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YA-hoo Fest! on 9.29

Hey! If you’re in Chattanooga on 9.29, stop by this exciting festival to hear some amazing authors speak about their craft! Or, you can simply visit & hang out with me.

I’ll be moderating Session 5: ‘Writers Talking Craft’ with Dave Connis, Randy Ribay, Maggie Thrash, and Jeff Zentner from 2:15-3pm that day. These are some heroes of mine in the YA realm. You won’t be disappointed!

Description:

Chattanooga’s Celebration of Young Adult and Middle Grades Literature

Includes:

Readings, Book Sales,
Panel Discussions,
Author Signings,
Food Trucks, Vendors & Fun

Link to register for this FREE event: https://www.yahoofest.org/

See you there,

Brian

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Kentucky-like Bahamas

Here’s a poem from last year’s trip to the beach. A large inspiration being a UK article citing how parts of the Kentucky River mirror the Bahamas of present-day (with limestone formations dating back 450 million years to the Ordovician Period):

 

If Kentucky wasn’t landlocked…
it’d be located somewhereabouts

Nassau

betwixt the Bahamas and the blue Caribbean

Limestone sediment and
formations similar to millions of years ago

Geologists see it
and caves in both

distant cousins

The earth as one piece
and then as many

Jostled about much like

family

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Pre-Orders for Pokeweed

My debut novella, POKEWEED, is now available for pre-order. When you purchase my book, it will ship your way on September 20th. Here’s a video teaser –

 

Prior to this publication, I wasn’t savvy to how important pre-orders were, but they ultimately determine a book’s well-being. Therefore, the more copies I sell during the pre-order period, the better its chance of living, breathing, and growing.

Writing this novella was amazing, and I’m so grateful for all those whose input went into it before publication at Black Rose. Thank you, Katerina Dotneboya, for the exceptional artwork created from halfway across the globe!

Some of my literary heroes read my work beforehand and shared their blurbs with me. They’re on my website & will be printed on the inside of this book.

I’m currently developing my first children’s picture book as well. I am so fortunate to have found a community of people who share my passion for writing both online and within the Chattanooga community.

Here are the two central link(s) to preorder POKEWEED: www.blackrosewriting.com/childrens-booksya/Pokeweed & http://ow.ly/d3cJ30lO2MS

Please share. I am so, so grateful.

#brwriting #pokeweed #throwforwardthursday

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It’s a Girl!

You might’ve seen the previous posts, but it’s true: Leah and I are expecting a girl this August. She is due to arrive on Leah’s birthday (Aug. 11th) no less.

We spent this past weekend at Mom’s in Monticello to celebrate with family and close friends. As we’ve learned this info., it is now much more real.

There is growth.

There is a child on the way.

 

We are naming her after my babysitter- Zella (Rose), which means ‘blessed.’

All of the complimentary Kentucky checkboxes were marked this past Easter weekend:

  • cake
  • fried chicken
  • guns
  • a couple of proud mamas

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New publication in September!

I hinted previously that there could be a new book coming down the pike this year.

THERE IS!  It’s one I’ve had quite a fun time with, as it really defies classification.

Here’s my best effort to label it –

 

  • an illustrated, Young Adult, Western novella set in 1880s Appalachia rather than, well, the West.
  • a coming-of-age story, with historical significance, as it centers upon a family caught in the disastrous, bloody French-Eversole Feud near Hazard, Kentucky.

 

With the current landscape of modern high school libraries shifting away from books involving shootouts, I was nervous to promote such a book for teen readers. However, the strong historical significance won out for me, to tell a story about this ‘not-so-famous’ Kentucky feud, which unlike the Hatfields & McCoys (happening due east of Perry County), spawned not from the greed over a hog, but something much more closely tied to every Appalachian – land, the coal within.

I look forward to sharing more details, as they develop, and I gladly welcome any of my more talented writing peers to offer to blurb for this book well in advance of its intended release, which is:   9.20.18.

Happy Easter Weekend to everyone!

 

Brian

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Being an enigma is far from bad

Every finger print differing for a reason

Consider the differences in the Grand Canyon

And Mount Everest

Trenches and peaks falling and rising in varying proportions

A cave remaining dark all day

And snow lingering on precipices, up high

A bat needing a home during daylight hours

And man craving rest in the darkest reaches of night

Differences are awe-inspiring

Sameness is bland

Leonardo da Vinci was anything but mad

Van Gogh while mad was anything except boring

Hobbits were constructed in the mind of a world-builder

And Billy Graham preached like his soul was on fire

These are the attributes of difference

These are the joys of deliverance

From a world lacking season

From a dish missing salt

Difference is good

Mysterious

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How Not To Wake Up in the Morning

My dream on 1/24/2018:
Do you remember Disney’s Rescuers Down Under?
It had that character Frank – a frilled neck lizard.
He looks so happy doesn’t he?
In my dream, I was jogging in a nondescript group and others were going around this angry lizard who blocked our path.
Well, my turn comes (like a game of Frogger) and I try to go left and right around the lizard, and it blocks my path both ways. Then, I go for the hurdle and it blocks that path overtop its head. Finally, I decide it’s come to fisticuffs and I jab with my right, and it seizes my fist in this Venus fly trap type of mitt, and I counter with the haymaker left (Southpaw always!) and it snatches that in its mitt too.
Before I can react too much the lizard pulls me toward itself with 100% gusto and I physically lunge myself awake flying out of my bed and making contact (eye lid first) directly with the nightstand edge. Luckily for me, it wasn’t a direct hit with the stand, because my neck cracked as it was.
But, I hit nose, cheekbone and upper/lower eyelid directly on the stand’s edge. And Leah jerked awake and was like “Are you okay?”
So I went to see the urgent care people and did vision tests, eye dye for testing for lens cuts, and fortunately it was a protected by the good ole eyelid.
They checked for retinal detachment and orbital fractures and the results were clean. I was able to see the chart across the room too.
I made it to work for my first appt. with a kiddo, and I have a nice shiner on the left side. It’s making for some entertaining advising sessions.
My favorite ending to a conversation went:
“It was good to see you, Mr. Tucker. Take care.”
To which I replied, “It’s nice being able to see you at all.”
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NEW Project Underway for 2018!

While it’s still very much in its infancy, I’m so excited about an idea I’ve been constructing of late!

It’s still too early to give much away, but suffice it to say it encompasses post-Civil War America. But not the parts in Reconstruction mode we all think about and get sentimental for.

It’s taken more research than I thought I’d put into a book, but hopefully that will pay off in bringing truth to light.

And most importantly, I hope you enjoy it as much as you’ve enjoyed other projects. Baptisms & Dogs, Wheelman, and Swimming the E. were all largely passion projects from personal experience and growth. This one isn’t memory-driven at all, but rather, an overflow of interest regarding a region. There. I’ve said too much.

It’s being composed as a quasi-illustrated novellette. (Say that 5 times really fast.)

And as much as I’d like to share sketches, plot, and a forthcoming title…it’s still too early in the game to do so.

However, my promise is to get these things to you soon. If you promise me, you’ll share the heck out of it once it becomes a real, living breathing thing.

 

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Event Pictures from Star Line Books – Swimming the Echo

Many thanks for the attendance at last week’s Q&A, Reading, & Signing at Star Line Books in downtown Chattanooga! It was a great return to that wonderful independent bookstore. Sharing Swimming the Echo and its construction with everyone was a fantastic time. The questions were thoughtful and welcomed! Hope to see you at the next event soon.

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Chattanooga Book Signing, Thursday!

Book Signing with Brian L. Tucker

Star Line Books loves to have local writers in the shop, and Brian Tucker is no exception. A great friend of Star Line, Brian will be joining us in the shop for a reading and signing of his most recent novel, Swimming the Echo.  Born in Monticello, KY, Brian is an immense talent, who has lived in the foothills of the Appalachians, Houston, and eastern North Carolina. His fiction has appeared in more than twenty publications. He is an alumnus of the Eastern Kentucky University Bluegrass Writers Studio and was a finalist for the Linda Bruckheimer Series in Kentucky Literature Award for his collection, Baptisms & Dogs. He currently lives in Chattanooga, TN with his wife, LeahSWIMMING THE ECHO, was released May 30th by eLectio Publishing.

 

About the Book:

It’s an adventure of a lifetime. When a summer job to explore Mammoth Cave lands in Cade Rainy’s lap, he doesn’t think twice. The teen from Southern Kentucky makes a break for it. But when he finds his dad is connected to a man working at Mammoth, Cade discovers there’s more to this trip than meets the eye. AND THE CAVE IS JUST THE START. Cade sets out to map the real route of twisted lies through fissures and stalactites, battling claustrophobia and bats.

EXPLORE. ADVENTURE. DON’T DIE.