I am so excited to announce that my book is now published at Amazon in both paperback and e-book for the Kindle. While this is not the first book I’ve written, it is the first one to be published.
My thanks to everyone who has supported my efforts on the book and is following me. My heartfelt thanks to the beta readers and editors who helped me whip it into the shape it is. If I’ve missed any spelling or punctuation errors, it is entirely my fault although after eight times through you’d think I would have caught them all.
You can check out the information on my book at my launch page.
Here’s the best part. Today only (September 1, 2015), the e-book version of my book can be downloaded for FREE. This is my way of introducing myself to you and giving you the opportunity to read it soon. I do ask that if you enjoy it that you will at least rate it at Amazon and maybe even write a review. Even if it’s not your cup of tea, please leave the feedback. Reviews are really important to all writers, so it will help me out tremendously to have a few reviews, good or not so good, on the book.
Thanks and I really hope you enjoy the read! Feel free to post comments and questions here or on my Facebook page.
Within the last few days I’ve seen many posts from authors who are upset with the proposed new plan that Amazon has to pay authors, whose books are in the Kindle Select program, by the pages read rather than by if the reader turns the pages on at least 10% of the book as they are now doing. First off, this applies to the Kindle Unlimitedplan, the one where clients pay $9.95 a month to borrow any book that is in the plan and it only applies to digital books. If they read the whole book, then the author gets the full royalty payment on it. If they only read 42 pages, then the author gets paid for the percentage of the book that is read.
Unfair, the authors scream. How is this unfair? First, the author has the choice of enrolling the book in the Kindle Select plan for 90 days. The author can also remove the book from the plan. As it is, the author is committing to giving Amazon exclusive digital distribution in order to enroll it in this plan. Once the plan expires or it is removed from the plan, then the author can place the digital book with any and all distributors. In return, Amazon markets the book, places it on sale, and may make it available to the Kindle Unlimited plan for a period of time. Meanwhile, the writer promotes it on social media or via a web site and collects royalties every time the book is sold and for whatever percentage of the book is read on Kindle Unlimited. Incidentally, if Amazon puts the book on sale or in their free for a few days, it’s my understanding that the author still gets the royalties.
Short Books
With the current plan, any book that gets the target percent read will receive an equal share of the pool, based on the book price the writer sets, that Amazon has for royalties for the month. I have seen more than one “writing guru” advising followers to write shorter books or even put short stories on Amazon. People are paying 99 cents for a 25-page short story. Is this fair? Is getting the same royalty for it as someone who writes a 150-page novella for the same price fair? Authors have been complaining about this. I have a book that is 330 pages and someone else has one that is 510 pages and we both sell the book for $2.99 (theoretically), is it fair that we both get the same royalty?
I have heard that some authors are breaking their books into chapters and selling them chapter by chapter to take advantage of getting 10% of the book read so they can get paid if someone only reads 5 pages and they can increase their sales by turning a 20 chapter book into an almost $20 series of Kindle books.
The new payment model that Amazon is proposing will address this issue by paying according to page count, not book. Amazon will also ensure that the books are not padded with extra pages by using their own format for size and word counts, so extra spaces between lines and extra large print won’t increase the pages.
It’s a Library
Consider this. If you have a book on Amazon, on another distributor or in a bookstore and someone purchases it, then you are paid a royalty for the book. If the person then loans it to someone else, swaps it for another book at a used book store or gives it to a library where others may read it, the author does not get a royalty. If you think of Kindle Unlimited as a lending library, which it is –the reader does not keep a copy of the book – then you are getting paid if someone borrows the book and reads part or all of it. You just don’t get as much if the book isn’t the reader’s cup of tea or doesn’t hold attention. Is that unfair? I don’t think so.
As I will be publishing my first, actual “for sale versus free fan fiction”, book soon, I am looking at the Kindle Select program. If it helps to get my book out to potential readers, then I am a step ahead in the marketing. If the readers like my book, then I will get a royalty. If they only read 30 pages and drop it, I still get a little money and some important feedback. If Amazon will let authors know how far the reader got into the book by letting us know the page count, then we can look at the pattern of drops and see where they reader might have lost interest in it. This then allows the writer to see if there is something at that point that could be improved to keep the reader engaged. This can be a valuable tool.
Mindless Lemmings?
Artist unknown
Will this stifle creativity, as a few authors have cried? Will this force them to conform to the same standard that traditional publishers require with the same format of arcs, highs and lows that sell books? Will everyone become lemmings following the leader off the no-creativity cliff because that is what the publishers expect? I don’t believe that will be the case. I do believe that the book will need to interest the reader and be well-written. It doesn’t have to follow the standard but needs to be coherent. You can write and publish any kind of book you want through Kindle, but it needs to engage the reader or your book won’t find any takers.
If you write about something you’re passionate about and no one else cares, then you won’t sell that book to anyone. If you put it under Kindle Select and the description is misleading, it might lead a reader to download it, read a chapter or two then decide this isn’t what was expected. This happened to me recently. The book sounded like something I would enjoy, but when I started reading it, I found it wasn’t what I thought it would be. While I normally read a whole book, even when it isn’t the best, I had to abandon this one. Under this new program, the writer would get paid for the 50 or so pages I read. It doesn’t mean it’s a bad book, just that it wasn’t one that I enjoyed.
Not Ready for Kindle Writers
More people than ever are writing books and Amazon and other publish-yourself publishers are making it easy for them to get their books published without it costing the fortune that vanity presses charge. I priced one many years ago and it was about $3000 to publish a book, which I would then have to go out and sell myself. It’s much more expensive now. Amazon publishes the book for no cost to the author. Anybody can write a book. That doesn’t mean it’s a good book. It doesn’t mean they are good writers. I have read some that really needed work before they were published, some that didn’t make any sense and I tried to read some that were really poor books. Possibly this approach from Amazon will help to weed some of the books that need more work, editors and better writing to be a success out of the pool. If readers consistently dump the book after the first chapter, then there’s a problem with the book. It failed to hook the reader.
Preview the Book
Most books on Amazon have the first chapter available to read before you purchase and this is true of the Kindle Unlimited books as well. You can read a few pages to see if you like the writing, the author’s voice and if the story sounds like something you’d enjoy. From this standpoint, with Amazon’s policy of refunding money if the customer isn’t happy, I feel that any book that is purchased, whether it is Kindle or hard copy, should not be refunded if the purchaser reads it, then claims not to like it and asks for their money back. I couldn’t believe that people do that with a book. You can’t do that in a book store. Especially when you can preview the book. You read the covers, you read a few pages, then you buy the book or put it back on the shelf. You don’t buy the book, read it, then return it and get your money back. That’s a scam as far as I’m concerned.
So bottom line, I am willing to give the Kindle Select program a try because:
It will help to get my book out to my potential readers, which will help me build my brand.
It may bring me royalties I wasn’t expecting to get from readers willing to read new authors.
If it doesn’t get full reads, then I may gain insight into why the reader quit reading the book, even if I don’t get a report from Amazon, but I really hope they will provide some feedback to the writers.
Readers who really like a book they read on Unlimited do sometimes buy a copy to keep on their Kindle or even purchase the print copy.
I have nothing to lose by trying this program and all the above to gain.
For the past two weeks, I’ve been working on a rewrite of my NaNo novel, “Funeral Singer”. While I received good feedback from a few of my beta readers, the total lack of response from the rest leads me to believe that the book is not compelling enough for them to continue reading it. I could be wrong, but that is the interpretation. After reading it through again, I do see some pacing issues and places where it needs more zing. With that in mind, I started a rewrite of it. While I haven’t thrown everything out, I am looking for places to tighten it up and make it more of a page turner.
I have read so many books on how to write, articles on things to do, ways to hook the reader and other tips for writing that my head is drowning in all the do and don’t tips of other writers. I almost find it crippling to approach my novel this way. The mechanics of trying to write a book that applies these rules at every line practically stifles the writing. Then I open a best-seller and most of these so-called rules are tossed aside. Good writing and telling a good story are what are most important, I feel.
Does every book have to read like an action movie? It seems like that’s what these writing advice tips are advocating. Even action movies are getting over-inundated in the action and lacking in the actual content of the story. For my movie dollar, I want a story that involves me in the story, the characters, and the emotions. Star Wars was a successful film because we cared about the characters. We fell in love with Luke and saw his hopes and dreams and felt his longing to make a difference. We fell in love with Han for his spirit, his sense of adventure, and his good heart. We loved Leia for her courage, her humor, and her dedication. We even loved Threepio and R2D2 for their human-like behavior and devotion to their owners. These are what made Star Wars work. While the action and the special effects kept the story rolling full-throttle, we still needed those telling moments, like Luke gazing out longingly at dusk to feel the yearning in him, Leia standing defiantly before Vader and showing her courage as she defies him, and Han getting drawn into the rebellion despite all his words of independence.
It’s also what makes a successful book work. It’s the part of writing that pulls the reader into identifying with the main characters and caring about what happens to them. It’s not throwing them into one crisis after another, but allowing for the ordinary and everyday part of their lives that the reader can grasp and identify with that builds the bond. Once you have that, then the reader will be pulling for your main character through the crisis and turning the pages to find out what happens next.
I call myself a writer and I want the words to be lyrical when I write. I love words and how they link together to form exquisite sentences. I like to read something I’ve written a few days after it’s done and think. “Did I actually write that? Where did it come from?”
Once, in a piece of fan fiction, I wrote this line: “Quiescent words fell on him, patient little architects constructing a long-forgotten world— a place both so distantly removed and foreign to his experience that it could have been an alien civilization.” Upon reading it, my friend, another writer, turned to me and said, “I wish I had written that.” And I thought, I can’t believe I wrote that.
When the creative brain is in charge, the words come from the soul and not from the logical side that is saying. “How does this advance the story?”
At the end of the day, the book I write is mine. It’s the story I want to tell and while it may not be a big hit with anyone, it is nonetheless, my story and I want to tell it as purely and elegantly as possible. I can only hope that someone will want to read it because it’s a good story.
Writers and readers alike, what do you think about this? Do you agree or disagree?? Let me know.
The future has disappointed me in some pretty serious ways. Back in the 1960’s and 1970’s, the future looked like it would be a pretty amazing place. Beginning with Star Trek and the possibility of many marvelous things to come, even though it was set many centuries ahead, there were still some inventions that could be happening as we moved toward the 21st century. Some of those are being realized now.
Replica of the Star Trek tricorder, photo by Wired.com
Things like the tricorder, which has a rudimentary version being developed now for medical diagnosis. In fact, a very small one called Scanadu is now being tested that can quickly measure heart rate, temperature, blood pressure, oxygen level and provides a complete ECG reading. That is a promise that is coming into being earlier than expected.
Now the transporter, that wonderful piece of technology that completely baffles anyone who contemplates it for more than a few minutes, is still a long ways off and one has to wonder if there is any way to move a body by breaking it down to molecules and sending it to a receiving unit? According to quantum physicists,it may be possible. But, we are a long ways from the reality of even transporting non-living items more than a short distance.
Block portable phone.
Communicators seem to be the technology that made the leap first and our modern cell phones and tablets are proof of how well that is developing. In fact, we may be way ahead of the curve on the Star Trek style communicator. We can instantly communicate around the planet from a device we can carry in our pockets. We can see each other on our tablet screens – hello, The Jetsons – as we talk in beautiful living color through high-quality mini-cameras in our phones and tablets. Pretty amazing. Was it less than 50 years ago that this seemed like a distant dream for the future? I was carrying one of the block mobile phones in the 80’s for my job!
KITT from Knight Rider
Where are the failures? KITT is a starter. By now, we expected the car from Knight Rider, the fully capable of driving itself, talking to you and monitoring your well-being type vehicle. It has taken a lot longer than one might have expected, but the self-driving car is slowly emerging. Mercedes has a concept carin test mode. I know that Nevada is one of the states that has allowed testing of a “driverless” car, but I haven’t seen one on the road yet. Chevrolet has a gorgeous concept design for one. Still, it’s 2015 and we don’t have this marvel available at a reasonable price yet. We do have some innovations, but they are a long way from KITT.
Speaking of cars, why are we still using fossil fuels to power our vehicles and many other things? One of Tesla’s battery plants is going into production near Reno and the automobileis available now for a really high asking price of $75,000. I believe Harrison Ford is driving one, but most of us can’t afford to put one in the garage. We have several hybrid cars, but nothing that is like the car we were hoping to see by now.
Where the heck is Mr. Fusion and the anti-gravity car? Back to the Future gave us hope for flying cars, which are sort of being developed by independent inventors with mixed success. Although I admit, the idea of people zipping around in the sky with the lack of attention they sometimes pay to driving is a frightening prospect. Even in BTTF they still went in sky lanes, not any which direction they wanted to go. We don’t even have an anti-gravity skateboard yet. Folks, there has to be a way to do this!
One more thing missing from the promise suggested by several movies and TV shows are the household robots. A Roomba is a great little vacuum, but it does not a robot make. I want the one that cleans the whole house, does the dishes, cooks dinner and walks the dog! Again, slow to develop, but there are also strides being made in that department. Some “robots” are single-function, like the Roomba. By the way, iRobotalso makes mopping, scrubbing and pool cleaning robots. There are complicated task robots like the ones used to perform surgery with precision or the civil defense and military units, also from iRobot, that assist with dangerous situations. Not surprising that defense robots would become commonplace before any domestic ones.
Are robotic soldierson the way? Certainly, they are being considered and drones are part of that robotic army. No one wants to lose human lives in wars, but what is gained in the my-robots-are-better-than-your-robots fighting? Surely the avoidance of war is the only real solution to problems and in this area comes one of the biggest failures of the future. We are still battling it out, still trying to force thoughts, ideas, religion, or what other propaganda we believe down other people throats. World leaders are still trying to push for more. The US Congress is failing miserably at managing the country. Social media has become a platform for anyone to espouse their views, right or wrong.
But these are heavy subjects for another blog. For now, let’s just say some key things of the future promise of the mid-20th century have failed to be realized as we are mid-second decade of the 21st century. I wanted the promise of those science fiction shows that offered a glimpse of a better world for everyone and a Mr. Fusion providing unlimited power from garbage. Is that so much to ask?
So tell me, friends, how has the future disappointed you so far?
It’s an old joke with the obvious answer of “To get to the other side.”
But the past couple of days I’ve been asking myself a variation on that same question. On Wednesday morning, my funny, sweet wild chicken decided, not for the first time, to leave the sanctuary of our yard to visit one of the neighbors. Usually, she has gone to the empty house next door, which is relatively safe, but that morning, she went into the high fence enclosure of the other neighbor. It was a fatal mistake for her. That neighbor has two pit bulls, who have a doggie door to the yard.
When I came out around noon, I easily spotted her crumpled body through the chain link fence. There was no blood and it looked like one of the dogs had quickly broken her neck. They had no interest in eating her. I never even heard a squawk out of her. Later, when my neighbor came home, she retrieved the body and I buried her the next morning in the garden that she had romped through for the past six months, a location where the morning sun touches her grave.
Cheeka in early December.
Cheeka was a wild hen. She arrived in our yard late last September, a young bird, about two months old and we had no idea from whence she came. She quickly joined the quail under the bushes in the back. When they ran through the yard, she ran with them, a happy wild bird enjoying the day. Of course, we fed the birds when food got scarce and we tried to figure out a way to catch Cheeka. Our neighbor, the owner of the dogs, knew someone who would add her to their hen house, but they wanted us to catch her. So much easier said than done. She was no dumb bird! She was a bit of a problem for us as our community regulations specifically say no poultry and our only defense was that she wasn’t ours. She was a wild bird just like any of the other birds that were in the yard.
Over the next few months, I fed her daily, along with the other birds, and I gave her a name. She grew into a beautiful hen with brown and rust-colored feathers with a hint of cream underneath. She came running when she heard my voice. I wouldn’t call her a pet, but she was a pleasant little animal who was perfectly happy in her life here, and I grew very fond of her. When it snowed in December, she woke me with loud, almost frantic clucks and squawks from the firethorn bushes next to my window where she’d taken refuge and complained about the strange, and cold, white blanket that covered the ground. We’d put a shelter in the yard for her, but would she use it? Of course not. She would barely go in enough to get the bits of food I put there to attempt to lure her inside.
As the sun began rising earlier in January and February, Cheeka would greet it joyfully with a series of little, happy clucks. She’d do it just outside my window for about six times, then move on to another area of the yard and repeat her chant to the sun. It was her little sun-worshiping ritual and it made me smile.
Even though she would run out to greet me and even follow me around the yard sometimes, she would never allow me close enough to touch her. She always darted away when I made a move toward her. But she wasn’t afraid of me and often kept up a conversation.
She was aware of the danger a cat presented and when a stray wandered in the yard, she raised the alarm and dashed with the quail to the safety of the hawthorne bushes along the back of our property. Like a good servant, I went out and shooed the cat away, restoring order in the yard. But I learned her squawks of alarm and danger from the couple of encounters with the stray cats.
Our dog never bothered her. He would sometimes chase her, just as he chases the quail, but to Flynn it was a game. He just wanted to play. And she fled from him to her hiding spot, clucking in annoyance, not in her alarmed voice. Even in play, she was aware the dogs and cats were a danger.
So, why, I’ve asked myself several times over the past few days, did she decide to leave the security of our yard and fly over an eight-foot fence to get into the barren dog yard next door? There was no food there. No shelter there. Why did she cross the fence?
Out of curiosity, I think. She liked to explore. She was an adventurous bird.
Exploring barriers between reality and other realities… Is it fantasy or just a step through a dimension portal?
I am so excited to announce that my book is now published at Amazon in both paperback and e-book for the Kindle. While this is not the first book I’ve written, it is the first one to be published.
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