In the last post, I mentioned my recent visit to Mediapedia author Kit Laybourne's NY apartment, where I videotaped Bret Kerr playing with his camera on Kit's balcony overlooking Central Park. Lest you think that's the only video we filmed there--oh, no. There's more. Much more.

For example, we also shot the first in a new video series I'm creating for Knack Books. This "show" will feature Nick Knack (yours truly) as he shares various step-by-step, do-it-yourself tips drawn from Knack Books. I like to think of Nick as GPP's entertaining answer to the Complete Idiots and Dummies guides--if severely mechanically challenged Nick can figure out how to get the job done quickly and easily, then so can you, dear reader, believe me. Without further ado, here's "How to Create a Perfect Slideshow":  
 

Halloween is just days away, and there's nothing like a good spine-tingling tale to help you get your spook on. GPP's new book, Haunted U.S. Battlefields: Ghosts, Hauntings, and Eerie Events from America's Fields of Honor, has 25 stories that will leave you and the kiddos shivering. Recently, I sat down with author Mary Beth Crain to discuss her fascinating look at the spirits and otherworldly entities believed to inhabit America's legendary fields of war.

Why do so many soldiers seem to hang around battlefields after death?

According to paranormal research, ghosts seem to be more prevalent at sites involving a sudden and/or violent death. There are a number of proposed reasons for this. The spirit may be disoriented, especially if it belonged to a young person who was very attached to life. It may not realize that it’s dead. It would undoubtedly have unfinished business—messages to get to the living, or loved ones it wanted to see again. A battlefield ghost may be seeking revenge, one more chance to get back at the enemy. And let’s not forget that battles were also high points in men’s lives, and many ghosts seem to want to relive them, over and over.

What's your favorite haunted battlefield story?

Wow. I have a lot of them, but I guess my favorite concerns the dapper Confederate General from Louisiana, Pierre Gustave Toutant de Beauregard, who lost the Battle of Shiloh due to a dumb miscalculation, and never forgave himself. His ghost has reportedly been seen and heard by many people at his old New Orleans home, now the historic Beauregard-Keyes House, moaning “Shiloh! Shiloh!” and wandering the halls. But the wildest part of the Beauregard haunting is the fact that since the General’s death in 1893, the home’s residents—and others—have reported witnessing a phantom midnight re-enactment of the Battle of Shiloh, complete with misty landscape, horses, soldiers, booming cannons, the whole nine yards—in the ballroom!

Did you have any brushes with ghosts while working on the book?

I don’t know if this counts as a ghostly encounter, but it occurred at around 2 a.m., when I was writing the chapter on my favorite Civil War personage, General Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, who won the critical Battle of Little Round Top and was supposedly aided by the ghost of George Washington. As I was working at my computer, the chapter suddenly started printing out by itself. Swear to God! And then, a few minutes later, my Chihuahua, Truman, started growling in the bedroom and backing up, like something or someone was coming toward him. He kept barking at thin air, and I had a suspicion that old Chamberlain was paying me a courtly visit, in appreciation, maybe?
 

We at GPP love our company's cover designs--and that's not just the marketing department talking. When final covers circulate, sales and editorial ooh and ahh appreciatively like first-time visitors to the Louvre, or the buffet at Bellagio. Even our HR director is crazy about our book jackets. The other day she was spotted at her desk stroking the cover of The Power of Purrs and cooing, "Aren't you a pretty one? Yes, you are! Mama has a little treat for you..." 

Anyway, it's no surprise that four of our talented designers were just selected as winners of the 2008 American Graphic Design Awards. Congratulations to Diana Nuhn, Georgiana Goodwin, Jane Sheppard, and Bret Kerr, who were chosen out of some 10,000 entries for Award Certificates of Excellence. Here are their winning covers:
 

Diana Nuhn, A Spring without Bees (Michael Schacker) and Jane Sheppard, The Boy in the Box (David Stout).
 

Georgiana Goodwin, the Woods Cop Mystery series (Joseph Heywood).
 

Bret Kerr, the Curiosities series (multiple authors).

Over the past 30 years, Bill Berloni has trained countless animals—including cats and dogs, pigs and rats—to perform in Broadway productions and Hollywood films, starting with the original Sandy in the musical Annie in the late 70s. Incredibly, all the animals Berloni has worked with came from shelters.

In his book, Broadway Tails, Berloni recounts the stories of these “throw-away” animals who went on to become showbiz superstars. Recently, Berloni stopped by the GPP offices, where we got a chance to sit down and discuss his book, his career, and some of the fascinating furry creatures who've graced the Broadway stage (no, I'm not talking about George Wendt):

Bill Berloni will talk about Broadway Tails at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, CT, on October 16, at 7 PM.

Step aside, Boston Pops:

I’d never been to Outdoor Retailer before, so I arrived in Salt Lake City last week bearing no fond memories or emotional scars from previous shows. Not so my seasoned colleagues. For some, this was their 18th or 20th time working the floor, so over dinner, or during slow moments in the booth, they invariably reminisced about shows past. And when they did, I reached for my Flip Camera.

In the following clips, Larry Seidl recalls how, at his first show, he worried he'd be forced to "sleep with a guy I'd never met before"; Mark Downey recounts how he landed his current job while angling to trade a pair of shoes for books; and Max Phelps describes the tornado that caused a stampede on the show floor and actually killed a worker. Plus, first-time attendee John Groton offers his impressions of O.R.

Hans Florine leads some life. He's a successful author, he's married to a former supermodel, and--perhaps most enviably--he lives in the Bay Area. Oh, he's also a legendary climber who set the world's record this summer for scrambling up El Capitan in Yosemite National Park faster than anyone before--3,000 feet, straight up, in just over 2 1/2 hours. Hans stopped by the booth at OR and told me about his historic ascent, as well as his recent, aptly titled book, Speed Climbing!: How to Climb Faster and Better:

Writer, photographer, and outdoor adventurer Stewart Green is the author of, count 'em, 18 books--most for GPP and FalconGuides. Since March, he has run About.com's climbing site. I got a chance to sit down with Stewart at OR to discuss his blog, the K2 tragedy, and his latest book for Falcon, Rocky Mountain National Park Pocket Guide, complete with nifty PopOut maps.

Falcon author Eric Horst met fans and signed copies of Conditioning for Climbers: