While Mockery is winding down and Mark McElligott's Random Thoughts From A Broken Mind is still gaining momentum, I've been quietly preparing to go full steam ahead with promotions this fall with Poke The Scorpion With A Sharp Stick. Brian Platter (Six Shot Studios) and I finished the book in record time. While I originally set a deadline for the final version of the book at August 1st, it's already done. You can buy the book in advance by clicking your way over to:
Please click the FB 'Like' tab to the right of the book and feel free to review, comment or rate the book while you're there. There's a ten page preview of the contents on the page in order to give you a sneak peek at how the book looks.
Starting on July 1st (through the end of the month), I'll be running a 30% off sale on lulu for those of you interested in buying the book online. This should offset their shipping rates and make the book more affordable to those of you who live out of state who are interested in picking up the third poetry collection. After that I'll be doing a soft launch on Sunday, July 10th at Brennan's Bowery Bar in Williamsville at 6 p.m. along with Mark McElligott and a live musical performance by Dave 'The Real Deal' Waters. If you're a former classmate from Clarence High School, it sounds as if the classes of '92, '93, '94 and beyond will be dog piling into Brennan's on the same day for an informal reunion. At last count, there will be no less than 50 other alumni showing up, so this event is shaping up to be a real barn burner. Signed First Edition copies of Poke The Scorpion, Mockery, Slapstick & Superego, Breathing Room Volume I & II, and If They Can't Take A Joke will be available along with Random Thoughts From A Broken Mind by Mark McElligott and 12 Priests & 3 Gnomes by David Waters.
The hard launch for Poke The Scorpion will hit in August and Mark and I will start touring and promoting in Rochester, Buffalo, Alfred and beyond. While I was apprehensive about releasing two of my own books in the same year, it was a necessary evil I had to carry out in order to devote the time and energy it's going to take to bring Icarus On The Mend in on time for a fall 2012 launch as a numbered hardcover limited edition of no more than 50 copies. I'll be devoting at least six months to proofreading, editing and re-writing the manuscript so that it's grammatically correct as well as entertaining from a pacing standpoint. One year later in 2013 I'll be retiring the hardcover format and launching two smaller volumes of the same book with the intention of releasing a third volume when I get older. Somewhere in the interim I'll release Travesty, a return to shorter form where my bombastic essays are concerned.
Mark McElligott and I will both be reading this Sunday at Rust Belt Books on Allen St. in the heart of downtown Buffalo at 5 p.m. We may be a little late, so please be patient with us as we're both driving from the suburbs. We're paying to rent the space, so attendance and book sales for this event will be crucial. The turnout will determine whether I go back to Rust Belt books or not, so if you live downtown, make Sunday count for us please. This is the first reading I've done at Rust Belt in almost a decade. Mark is polished and primed and almost pitch perfect where his timing and delivery are concerned. Stockman's, Caz Coffee and Finnan's were good practice for breaking his teeth on audience response and now he's ready for prime time. Look out, Buffalo, because we're ready to make a sizeable entertainment dent in the collective populace for the rest of this year and we won't stop until we win you over.
See you this Sunday,
Tom Waters 
