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Old 01-11-2012, 05:49 AM   #1
ATDrake
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Exclamation Free (Kindle DRM-free) October Five by Mobashar Qureshi [Canadian Mystery] +KDP

No significant backlist sf/fantasy has yet shown up in the KDP Select exclusive-or-else slushpile trawl.

But there is something nice for Canadiana mystery aficionados. (And a few romance thriller etc. for non-Canadiana/non-mystery aficionados.)

The Mercury Press is a long-established (okay, they're older than I am, which I count as ancient in publishing terms) Canadian small-press imprint which has produced stuff which has gone on to win the Governor General's Award.

Mobashar Qureshi, a Nigerian-born Canadian writer, was once named a top 10 rising mystery talent in our semi-prestigious Quill & Quire book industry/home-grown literature magazine, roughly equivalent to Publisher's Weekly.

The October Five by Mobashar Qureshi is an apparently police procedural murder mystery, originally published by Mercury Press in 2009.

He also offers some other novels and short fiction at prices ranging from 99 cents to $2.99, it looks like.

Free without DRM for who knows how long @ Amazon main UK DE ES FR IT.

Description
Veteran Detective Karl Whaler is thrown into an investigation that may be the strangest and most dangerous of his career, involving five men who meet secretly in a room. They consist of a Plumber, an Electrician, a Caretaker, a Locksmith, and a Butcher.

Whaler’s search leads him to a mystery that is decades old.

The October Five is a mystery that examines friendship, loyalty, and justice.


Award-winning sf writer Eric James Stone's free story of the day is: Tabloid Reporter to the Stars

Don Pendleton, writer of those Mack Bolan: Executioner action/adventure novels which my library has in paperback, offers the self-explanatory: Time to Time: Ashton Ford, Psychic Detective. Other books in this and another series by him are $2.99.

Kensington & Harlequin-published Doreen Owens Malek offers two more romances; contemporary with lawyer & soap opera star: Another Life, historical which looks like it's set in the US Civil War, though there could be some other context for "rebel" such as Highland Scot: Torchlight

Kensington-published cozy mystery writer Peggy Webb offers two romances free to all via Smashwords; time-travel romance novella: Christmas in Time, humorous contemporary romance: Donovan's Angel

Formerly featured small-press erotic romance writer Jenna Byrnes offers two shorter tales; paranormal f/m ghost romance: Dreams of Dani

In conjunction with also-Phaze Press-published Jude Mason, Byrnes offers an m/m romantic suspense: Willing and Able

Mason also offers a solo m/m historical romance short with a paranormal element: Of Death and Desire

Writers who have been omnibused with formerly Dorchester-published Gemma Halliday's works have some of their own works free if you want to try them (mainly horror & thriller as far as I can tell + some mystery and maybe a fantasy): Scott Nicholson, J.R. Rain, Aiden James.

Previously-featured Robert Swartwood, who had a few stories published in respectable horror/literary outlets, offers a collection of such (may not be the same as the published ones): Phantom Energy: [Very Short] Stories

(ETA: Short zombie story by Swartwood which he says won some kind of contest: In the Land of the Blind)

J.R. McLemore, who similarly has one or two stories published in traditional small-press horror/thriller magazines, offers a mystery/thriller novel: Majoring in Murder

Previously-featured Robert W. Walker's 5th Jessica Coran Forensic Pathologist thrillers is now KDP-freebied and seems to have comparatively better reviews than the 7th posted earlier: Darkest Instinct.

Fellow MR member author and writer of TV show tie-in novels Lee Goldberg offers a PI mystery/thriller: Watch Me Die.

Dave Zeltserman's Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine Reader's Choice award-winning short stories are now KDP-freebied (previously free for a long time on Smashwords, but now Amazon-exclusive): Julius Katz Mysteries

Berkley-published Julie Hyzy offers a mystery in her Alex St. James series: Deadly Shorts

If you missed UK writer John Matthew's previously Penguin-published legal thriller earlier, it's free again: Ascension Day.

That pretty much seems to be it. Happy reading, if you see anything you think you might like.

ETA: This is as far as I can tell not a genuine backlist author/book (only work, published as only book by "publisher" who's never printed anything else), but the Product Description section is certainly what I can only hope is a work of performance art and I encourage you to view it for the lulz: Noble Vision: A Novel

That is possibly the most brilliantly elaborate product-page-trolling I have yet to see on Amazon, short of those comedic fake reviews on the 3 Moon Wolf Shirt and the Tuscan Milk.

Huh. Looks like the author may actually be seriously for serious about that. But the hyperbole of the quoted "reviews" are still sporfle-tastic, even if subject to Poe's Law.

I also like how the moment there's a 1-star review, several other 5-star reviews pop up in the next couple of weeks, some by people who've never bothered to review anything else thus far. But that may simply be coincidence. Very enthusiastic sudden coincidence.

Last edited by ATDrake; 01-11-2012 at 03:09 PM. Reason: You'd think that a testimonial from a Nobel non-literature laureate on a self-published novel would be totally fake.
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