My New Book Has Just Been Published

I’m pleased to announce that my new ebook, The Turncoat Chronicles, has just been published both on Amazon.com and on Smashwords.com. Why publish it in both places? Because Amazon only offers it in their own proprietary Kindle format (AZT), while Smashwords converts it not only for the Kindle, but for all the other ereader formats, as well. If you don’t own an ereader, it’s not a problem. You can download a reader for your computer for free. I like the Adobe Digital Editions reader which provides a smooth and pleasant reading experience in the epub format.

I’m expecting the book to raise some eyebrows in the U.S.A., as it’s openly critical of the past half century of foreign and domestic policy abortions carried out by the country’s big military, industrial and government operators. Having said that, what little feedback I’ve had thus far has only been positive. Though I suspect that’s because that praise has come from what our friend Moroccan Sheila calls “birds of my feather.”

You know the opinion I’m really interested in hearing? Yours.

How Internet Body-Snatched Marketing and Changed Writers’ Lives Radically — III/III

This is the third and last part of a three-part post, about Internet book marketing, excerpted from Michael Booth’s ebook, The Ebook Ebook.

A Social Networking Site That Will Work for You

Want a social networking site that will actually work for you? There is one, but you have to create it yourself. By laying out the playing field and establishing the ground rules you can tailor your social network to your own needs. Make a thematic network related to the subject of your book and you can turn yourself and your book into the arbiters of your entire sector. It’s far easier than you might imagine.

How Internet Body-Snatched Marketing and Changed Writers’ Lives Forever — II/III

This is the second installment of a three-part post on Internet marketing for authors.

The Web Is a Hotline to the World’s Readers

It’s cheap and easy to reach the people you need on the World Wide Web.  There are several routes in, and when you cover enough of them they create an effective “spider’s web” of communications. For openers there’s the website, or better yet, a series of interlinked mini-sites dedicated to each of your books.

How the Internet Body-Snatched Marketing and Changed Writers’ Lives Forever I/III

This is the first of a three-part post about how profoundly the Internet has changed marketing, extracted from Michael Booth’s new  ebook, The Ebook Ebook. The changes, of course, include those in book marketing. The short answer: The better you use the tools which Internet provides you (most of them free) the more successful your book promotion –and sales– will be. The bad news: 1/ You can’t do it without Internet. 2/There’s a learning curve.

The secret to getting on top: Get started now!

If the publishing world has evolved in the past few years, the changes in marketing have been equally dramatic. Briefly, the new online marketing model has supplanted old-fashioned marketing. (Why? Because it’s better: cheaper, faster, more efficient and easily quantifiable.) These changes in marketing technology were accelerated by a worldwide economic crisis the likes of which nobody under the age of 80 had ever seen before. The changeover hit so fast, in fact, that a lot of marketing professionals—including book marketers–were unable to keep up and were abandoned along the trail.

In Order to Survive Newspapers Have to Disappear

In an excellent long article on the future of the newspaper industry published in the London Review of Books, John Lanchester arrives at a fascinating conclusion: In order to survive newspapers have to disappear. At least in their “outlandishly expensive” print versions. The future? You guessed it: eNewspapers. If this trend pays out the way the author foresees, with millions of people running around with e-reader gizmos in their pockets, it will be a tremendous boon for ebooks, and by extension ebook writers and publishers.

Self Publishing and Libraries

Carly Arthur, Syracuse University graduate student in Library Science, writing in her blog, Think in LIS, reflects on the implications of ebooks for (especially) public libraries, a subject often overlooked by people who do ebooks in one form or another. Carly says:

Young California Newspaper Pro Joins Online-Publishing Bigtime

The Book Brewer show team. Dan Pacheco is at right.

Dan Pacheco, a bright young Californian who presented a printcasting project to the Knight News Challenge in 2008, woke up the other morning in the ebook-publishing bigtime. Borders, the book people, who were looking for a viable online-publishing solution which would bring them up to speed with Amazon, Smashwords and Barnes & Noble in that department, decided in favor of Book Brewer, Pacheco’s ebook publishing application.

The Digital Innovators Interviews: London’s James Bridle

This young man is a smart and eclectic cookie. He has some interesting things to say about e-publishing.

Suddenly Indie Authors Are Being Courted by a Helpful Army on a Roller Coaster

If there was ever any doubt about recent changes in attitudes towards self publishers, now we find collectives of literary brahmins who formerly wanted very little to do with them,  courting these erstwhile untouchables. Beginning with (Holy Cow!) literary agents. If in previous times the whole publishing establishment considered unknown authors little more than obstructions in the pipeline, today we are seeing fairs and conferences, websites and blogs aimed at the online self-publishing market. They will advise you, guide you, hold your hand, edit you, proofread you, market you, provide you with art work and shine your shoes. All for a price, mind you.

Ebooks Are Good for You!

There are three things I hope you will take away from this site and this book:

1. My enthusiasm for this new form of publishing which is already shaking the foundations of the traditional publishing world, and about to shake those of the rest of the world, as well.
2. Some critical observations. Feedback is the life blood of online communication.  So please be sincere and prolific with your comments.
3. A desire to spread the word. Though money is not my first priority (hardly, with the book priced at $2.99), I want you to buy The Ebook Ebook and–if you find it useful and interesting–tell your friends and colleagues about it.