I haven’t written a new Chen and Castilblanco mystery/crime/thriller novel for years (the last, Gaia and the Goliaths, was published in 2017). The detectives were still alive and kicking in the last novel, Chen and husband Eric Kumala with a new baby and Castilblanco and wife Pam Stuart with two adopted children. Was that an appropriate way to end the series? I thought it might be a positive way to do that, a life-goes-on message where Dao-Ming Chen mellows out as a new mom and Rollie Castilblanco does his part to hold his family together, something very important to Hispanics (the two adopted kids are relatives).

In the novella “The Phantom Harvester” (a free download—see the web page “Free Stuff & Contests”), the reader can discover whether Castilblanco’s children follow the old detective into law enforcement careers. And in The Golden Years of Virginia Morgan, Castilblanco had more than just a cameo as he helps DHS agent Ashley Scott with her problems. He also has a few cameos in the first three books of the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series, including its recent addition, Death on the Danube, and Chen will have one in #4 (untitled as yet, although a preview is contained at the end of Death on the Danube).

Not long ago in these pages, I wrote about how an author must realize when a series should end. I can understand why some, even famous writers, can’t help themselves. (Baldacci, Child, Connelly, Deaver, Gerritsen, and others come to mind; Grafton was the worst; and Patterson just started writing everything else, including writing children’s books, all bad, abandoning Alex Cross. Oh, and let’s not forget that Pendergast series! Of course, the fault might not lie with these authors. Their publishers, the greedy bastards, prod the old mares and stallions in their stables, failing to realize that their prodding nearly guarantees formulaic stories from them.)

I wanted to avoid forcing another Chen and Castilblanco novel. My stories are often theme-based; many of the Chen and Castilblanco novels have more than one important them weaving through and around the plot. As much as I love Brit-style mysteries, their themes, if any exist, aren’t earth-shaking, especially when they border on cozies. Again, as much as I like Brit-style mysteries for my COVID reading, my mystery/crime/thriller stories are more complex—I don’t do simple! I want readers to think about those themes. I don’t see literature as escapism from the problems in the world.

I get that readers become attached to principal characters in a series—that’s the biggest reason why series exist! But authors fall into that trap too. If I never write another Chen and Castilblanco novel, they will still live on, maybe acquiring a bit of immortality I cannot have. That’s both sad and uplifting. Of course, in a thousand years, no one will care about any of today’s authors or their characters!

Maybe I’ll bring Chen and Castilblanco back. Until I do, you can binge-read the entire series of seven books. They’re evergreen in the sense that they’re as fresh as the day I published them, treating those important themes and filling them with twists and turns that might leave you head spinning. If these were the only books I’d written, I’d still be completely satisfied with my oeuvre. Happy reading!

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Comments are always welcome!

Binge on the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco” Series. The cases these two NYPD homicide detectives start with in the Big Apple but often take on national and international ramifications. In The Midas Bomb, they face a conspiracy involving a Wall Street swindler and terrorism. In Angels Need Not Apply, the murder of an FBI agent’s son leads to battles with a cartel, militia, and al Qaeda. In Teeter-Totter between Lust and Murder, Castilblanco’s attempts toward proving Chen innocent of murder leads to a group intent on overthrowing the US government, all financed by the illegal gun trade. Aristocrats and Assassins finds Castilblanco and his wife on vacation in Europe, his idyllic time there destroyed by yet another terrorist who’s kidnapping members of Europe’s royal families. The Collector has the two detectives fighting human traffickers where some of their victims are forced to work in porn and snuff videos, all financed by stolen artworks. In Family Affairs, Castilblanco’s own family is threatened, but both he and Chen are on their way to becoming parents. And Gaia and the Goliaths explores environmental issues and how fossil fuel companies, including Russia’s, will do anything to preserve their hegemony. All these novels are available wherever quality ebooks are sold.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

This isn’t a travel blog, but I thought you, my readers, might enjoy a bit of distraction from the 2020 election’s bitter partisan battles by seeing descriptions of the Danube river ports featured in Death on the Danube, my new novel. Of course, you can read about how my main characters Esther Brookstone ad Bastiann van Coevorden react to them in the book, but this will give you a preview of what to expect…and maybe help plan your own riverboat tour?

I used several references to make these descriptions, too many to list here. Like an honest high school student writing a report, they were only used in spirit, rewritten but sticking to the facts, as I edited them in such a way to fit into the narrative in the story. (If you’re a high school teacher—I respect you all, especially now—you can use your software to check me.) Some focus on the sites, others on the history (particularly the one for Budapest). Enjoy.

Vilshofen, the largest town in Germany’s Passau district, has a history going back to at least the year 776, with twelfth-century documents showing its current name. With flooding from the river a constant problem, they began to construct dams in 1957. A new bridge was finished in 2002, and Vilshofen became a popular port for passengers beginning or ending their riverboat cruises on the Danube. Today visitors are attracted to the town not only for its old world charm, but also as being an excellent place for art, museum, and festival lovers.

Passau is a town in lower Bavaria near Germany’s border with Austria; it’s also known as the “City of Three Rivers” because the Danube is joined there by the Inn from the south and the Ils from the north. It was once an ancient Roman colony, but today it’s the last stop before Linz for riverboats cruising downriver.

Linz is the capital of Upper Austria and where the Traun flows into the Danube. It’s the third-largest city in Austria and the center for Austrian steel and chemical production. It’s in the country’s north-central region, approximately nineteen miles south of the Czech Republic’s border, and it spans the Danube. Long before it became one of Hitler’s “Führer Cities” and the proposed site for his new art museum (he spent nine years of his childhood there), Mozart spent a productive four days there composing the famous Symphony in C Major, now named to honor the city.

The Danube valley between the towns of Melk and Krems in lower Austria is called the Wachau. The river flows north-northeast from Melk to Dürnstein, curving southeast and then east past the city of Krems. In the Wachau, the town of Spitz lies on the Danube’s western bank and the town of Melk on its eastern bank. The whole valley is known for its vineyards and other agricultural products, particularly apricots.

Vienna isn’t typically Austrian; it’s as cosmopolitan as London and Paris. It’s the capital of Austria and its largest city, containing nearly one third of the country’s population. It has the sixth-largest population within city limits among EU cities. Until the beginning of the twentieth century, it was the largest German-speaking city in the world. Today, it’s the second-largest German-speaking city after Berlin, and is still a cultural center reflecting its rich history as the capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, where many composers and artists became famous…and where modern psychoanalysis began with Freud.

Bratislava is Slovakia’s capital. It is one of Europe’s smaller capitals but still the country’s largest city. Bratislava occupies both banks of the Danube and the left bank of the Morava. Bordering Austria and Hungary, it is the only national capital that borders two countries. The languages of the Czech Republic and Slovakia are similar, and many citizens in one country have relatives in the other.

Even under Soviet rule, Budapest always leaned toward the West. It is the capital and most populous city of Hungary, as well as the ninth-largest city in the EU by population within city limits. Its eclectic mix of past glories and future promises often seem at odds.  Evidence of the bloody 1956 revolution still remains. The revolt started as a student protest, which attracted thousands as they marched through the city’s center and to the Parliament building overlooking the Danube, attracting more protesters by using a van with loudspeakers. A student delegation tried to broadcast demands and was detained. When the delegation’s release was demanded by protesters outside, they were fired upon from within the building by the Federal Police. One student died and was wrapped in a flag and held above the crowd. As news of protests and fighting spread, disorder and violence gripped the capital…until Soviet soldiers and tanks moved in to stop it…but they only added to it over several days.

Esther visited other places that aren’t Danube ports-of-call; they’re on side tours taken when your riverboat docks at these ports. And you will have to take a side tour to read the novel to experience them through their eyes…or sign up for a riverboat tour in the future!

[Description of figures, from top to bottom: #1 is Passau; #2 is the Lake District near Linz; #3 is the Wachau Valley; #4 is Schonbrunn Castle in Vienna; #5 is Bratislava; and #6 is the Parliament Building in Budapest. All photos copyright, Steven M. Moore.]

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Comments are always welcome.

Death on the Danube. At the end of Son of Thunder, #2 in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series, ex-MI6 agent and ex-Scotland Yard inspector Esther Brookstone and Interpol agent Bastiann van Coevorden finally say their I-do’s. At the beginning of this new novel, #3 in the series, they embark on their honeymoon cruise down the romantic Danube. When a strange passenger who is traveling alone is murdered, Bastiann takes over the investigation because the river was declared international waters in the Treaty of Paris. Who really is this gaunt victim? And who on the list of passengers and crewmembers is the assassin? Mystery, thrills, suspense, and romance await readers who join them in their journey. You can’t take this trip now because of COVID, but you can join them in spirit. Available in ebook and print format at Amazon, and in all ebook formats at Smashwords and its affiliated retailers (iBooks, B&N, Kobo and Walmart, etc.) and affiliated library and lending services (Scribd, Overdrive, Baker & Taylor, Gardner, etc.). Click to see the book trailer.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

They can drive any author nuts. How can an author tell that someone’s comment to a blog post is spam? First, that someone doesn’t follow the rules. Here are mine (these also appear on my “Join the Conversation” web page):

No post with foul language or pornographic innuendos is accepted. I try to keep this website PG-13. Please help me in this effort.  For example, your marketing posts about porn, sex toys, and ED drugs WILL be eliminated!

I also try to keep this blog commercial free. Help me in this effort. No marketing posts are accepted. Don’t try to disguise them either. My spam filter will recognize the keywords used by marketers; if it doesn’t, I will. In particular, posts about SEO, WordPress plug-ins, and other annoying illusions to general website improvements aren’t accepted. I’m sure there are many creative gurus out there, but I already have trusted consultants.

Please refrain from making comments in languages other than English. That’s unfair to readers who don’t know your language and hinders continued discussion if a thread is started. I apologize for any inconvenience this might cause. I know a few languages, but I’m no polyglot. Let’s all use English so everyone can understand the comment thread. (Even though I’m a writer, I won’t hold incorrect spelling or grammar against you—all there are interested in your ideas.) Posts in other languages than English will be eliminated—sorry. Please comment on just the particular post; and please, no generalities about how great this blog is or how you’re going to recommend it to everyone.That wastes everyone’s time, including mine. You can start your post with a simple “I agree” or “I disagree” or something similar (even just a “Hi Steve” tells me you’re not spamming the Universe—I don’t test to see if you’re a robot), but readers (and me!) will want to know why you do either one. Zero information comments will ALWAYS be eliminated. I really don’t need any gratuitous pats on the back other than your reading this blog, but I welcome comments that contribute to the conversation.

Please also note that some comments are held by WordPress software, so if yours doesn’t appear immediately and is acceptable as part of the conversation, I will fix the problem. Also, your first comment on this blog has to be approved by me. From then on, you might sail through, unless WP flashes the red light and calls the cops (with my spam filter) or I catch you breaking one of the above rules. That first approved comment isn’t a low hurdle, though.

Please don’t think you have to agree with me. Discussion threads are generally enlightening, and I respect other people’s opinions. Keep the discussion to the topic in the blog post, though.

Follow these rules if you want to join the conversation. Doing so will make the blog a pleasant experience for every reader.

There are other reasons your comment will be censored too. Recent comments in Chinese or Russian immediately sent up red flags, especially now during the buildup to the US election. In general, if the commenter has a different name from her or his email address, I’m suspicious. And I don’t do proxies anymore—now they’re invariably spam, so they’re verboten.

Be forewarned: I have to approve every new comment! Once you’re a trusted commenter, you’re golden. That’s for my readers’ benefit: They don’t have to go through that “Are you a robot?” nonsense.

Happy commenting! And thank you for your understanding.

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Comments are always welcome.

Death on the Danube. At the end of Son of Thunder, #2 in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series, ex-MI6 agent and ex-Scotland Yard inspector Esther Brookstone and Interpol agent Bastiann van Coevorden finally say their I-do’s. At the beginning of this new novel, #3 in the series, they embark on their honeymoon cruise down the romantic Danube. When a strange passenger who is traveling alone is murdered, Bastiann takes over the investigation because the river was declared international waters in the Treaty of Paris. Who really is this gaunt victim? And who on the list of passengers and crewmembers is the assassin? Mystery, thrills, suspense, and romance await readers who join them in their journey. You can’t take this trip now because of COVID, but you can join them in spirit. Available in ebook and print format at Amazon, and in all ebook formats at Smashwords and its affiliated retailers (iBooks, B&N, Kobo and Walmart, etc.) and affiliated library and lending services (Scribd, Overdrive, Baker & Taylor, Gardner, etc.). Click to see the book trailer.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

Cruises…. It’s human nature: When we can’t have something, we want it. That’s even more understandable now. Many don’t consider riverboat cruises, though. They prefer to cruise on floating cities, eating and partying, take perilous tenders to shore for their tours, and then do it all over again as soon as they can. They might see some sights, visit crowded beaches, and see lush vegetation and some strange animals, but they’re basically locked up 90% of the time in a crowded college dorm within a big city, a dorm full of many rowdies (you’ll meet a lot of Trumpsters, I’m sure), seeing only wide expanses of ocean—nothing peaceful, educational, or enlightening about that.

Riverboat cruises are different, thank God. Instead of a floating city, you’re in a floating village where you have a chance to establish friendships with kindred souls desiring those peaceful, educational, and enlightening experiences “far from the madding crowd.” You do not feel like you’re in Times Square on New Year’s Eve either. You can relax on the top deck of your riverboat, or on the prow or formal lounge, while looking at wonderful vistas on the river’s shore along with quaint, old towns.

Is it any wonder that Esther Brookstone and Bastiann van Coevorden, principal characters in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series, decide to spend their honeymoon on a riverboat? They choose to cruise the beautiful Danube from Vishofen, Germany to Budapest, Hungary. (Several pictures sprinkled around this post correspond to that trip.)

My new book, Death on the Danube, is the third book in that series. (You can watch a trailer here.) The title alone leads you right into the story: A mysterious stranger is killed, and Bastiann takes charge of the murder investigation. He’s an Interpol agent, and the Danube is international waters. Of course, his new bride, Esther, helps him.

They manage not to skimp on the romance, though. Their riverboat docks at various ports on the Danube, and on the shore tour buses await them, ready to take them on unforgettable side trips to venues full of history going back to times before Columbus. And, along with their fellow passengers, they still manage to feast and party. For the first, they taste dishes from the surrounding countryside, along with local wines; for the second, singers and dancers onboard or at tour sites immerse them in local culture.

I’ve mentioned that Bastiann is an Interpol agent. Esther has an interesting history too. During the Cold War, she was an MI6 spy in East Berlin. Later she became a Scotland Yard inspector working in the Art and Antiques division. Now she’s retired and has her own gallery in London. In the first two novels, Rembrandt’s Angel and Son of Thunder, she first becomes obsessed with recovering a Rembrandt stolen by the Nazis in World War II, and then in finding St. John’s tomb. In this new novel, she just wants to enjoy her honeymoon with Bastiann, but the murder investigation interrupts that.

Maybe you think I’m looking for a job writing ad copy for a riverboat cruise company? No, I just wanted to share my enthusiasm for riverboat cruises in the only way I know how. You can experience one of these wonderful cruises right from your armchair as you read my new novel. Esther and Bastiann will welcome you aboard! Fair warning, though: Esther or Bastiann might come around and interrogate you as a person of interest in the investigation. Good sailing!

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Comments are always welcome!

Death on the Danube. At the end of Son of Thunder, #2 in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series, ex-MI6 agent and ex-Scotland Yard inspector Esther Brookstone and Interpol agent Bastiann van Coevorden finally say their I-do’s. At the beginning of this new novel, #3 in the series, they embark on their honeymoon cruise down the romantic Danube. When a strange passenger who is traveling alone is murdered, Bastiann takes over the investigation because the river was declared international waters in the Treaty of Paris. Who really is this gaunt victim? And who on the list of passengers and crewmembers is the assassin? Mystery, thrills, suspense, and romance await readers who join them in their journey. You can’t take this trip now because of COVID, but you can join them in spirit. Available in ebook and print format at Amazon, and in all ebook formats at Smashwords and its affiliated retailers (iBooks, B&N, Kobo and Walmart, etc.) and affiliated library and lending services (Scribd, Overdrive, Baker & Taylor, Gardner, etc.). Click to see the book trailer.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

They go from the prestigious Nobel, Pulitzer, and Man Booker prizes to less prestigious and banal ones some local book clubs or author groups hand out (often associated with some event). By and large, they all are recognitions of some author’s hard work in writing a book considered meritorious by some committee of judges—popular voting often wouldn’t provide the same recognition, because it’s often fickle, as Dancing with the Stars and American Idol have shown. (Recall Adam Lambert losing the latter because homophobic evangelicals biased the vote, giving a winner who has done nothing since? Yes, evangelicals damage the country and the world that way too.). The most extreme popular vote is sales numbers, and that really is fickle! But who are those judges?

They can be biased too, of course. They’re often just the good ole guys and gals who award prizes to someone within their same in-group. I can imagine them sagely nodding and saying, “Now it’s so-and-so’s turn to win.” Or one group tries to exclude another. In 2018, a group pressured Man Booker to exclude American authors, for example (they fortunately didn’t succeed). I’ve seen prizes awarded to books that are terrible; I know this because I read them (although sometimes they were so bad, I couldn’t finish).

Those top prizes—Nobel, Pulitzer, and Man Booker, to name a few—are coveted by authors and publishers alike, so you know literary politics plays a role as big publishers campaign for certain books and authors (the adjective “literary” is needed because most politics is controlled by illiterate idiots—DC is infested with them). That’s human nature, and, because of this, for me, they’re always suspect. It’s also hard to prove any shenanigans, because the public knows little about the inner workings of the judging processes. The Nobel committee created a scandal a few years ago, so much so that no prize was given.

But do avid readers actually read prize-winning books, or are the prizes, no matter the level, largely ignored by readership and reduce to ego-trips for the authors? The last Nobel prize novel I read was Garcia Marquez’s Cien Años de Soledad (One Hundred Years of Solitude); I read it in the original Spanish long before Gabo received the Nobel for it and greatly admired his use of magical realism. (The latter influenced part of my “Chaos Chronicles Trilogy,” although Gabo used it in neither a fantasy nor sci-fi setting—yes, those can also seem very realistic!)

These top prizes are often given to what’s been called “literary fiction” books (as if genre fiction wasn’t literature!), a catch-all category often not found in bookstores that are smart enough to realize that the label is meaningless. (Although it might seem unusual to call To Kill a Mockingbird a legal thriller, that’s what it is, and it’s undoubtedly the best one ever written! Sorry, John Grisham—your books can’t compare.)

My suspicions about how meritorious prizes are covers all levels. Why did Cixin Liu’s The Three-Body Problem receive a Hugo? It’s a terrible sci-fi story and terribly written. It’s something like a political thriller, and I suppose that any story knocking modern China is worthy of some consideration, but the Hugo? Really? (See my 7/28/2017 review in the “Book Reviews” archive of this blog.)

Many low-level prizes are nothing more than money-makers for the organizations “sponsoring” them. These disguise that practice by using the questionable tactic of calling entry fees “reading fees.” When many of these use volunteer judges, their pay being promised prestige, you have to wonder who’s getting those fees. Danger, danger, Will Robinson! Authors should think more than twice about entering such contests.

All that said, I’ve seen fellow authors, whose books I greatly admire, win prizes. Many of these are good friends, and I applaud them. An old professor of mine, N. Scott Momaday, won a Pulitzer and truly deserved it—he’s a great writer. I never met Gabo when I lived in Colombia, but he and Pablo Neruda are my favorite Latino writers (poet in the case of Neruda)—both Pablo and Gabo won the Nobel. I don’t need formal judges, volunteers or otherwise, to tell me what books are worth reading. I really don’t care if a book wins a prize or not when I’m selecting books to read. Book prizes are like Emmys and Academy Awards: useless for determining my entertainment choices. In fact, many determine what I do NOT want to read.

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Comments are always welcome.

Death on the Danube. At the end of Son of Thunder, #2 in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series, ex-MI6 agent and ex-Scotland Yard inspector Esther Brookstone and Interpol agent Bastiann van Coevorden finally say their I-do’s. At the beginning of this new novel, #3 in the series, they embark on their honeymoon cruise down the romantic Danube. When a strange passenger who is traveling alone is murdered, Bastiann takes over the investigation because the river was declared international waters in the Treaty of Paris. Who really is this gaunt victim? And who on the list of passengers and crewmembers is the assassin? Mystery, thrills, suspense, and romance await readers who join them in their journey. You can’t take this trip now because of COVID, but you can join them in spirit. Available in ebook and print format at Amazon, and all ebook formats at Smashwords and its affiliated retailers (iBooks, B&N, Kobo and Walmart, etc.) and affiliated library and lending services (Scribd, Overdrive, Baker & Taylor, Gardner, etc.). See the Readers’ Favorite 5-star review here.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

Self-published authors want to know how to price their books. Traditionally published authors usually don’t determine their book’s price, to their consternation, because those publishers often shaft them in that process. So let’s take a step back and just analyze what an ebook or print book should cost a reader, irrespective of how it’s published.

For ebooks, prices are changing. There’s plenty of supply, but there’s also more demand because, in this time of pandemic, ebooks are the safest ones to buy. For fiction, I’d put a new 60-kword ebook at $3.99; $2.99 or less for older. 80 kwords and above? Anybody’s guess, but $4.99 at least, but certainly less than $7. After all, $1 bets on five NFL games costs $5. Guess which entertainment has more lasting value. By the way, those $0.99 and $1.99 prices are bad choices. Unless you’re doing a sale, readers are likely to think the book has poor quality. And authors always strive to make quality books, right?

Print books are oranges compared two ebook apples, i.e. they’re a different species. I’m tempted not to do them anymore. I didn’t for A Time Traveler’s Guide through the Multiverse. I did for Death on the Danube. Why the difference? Because the first two books in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series had print versions, while Time Traveler’s Guide was a stand-alone.

Yes, I know, those marketing gurus I railed against yesterday say that ebooks have plateaued and print remains strong. More BS, and wishful thinking from the Big Five publishing conglomerates. COVID has made many experts eat their words! Yes, the Big Five artificially elevate their ebook prices to make their print versions seem the better buy, but a print version should cost more than an ebook because it takes more money to produce a print version! And readers should pay more for the print version, considering global warming (if you can’t figure that one out, you’re part of the problem).

Enough readers still live in the 19^th century and like print better, but they shouldn’t have to pay the exorbitant prices traditional publishers charge either. I suppose some authors get some kind of ego boost seeing their books in print. From the author’s point of view, though, they’re only useful for those ego boosts and book events (the latter might come back, after all, if we ever get through this pandemic). Still, self-published authors shouldn’t follow traditional publishers’ lead in pricing their print versions. I recommend pricing them at the minimum price allowed by Create Space, or whatever printing service you use. Amazon has an easy formula to use, but you need the number of pages. You’ll know that, of course, once the print book is formatted. Set your print book at that minimum allowable price and everyone will be happy. You might actually make a bit more money too (the old numbers game). Just be aware that you’ll usually sell more ebooks!

If you’re traditionally published, your publisher can screw you with a high price for print and an ebook price almost as high. Those prices can lead to poor sales numbers. And then the publisher is liable to blame it all on you, especially when bookstores start returning the unsold books. (That’s why Big Five publishers are endangered species, except for their non-fiction tell-alls and celeb books. I don’t read many Big Five books now, and a lot of authors avoid them.)

Will correct, reasonable pricing help sell books? Nope, it’s just one necessary condition. There are no sufficient conditions authors or publishers can control. Everyone’s playing the lottery, and readers are rolling the dice.

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Comments are always welcome.

Death on the Danube. Esther Brookstone and Bastiann van Coevorden are on their honeymoon cruise floating down the Danube when a mysterious passenger is murdered. Because the Danube is international waters, Interpol agent Bastiann takes over the murder investigation. This third book in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series lets the reader follow more unique adventures of this crime-fighting duo full of mystery, suspense, and thrills. Come take a romantic cruise with the two sleuths. Available in all ebook formats and print (the print version is coming).

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

Molly Malone was a fish monger who marketed her cockles and mussels through streets wide and narrow, but should authors become book mongers? Molly was probably a lot better at selling her wares than authors are at selling their books. We’re good at writing. Most of us hate the rest and aren’t that motivated to do it. That leads to marketing gurus taking advantage of us.

Various gurus make a lot of money doing just that. (I could name names so authors could avoid them, but that wouldn’t be nice, would it? Write me if you need a list.). They’d answer, “Yes, you have to market your books, and we’re the ones who alone have the secrets about how to do it successfully.” BS. They all want your money upfront, and most of their secret methods are outdated and fail. They weasel out of those failures by blaming the authors, of course.

I market intensely when I launch a new book. I contract that out, and the lady who helps me is efficient and delivers, all business and making no promises. I appreciate her honesty. Her packages are also reasonably priced. I’ve worked with her for years, and she’s helped with both my traditionally and self-published books. In the wild seas of book marketing, she’s my rock that keeps me above the threatening waves.

Frankly, the dice are loaded against me and most authors, and no marketing guru can change that. The fundamental problem is that there are now too many books and too many authors that readers are overwhelmed by the offerings. They have no effective way to separate the wheat from the chaff, and there’s a lot of the latter. I know from experience. I’m an avid reader, and I’m constantly bombarded with offers of reading material, so much so that I’m overwhelmed and start looking for ways to tune out all the noise. I suspect every avid reader faces this dilemma.

As an author, I wave the white flag. What’s helped me conclude all those marketing gurus are basically worthless is they don’t believe in their own methods. If they did, they’d offer some kind of royalties-sharing plan—let’s sell books together and make money as we do. Consider a self-published book where I get 60 to 70% royalties. I’d give them 20% for a year. That should be time enough for them to prove the efficacy of their methods. Like the old snake-oil salesmen, they’re not interested in that—they want their money upfront!

Traditional publishers could make the same offer. Oh, yes, they usually take 80% or more of the royalties already, saying their investment in upfront costs (editing, formatting, and cover art) makes that reasonable. But I shouldn’t have to give them any more then to get marketing help, right? After all, if a book doesn’t sell, they lose more than I do! They could go to those same marketing gurus and make the offer of royalties sharing using their 80%. They don’t. They expect the author to do it. In fact, they send out recommendations for authors to try…using the authors’ money, of course.

So what’s an author to do? I’ve adopted a new policy. I don’t like to be bombarded as a reader, so I refuse to bombard other readers with “Read my book!” messages. I’m using a more novel tactic (pardon the pun); I’ll focus on all my books, but without bombarding readers. (The exception is that book-launch marketing, of course.) This is mostly done with blurbs at the end of these blog posts and showing cover art here and there. This limited effort comes from the belief that my writing books in different genres—mystery, thriller, and sci-fi novels—and all these are “evergreen,” will appeal to a wide demographic of readers. (“Evergreen” means the book is as current and fresh as the day I wrote it.)

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While you don’t need a writer to be a fan, crosswords seem a natural pastime for authors. Give me a spare half-hour, and I’ll try to breeze through one. I often get through Monday’s NY Times’s crosswords in less than that, using a pen, and take slightly more time with Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s, using a pencil. If I don’t finish one, I just toss it. There’s always another one.

I often receive books of crosswords as gifts. The intention is good—people who know me know I’m a fan. One of these contained crosswords labeled “easy.” They weren’t so easy, though. I checked the author indicated on the cover. Will Smith? Now, both Will and Smith are common first and last names, respectively, but an unsuspecting buyer probably will think of Will Smith, the actor. He could be a fan and a creator of crosswords, as far as I know. Inside the author was not Will Smith. Maybe the author is some fellow from Hong Kong, who speaks and writes English better than I do and really thinks these crosswords are easy? It was hard to tell.

So here’s the punch line: those “easy” crosswords books were published via Amazon’s Create Space, now part of KDP. Amazon is well known for selling just about anything, and its KDP offerings are no exception. I’m always fighting that stigma because my books are often listed among a lot of trash books that are published. Some of these are undoubtedly pirated. Amazon can’t control that, of course. Anyone can publish anything these days.

This is related to the problems with Amazon affiliates in general. Company X can make a terrible, even dangerous product and sell it on Amazon. In the gig economy, the huge retailer offers a way to reach a national, even international audience, for someone who makes boutique soaps in their garage, for example. I don’t have problems with that per se, especially in these days of COVID, but there’s very little quality control. Just consider all the face mask and hand sanitizer offerings there.

And, like it or not, every self-published author participates in that gig economy. Authors can write, publish, and market their books right from their homes. Many sell directly from their website, or process book orders right at home. Again, nothing wrong with that. The days of book signings and book events are gone, or on their last legs with the pandemic. Amazon and every other internet retailer is the better answer. In fact, one of my internet retailers is Smashwords, and they distribute to many other retailers and lending and library services as well.

You can understand why I sometimes feel like that Will Smith who’s not a Will Smith. In fact, dear readers, I could just be a computer program that writes, publishes, and markets books, all automatically, some sort of AI that’s pretending to be human. Or maybe an ET doing everything from my cloaked spaceship in orbit.

Now those are new versions of “nerdy author,” right?

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Comments are always welcome.

Death on the Danube. Esther Brookstone, ex-MI6 agent in East Berlin in the Cold War and ex-Scotland Yard Inspector in the Art and Antiques Division, is on her honeymoon with Interpol agent Bastiann van Coevorden. Their idyllic cruise down the Danube is interrupted when a reclusive and mysterious passenger is murdered. Why was the victim alone on that riverboat filled with couples, in a stateroom by himself? And who killed him? Esther and Bastiann were often called Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot by wags at the Yard, and this addition to the series might remind readers of Christie’s Death on the Nile and Murder on the Orient Express, but this mystery/thriller is very much a story set in the twenty-first century. So tour the Danube with Esther and Bastiann…and enjoy the ride! Coming soon.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

My character Esther Brookstone becomes obsessed with finding things: a missing painting in Rembrandt’s Angel and St. John the Divine’s tomb in Son of Thunder. In the third book of the series, Death on the Danube (coming soon!), she does more traditional sleuthing, helping new hubby, Bastiann van Coevorden, find an assassin. This Miss Marple-like woman and her Hercule Poirot-like husband are on their honeymoon! I’ve become obsessed with telling readers about her adventures (although George Langston, her ex-boss, gets the credit for that, as he takes on the role of Dr. Watson to chronicle the sleuthing pair’s escapades contained in the books). That obsession, storytelling, has gripped me since my first novel, Full Medical (2006).

Although I’m an ex-scientist (you might still see some of my ancient publications if you google me—yes, that’s the same Steven M. Moore!), and those skills allow me to create complex stories without too many errors in logic, I’ve always been more verbal and visual. Any successes I had as a scientist are due to those same skills of organization and visualization of lots of experimental data. I remember my surprise long ago when my SAT verbal score was a bit higher than my mathematical one. Now I realize I shouldn’t have been—I’ve always been obsessed with words, both in reading and writing.

My reading led to writing. I was always reading “ahead of grade,” as elementary teachers call it (I bless them all for putting up with my idiosyncrasies). I soon had acquired enough hubris to believe that I could create stories as interesting and entertaining as the ones I read (mysteries, adventures now known as thrillers, and sci-fi, all at an adult level). I wrote my first novel the summer I turned thirteen—it went into the trash can when I left for college. My current writing style has mostly remained the same, though—minimalist writing. In my reading, I admired and still admire how good storytellers allow readers to participate in the creative process by providing just enough narrative and character description so readers can exercise their own visualization powers. How could I write like that and still maintain my own voice? Practice, practice, practice. I believe I can do it now (there’s always room for improvement), but it’s always been my main goal…or obsession, if you will.

Writing is my obsession now. Part of that is because I didn’t start publishing my stories until 2006. (It would have been earlier, but some agents and acquisition editors spammed me with loads of rejections for a while.) From the very beginning, I wrote stories that would always be “evergreen,” stories as current and entertaining as the day I wrote them. That same late start means that I’ll continue to write them to catch up. I have many stories in me still, and I feel this need to write them. That’s my obsession.

Are other authors obsessed in this way? I sense that some aren’t; they’re just writing stories that satisfy market demands. As sci-fi writer Robert Heinlein said, “…maybe I should study the market and try like hell to tailor something which fits current styles. But…if I am to turn out work of fairly permanent value, my own taste…is what I must follow.” That’s my motto too, which means I should continue to write “evergreen” books that will provide readers with more stories with permanent entertainment value.

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Comments are always welcome.

Death on the Danube. Esther Brookstone, ex-MI6 agent in East Berlin in the Cold War and ex-Scotland Yard Inspector in the Art and Antiques Division, is on her honeymoon with Interpol agent Bastiann van Coevorden. Their idyllic cruise down the Danube is interrupted when a reclusive and mysterious passenger is murdered. Why was the victim alone on that riverboat filled with couples, in a stateroom by himself? And who killed him? Esther and Bastiann were often called Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot by wags at the Yard, and this addition to the series might remind readers of Christie’s Death on the Nile and Murder on the Orient Express, but this mystery/thriller is very much a story set in the twenty-first century. So tour the Danube with Esther and Bastiann…and enjoy the ride! Coming soon.

Around the world and to the starts! In libris libertas!

Bookend commercials and a day’s bookend storms…bad; Simon and Garfunkel’s “Bookends”…good. Bookends for books are on the endangered species list. The reason? Ebooks.

Many older readers and others prefer print. Like me, they like to browse in bookstores, libraries, and online; the first two are usually for print books. But, unlike me, they don’t take advantage of the convenience of ebooks: they’ve saved my sagging bookshelves. Bookends are needed to put some order into bookshelves, but they’re not needed for ebooks. Avid readers can load up their e-readers, not their shelves, so there’s no need for bookends.

During the COVID pandemic, I’ve been binge-reading, even entire series (many of them British-style mysteries). Imagine if I had print versions for all of them. Every room in my house would be needed to house them. And that’s not just a recent phenomenon. Even at my old day-job, I’d average a book every two weeks. Now it’s four or five per week, but the principle is still the same: print is impractical.

Besides, I can’t afford print. Many excellent ebooks are reasonably priced at $2.99 or $3.99; print versions are at least $10 in general. So I can buy a five-book series in ebook format for $20; the same series in print format would be $50 at least. (Big Five ebooks are a lot more expensive, but I rarely buy Big Five fiction anymore.) I’m no longer going to Burger King or McDonald’s; in the days of COVID. I prefer food for the mind, and an ebook costs about the same as a fast food meal.

Preference for ebooks had flattened before COVID, but I suspect, when all the dust settles, we will see that the pandemic has not only increased readership in general, but it has led to a surge in ebook sales numbers (why risk going to a bookstore or library when you can order an ebook online?). But preferences change slowly, and they will continue even after COVID. It’s hard to predict how things will shake out. Older readers tend not to be into e-anything, so they prefer print more than ebook versions; younger people tend not to be readers at all, and are more into streaming video and computer games. Any COVID-boost to readership might be ephemeral, but if books have any staying power, it’s more likely it will occur because of ebooks.

So I will continue to read and write ebooks, preferring them over print. Now if I could just protect them from being pirated, I would be a happy camper.

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Comments are always welcome.

“Esther Brookstone Art Detective.” This series, at times very much in the style of British mysteries, might be binge-worthy too. Esther begins her adventures as a Scotland Yard inspector with an MI6 background as an ex-spy during the Cold War. Interpol agent Bastiann van Coevorden enters as her paramour. The wags at the Yard have nicknamed them Miss Marple and Hecule Poirot, but those adventures are very 21^st century, with mystery, suspense, and thriller elements. In the first two novels, Rembrandt’s Angel and Son of Thunder, poor Bastiann has to deal with Esther’s obsessions. In the first, she’s obsessed with recovering a painting stolen by the Nazis in World War II. In the second, she’s obsessed with finding St. John’s tomb using written directions left by the Renaissance painter Botticelli. In the third, Death on the Danube (soon to be published), Esther and Bastiann’s honeymoon is interrupted by a murder on their riverboat. Available wherever quality books are sold.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!