Thank You!

A great big thank you to everyone who took a chance on Lethal Seasons. This is now the most successful month ever, for me as an author. I am beside myself giddy about it.

A few new reviews have trickled in that show that you are enjoying the journey with Nick, Wisp, Angus, Tillie and and all the others at High Meadow. Thanks for taking the time to post a review. It really helps.

The read through shows me that a lot more of you are engaged also. Sales of the other books in the series are continuing nicely. That's a big Whew! for me. It means that I got it right in the rest of the books too.

And a nice little side effect is that a few people are reading some of my other series. So thanks for taking a chance on them, too!

You guys are the best!

Lessons Learned Print Error

If you were thinking about buying the print version of Lessons Learned - wait a week.

I learned my own lesson about trusting the online viewer. Apparently I missed a doozy. Page 15, the first page of chapter 4, is cut in half. Not sure how that happens when I uploaded a doc. How did one page just not transfer over? Weird.

The corrections have been made and I am just waiting on the press proof before releasing it. I want to inspect this one more closely. I already looked at every page on the online version, so it should be fine, but...

And I will toss out a sincere thank you to the person who noted the error in their review on Amazon. If I hadn't seen that, I would never have realized the mistake. Thanks!

If you have purchased a bad copy, you should be able to return it for a corrected one in about a week. I'll make an announcement here and on my FB page. If that doesn't work shoot me an email.

High Barrens only 99c until Sunday

If you haven't had a chance to pick up my latest book - now's the time to grab the ebook.

High Barrens - a stand-alone, high fantasy, coming of age is on sale for 99c through Sunday, May 13. After that it will go back to $2.99

Click HERE to pick your favorite retailer.

Click HERE to see a preview on my website.

I just got my first review and it was a 5 star. Woohoo!
"Well written book that grabbed early and kept you interested and reading straight through."

It's always a boost to see that people are enjoying my stories. While I'm busy writing, I don't think about how people will react to what I'm putting on paper. At that time, I'm too busy working my characters through their world. It isn't until I push the Publish button that I start to worry about my audience. And until the first review shows up, I'm constantly second guessing it. Reviews like that say I probably got it right. Yay.

If You've Read It, Please Review It

That's a request for all readers and all books by any author.

Reviews are so important for an Indie author. Aside from letting other readers know how you felt about the book, it creates a benchmark for advertising.

There are some advertisers that use the number of reviews as a cutoff point. Since they are inundated daily with authors signing up their books, they need a simple rule of thumb to cut down on the sludge. My mysteries are well liked, but lack reviews, so they aren't admissible. As a result, I can't use a lot of the better advertisers. So they don't get a lot of notice.

So if you like a book, leave a review. It's important!

Naomi Novik - My New Favorite Author

I don't remember where I read a review or recommendation of her book Uprooted. But it intrigued me enough to check it out. I liked her writing, enjoyed the book and went looking for more. That's when I discovered her dragon books.

The Temeraire series could probably be summed up as the Napoleonic Wars with dragons. But if I had read that, I wouldn't have tried it. Alternate histories are not something I read very often. The characters are the heart of the series and what has made me love it. There are battles and some interesting history along the way. (Not sure how much is true.)

I've been plowing through the series, book after book, quite gleefully. I discovered the other day that book 9 is the last book. I will be very curious to see how it is all wrapped up. Right now I am in the middle of book 6. I might need to slow down a little, now that I know it has an end.

Some of the books have more battles than others. I have to admit to skimming those parts a bit. Especially if my favorite characters aren't front and center.

The thing that constantly amazes me is the time it takes to travel or get news. A journey from England to Africa is said to take months. Letters can only travel as fast as a ship or a horse (or courier dragon!) can get them there. Moving troops and supplies and ships is an endeavor of weeks or months. Everything happens at a slower pace because it has to and plans must be drawn up a year in advance.

So if you're looking for a great dragon series, look her up.

50 Reviews!

Lethal Seasons now has 50 reviews!

As the numbers started climbing, somehow 50 became an important milestone in my head. I check the number of reviews on my books from time to time and it always amazes me to see more rolling in.

The first milestone is 10. That is the number required by some of the better promotion sites. Passing that was a great relief. Passing twenty-five was astonishing. Now I'm up to 50 and wow!

A huge thank you to everyone who left a review. Whether it was just a couple words or a couple paragraphs. It all counts toward helping me reach more readers.

THANK YOU!

And a reminder that Lethal Seasons (and 9 other novels) is available in the boxed set Apocalyptic Fears III for only 99cents. That's a lot of reading for less than a buck!

Happy New Year to you all. 

Wishing you a peaceful, healthy and prosperous 

year ahead.

Writing Emotional Moments

I was watching Childhood's End last night and a highly emotional moment was brushed over too quickly. The character, Ricky, chooses to make a tremendous sacrifice that will impact his life terribly. There was a spurt of action and then it was over and on to another POV.

That felt all kinds of wrong to me.

First of all, no one acknowledges the sacrifice. Ricky is dying. He is young and newly married to Ellie. He is offered medicine that will cure him. That in itself was handled very blithely. He didn't seem to care much either way when the alien gives him some sort of magical cure. As they talk he puts the medicine on the work bench.

Ellie and the religious woman arrive on the scene. Neither knows about the medicine. There is a confrontation and the alien is shot, crumples and appears to die. Ricky runs over and gets the medicine to cure him. He's been told there was only enough for the one dose. So Ricky chooses to use this medicine, the only cure for his illness, to save the alien's life. But no one knows what it is, so neither woman makes any comment or move to stop him.

The alien is saved and bang we go off to another plot line.

I thought Ricky's sacrifice fell flat because no one was there to witness it or mourn for his loss. If Ellie had seen it, we could have felt the loss so much more through her eyes. She would have argued for him to keep it for himself. And we could have seen his reasons for why he thought the alien's life was more important than living out his life with his wife.

The alien doesn't acknowledge the gift. I don't know how this was originally written, but if I was writing it, I'd put it up to the innate selflessness of humanity. The alien should have reacted in some way. Even if he came back and said it didn't matter. The lack of reaction was disappointing.

Ricky and the alien seem to have become friends. The alien tries to soften some of Ricky's difficulties. He should have been surprised and grateful to Ricky for saving his life. This could have been more pivotal in their relationship.

Even to keep the sacrifice private, just between Ricky and the audience, would have worked if there had been a bit of internal dialog. Maybe a glance at the medicine and a glance to his wife. Something to indicate his understanding of what he is giving up. The scene was too fast and too short for something so important. He seemed to not care about the cure and gave it away too easily.

Emotional moments need to have enough time to sink in. A witness, or internal dialog, needs to settle them into the reader/viewer's mind. If they go by too fast, they have no lasting meaning.

The Giveaway Conundrum

The Goodreads Giveaway for Scattered Seeds isn't working out as well as I'd hoped. It's been 3 weeks since I mailed the books. Still a little early for any reviews, but I'm not expecting many. I went to check my Amazon page and discovered 6 used books for sale.

Since I've only sold 1 print book, and that's in the UK, they can only be the books I sent out. So of the 10 people that "won" my book, 6 have sold them to used book stores.

If the remaining 4 people read the books and review them, I will be delighted. But I'm not holding my breath.

I debated having a giveaway. On one hand, it's a 2nd book in a series, so that limits the audience. On the other hand, it could interest people in buying book 1 (the ebook is only .99) But this isn't the first time I've found gifted books for sale. It's disappointing, but there's nothing you can do about it.

In the future, I don't think I'll be doing a giveaway through Goodreads. Seems like there are too many people who are signing up for the wrong reasons.

A Changed World Update

First of all there is an incredible review of Lethal Seasons over on Nonlocal Science Fiction. I've had good feedback, for the most part, on this book, but this is the first professional review. And it blew me away. They will also be doing a pre-release review of Scattered Seeds as soon as I can get them a copy. So please visit the website and give them some love for me.

Secondly, the book trailer for Scattered Seeds is almost done. This time around I am doing it myself. I discovered Windows Live Movie Maker was already on my laptop. And Alex had delivered the final cover. So it looked like I had everything I needed to get going. I had a lot of fun playing around with it. I think I may be doing more of them in the future.

Next point of interest, I got Scattered Seeds back from my third reader. She only had a few, but important, notes. I expect to start tweaking today with hopes of getting it to line editing by early next week. Woohoo! Still on target for my pub date.

Finally, I have brainstormed and tweaked the titles for my space opera, which I might start calling a space fantasy. I am going with Façade as the title of book 1 and Transmutation as the overall series.

With all the various incarnations in my head, I actually wrote an outline for this book. Since I have rewritten this story 3 times, I know it intimately. And chopped it all up to drop out excess herrings and extraneous plot lines. I think this will be a cleaner, clearer, more intense story about a new species hiding in plain sight.

Now I just need to write it.

Free Books for Honest Reviews - Story Cartel

I am experimenting with Story Cartel for Dark Deeds. It's a great set up for readers and authors. You can get any book on the site for free with the request that you give it an honest review.

You can get Dark Deeds HERE

Reviews are so important for authors. Not only do they help readers decide to purchase, they are a requirement for some advertising. A few of the better sites require a certain number of reviews at a certain average. For example - 5 reviews on Amazon with a 4.5 star average.

For new authors getting reviews is difficult. I have sold about 40 ebooks of Lethal Seasons and I have 1 review on Amazon. There are a few more reviews on other sites, but for some advertisers only Amazon counts.

I've had friends balk at giving a review. "I loved the book, but I don't know what to say."

It isn't a book report, so get that childhood trauma right out of your head. A rehashing of the plot isn't what people want to see. As a reader, I want to hear about pacing and characters. Other people notice different things. I once got a review that said my sentences were too short.

A few lines about how you feel about the story is best.

"A face-paced story that had me on the edge of my seat."
"The pace plodded and I lost track of the characters."
"Loved the hero in the beginning, but he turned out to be a wimp."
"The side-kicks were hilarious. I want to see more of them."

As an author, hearing feedback like that might influence my next book. I don't write for the critics that will give me a finely honed review on all the nuances (or lack there of) in the story. I write for people who tell me they love the characters and want to visit with them again.

My favorite review so far is only 2 words: "So good." I wish s/he'd written a bit more. It would be great to know which parts they liked best, or least. But I am thankful s/he took the time to write a comment.

The next time you finish a story, remember to review it where you bought it!

Lethal Seasons is Out! And a bad review

Lethal Seasons is now available in print at  Amazon and in ebook just about everywhere! Smashwords has nearly every ebook format available. For more ebook retailer links, click on the Lethal Seasons page.

My very first review of Lethal Seasons was a bad one. Put me in panic mode. Oh no! What should I do now? The correct answer is: nothing. It's out there. Nothing I can do to change a person's opinion. And the review itself was a bit of a mixed bag, I think the reviewer sort of liked the story but really did not like the characters. Which will totally ruin a story for you.

But then I thought, is this a rite of passage? All my other books have gotten good reviews. Not many, but all good. Which I know will always make readers suspicious. When I see a book with only good reviews I wonder if it's all just friends and family. I feel like I need disclaimers on my reviews - This is a total stranger! Really!

So now I have a bad review. And I am oddly proud of it. I handed out the novel and got honest feedback from someone I never met. Obviously, not my target audience...some of what the reviewer disliked will, hopefully appeal to someone else. I am thankful that the reviewer explained why the book didn't appeal.

Everyone is entitled to an opinion. Reading is very subjective. I created a "shelf" in my Goodreads account called "Not my cup of tea" specifically for books that were well written, but did not appeal to me. I do try to point out why I don't like them so that other readers can decide if those elements are ones they'd enjoy. Tastes vary. As my great-uncle used to say - that's what makes horse racing.

In other news - I ordered my first batch of print books. For all the folks who won the Goodreads Giveaway - thanks for your patience! I hope to have them in hand by next week and in the mail soon after.

And now it's time to get back to work on the next book!