Amazon. I have many problems with Amazon, but package delivery isn’t one of them. Like most online retailers, they use many delivery services—the USPS is just one of them. These delivery services generally do a good job (I just wish more of them would at least ring the doorbell). They also make money from retailers, whether you get free delivery or not (it’s rarely free for the retailer). That keeps the USPS in business so the few of us who still send letters, birthday and holiday cards, and yes, packages, can still do so.

Every online retailer has to pay state sales tax for direct deliveries now; I guess the law also applies to affiliated retailers (Amazon has many), but that’s not Amazon’s responsibility—how could it be? Is Amazon putting brick-and-mortar stores out of business? Maybe. Toys-R-Us couldn’t adapt; Walmart and others are adapting. Blaming Amazon for USPS budget woes seems like a stretch, but the times they are a-changin’….

My problems with Amazon? They’re mostly book author-related. Readers are only affected because they’re limited to what they can see on their laptops and smart phones. That’s why libraries and bookstores will never be replaced, thank goodness.

Facebook. Many of you know I have a Facebook author page. It complements my website and includes mini-reviews of books, mostly classics, and some chat about my own books, including sales. I pay nothing for that service. But everyone reading this who uses Facebook should revise their security preferences. And beware of surveys. Your online security is important to me. Every reader is. We all have to help each other.

Old radio shows. They were the precursors of audiobooks, complete with sound effects. They were the precursors of podcasts too. Most of all, they were like fiction books because they sent imaginations into overdrive. Even though families often sat around listening to them, each person’s imagination participated and created her or his own little world.

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[This article is the second in a series about social media use by authors. Feel free to comment.]

Let’s see: I’ve disparaged Twitter—it’s mostly useless, for authors directly participating at least (your publicist might use it, though); and I’ve given my advice to use Facebook in a limited sense (you could limit it to just an author page—if they start charging, forget about it). What’s left?

Goodreads. This massive website for discussing books and reading used to be a lot better, but it’s gone downhill since Amazon took it over. It’s never been user friendly and allows cliques to develop without any adult supervision.  Anyone can form a group, and some of them are huge.  Groups are run by a monitor (maybe more than one for large ones), and submonitors often control subsections of groups. Rarely you’ll come across monitors or submonitors who are snarky individuals, little despots who like to flaunt their power.

Authors should promote their books in the sections allocated to them, of course, but the definition of promotion is often distorted by monitors. I was censored in one chat thread about sex and romance in books just for mentioning my opinion as both reader and author—no mention of my books, so not really promotional at all.

Groups can be political too. I was kicked out of a discussion group for expressing an opinion contrary to the monitor’s (I can’t even remember what the thread was about, or what pissed him off—a mountain out of a molehill, to be sure, but the little tyrant booted me out without any explanation).  You never know when someone will get their hackles up and go after you. Back away from such people. They’re not worth your time.

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A. B. Carolan and Steven M. Moore wish you:

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Celebrate responsibly.  Don’t drink and drive.  If you see one of the wee people, you’ve had too much!  Or, Ancestry will say you have some leprechaun DNA.

Chinese culture goes back millennia.  Food for thought.  I salute all my Chinese readers, friends, and relatives.  Have a great celebration along with Detective Dao-Ming Chen of the NYPD!

2017 was bad for many reason–politics, extreme weather, terrorism, ethnic cleansing…the list goes on. Let’s learn from our mistakes and refocus to make 2018, and our world, much better.

In libris libertas!

There are risks and costs to action. But they are far less than the long range risks of comfortable inaction.—John F. Kennedy.

***

The entire “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series” is on sale now at Smashwords until December 24. The NYPD homicide detectives’ cases usually start out in New York City but expand to national and international crises as they fight all sorts of criminals—gun runners, sex traffickers, evil hedge fund owners, drug smugglers, terrorists, and more. The crime-fighting duo also have their own personal battles to fight. These seven ebooks make excellent holiday gifts for the reader on your gift list—maybe that’s you? Use the coupon code when you checkout at Smashwords to receive a fantastic sale price and hours of reading entertainment! And don’t forget The Chaos Chronicles Trilogy Collection, a bundle of sci-fi novels that’s ideal as a holiday gift.

In libris libertas!

A perv, a con artist, and a fascist walk into a bar. Bartender says, “What’ll it be, Mr. President?”—seen on a church sign.

***

The entire “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series” is on sale now at Smashwords until December 24. The NYPD homicide detectives’ cases usually start out in New York City but expand to national and international crises as they fight all sorts of criminals—gun runners, sex traffickers, evil hedge fund owners, drug smugglers, terrorists, and more. The crime-fighting duo also have their own personal battles to fight. These seven ebooks make excellent holiday gifts for the reader on your gift list—maybe that’s you? Use the coupon code when you checkout at Smashwords to receive a fantastic sale price and hours of reading entertainment!

In libris libertas!

If I were to run, I’d run as Republican. They’re the dumbest group of voters in the country. They love anything on Fox News.—Donald Trump

***

The entire “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series” is on sale now at Smashwords until December 24. The NYPD homicide detectives’ cases usually start out in New York City but expand to national and international crises as they fight all sorts of criminals—gun runners, sex traffickers, evil hedge fund owners, drug smugglers, terrorists, and more. The crime-fighting duo also have their own personal battles to fight. These seven ebooks make excellent holiday gifts for the reader on your gift list—maybe that’s you? Use the coupon code when you checkout at Smashwords to receive a fantastic sale price and hours of reading entertainment!

In libris libertas!

You use a glass mirror to see your face; you use works of art to see your soul.—George Bernard Shaw.

***

Now’s your chance to read epic sci-fi! The “Chaos Chronicles Trilogy” is now a bundle. You can read the Chaos Chronicles Trilogy Collection for $5.99—one ebook that costs less than the ebook for the first novel in the trilogy. The novels, Survivors of the Chaos, Sing a Zamba Galactica, and Come Dance a Cumbia…with Stars in Your Hand!, take you from the Chaos years of an Earth dominated by multinationals and controlled by their mercenaries to Humans’ first interstellar colonies and a first encounter. You will meet strange ETs, good and bad, bipeds and collective intelligences, and experience mystery and intrigue, as Humans expand into near-Earth space. Now available on Amazon and Smashwords and soon at all the latter’s distributors (Apple, B&N, Kobo, etc).

And, don’t forget holiday shoppers, the entire “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series” is on sale at Smashwords until December 24. Use the coupon code on checkout. Hours of entertaining reading for your favorite mystery/thriller reader–that might be you! You can complement this series with Rembrandt’s Angel–its two main characters have cameo appearances in the detective series. All these ebooks are available on Amazon and Smashwords.

In libris libertas!

A priest, a politician, and a Hollywood director walk into a bar. What do they have in common? If this is the start of a joke, it’s a very bad one, because there’s nothing good or funny about sexual perversion and exploitation. Is the reason found in our institutions? Maybe. But it’s surely found in powerful men taking advantage of their position, men who lust for victims and use their power to dominate them.

Jimmy Swaggart, Bill Clinton, Weinstein, Franken, Spacey, Donald Trump, Ailes, O’Reilly, Roy Moore (no relation, thank God), and many others have abused their power by sexually harassing and molesting victims…and more. Men doing that (it’s rarely women) aren’t uncommon, historically speaking—it’s been going on since Ugh the caveman clobbered another tribe’s cavewoman and hauled her off to his cave. Maybe it’s a manifestation of male human beings wanting to be the alpha male in the pack, which would make it even older…but that’s an oversimplification.

The men named above embarrass me. All men who do this embarrass me. Of course, they’re just as likely to harass and exploit other men who they consider inferior—I’ve seen and experienced a lot of that—but sexual exploitation makes it worse. Other men are just seen as competition by these jerks; the victims of sexual exploitation, all too often women, are treated as sexual objects to be dominated as an expression of their narcissism and virility. I’ve had it with them!

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