Sassymonkey issued an October Reading Challenge.
So I figured I’d do this one too, since I just finished the RIP Challenge with the following books:

1. Winter Moon , by Mercedes Lackey, Tanith Lee, and C.E. Murphy
2. The Reluctant Miss Van Helsing , by Minda Webber
3. Death Splits a Hair, by Nancy Bell
4. Magic Street, by Orson Scott Card
5. Everybody Comes to the Nightside (3-in-1), by Simon R. Green

My October reading list will be:
1. The Thirteenth Tale , by Diane Setterfield – Yep, since everyone else is doing it…

2. The Artifact , by Kevin J Anderson – He’s one of my favorite authors, so I’m excited about this one.

3. Nephilim, by L.A. Marzulli – One I’ve started but abandoned.

Bonus Book: I’m also hoping to start Dean and Me: (A Love Story), by Jerry Lewis and James Kaplan.

And I need to get going on some drawings. I’ve slacked off for over a month. Next project is for a friend of mine’s husband (Christmas present), a portrait of Ben Browder from Farscape. And I always get an influx of people asking for portraits and such to give as gifts right before Christmas, so I need to get as many done now as I can. But then, there’s nothing like waiting till the last minute.

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Well, so much for the book signing.
I had drug my sister along, even though she doesn’t own any of Janet Evanovich’s books, she still enjoys them. I had assumed Janet would give a little talk. I was wrong. When we got there, I was #535, and told they’d call out numbers to get in line to meet Janet and to get books signed. There didn’t look to be nearly that many people in the store, so I decided to stick it out to see how fast the line went. Well, at first, they were calling out sets of 25 every few minutes. So I was hopeful. My sister and I sat and read for a while. And hour passes quickly, and I offer to buy my sister coffee for the both of us at the Starbucks stand. (It’s the least I can do for dragging her to this, and Janet not even giving a talk. I had talked up my last experience at MJD’s book signing, so she had reluctantly agreed.) Bringing back the coffee, my sister had a strange look on her face. She said that the line of people called was ridiculously long, and that even though they might get to my number in an hour or so, we’d still have to wait another half an hour (at least!) standing in line. Forget that. So I dejectedly left Barnes and Noble with my unsigned books, and walked down to Best Buy so my sister could buy her husband a birthday gift. At least the trip wasn’t a total waste. If Janet had been my favorite author, I might have stayed. But it definitely wasn’t worth over 3 hours of waiting just to get an autograph and a picture. (I did sneak up and take a couple photos from a distance. Whoopee.) I felt bad for my sister that I had drug my sister along to sit for an hour and a half for nothing, and she felt bad that I didn’t get to meet Janet. She consoled me that at least we did have fun reading. We actually go to B&N occasionally just to sit and read (so we don’t have to actually buy the book).

What saved my night from being too much of a bummer was Smallville. This episode was ten times better than last week’s season premier! Justin Hartley, star of the Aquaman series that never made it to the small screen, made his first appearance as Green Arrow on Smallville. I’m such a comic geek that these special appearances by future JLA members make me giddy with delight. Oliver Queen (Green Arrow) is a great character, and I’m excited to see more of him in next week’s episode.

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