This weekend I'll be sharing my writing life with peers and fans at Love is Murder, an annual convention for writers and readers just outside Chicago.  This is one of my favorites because the atmosphere makes it easy for fans and authors to mingle.  Plus, new writers get to mingle with, learn from, and work alongside more experienced authors. Aside from being great fun, Love is Murder provides an educational forum to writers and readers to further their…

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Win free books/e-books on the Blog Crawl!

Today's stop is at Chris Verstraete's blog, and the post is "Slowing Readers-Bad Policy". Find it at
http://candidcanine.blogspot.com

I met Lynn Naugle at the BWI airport.  I was doing a book signing, and she was winding up a visit to the Baltimore area.  I signed a copy of Russian Roulette for her and she dug into it on her way home to Florida.  She liked it enough to send me a very nice email, and to continue reading my Hannibal Jones series.  I've posted Lynn Naugle's exact words on my web site as this week's featured review - http://www.ascamacho.com

If you’ve been wondering why the people of Tunisia and Egypt have risen up against their dictators and why it caught Washington with pants down, it’s because you didn’t read THE FOURTH ASSASSIN, the latest of my Palestinian crime novels.

In THE FOURTH ASSASSIN, which was published exactly a year…

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It’s a deep-freeze with a record amount of snow in the Ol ‘Peg. February has started with a cold snap and general crankiness with shoveling on my part. This can be the tough month, but it tends to be one of my busiest for some reason. For those you putting together various proposals for March 1st deadline for funding, you know what I mean. I have a project I would like to put forward, but I’m waiting to hear about a gig, and that answer will come down tomorrow (Wednesday). If it goes ahead,…

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Well here we are. My first entry using a new tool. I have used Blogger in the past, but found the templates and look of the thing to be unappealing. I tried a paid hosting site called Squarespace, but found it expensive for what I was getting for my buck. Squarespace’s Gallery was buggy and the final straw was the jumpy, inconsistent nature of its blog entry function. If something as simple as writing text and posting an entry becomes a chore, you can bet your bottom dollar (especially in…

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For every reputable self publishing company, there are dozens of scam artists lurking, ready to fleece unsuspecting authors for inferior products and services.

 

Read my Spotlight article in the Las Vegas edition of Examiner.com today, and if you are contemplating self publishing ask the questions, do the research and take your…

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Does the way we use our language say something about our confidence? When I create prose, even for a writing exercise or a class, I call it writing. So, why is it that doctors call what they do "practice"? 

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The seminar I co-presented on Internet Basics for Authors was great fun, in a surprising way. We had a healthy handful of attendees at the National League of American Pen Women, and we had a well structured presentation ready. However, after about 10 minutes hands began to pop up and the rest of the 90 minute session was driven by questions. As it turned out, not a bad way to run a seminar.



I also had the opportunity to do a very fun and free-wheeling interview on Brayton's Briefs, a… Continue

 

You be the judge and jury of my bestselling legal thriller, STATE'S EVIDENCE, now in Kindle and Nook.



A must for fans of Grisham, Rosenberg, Fairstein, Scottoline, Bell, and other great legal novelists.



Assistant District Attorney Beverly Mendoza appears to have an open and shut case when she prosecutes Rafael Santiago for…

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Now on sale in Kindle and Nook, my new tropical police procedural and medical mystery eBook, MURDER IN MAUI: A Leila Kahana Mystery.



Maui County homicide detective and composite sketch artist Leila Kahana is the protagonist. A Hawaiian native, Leila follows in the footsteps of her grandfather who was the County of Maui police chief.…

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So I have the idea. I do some research. I work it up into an outline plot with a smattering of characters and then I start writing. This is when it gets messy.



1. The brain dump or free flow



First up is the free flow type of writing when I'm eager to bring the idea and characters to life by getting words and actions on to my computer screen as quickly as possible. Often these are not the correct words, the description is hazy, the characters not fully formed, the grammar and… Continue