Thanks for the support

Thank you, readers and Internet friends, for all the support through the publishing and launch of my third book, Army of Worn Soles.

Publishing any book is an intense and drawn-out process—a lot of work over a long period. As I said in my post of June 16, I did not accomplish this on my own. First credit has to go to the protagonist and subject of the book, the man who lived the story and somehow survived Operation Barbarossa, scorched earth, capture and starvation, my father-in-law, Maurice Bury. Without his surviving, and later cooperating with me, this book simply would not have happened.

I have to thank my beta-readers for their insight: Literary Gary Henry, Action-writer Alan McDermott and Flawless Frederick Lee Brooke.

Rockin’ Rebecca Tsaros Dickson, as I said, did a fantastic job of bringing out the best I can do as an editor.

I asked a number of people to do advance reviews, and they responded not just with a blurb, but also with suggestions that really improved the book:

• Scintillating Cinta Garcia de la Rosa

• The Exemplary Elise Stokes

• Dynamic David C. Cassidy, who is also responsible for a beautiful cover.

Thanks to all the people who posted reviews on Goodreads and Amazon:

•  Alex B. “Afobos”
• Samreen Ahsan
• Kate from “Kate’s Reads
• Stephen Woodfin

And then all the bloggers who agreed to host the cover reveal and/or an excerpt:

• Dawn Torrens
• RS Guthrie

• CR Hiatt

• Rebekah Lyn and Onisha Ellis

• Michael Lorde

• Karen Wodke and PJ Hawkinson

• All the members of BestSelling Reads

• Seb Kirby

• Michele Chiapetta

• Gae-Lynn Woods

Let’s not forget my family: my beautiful and ever-supportive wife, Roxanne, for not only filling in some critical information about her father, but also putting up with me over these past months when I’ve been sitting at my computer, researching or writing or editing or some damn thing instead of fixing things around the house; and my mighty sons, Awesome Evan and Super Nicolas, for enduring their dad’s weirdness.

Oh, yeah, and the won't let me leave out the cats. So thanks, Simba, for howling all morning while I try to write, and Cloudy, for putting your fluffy tail in front of the computer screen when I'm trying to type something. I don't know where I'd be without you.

I’m grateful to you all.