I am a terrible salesman. I bombed out of telemarketing jobs in high school, could not move a single chocolate bar for band fundraisers, and always had a huge pile of unsold Scout-O-Rama tickets every year. Alec Baldwin’s character in Glengarry Glen Ross would probably have me taken out back and shot.

If you’re reading this site, you’re probably already a fan of the adventures of Cade and Barrows, and you’ve probably already bought RED, WHITE, AND BLOOD –  now available in the UK as well. If not, I’m not going to try to convince you. (I think you’d enjoy it. Of course, I would say that.)

But if you’re here, and you are looking for something to read, I can offer you some other suggestions as well. Some of these people are friends of mine. Others I just admire. Either way, I get nothing but warm feelings from these recommendations, so you can be sure I’m not pushing them on you out of any kind of profit motive.

OVERSEAS by my friend Beatriz Chantrill Williams, on sale now. Time travel and romance and Wall Street, with plenty of war for the guys. You should pick this up before the inevitable movie with Brad and Angelina. Then you can say you were ahead of the curve.

THE GONE-AWAY WORLD by Nick Harkaway. It took me a long time to get to this one, and now I’m feeling like an idiot for stalling. It’s a remarkable book. I honestly considered reading it to people on my book tour instead of my own work.

WYNONNA EARP: THE YETI WARS by my pal Beau Smith. If you’ve already read my work, you’ll know why I love this graphic novel. It’s got Bigfoots vs. Yetis, the paranormal crimes division of the Marshals Service, and vampires, all mixed up in a blender of violence and humor.

LIMINAL STATES by Zack Parsons. Another wholly remarkable book, which spans decades and genres as it tells the story of two men in the Old West who discover a way to live forever, and the hate that binds them, and the terrible price they impose on the world for their existence.

THE APOCALYPSE CODEX by Charles Stross. Really, everything by Stross is worth reading. He’s an incredibly smart writer who has the gift of seeing his fictional worlds all the way to the end of the tunnel, no matter what’s coming from the other side. But this is another one of the Laundry Files novels, and as such, I’ve pre-ordered it without so much as a peek inside. Imagine saving the world from the Forces of Darkness were up to a bunch of overworked and underpaid bureaucrats, who are forced to deal with mind-eating terror but also get their expense reports done on time. It’s funny and dark and amazing.

CHEW by John Layman and Rob Guillory. My current favorite comic book out there, in convenient bite-sized package form. I’ve sung the praises of this before, but it just keeps getting better. Briefly, Tony Chu is a cibopath — someone who gets psychic impressions from whatever he eats. And he’s also a federal agent thrust into one disgusting, insane, and deadly situation after the next, where often the only answer is to be found by taking a bite of something really awful. Start at the beginning. You won’t regret it.

My interview with Minnesota Public Radio’s Kerri Miller is here on the MPR website. Also, you can now pre-order the paperback of BLOOD OATH, and pre-order the sequel, THE PRESIDENT’S VAMPIRE. And let’s not forget the stylish merchandise you can grab at Zazzle.

OK. That’s it for the message from our sponsors. Now, the news:

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss: Tea Party Senate candidate has reporter cuffed for asking questions at public event.

How President Obama blew it.

Twenty-eight songs from Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow.

Why TV is so great and movies are so bad right now.

Creepier than Cloverfield: Video of mysterious sea creature. (Begins at 1:30.)

Guide to Bigfoots around the world.

Beau Smith is running “Wynonna Earp Week” over at First Comics News to announce his original graphic novel, Wynonna Earp: The Yeti Wars from IDW Publishing.

If you don’t already know Beau, he’s been writing comics since forever, as well as marketing those books to the wider world out there. He’s the guy who made Guy Gardner — a second-string Green Lantern with a bowl cut — into an actual badass member of the DC Universe, among many other things.

His upcoming book is about Wynonna Earp, a descendant of the famous lawman who handles weird and paranormal crimes for the Black Badge division of the U.S. Marshal’s Service. If I had to use the bad Hollywood math description, I’d say it was “X-Files” meets “Justified.” But that doesn’t really do it justice. Beau was kind enough to forward me the script, and let me sum it up this way: Yetis, explosions, massive ordnance, immortals, vampires, mad scientists, more explosions, hot chicks, cold beer, and a crack squad of Bigfoots. Bigfeet. Whatever.

If that’s not your particular brand of vodka, well, we probably don’t have much else to discuss.

As part of the ongoing launch, Beau has a short introductory piece about each part of the Wynonna Earp universe. Today’s features Smitty, the gunsmith and veteran (read: old) marshal who works with Wynonna. Any resemblance to Beau himself is purely coincidental, I’m sure.

Wynonna Earp: The Yeti Wars hits stands in December. (The Diamond Comics Distribution Order Number is OCT100439.)

Oh, and it will include an introduction by me, unless someone in power comes to their senses before publication.

Nathan Fillion is already an A-lister to me. (Wow. That looks really creepy when it’s typed out like that.)

Why do “True Blood’s” vamps have their fangs on the laterals, not the cuspids? This is actually something that’s bothered me for a while. Leave it to The Answer B!tch to uncover the truth.

The weirdest moments from Archie Christian Comics. I read all of these as a kid. The weird part is, at the time, none of them struck me as weird.

Gawker Media now has more readers online than any newspaper except the New York Times. To be fair, most newspapers have scandalously few pictures of giant goldfish, so it’s sort of their own fault. (Other news buried in that chart: the LA Times is getting killed by everyone except the Wall Street Journal, which charges its users for some content.)

If I had a million dollars: art deco motorcycle. (Via BoingBoing.)

Messing with Sasquatch in Minnesota.

The first 40 pages of my novel BLOOD OATH, in German. (My high school Deutsch teacher, Herr Luttman, would be so proud.) BLUTIGER SCHWUR hits stands in Germany on September 13. Also, Suspense Radio interviews me with my brilliant publicist Megan Underwood Beatie.

You might have heard that Bigfoot is roaming near San Antonio. Apparently, there’s also a much shorter animal in the area. All we know for sure: it’s not Bigfoot.

He said that unlike the 6-foot-tall “Bigfoot” sighted near Loop 1604, this animal was about 3 feet tall. It bared its teeth and let out a high-pitched hiss before it scaled the fence to the neighboring business.

“I was freaked out because I wasn’t expecting to see that early in the morning,” he said. “I just backed up slowly and when it left, I ran inside to tell the guys what I saw.”

He was sure the animal was not a raccoon or a possum, and “the movement it had looked like a monkey.”

Joe Duarte, the shop’s owner, and his brother, Adrian, went to look for the animal, but all they found were prints about five inches long.

“We didn’t know what to think,” Joe Duarte said.

But he did wonder if the animal could have escaped from the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research, which keeps baboons on hand and is located just north of the shop at Loop 410 and Texas 151.

The two immediately called the foundation. Adrian Duarte, the shop’s manager, said that a few hours later, two individuals showed up to inspect the prints. He said the men told them they resembled a baboon’s print.

Foundation officials said Wednesday they don’t know what it is but they do know it’s not theirs.

Local wildlife experts say it looks like it might be a macaque, possibly one someone tried to keep illegally as a pet. And it apparently likes PB&J sandwiches.