John Passarella Author Blog

My new novel, KINDRED SPIRIT, revolves around a fictional TV news station. The main character in the novel, Hallie Moore, is a news reporter doing “best of” type segments for NBN7 News called Hallie’s Comets. I’ve created a related Web site for the new station that is up and running already. HOWEVER, I want to add more content to the site, including a page for the NBN7 News Team. This is where you come in…

I’m asking interested fans to send me a photo of themselves to post on the site to list those chosen as some of the stations reporters. In the book, I mention some reporters and anchors by name, but some reporters (the sports guys/gals, the health reporter, the consumer reports reporters, the investigative journalist types, etc.) are unnamed. To fill those employment gaps I’d like to use fictitious names with your photo, and give a tiny bio. You can even list a few towns where you’ve lived (or enjoyed visiting) and I’ll look for rated news station markets near those towns to give your reporter character some backstory. Reporters on the rise move from lower rated markets (smaller cities) to higher rated markets (big cities), but reporters at the tail end of their careers may have an opposite progression.

Pose in business wear if you want to be a serious reporter, something casual if you’d like to be part of the sports team, etc.

Additionally, I will create some fictional local stories of the man-bites-dog variety, but maybe not that silly, and I can use pictures for the people invovled in those stories — just in case you don’t want to be all dressed up in your photo.

If you have an idea for the type of story you would like to be in, let me know. Hot dog eating contest winner, multi-car pile-up victim, principal of a school involved in an asbestos clean-up, etc. I’ll use fictionalized towns and streets and institutions but the idea is to set these local stories in the Philadelphia metropolitan or suburban area, but as far south as Dover, DE and as far east as the Jersey Shore.

Let me know and send in those photos!

Until the next one,
-Jack

A long time ago in a galaxy far… no, scratch that. Definitely happened in this galaxy. But it was a long time ago that I started a “Use Your Name in My Next Novel” contest. People signed up at book signings and through my Website via an e-mail link. Unfortunately, the local signups were lost or misplaced when my family moved into a new house. But I do have all of the e-mail entries and I used this list to pick names for random/incidental/mentioned characters in my new/current novel, Shimmer.

If you read my other entry about the delays associated with Shimmer, you’ll understand how long it has been since I started the Use Your Name contest. So, to make amends, I’m using several of the submitted names in Shimmer and I may use some of the others in my next next novel, if you know what I mean. I apologize for those whose names I lost in transit and I hope to have more sign-up opportunities at my future signings for Kindred Spirit.

I’ll announce the preliminary winners in my next newsletter, which I hope to send out sometime soon, especially now with KINDRED SPIRIT moving crisply along the book production rails. Why “preliminary” winners? Well, for several reasons, the main one is that I have to sell this book. The next book sale isn’t guaranteed, of course. But let’s assume I do sell the book. Okay, the next step is for the characters bearing the names (though not the descriptions, occupations, or personalities) of the preliminary winners to make it through revisions and edits and page cuts, etc. (I still remember I lost one of my characters in WITHER before that book reached the publication stage. I mentioned him in WITHER’S RAIN or maybe it was WITHER’S LEGACY even though he wasn’t named after any particular person.

I’ll let the prelim winners know they’ve made it past the first stage and I’ll update them along the way.

Also, before I forget, the zombie story I wrote for the Modern Magic anthology should be coming out soon. No firm date yet, but soon I’m told. I had fun writing this gonzo story which featured two real life Philly DJs (Preston & Steve from WMMR 93.3FM) in fictional battle against a horde of bloodthirsty zombies. Are there any other kind of zombies?

Until the next one,
-Jack