Free download of “Lonesome Cove” for the Kindle

 

“Lonesome Cove” is the fourth novel in the Terry Rankin series. I won’t be writing another until some time next year, since I’m tied up with two other projects right now.

This free download will be available for two days only – the 13^th and 14^th of June (that’s this Wednesday and Thursday), and I would dearly love to see several thousands of downloads during that period. Please help me out with this and repost this, or copy/paste this post into an email and send it off to every literate person you know (even if they don’t have a Kindle; they might know someone who does).

And if you are receiving this in an email, please forward it to everyone in your Address Book.

I have one last request for you before we get to the nitty-gritty; please take the time to post reviews for me. If you’ve read of my other novels, please post a review, and certainly for “Lonesome Cove”. It’s a great story, and potential readers always look at the reviews before they invest in an author they haven’t read before.

But it is a heck of a story:

Terry Rankin isn’t so sure about his new client, Gianni Lupo. Gianni is an old man, just released from prison after serving the full twenty-five years of a Life sentence for a double murder in Miami. But Terry figures the man’s paid for his crime and now he’ll spend his declining years tottering around his home on Sanibel Island. Terry isn’t sure why Lupo feels the need for armed bodyguards, but what can go wrong? After all, it’s been twenty-five years.

And three tons of gold is still missing…

Here’s the link to the book page on Amazon.com:

http://www.amazon.com/Lonesome-Cove-The-Bend-ebook/dp/B007TVBGEM/ref=sr_1_5?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1338410985&sr=1-5

Remember to verify that the Kindle purchase price is $0.00 before you click the Buy button!

Give a Little, Get a Little – On the Cheap

 

You’re a writer; you’ve published one or more novels/poetry chapbooks/articles/screenplays etc., and you live in the requisite cold, draughty garret along with a few pigeons and mice, or perhaps in your parents basement with just a few mice and maybe a cat who does not really appreciate your company as much as you’d like.

And you’d really prefer an upgrade to your life. Maybe a nice beachfront condo in Maui, or at least Coral Gables. I mean, come on already. You’ve paid your dues. You’ve got all this stuff written and you know from your readers (along with your mother) just how good you are. You just don’t have all that many readers, yet.

You’re on FaceBook and MySpace, you’ve got your very own web site and you keep your blog up to date (pretty much, anyway). But the readers aren’t lining up to buy your stuff in sufficient numbers for that lifestyle upgrade to which you’d just love to become accustomed.

What’s a boy/girl/other supposed to do?

Learn. You have to become much more than  just a writer. No matter how good you are as a writer, no matter how many of your readers have taken the time to tell you (along with your mother) just how very much they enjoy reading whatever it is that you write (and I’m assuming that you aren’t paying them to tell you this stuff), being a great writer is not, in and of itself, enough to get you out of that garret (or your parents basement, for that matter).

You have to learn; about your place in the market, about how to make your potential readers aware of you and your product, about how to add value to your product for those potential readers, and about how to encourage them to take some of their hard-earned cash and put it directly into your pocket instead of mine.

Did I just say that?

Sadly, that’s exactly what I said. You, Dear Reader, are one of my many competitors in the marketplace. One of several hundred thousand, in fact. I go into bookstores, and I browse through the book pages on Amazon and I see competition (I also see lots and lots of books I’d love to read). Every one of those books was written by someone just like you. Or me.

And we, each of us, compete for every dollar any reader will ever spend on another book in his or her entire life.

There really are hundreds of thousands of writers in this world, boys and girls, and tens of thousands of books/articles/screenplays/chapbooks published every year. What makes you so special? What is it about you that a reader would want to buy your book instead of mine? How is he or she supposed to find you, or see one of your book covers as opposed to me, or one of mine?

And who in the heck is he (or she) anyway?

But I’m just a itty-bitty little ol’/young/middle-aged writer person – how am I supposed to do that when I can’t even buy myself a cup of coffee at Starbucks?

Good questions. Let’s get some answers.

First, we have to define our terms. These two definitions are from:

http://dictionary.reference.com

mar·ket·ing

   [mahr-ki-ting]

noun

1. the act of buying or selling in a market.

2. the total of activities involved in the transfer of goods from the producer or seller to the consumer or buyer, including advertising, shipping, storing, and selling.

pro·mo·tion

   [pruh-moh-shuhn]

noun

1. advancement in rank or position.

2. furtherance or encouragement.

3. the act of promoting.

4.the state of being promoted.

5. something devised to publicize or advertise a product,cause, institution, etc., as a brochure, free sample, poster,television or radio commercial, or personal appearance.

So “Marketing” is any activity that enables you as a business person to get your products into the hands of consumers. As noted above that can (and probably should) include advertising, selling and delivering your products.

“Promotion”, then, includes advertising (getting yourself and your products before the eyes of your potential customers) and giving them a good reason to purchase your product.

Let’s start with ‘Marketing’. You really can’t sell into a market until you know what your market is.

Identify your market. Who reads your stuff now? How old are they, what kind of education do they have, what are their likes and dislikes? What do your readers have in common? Where do they live? How do they earn their living? Do they go to church/synagogue/mosque? Are they tradesmen/women? Educators?

Once you have identified the groups into which your readership (or potential readership) falls, you need to figure out how to reach them.

And that’s where “Promotion” comes in.

Write articles or get interviewed in trade magazines your readers buy. Offer to do personal appearances at libraries and book clubs, become a guest blogger on blogs that you know cater to the readers you have targeted. Redesign your web site and modify the keywords and meta tags for each page you have on your site to improve your search engine ranking. Make sure the book reviewers for your local newspapers know you’re alive and writing. Take them to lunch if you have to.

You need to get yourself and your product up out of the muck where people can see you. You have to make yourself ‘Special’. I know your mother already thinks you are and probably tells you that every day, but it’s not enough. You have to make sure potential readers think you’re special – someone they want to pay attention to – someone who’s work they know and trust and enjoy.

You need to convince those potential readers to buy any book that has your name on it because it has your name on it.

Do that, and that lifestyle upgrade you’re looking for is within your reach.

Sell yourself. You; not your books so much, but you. Everybody knows the names of Joan Collins and Agatha Christie, Ernest Hemingway, Robert Heinlein and John Grisham, Carl Hiaasen and Randy Wayne White and John D. MacDonald. Most people could not name more than one or two titles these folks have written, but they know their names.

But they don’t know yours.

And who’s fault is that?

The titles of your books are nowhere near as important as YOUR NAME, and what thoughts and feelings people associate with your name. You need to tell people who you are and why they should prefer your work product to that of other writers in your genre. You need to convince them they have a reason – added value to them – to give you their hard-earned money.

You need to “Brand” yourself.

Here’s another definition from the nice people at Dictionary.Com (http://dictionary.reference.com)

brand

noun

1. kind, grade, or make, as indicated by a stamp, trademark, or the like: the best brand of coffee.

2. a mark made by burning or otherwise, to indicate kind,grade, make, ownership, etc.

3. a mark formerly put upon criminals with a hot iron.

4. any mark of disgrace; stigma.

5. branding iron

verb (used with object)

9. to label or mark with or as if with a brand.

10. to mark with disgrace or infamy; stigmatize.

11. to impress indelibly: The plane crash was branded on her mind.

12. to give a brand name to: branded merchandise.

13. to promote as a brand name.

For purposes of this article, let’s consider #’s 1,9, 11 & 13.

Send out an email blast to your readers and maybe even post these questions on your web site:

• “what phrase would you use to describe me as an author/writer?”
• “What other authors or writers would you compare me to?”
• “What separates me and my work from other authors you have read recently?”

Take those results and come up with a few short phrases – say, two phrases, and turn them into a signature for every email you send out, every press release you send out and make sure it appears at the top of every page on your web site and even on your blog page. Make sure it appears on your business cards, as well.

That is your brand, and do not ever change it (unless your sales drop off dramatically, in which case you have to go back and do a bit more research).

It can take months or years to build a good brand and a good readership. This isn’t something that happens overnight – at least, not without a great deal of money, and I’m pretty sure nobody reading this has THAT kind of money laying around to invest in things like marketing, promotion and branding.

So take it slow. Do your research, and take your chances. Take small steps, study the results, note your failures and learn from them, and take yourself out to dinner when your decisions put a bit more cash in your pocket. Celebrate your victories and learn from your failures.

Just don’t quit on yourself. Ever.

I know full well what it means to go to bed hungry; I know what it means to find yourself in your car on your last tank of gas driving toward a Salvation Army shelter with a  very bleak future ahead of you. I know exactly how it feels to know that you have no job prospects in our future. My entire life has been and continues to be a hazardous experience filled with ups and downs.

I certainly can’t recommend it to anyone. But it’s what I’ve got to work with, and I’m no quitter.

I am, in fact, a writer. And a salesman, and a bit of a philosopher (it’s somewhat embarrassing at times, but you have to take the good with the bad).

I did mention this a bit earlier, but it bears repeating; being a good writer isn’t enough. You have to become a very good marketing agent and you have to become responsible for your own promotion. Promote yourself. Sell yourself. Do that, and your customers will buy your books; you won’t have to sell them once you sell yourself.

Morgen Bailey

 

Morgen Bailey, located in Northampton, England,  has recently set up a new ‘Author’s Interview’s’ blog and reposted (and updated) an interview I did with her a few month’s back. Don’t let her address on the other side of the pond put you off. Her work and her blog posts are read all over the world:

http://morgensauthorinterviews.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/author-interview-no11-gary-showalter.html

But this post (this one, right here) is not so much about about that interview with me (though it does have a lot of new info in it) as it is about Morgen and what she’s up to.

If you are a writer, or you love writers and what they do, or don’t give a fig about writers just so long as you have something interesting to read (or if you’re so desperate for something to read you’re back to reading the labels on soup cans), Morgen has something to offer you.

In her own words:

“Also I’ve since had a story published in a new charity anthology and four of my free (debut) eBook short stories, a writer’s block workbook and an anthology of short stories went live on Smashwords and Amazon and I’d be ever so grateful if you know of anyone who might be interested… more (novels) to follow shortly.”

Here are a few links to get you started:

Morgen with an ‘e’

http://www.morgenbailey.com/
http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com and http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/morgenbailey

Now a new forum at http://morgenbailey.freeforums.org

And please, for my sake do repost my previous blog about the giveaway of the Kindle version of “The Big Bend”. It runs from 2 May through 4 May, and I would love to give away several thousand copies of that novel. It’s not only the first in the Terry Rankin series, it’s also the best selling of the lot ( it is a well-written tale and my personal favorite).

Here’s the link to the book page on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Big-Bend-ebook/dp/B0035G0722/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1335612333&sr=8-3

Another Excerpt from “Lonesome Cove”

 

Terry Rankin is in Miami, looking for information on Gianni Lupo’s grandaughter, Nikki. He finds a lot more than he bargained for. But not much solid information:

 

I paid the bill and left a nice tip, then headed for my hotel a few blocks away. There wasn’t anything left to do until Petty called with some answers. South Miami is a nice place; everything is close by, the weather is nice, the people are nice. The staff in the hotels are nice. It’s all so damn nice.

On the surface, anyway. Just like most parts of the civilized world, folks are polite. It helps to keep people from killing each other over the little things. Most times, anyway. There are exceptions.

Hal Petty called while I was in the shower. So did Cathy. I called Petty, first.

“Got some interesting stuff for you. Don’t like it a lot, and I’m sure you won’t, either. Doesn’t make a lot of sense, but then there’s a whole lot in life that doesn’t make a lot of sense.”

I laughed. “You’re not making much sense either, right now.”

“Okay, this is what I got. Tammy O’Shea, aged eighteen. Died in a car accident on 23 December, 2000. Sound familiar?”

Oh, crap, yes, it did. “Who else was in the car, Hal?”

“Rosa and Angelo Gianuzzi.”

“Where was their daughter, Nicola?”

“No mention of her in the newspaper report. Got a call in to the police department in Trenton who responded to the accident. No call back from them, yet.”

“What else?”

“Tammy O’Shea, of Trenton, New Jersey, has a Florida driver’s license. No violations, no wants or warrants out on her, no ‘Also Known As’ listed. She’s had the license for nine years. Clean as a whistle. Registration and insurance on the Corvette is in her name, with the address I gave you earlier.”

“Hal, you have to get me some information on Nicola Gianuzzi.”

“I’m working on it,” he said with a bit of asperity in his tone. “I’ll get what I can from the Trenton PD and the local obituary columns and work from there. Your girl would have been way too young to strike out on her own. She had to live with someone until she was old enough to join the army. If she’s using the O’Shea ID to cover herself she had to have professional help setting it up. I’ll see what I can learn.”

Gianni Lupo didn’t know that a third person had died in the accident that took the lives of his daughter and her husband. I wondered how he learned of the accident. I wondered if it was an accident. I wondered where Nicola Gianuzzi was, and why she was masquerading as Tammy O’Shea.

Then I called Cathy. I did not tell her what Hal Petty had learned, or about my thoughts. I wasn’t about to drop that on her over the phone. That was going to be a face-to-face conversation. After we said our hellos, I asked, “Did your dad stop by today?”

“Yes, in fact he’s going to stay over tonight. We’ve been all over the boat, looking at what Rolf and his crew did. Dad loves the instrumentation in the wheelhouse. Now that he’s had a good look at Nina R, he’s thinking of getting some new gear for his Riviera.”

“He’s got a real pretty boat, Honey.” Calling a forty-five foot Riviera pretty is a major understatement. Try beautiful.

“What’s new on your end?”

I told her some of what I’d learned, but not all. “I’ll tell you the rest when I get back tomorrow evening. Everything I thought I knew has been changed in just a few hours today. No idea where this thing will go tomorrow.” Oh, boy, was I right about that.

“Well, you take good care of yourself. Spike’s trying to grab the phone to say hello,” she giggled.

“Hello, Spike,” I laughed. “Cathy, tell your dad I said hi, will you? I’ll see you tomorrow night.”

Ten minutes later, things changed again, when someone knocked on my door.

I cursed myself then, for flying to Miami. If I had driven as I first thought to do I would have a weapon with me. I wasn’t expecting anyone, and a knock on the door in the middle of the night is always cause for concern. I moved to stand with my back against the wall of the bathroom and faced the closet on the opposite wall. That placed the entry door on my right side.

“Who is it?”

“FBI, Mr. Rankin,” a familiar though not quite welcome feminine voice replied. I breathed a sigh of relief, flipped the deadbolt and opened the door for her.

“I never caught your name,” I said as she and her young male companion entered. I first met her in the parking lot of the apartment hotel late one night last month. She came with a message from my government asking for my cooperation in ending the life of a very unpleasant and dangerous man.

Then after it was all over she and her gofer came to bring me a gift from my government. A gift that I quickly dropped into the depths of the Gulf of Mexico, unopened, where I hoped no one would ever find it.

She was a pleasant woman, easy to look at and obviously a very capable agent, but not entirely welcome right then.

“And how can I help you and my government this evening?” I asked as the young man with her closed and locked the door.

She brushed her shoulder length blond hair off her face and said, “Did you wonder why Mr. Lupo settled on your company to provide his protection?”

“No, it never entered my mind,” I replied as I pulled a soda out of the mini bar. It should have, though. But I’ve never been one to check the dentition of gift horses.

“I visited him while he was still in prison and recommended you.”

That caught my attention. “Why?”

Another knock on the door interrupted us. As I began to move toward the door she put out a hand to stop me. “Paul, give me your backup piece,” she said as she pushed me into the room and around the corner, out of the line of sight from the entrance. She handed me Paul’s Springfield Arms .40 semi-auto. I slipped the safety off and racked the slide to load a round into the chamber as she said to me, “Stay there.”

She took up a position with her back to the wall, her weapon in a two handed grip, with the barrel toward the ceiling. She signaled to her companion, saying, “Get your weapon ready. Stand beside the door. Ask who it is.”

The young man held his pistol parallel to the floor and pointing at the entry as he called, “Who is it?”

The burst of rounds that answered his question blew right through him, pulling a red mist in its wake and catching the woman through the sheetrock wall she thought would shield her. It didn’t. It never does.

Time slowed to a crawl.

As she dropped to the floor, cursing the pain, I moved to stand against the opposite wall where the pistol in my right hand could point more naturally down the short hall. The door eased open on its hinges; the rounds from the automatic weapon had destroyed the locks holding it shut.

Two men entered. I took one step into the hall and pulled the trigger four times, dropping them both. The second man tried to stand and bring his pistol to bear, but a fifth round put him down for good.

I stood there, staring at the mess that was once Paul. I’d never learned his last name, but he’d died doing his job in my hotel room.

Screaming from the other patrons on the floor assured me that at least one person had already called the front desk and probably the cops, as well. I pulled the pillows off the bed, stripped the cases off and moved to kneel beside the woman, where I did what I could to stop the bleeding. Two rounds struck her in the back; one through her right shoulder blade and the second lower down, blowing out through her stomach.

She was alive, in extreme agony and cursing a blue streak. Anger, frustration, and sadness mixed in her words. “That kid wanted to be an agent his whole life. He’s been with me since he got out of the Academy. I was his field training officer. My bosses thought I’d keep him out of trouble. And I just used the poor bastard as a speed bump.” There was more like that. She never lost consciousness; the agony of a round in your gut is indescribably painful.

The paramedics had her on a gurney in a matter of a few minutes. I spent the rest of the night answering questions.

It would be another week before I learned her name, or why she’d come to visit. Once the cops had me at the station I called Cathy to let her know I was okay and then my attorney, Allison Saunders, just in case.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough answers for them, though I told the story as I knew it from beginning to end half a dozen times and answered all of their questions as thoroughly as I could. The officers who interviewed me asked questions and demanded answers, but they wouldn’t tell me a damn thing.

I was a witness, a victim if you prefer, but I was treated as I had treated perpetrators through all my years in law enforcement.

It is never pleasant to be on the receiving end of an interrogation.

They released me around mid-day on Sunday. I returned to the hotel to find they had moved me to another room. I showered and shaved, packed my bags, paid the bill and drove to the airport. After turning in my rental car I checked in at the airline desk. Then I found a restaurant, had a decent meal and drank coffee until my flight was called.

I didn’t read the newspaper. I didn’t even look at it.

I’d be back in Miami, right after Gianni Lupo and I had a long and probably very unpleasant conversation.

Cathy was waiting for me when I stepped aboard Nina R Sunday night. I wasn’t hungry, but my stomach was roiling from all the coffee I’d drunk, so we put a few potatoes in the oven to bake, assembled a garden salad and steamed a few salmon steaks. The night had turned chilly so we ate at the galley table. I told her the whole story about what I’d learned on Saturday. She took copious notes, and like the investigator she is, she asked lots of questions.

“Somebody is gaming you, Rankin.”

“That’s my take, too. I’m planning to have a long talk with Lupo tomorrow.”

“You think he’s behind this? That man spent the last twenty-five years in prison.”

“And he pointed me toward Miami, don’t forget.”

“What about the Corvette nobody can find? Who made it disappear? Gianni Lupo? Even if he was the Don of Dons he couldn’t pull that off.”

“Somebody set his granddaughter up with a cover identity, Cathy, and that same somebody is protecting her, or at least working hard to make sure nobody gets past the cover to see what’s behind it.”

Cathy grimaced. “You believe that kid behind the pharmacy about the drugs he claims he sold her?”

“Two questions about that; first, if he was on the level and things went as he says they did, maybe Nikki Gianuzzi was buying drugs from him as part of a sting operation. Second, if things went as he claims, maybe she was buying them to use herself. Some people do consume illegal drugs, though it’s unlikely any DEA agent would be that stupid. Third-”

“You said two things. I get to say something now.”

I shrugged and let her continue.

“Let’s say he was on the level and told you what he thought to be true. Never mind if what he said was a hundred percent valid; he thought it was. He sold her illicit drugs and assumed she was using them.”

“No law enforcement agency in the world would put a jerk like that on the street, and nobody is that good an actor. I’m taking him as real, right along with the hairdresser and the guy in the karate school.”

“So you believe what they had to say?”

“They all reported basically the same thing, with sufficient differences to allow me to build a fairly accurate appraisal of Tammy O’Shea/Nikki Gianuzzi.”

“But the hairdresser thinks she’s a high-priced call girl, the kid at the pharmacy thinks she’s a drug user, and the karate guy thinks she’s a nice rich lady with a healthy body,” Cathy retorted.

“They saw what Nikki wanted them to see. None of them saw her.”

Cathy shrugged. “So what’s third?”

I had to think about that for a second. “Ah, the third point I wanted to make. She bought the drugs as a part of her cover. The ‘flash’ car, the party girl and the drugs, and the proven martial arts expertise all paint a picture of a single woman with big bucks and a big lifestyle. That’s what she wants the world to see.”

“Why?”

“No idea. But it has to do with where she parked the car she didn’t drive on the Tamiami Trail the day she disappeared. The car she drove when she actually went into that apartment in that upscale complex. It has a lot to do with whoever she works for, or with, and what they’re doing.”

Cathy leaned back and stretched. “And what great insights do you have on who sent those two men to kill you last night?”

I shrugged again. “Great insights? I don’t have so much as an itty-bitty inkling.”

Well, I went and did it again

(Scroll down to the end to see the cover art for “Lonesome Cove”!)

I hated it the first time, too. Just as much as I hated it this time. And I knew – I knew I was gong to hate every minute of it. And I went and did it again anyway.

Not that I had any choice in the matter.

Needless to say, I’m referring to rebuilding my web site for the second time in a month. At least this time I DO get a blog page (not that I’ve figured out how to get a blog onto it yet) and I DO get analytics (not that there’s been any traffic on the site yet), and not that it looks particularly good or even in the same ball park of what I want it to look like.

But www.garyshowalter.com is  Live. It’s up there, it’s been Published, however you want to say it. My web site is out there once again for all the world to see. And just as soon as I get around to adding in the keywords and metatags on the pages folks should be able to pull it up in google, yahoo and any other search engine. Some day. Better be soon, too.

And there’s even a Contact Us form at the bottom of the nav bar. Wowie. Am I big time, or what?

There is an awful lot of work to do still. The Home page has an irritating table on the right side that just has to go. I’ll stick on another page and put the contents where they belong – on a page of their own. I don’t have an Events Page, either, so that has to be added, and I still need to get all of the book cover icons inserted and linked to the correct book pages on Amazon for punch-through’s. And a dozen other little odds and sods.

And the colors are – well, not attractive. I’m no diva when it comes to color coordinating stuff. I just do not pay any attention to that sort of thing. But even I can see it is not what I want it to be.

And I’m supposed to be a writer, not some geeky web site builder. Actually, I spent years in web site building and testing. I even did it for a very profitable living. But there is a very good reason I do not do this stuff for a living now. I do not enjoy it, not the least little bit. All that fiddly, hunty-pecky stuff sets my teeth on edge.

Enough. I’m ranted out for the evening. If you would pretty please with sugar on go to www.garyshowalter.com and poke around for a bit. Please, use that form on the Contact Us page and let me know what YOU think I should do. Especially if you have any opinions on the colorizing issue. I sure don’t.

Here’s an interesting thing that actually has to do with writing stuff. Sorta. I finally got the cover art photographed for “Lonesome Cove”!

Here it is, without any of the graphics in the way. All of my cover art is painted especially for my book covers by Mickey Summers of Silver Springs, Florida and used with his permission.

Neat, huh? Mickey Summers is a great artist. Thanks, Mickey!

Yesterday was absolutely Wonderful, and Today is ramping up to be just as Nice

 

I got up at 3 AM yesterday and left the house for the drive to the Inverness Book Festival. I live in Deland, Fl, on the East coast just inland from Daytona. Inverness is on the West coast. You know how some people 'hunt & peck' on keyboards, right. Well, that's how I navigate Florida roads...

Inverness finally showed up in the windshield at 7:30. I checked in with one of the boss ladies, found my table and spent the next forty minutes getting all my little rubber duckies in a row. Between catching up with a few of the other authors I knew from previous events and meeting lots of new ones (and drinking another much needed cup of coffee), I was ready a few minutes before the hordes of readers started to trickle in. And we were all busy for the rest of the day.

Not only was the room packed with authors and readers, there were two rows of marquee tents set up outside. It was one of the very best-organized events I have been to in the last few years.

Inverness, in case you are not familiar with it, is a small town  just inland from the West coast of Florida, close to Homosassa Springs, It is also the center of several retirement communities in the area and folks over there just love to read (oh, goody!)

Kathleen Walls, my tent mate at several events last year, is not only an author, she is a publisher of other authors. I was able to get into the Inverness Book Festival through her connections with the festival. Thank you so very much, Kathleen!

Kathleen is also going to be my publisher for “Lonesome Cove”.

One of the first visitors to my table spoke with me for a few minutes and then wandered off to look around for a bit. I suppose there were thirty authors in the room with me; authors of books on  living a spiritual life, poetry, making a business out of your music, historical fiction, mysteries, how-to politics and so on. quite an eclectic groups, actually.

Well, that lady I mentioned above came back about half an hour later and bought all three of my novels. That one sale covered the cost of my trip across the State. Then all I had to do was sell one more book to cover the gas back to Deland and another to cover my lunch and I’d be all set.

By the time I left Inverness that afternoon I not only covered the cost of the day in Inverness; I came home with plenty of cash.

I stopped in Silver Springs on my way home, to see the cover art for “Lonesome Cove”.  Mickey Summers is an amazing fellow; former educator (art) in the Marion County school system (30 years), former Ranger with the Florida Park system, naturalist (he spends every minute he can outdoors, and in Florida that means walking in forests, swamps and bogs) and he knows the history, geology and ecology of Florida better than you know the back of your hand. And he paints, too. He is a naturalist painter who can tell a very long story ( a picture is worth a thousand words, you say? That’s nothing to Mickey’s paintings) with a single picture.

Well, I didn’t have my camera with me, so the cover art is now here in Deland, waiting for me to pull it out of wherever it got packed for the move down here. It’s here, somewhere. I know it is. And I also picked up the MS for “Lonesome Cove”, as well. Mickey not only does my cover art; he is my first line of defense against my own stupidity in things like ‘choose’ instead of ‘chose’ and ‘bored’ instead of ‘board’, and having a character driving a red Ford pickup in one para and then putting him into a gray Buick sedan in the next.

Mickey checks dates, places and timing with a calendar, map and stop watch. And then he’ll draw a sketch, if he needs to, just to figure out if my descriptions of the layouts of scenes, rooms and the movements of characters is a bit too confusing for him. No kidding. he has saved my butt this way too many times to count.

So I’ve got my work cut out for me for the rest of this week; review the editing and make corrections, and then get the cover art photographed (yes, I can do a pretty good job with a camera and some photo editing software).

Then I print out a hard copy of the MS and get it up to my good friend Lesley in Jacksonville for a second look-see before sending it off to the publisher, who will have her own editor go over the MS before they start pre-production work

Have a great week. Oh, yes. I forgot. For those of you who plan to watch the Super Bowl today, I do hope you enjoy the game and the commercials. I’ll be sitting on the couch, too. And my team is guaranteed to win, so there (and no, I’m not going to tell you who that is).

I’ve posted a few blogs about moving my web site over to Microsoft’s Office 365 servers, so here is the very last on this issue: my new web site is finally up (www.garyshowalter.com) and everything – including my business email, works just fine, thank you so very much. At least, I think it does, which leads me to a request I have for you.

If you’ve stuck with me so far, please do me a very big favour ; on my web site there is a “Contact the Author” button on the left side of the window. It opens a short contact form where you can enter your name, email addy and stuff like that, and add a little note. Please do that for me. I

f you would like to be kept abreast of the progress on “Lonesome Cove: and further writing ventures I have lined up via a Notification List of readers I maintain, please let me know that specifically in the text box provided on the form.

If you do not make that request, I promise I will never send you an email for any reason (not because I do not like you and appreciate you, because I do. But if you do not request to be added to that notification list, I will not harass you with unwonted emails).

On my part I promise to never, ever, buy, sell or trade your email address to any person or agency or otherworldly being for anything, including gold, silver or Cheetos. Ever, I promise.

The Free Download Promotion of my second novel, “Hog Valley” has ended

 

The free download promotion of the Kindle version of my second novel, "Hog Valley", has ended. There were 1257 downloads during that period, from all around the world.

I got a big kick out of watching the numbers jump while folks downloaded the file.

The number of follow-on sales of my two other novels, "The Big Bend" and "Twisted Key", are very satisfactory, and I expect that number to increase over the next few weeks as people finish reading "Hog Valley".

Thank you to everyone who downloaded the novel. Please post a review of the novel for me on Amazon when you finish.

And remember, there are two other novels of mine up there, at very reasonable prices. And very soon my fourth novel “Lonesome Cove”, will join them.

Enjoy the story, folks, and thanks again for downloading “Hog Valley”.

A very Moving Experience

 

I have a strong dislike moving, almost as much as I have a strong dislike for accounting, and washing dishes and folding laundry and cutting the grass. I started to say I hate moving (and all that other stuff), but ‘hate’ is a very over-used and much misunderstood word. Hate implies a predilection to violence, and I have a strong dislike for violence.

Mostly because I have had to use violence in the past, and I have had violence done to me as well. While violence may appear to resolve a crisis in a very blunt fashion, and is very appealing on both the small and big screens, it does carry with it many undesirable and unexpected consequences (that script writers rarely bother with). So we’ll just go with ‘strongly dislike’, shall we?

Anyway, I had planned some day in the future to move to Deland, Florida, where I intended to work on my fifth novel in the life and times of Terrance Charles Rankin. Due to family issues, however, that move occurred last week instead of a few years down the road. Well, it’s done now and I am currently living and working in Deland.

My library is stacked up in a corner, in twelve rather heavy boxes, but my computer is up and running well, thank you very much. I have a number of chores yet to do to get me settled in, but I did find a rather good barber, yesterday, after first finding a rather bad one. In other words, one very good – and rather close – haircut required the attention of two barbers, at a cost of $32.00, not including a tip to either one.

But I can state there is at least one good barber in Deland, Florida, who will see me about twice a month for all the time I live here, and very bad one who might pass me on the street but will never see me darken the door to his shop, ever again.

Such is life. You pays your money and you takes your chances.

I got a call yesterday from an independent bookstore in Gainesville, Florida, telling me they are shutting down after nearly thirty years in the same location. That is a very sad thing to hear. They still have some few copies of my novels and want me to stop by and pick them up. Unfortunately, it will cost me as much in gasoline to drive to Gainesville and pick up those copies as I would ever make from selling them. So I will ask to have the books donated to the local public library, instead.

It is a sad comment on the economics of today that this is not the first independent to go under; it is even sadder to know that it will not be the last. People take a big risk with their life savings in starting a new business – bookstores included. People open a bookstore because they love books, and they love people who enjoy reading. When a bookstore dies, dreams die all around them.

As an author, I feel the loss of every bookstore, and not only as the loss of another market for my novels. I too, am a dreamer, you see.

And just like anyone else who experiences the loss of a dream and an enterprise, I immediately start looking for options, some other way to rebuild my life and keep my dreams and goals alive and thriving. Without a dream and the goals to support them, life loses its vibrancy, its tension and excitement. Without something to live for, why bother getting up in the morning?

So this morning I made the short drive into dynamic downtown Deland to an independent bookseller and offered a few copies of my novels on consignment. They were happy to take them, of course, and I was happy to pass them over. I’ll locate another bookstore in a week or so on the other side of town, and make the same arrangement with them.

On Saturday, the 4th of March (just before Super Bowl Sunday), I will be in Inverness, Florida, at St, Margaret’s Episcopal Church, 114 North Osceola Avenue, for the 2nd Annual Festival of Books. Apparently, the first was a roaring success, so they’re doing it again.

If you are in the area, please do stop by. Inverness is a very interesting little town, and that part of Florida has a lot to offer visitors.

“Lonesome Cove”, my fourth novel, is only days away from completion (I could have said hours, but knowing me as well as I do it really is days). Once it is on its way to the editors I will start writing my end of a novel I am co-authoring with a very interesting fellow who has the sort of chops that would make many men green with envy in today’s world of organized crime and counter-terror work.

I’ll get into this a bit more in an upcoming blog post. Needless to say, I am anxious to get started on this project.

I spent the last seven days in the hospital

 

And just got out this afternoon. Actually, I went on Friday night, was sent home on Sunday afternoon and went back in on Monday, feeling even worse than I had on Friday when I took my painfully swollen and completely useless right leg to the emergency room.

Okay, I admit it now. I am an old and essentially useless codger Well, I feel like one right now, anyway. I had to have help getting from the passenger seat into the wheelchair on Friday when my sister drove me to the emergency room, and I was well and truly bound up in my misery, on the verge of being a crotchety old fart, to boot. But my knee hurt, darn it, and I needed help, and I hate feeling helpless and needy.

I really, really, hate that feeling.

In fact, it blows my self-image right out of the water.

By Sunday, all the docs managed to do was pump me full of antibiotics and send me home. They had no idea what was wrong.

But when I hauled my sorry butt and very swollen knee back to the emergency room on Monday evening, the change in their approach to problem solving took a dramatic and very welcome turn for the better.

They pumped me full of morphine. I was Mr. happy in a very big way. At least, I was, until they slipped a very large needle into my right knee and began to draw out some hideous-looking greenish-brown fluid out of my knee. About thirty CC’s of file stuff. I admit that I let out a few girlish shrieks intermixed with sailor-like curses when they struck bone during the procedure, but aside from those brief (though very painful) moments of true weakness, I was my usually manly self.

Yeah, right. I was a true wussy-boy, and I admit it. My self-image is going to go through a reality check over the next few weeks.

Along with my web site, which I was supposed to be rebuilding during these last seven days. But my knee was in such bad shape all of last week I couldn’t even sit with my feet on the floor. In fact, it was so painful it hurt to lay flat on my back in bed. Once I realized the pain was not going away I had no choice but to take my sorry butt to the hospital.

And I’m glad I did. Screw the web site, or anything else I wanted to do with that time ( get married again to a wonderful woman, go sailing, build a boat, sell books, finish writing “Lonesome Cove”, whatever).

I am physically exhausted, and wondering why I am beavering away at this blog post. Actually, I know why; I do not want to get back into a bed of any sort right now. I want to do ‘stuff’, just as I have all of my life. Build things, design things, run companies, take a well-armed squad on patrol in the West Bank; you know, ‘Stuff’.

Laying flat on my back in bed scares me. It means I can’t do any of that ‘Stuff’.

So, this is my plan for the rest of this week. Get my web site redesigned and make it live before the weekend. I’m starting from scratch, using “KomPozer”  (http://www.kompozer.net/ ), a SourceForge free application to build the site.  I worked on web sites before, and have a pretty good idea of what’s involved. But I’ve never used an application like KomPozer to build one from scratch. I written HTML in Notepad (yes, you can do that, if you’re a purist. Purists insist on doing things the hard way, which is why I’m not a purist). 

I’ll let you know what I think of KomPozer once I’ve got the site up and running. I’ve gotten some good recommendation for the app, and that means a lot about its ease of use.

I had to trim the original site down by several pages that had little to do with my writing; it’s become somewhat haphazard with all of the additions over the last year or so. At a later date I will set up another site for the Photo Gallery and get that back on-line.

On Saturday, I will be at the Middleburg Historic Festival, 2102 Palmetto St, Middleburg, FL, between 8 am and 4 pm.

Then I have much of the week following to fine-tune the site and prep for all of the events I have crammed into the week following. Such as:

Please take note of the two interviews: 

On 14 November I will be live on WOCA 1370 AM out of Ocala, Fl, on their morning drive show, discussing “Twisted Key”.

On 16 November “The Authors Show”  (http://www.theauthorsshow.com/), available via internet all over the world, will begin broadcasting a pre-recorded interview with my about the novel.

 

14 November  - Live radio interview WOCA 1370 AM Radio, Ocala, Fl - 10:00 - 10:30 am

16 November - Green Cove Springs "Boutique" - VIA Clubhouse, 17 Palmetto Ave, Green Cove Springs, Fl 10:00 am - 5:00 pm

16 November -  I will be on "The Authors Show", http://www.theauthorsshow.com/, the most popular internet radio show devoted to authors in America, and available all over the world via Internet Radio. This is a pre-recorded and professionally edited interview. It will run at several times during the day and will be re-run the following weekend, as well. The show interviews several authors during the course of each week, and is well worth your time, if you love books and the people who write them.

19 November - Book signings at "A Novel Idea" bookstores in Ocala, Fl:
       Silver Springs Store: 2019 E. Silver Springs Blvd. - 12:00 - 2:00 pm
       College Ave store: 3131 S.W. College Ave. - 4:00 - 6:00 pm

 

Give the interviews a listen and let me know what you think.

Meeting Harsh Reality Head-on

Or, a Self-publishing nightmare come to Life.

If you are a self-published author, or hope to one day be self-published, or even just a fan of mine, you might find this both interesting and educational.

My first two novels, “The Big Bend” and “Hog Valley”, were published by Createspace, and I must say they did a truly professional job of it. My third novel, and the one I hoped to put me over the top in sales and see me well on the way to making an honest living as an author, is a chromatically variant equine (that’s a horse of a different color), indeed.

I have been desperately short of cash for most of this year, due to health issues and a depressingly small income. So, when “Twisted Key” was finally ready for the publisher, my finances were not. I couldn’t afford to go with CreateSpace, and did not want to lose the income I could generate from the Fall selling season.

So I started to look around for options, and thought I found a rather good one. Silly me. Silly, overly optimistic, desperately-short-of-cash-grabbing-at-straws me. I went with XLibris Book Publishing (http://www2.xlibris.com/bw_custom.html).

During my on-line searches for a POD publisher I came across their site and began to fill my contact info. I did NOT complete the form, or click the Submit button. I continued to search for other web sites, instead. But a few days later I received a phone call from one of their publishing consultants. Since he was on the phone I decided to speak with him and told him of my circumstances and what I needed from a publisher, including a cost-per-unit to me of around $5 – 6.00 before shipping. I even told him that CreateSpace charged me between $4.80 and $5.50 per copy for my first two novels in orders of 10 – 20 copies, and that I wholesale to indie stores at $10.00 and retail for $15.00 direct to customers, and that I expected to pay close to that with any publisher I signed with for “Twisted Key” He assured me that XLibris could meet all of my needs in interior formatting, provide both ISBN and LLC #’s and that he could arrange for me to make 3 payments to cover the fee.

We spoke a few times before I signed any agreements and during each conversation I asked about the cost-per-unit fee. He assured me it would be reasonable and that I could receive discounts for any size volume purchase to reduce the fee, and so on, but until they had the files for the interior and cover art and knew what their setup and productions costs would be he could not give me a cost per unit.

That made sense, so I signed the agreement and set up the financing plan. As you will see in the letter below, things didn’t work out quite the way I expected. Their work was good, in that the  interior was formatted (sort of) as I ordered and the cover art was more than acceptable; it was wonderful, in fact.

But the cost-per-unit was not. After the final payment was made I was told the cost-per-unit would be $13.00, not including shipping.  When I 9quite rightly) expressed my outrage, I was told that was their “Standard” fee.

As you will learn from reading the letter below, that is not the only disappointment I have had with XLibris Book Publishing. On 27 September, I sent a letter to their Customer Service department and requested a reply within 10 days. To date, I have not received anything in return.

Needless to say I will NOT be purchasing any copies of my third novel from XLibris. I cannot hope to make a living selling this novel for $12.00 wholesale or $15.00 retail when my cost-per-unit is $14.00 including shipping.

Here is the letter I sent to the XLibris Book Publishing company:

 

27 September, 2011

Gary Showalter

Orange Park, Fl

Sir, or Madam:

Regarding XLibris Book ID # 102560 (“Twisted Key”):

On the 5^th or 6^th of July of this year I entered into discussions with Genesis Dacua, a Publishing Consultant with XLibris regarding the publication of my third novel, titled “Twisted Key”. During these discussions, both verbal and through email, I explained the following:

I invest between 18 – 24 months researching, writing and editing each of my novels. “Twisted Key” is the third I have published, by the way. That is a major investment in time and materials by anyone’s estimate.

My first two novels were published by CreateSpace and used this format:

· Trade paper format (6 x 9)

· 14-point Garamond font for the body of the text

· I provide the body text and all additional text fully formatted other than page headings/numbering and the copyright page and ISBN/LLC info

· ISBN and LLC#’s

· I provide the cover art and approve the graphics work done on the cover.

We also discussed hardback and digital formats, and I told Mr. Dacua that I had digital versions for both Kindle and Nook already in the market at $5.00 and did not want another such, and that I saw no need for a hardback version since it would be priced well outside what my readers could pay for a book.

Genesis and I came to an agreement on the work to be done and the final price of 1,050.00. I made my first payment of $350.00 on 20 July, and the second on 20 August.

Near the end of August, Lorie Adams called and told me that everything was ready for publishing, and if I could make the final payment the files would be sent to the printer immediately.

My last payment of three at $350.00 was made on Friday, 02 September. I spoke with Seth Sisson on Monday of the following week and explained to him that I intended to launch the novel on 24 September at the Florida Heritage Book Festival in St. Augustine, FL and would need to have all of the materials (the 45 copies of the novel and the promotional materials), before that date.

This was in fact, done. The copies are in good condition (with the exceptions noted below), and the cover art and promotional materials are of good quality.

However, to get the materials on time I had to waive the inspection of the Author’s Copy (galley proof), since that would have required two weeks’ time we did not have to spare.

Sections #1 & 2 below could be blamed on my failure to wait for the Author’s Copy; however, both issues were included in the original written agreement with Mr. Dacua (attached) and the “Black &White Service Order Form” (also attached). XLibris’ failure to perform according to our agreement is responsible for these two issues.

After receiving my 45 ‘Free’ copies, I find myself with the following issues:

1. Incorrect font size in the body of the text.

a. I specified 14-point Garamond and you used 12-point

2. Missing LLC#.

a. As we have already discussed, my novels were to include an LLC # so they could be sold into libraries. That is a big market and without the LLC# I cannot get this novel into that market. This is going to cost me money.

3. Hardback and digital versions.

a. In discussions with Mr. Dacua I made it clear I did not want to pay for either the digital or hardback versions of my novel. Yet both were produced and were made available through the web site set up to market “Twisted Key”. The digital version was removed, but the hardback version is still available for sale. It was never to have been created, yet it was, as was the digital version.

4. Neither Lorie Adams, my Author Services Representative, nor Genesis Dacua nor Seth Sisson, a Senior Book Consultant, told me what my cost-per-unit was going to be, despite repeated requests by me for that information. Genesis stated that he had no idea what that price would be until after his people had completed the formatting. In my several conversations with the above named individuals I explained that I am a novelist and that I write for a living. I told all three of your employees that I sell my novels at retail for $15.00 and that is where my novel had to be sold. In response I was told that I could price my books however I wanted. That was a completely inadequate and disingenuous response. I was also told, several times, about how the number of copies I ordered would affect the discount I would receive on each copy. Again, very disingenuous and totally useless without knowing what the cost per unit was.

a. Only after XLibris received my final payment was I given the cost-per-unit price of $13.00 per copy. On top of that, I was told by Seth and by Genesis both that this is your “Standard” price. If they knew that after you had received my final payment, Genesis certainly knew this during our initial conversations. Had he been honest with me I could have made an informed decision about whether to proceed doing business with XLibris or to look elsewhere.

b. My first two novels, “The Big Bend” and “Hog Valley”, published by CreateSpace, cost me $4.80 for “The Big Bend” and $5.14 for “Hog Valley”. Per copy, in lots of 10.

c. “Twisted Key”, on the other hand, published by you, cost me $13.00 per unit.

5. I cannot purchase copies from XLibris at $13.00 each (plus shipping charges) and hope to sell them at $15.00 retail, much less $10.00 wholesale to book stores.

Nobody could, and hope to make a living doing so.

Therefore, and setting aside for the moment the issues identified in sections 1, 2, & 3 above, I find myself, after having paid $1,050.00 dollars for your services, that I cannot afford to purchase copies of my novel since I cannot sell them at a price that would allow me to recover my initial investment, never mind making a living.

I find that I have, without a doubt, wasted over $1000.00 I cannot hope to recover from selling copies of my novel.

Please respond within ten (10) business days with a solution to these issues.

 

Today I began to file complaints with a few online rip-off and scam sites, social media sites and a few authors networking sites to which I belong. Later today I will visit the BBB on-line site and file a complaint with them, as well.

In the meantime, do yourself a favor and stay far away from XLibris Book Publishing.

I will post more on this issue next week.

“Twisted Key” is now available

 

My third novel, “Twisted Key”, is now available for purchase. What follows is a brief description:

Terry Rankin has a new client; Fatima al Natsche, a Muslim woman living under a sentence of death for her work on behalf of women suffering under Islamic law. Terry’s a businessman – he’ll protect just about anyone who can pay the freight. In fact, he admires Ms. Al Natsche and the sacrifices she’s made to get her message out.

But then her daughter flies over from Norway and gets snatched off the street in front of her mother’s home, and all of the masks come off and all of the dirty little secrets come out to play in the Florida sun.

“Twisted Key” is a story about a clash of cultures and family values gone wrong. It’s about buried treasure and what happens when the allure of big bucks meets honor and self respect.

You can find it on line now at: www.TwistedKeynovel.com. It should also be available through the Amazon and Barnes and Noble web sites but that will take another month or so.

In the meantime I am hard at work on “Lonesome Cove”, and spending my spare time (like I have any) setting up a shop to build harps.

I have some events scheduled for the Fall and Winter seasons, and will be adding a few book signings at bookstores in the  North Florida area in the near future:

24 September - Florida Heritage Book Festival, #50 Sevilla Street, Flagler College Ringhaver Student Bldg, 2nd Floor, St. Augustine, Fl. 9:00 - 5:00

15 - 16 October - Orange Park Winter Festival, 9:00 am - 5:00 pm, corner of Kingsley Rd. and Park Ave.  Orange Park, Fl

22 October - Calvary United Methodist Church Harvest Festival, 9:00 am - 3:00 pm, 112 Blanding Blvd, Orange Park, Fl.

5 November - Middleburg Historic Festival, 9:00 am - 5:00 pm, 2102 Palmetto St, Middleburg, Fl

Please drop me a line at: gary@garyshowalter.com and let me know what you think of my story.

Sometimes, Life hands you lemons, and even makes you wear shoes

And sometimes, Life hands you lemon meringue pie. But in this case, it was lemons – maybe. I had hoped to launch my third novel, “Twisted Key”, at the Florida Heritage Book Festival in St. Augustine on the 24 th of September. That might still happen, but the publisher refuses to promise or even hint at the possibility of the books arriving on time, or even a week later.

I truly hate my publisher, and dream of doing dastardly things to all and sundry who work there. But I am a realist, so those dreams will remain just that. But one always has options, don’t one? This one do, for sure.

With that said, I will be at the Festival with “The Big Bend” and “Hog Valley”, and with a great deal of good fortune (Life does owe me a bit of that), “Twisted Key” will be there as well. If not, I do have several other engagements arranged for the fall and early winter, and will be setting up a few book signings to fill out the pre- holiday season.

Now I have to get a haircut and beard trim, and root around in my closet for my shoes. I hate wearing shoes almost as much as I hate my publisher, and that’s saying quite a lot about my feelings toward shoes.

You will be hearing some details later on about this particular publisher, but for right now, ‘nough said on that subject.

Way too hot and way too tired

But nobody cares, since most everyone else is in the same boat, except, of course, for folks who work in air conditioned offices. I used to, and at the time I had no pity in my heart for all those folks sweating away in the heat and humidity. I guess it’s karma, because I’m right back to sweating. And it’s really hot. And humid.

I wonder if it’s any better in Caspar, Wyoming? I know it’s far worse in Leaky, Texas.

Last weekend we rented a U-Haul truck and made two trips from the old apartment to the new house.  I was so wiped out from that that I blew off two scheduled meetings during the week so I could recover.

Today we filled up a van and two cars with more stuff. I have no idea where all of this stuff is supposed to go; this house is more than twice the square footage of the old apartment, but every nook and cranny is filled with boxes of stuff. We are gonna have a really big yard sale, some time real soon now.

On 09 August, the New York Times carried an article by Julie Bosman titled, “Publishing Gives Hints of Revival, Data Show”.  Without differentiating between eBooks and printed books, recent statistics developed by Book Stats show that in 2010 the publishing industry ended up the year with a net revenue of $27.9 billion dollars. That’s an increase of 5.6% over 2008. 2.57 billion books in all formats were sold in 2010; a 4.1% increase over 2008.

Good news for writers, huh? Here’s a reality check for those nice folks who boost eBooks over paper. In 2008, eBooks made up 0.6% of the total trade market. By 2010, that percentage grew to 6.4%. That is a growth of 1274% in three years.

Traditional publishers don’t seem to be all that worried, though. Or maybe they’re drinking their own koolade again.

In May of this year, Amazon stated that eBook sales passed print books for the first time.

I’ve got two events in this week:

16 August - "One Book, One Putnam" Putnam County, Fl, Woman's Club of Palatka, Inc., 605 South 13th Street (on the corner of Crill Ave. and 13th St.), Palatka, FL 32178, 5:30 - 7:30 PM. Multiple authors will be present

17 August – member of 3 - person panel  (with Lydia C. Filzen, and Susan D. Brandenburg) at the meeting of the Clay County Writer’s Group to discuss writing as a second career. The event will be at the Fleming Island Library Meeting Room and starts at 6:15 pm.

Stop by if you’re in the area. And have a good week.

A Very Brief Update

 

We are a bout half-way through our moving into a new (to us, anyway) home. It’s a 3-bedroom, 2-bath single story home with a  large screened in porch, kinda-sorta sunken living room and a two-car garage that I will be using as a workshop. The move is not going quick, but it is moving along.

I spend about half my day in the workshop – I built a nice office desk to replace the table I’ve been using in the apartment. It needs rebuilding, very badly. My dad built it during the 1960’s while we were living in the Panama Canal Zone out of Luann mahogany, and the joints have since dried out. So I bought a load of 2 X 4’s and 2 X 6’s and a solid core 30” door. Then I bought even more 2 X 4’s and 2 X 6’s to build a work bench. So the office desk is complete and set up in the  office (the third bedroom) along with my book cases and I am now finishing up a temporary top for my work bench. I’ll take some digital photos later today or tomorrow and publish them on my next post.

The big news for this very busy period is that “Twisted Key” is now in the hands of the publisher. I’ve received proofs for the paperback and hardback covers and made a few comments. As soon as I get the final proofs, I’ll post them here. All I can say right now is that they are truly gorgeous!

I’ve got the landlord coming by later this morning to finish up some work in the new place so I can’t hang around here.

Lots to do, and all too little time to get it all done. The weeks just fly by, don’t they? Where are we all rushing too, I wonder?

“Twisted Key”, “Lonesome Cove”, writing and what I’m reading

 

I’m getting this blog out early. I don’t recall ever doing this before, but then I’ve never been this busy before, either.

I sent out a notice to my readers last Saturday evening offering signed and numbered copies of “Twisted Key” in return for a contribution toward the publication of the novel. Health issues over the last few years have come close to wiping me out financially, so it just made sense to do this.

This offer is being run through Kickstarter, an on-line ‘Crowdfunding’ organization. You can click on the link below to read through the offer:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/344026567/publication-of-my-third-novel-twisted-key

The response has been very encouraging. I have received about a quarter of the necessary funds during the first week. The offer for advance copies of “Twisted Key” will run through 11 July. If you enjoy a good mystery novel, you can’t go wrong with “Twisted Key”. It is by far the best I’ve done to date.

Work on “Lonesome Cove” has been put on hold until “Twisted Key” goes off to the publisher. I can have the first draught complete with another month’s work, but that means I have to be able to concentrate on nothing but the writing, and I just can’t do that right now.

I suppose some writers could, but I rely on my characters and their read of the situation for guidance when I write. My characters drive my stories, and getting into that ‘zone’ means not having any distractions to deal with.

Outlines work really well for me when I work on a non-fiction project; but I just can’t write fiction that way.

I start with a snapshot of a scene – a brief moment in time – and ask myself three questions: what is going on in the scene, how did those people come to be there, and what happens next? Then I write the first draught. That’s all there is to the ‘creative’ aspect of writing. Everything else is rewriting. And editing. And marketing.

My bookshelf is growing. I recently acquired Winston Churchill’s 6-volume work on WW II, and am about a third of the way through the first volume. This mammoth work ahs been labeled as Churchill’s effort to make himself look good for posterity. Well, of course it is.

Why would anyone in his right mind spend so much effort to make himself look bad? Churchill wrote to get his point of view events across to historians, politicians and people in general, and I salute him for that. If Winston Churchill hadn’t stood up and done his job we’d be living in a much grimmer world right now.

I’m also working my way through Terry Pratchett’s “Unseen Academicals”. I’ve read just about everything he’s written over many years and enjoyed all of them. I’ve also got S.M. Sterling’s “High King of Montival” on my nightstand (okay, I don’t have a nightstand, but the book is close by, I promise), and I’ll get to it right after I finish Mr. Pratchett’s novel. One must stick to one’s priorities, or why have them at all?

I am somewhat confused about a few things

 

And I am a day late in posting this, too. Sorry about that. Part of that confusion I mentioned above, I suppose. Lately people have been telling me to focus more. My web site is way too diverse, and so are my blog posts.

Frankly, I know the web site needs a redo, and I have been putting it off since I am not a web site designer and absolutely refuse to pay someone who is to take the job on. I’m a writer with more than a passing acquaintance with computers and internet technology. Enough experience, in fact to have a pretty good idea of what I don’t know when it comes to designing web sites. And I don’t really want to take the time to learn all that stuff.

So I will be redesigning my web site some day real soon now. I promise.

This blog started out with the goal of writing about writing, and to me that includes writing about the software I use and the problems I face in using it and the solutions (if any) to those problems. And I’ve heard from several people over the last few weeks that I have to focus like a laser on writing – maybe included excerpts from the novel I’m writing and invite comments and suggestions. That sort of thing.

But I should stick to writing about writing and avoid computer stuff and furniture and restoration and stuff.

Well, maybe, but then again, maybe not. I am a writer with a very broad background, and all of that experience – in computers, and furniture making and restoration and silver and gold smithing and grounds maintenance and half a dozen other lines of work are all a part of yours truly, and that experience influences my novels no end.

I’m not going to start a blog just about furniture making for the same reasons I’m not going to start a blog about gold smithing or stone setting. Simply put, I don’t make a penny from these posts, but I do make a living (well, sort of) from my novels. So I spend much of my valuable (to me) time writing those novels and put in about an hour a week on this blog and checking out FaceBook and LinkedIn and the other social media sites where I have a presence.

And I will probably continue to write about computers and software and the problems they give me because I know good and well those same problems are ticking other folks off just as much as the do me. And some of those folks are writers and a lot of them are readers, too.

About the only things I will promise you I will never, ever cover in these blog posts are religion and politics. There are a few other subjects, but they’re not worth mentioning. In any case I’ll never discuss them, so who cares.

About a week ago I released “Collected Essays & Articles Written in Israel During 2001”, in Kindle format on Amazon.  I moved to Israel in 1981 and left to return to the States at the end of 2003, so I had some familiarity with Israel, Israelis and Israeli politics in the year 2001. In fact I knew a few of the Movers and Shakers in those days.  I admired many of them and couldn’t stand to be in the same room with the rest.

Everything in the collection has been published.

Here’s the link to the collection:

http://www.amazon.com/Collected-Essays-Articles-Written-ebook/dp/B004ZGOKVA/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1305063089&sr=1-4

The articles in this collection cover cover Israeli politics and Muslim terror, and I don’t pull any punches with either subject. Some of the material is valuable for its historical value but most of it is still relevant to the world we find ourselves in today.

These articles are not the “I’ve got the answers to the world’s problems!” sort of things. They are a very direct, no-holds-barred, concise explanation of the who, what, when where, why and how of many of the problems Israel faces today and what American should expe4ct to face tomorrow and next year and the year after that.

Let me know what you think.

“Hog Valley” has been nominated for the Dan Poynter Global eBook Award

 

 

This is a very big deal, friends and neighbors. Dan Poynter is a mover and shaker in the world of ePublishing, and he has set up this contest for eBooks to ensure national and international recognition for the best of the best in electronic books. “Hog Valley” has been nominated for this award.

If you have read the novel in either paperback or in Kindle format, please click on the link below and give the novel a rating (preferably the highest), and leave a brief comment on your opinion of the story:

http://awardsforebooks.com/book-writing-contest/fiction-mystery-suspense-thriller/hog-valley/

Just below the book title “Hog Valley”, on the top left of the page, you will see 5 ‘E’s. Click on the right hand ‘E’ to give the novel the highest possible rating. Further down the page is a Comment box. Please leave a brief comment about your response to the story.

I cannot promise to name my first-born child after you. He’s 25, much larger and meaner than I am, and he would probably object to having his name changed. But I would still be very grateful to you.

Awards mean a great deal to the commercial success of any novel. Not only does the author get a pretty sticker to put on his book covers, but major publishing houses, literary agents, book reviewers and readers all pay attention to these awards and the author whose work grabbed that particular brass ring.

“The Big Bend” and “Hog Valley” are both available in paperback and  the Kindle eBook format, and my third novel, “Twisted Key” has recently been released in Kindle format. It should also be available in paperback some time in July or early August.

Right now, the Kindle versions of my books are on a par with the paperback sales. As awareness of Terry Rankin stories grows I fully expect Kindle sales to outpace paperback sales. That is the way the publishing industry is moving. eBooks have all sorts of advantages over paperbacks – price is only the most obvious of those differences.

I’ll get my regular post out in another few days.

Have a good week.

“Twisted Key” in Kindle format

I have been placed in the unenviable position of having to make an executive decision for which I find myself criminally ill-equipped. The MS for “Twisted Key” has been ready to go to the publisher for some time, and I have had the photography of the cover art (painted by my good friend Mickey Summers) for the last few weeks. But a few unfortunate delays have pushed out the publishing date for the paperback version until July.

However, the Kindle beckoned.

My hope was that I would produce the Kindle version at the same time the paperback version became available. I could not rationalize waiting that long before making the Kindle version available for those who own Kindles.

So that’s what I did with my day (so far – it’s only ten am and there’s no telling what kind of trouble I’ll get into later on). I sized the cover art to 6” X 9” and added a title and author name, as you can see below:

 

 

Then I cleaned up the *.doc file and uploaded the two files to the Kindle Publisher. It should be available for sale at www.amazon.com some time in the next few days. I’ll provide a direct link in my next blog post. In a few days, say Saturday or Sunday,  do a search for my name in the books section of the Amazon site. That should bring up all of my published works, including the Kindle version of “Twisted Key”.  Just so you know, it’s priced as $9.95.

I’ve mentioned this before, but the three readers who had access to the completed manuscript all said it is a very interesting and edge-of-the-seat story.  One reader, Kathy O’Donnell, the owner of the “Well Loved Books” bookstore here in Orange Park, read it in six hours. When I asked how she did that, she said one of the reasons was that Spike is back in the story line. That’s right, the six-toed marina cat is back, and just as feisty as ever.

Have a good week.

Sales are up, I am happy to say.

Technorati Tags: book sales,writing,Life in general

 

Internet sales of “The Big Bend” and “Hog Valley” were both up for the month of March. The best month in this new year to date. That’s for both paperback and Kindle, by the way. I very much hope that “Twisted Key” will be out soon, and that should go a long ways toward improving relations with my bank manager.

I didn’t get to do much on “Lonesome Cove” this week. Some editing was done at the beginning of the week – I’m up to page 204 in the  manuscript, which means it’s time to go back and massage all the bits into place before I write the final one hundred pages of the story.  But some time on Tuesday I began to feel a bit ill – passing kidney stones at first, then a cyst on my back began to get a bit fractious and then an abscess began to form behind one of my molars.

Aha! Said I, as a pattern began to make itself apparent.

That’s when I realized I needed to see a doctor. So the cyst has been drained – twice, and I’m on three types of antibiotics. No more kidney stones flowing painfully through places they have no right to be, and the abscess behind my molar is beginning to shrink. Getting old is not as much fun as the adds on television say it is.  But at least I’m still here to write about it.

I was supposed to drive down to Silver Springs this weekend to photograph the artwork for the cover of “Twisted Key”,  but what with being nibbled into an early grave by that infection I had to put it off. I hope to do that Tuesday morning. Mickey Summers, the artist who does all of my cover art, says it’s a lovely picture and photographs very well. I’ll try to get a photo posted when I get back.

One of my favorite authors – Simon Winchester – has a new book out. It’s titled “Atlantic”. Simon writes about real stuff. “Krakatoa”, “A Crack in the Edge of the World”, “The Map that Changed the World”. Fascinating stuff, and he writes in absolutely gorgeous English. Not only that, but you can actually understand what he’s saying. His writing is clear and engaging and the subject matter is truly fascinating. If you have any interest in how this planet of ours works, about how we as humans cope with this earth and its changes, pick up one of his books. You won’t be disappointed.

I’ll be back to work on “Lonesome Cove” on Wednesday and try to get the editing done by the weekend. Then I start on the final third of the story.

Have a good week. Stay safe.

“Lonesome Cove”, “Twisted Key” and Google SketchUp

Technorati Tags: writing,editing,cover art,software review

 

Let’s talk about software first. Google’s “SketchUp” ( http://sketchup.google.com/) is an unlimited use, free 3D modeling program. There is a pay version for around $495.00, but most people will never need the additional features. Google developed SketchUp for use in modeling structures in Google Earth. Then they figured out it was commercially viable and put it on the market. It is without a doubt the easiest to use 3D CAD program in the whole wide world.

There is a learning curve associated with any design program of course, but Google has managed to simplify things to the Nth degree.That URL contains links to a lot of on-line training videos and all of the help you will ever need to become proficient in the use of this lovely little program.

But wait, there’s more!

I’m not designing buildings. I spent a lot of my life as a furniture maker/restorer/designer. Check the Photo Gallery on my web site (http://garyshowalter.com/PhotoGallery.aspx) for samples. I don’t have photos of every piece I’ve ever built or designed, but there is enough there to prove that I have spent many hours over a drawing board. In the 1980’s I worked with AutoDesk’s AutoCAD in a few architectural firms and even owned one of the early versions of AutoCAD LT.

Google SketchUp is a perfect tool for woodworkers who do their own design work. Fine Woodworking magazine (http://www.finewoodworking.com/) sells a downloadable (in *.PDF format) eBook titled “Google SketchUp Guide for Woodworkers” by Timothy S. Killen through their on-line Store (http://store.finewoodworking.com/sketchup-guide-for-woodworkers-tim-killen-ebook-077846.html). It costs $12.99 and is well worth the price.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I am going to be building myself a proper desk for my home office. It will be based on the Wooton Patent Office Desk, and I include a photo here so you can get an idea of what I’m talking about:

 

I have no intention of building anything as fancy as that desk. There won’t be any fretwork on the top and I will cut the pigeon holes above the writing surface to a minimum; I need that space for a computer monitor, for a start, and below the drop-down writing surface I need space on the left for the computer case and on the right I need space for a trash can. In between I need space for my knobby knees. Most of the storage space inside the doors will be for file folders, spare pens, cell phones, specialty paper and so on. My version of the desk will be about 48” across the front and about 60” high.

I much prefer Shaker-style furniture; simple clean lines where form follows function so the desk will have clean lines with a minimum amount of molding. I am not a fan of dark woods, especially in small rooms (dark wood just sucks all of the light out of a room). Since I don’t have a large (or even a small) workshop nowadays (or even a workbench, much less a place to put one), I will be working in veneered plywood for the case and using ‘Real’ wood to trim it out along all of the exposed edges. And a router to cut dadoes and mortises and trimming edges and so on.

But don’t think SketchUp is limited to designing buildings for GoogleEarth or designing furniture. Approachable, useable 3D CAD software can be adapted for use in just about any craft. At these prices, what have you got to lose?

“Lonesome Cove” is close to 180 pages now, and is fast approaching a few critical scenes. I've backed of writing for a few days while the scenes sort themselves out in the depths of my lizard brain. Actually, I just got tired of writing and took a few days off to see what the rest of the world is up to. I’ll be back to work on it today.

I have a radio interview at 10:00 in Ocala on Tuesday morning at WOCA AM to discuss “Hog Valley” and and announce the book signing at A Novel idea bookstore on Silver Springs Blvd on Saturday. I hope to pick up the cover art for “Twisted Key” from the artist after the interview and then I can get the package off to the publisher near the end of this month.

Wednesday morning I’ll be in Fernandina Beach to meet with some very nice people who have expressed an interest in carrying my books.

And of course on Saturday I will be at A Novel Idea on Silver Springs Blvd from noon to 2 PM. Stop by and say hello!

Have a good week.