I’ve decided to stop worrying about getting ahead of myself and go ahead and publish the site that I want to have when I’m a published author, not if I’m a published author.  A big part of the advice in Dave Wolverton’s recent series of “Kick in The Pants” missives dealt with building visibility, recognition, and connections in advance, so I figured I might as well go live with what I’ve been planning for a while.  Sometimes perception can make reality, and the rest of the time you might as well give it a go regardless.

So, welcome to Version 2.0 of kennedybrandt.com!  In addition to changes here, I’m now on Twitter and Technorati, and even (yikes) MySpace.  I’ve added sections for News, Biography, Live appearances, Samples (not yet live), and more.  The fact that I don’t yet have much content to populate some of these is irrelevant;  from what I know of myself, simply having them there will drive me to create content for them.  Yes, I’m entirely comfortable pushing my own psychological buttons.

Another piece of advice Dave focused on was that readers like to know what authors look like.  Even Dave, a best-selling author for years, enjoys knowing what his readers and junior aspiring writers look like.  So from now on, whatever else may be pictured on my blog entries, there will always be a happy, welcoming, smiling Kennedy near the upper right corner.  (I hope I’m not tipping my new Marketing-saavy hand by telling you all this.)

Let’s see, what else...  The text should now be slightly easier on the eyes, as I’ve adopted a very light grey type instead of pure white.  I don’t want anyone to go away from here screaming, “My eyes!  My eyes!  Have mercy on my eyes!”

I’m very grateful to Dave for inspiring these changes at this time, for setting up his new (under construction) site to help aspiring authors connect, and for quoting me in three or four of his Daily Kick installments last week.

Oh, and a grateful Hi, Carolyn! to Carolyn Nicita for editing and compiling Dave’s Kicks last week.  She did a great job with what I understand was a boatload of material.

Now all I need is a book deal...