Grant Blackwood is as good as advertised.

Who says so? Answer: Judges in the 2002 Minnesota Book Award competition.

Blackwood is one of three nominees for the top award in the pop fiction category.

His first effort, "End of Enemies" attracted attention -- all positive -- from book reviewers. Better yet, it is headed for a second printing.

Now comes "Wall of Night" and it is expected to whet the reading appetites for more of the exploits of Briggs Tanner.

His publisher, Penguin Putnam, already has him working on a sequel.

Not bad for the former "Hormel brat," who enlivened the neighborhood for friends like Austin's Dick and Jackie Robinson.

Blackwood will visit Austin Saturday for a book signing party at Black Bart's Golf / Nemitz's, 400 N. Main St.

The author will sign copies of "All of Night" and his first effort from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday.

The son of a Hormel Foods Corporation family, Blackwood grew up in Austin, but now makes his home at Rochester.

That is, physically he is in Rochester.

Creatively, he travels the world.

The new book picks up the adventures f fictional hero Briggs Tanner. Twelve years ago, Tanner was sent to China to help strategic master-mind General Han Soong defect to the West. The escape went perfectly until, somehow, the secret police interrupted them at the final rendezvous.

Tanner barely escaped the county, but Soong and his family were arrested and made to disappear.

Now Soong has resurfaced. He's contacted the CIA with the message that he is alive and must get out of China. and the only person he will trust is Briggs Tanner.

The rest of the story is …… well, read the book.

"Writing this new book was a much different experience for me," said Blackwood in a telephone interview with the Austin Daily Herald. "I've been writing for 15 years; the last 12 in Rochester and my editor said he really likes this book and that's encouraging for any writer to hear.:"

Writing his second book in only eight months after spending three years on the first suggests the dozen years Blackwood spent before any literary effort of his own was published.

He hasn't forgotten what he learned while paying his dues. "I remain humble about the whole process," he said of the wave of publicity around him. "It's a tough business."

Blackwood continues to spend hours — days even — in libraries and surfing the Internet, researching material for his next book.

"I find it best to immerse myself with the culture I am writing about," he said of his penchant for study and observation.

He has resisted the impulse felt by others to write a book influenced by the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack on America/

Critics are already calling "Wall of Night" a legitimate page-turner and the author said he is grateful to the people who supported and assisted him through the "End of Enemies" effort and returned to bolster his second effort with "Wall of Night."

Just don't call him a "poor man's Ton Chancy} after the most successful pop fiction writer today.

The Minnesota Book Award nomination suggests this author is rich in pop fiction talent.