Smiley, whose previous book, “Parole For the Soul: Poetry that Liberate the Mind and Frees the Soul,” drew rave reviews, talked to INK about the inspiration for his latest work and how he hopes it enlightens others.

INK: How would you describe the contents of the new book?

SMILEY: “Wisdom and Faith Lead to a Better Place” is a collection of poems, short stories, quotes, and essays about various aspects of life including politics, love, religion, and of course using Wisdom and having Faith.
I was inspired to publish this book in response to personal setbacks over the course of the last couple years. Using setbacks as motivation has allowed me to climb the corporate ladder and “Wisdom and Faith Lead to a Better Place” is symbolic of that climb.”

INK: What personal experiences inspired the book?

SMILEY: “My cousin Tanisha Washington and I were discussing possible titles for this book based on my desire to show the growth I have experienced since my first book “Parole for the Soul: Poetry that Liberates the Mind and Frees the Soul.” “Wisdom and Faith Lead to a Better Place” is the title upon which we agreed was catchy enough and held true to the essence of the book.”

INK: What do you hope to accomplish on the book tour? In other words, what impact do you hope the book as well as your personal appearances will have on audiences?

SMILEY: “It is my hope that the book tour creates a buzz that will allow me to go from ‘local’ author to an author with national prominence. I hope that people in the audience are entertained and edified. For example, I have a piece called “Maybe” that states that maybe we don’t need to purchase every state-of-the -art electronic device that hits the stores. By cutting down on what we purchase we can have more time with family and doing things that bring us joy instead of going to work.”

INK: What, if anything is different about you since your last book, Parole For the Soul?

SMILEY: “Since my first book I have really grown in how I view adversity in life. I understand better that my life has a calling that goes beyond personal comfort. “Wisdom and Faith Lead to a Better Place” has a plethora of essays and poems that speak to issues on a much broader scale than ‘woe is me.’”

INK: What advice do you offer to aspiring writers?

SMILEY: “I’d advise aspiring writers to keep aspiring and to keep writing. Eventually, if they are persistent enough their, breakthrough will come. Before getting published I received many rejections letters, but I knew one day I’d find the right publisher. During my time searching for a publisher I was able to complete several other manuscripts that will soon be published.”

WISDOM and faith lead to a better place by E. Scott Smiley
$ 29.95 • 356 pages • Available through PublishAmerica.com
Visit www.publishamerica.net/product89946.html

Monica Hughley, the new director of the Fort Wayne Women’s Bureau’s Women’s Enterprise program, says promoting innovation, growth and sustainability will be among her chief goals for Indiana’s premier women’s business center.

“I really want to challenge people to think outside the box and do things that are atypical of things they have done in the past,” Hughley says.

Launched in 1999, Women’s Enterprise has served more than 3,000 women and men and can take credit for more than 150 business success stories (including INK Newspaper). Hughley wants to take those numbers even higher.

“One of the things that we definitely want to promote is growth and sustainability so that we have have a larger economic impact on our community,” Hughley explains. “A lot of times people think they want to start a business but you have to do your due diligence in order to be successful. What we offer is education, counseling, consulting and mentors. It’s so important because in order to start a business you have to have the correct tools in place. “

A native of Gary, Indiana and a Purdue University grad, Hughley is an experienced entrepreneur and business trainer, however she admits she didn’t know much about Fort Wayne before seeking the director’s position at Women’s Enterprise.

“I’d actually never been to Fort Wayne. I   don’t think I’d ever even driven through Fort Wayne.” Hughley laughs.

However, Hughley does have solid connections here, including the head of the region’s most renown high-tech business incubator, Northeast Indiana Innovation Center (NIIC) president and CEO Karl LaPan, who told her about the opportunity at Women’s Enterprise.
“
I know there is a lot of growth potential here,” Hughley says. “By increasing economic opportunities and independence for the men and women of our community, Women’s Enterprise at the Fort Wayne Women’s Bureau helps create new jobs within Northeast Indiana and that’s sorely needed in today’s economy.”

Prior to coming to Fort Wayne, Hughley was in Syracuse, New York, where she was director of Syracuse University’s Southside Entrepreneurial Connect Project and Innovation Center. In that position, Hughley oversaw the development and management of eight entrepreneurial outreach programs including a women’s business center and a business incubator. Her responsibilities also included community outreach to government, civic and business leaders in the community. Hughley has also been the president/owner of Brown Holding Group, LLC -Chemical Distributor. Prior to that she was a senior sales representative at Indianapolis-based Mays Chemical. Fort Wayne Women’s Bureau chief external officer Jeanette Dillion says the combination of Hughley’s education, business ownership experience and work background make her the ideal person to run the Women’s Enterprise program.

“Monica was ultimately chosen because she had those qualifications plus experience in running a program similar to Women’s Enterprise plus experience with incubators,” Dillon notes. “We feel lucky to have her.”

Women-owned businesses continue to be one of the fastest growing business sectors in the nation. The country’s 10.6 million women-owned businesses employ 19.1 million people and contribute $2.5 trillion in sales to the nation’s economy. As a women’s business center, Hughley says Women’s Enterprise works to meet the particular needs of female entrepreneurs with informative programs, flexible schedules and individualized mentoring sessions.

“In our society, women have to be flexible because we hold so many roles. So, our program is flexible,’ Hughley explains. “Our focus is women but we definitely reach out to others – we don’t discriminate. We help all people.”

Of the 3,000 clients served by Women’s Enterprise since 1999, 66 percent are considered low and moderate income. Hughley says the program will continue to target those potential entrepreneurs. She says the program will also work harder to reach diverse populations including Hispanics, Burmese and Africans, in addition to the African American population.

“We want to create new entrepreneurial opportunities for all people,” Hughley says. “There has never been a more important time to help others in our community become self employed.”
By helping more individuals start and maintain small businesses, Hughley says Women’s Enterprise will have a positive impact on the larger community.

“Small business is probably the largest employer in the United States right now,” Hughley says. “What we want to do is create small business ventures that are going to be around for a long time and create jobs in the community. It’s important for us to prepare people to get their business plan in order, to look at their financials, to prepare strong marketing plans – all aspects of preparing for a successful  startup and also being able to grow and maintain their business.”

“I’m really excited about getting this position. You could call it my dream job because I really see a lot of opportunity for growth.”

For more information on Women’s Enterprise, a program of the Fort Wayne Women’s Bureau, visit www.womensbureau.com/we or call (260) 424-7977.

Smooth jazz lovers will soon have an opportunity to enjoy live performances by some of the region’s top artists. Beginning Sunday, February 14, 2010, Elise Entertainment presents Smooth Jazz @ Calhoun Street. This series of live music performances will be offered twice a month at Calhoun Street Soups & Salads, 1915 Calhoun St., in Fort Wayne. Hosted by bassist Darron “Cookie” Moore, northeast Indiana jazz fans will be able to hear and connect with the best up-and-coming musicians in the region. Elise Entertainment is owned by Darron Moore and his wife Michelle.

“This series will give musicians and fans a chance to connect, to understand that there is a market for those of us who love this music.  And that market is larger than we think,” Moore says.

Smooth Jazz @ Calhoun Street” will be presented at least twice each month. With the first in the series scheduled for Valentine’s Day, 2010, the inaugural show will celebrate Moore’s latest CD “A New Love.”  The musicians will take the stage at 6:00 p.m. performing until 8:00 p.m. The cost is only $10 per person.

“Listening to your favorite smooth jazz CD’s shouldn’t and no longer will be your only option,” Moore explains. ”Elise Entertainment is dedicated to bringing life back to live entertainment to offer new entertainment choices for the discriminating jazz fan.”

Story by Vince Robinson/Photos by Tom Lecy of ThomaSheryl Photography

Methodically thorough and dangerously reckless.

Meticulously technical and creatively artistic.

Intensely serious and hysterically funny.

Carlos Hickman, owner and founder of LOS Labs Automotive Firm, is a study in contradictions. Even his location is a clash of opposites. Located at 811 West Coliseum Blvd, the shop is close to Coliseum Boulevard and Lima Road – one of the region’s busiest intersections. Even so, the business is discretely hidden from view behind a row of stores. You’ve probably driven past it countless times going to and from Glenbrook Square and never realized it.

However, the Fort Wayne native manages to pull it all together. The company he founded ten years ago with just $800 is now a nationally recognized leader in high-end custom audio, video and fabrication solutions for clients ranging from corporate executives, professional athletes and celebrities to die-hard car enthusiasts who want the very best for their beloved vehicles.

“We try to develop new trends and styles here,” Hickman says. “A lot of times clients bring their vehicle here because nobody else has a solution. Customers love the service.”

Despite designing, handcrafting and installing car audio and video systems ranging from tens of thousands of dollars in value all the way up to six-figure projects, Hickman’s main personal transportation is a no-frills Ford Ranger. For him, it’s less about a love for cars than about a passion for the work and the drive to be the best at what he does.

“Most people have to have down time. I do not,” Hickman explains. “Most people work to live. I live to work.”

Hickman’s personal drive and philosophy, and the life experiences that molded them, are what make him a worthy role model for young people, as well as for other entrepreneurs of any age. The 30-something Hickman is especially interested in being a positive example to the many young Black males who see crime, rap music or sports as their only avenues to financial success.

“You don’t have to do the ‘streets, beats or cleats thing’,” Hickman says. “I’m not one of those guys who has to have a bunch of women – one will do me just fine. I don’t play sports. I don’t sell dope. I don’t rap. I just work hard. That’s all I do.”

Growing up poor is part of what forged Hickman’s drive to succeed.

“We had to heat the house with the oven. I was paying utility bills by selling baseball cards when I was 11-years-old,” Hickman recalls. “Whenever I wanted to do something, the answer was always, ‘We don’t have money for that.’”

As a teen, Hickman found social life to be yet another challenge.
“Girls back then liked the guy who was the athlete, the street hustler or the guy who was great with music. I was never one of those guys,” Hickman says. “I wasn’t hip. I didn’t have money, so I didn’t have great clothes. I didn’t have a car. It was a lot of ‘didn’t haves.’”

All those early challenges made Hickman determined to succeed through hard work. After graduating from Northrop High School, he attended Purdue University where he majored in electrical engineering. For a time, he worked for defense contractor Lockheed Martin, and in August of 2001, Hickman was prepared to leave the Midwest for a job in Seattle with airplane manufacturer Boeing.

However, one month later, Hickman’s plans changed forever. On September 11, 2001, the deadliest terrorist attack on U.S. soil shook the nation. While the entire economy was in shambles, the airline industry was particularly devastated. The Boeing job was now questionable at best. In the meantime, Hickman decided to try to make a living out of something that had previously been mainly a hobby.

“I’d been doing automotive installs on the side for years,” Hickman says. “I always had a love and a passion for it.”

Hickman flashes a broad smile and a hint of embarrassment when he recalls his first auto assignment: at age 15, he talked his sister into letting him work on her car stereo. The results were less than spectacular — a lot less.

“I butchered my sister’s car. It was bad,” Hickman laughs. “I can’t remember how I talked her into it. I do remember that she was mad. But I fixed it, and I ended up getting better.”

Learning as much as he could from reading, research and hands-on application, Hickman got so much better that he landed a job as a car stereo installer at a major appliance store. After a short time working primarily on commission, Hickman decided his skills could be put to better use working on his own. Combining his education, experience and an $800 loan for tools and rented garage space, Hickman went out on his own.

“I didn’t want to be the guy who showed up to work one day to find out that his job had been outsourced to Asia. I wanted to control my own destiny,” he explains. “If I was going to fail, it was going to be at my own hand.”

With no actual experience running a business and no formal business plan, Hickman hit the road – literally. If he saw a car on the street that looked like it could use his skills, he’d approach the owner.

“I would actually run up to people in the middle of the intersection to try to convince them that I was the guy to fix up their stereo. If the driver was young and looked like someone who took an interest in their car, I would go talk to them.” Hickman recalls. “I would convince them that what they had was inferior and that what I could do was superior, and I could do it at a better price.”

“I would tell them to follow me to the shop,” Hickman laughs. “Oh yeah, I was reckless.”

However, Hickman credits that determined drive and reckless ambition with propelling his business to the next level. Using his college connections, positive word-of-mouth, submissions of his work to national auto magazines, and meticulously building relationships with manufacturers, vendors and suppliers, Hickman grew his business from a drive-by sales pitch to an award winning company employing about eight installers.

LOS (Logic Operating Systems) Labs Automotive Firm is drawing national and international attention to Fort Wayne through its innovative design work and commitment to quality. Another example of Hickman’s ingenuity is the company’s state-of-the-art website (www.loslabs.com). The website gets about 200,000 hits per month from all over the world.

“We have people from Croatia, Poland and Russia who e-mail us to ask whether we ship product overseas.”

Although Hickman is currently focused on growing his business, he does envision getting married and raising children someday. At present, his custom automotive work provides a stimulating creative outlet for him. In addition, he is putting the finishing touches on a book of poetry and other writings. While Hickman definitely has his serious side, he also has a quirky sense of humor. In fact, he even got up the nerve to perform as a stand-up comic while attending college.
“I don’t have enough sense to be scared,” he chuckles.

Hickman believes success in business demands a suspension of fear and a commitment to give it your all.

“You need to be fanatical about it,” Hickman advises. “You have to be almost dangerously reckless. You can’t care about comfort and self-preservation if you’re going to make it. Don’t be that old guy at the barbershop talking about what he could have been.”

“If you die striving, it’s better than living wondering.”

By Michael Summers

David Russell made a promise to himself many years ago when he served in the military during the first Iraq war: if he made it out of that experience, he was going to pursue his dream of becoming a horror writer.

“During Desert Storm, me and a bunch of guys in my unit were all sitting around talking about what we were going to do when we got out of the army,” he recalls. “For some reason, I just said if I survive this, I’m going to be a writer. If I can make it out of here, I’m going to do it.”

And he did. After he got out of the military, Russell, a graduate of Wayne High School, began the long and sometimes painstaking process of writing stories, honing his craft, and submitting his work to magazines that specialized in the horror/thriller genre.

“I write weird tales,” Russell says of his apprenticeship. “Everything I write is out there and ridiculous. It could never happen. But when you write something like that, you still have to pull the reader in, you still have to make them care about who you’re writing about, and you have to make it believable. If you develop your characters and bring your reader along, you can make anything believable.”

He says he submitted hundreds of stories, and even got a few bites. A horror magazine based in California called Aberrations accepted one of his stories and sent him a contract, but that’s when Russell ran into one of the problems plaguing the fiction magazine market — the magazine folded before his story could appear.

“The smaller ones come and go by the month,” Russell says. “You have to get lucky to find a publisher that’s actually going to make it.”

Of course, the magazine business isn’t what it used to be, so Russell began looking at other venues to place his work, and got lucky several years ago when Eternal Press, an Australia-based e-publisher specializing in genre fiction, took a liking to his stories and included a couple in an anthology they were publishing. Founded by Julie D’Arcy and K. Celeste Bryan, two novelists in their own right, Eternal Press is part of a burgeoning industry of online publishing companies, letting readers download books and stories directly to their computer or hand-held device. Bryan says that the demand for e-publishing comes from younger readers looking for an alternative to “the cookie-cutter template stories (offered by) New York mass market publishers.” Bryan says many of their customers read while commuting or traveling, and find an iPOD, say, a less bulky alternative to a typical print book.

Two of his short stories (he writes under the name D.L. Russell) were accepted for an anthology called Paranormal Bedtime Stories.

Eternal Press later released Russell’s novella called Maxwell: the Last Vampire. The publishers asked their authors for a “fresh take” on a vampire story, and Russell happened to have written one earlier that year. Russell calls it an action adventure story where the Maxwell of the title is trying to outwit the other “creatures of the night” intent on killing him and ridding the world of vampires once and for all.

“The big trend in vampire stories right now seems to be romance, and I didn’t want to write that,” Russell says, adding that he tried to create a more barren vampire myth for Maxwell. “The way I figure, vampires living for hundreds or thousands of years… it’s got to get old. Maxwell is really tired of being around.”

“To me, every horror writer should write their own version of a vampire story, or werewolf story, or whatever classic horror subject,” Russell continues. “That’s the basics of horror. Everything is tied into one of those, and most of it has been done to death to be honest with you. But if you can take that subject and put your own twist on it and come up with something new, readers will go for that.”

But Russell says Eternal Press’s primary focus is “paranormal romance,” which didn’t sit well with his style.

“That’s just not my cup of tea,” he says. “I’m not downing it or anything, but that’s just not what I write. The paranormal romance writers got more of the billing.”

After doing his research, Russell found Wildcat Books, an independent publisher based in Winchester, Virginia that he thought matched his sensibilities much better. Russell submitted a synopsis and some samples, and Wildcat Books liked what they read.

“The publisher really likes the ‘pulp fiction’ era,” Russell says. “Pulp fiction is kind of old school, and I think I write some old school, kind of Weird Tales and Amazing Stories kind of things. That’s the way I see my fiction, and I just thought it might be a good match with the pulp idea that they had.”

But now, as Russell’s first short story collection Hell Is An Awfully Big City is just coming out in print from Wildcat Books, he’s discovering that the actual writing process might be the easiest part of being a published author. When I reach Russell on his cell phone, he’s in a branch of one of the big chain bookstores in Fort Wayne, trying to find out if they stock books by local writers.

“I’m learning that when you’re in this business, you’re on your own,” he says. “I can’t stress that enough. Every writer out there is trying to push their work, and you’ve got to really, really promote your own book.”

So Russell has been doing the rounds. As it happens, this particular bookstore does not stock books by local authors, but he’s found plenty of others, here and in other cities, that do, so Russell has been calling and e-mailing as many places and people that he can, trying to set up book signings or anything else that can help promote Hell Is An Awfully Big City.

Among the nine stories in Hell Is An Awfully Big City include “Dreams Still On You,” about a bookstore owner who falls in love with the ghost living in his house. That was the story that first brought him to the attention of his old publisher, Eternal Press, who liked the “romantic” aspect of the piece enough to include it (and another story called “Raymond Doesn’t Remember”) in the anthology Paranormal Bedtime Stories.

Indeed, Russell’s take on the horror/supernatural genre is a little old school. The tales in Hell Is An Awfully Big City are modern stories in contemporary settings, but there’s sort of a Twilight Zone feel to many of them, where something that appears normal or average proves itself to be exactly the opposite.

“I like the old guys,” Russell says, explaining his literary influences. “Ray Bradbury, Harlan Ellison, Robert Bloch… I still love guys like Stephen King and Dean Koontz, but the older guys, the guys who used to get published in regular magazines when it seemed every single magazine used to run least one piece of fiction, those are the stories I really, really like.”

“The Old Men of McDonald’s” — the most recent story in the collection — takes its premise from a sight that’s familiar to many of us: the small groups of older men that can be found sipping coffee and holding forth in practically any franchise in the country. But Russell’s story gives these groups of seniors a deeper, stranger purpose. There’s also “That Ain’t No Chicken,” a funny story about an egg farm told, partially, from the point of view of the animals.

The title story is a “deal with the devil” story, where the main character Rufus is approached during the last days of his life by the Devil.

“I kind of feel that every horror writer needs to put their stamp on one of the basics, the classics, and the ‘deal with the devil’ story is one of those,” Russell says.

In addition to his own writing, Russell also publishes and edits the e-zine Strange, Weird and Wonderful.

“We believe there’s talent everywhere, and with the ‘zine, our goal was to give new writers a way to showcase their work,” he says. “I still get a rush when somebody sends in a good story and says they haven’t been published before.”

As with any fiction, the horror/supernatural genre has its share of conventions that have just been seen so many times that readers lose patience. As an author and an editor in the genre, Russell says that what counts is originality, the author’s own, unique take on a tale.

“Predictability is predictability,” he explains. “Readers can tell when something has been done before. There are stories that I’ve half-written that I’ve stopped because I’ve thought ‘I’ve seen this before.’ And it’ll just sit on the shelf if I can’t come up with something original.”

Russell points out that the old vampire story got an update several years ago, after Laurell K. Hamilton took up the baton from Anne Rice, revved up the sex and romance for her Anita Blake series, and sort of started the current “vampire romance” craze (see Stephanie Meyer).

“Even though I’m not a big fan of the whole ‘paranormal romance’ thing, when it started out it was pretty original,” Russell says. “Now, everyone is copying it, so it’s becoming cliché, but in the beginning, when Hamilton first started doing that, no one else was doing it, and it took the genre by storm.”

“There are only so many stories to be told, but there are a thousand ways to tell those stories, and when you can get a reader to forget that they might have seen the this or that before, and just get into the story you’re telling… then you’ve really got something.”

Visit  www.dlrussellsworld.com & www.strangeweirdandwonderful.com