Jeri Smith-Ready

Jim's story is live!

I’ve posted the third story in my “Days the Music Died”/how-the-DJs-became-vampires series (thanks to Renee S. for the series title suggestion!).

At the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival, Jim tunes in and turns on to a group of hippies who promise him the experience of a lifetime. The last experience, as it turns out.

Here’s the opening line:


Read the rest!

This story’s page features an Isle of Wight set list playlist, as well as a video of The Doors performing “When the Music’s Over,” the song they sang while Jim, uh, broke on through to the other side.

BONUS GIVEAWAY: Everyone who e-mails me at jeri AT jerismithready DOT com (or comments on this post) with their thoughts on Jim’s story will be put into a drawing to win a choice of ONE of the following:

1) a DVD of MESSAGE TO LOVE: THE ISLE OF WIGHT FESTIVAL, featuring performances by The Doors, Jimi Hendrix, The Who, and Joni Mitchell
2) a CD of The Who’s Isle of Wight concert
3) a CD of Jimi Hendrix’s Isle of Wight act, which sadly was his final appearance before his death

The drawing will take place at 11:59pm Eastern Standard Time on Tuesday, December 2.

If you subscribed to my newsletter, you could've read it a week ago. I'm just sayin'. The signup box is on every page of my website.

Read the first in the short story series: “Crossroads” (Monroe’s tale).

And the second, “Rave On” (Spencer’s story).

I probably won't be blogging again until after the holiday weekend. I plan to spend the week catching up on e-mail, cooking scrumptious food, and nursing my convalescent post-surgical pupster.

For frequent updates, this week and always, come follow me on Twitter. You're more likely to see the real, spontaneous me there any day. If you need extra incentive, in February I'll be doing a Twitter-exclusive contest to win an ARC of Bad to the Bone. It's fun, it's quick, it's thoroughly non-annoying: it's Twitter!

(By the way, you don't have to be a Twitter user to follow me--my status updates have an RSS feed. But the contest will be for Twitter users only.)

Don't forget, I'll be signing books and doing a reading from The Reawakened at the Winchester, VA, Borders bookstore this Saturday, 3-5pm. Hope to see you there!


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Now playing: Snow Patrol - You Could Be Happy
via FoxyTunes

Labels: appearances, Contests, current contests, short stories, twitter, vampire series

• posted by Jeri @ 12:23 PM
• 1 comments

Reawakened now shipping!

If you're in a bookstore this weekend, look for The Reawakened! Official release date is Tuesday, but some stores put them out early. Or just order from Mysterious Galaxy, Barnes & Noble, or Amazon.com.

If you want to know what's happening with me, come follow me on Twitter. No time to blog due to deadline on Tuesday, but I have moments here and there when I can spit out a sentence or two. This morning I've been answering questions on how I can write 176K words on a ~100K novel, and yesterday I discussed my little girl Meadow's recent medical adventures.

There may come a day when I give up regular blogging in favor of the less time-consuming Twitter. It suits my need to spit out random thoughts and connect with others without having to develop a full-blown essay.

Enjoy your weekends!

Labels: pets, The Reawakened, twitter

• posted by Jeri @ 9:54 AM
• 3 comments

I'm all a-Twitter! (and how not to be a moron)

We interrupt the social studies class for a moment to announce that I finally joined Twitter, where you can check out my random thoughts during the day. Since I'll have less and less time to blog this month, Twitter is a good place to go to keep up with All Things Jeri. Why anyone would want to do that is beyond me, but whatever. I rarely answer the question posed, "What are you doing?" because frankly, WHO CARES???

Anyway, you don't have to join Twitter to follow me. Just lurk and listen, then shake your head in bewilderment at this exercise in self-importance.

Now...as promised yesterday, the list of states where voter registration is still open. I'll employ the world's most obnoxious HTML code--the dreaded blink tag--to denote states where voter registration closes tomorrow. And at the bottom, a new video, featuring a hysterical rant by late night talk show host Craig Ferguson! He's from Scotland, which means anything he says is funny.

Please check out VotersUnite! for any special rules or concerns regarding the voter registration process in your state. In a few states they make you reregister if you didn't vote in 2006, or show a photo ID at the polls, or or eat fried lizard tails (which taste like chicken, but only when wrapped in chicken), just to see if you're serious about voting.

Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
District of Columbia
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Mississippi (or until noon on 10/4 if clerk's office is open Saturdays)
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Virgin Islands
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming

And now, your reward for scrolling through the list of great states:

Labels: twitter, voter registration

• posted by Jeri @ 7:59 AM
• 1 comments