(poking head in, because it occurs to me I hadn't shared this, and then back out)

So, it looks as if Andy Summers - guitar player for the Police - may be blurbing the Kinkaids. We got to talk at his Haight Street signing. His editor has offered to forward anything I send, and Andy wants to read.

So, there's that.

Back to work.

Hey, that's excellent!

And my copy of Cruel Sister came in - -just started reading it and enjoying it so far.

HMOG. Here's a conference erika should be at: [link] I mean, I'd like die to go, but you have to be admitted with a writing sample and NSM.

dcp, I can write upside down and also mirror-wise, and neither one was especially hard -- I could just kind of do it. I definitely get better with practice, but the basic principles are just there.

OMG, Jesse. That is so something I do need to be there for. Stupid no money. Stupid big country. But could I write while squealing like a fangirl? Tim Goodman does it...and we all know what a baseball geek Olbermann is. I suppose it could be the same thing.

If you can bring yourself to write about "healing the human spirit" without puking, you could get this:

The Larry and Marcia McCartt Scholarship is given annually to a woman who has overcome personal hardships and shows talent and a strong commitment to the craft of writing and its ability to heal the human spirit. The scholarship covers the entire cost of non-credit workshop tuition ($650).

Sadly, it doesn't help with travel and etc. But still. Gah!

There would be a really comical irony in learning how to write from Lehane and Simon by doing that. Psych!

Possibly healing the human spirit by letting people shiv their enemies in fiction, thereby releasing the anger from their hearts?? Also, I find Bubba Rogowski (whatever his name is) a real inspiration.

Any guy that names his dog after Phil Esterhaus is always okay with me, Jesse. Even before he could snap me like a twig.

Request: I'm going to post my proposed letter to Andy Summers. I need feedback. Any and all greatly appreciated. Thanks.

"Feedback, PLEASE. I want to get this out ASAP.

- - -

Dear Andy:

A quick introductory reminder: we met at your Haight Street signing in San Francisco last week. From one Thomas Dunne author to another, thanks for taking a moment. John Parsley graciously forwarded my email; this is the follow-up. Apologies for any repetition, between this and the email. Apologies, too, for being a trifle long-winded; I wanted got it all down.

Right. Deep breath, and here we go:

I'm writing to ask a favour: Would you be willing to blurb my new series, somewhere down the line?

As you'll see, it's appropriate. I've spent years in Bay Area music (working with the Dead and the Airplane, among others) and had a long on- and off-again relationship with a legendary session piano player (during your Q&A at Booksmith, I asked if you'd got to work with any of the session guys in LA, during your tenure with the Animals - I was hoping you'd had the chance to work with my ex, Nicky Hopkins, but alas, it seems you didn't).

In an attempt to get some perspective on those years, I've just finished the fourth book of a new series, the Kinkaid Chronicles. These are mystery novels, told by JP Kinkaid, a fictional session guitar player, and run in a chronological progression. The completed titles are listed below.

The series is being looked at by, among others, Random House. If you saw your way to blurbing, you would, of course, get your own shiny thanks and acknowledgement, along with Bela Fleck, Pete Sears, Neil Gaiman and a few other friends who've expressed interest in reading and blurbing these, or who give me permission to mention them to potential editors. I'm enclosing a flyer about the Kinkaids.

These aren't straight mystery stories, by the way. The focus in these books are the people: JP himself, mid-fifties and chronically ill, with multiple sclerosis and a heart problem. His lover and companion of twenty five years, Bree Godwin. His estranged wife, Cilla. JP's bandmates in Blacklight, the megastar touring band he joined in the late seventies. His local musician friends in the Bay Area, particularly his pickup band, the Fog City Geezers, and his keyboard player closest friend, Tony Mancuso's, longtime band, the Bombardiers.

Nicky - my inspiration for JP Kinkaid - was also chronically ill. He didn't have MS, but I do, and I can write about it with authority. I'm attaching a short section from the second book in this series, While My Guitar Gently Weeps. The man JP is remembering, Jack Featherstone, should be immediately recognisable as being based on Ronnie Lane. I chose this particular piece because, in a way, it covers everything I'm trying to do with this series: memory, family, loyalty, letting go, holding on. And why, in so many ways, music is what a musician is, and not just what he or she does.

These aren't hatchet jobs, or tell-alls, or even roman a clefs. I loved my years in rock and roll, loved the people, and in particular, loved and looked after the legend JP Kinkaid is based on. I've done tours, arranged charity events and fundraisers, worked with Bill Graham and Amnesty International. I saw rock and roll (I was at Woodstock and Altamont and wasn't stoned for either of them, which I suspect makes me something of an anomaly) at its best and worst. By request, I made miso soup at two in the morning and took a taxi down the mountain to a late-night recording session at the Record Plant in Sausalito. I've been hidden from some seriously pissed-off cops backstage at a 1970 Dead gig in New York, crouched in a roadcase while the Dead's keyboard player, Pigpen, leaned against it casually and told the cops that no, he hadn't seen anyone matching that description but he'd be sure to let them know. It's been a long strange trip, and a lot of those personal incidents are woven through the Kinkaids.

I'm considered a literary writer rather than a commercial one, (continued...)

( continues...) but the Kinkaids - the closest to my heart of anything I've ever written - may well be both.

In any case, thanks for your time on this. I know how exhausting touring is, and I hope you get to catch up on rest and family time soon!

Cheers,

Deborah Grabien"

Input? Suggestions? I so need this.