Arista Warrior, 2nd Edition

The long wait is over, and I’m happy to announce that the second edition of Arista Warrior is in the production phase. What does that mean? It means that the book is done and the only thing really left for me to do is approve copy-edits and quality control notes. So far as I’m aware, and if everything goes according to plan, the book should be hitting your favorite bookstore shelves, websites, and e-readers by mid to late June.

To give you a glimpse into the new edition, here are my notes from the preface about what’s changed. Remember, the first edition was published in October of 2012, so there’s over six years of advancement to cover which is part of why it took so damn long to finish. Well, that and having a job, family, dogs, guitars, and a life, all of which are excuses further compounded by my apparent compulsion to miss book deadlines.

My primary goals in writing the second edition were as follows: (more…)

Arista Warrior

Arista Warrior Book
I am proud to report that I have finished the first draft of my new book, Arista Warrior. With the tagline, A real-world guide to understanding Arista switches and EOS, this will be the first published book about Arista switches that contains all original information. It should be available for purchase by November of 2012. (Edit: now available for pre-order from Amazon.com!)

If you’re not familiar with Arista switches, I urge you to give them a look. I discovered them while doing a vendor comparison study for a client, and believe it or not, I only found about them because the other vendors kept mentioning them. After visiting their headquarters and meeting the people behind the technology, I was impressed. I’ve been doing this for a long time and I’m not easily impressed, so I figured there was something special going on, but it seemed like the world hadn’t yet caught on. I immediately contacted my editor and proposed the idea that has become this book. Roughly a year later, here we are. (more…)

Visconti Traveling Ink Pot Review

The Visconti Traveling Ink Pot is the solution to a problem that many people, myself included, didn’t know existed. Namely, how do you fill a fountain pen while traveling? For me, the answer has always been to use cartridges. I greatly prefer bottled ink over the ink found in most cartridges and I had accepted the compromise of lesser ink in favor of portability. All of that changed when I bought a new pen that did not support cartridges, or even a converter. How was I to use my wonderful new pen during one of my many business trips? Was I to be forced to bring a bottle of ink with me, or worse, leave my new pen at home? (more…)

Network Warrior, Second Edition

I’m excited to report that the second edition of Network Warrior is in the final stages of production and should be hitting the shelves of your favorite bookstore soon.

My goal in writing the second edition of Network Warrior was to make the new book even better than the first edition. I wanted to include as much new stuff as possible, but I also wanted to refine the original material to make it more current and accurate. I didn’t remove much information, except to replace it with newer or better examples.

What’s new in the second edition of Network Warrior? Here’s a bulleted list: (more…)

Peenut Guy Revealed

I am honored to have been asked by Ricman to write up a bio for Peenut Guy, the main character in a comic he’s been drawing. Peenut Guy can be seen on his webpage over at PeenutGuy.com, and for you guitar-lovers out there, the strip is posted daily on TheGearPage.net.

Who is Peenut Guy? He is you and me. He’s every one of us who’s had a bad day. He is every one of us that’s ever made a mistake or a poor decision. There is one defining characteristic of Peenut Guy that separates him from most of us though:

Peenut Guy never lets life get him down. (more…)

Cozy Tales – Preface II

I would like to thank all of my readers who responded to my original Cozy Tales Preface. Most of the comments were very helpful, and as a result I decided to abandon most of that preface.

The following text, entitled Introduction, is an edited form of the original opening chapter for Cozy Tales. I think it conveys the spirit of the book better than the preface. I posted. I look forward to reading what you think. As with the last example, I encourage you to either post on the forum where you saw this, email me, PM me, or contact me in any other way you deem acceptable.

Cozy Tales – Introduction

In the life of every dog lover, there is one special dog. For me, Cozy was that dog. Cozy was a 160 pound Newfoundland who, as a puppy, chose me to be her companion in life. My wife, Lauren has always said that Cozy and I shared a special bond. The logical part of me says that Cozy just saw me as her Alpha male. I’d like to believe that there was more to her affection than simple canine hierarchy though.

(more…)

Cozy Tales – The Preface

I would like to try something different today. As many of you may know, I have written a book about my life with Cozy, my beloved Newfoundland dog who was put to sleep in my arms some four years ago. In an effort to make the book appealing to agents, I am rewriting the beginning, which I have included here. I am also you asking for a favor.

Please pretend that you are standing in your favorite book store (or hovering over your ebook device of choice) and reading this passage. Imagine you’ve picked up the book because of the stunning graphics and handsome author’s picture, and intrigued by what you’ve seen thus far, turned to the beginning to see if it’s worthy of purchase. (more…)

How To Type Faster

According to typingtest.com, the average speed from some 15,000 people tested is 36 words per minute. Five years ago my typing speed was probably half that, and that speed was only a result of sitting at a keyboard eight hours a day for 25 years. It was simply repetitive use of a tool that led me to be barely proficient with its use.  So how did I improve my typing speed so dramatically? (more…)

The Task of Writing

2nd Draft Manuscript
2nd Draft Manuscript

Writing a book is an arduous process. Anyone who says otherwise probably hasn’t written a book, or if they have, it likely hasn’t been published. As I wrote in my blog entry
What it Takes to be a Published Author, writing is harder than most people think. Sure it is sometimes easy to sit down and put words on paper, but almost 100% of the time, those words are crap. While the mechanics of writing are different for everyone, I thought some might be interested in how I approach the task of writing a book. (more…)

What it Takes to be a Published Author

Being a published author, I am constantly told what an amazing achievement it is. I agree, but I’ve accomplished other things in my life that were much more difficult. I have a second degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do for example. Still, there is something mystical to most people about being published that transcends other accomplishments. Perhaps we all lust for fame. Though I’m far from famous, if you google my name, my webpage or book will come up first. I guess I’m the most famous Gary A. Donahue on the Internet today. All because I’m a published author.

So what does it take to be a published author? It takes more than being a writer. A writer is someone who writes. Anyone can be a writer. To be a published author, you need to, well, be published. In my experience, here are some of the reasons that I’m published: (more…)