"The Shameless Promotion and Endless Plug-Your-Novel Thread"

[Joseph Rhea]

CYBERDROME
The debut science fiction thriller from the Rhea Brothers.

Winner of the 2008 PODBRAM Award for "Best Science
Fiction Novel of the Year" and more than 1400 copies sold
this year alone.

Now reduced to just $0.99!



Alek Grey specializes in preventing break-ins to secure computer systems.
When a company calls him in after their system is compromised, he is shocked
to learn that his own father is one of over forty people trapped in neural-interface
with a revolutionary new form of artificial reality called Cyberdrome.

When an attempted rescue mission goes horribly wrong, trapping his ex-girlfriend
along with the others, he learns that these events may have been triggered by
the emergence of a smarter-than-human intelligence inside Cyberdrome,
possibly giving rise to the long-feared, "Technological Singularity." Faced with
overwhelming obstacles and quickly running out of time, Alek realizes that
there is only one way left to save the people he loves.

But that could mean risking the fate of all humanity!


Now available in eBook format for the Amazon Kindle, B&N Nook,
Sony Reader, Apple iPad, and paperback too! (see links below)

Links:
Kindle Version at Amazon: Now just $0.99 [DRM-encryption-free!]
Epub version at Smashwords: Now just $0.99 [use coupon code WV76R]
Other versions at www.Cyberdrome.org

[davidhburton]

OK, I posted this on my book thread, but I'm going to be shameless and post here too!!

Good news! The Second Coming was chosen over at The Fantasy Book Club (at Goodreads) for the July group discussion!!

Feel free to come join us!

You can add me on Goodreads here:
http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...e=email_widget

The group is located here:
http://www.goodreads.com/group/show/...tasy_Book_Club

The Second Coming is available on Kindle here:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0037HOR1Q

And at Smashwords for ePub/PDF/LRF/PDB here:
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/9326

Hope to see you there!
David

[patinagle]

Book View Café is having a big ebook sale this week in honor of the RT convention:


Jay Caselberg - ANGEL ON THE BEACH (collection): On Sale $2.99

Brenda Clough - REVISE THE WORLD (science fiction): On Sale $2.99

Chris Dolley - INTERNATIONAL KITTENS OF MYSTERY (humor, picture book): On Sale $.99

Vonda N. McIntyre - THE MOON & SUN (science fiction - NEBULA AWARD WINNER): On Sale $2.99

Pati (P. G.) Nagle - GLORIETA PASS (historical fiction): On Sale $2.99

Jennifer Stevenson - FOOLS PARADISE (romance): On Sale $.99

Patricia Rice - MERELY MAGIC • MUST BE MAGIC • THE TROUBLE WITH MAGIC (romance) - All On Sale: $2.99 each

Judith Tarr - ARS MAGICA (historical fantasy): On Sale $1.99

Sarah Zettel - IN CAMELOT'S SHADOW • FOR CAMELOT'S HONOR • UNDER CAMELOT'S BANNER • CAMELOT'S BLOOD (fantasy) - All On Sale: $2.99 each


http://www.bookviewcafe.com/index.ph...fe-Ebookstore/

[NickSpalding]

Now, this is very handy...

I've been agonizing over how much promotion to do for the book, figuring the last thing anybody needs is me stumbling around doing a bad impression of Don King, trying to flog as many copies of my epic as possible before the subtelty police come along and take me away in cuffs.

But here, in this thread, I feel comfortable in bringing out the big promotional guns for 'Life...with no breaks'. So here they are:

1) The book has breasts in it.
2) It's an easy read with lots of laughs to be had.
3) Did I mention it has breasts in it?
4) And strippers...there's a bit with some strippers in, too.

So why not download today for the ridiculous price of $1.49!

Link here and also below in my sig, with the book's cover

http://www.amazon.com/life-with-no-b...1891500&sr=8-2

[Dr. Drib]

Has anyone read the story called [I think!] "The Shameless Ebook Writer's Disappearance"? It dealt with aliens who wish to kidnap a "Real Author" only to find out he's a writer of ebooks. He even self-promotes himself - endlessly and without any pangs of conscience. Strange, no?

Well....this author has NO class at all - zero class; in fact, this fellow just doesn't know when to be quiet! The aliens, a no-nonsense group of creatures (kinda like used-car salesmen or telemarketers *), get so disgusted with him that they banish him to the planet Zondervano, where he is forced to read Inspirational Self-Help books all day long under the watchful eyes of nondescript Keepers [?], whose one purpose is to prevent ANY communication whatsoever with anything Real. They also confiscate his 12 ebook Readers for further study. They are disappointed, however, when they discover that all these ebook-reading devices contain endless permutations of the same story by this same ebook writer now in exile. (It's almost as if the ebook writer was suffering from a severe case of ICC [Imaginative Constipation Crisis] and was unable to create anything new!)

I realize this scenario sounds far-fetched, but has anyone read this story? Anyway, that's all I remember about it, since I read it years ago. Unfortunately, I only remember one line from the story, a line atributed to Slllrrrz, a somewhat obese alien with an irritable eye-stalk who said, "You're not Norman Mailer!"

Can anyone help me with this? I think the title is correct, but I could be wrong.


* = Not that there's anything wrong with used-car salesmen and telemarkers.





Don

[pdurrant]

I have a new book up at the Kindle store! Well, it's newly published by me. It's not actually a new book. In fact, it's just coming up to its 110th birthday.

It's Kim by Rudyard Kipling. And yes, there are 28 or so editions of Kim already up in the Kindle store.

So what makes my edition worth looking at? Two main things:

1. The text. This is the best version of the text that available in electronic form, even better than the ePenguin one.
2. The Illustrations. Mine is the only one to include the illustrations done for the book by Kipling's father, J. Lockwood Kipling.

There are other good things about the book too:

• the interesting cover
• the hyperlinked table of contents
• the hyperlinked list of illustrations
• the two-way linked glossary entries for foreign and unusual words
• the good quality formatting of text and verses
• the British spelling throughout

Only $2.99!
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003JBHNS4/

It should be appearing at BooksonBoard, etc, as an ePub in the next few weeks.

Of course, both these editions are completely free of DRM.

I have examined all of the other version of Kim available at Amazon. 25 of them are quick and bad conversions of the Project Gutenberg text. One of them is a careful conversion of the Project Gutenberg text that is almost good. It just misses some italics, and still has the textual errors. But the formatting is excellent.

There are just two that might be worth buying.

• The Modern Library edition, based on the original 1901 edition, which has only a few typos, but alas - the footnotes aren't hyperlinked.
• The ePenguin edition, based on the 1941 American "Burwash" edition. Hyperlinked footnotes, and only a few typos (especially towards the end). And, of course, mainly American spelling.

Both (of course?) have DRM applied. They do both have introductory essays as well.

I suppose I should also mention that if you'd prefer a version without my glossary (or if you'd prefer a free edition!), a similarly splendid edition that just omits the glossary can be found here at Mobileread:

Kindle/Mobipocket: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?p=198181
ePub: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?p=890843

[neilmarr]

Great stuff, Don. Reading between your lines, though, I have the sneaking feeling that you secretly appreciate a cheeky chappy who promotes himself and his book entertainingly and effectively without getting on your wazz.

I know you didn't have Nick Spalding and A Life With No Breaks in mind as you wrote, of course, but let's take Nick as an example of a plausible marketeer in embryo ...

I'm a pro editor with with over forty years' wearing experience of saying 'TBNT' to writers. This week, for instance, I have collected about fifty submissions by authors hoping to publish through my own wee house. That's my weekend taken care of. And my two associate editors will each be facing a similar pile.

I doubt if I will find one submission in my fifty enticing enough to ask the author to let me look over his/her full manuscript. Our hit rate at BeWrite Books is something like ten eventual publications from 1,000 cold subs.

So you can plainly see that when it comes to my precious recreational reading time, I'm not wildly enthusiastic about free and two buck downloads from unknown authors who have gone through no selection process and who try to wing it as first-timers without professional editorial input.

But Nick has intrigued me since he joined MR recently, so I broke a golden rule of mine and downloaded a free sample forty pages or so of his book. I was amazed to find that I was so well hooked by the prologue/intro/excuse (call it what you will), that I stopped there to go back and download the full monty.

I think it cost a buck and a half from Smashwords. I probably couldn't get a half-pint of bitter for that in the UK these days. But that's not the point ... Nick's gentle and witty promo led me (for the very first time) to the 'shameless promotions' thread here, which led me to download the sample, a few pages of which led me to buy the book ... TO READ FOR FUN!

If I get fed up after a while, I'll let him know his novel experiment failed for me and the book's crap. I'm a brass-necked old cuss and honestly believe that if a wannabe writer can be discouraged, he should be. If the book lives up to its prologue promise, I'll post a review everywhere I can by way of thanks.

Either way, Nick made a sale with a mere intro in his book (let's call that 'the query letter') that, had it come to me as a submission backed by a sound writing sample of a couple of thousand words, would have brightened my weekend's submissions filtering no end and led to a request for full ms assessment.

To A Life Without Breaks tonight. It might be a dog's dinner of a mess, but I'm already impressed by a writer who managed to lure a busy -- often jaded -- editor to stump up the cost of a jar of good ale to see what's on offer.

Watch this space. Hoots. Neil

[joycedb]

Okay, it's been awhile since I plugged my book, so here goes.

Because my reading and writing pleasure leans towards women's fiction, my characters have issues with their families, lose loved ones, and struggle to fill their lives with friends they treasure, a way of life that nurtures them, and a special someone who holds the same things dear. If the following blurb interests you, I invite you to read the first two chapters of my full-length novel, SERENDIPITY HOUSE, on my website, joycedebacco.com.

Sylvie was a pleaser. She did as her mother pleased, and she did as her fiancé pleased. Then she did as she pleased. Raised by a domineering mother, Sylvie doesn’t like the submissive woman she’s become. Determined to take back her life, she heads to the hills instead of to the altar on her wedding day. Coming across a quaint, country inn with an intriguing name, she impulsively checks into SERENDIPITY HOUSE. Peopled with an odd assortment of characters, the inn has clearly seen better days. Even the regulars have a bit of wear on them.

Thus, when debonair Alex arrives and is strangely comfortable vacationing among the geriatric set, Sylvie is suspicious and does her best to ignore him. But Alex will not be ignored, pushing her buttons until she admits, if only to herself that she’s falling in love with him. Not until she’s hired to manage the inn does she learn he’s not the pedigreed gentleman he purports to be, but a streetwise PI hired by her ex to find her. Adding insult to injury, he’s bought the inn and asks for her help in restoring it to its former glory. Forced to work together, both learn about relationships, expectations, and acceptance—among family members as well as strangers who become like family.

Thanks for reading , and I hope you’ll visit SERENDIPITY HOUSE.

[Helen Smith]

Has anyone read the story called [I think!] "The Shameless Ebook Writer's Disappearance"? It dealt with aliens who wish to kidnap a "Real Author"

Thank you for bringing this to everyone's attention, Dr Drib. I take it you were as shocked as I was when you realised how much the subject matter resembled certain passages in my much-lauded, much-loved novel, Being Light. Perhaps I ought to send a petition about it to the British Prime Minister. If I decide to do so, I hope I may call on you for support.

For those readers who have no idea what I'm talking about, here's the blurb for Being Light:

Roy Travers is swept away by a freak gust of wind while trying to install a bouncy castle in Brockwell Park, south London. Sheila, his wife, can’t understand why he hasn’t found his way back home. She begins to suspect that Roy has been abducted by aliens and enlists the help of Mrs Fitzgerald’s Bureau of Investigation to find him.

Sheila travels to Kent with Alison, a private detective. Together they build a missing persons advertisement out of pebbles on a beach, hoping it will be seen by the aliens who have taken Roy. But Roy was not taken by aliens. The truth is far stranger.

Yes! Exactly! Abducted by aliens! Now you see what I'm talking about - kind of similar, isn't it?

Being Light had some great reviews in the UK press:
'A screwball comedy that really works.' The Independent
'Imagine a satire on Cool Britannia made by the Coen Brothers… very funny.' Times Literary Supplement

Being Light is £1.99 or $2.99 direct from TygerBooks in mobi or epub format (or lrf or prc on request), $2.99 from Amazon, $2.99 from Mobipocket.

DRM free everywhere except Mobipocket, which doesn't allow it.

I have no idea where one would go to purchase 'The Shameless ebook Writer's Disappearance'. The book itself seems to be as elusive as these so-called 'ebook writers' you keep talking about.

[neilmarr]

Gotcha, Helen. Thanks. Looking forward to the read. Hoots. Neil

[Helen Smith]

Thanks, Neil. That's lovely of you. I really appreciate it.

Have a good weekend,
Helen

[William Campbell]

Originally Posted by NickSpalding

1) The book has breasts in it. And strippers...there's a bit with some strippers in, too.

So does mine. I hadn't thought to call attention to it, not like it's a spoiler, not even close. But then I don't know the threshold for offense in this group. I agree this thread feels safer to talk about that sort of thing, within reason of course. Maybe it's time to let some of those cats out of the bag.

So having breasts and strippers, my mind wanders to the question -- are any of yours the fake variety? (not yours, I mean, your character's). I couldn't resist a short commentary about the sort that resemble a large cantaloupe sliced in two and pasted into place (we hope straight and level). All in the vein of a little injected humor.

If I'm crossing the line of decency I expect we shall know shorty.

By the way, I like your cover. Clean, clever, a little fun. And different from most others, I like that.

[plumboz]

I have shamelessly abandoned the $4.99 price for Boomerang in favor of $1.99 and even more in favor of a long term $0.99 coupon redeemable at Smashwords. Shameless indeed. And a heck of a deal. You won't find a better book for the money. Masterful yet restrained use of punctuation featured throughout.

Coupon Code: MN64D.

Best,
Alan

[ImogenRose]

I am super exited that PORTAL made the Kindle bestsellers list today!

[alvico]

Originally Posted by ImogenRose

I am super exited that PORTAL made the Kindle bestsellers list today!

Congratulations, Imogen. That's fantastic news!