lists, and some of those are morbid to contemplate. Literally a bucket list is a checklist of things to do or see before you die. It’s sad to think finances and circumstances probably won’t allow me to complete my list. I have always wanted to spend quality time in Tuscany, the Greece Islands and Australia. Speeding through the Italian countryside in a bright red Lamborghini won’t happen. Ditto a month-long cruise through the Panama Canal. I’ve always wanted to vacation in a hut sitting over the water in Tahiti. It is extremely unlikely that my lyrics will ever be recorded by a famous singer.
That all said, sad as that might seem, I’ve done most of the rest of the items on my list. I drove down Lombard Street in San Francisco (check). I took photos of the sunrise from Cadillac Mountain in Acadia National Park (check). I’m living full-time in an RV (check), photographed the Oregon coast (check) and walked through Times Square in New York City (check). Next week we will be on our bucket-list cruise to Alaska and I have been to Hawaii twice (check). I wrote and published a novel (now seven of them- check) and was the number one best-selling author for a day on Amazon (I’ve done that a few times now- check). I bowled an 800 series (check) and have sat in or near the front row at concerts by the Moody Blues, Crosby Stills & Nash and the Alan Parsons Project.
Possibles on my bucket list include visiting Kilauea on the Big Island in Hawaii, camping in our RV in the Florida Keys, taking photos in Yellowstone National Park and experience a full lunar eclipse in person.
The way I see it, unless I come up with a new bucket list, I’ll have done everything on my list that I can possibly do with many years of life ahead of me. The problem is that there are common things on many bucket lists that I just don’t have that much interest in, if at all, or if I was interested, it just wouldn’t disappoint me all that much if I never did them. Examples might be skydiving or zip lining. I have no interest in the former and don’t care all that much about the latter. 
So, I could use some help. What are things you would suggest to add to my bucket list that won’t be overly expensive and that I might not have considered before? Many items on “amazing” bucket lists online just don’t seem all that interesting to me. Explore a cave? Maybe. Airboat on the Everglades? Done it. Start a company? Done it. Ditto going on a Caribbean cruise. Be a guest on a talk show? I’ll probably do this but I'm not really looking forward to it. Learning to play the piano or become a private pilot are not options either.
What am I missing? 
In applying for a position as a "Color Explorer" I was asked to provide a short essay on what color inspired me and why. This was my submission: 
Many shades of green represent life and prosperity. In my travels I've been fortunate to have encountered and contemplated the flowing green grasses in the Midwest and Southwest, dark pine forests in the Rocky and Cascade Mountains, the thick deciduous woods encompassing the entire east coast, the algae- and lichen-covered rock in Pinnacles National Park, and the greens of desert blooms out west. Greens are present in the animal kingdom from the shiny emerald feathers of energetic hummingbirds to the leathery skin of lethargic crocodiles, from swift geckos to easy-swimming sea turtles, from vivacious parrots to timid tree frogs. All of these experiences encourage me to explore nature and its success ever more across North America and beyond. Even the neon greens of the Aurora Borealis are proof that the planet protects us, despite our attempts to the contrary. What do you think? 
I’ve been a novice. Now I’m working on my seventh novel. I’ve been writing poetry all my life and authoring articles and blog posts for a good portion of my career. I have some simple suggestions to share that may seem intuitive to some but are definitely worth considering.
First, know your craft. I would offer the analogy of building a race car. If you have never worked on this type of car before, the task would be monumental. Imagine starting the project without knowing about aerodynamics and drag coefficients. You can't depend on engineers correcting your design after the fact. Similarly, poor grammar or disjointed plotlines can be caught and corrected by editors, but you shouldn’t count on an editor to know your intent. Also, I believe you should know the rules before you break them, purposely. Next, strive to be profound. Dictionary.com defines “profound” as “penetrating or entering deeply into subjects of thought or knowledge; having deep insight or understanding.” This should be the goal of most pieces of literary work. Whether you are writing poetry, a short story, a narrative or a full-length novel, you should include a unique point of view, aspect, comparison or conclusion to make the read interesting. Why bother spending your time writing if you are just going to repeat or regurgitate what has already been written? A narrative without insight is simply boring. Be satisfied with baby steps. Not many great books have been written in a hurry, nor many careers made in a day. My first complete novel was actually my third attempt. When it wasn’t working, I stopped, took some time, reviewed my process, changed my strategy, and tried again. The third time was a charm. I’ve written hundreds of poems, but I started with one, then wrote another, then the next, and so on. 
Network. I’m continually surprised at how many writers, even famous authors, take time to help novice and experienced writers alike. The Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers group is a prime example of this, but I’ve found this to be true in a variety of interactions I’ve enjoyed. At the RMFW Gold Conference a few years ago, after meeting several best-selling authors, I wasn’t reduced to “what was I thinking?” With their encouragement I changed my thinking to, ”I just might be able to do this!” and finished my novel two weeks later. I have paid it forward in various ways, such as assisting members of online writing groups and other aspiring authors.
Last, gather validators, including friends, family and colleagues. I’m under the opinion that critique itself isn’t enough, and too much critique can truly be counter-productive. However, readers of your genre can validate a variety of factors (or not), such as plot formation, reader interest, believability, character construction, and more. It was especially important for me to know if something was off. I was fortunate indeed to have a wife who had read hundreds of mystery and spy novels, so she was able to validate my plotlines and believability as I progressed. Reliable validation like this should be sought and cultivated. Sometimes cultivation is what a novice needs most. 
Before I go into detail about my writing process, I thought I would share a question I get quite often. This one was asked in AMAfeed.com (amafeed.com/user/47451):
Question: How do you keep your plots unpredictable without sacrificing plausibility? My answer: Some readers might disagree that my plots are plausible... I hope they are, but let's face it, this isn't the news and it's not a story based on facts. I really focus on the characters and try to be true to their nature in any given situation. The other thing is that I believe in coincidences and have no problem having them be part of my story. So you can see that I have my work cut out for me. In Book #7 I have six other book's worth of plots and subplots that shouldn't be repeated. In addition, movies and detective-based TV dramas are a constant and I'm always afraid once I use a plotline, it will come out in other media by someone else. For example, I had the ending of my first novel copied by one of the Mission Impossible movies (okay, maybe they never saw my book, but it came out well before the movie did). I don't want to copy plots from other work either. So, here's my process. First up, I try to think of a few possible book titles that could spark interest. This is a two-way street in that often the plot suggests a title, but just as often it's the other way around. I spend several days thinking about possibilities for both. Next I set up the structure on Scrivenor, the writers' word processing software I use. I like Scrivenor because it is fairly simple to publish to a number of formats, including Kindle's mobi, and allows me to storybook on the fly. I set up the title page, even without a title, a publishing info page that lists copyright notices, previous books by me, etc. I also add placeholder pages for Acknowledgments, then add in a section for About the Author, social media an review links, and another with the excerpt from the Pat Ruger short story I always include in a new book. This changes to an excerpt of the next one as soon as Chapter 1 of that book is mostly finished. Speaking of storyboarding, that is my next project. This can sometimes take as long as the writing itself, since I need to consider sub-plots, new characters, plausibility (see my AMAfeed Q&A), length and complexity. Sometimes I leave some of the storyline to develop as I write instead of during this step. Very often, the storyboard will change as I realize that this character wouldn't do this or that plotline doesn't make sense in black and white. Also, I don't want to hold up the writing to get 100% of the story planned. I might make a chapter that says, "Pat gets out of trouble" or "The FBI is annoyed," and then think it through while I'm writing the previous chapters. One additional step here is the first chapter, which I think have been eyecatchers in my books so far. I usually spend a lot of time prepping and planning for this. Finally, I begin actually writing Chapter 1 and I try to write 1,500 to 2,000 words in a sitting. Sometime this is a full chapter, sometimes not. With the completion of each chapter I review the storyboard and make sure that either I'm on-plot or need to change the storyline. I do this again before beginning the subsequent chapter. After every 10,000 words, I tackle my wife and ask her to read it for context, obvious errors and other problems. She has read over a thousand books, mostly murder or spy novels, and knows a thing or two about what readers like. At some point I assume the title and plot will stand and send ideas for the cover to my very special cover artist, Elizabeth Mackey. She sends me questions or samples and we get a final graphic completed. Assuming I haven't gone insane, I finish the book and complete all the remaining structural pages. I publish the manuscript to various formats and send them out to my proofreading team, of which I have a few standing editors and some that change from book to book. I get all the feedback, correct mistakes and make suggested changes that make sense to me. Then I send it back to a couple of my best proofreaders. Once I'm satisfied that it's the best it can reasonably be, I publish the ebook to Amazon.com and create the PDF (from the Word version that I've formatted for size and pagination) to send to Createspace for the print-on-demand paperback version. There may be other small steps I've left out or forgotten, but this is basically the process I've been following since Book 3 of the Pat Ruger series. There's a fine line that a book series needs to walk. Each novel really should be standalone, which means that you have to bring a new reader up to speed with regard to characters and history, yet not bore your series fans. So writing a series has both advantages and disadvantages. Regardless, Book 7 has begun! 
The first time I heard this phrase was in the Dennis Quaid movie, "D.O.A.," one of my favorite films. Quaid plays a college English professor who had two novels published, if I remember correctly. The first one was a blockbuster and got him noticed by the university, the second received lukewarm reviews and the third book just wasn't happening.
"Publish or perish" meant that you could lose your job as a teacher or scholar if you didn't continue to produce work for the establishment who employed you, at least until you reached tenure. Independent authors have the same dilemma, in a way. Stop publishing new books and you will quickly sink into obscurity. Fellow YouTubers may have it worse than us authors. The video market is most definitely a "what-have-you-got-for-me-right-now"-type of industry. While the occasional cat or puppy video might make several rounds on the Internet, the vast majority have one shot, and a short one. Worse, it can take 8-15 hours of their time to make one 15-minute video, so channels like "The Motorhome Experiment" and "Less Junk, More Journey" are constantly looking for fresh new locations and scenery to film, even if it means driving to the Arctic Ocean, then spend significant time editing, narrating and adding music to their pieces before needing hours of uploading time to get them to YouTube from the middle of nowhere. If they stop for any appreciable amount of time, oblivion happens quickly. Many fans and subscribers who don't get their fix quickly enough simply move on to more developed channels and more content. I finished my latest manuscript a couple of weeks ago and am working feverishly on polishing and publishing. I will need to spend considerable time on marketing, even with help from my social media team. However, I can't sit on my laurels (do people still wear laurels?) with regards to Book #7. That work has to begin before #6 is even on the market. Even with my relatively modest reader base I was under pressure to give them the new story for their favored characters as quickly as possible. I became an indie novelist with my eyes wide open. I adequately perceived the market and decided to self-publish, since chances of getting a traditional publishing contract were remote and would take time away from writing. The truth about "publish or perish" weighs heavily on me, but I'm up to the task. 
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