Would you write honest reviews in return for free books?

Posted on June 21, 2015 by Richard Bowker

A friend of mine mentioned to me today how much she liked my novel Senator, which she had just finished. So I thanked her and asked her if she’d written a customer review. The question seemed to baffle her. She had never considered writing a review. Why would she do that? But of course, now that I asked her…

We’ll see if she gets around to it.

In the ebook world, nothing is more important for sales than customer reviews. But they’re extraordinarily hard to get, in my experience. And it’s not just my books–I’ve come across lots of books by fairly well-known authors that have just a handful of reviews.

My publisher has a marketing arm called eBook Discovery that just launched a Read and Review Club to try to address this. If you sign up, you can download certain books for free every couple of weeks, in return for leaving an honest review at Amazon or other eRetailer. There’s some additional logistics involved, but that’s the basic idea. I have no idea if this will work, but it doesn’t seem implausible. I think the key will be to get a sufficient variety of books from authors they don’t publish, so that readers will stay interested. Why not click the link and give it a try?

By the way, I believe them when they say they want honest reviews–if you hate the book, say so. They are of the opinion that it’s the number of reviews that matters, not how positive the reviews are. I’m not quite sure I believe this, but that’s what they say.

“Senator” on sale for $0.99!

Posted on June 10, 2015 by Richard Bowker

My publisher in its wisdom has reduced the ebook price of my novel Senator to $0.99. Probably trying to get rid of unsold inventory or something. Buy it before they run out! On Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

A nice review for “The Portal”

Posted on June 7, 2015 by Richard Bowker

On Amazon:

The book is primarily written for the pre-teen or early teenager, I believe anyway, but I really enjoyed it. The characters pre teens in their world, were transferred to another world, in a different time, to a war torn New England where New Portugal and New Canada were going to attack New England. The boy’s, in conversation with army officers, gave ideas to the Army of New England for weapons that could change the outcome of the war. I haven’t enjoyed a simple, nonsexual, non-cussing book in a long time such as this book is. I recommend this to any boy, I’m not sure about girls since there aren’t many girl characters in it. There is a message in it about family, even families who might have issues and personality problems; about loneliness and familial love; about goodness and evil; about prayer in time of despair. It is not a God book, but it has a spiritual bent, especially when the war starts. For the most part, the main characters are all honorable, even those characters who might seem to be dishonorable, especially those who have come in contact with our two hero’s, in both worlds.

I can’t recommend this book enough.

That sounds about right!

I just hope the reader doesn’t try out some of my other novels, which fall pretty clearly in the “cussing” category, as several annoyed commenters have pointed out.

The fluffy bunnies are here to get their revenge

Posted on March 29, 2015 by Richard Bowker

My friend Craig Shaw Gardner has ever-so-slowly been releasing his funny fantasy novels as ebooks. His Cineverse Cycle has finally arrived, and that’s a good thing for humanity. Here’s the overall plot summary, such as it is:

Roger Gordon’s life was dull until a Captain Crusader Decoder Ring unlocked a door to the world of B-movies. Now his life is filled with adventure as he frolics through the silver screen’s weirdest westerns, thrillers, and romances.

The three books are Slaves of the Volcano God, Bride of the Slime Monster, and Revenge of the Fluffy Bunnies. I have previously expressed my opinion that Revenge of the Fluffy Bunnies is the best book title in the history of Western Civilization. I stand by this opinion. Here’s its cover:

So why are you just sitting there like a doofus reading my stupid blog? Go enter the Cineverse!

“Where All the Ladders Start”: The printed books have arrived!

Posted on February 22, 2015 by Richard Bowker

Here’s what the book looks like:

I’m all in favor of ebooks, but physical books do seem more “real,” don’t they?

But here’s the problem you run into with printed books: My publisher got complaints about the point size of the font they use, so they upped it from 10-point to 12-point. This means that, instead of being about 300 pages, the book ends up being a lengthy 392 pages. Which means that they have to charge more for it than, for example, The Portal: $17.95 retail.

I can get you a discount, though.

My novel “Dover Beach” is available for $0.99!

Posted on February 12, 2015 by Richard Bowker

While I’m shilling for my books here, I should mention that the first book in my Last P.I. series, Dover Beach, is available on Amazon for a mere $0.99. That’s like almost free! The idea here, of course, is to get you into the series so you’ll buy Books 2 and 3. Did I mention that Book 3, Where All the Ladders Start, is available now?

(There’s a certain amount of snow in Dover Beach, as I recall, but it’s not that bad. Really it isn’t.)

Here’s a customer review:

Richard Bowker presents an awesome look at the role of a P.I. in a post-apocalyptic world. My first reaction was what on Earth would the remains of society need a Private Investigator for—it’s unlikely a P.I. would be hired to checkout phony insurance claims when there ain’t no more insurance companies. Richard builds a compelling plot with polished nuances sparkling for the reader. The plight of the survivors in Boston is rather frightful. The contrast between the shattered United States and merry old England is striking. He provides a nicely developed depth to his cast of players, and with all things considered, their surroundings are believable. I liked how he addresses real world money issues and there isn’t a P.I. with a pocket full of cash—but a meal at a London McDonalds is affordable. Richard did a marvelous job of resolving all the dangling loose ends—including a few dangling parts the reader doesn’t suspect are dangling—so to speak.

My new novel “Where All the Ladders Start” is available now!

Posted on February 12, 2015 by Richard Bowker

My new novel Where All the Ladders Start is out on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Google Play, and other fine ebook retailers. For those of you who haven’t been paying attention, it’s the third book in my Last P.I. series, which also includes Dover Beach and The Distance Beacons. In this one, our hero, Walter Sands, investigates the disappearance of the charismatic leader of the Church of the New Beginning. Twists and turns ensue, along with lots of humor and a few Deep Ideas.

(Note to local readers: even though there is snow on the cover, no shoveling takes place in the novel, and only a small amount of dangerous driving. This is the nice kind of snow, not the kind of never-ending, soul-destroying snow that is falling as I type these words.)

The ebook is priced at a mere $4.99. A print version will be available shortly. If you want a print copy, let me know and I can send you an autographed copy at a discount.

Two readers have already left reviews of Where All the Ladders Start. Here’s the first, which was up before I even knew the book was available:

fantastic series, rich characters, read this, read the whole series!

it may seem like hyperbole but I LOVE the characters and ideas that roam the world they are set in, and so should you. give this a try!

And here’s the second:

Most excellent.
I look forward to the next in the series.

So I really don’t see why you don’t just go buy the book right now. You don’t even have to go out into the snow!

“Senator” Free Friday link

Posted on January 30, 2015 by Richard Bowker

Here’s the link for the Free Friday writeup of Senator on Barnes & Noble.

People are already reviewing it, which I think is weird. As with my previous Free Friday experience, the reviews are bimodal—people either love it or hate it. Here is a hater who left a comment:

Used the Lord’s name in vain multiple times at the beginning so I read no further. I don’t recommend this one at all.

Can’t argue with that. Here are some more favorable comments from Barnes & Noble and elsewhere. This one is voted the most helpful on Barnes & Noble:

One of Richard Bowker’s best novels — full of characters who are not just interesting but believable. Bowker’s style is clean and spare, but also engaging, vivid, and fast moving. I read this when it first appeared in hardcover, and am glad to see it back in print as an ebook.

And here’s the most helpful review on Amazon:

The beginning of this book put me off. I generally do not care for novels written in the first person, and the first chapters were tedious, another overworked story of the dead mistress whose murder threatens to ruin her high-placed lover. However, once all of the players were identified, I found myself relating to the protagonists and many supporting characters on the same kind of personal level as when I first read Presumed Innocent so many years ago. Bowker creates the flawed hero of the classics, a man driven on the one hand by ambition and on the other,by a sense of honor. Even at the end, the Senator possessed strengths and weaknesses that are not entirely resolved. In other words, he is human. This is not just a fine tuned murder mystery, it is a journey into the very complex issues of guilt and innocence-good and evil. For nearly a quarter century, I was a prosecutor of serious felonies, a position not without personal as well as professional challenges. It was not uncommon for me to sometimes relate to the defendant sitting one chair away at counsel table on a very human level. That did not change the nature of my mission–I was considered a tough prosecutor– but it made me reflect upon the difference between the concept of legal guilt and that of moral evil. This is not a story in which the murderer is arrested, tried and convicted, but its resolution is gratifying. In the past 18 months I have downloaded more than 415 books on my Kindle, and read all but a very few.This is one of the better ones, perhaps when it comes to a political mystery, the very best.

Just one more:

This is one of my favorite Richard Bowker novels — full of characters who are not just interesting but believable. Bowker writes in a clean, spare style that I find engaging and vivid, but also fast moving. I read this when it first appeared in hardcover, and am glad to see it back in print as an ebook.

“Senator” is free at Barnes & Noble!

Posted on January 29, 2015 by Richard Bowker

My novel Senator is one of this week’s Free Friday selections at Barnes & Noble, and I just noticed they’ve already changed the price. Dover Beach was a Free Friday selection a while back; lots of people downloaded it, and it got lots of reviews, most of which were great. Some of them were, um, interesting. If you do download and read Senator, please leave a review, and I hope it’s at the reverential/awestruck end of the spectrum.

Eternity’s End

Posted on January 17, 2015 by Richard Bowker

My friend Jeff Carver has been running a highly successful BookBub promotion of his epic Nebula-nominated science-fiction novel Eternity’s End. Only 99 cents! But hurry–this is the sale’s final weekend!

Here’s the star-spanning description:

The Flying Dutchman of the stars! Rigger and star pilot Renwald Legroeder undertakes a search for the legendary ghost ship Impris—and her passengers and crew—whose fate is entwined with interstellar piracy, quantum defects in space-time, galactic coverup conspiracies, and deep-cyber romance. A stand-alone Star Rigger novel, and an excellent starting point for readers new to the Star Rigger Universe. A Nebula Award finalist, from the author of The Chaos Chronicles.

I have always wanted to write novels about interstellar piracy, quantum defects in space-time, galactic coverup conspiracies, and deep-cyber romance. But somehow Jeff always beats me to it.