Follow who? Where?

I can't really say that I think there's anyone out there I recommend following. That's like recommending a pizza place to a dweller in New York. Everyone's already got their favorites and there's no way in hell to argue with the whys or wherefores of their decisions.

I can tel you who I follow.

First, I follow Charles R. Rutledge on his blogsite. He is often laconically funny and casually insightful. Sometimes he talks about his cat, sometimes he reviews books. Anyway you look at it, I dig what he has to say.

Second, I love keeping up with Cliff Biggers at his site, Not Much'a Nothin' Cliff does a little research into the world of fifty years ago in the small town where he was raised, Rome, Georgia. His father worked on the newspaper there and maybe that's part of it, but mostly I think it's because, like me, he wants to remember the world for what ti was and see the changes as they take place. It's a wonderful little time-capsule into the world that used to be and I really enjoy the articles.

Third, Allison Pang has a fun little site where she writes a comic that is then illustrated by Irma Ahmed. The site is called sadsausagedogs.com and the comic strip they offer up is called Fox & Willow. It's a fun little ride and I recommend it. You might remember Allison from her stint here as one of the Word-Whores. She's smart, she's funny and she's talented, all of which reflects nicely in the comic strip.

Fourth, I tend to follow about a zillion people on Facebook, but mostly just to keep up with my friends. I can usually count on several for the aforementioned for fun, but you can add in Richard Dansky, Jeff Strand, Christopher Golden, Jonathan Maberry, Errick Danger Nunnally, Bracken MacLeod, Holly Newstein-Hautala and a plethora of others to that mix. Reading their posts brings me joy.

Fifth, I do the Twitter thing, mostly to find out what everyone is up to. Tied with that is Goodreads.com, where I check out what everyone has been reading.

What's that? What has any of this do to with writing?

ALL of it has to do with writing. Writing is a solitary thing. This is how I keep my sanity.

I write stuff.

I read stuff.

I fond out what my friends are up to, and oftentimes what they are up then requires that I buy more of their books. I buy a LOT of books. Sometimes I even manage to read them.

Want to know a few more million places I like to check out with regularity? Check out my links at Genrefied. There's another 100+ to look into.


And now and then, I go over to Amazon.com and drool at all the books I want. This week there was a nice surprise added:

Kind of nice to see that. I guess that officially makes me a best seller. :)