Karina Fabian…

of the Catholic Writer’s Guild writes:

Ann Lewis and I are touring our latest books in April, and we wondered if you’d be interested in reviewing one or both of them, or just hosting us on our tours. Here’s a little info:

Infinite Space, Infinite God II, edited by Karina and Rob Fabian: Twelve science fiction stories featuring Catholic heroes. Meet a time traveler who sacrifices his life to give a man a sip of water, and the nun who faces venomous snakes to save a friend. Share the adventures of priests who battle aliens and machines in order serve the greater good. Infinite Space, Infinite God II spans the gamut of science fiction, from near-future dystopias to time travel to space opera, puzzles of logic to laugh-out-loud humor and against-the-clock suspense. A great read for any science fiction fan–a must-read for the Catholic sci-fi lover. Learn more at www.isigsf.com.

Murder in the Vatican, by Ann Lewis: A sudden death in the Vatican. An international incident over stolen artifacts. A priest’s wrongful imprisonment for murder. In this collection of three as yet untold tales, hinted at in the original Holmes stories, the voices of Dr. John H. Watson and the legendary Pope Leo XIII reveal how the great Sherlock Holmes brought these grim ecclesial cases to startling and poignant conclusions. Learn more at http://holmeschurchmysteries.com/ This book has been receiving critical acclaim from both mystery and Sherlock Holmes organizations, including the American Chesterton Society.

BTW, will you be staying at the cheetalicious Nile suite at CMN again? 🙂

I got a copy of Murder in the Vatican from Anne at CMN (Catholic Marketing Network) last August and it rawks. I liked it so much I offered it the greatest and most conflicting-to-authors compliment I could pay it: I passed it along as a gift to somebody else (in this case, Fr. Shane Tharp). “Greatest” because the highest compliment you can pay a book is “Hey! You gotta read this!” “Conflicting” because, of course, pass-along readership means “readers who don’t pay you for your work”. (By the way, publishers tell me to assume five pass-along readers for every book sold. So there you are.)

On the whole, we writers see that as only a small conflict and mostly get a thrill out of somebody getting excited about something we’ve written. We figure the royalties were never gonna be that big anyway, so we’re delighted somebody’s getting joy from the work. (I just got my big fat royalty check for six month’s sales of This is my Body: $70! Woo hoo! Paris, here we come!) That, you see, is why I became a Catholic writer: the immense power, influence, and wealth. And don’t forget the smokin’ babes. Yes, that’s what it’s all about: gold, guns, and girls.

Speaking of girls, Karina alludes to my exciting weekend in that den of iniquity, the Radisson in Valley Forge last August. I was, you see, not booked a room the first night due to an bureaucratic oversight. So I stayed on a cot in a conference room. When I got downstairs to the front desk the next morning, I asked to check into my room and they informed me that since I’d stayed on the crappy cot last night, they assumed I’d just keep doing that and gave away the room I was booked for. I replied something to the effect of “Not just no, but hell no.” and stated for the record that a screwup on their part did not constitute a crisis on my part.

They made amends by booking me into the only room they had left… a Fantasy Suite on the top floor. The room is “Cleopatra’s Tent” but I thought of it more as Cleopatra’s Boudoir (check out the mirrored ceiling, the truly cheetahlicious bed sheets and the zebra curtains: Klass with a capital K). Sadly you can’t see the hot tub (which I was highly disinclined to use due to the heat). It was so over-the-top in it’s pure 1970s-tricked-out-Chevy-van tackiness that I felt duty bound to show it to *some*body, so I showed it to Anne and Karina, who were suitably aghast for the minute and a half they popped in to check out the awesomeness.

So there you have it: the proof of the high times and misdemeanors that characterize the corruption of us in-it-for-the-money convert writer types. Not just a hotel room straight out of the The Spy Who Shagged Me, but *women* in that hotel room for nearly two minutes! God alone knows what other delectable secrets I’m hiding.

By the way, don’t neglect to check out the other rooms. There are no words for some of them.