September 12, 2014 · 10:19 am

More Dell Zero news — Reviewed at PerihelionSF!

http://www.perihelionsf.com/1409/reviews.htm

I’m chewing my heart out in envy. The other day she gets this neat video review, today she’s up in lights at a cool online science fiction magazine. What next?!

I told you these “Awesome Indies” were awesome 🙂

I’m told Dell Zero is going on sale today for a promotional period (99 cents). They usually drop the price by the afternoon some time, so be sure to check.

Sneak peak at this great review:

IF LITERARY THEMES ARE a sign of the times, dystopian fiction may be the canary in our coal mine. Stories celebrating social harmony and scientific advances are scarce as hen’s teeth, but the market explodes with cautionary tales that show our own society reflected in a futuristic dystopia. I don’t know if this signifies that most readers already feel we’re living in a bad (dys) place (topia). I do know it’s hard to find authentic characters in a compelling story no matter what the genre. In a field full of Brave New Knock-Offs, “Dell Zero” by Carol Ervin kicks all kinds of hindquarters.

Who is Dell Zero?

…

http://www.perihelionsf.com/1409/reviews.htm

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September 10, 2014 · 10:14 pm

Dell Zero video review by P.T. Hylton

Check out this review of Dell Zero. It’s like watching TV about books 🙂

 

August Book Reviews

 

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September 7, 2014 · 2:09 pm

Kick 2 is out with the betas…

I still don’t know what the title is going to be, following the discovery that “Ride” was taken.  We’ll see after the betas come back. Maybe they’ll suggest the title should be “Unreadable” 🙂

I’m glad it’s finally out there — means I get to work on some other commitments.

Yay.

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September 7, 2014 · 12:50 pm

Harvey Click’s new book: Demon Frenzy (99 cents for a limited time)

After reading “The Bad Box” I became an instant Harvey Click fan.  So I’m totally looking forward to his latest book: Demon Frenzy

demon_frenzy

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September 4, 2014 · 1:29 pm

Rocking Self Publishing Podcast Episode 63: Quadruple Your Kindle Sales with Nick Stephenson

Attention author friends. If you can only listen to one podcast episode about self-publishing, this would be the episode. 

*Update: forgot the link* –> http://rockingselfpublishing.com/

It covers:

1) keywords — heavily, exhaustively (around the 50% mark in the podcast)

2) how he broke the cycle of sales bumps after promos (followed by declines).

3) mailing lists, how to deal with them smartly

4) permafree a little bit, but nothing he’s done relies on permafree

5) websites/blogs
 

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September 2, 2014 · 4:25 pm

The Reader-Writer Relationship: a cautionary tale…

Funny…and a little scary:

http://www.mark-capell.com/blog/the-readerwriter-relationship-a-cautionary-tale

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September 1, 2014 · 10:22 pm

August Numbers

One author’s outlook on sales (funny)…

kristinemckinley's avatarK. McKinley's Blog

Number of Books Sold:                    1

Number of Free Downloads:           83

August was a disappointing month. I just had one sale. My second book was purchased but they didn’t go through and buy the rest. This has only happened twice before. Sometimes it takes weeks but they always go back and buy the next in the series. The person that bought the second one probably died. That’s really the only possible reason the rest of the books weren’t purchased.

My Free downloads weren’t as much as last month but they were more than June, so I’m fine with them. I had a few days where I had several downloaded in a day. But then I had a few days where I had none downloaded. The graph looks like a roller coaster ride.

Monthly Word Count Goal:           7350

Words Written:                                 6288

Books Read:                                      22

As you can…

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August 29, 2014 · 12:55 pm

297 Flabby Words and Phrases — and a grain of salt

I saw this linked-to on Kboards. It’s a list of words and phrases guaranteed to rob your writing of its mojo.  I think it’s useful to go through the list — not to completely avoid these words and phrases but to understand how writing is robbed of its virility by cliches and redundancy.

Here’s one I really liked:

15. All of – Flabby expression. Drop of. Ex: All of the guests loved the party. Better: All the guests loved the party.

http://boostblogtraffic.com/weak-writing/

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August 24, 2014 · 8:50 am

Sunday Word Count: Not applicable, lots of editing though

FarkusYay, I finally get to use this photo of Scut Farkus.  I haven’t been writing anything new, but I have been doing lots of editing. All the major inconsistencies are fixed, no visible plot holes left, lots of clunky writing declunkified, and the typos that are left are hiding in plain sight no matter how many times I read them.  A few more passes and I’ll be ready to send “Kick 2” off to my beta readers. Oh yeah, I’m probably going to have to rename it from “Ride” to something else — there’s another novel called “Ride” and I’d rather not confuse things if I don’t have to. Also, I like to avoid the image of being a claim jumper.

Cheers

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August 19, 2014 · 3:18 pm

Author Interview: Harvey Click

Interview with Mr. Evil himself. Totally looking forward to “Demon Frenzy”.

raylitt's avatarDirty Little Bookers

Thank you to our CALLING ALL INDIES! winner and new boogeyman for infiltrating our happy place with some pretty indelible horror imagery. Here we get to know a little bit about the mysterious writer/professor, and why he may never write again (NOOOOOOO!!!!!!). Enjoy.

DLB: What do you want readers to find when they open The Bad Box?

HC: A dark jewel with many facets. I want them to be constantly entertained to the last page, often chilled to the bone, and at least occasionally moved. Horror needs to be entertaining, thrilling, and scary or else it’s not worth reading. But I think a good horror novel should also have a resonance that lasts after the last page is turned. What interests me most in the horror genre is the element of the fantastic, and I think the resonance I’m talking about requires this element.

Some people say that supernatural…

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