Tag: Rod Davis

Winding Down

Well, yesterday was a great day at my local Barnes & Noble branch–I sold over half the books they ordered for me and met some really cool people by saying hi and good afternoon to everyone who walked within talking distance of my table. I also decided to create a list of everything I need to take to a book event from now on because I left half of it at home! But the bookstore seemed pleased; they let me sign what books were left over, and then they invited me back for the Christmas season to do another event! So that made me feel good.

This week I have three interviews–one with an MFA mate in the metro-DC area on Tuesday via Zoom, another with a different local TV station with local TV personality Walt Grayson, who has been in broadcasting longer than I’ve been alive, and a final one on Friday with an MFA mate and author Rod Davis from Texas who is releasing a Katrina novel in September this year.

And then I’m done for a while.

I’m not completely done with book events. Even though I’m not a panelist this year, I plan to attend the Mississippi Book Festival in September. I am going to work with our local library to start up a writers’ group for the last four months of the year and then gauge interest in continuing. And I already have three events in January 2026 scheduled and another set up at Mississippi State University, where I went to school, for April 2026. So the fun isn’t over quite yet.

But what a ride it has been. I’m hopping back on the query merry-go-round with my new completed manuscript and will see what happens from here. I’ve got another story cooking in my head, but I’m not going to actually start drafting until I get the current one sold, if ever. No use in getting ahead of myself.

Louisiana Book Festival 2024

So us Madvillians went down to Baton Rouge, Louisiana this weekend for this event. It’s much like the Mississippi one, with panels, booksellers, food trucks, etc. We stayed at the hotel designated for the festival because we didn’t know what the parking situation would be, so we rode a shuttle service they had set up.

On the shuttle, we met a very pleasant man named Victor Dixen who spoke English with a French accent. He was dressed out in 17th century clothing with a tricorn hat and was also an author doing a panel–he said he writes vampire novels set in French history. He asked Bob to take some pictures of him on the steps of the capitol building, and we decided after we went and got me registered, we’d go to his panel since it was in the same room as mine.

It was a horror/dark fantasy panel, with Victor, another author that finished two incomplete novels left by George Romero, and two ladies, one who wrote a novel from the point-of-view of the Dark Lady of Shakespeare’s sonnets, and another that constructed a bestiary of magical creatures. We couldn’t have picked a better one as far as Bob was concerned. He thoroughly enjoyed it. I also saw Ellen Ann Fentress, my thesis director, and introduced her to Bob.

Our panel was me plus three other authors published by Madville: Steve Yates, who I work with at my job; RJ Lee, an author from Oxford, and added in was Rod Davis from San Antonio. We had a very few people at our panel, but we plugged along and had a cool conversation about craft, etc. Very rewarding. And all the people who attended bought all four of our books, and Rod decided to buy books from us, the three Mississippi writers, which I thought was kind of him. We also signed a t-shirt for a lady collecting signatures as a gift for her daughter. So that was a warm, fuzzy feeling, too.

Next up is Starkville, Mississippi at the Book Mart and Cafe’s holiday open house event, the place where earlier, they didn’t receive my books in time. So I am looking forward to that next Sunday with a slate of other authors. And I hope to collaborate with this bookseller to have library events in Starkville and Louisville next year. So I’ve got a lot cooking for the new year already!

Check in next week and see how Starkville goes!