Category Archives: Ebooks

Summit will now cost you money

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I told you to download Summit from Amazon when it was free, but you didn’t listen to me.  You never listen to me.  Now you have to pay $2.84 for it.  Why $2.84?  I don’t know.  But it’s worth it!  Probably worth even $2.99, now that I think about it.

The purpose of making the book free was to generate some nice reviews, and I got some!  Here’s a sampling:

This is a well written, well -rounded, exciting book. I loved it and will be looking for all books by Mr Richard Bowker. I do NOT give five stars often or lightly, but I am impressed Summit. So if you like thrillers, this is a great one to read. And Mr Bowker, if you ever need a beta reader, I would be thrilled to do it.

And:

The author has a way of bringing you right into the story; the characters are believable and flawed. The sprinkle of romance is fun and the Mr Bowker’s knowledge of classical music and the ability to identify the problems of a classical music prodigy are amazing.
Above all the plot twists and turns were extremely suspenseful.
I also appreciated the author not painting the Russians as all evil and U.S. as all good.
I wish Bill Sullivan had a better ending, but such is life. More importantly, Fulton and Valentina (more than) survive.
A great read, thanks !

I wish Sullivan had a better ending, too!  And:

Richard Bowker manages to give lots of credibility to the subject of psychics. What is there not to agree in the end? Psychics do exist, even if their lives are depicted more in the dark forces type of books than in a thriller.
Deep thoughtful take on American and Russian ideals, the perceptions and beliefs ingrained in their nationals to infuse a patriotic love, which makes us explore our own psyche and rattles perhaps our own confidence in our righteousness. The same political corruption and power greed exists at all levels, in all countries- and is perfectly delineated in the pages of this book. It is difficult not to love the heroes, and the insertion of a love story makes the read even more enjoyable for female readership. I did enjoy this book till the (perfect) end.

And, as a reminder,here’s the exciting new cover:

summit

Who needs an editor?

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Jeff Carver has a post on the Hugh Howey article I recommended.  He says:

It’s pretty interesting, although I don’t necessarily agree with everything he says. (For one thing, he doesn’t mention the role that traditional publishers play in helping writers, especially new writers, improve their craft and produce better books. Some say that that role is diminishing these days, but I think it really depends on the publisher and the editor.)

This got me to thinking about just how much help my various editors have been to me.  The answer is: not much. Probably the best known of my editors was Judy-Lynn Del Rey, who bought my first novel for the Del Rey imprint of Ballantine Books.  She did two things, as I recall:

  • She made me change the book’s name to Forbidden Sanctuary, claiming this was a more commercial title than the one I had come up with.  Can’t say if she was right or wrong about that.
  • She pointed out that “He shone the light” should be “He shined the light.”  That’s a fair cop.

And that’s it.  Well, she also ordered a cover that was ludicrously unrelated to the actual events of the book.

My other editors were similar.  They made various small suggestions, some of which were good, some of which weren’t so good (in my opinion).  None of them helped me improve my craft, or made any of my novels substantially better.  They didn’t have the time or the interest.  Or, possibly, the talent.

This is not to say that a good editor can’t help a writer.  I just don’t think the odds are good you’re going to find such an editor in mainstream publishing.  If your book isn’t deemed publishable as it stands, it isn’t going to be published.

What most writers do need is copy-editing.  But, as Howey points out, you can hire a copy editor, just as you can hire an artist to create your cover.  There are lots of people out there who know the difference between shone and shined, even if you don’t.  And they don’t charge very much for their expertise.  When you’re self-publishing, you’re the boss.  That can be a bit scary, but it’s also liberating.

A great article about self-publishing ebooks

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Hadn’t heard about Hugh Howey until last week, when Jeff Carver mentioned his success as a self-publisher of speculative fiction.  Now he’s written this piece for Salon, which encapsulates a lot of what I think about self-publishing in the ebook world.

With self-publishing, you learn your craft while producing material. You win over your fans directly. You own all of your rights, and your works stay fresh and available for your lifetime (and beyond). Nothing goes out of print. I think this advantage is difficult to fully appreciate. My bestselling work was my eighth or ninth title. As soon as it took off, the rest of my material took off with it. To the reader, it was all brand-new. To those being born today who will become avid readers 15 years from now, those works will still be brand-new. My entire oeuvre will always be in print and always earning me something. Nothing is pulled and returned from the digital bookshelf.

For me, one of the main motivations for entering the ebook world was getting my previously published novels, long out of print, back out onto the market. But even if you haven’t been in print before, self-publishing ebooks really does seem to be the way to go.  You may not be successful, but most print authors aren’t successful — I can’t say that I have been particularly successful.  At least the books are out there, available to anyone and everyone.  And you have a chance of finding an audience, the way Hugh Howey did.  And even if you don’t become rich, you’re likely to get more feedback from your readers than most print authors ever get.  Here’s a sample of reader reviews of my books in the past few weeks:

On Summit (four stars)

The beginning is a bit confusing but it becomes clear as you go along. I enjoyed this piece of fiction. Valentina and Daniel made very good heroes.

On Dover Beach (five stars):

One of the best scifi books I’ve read in a long time. . . . you’re right there, experiencing everything along with the characters and can’t wait to see what happens next… more please!!

On Senator (five stars):

Kept you guessing til end, lots of twist and turns. Better yet was the way he writes about politics in Washington, where lies are told til they believe they are the truth.

Praise like that is better than money.  And I like money!

Amazon buys Goodreads — should I care?

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I have never paid much attention to Goodreads, but it seems like a fine idea for a web site — a place where readers can go to rate books, swap recommendations, discover what their friends are reading, and so on.  So now Amazon has scooped it up, and the Authors Guild isn’t happy. Here‘s Scott Turow, the Guild president:

“Amazon’s acquisition of Goodreads is a textbook example of how modern Internet monopolies can be built,” said Scott Turow, Authors Guild president. “The key is to eliminate or absorb competitors before they pose a serious threat. With its 16 million subscribers, Goodreads could easily have become a competing on-line bookseller, or played a role in directing buyers to a site other than Amazon. Instead, Amazon has scuttled that potential and also squelched what was fast becoming the go-to venue for on-line reviews, attracting far more attention than Amazon for those seeking independent assessment and discussion of books. As those in advertising have long known, the key to driving sales is controlling information.

This seems pretty odd.  In what sense did Amazon scuttle the potential for Goodreads to become an online vendor?  This was Goodreads’ decision, not Amazon’s.  If that wasn’t the direction they wanted to take their business, well, frankly I think they’re pretty smart.

Should we be worried that Amazon will “squelch” Goodreads’ reviews and online community? That would be insane — that’s what Amazon is buying. The more people who go there and talk about books, the more books Amazon will sell.

What Amazon will presumably squelch are links from Goodreads to other booksellers.  Goodreads has a “Get a copy” feature that links out to different online vendors, allowing you to go directly from the Goodreads page for a book to the bookseller of your choice.  I assume this feature will go away, and you will only be directed to Amazon (as is the case with IMDb, another Amazon subsidiary).  How important is that to the Goodreads community?  I guess we’ll find out.  But if it’s really important, someone will start a new online community; it’s not like the barriers to entry are particularly high.  And it’s not like the lack of a link to Barnes & Noble, say, will make it a lot more difficult for a Goodreads user to buy a book from them instead of Amazon.  We’re talking about about a couple additional mouseclicks here.

The Authors Guild seems to have a deep fear of Amazon’s potential monopolistic power; they also came out against the Justice Department’s suit against Apple and the major book publishers for (essentially) price fixing.  The Guild was arguing that readers should pay higher prices for ebooks to guard against the potential of an Amazon ebook monopoly.  I’m not convinced Amazon is the threat the Guild thinks it is.  I have no doubt that Amazon would like to corner as much of the online bookselling market as they can; I just don’t see how they can keep other smart, nimble vendors out of that same market.

The newly re-covered Summit is free on iTunes!

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I don’t know why we keep giving stuff away, but we do.  Here you go.

Here’s that new cover everyone’s been talking about, with the Kremlin clock tower that no one recognizes:

summit

As with other free offers, the idea is to bludgeon Amazon into also making the book free by having thousands of rabid fans click on the “tell us about a lower price” link on the Summit page. Please help — it only takes a few seconds.

My wily publisher’s idea, by the way, is to tie Summit to Marlborough Street as part of a “psychic thriller” series.  Works for me if it will sell copies!

By the way, Dover Beach continues to be free on Amazon.  It’s piling up some really nice reviews, along with a couple that make me scratch my head.  One of them is probably worth a separate post.

Amazon has a patent on selling used ebooks — are we doomed?

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A few months ago I vented about the possible advent of a market for used ebooks, which (if legal) would doom the quaint custom of writing in return for money. Now it turns out the Amazon has patented a way to create a digital marketplace for ebooks and other kinds of digital objects. As this Wired article describes it, the mechanism would be similar to the one used by Amazon’s Kindle e-book lending process.  When you lend the ebook book, your access to it is cut off for the term of the loan.

The proposed used digital marketplace would take that one step further. Instead of loaning the access rights of an e-book, music file, video or application, in exchange for some cash, the original owner of the digital file would transfer the rights to use that file to another party permanently.

If the file were downloaded to a device, after the sale, the original owner would be unable to access the file. the data would still be on the device until deleted by the original owner, but access to the contents of that file would be turned off.

The Wired article floats various theories about what Amazon is up to here.  The one that makes most sense to me is that this is just another way for Amazon to bypass traditional book publishers and record companies. For authors to get a cut of the resale money, they might have to deal directly with Amazon, rather than via a middleman.  I can’t imagine that Amazon wouldn’t offer some kind of royalty on these resales, because then they risk having top authors simply refuse to publish their works for the Kindle.  But I could be wrong–nothing seems to have stopped Amazon from selling used print books.  And, as the Wired article points out, used ebooks aren’t going to have dogeared pages or ripped covers.  They’d be just as good as the new version, only cheaper.  Who wouldn’t like that–except the starving author?

Amazon Author Central: Tracking your ignominy in real time

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Want an easy way to feel like a failure?  Become an author and check out Amazon Author Central, which provides a wealth of statistics about how badly your books are doing.  The depressing news is updated hourly, so you can check back multiple times during the day to increase your feelings of worthlessness.  Here, for example, is a snapshot of how I stack up against other fiction writers over the past month.  The trend slopes upward a bit, but in a fairly narrow range of mediocrity.

ScreenHunter_05 Feb. 02 10.30

Amazon also offers graphs by category (I’m close to breaking into the top thousand in science fiction!) and by individual book. In the old days, authors would get their bad news via semiannual unintelligible statements from publishers.  Are we better off today?  I suppose. Theoretically, you could use all this information to plot your marketing strategies or judge their effectiveness, if you’re the sort of author who has marketing strategies.  But mostly it’s just another way of wasting your time when you should be working on your next book.  After all, that’s the one that’s going to make you famous!

New covers for Pontiff, Summit? Opinions solicited.

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One of the advantages of ebooks over printed books is that, if you don’t like your cover, or think it isn’t working, you can switch to a new one pretty easily.  We’re pondering making a change for Pontiff and Summit.  You can see the originals at the links.  Here’s the proposal for Pontiff:

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The idea is still to suggest religion and murder, but maybe with a cleaner look.  I’m not sure I like the bleeding rosary, though.

And here’s the alternative for Summit:

summit

Here the designer has dropped the hammer and sickle, which she claims looks dated, and added the Kremlin clock tower to suggest the Soviet Union.  Again, the design is brighter than the original, I think.  Is that good?