M.J. Rose is giving away the first book in her Reincarnationist series through Halloween night at midnight. (I know it's not much notice, I just found out about it myself. Sorry.)

You can get it in PDF, for the Kindle or the Microsoft Reader. More information, including the option of signing up for Ms. Rose's newsletter and entering a contest to win a signed copy of The Memorist, next in the series, can be found here. http://mjrose.com/books/reincarnationist_free.asp

Enjoy!

A long time ago, when I was getting ready to buy a new vehicle for the first and only time, my parents gave me this bit of advice: you always pay cash for your transport. Never buy a car on credit, it just isn't done. It took me several years to realize just how terrible this advice can be. I'm going to save you all that heartache now by explaining why buying a car or truck on credit can be one of the smarter moves you can make. In the next installment of this series I'll give you some thoughts on how to navigate the dizzying world of financing options.

We all come into this world with a clean credit slate. Some of us end up with great credit, some of us poor credit and some of us no credit. Maybe we just pay cash for everything, then one day we find out that we're a poor prospect for a mortgage because we don't have a credit history. Or we didn't pay attention and made some late payments on our credit cards, or maybe someone in the family was very ill or unemployed and we had to run up some hefty balances on our cards, all of which can ding our credit.

There are a number of things you can do to fix up your credit, including always paying more than the minimum balance, keeping your balance below 35 percent of your limit, and avoiding late payments but my secret lending source says there is one thing you can do that has the potential to really bump your credit score. My source, who we'll call Deep Thought, has twenty plus years of experience in the world of finance and his advice is quite valuable.

Lenders want to see a pattern of borrowing and paying back on a steady basis. I don't mean that they want to see you run up your credit card and pay it off every month. Anyone who is thinking about lending you a big sum of money over a long course of time wants to know that you've done it before. They want to see that you can borrow x amount of money and have it paid off in y number of months.

What's the best way to do this? You could buy something ridiculously expensive, like a pumpkin made of diamonds and pay it off over time. Or you could buy a car and pay that off over time. Deep Thought says this can raise your FICO score (the numbered rating system used throughout the lending industry) by as much as 100 points. With credit drying up you may be having trouble qualifying for a mortgage. By buying a car and paying with credit you might be able to bump your numbers high enough to snag the mortgage and get the house you want. It doesn't have to be a new car; a used car will certainly do the trick.

Things to keep in mind:

• Don't borrow more than you can comfortably pay back. You want to help your credit, not harm it. You also don't want to raise your DTI, debt to income, too high as this has an adverse affect on your ability to borrow. Work your budget out before you go car shopping so you don't crazy and come home with a gold plated Mini Cooper when you can only afford a used Hyundai.
• When you calculate how much you would like to spend on your monthly car payment don't forget to include insurance. If you've been driving a car that's paid off and has liability only you're going to need to set aside a larger chunk of cash as you'll need comprehensive coverage.
• Don't miss any payments. Make sure all your payments are made with enough lead time to give the lender time to process the payment. I went a bit mad with this idea and have my car payment deducted from my checking account every month. That way I don't ever have to worry about being late. The money comes out on payday so I just think of my paycheck as being smaller than it really is. Now, this could be a problem if for instance I was suddenly laid off my job (which pays me via direct deposit) so it's something I'd have to think about if my circumstances changed.

If your house is out of control, a big mess and you don't know what to do about it, you can join the half a million other people who have looked to the Fly Lady for a system to get the house clean, tidy and uncluttered.

She's in the middle of her yearly plan to help you get through the holidays with very little fuss or muss. You can learn more at her website, which can be a bit overwhelming. You may want to check out the holiday cruising information about halfway down the page.

http://flylady.net/index.asp

A member of a support group for a major neurological disorder directed me to the Partnership for Prescription Assistance Program, found at https://www.pparx.org/Intro.php.

The following quote is from the about page on their website.

Who We Are

The Partnership for Prescription Assistance brings together America's pharmaceutical companies, doctors, other health care providers, patient advocacy organizations and community groups to help qualifying patients who lack prescription coverage get the medicines they need through the public or private program that's right for them. Many will get them free or nearly free. Among the organizations collaborating on this program are the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American Autoimmune Related Diseases Association, the Lupus Foundation of America, the NAACP, the National Alliance for Hispanic Health and the National Medical Association. To access the Partnership for Prescription Assistance by phone, you can call toll-free, 1-888-4PPA-NOW (1-888-477-2669).

Our Mission

Our mission is to increase awareness of patient assistance programs and boost enrollment of those who are eligible. The Partnership for Prescription Assistance offers a single point of access to more than 475 public and private patient assistance programs, including more than 180 programs offered by pharmaceutical companies.

Maybe they'll be able to help you or someone you know. Best of luck.

I believe I was fourteen when I walked into a little shop and picked up my first issue of Elfquest. This was in San Francisco in 1977 and the series was in its infancy. Now thirty years later the creators offer the Elfquest universe for free online. Below is a quote from a press release that I released in March of this year. (I know, it's old but hey, this site didn't exist then so I couldn't exactly post it could I?)

Elfquest's 30th Anniversary Gift: Everything

Thirty years after its first appearance in early 1978, Elfquest is poised to make its biggest online splash ever. Beginning March 14, and every Friday throughout 2008, Warp Graphics presents every Elfquest comic book story from the Original Quest all the way up to 2006's "The Discovery."

With over 6000 pages of material to prepare and upload, the project will easily take the remainder of this 30th anniversary year. The initial offering will start off with an explosion of firsts: There will be the entire first graphic novel, to introduce new readers to the characters and world of Elfquest, plus the first issues of all the spinoff titles produced during the 1990s. Each week will see several more issues added to the collection. Eventually, every published page will make its way to the online archive. A timeline and a catalog of all Elfquest appearances are part of the package, so all readers will be able to experience the complete saga from start to present-day.

The official Elfquest site is http://www.elfquest.com.

Tis the season to send a voodoo curse, but they can be costly. Luckily for us there's pinstruck.com, a free site renowned for the quality of its electronic voodoo doll/curses. http://www.pinstruck.com/ You can even send a sample to yourself, so you know what your victim is getting.

Even if you don't want to send someone a nice cuddly curse, you may want to visit the site just for the awesomely scary toothed face on the entry page.

Benn Ray of the Mobtown Shank announces:

Get a free Wilco/Fleet Foxes cover of Bob Dylan's "I Shall Be Released."
http://wilcoworld.net/vote/

All you have to do is follow the link and pledge to vote.

That's it. You could also make a small donation, but it's not mandatory.

Wilco's website says:

Such tumultuous times. And in the spirit of giveaways that seem to be sweeping the nation, we've got something free for you. No it's not a pile of cash (sorry) but rather an audio postcard of sorts from a summer's night in Oregon with our friends the Fleet Foxes & a lovely Bob Dylan tune. All we ask is you check the "I pledge to vote in the 2008 Election" button below. If you can spare it, we also encourage you to consider a donation to Feeding America (http://www.feedingamerica.org/). (and please feel free to pass this link along to friends, family members, etc.).

I know some of you have already voted so you can make your pledge without worrying at all about fulfilling it.

The Blood Brothers Presents: the Master of Horror is halfway through its theatrical run. Tis the season to scare the crap out of each other so you should head over to Theater Mania and reserve your tickets now. http://www.theatermania.com/content/show.cfm/show/147325

James Comtois, author of one of the pieces, also recommends another show saying, "I also want give a shout-out and discount tickets offering to Mr. Clay McLoud Chapman's brilliant and bizarre "Pumpkin Pie Show," on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights at 8 p.m. Until November 1st at UNDER St. Marks Theater on 94 St. Marks Place (between 1st Ave and Ave A). You can get $12.50 discounted tickets or 2 tickets for $25 by going online at http://www.smarttix.com/show.aspx?showcode=PUM0 and using the password NOSEDIV. Mr. Chapman is a wonderfully oddball writer and storyteller that I can't recommend enough. If you've never experienced his work, you really need to."

Colleen Lindsay has alerted me to yet another set of free books, this time a trilogy of crime noir novels. Written by Charlie Huston, the free novels are being released one per month, in pdf format, in support of his latest, which is scheduled for publication in early 2009.

The first one, Caught Stealing, is available through the end of this month. November brings us Six Bad Things with A Dangerous Man appearing in December.

Find more information, including a contest, and downloads here.

I've just started the first one and so far it's a fast read with plenty of action.

Have you ever wanted to write a novel? Have you wanted to write very quickly and get it over with quickly, allowing you to move on to the most important phase, the bragging phase? If so you'll be interested in NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month. During this crazed writing frenzy thousands of writers from around the world all buckle down and try to write a fifty thousand word novel in thirty days or less.

You can read more about my take on this event here, in a column I wrote about it a couple of years ago. The event itself is free, as is the website and all the tools, but I do donate each year to defray the cost of expenses.