HustleKnockin'

2008 NEW YORK BOOK FESTIVAL CALL FOR ENTRIES

2008 NEW YORK BOOK FESTIVAL CALL FOR ENTRIES

NEW YORK (November 27, 2007) The 2008 New York Book Festival has issued a call for entries to its annual program celebrating books that deserve greater recognition from the world’s publishing capital.

Last year, over 20,000 attendees enjoyed the beauty and serenity of Manhattan’s Central Park as they browsed books, listened to music and author readings and enjoyed our food vendors. This year, the day festival will offer expanded stages and new opportunities for authors, publishers, musicians and vendors.

The 2008 New York Book Festival will consider published, self-published and independent publisher non-fiction, fiction, children’s books, teenage, how-to, audio/spoken word, comics/’zines, e-books, poetry, wild card (anything goes!), unpublished stories, science fiction, horror, photography/art, romance and biography/autobiography works.

A panel of judges will determine the winners based on the following criteria:

1) The story-telling ability of the author.

2) The potential of the work to win wider recognition.

Terry McMillan’s Open Letter to Karen Hunter & Simon Schuster

From Terry McMillan, the lady who brought us such "ain't not good black men" novels... Terry McMillan’s open letter to Karen Hunter and Simon Schuster reps. Courtesy of Playahata.com

Terry McMillan says Ray J,Superhead & ilk of authors must go
Terry McMillan’s open letter to Karen Hunter and Simon Schuster reps.

Dear Simon & Schuster,

The three of you 1.karen@karenhunterpublishing.com, (2) louise.burke@simonandschuster.com, 3.carolyn.reidy@simonandschuster.com along with the other publishing houses who have been kind enough to add “special” urban/ghetto imprints are all about to see a major shift in your ongoing and relentless publication of exploitative, destructive, racist, egregious, sexist, base, tacky, poorly-written, unedited, degrading books.

Like a number of Black bookstores who are starting to refuse to sell this trash, I, along with other Black literary organizations, supporters, book clubs as well as writers are about to make our opinions known, to aid in making clear to the public just how demeaning these books are and what it means to our community.

It is sad that it took years of selling trashy sexually-driven as well as tell-alls before so-called black writers were ever allowed in the Big Publishing Houses’s Little Rooms enough to FINALLY get our own imprints. Why hasn’t Walter Mosley or Edwidge Dandicat or Barak Obama or Terry McMillan or Jamaica Kincaid among others ever offered our very own imprints, I wonder?

I’ve heard that Simon & Schuster has even gotten some of its authors out of jail just to go on a book tour. Karen, you should be ashamed of yourself, but like Jonathan, I can tell that you (along with your sister-in-law Wendy Williams) are all cut from the same cloth.

You care nothing about pride as a Black woman or you wouldn’t align yourself or even put your name on some of the ugliest words and stories possible. You are an embarrassment and for someone going around bragging about being a Pulitizer Prize winner (which I understand you are not, that you were associated with other writers at the Daily News who actually deserved it) you should be ashamed of yourself for relying on such a prestigious literary prize to co-write some of the despicable and outrageously base books that you can.

I find it sad indeed when a Black woman of your so-called reputation was willing to help my ex-husband write a tell-all describing “the juicy details” about our so-called relationship. You know he is a liar and a thief and that he played me and you didn’t care. As long as you got paid, and this is precisely why no one (last week I understand according to Book Scan a whopping 600 copies had sold nationwide, and only 87 on the entire west coast) is buying it. Karinne “Superhead’s” book is tanking just like Balancing Act, and RJ’s book is not going to fly either.

ProdigalPen News!

For Immediate Release:

ProdigalPen, Inc. Publishing, Inc is pleased to announce its most recent title KNOCK THE HUSTLE: How to Save Your Job and Your Life from Corporate America by Hadji Williams has sold out of its first printing of several thousand copies and is entering its second printing, coming December 2007. Critics and and fans of both the business and urban genres are already calling the decidedly urban-flavored, no-holds barred tome a genuine classic.

In related news:

In recent months, KNOCK THE HUSTLE has picked up a slew of immensely positive reviews, including one from the Stanford Graduate School of Business Library (yeah--those guys!), best-selling author, George Fraser (Success Runs in Our Race) and noted business industry publication ADWEEK magazine, just to name a few.

Also to update, ProdigalPen Publishing, Inc. will be releasing the much-anticipated follow-up, KNOCK THE HUSTLE 2: The Resignation in the Spring 2008.

Art vs. Ads

First time I saw this quote was in an issue of ADBUSTERS a couple years back. When I read it, it reminded me of second grade.

In case you can't read it, it says the following:

"The thing I hate the most about advertising is that it attracts all the bright, creative and ambitious young people, leaving us mainly with the slow and self-obsessed to become our artists. Modern art is a disaster area. Never in the field of human history has so much been used by so many to say so little."

It's widely attributed to a guy named Banksy, a guerilla street artist/and critic from somewhere out in the UK.

I remember wanting to be an artist until I was about 9 years old... that's when our teacher took our class to the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago to see what she swore was "a truly important work":

It was an entire exhibit of gigantic canvases—each one painted in solid colors--one was all white, one was black. another one was half-white and half-black done vertically, then another just the same but done horizontally... filled each wall, top-to-bottom in the entire room.

Eric Jerome Dickey

TALKING SEX WITH JEROME DICKEY
Nashauna Drummond,
Acting Lifestyle Coordinator

After a slew of tantalising novels and an immeasurable throng of fans, Eric Jerome Dickey continues to explore the 'what if' of human interaction.

On his recent visit to the island to launch his latest novel, Waking With Strangers, Dickey explains that his characters work by exploring the 'what ifs'. He notes that he never knows where his characters are going and that's the fun part.

WALKING WITH STRANGERS
The sensual sequel to Sleeping With Strangers, it opens with the main characters, Gideon, Lola and Mrs. Jones, in London and the periodic flashback to how they got there. "It catches them at this particular moment when so much is going on." Both women with their own set of 'baggage' get caught up in the dangerous game that is Gideon's life. Lola came to London to be with the love of her life only to find out that he has been living with another woman. Mrs. Jones who is Jamaican, is 'fleeing' a failed marriage and there's a price tag on Gideon's head. Dickey notes that he wanted his characters to move and a book that moves.

Gideon, an assassin, met both women on a flight from the United States where he had just completed a hit in Tampa and realises that he is being followed. With all the enemies he's made in his line of work, it could be anyone, and at the top of the list is the woman who taught him how to kill - his mother.

ProdigalPen News!

For Immediate Release:

ProdigalPen, Inc. Publishing, Inc is pleased to announce its most recent title KNOCK THE HUSTLE: How to Save Your Job and Your Life from Corporate America by Hadji Williams has sold out of its first printing of several thousand copies and is entering its second printing, coming December 2007. Critics and and fans of both the business and urban genres are already calling the decidedly urban-flavored, no-holds barred tome a genuine classic.

In related news: In recent months, KNOCK THE HUSTLE has picked up a slew of immensely positive reviews, including one from the Stanford Graduate School of Business Library (yeah--those guys!), best-selling author, George Fraser (Success Runs in Our Race) and noted business industry publication ADWEEK magazine, just to name a few.

Also to update, ProdigalPen Publishing, Inc. will be releasing the much-anticipated follow-up, KNOCK THE HUSTLE 2: The Resignation in the Spring 2008.

HustleKnockin' Baby!

By the way, I have a blog outside of Myspace... Similar material but a little more street" and business focused. It's called HUSTLEKNOCKIN. It's all about smahin constructs thru information, honest dialog and open minds.

If you get a chance, swing thru... HUSTLEKNOCKIN'
We cover all kinds of stuff, including free excerpts from KNOCK THE HUSTLE (2006) and the upcoming KNOCK THE HUSTLE VOLUME 2 (Coming Summer 2007).

luv the visuals? We're tweaking the color scheme and visuals along the way--trademarking at every turn. Get your intellectual property game together, folks. it's real!

HONOR AMONG THIEVES, Part 6

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Like the drug game, fast food’s also a commodity hustle—quality goes out the window when it comes to commodities. It’s about value meals, over a bazillion served, and convenience. If you want cheap food for the masses it’ll be made cheap, sold cheap, and probably taste cheap. When you consider Pizza Hut, Outback, TGI Fridays, KFC, Taco Bell, BK, Wendy’s, and the rest, you’re talking about thousands of outlets serving hundreds of millions of customers worldwide each day. The price-points, competition, and barriers of entry alone force them to use cheaper (and consequently less healthy) ingredients just to compete and grow.

KTH EXCERPTS!!! N'joy

(You Can’t) Knock The Hustle

A realist is always hated in a society of
sanctimonious hustlers, which is what America is.
—Gore Vidal

My hustle of choice: the advertising and marketing industry. Been in it for 15 years. Now the best way to explain marketing is this: Hold up your hand, either one: Go ’head, get it up—I’ll wait (lol)... Okay, now think of your hand as the marketplace:

My Book Fair is in 2 Days!

Yup, this Saturday I'll be at the Cultural Center in Chicago signing complimentary copies of KNOCK THE HUSTLE as part of the OCTOBER BOOK FAIR AT CHICAGO CULTURAL CENTER!

Woaaaaah!!!!!

It starts at 9am and goes untl 3pm. It's free and open to the public.

I'll be one of 30 Chicago Authors in attendence who will have books, most authors ill be selling theirs, but I'll be giving away promo copies of KTH since I'm just about out of my first run and and getting ready for the second edition of KNOCK THE HUSTLE which will drop in early 2007. But you'll find some good deals on some great books from outstanding local and nationally recognized writers, some first-timers, too.

Check it out!!!!

My Book Fair is coming up!

Hadji Williams, author of KNOCK THE HUSTLE will be signing and appearing at the OCTOBER BOOK FAIR
AT CHICAGO CULTURAL CENTER!

I'm one of 30 special Illinois authors that will be out from 10a-3pm. It's a Saturday so if you're in town and have nothing better to do, come out and support! or throw tomatoes, your choice.

Stanford Likes KTH, too!

look what i found?! Stanford University's Library folks actually dug KNOCK THE HUSTLE! Gave it a nice little review in their newslettler. And it didn't cost me a thing. Didn't even know it had happened, in fact.

At any rate, here's the review.

Does this make me more legit, now?

Organic Journaling?!

Okay, i'm not sure what the hell to call what she's doing. but my buddy leslie Stewart is got bizarre pass-it-on/pay-it-forward communal live action thing on her hands...

You take a journal. you write in it. you live and write some more. then you pass it onto somebody else. they live and write and whatnot. then pass it on. the person left with it when it's finished mails to her and she blogs the whole thing.

or something insane like that.

read and weep. then get out of your cubicle and join in.

I smell sponsorship. And leslie hates sponsors. but this one's too good to pass up.

Bean Soup Times digs KTH, too!

Bean Soup has a good circulation in Chicago. over 80,000 actually. So screw the Reader and New City and URB for that matter. They don't have to like KNOCK THE HUSTLE.

Why?

Because Bean Soup Times and underground pubs like that are diggin' it enough to review it.

So there.

LOL.

review below.

Amazon says...

Actually it's RAWSISTAZ--one of the larger black reader sites around. Here's there take on a certain book:
-------
RAWSISTAZ.com
Now You Know, July 26, 2006
Reviewer:The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers (RAWSISTAZ.com) - See all my reviews
Now you see it and now you don't. Can you survive in Corporate America and still keep your self-respect? Well according to KNOCK THE HUSTLE by Hadji J.S. Williams, if you know the game you can survive, however, if you're clueless then join the club, you have been played.

Now this is what you call an original analysis of the "American apple pie:" for those of us who want to make it big and become wealthy in a one package deal. Mr. Williams breaks it down very methodically that if you think you have the upper hand on your career and income, you better take the blinders off and blink again.

Gil Scott Heron gets locked up. Again.

here's a bad story, courtesy of eurweb.com...

*In Queens, New York, activist Gil Scott Heron was sentenced to two to four years in prison for violating a plea deal on a drug charge, reports the New York Post. The 56-year-old musician, poet and singer – best known for his 1970s anthem “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” – violated the deal by leaving the drug treatment center he was placed in, the New York Post reported Thursday. Heron, who is HIV positive, said he left because the in-patient rehab clinic stopped giving him his HIV medication. The prosecution also noted Heron once left treatment for an appearance with singer Alicia Keys.

This is pretty heartbreaking for me. Especially considering that I’m a former spokenword poet. Bet y’all didn’t know that? Yeah. I gigged around Chi-town and other spots for a while. Coming up, Pops had a couple of Scott’s album’s at the rest… between G. and some other cats, I got to writing when I was about 5 or 6 years old. Never stopped. Didn’t grab a mic until my early 20s stopped by late 20s. Anyway…

Is BET in Trouble?

BET is a sinking ship.

I ain’t trying to throw salt in the game, but Bob Johnson didn’t spend 18 years with his wife building that channel up and walk away from it like it he don’t know it; $3 Bill or no trey. He's a hustler but Hustlers got ego. They don't leave unless the gettin' is good. And BET shoulda been gettin' good, but it wasn't.

No, I think he cashed out for a couple reasons (besides a nasty divorce.)

Bob saw the writing on the walls. He saw the sag in the thongs.

Tired of Booty Black Flicks?

It’s super bob to the rescue!

Bob Johnson, founder of BET is starting up a movie studio dedicated to black family flicks. No lie. So the braintrust who brought you classic TV fare like:

Cita’s World…

endless reruns of The Parkers…

The parade of screaming comics coonish-yelling-the only-3-differences-between-whites-and-blacks-they-can-think-of-while-ripping-off-Richard-Pryor aka ComicView…

weekly airings of Trois

and of course, that bastion of black womanhood, BET: UNCUT…

Oh, did I mention that BET shows music videos?

And here’s the best part: Bob’s not waiting to be bought out by a conglomerate like he did with BET in 2000. No, this time, he’s partnering with the founders of Miramax right out the gate.

Full story below:

Was this guy the answer?

On the one hand, I’m sorry to see anyone go. On the other hand, I’m a little frustrated, that something like this gets celebrated. I’m not sure why. Equality is never as one-sided as Black and White…
And maybe that’s what bugs me about it. That it actually takes a client, a so-called “suit” to push for something as innovative as inclusion and diversity, but only because it “makes good business sense.” And that our industry, which swears to be the most creative thing this side of Hollywood couldn’t get any more milquetoast if it tried.
Ironically, nothing’s gonna change until you get more Sam Thurm out there.
Or until people stop debating whether not equality has anything to do with business sense, “giving back” or political correctness and accept it for what it is:

Right.

With all that said, the business community lost what seemed to be a pretty good guy this week.
Remember business ain’t everything.
Go home and kiss your family and hug somebody you care about and thank God for breathing.
The buildings will probably be here on Monday.
You’re not promised tomorrow.

Would you like some white bread with your beer?

Okay, so I'm chopping it up with a buddy of mine the other day. Can't say he's my boy or my partner. Or een my dawg. maybe if it were 1999. but it's not and he's white. So he's just my buddy.

He'd be my bro if he were about 25; but he ain't so, buddy it is.

We joke like that. known him since college. Anyway...

He's in the beverage game. more proof that he's white. he says beverage. a lot. why harp on the "white" thing? because he calls me up, we talk about liquor--he's in the marketing biz--he tells me that some big dumb white client he works for is struggling to move cases.
again. he ads, "these guys are too white for their own good."

Finally, after Ted Ferguson bud guy.. umpteen incarnations of blonde vs. brunette jokes
SNL vs. Mad TV styled bits, somebody besides me, unprompted just says it.

They're too white for their own good.