News and Notices from the Writing Trenches #133…
Winter’s coming! We’ve been through our few days of Indian Summer (should we call it Native American Summer to be PC?) and some weather a few weeks ago already seemed like late November. In lieu of hibernating, you might want to consider stretching out in your recliner with a good book and a glass of wine or something stronger. A fireplace also helps chase away the winter doldrums. While streaming video series or computer games are an alternative, books are less passive and stimulate your mind more. And you can multitask a lot easier: Books, drinks, and music are hard to beat.
Something new to read? There are many books out there just waiting for your perusal, but I would be very honored and pleased if you chose one of mine! There are twenty-two to choose from—all written to entertain you; all with current themes to stimulate your mind. (See the list on the “Books & Short Stories” webpage.) Every book can be read independently, even books in a series. I refuse to be formulaic. I might repeat some characters—they’re always clamoring for their stories to be told—but each story is fresh and new. There’s a reason Blarney Castle is on my “About the Author” webpage—my muses are really banshees with tasers, and they know all about the stories I’ve told and the stories I have yet to tell. Choose one story already told from my catalog and relax in that recliner to enjoy an entertaining read.
Facebook Redux. I got tired of posting “normally” on FB because (1) way back they stopped letting me share my blog posts (Google+ allows me to do that, and I RSS to both my Amazon page and Goodreads); (2) since then, they have censored me on numerous occasions (over-compensation for conservatives’ complaints?); and (3) many times I would make an innocent comment and some jerk would climb on her or his soapbox and skewer me (why I never use Twitter, not even at 3 a.m.). (Apologies to all my FB friends—it’s not your fault.) I have increased the number of mini-posts on my author page. These posts contain short reviews of classics, quotes, some wacky definitions, and newsy items to complement the longer ones in this blog. Check it out. (That’s one reason these “News and Notices…” have diminished in number. Another is that I’m spending more time writing!)
Blog slant. Besides this newsletter, this blog also features op-ed posts, among many others. While I never worry about an author’s political opinions when deciding to read her or his book (otherwise I wouldn’t have read Card, Clancy, Crichton, Heinlein, Hogan, and many others), I often fear that my political opinions irk some readers and cause them NOT to read my books. I was pleased to learn that Hugh Howey, who became famous for the post-apocalyptic Wool tales, has included op-ed posts at his website—his “The Greatest Threat” is a recent example, found on his blog “The Wayfinder” (named after his Wayfinding series, I guess?). His website can be found here . Thanks to author-friend Scott Dyson for bringing this to my attention—Scott is a regular commenter to this blog (news flash! we don’t always agree—reasoned comments are always welcome whether I agree with their content or not).
New Smashwords addition. The ebook Angels Need Not Apply has been added to Smashwords. That means that this title is available there as well as retailers where Smashwords distributes (Apple, B&N, Kobo, etc) and its associated book lenders—these offer other ebook formats preferred by those who don’t have Kindle readers or don’t use the free Kindle app. Smashwords even offers the Kindle format (.mobi). Of course, you can still find this ebook on Amazon. It contains several themes which are still current; it also has a new cover.
Future releases. Gaia and the Goliaths, #7 in the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series,” is in final edits—the major theme is ecology and starts out with the murder of an environmental activist (C&C are NYPD homicide detectives, after all). Rembrandt’s Angel teams up Scotland Yard inspector Esther Brookstone with paramour Bastiann van Coevorden. They stop a group dealing in the sale of stolen masterworks. I’m hoping for an early 2017 release for both books.
Price increases. You should start considering the prices of all my books as sale prices until the end of the year, because early next year there will be price increases. While writing is great fun for me, and I give away a lot of freebies (see the list of free PDFs available for the asking on the webpage “Free Stuff & Contests,” and all the short stories in “Steve’s Shorts”), writing is a business. It’s an entertainment business, of course, and my principal motivation is to entertain you, the reader. But even McDonald’s raises prices, and my books will generally cost you less than a meal there and be healthier for you too. You only read free stuff? OK, go for it, but with time authors will stop entertaining readers if everyone insists on free! Inflation affects everything, including entertainment (have you looked at your cable or streaming TV bills lately?). You don’t read books? Why are you reading this post then?
Speaking of prices… Have you noticed that indie ebooks and those from small presses and imprints are better buys than ebooks from the Big Five? Many of the latter cost almost as much as the print versions. And that old myth about indie and small press ebooks being poorly edited just isn’t true anymore. Sure, there are some clunkers, but the worst formatted and edited ebooks I’ve seen come from the Big Five when they finally decide to release a dated but successful print book in ebook format—they favor print and aren’t attentive about bringing you a quality ebook. It doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes or Dr. Watson to figure out those indie and small press books are a better value!
In libris libertas!
