Just when I needed a Shooting Star most....

The past few days have probably been the hardest in my life and I know today and tomorrow won’t be easy either, but lo and behold, an amazing gift from a shooting star….

Lauren at Shooting Stars Magazine put together an incredible surprise for me and told me about it just now, when I need it most. It brought real tears of joy to my eyes, breaking through the tears of sadness that have been clouding my eyes since Thursday.

She is running “Stephanie Kuehnert week” on the Shooting Stars Magazine blog this week! They’ve done four blogs so far as a part of it, including a great guest blog from Melissa Walker that made me smile because I loved Poison, too, and a cool song of the day from Tegan and Sara. Best of all, she and a bunch of other amazing bloggers put together an extremely cool, HUGE contest to celebrate the release of IWBYJR!

I knew nothing of this, had nothing to do with it, and seriously cannot express how grateful I am to the lovely, lovely bloggers who contributed to this and especially to Lauren. You all made a hard time easier. Thank you! I hope everyone will go check out the contest and party with Shooting Stars Magazine this week.

Again this means so much to me and thanks to all the lovely bloggers for making me smile today.

To Marcel

Note: This is long and I don't really expect anyone to read it, except maybe those closest to me and to Marcel. But I needed to do this, for me.

I think I'm finally ready to try to put this into words. Tomorrow I gather with the many others who love Marcel, some of whom I haven't seen in a long, long time and I only wish it were under better circumstances. Tomorrow begins the rituals of saying goodbye, the public ones. The last three days have been private, shared only with Katie and Polly from time to time. So now feels like the appropriate time to try to put my thoughts, memories, and feelings into some sort of order, to document them at least.

I guess will start by simply transcribing from my journal what I wrote soon after learning the news and adding to it so it makes more sense:

I walked 3 miles in forty-five minutes to get to the place that seemed best to remember you, the park where we first got to know each other. I listened to Automatic for the People because its the album we discussed in one of our first conversations. I cried while talking to my mom at the beginning of my walk and realized the one thing I forgot was Kleenex. I packed everything I could think of into my bag: journal, waterbottle, iPod, phone, wallet, photographs, even my tattoo cleaning stuff because even though logically I know I have a place to be at 7 o'clock I felt like I may never stop walking.

"Try Not to Breathe" made me cry really hard. "Everybody Hurts" which is supposed to be one of those sad songs made the tears stop, but I decided that just in case they started again, I should stop for napkins. I thought about the Beacon being on the way, but I didn't want to talk to anyone I knew, so even though my shot of Patron wouldn't be free, I stopped at Healy's. I had patrons like me when I bartended in the afternoons. I was the weird tearstained girl in pigtails who stopped do one shot of tequila and then left with a bunch of napkins in my hand. I thought about explaining myself to the bartender so he wouldn't wonder like I used to, but that would mean spitting out the words again. I'd already called both my parents and my boyfriend to sob, "My friend Marcel is dead. He died in a motorcycle accident." And I couldn't say it again, not even to a stranger. Let him wonder.

I got here right as the album ended and saw that Katie had called a moment earlier. Why was everything so perfectly timed when everything is so very very wrong about it all.

Katie said, "Where are you?"

I said, "Under the tree where he talked us out of running away."

She said, "I'll be there in five minutes."

You were always there for me when I was troubled. Katie and I were dead serious about leaving that time. We were gonna leave that night. Walk to Canada via Minnesota. Everyone else who said they were gonna come chickened and tried to talk us out of it. No one could convince us but you. You tried after everyone else gave up. After we began to talk about starting our walk down North Avenue or Lake Street because you couldn't just walk up 290. You called us over to that tree. Squirrels darted around nearby because the squirrels always liked you. You acknowledged why were leaving and the others wouldn't. You acknowledged that what was troubling us was deeper than teen angst, which was why we were so determined to escape. You told us you understood, but then you told us why we shouldn't do it. There was some statement about how we both had bright futures after we fought through this, but knowing that this was similar to what everyone else said, you quickly changed tactics, and whipped out the Marcel logic. I don't remember anything exact about it, but it was a big metaphor about ducks. Ducks. That's all Katie remembers, too. And that it was extraordinarily convincing. We stayed. We didn't run away. We'd never seriously talk about it again.

I'd known who you were since those awkward years at Percy Julian Junior High, but I didn't really get to know you until sophomore year when I started hanging out at the park, wanting desperately to be friends with your group of friends. We also had Geometry class together. You sat one row over, a couple seats behind me. One day in the middle of class you just burst out laughing. I'd gotten stoned at lunch the period before, so I was half asleep when your random guffaw (it was kind of a cackle/guffaw because it was louder and longer than a guffaw, but too deep to be anything but a guffaw) jarred me awake. I turned to stare at you like everyone else. But unlike them, I started to laugh too. I thought your interruption hilarious and perfect. And I was stoned and thought maybe you were, too and maybe you were, but more likely you were just being Marcel. I think when the teacher asked you why you were laughing you just shrugged and he might have made you leave the room. I just remember wanting to be your friend so badly right then. We started to talk a bit after seeing each other around at the park. I ditched Geometry a lot because it was during fifth period lunch, but when I went it was cause I knew I'd get to talk with you. I felt so lucky to be your friend and was completely astonished when you wrote in my yearbook that year: "It's been nice half-knowing you. It's been a strange year, but I'm glad I met you and thanks for talking to me! It's always strange when I find someone who will..." So odd because I felt exactly the same way.

And it was a strange year and the circumstances that made it so that we only half-knew each other were unfortunate. The second half of sophomore year was awkward because of that person I dated that I don't like to talk about now. He had been friends with you and your friends and then totally turned on you all for reasons I never really understood and I got dragged with and put in the middle and it screwed up my chances to really be friends with some people who I really wanted to know. But you were above the fray. You always were. And in Geometry class, you let me pretend like my life was normal and so was our friendship. And when I couldn't be there for my best friend, you were. You saved her life. Literally. Did I ever thank you for that? Thank you.

I know I thanked you for all you did for me though and I'm so glad I was at least able to do that when I was in St. Louis a few years ago and we stayed up drinking and talking in your living room until dawn. Of course you gave me more patented Marcel advice then and on a few occasions thereafter and I'm not sure I properly thanked you, but I'm hoping you knew.

Junior year is when I really became close to you. You were one of the few people that I trusted. I was so completely incapable of trust back then, but you I trusted one hundred percent. There were all of these car rides. I drove everyone to and fro. I usually dropped you off last, partly because you lived closest to me and partly because I liked having those few moments where it was just you and me and your wise words. The snippets of advice and consolation that I needed so badly at 16 and 17 and you were one of the only people who could provide them. And I knew I could tell you anything and you wouldn't tell a soul, even Polly or Katie, if I asked you not to. And through those brief car ride conversations, we developed this special way of communicating. I remember one time I had a decision to make and I didn't want to go into detail, so before you got out of the car, I looked into your eyes and said, "Black or Brown?" And you said, "Brown would be the best choice, but you're going to have to go with Black." It made sense to me and I knew it made sense to you, too. Just like the duck thing and the running away.

There was also the incident with your ring. That person I dated gave it to me even though it wasn't his to give. When I was recovering from his damage done, I tried to give the ring back to you. You took it in your hand, examined it, told me why it was special to you and that you'd missed and then you pressed back into my palm and told me that I needed it more than you did and to return it when I was really ready. I believe I mailed it back to you from Madison when I finally moved there, but since those were still hard days for me it's blurry and I can't find the letters you wrote me while I was living there for the life of me. I might have given it back to you right before I left.

After that point, I didn't see you for almost six years. But then you were in St. Louis and so was my brother. And it was the town where I was born so I went back a bit and when I did, we'd hang out. We had new adventures, getting drunk at some party on the quad at Wash U. You found a lipstick on the ground and gave it to me. I said I liked the color but it was used, so you cut the tip of with a pocket knife. I wore it after that because you said it was okay. You took Ric and me to the City Museum, telling us it was a giant playground for grown-ups. We had more fun than I'd probably had since childhood. We took photobooth pictures which I've had on the fridge ever since. But when I came home after hearing the news I took it down and started carrying it around with me because when the sadness gets the most unbearable, I need to look at you making funny faces. And I've always been amused by the one where Ric moved so you can only see his t-shirt and it looks like we're posing with Robert Smith. Even though Jenny's wedding reception was in the City Museum, it will always be my place with you. I need to take Katie to play there. We always talked about going down there to play with you, but didn't. She'll need that now.

St. Louis, though it was my hometown for seven years, will mostly remind me of you now. I shared my childhood memories with you, brought you into them, which I haven't really done with anyone else. When I came back to visit without Ric, you were living near my grandfather's old house. We walked in the Botanical Garden together and I told you about my love for the Japanese Garden as child. I showed you my old house and you came on the mission with me to find the old Wizard of Oz playground, which I'd hyped up so greatly to you. We ran all over the park with the reservoir looking for it and then had to face facts that it was gone. I swore to you that it had been there and I wasn't crazy and you said you believed me.

You never acted like you thought me crazy even during those times when I really was. When I was looking for closure with those times in 2004, you were the one I turned to. Additionally, my relationship with Ric was falling apart and you were there with advice and clarity as always. You told me in not so many words that you were proud of me and I'd do great things. You told me on more than one occasion "Again and again, I receive confirmation that the only constant is change." You seemed better able to deal with that than I and I tried to learn from you. I promise that I will always keep trying to learn from you.

Oh Marcel....

There are many people you were closer with than me but you never made me feel any less significant and you changed me, helped me, marked in an indelible way-- the way few people did. You helped set me on this path I'm on and it's going to be so hard to walk it without knowing I can drop in on you or that you'll drop a line from time to time.

Montana.... I remember the way you spoke of it with reverence the summer you spent there. The big skies. But why'd they have to go and fucking swallow you? So many people love you, need you, miss you, were touched my you. And boom, motorcycle accident under the open sky and you're gone from us.

But you're not. You're too deep inside of every one of us. I will live my life with lessons learned from you. I will do my best to pay tribute...

I had to do a reading the night after I learned the news. I dedicated to you and swallowed a sob. Then as I read the scene where Michael and Louisa flee town on his motorcycle, I almost choked up again, not just because of that reference, but because I realized in that moment that I'd poured so much of my admiration of you into that character of Michael. I'd realized a while back when someone asked me where I got the names for my characters and I really thought on it, that I'd subconsciously named my two good guy characters Michael and Tom after my "little boys," two of my dearest guy friends in high school, but the idea of Michael, the softspoken man with wild, dark curls and coffee-colored eyes that can look right into you and a sense of empathy that so few have... That's you, Marcel. And no doubt you will continue to seep into the words I write always. You will live forever in that way, through each of the lives you touched.

I miss you. I thank you, my dear, dear friend.
L to R: Katie, Thea, Stephanie, Dave, Marcel and Polly at our feet. In front of Melrose Park Denny's. Fall 1995. The best of times and the worst of times, but mostly the best.

IWBYJR available from Amazon early

On any other day I would have been overjoyed to open my email this morning and find out that preordered copies of I WANNA BE YOUR JOEY RAMONE are shipping now. And that if you go to amazon.com now, it says in stock, not preorder anymore, meaning you can actually get the book now and not have to wait until July 8. I guess this happens sometimes. I don't know if it means it will be in other bookstores, too. Tell me if you see it, I guess. And please, be excited for me. I really can't be right now. It took a lot of effort just to tell you about this. Seems so unimportant right now. But I now I'll want to remember this later so I figured I better document it.

Thank you to everyone who has and continues to leave notes of sympathy. It really does mean a lot to me. I'm still buried under many thick blankets of grief and am finding it to difficult to do anything but take long walks and smoke cigarettes and listen to Automatic for the People and respond to emails on autopilot and even answering email is difficult. I walked roughly five miles yesterday and have smoked almost an entire pack of cigarettes, which I haven't done in years and I know is not good, but really, there are worse things I could do and it seems like there is this crushing weight on my heart and when that feeling gets intense, smoking works as a release valve. I'll stop soon, I promise.

I know people worry about me and I don't want them to. It's difficult because right now I feel like the only people I can talk to are Katie and Polly, who hurt definitely as bad and most likely even worse than I do. And even with them, it's not like we really talk much or know what to say. It's just the comfort of having them on the phone with me, knowing that they still exist in this world because the reminder that people that you thought would exist forever could be gone in a split second is so terrifying. I want to talk to and be around my other friends, too, but I don't know what to say about how I'm doing and I don't know how to make normal conversation and even listening to normal conversation for an extended period of time brings about the anxious crushing weight. I've been through this all too recently so I know I just have to take it an hour, a day at a time, but yeah....

I did write about Marcel and my memories of him and my reactions to this in my journal yesterday and I'll type that up at some point and tell you all about him because he deserves that kind of tribute. He deserves to live forever. I really always thought he would. That like I said yesterday, he'd be the old man in the park playing chess and Polly added, he would be wearing funny hats and telling great stories. There is really no way to put what kind of unique person he was into words. I can't do him justice, but I'll try at some point. For now I'll just say that he was the kind of guy that touched every person he met, made you want him as your best friend or as Polly put it, he was everyone's best man.

Ok this is all too raw right now and not a proper tribute. That will come later. And right now I need to try to figure out how to do normal things like take a shower and write a grocery list.

A Devastating Loss

This all seems so irrelevant now, but I started writing it this morning before I got the news so I guess I will just post it.

You can find an interview with me including a picture of my cool, messy office at the Author2Author blog.

And my agent posted a blog I wrote about Rock 'n' Read at her blog.

And of course I'm reading tonight at Old School Records at 7 pm at 7446 W. Madison in Forest Park.

I was going to post part 2 of my personal tattoo explanation beneath this during my lunch hour. But it's going to have to wait for another day. It means nothing right now. None of this means anything at all right now.

At ten this morning I got an email from my friend Polly saying to call her, it was important. I called. She was crying. Our friend Marcel is dead. He was killed in a motorcycle accident last night. I managed not to burst into tears while in the middle of the office on the phone, but then I went to call my best friend some place more private and started sobbing.

I also called my boyfriend and he came to pick me up from work. I went to get cigarettes for the first time in years. I've smoked two. I'm going to take a long walk shortly and smoke more and cry more and then suck it up for an hour and do my reading and dedicate it to him and try not to fucking sob my eyes out because he never got to read it, he never got to hear it and he was always so supportive.

Marcel is one of the most unique souls I've ever known. We've only talked and visited sporadically since high school but the talks and visits have always been incredibly meaningful. I meant to call him when I was in St Louis last. I didn't because there was family stuff and I figured I'd come back in a couple months and see him. Don't do things like that. See your friends whenever you can because you never know... You think I'd know better because this is the third friend to die suddenly in nine months.

He was so special to me and so many other people. I can't even tell you. Not right now. I will later when I have the words because he deserves that. But now I need to go grieve. If I'm not in touch over the next few days you know why.

Thanks for listening.

Tattoos in Progress, Contests, and Interviews

Before we get into ink stories, I want to let you know that the first of a slew of interviews and contests and such has posted.

You can win a signed copy of I WANNA BE YOUR JOEY RAMONE on Book Chic's blog. He's been doing tons of amazing book giveaways all month long and he wanted to include my book, which is a big a honor. So yeah, go check out his blog and enter to win!

The fabulous, up-and-coming YA author Tara Kelly (her book HARMONIC FEEDBACK comes out in Spring 2010 and I totally can’t wait for it) has interviewed me about my road trip to publication and some other fun facts on her blog. It was a really fun interview and I blathered quite a bit, so check it out! Though now I am about to blather quite a bit here….

So as I mentioned, I got some ink this weekend. It was the first sitting so the piece is not complete and will not be until the weekend after I get back from tour/vacation because I need to let this part heal and then I can’t do anything more right before tour/vacation because I’m going to a hot, sunny place and it’s not good to expose fresh ink to the sun. Before I show off what I just got, I need to explain the history of the ever evolving art on my right arm.

I got my first tattoo on my seventeenth birthday, July 13, 1996. You had to be 21 in the Chicago area at the time, but I told my parents it was the only thing I wanted and that I needed parental consent. My parents are both nurses, so they agreed to this only after a consultation with my doctor (who said it’s fine as long as the place was sanitary) and an inspection of the place where I was going to get it done. My dad went to the parlor, asked all the appropriate public health questions and signed the parental consent form. He also drove me to my tattoo appointment on my birthday. I can’t remember if he stayed or not. I just have this vague recollection of him in business clothes looking utterly out of place with the heavy metal types at the tattoo parlor.

I wanted an arm band of female signs going around my right arm. Very simple. Here's the best one I have of it. Me and my friend Eryn in 2002 or so....

I think it cost me about forty bucks and took about half an hour. The store owner, a guy named Spider, told me not to go all the way around the arm because it was my first tattoo and he’d “seen marines cry” getting tattooed on the underside of their arm. I took his advice, though I don’t remember it hurting too badly, but I had a high pain tolerance then. I just remember it sort of sucked having to go straight to work bagging groceries afterward and since then I have always tried to get my birthday off of work. But my co-workers, mostly girls in their late teens and early twenties from the West Side of Chicago, thought I was so hardcore. Some apprentice of Spider’s did the work. The symbols are kind of uneven and Spider would later have to attempt to fix them. My second tattoo by that apprentice about six months later was even worse and I’ve been trying to figure out how to cover it up or fix it for awhile. But at the same time it’s a part of me, it expresses my messed-up teenage self a little bit, so maybe I’ll leave it alone.

I’ve always known that I would never cover the armband, only add to it to try to distract from its imperfections and also because I don’t like such simplistic designs anymore. In 2004 (or 2005 maybe?) I decided to add a logo that the band Hole used on the liner notes to my favorite album of theirs, Live Through This. It’s a little witch inside a heart. I put that above the armband and then the words Live Through This in Polish below it. Why Polish? Because that’s my matrilineal heritage and this is my feminist tattoo. So this is how it looked up until Sunday:

Sunday I added the beginning of something new to it, the music to the song I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone. My friend Jenny Hassler transcribed it for me and my tattoo artist came up with something pretty cool when I told him vaguely that I wanted the music to sort of swirl in a wavy way around my arm. I didn’t really think he’d be able to incorporate the older parts of the tattoo, but he has. Right now it is just lines of the music staff which he freehanded. Sitting number two, he will add all the notes, add some shading, color in the heart from the Hole logo, and add the five guitar picks from the cover of my book in various places around this:

My boyfriend points out that I will still have a lot of space on the back of my arm. One day I may be ballsy enough to fill that. It didn’t make me cry (though I expected it to be the worst pain of my life thanks to Spider’s build up), but it was pretty damn uncomfortable and fortunately Scott struck up a conversation with my tattoo artist so I had something to focus on. But the next plan, which will have to be put into action when I officially decide not to be a part of the normal work world anymore, is to get my muse tattooed on my lower arm. She’s a fairy reading a book that my friend Kevin drew for me, but I’ll probably let the tattooist take further. I know now that I want her to be wearing headphones for example.

So yeah, that’s my tattoo. On the most surface level, it’s my tribute to all the female musicians who have influenced me. I salute them with the female signs, I reference my favorite band hole, and I incorporate a symbol of my book which was my ultimate tribute to them. But there is a much deeper meaning to the tattoo. Put simply it shows my progression from teenage feminist to twenty-something survivor to published author. Writing, music, and feminism, the three things that got me through.

I wrote more about that, really intensely personal stuff because my tattoos usually have a basic story and then a really personal one. I need to sleep on whether I will share this one, but I probably will. I just wanted people to have a chance to comment on happy tattoo stuff before I tell deep personal tales, so yeah. Lemme know what you think.

Girlfriend Cyber Circuit Presents: Jenny O'Connell and a cool contest!

For those who are dying to know (*grins* Keri, I'm talking to you), I did get tattooed this weekend. It was just the first sitting and it won't be complete 'til after my tour, but I'll tell you about it tomorrow. Today I'm really excited to have Jenny O'Connell here today on her Girlfriend Cyber Circuit tour. Jenny's one of my fellow MTV Books authors and she has two books coming out, LOCAL GIRLS and RICH BOYS, that are kicking off her Island Summer series. Check out how totally summery these books look! Makes me want to go hang out on Martha's Vineyard where the books take place:Here's the scoop on these books:

There are two kinds of people on the island— those who leave at summer’s end… and those who are left behind.

Bestselling author Jenny O’Connell presents a sizzling new series for summer. Her first two Island Summer novels, LOCAL GIRLS and RICH BOYS (MTV/Pocket Books; June 2008; $9.95 each) highlight the lives of the summering visitors, the year-round locals living in the beach towns of Martha’s Vineyard, and the fireworks that explode when they combine for three steamy months.

In LOCAL GIRLS, friendships are in danger of ending with the summer. Kendra and Mona are best friends, local girls who spend their summers catering to rich tourists and the rest of the year chafing against small-town life. Then Mona's mom marries one of the island's rich summer visitors, and Mona joins the world of the Boston elite, leaving Kendra and Martha's Vineyard behind. When Mona returns the following summer, everything is different.

Unlike his sister, Mona's twin brother Henry hasn't changed. He's spending his summer the way he always has: with long, quiet hours fishing. Early mornings before work become special for Kendra as she starts sharing them with Henry, hoping he can help her figure Mona out. Then Kendra hatches a plan to prove she's Mona's one true friend: uncover the identity of the twins' birth father, a question that has always obsessed Mona. And so she begins to unravel the seventeen-year-old mystery of the summer boy who charmed Mona's mother. But it may prove to be a puzzle better left unsolved--as what she is about to discover will change their lives forever...

In RICH BOYS, Winnie jumps at the chance to babysit for a wealthy summer family and earn some extra money—but soon learns that life in the Barclay’s beautiful vacation home isn’t as perfect as it appears. And what was supposed to be a carefree summer quickly becomes more complicated than she ever thought possible.

As for Jenny O'Connell, here's the basics on her: She received her BA from Smith College and her MBA from the University of Chicago. The author of PLAN B and BOOK OF LUKE, she lives outside of Boston with her family.

Of course, I've gotten a little bit more in depth with her and her books by doing my usual music-themed interview:

Please list five songs that would be on the soundtrack to your book and explain how they relate to your story or characters.

Jenny: Actually, for the Island Summer series I didn’t think about music so much as the sound of the island – the waves, the wind rustling the trees, the sound of shoppers on Main Street in Edgartown. I never thought of music playing because there was so much “noise” made by the island itself. It’s also a pretty timeless place that feels immune to trends – I pretty much just picture someone on the beach playing an acoustic guitar around a bonfire.

Name some of your main character's favorite musicians or bands.

Jenny: I can honestly say I’ve never thought about the music my characters listen to (although one of my books OFF THE RECORD has music at its very core and reason for existing – in that one music plays a huge role). But I always imagine them listening to women singers/songwriters.

Who are some of your favorite musicians or bands?

Jenny: Alanis Morissette, Toni Childs, Indigo Girls, Melissa Etheridge, Pink Floyd.
I’m a big fan of the tormented woman song-writing.

Even though music plays in so heavily into my storytelling, I rarely can actually listen to it while I'm writing. Can you? How does music fit into your writing process?

Jenny: I love to go running while listening to my iPod. It lets me really listen to lyrics and the story the musician is telling. It totally inspires me. One of my books was heavily influenced by an Alanis Morissette album – that woman can write!

While music is my muse, I know other writers find their muse in theater, sports, art, the great outdoors, etc. What is your main muse?

Jenny: Bad experiences. I think back on ex-boyfriends, dumb things I did, dumb things my friends did. I have a great memory for horrifying stuff.

Personally I love the idea of those island sounds as the soundtrack to this book and it really makes me want to read it on the beach. And bad experiences are definitely one of my muses, too!

If you are as excited as I am about this fun series for summer, learn how you can win an Island Summer t-shirt – just in time for the beach. Go to http://jennyoconnell.blogspot.com and enter to win today! And learn more about LOCAL GIRLS and RICH BOYS at www.jennyoconnell.com.

Roller Coaster Rides and other updates

I've been a bad, bad, bad blogger. Part of it was personal chaos (resolved in some ways, not in others, but that is how life generally is, isn't it?) and part was just the big huge roller coaster ride that the last *gulp* month before debut novel publication really is.

You should visit my MTV Books blog to learn all about the ups and downs of this week. There is news about ROCK 'N' READ, including pretty new banners you can have and, news about BALLADS, including photo documentation of contract receipt and the updated playlist.

On other fronts I have spent the last few hours getting my head on straight about blogs for the next couple weeks. Where I'll be, guests I'm having... So the radio silence of this week was probably good because I won't be shutting up for about two weeks straight come end of June. Be prepared. Also, the place I will probably kick off my weeks of blathering is Teen Fiction Cafe! I was invited to become a blogger there today and I am soooooooooo excited. Check out all the cool people who blog there!

Also, I have a new novel in my head. I've only been able to write one day a week, which is extremely frustrating to me, but I'm not sure things will improve until after vacation/tour. But those of you who like the Beacon stories, will be excited to know that it proved to be inspiration for this new novel, in which one of the main characters is a bartender.

Okay, there might be more stuff to tell you, but I'm starving now, so I have to go eat and then I have to see a man about a tattoo. I might have new ink this weekend... If not I will at least have new ink plotted for my return from vacation....