Concern, Cash and Capitulation – My Love/Hate of KU

                                                                              by Janis Patterson/Janis Susan May

According to some, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly but expecting different results. I guess I’m insane, because I’ve been avoiding Kindle Unlimited for years. Why? Because I hate even the threat of a monopoly.

Let’s face it – the ‘Zon is closer than a lot of people – myself included – think to becoming a monopoly in ebook sales, and if that goal is accomplished, how long do you think we writers will be receiving those lovely 70% royalties? On the other hand, the ‘Zon is the 800 pound gorilla in online book marketing, and that is a very real fact with which we must deal.

I have long touted the desirability of going wide, of having my books available on numerous platforms, of supporting diversity in sales venues. (In the interest of full disclosure – I will admit to having a couple of short stories exclusive to the ‘Zon for various reasons not germane to this discussion.) However, going wide can be dangerous to one’s bank account.

The ‘Zon’s exclusivity program of Kindle Unlimited, which they push shamelessly, is ruthless. If you aren’t in KU, your books get shoved down... way down. I have typed in the exact title of one of my wide books, both with and without quotation marks to show search for entirety and by word, yet in neither instance did either show up until the fourth or fifth page. The pages of books that did show up were all KU titles – some of which did not even share a single word in their title with mine.

Even with such a handicap regarding discoverability, the biggest chunk of my income is from the ‘Zon. The other venues, which I have worked so hard and done without in order to support, offer only trifling sales. And no, they don’t advertise or push my books either.

So – the question becomes, how much can I afford to support a principle when it is not supporting me? I am fortunate; I do not have to depend solely on my writing income to survive – however, it is a part of our household income. I repeat – how much are we supposed to give up in order to support a principle? One of the writers whom I have mentored, as well as several other professional friends, are in KU and making very respectable sums on page reads alone. And no, none of them are ‘book stuffing’ scammers of any stripe – just hard working writers with good stories to tell.

I’m a good writer, too, I work hard and I have good stories to tell. I’ve won awards and been on several best-seller lists (all in Europe – go figure!) but I’m buried so far in the search engine heap my books may never see the daylight of solvency.

So I have come to the conclusion that the least I can do is experiment. I’ve decided to pull some of my better-selling books from other venues and place them in KU. If they do well, I’ll move them all. To those of you readers who use non-‘Zon venues and devices, I’m sorry I shan’t be available to you, but let’s be honest - if you had bought my books I wouldn’t have to be doing this.

I still hate even the remotest hint of a monopoly.

I hate bankruptcy even more.

How to Bake a Murder Was a Pleasure to Read

Now that I'm part of the older generation, I find it difficult to discover books containing heroines with whom I can relate. Many books seem to be about younger people. 

However,  I did stumble upon a great cozy mystery called How to Bake a Murder by K.J. Emrick. In it, the older heroine is actually depicted as savvy and kindhearted, not a feeble woman who does dumb things. 

If you'd like to read my review, you can find it at this link.

This ebook is available on Amazon and worth checking out.

Morgan Mandel

http://www.morganmandel.com

Binge Watching and Binge Reading

I started binge watching TV, when I noticed some of the stations, such as ION, TNT, and others devoted entire days to certain programs, or at least showed one or two episodes each day in a row until the series was completed, such as House, and Judging Amy.

Turns out I found binge-watching so satisfying, I've graduated to borrowing television DVDs from the library, such as  Homeland, The Mentalist, Chicago Fire, and Chicago P.D.. That works even better for me, since usually only a few commercials appear on the lead disc of a series. Last December, I was lucky enough to get a free trial offer for Showtime and I binge watched the entire season of Homeland, which had just been completed. I'm dying to see the new episodes when the series starts up again, but will now need to decide whether to get a subscription to Showtime or wait for the DVD. I'll be more fortunate with Chicago Fire and Chicago P.D., since they're on NBC, a major network. I've digressed a bit here. Anyway, I've heard I'm not the only binge watcher. 

This TV binge-watching of mine reminds me there are also a ton of binge readers. I'd often heard readers like nothing more than to follow a series by a favorite author, and now I better understand that preference. 

For authors, I'm offering some suggestions on how to create a series to hook binge readers: 

1. Use the same character in each book.
2. Create a collection or anthology using the same theme as presented in the lead book, as I've done in my Always Young series. I confess to not completing the third of the series, but one of these days it will be ready. I've been sidetracked by a good twin, bad twin book I'd started ages ago and begs to be done first.
   
3. Use a certain locale in each book, as I've used in my so-far two book Deerview series, which I might later expand.
   
4. Do a spin off by turning a minor character in one book into a major in another, as I've done in my short Perfect Match series.
   

What about you? Do you binge watch or binge read? Do you like to write or read a book series? If you're an author with a series, please share a link to the first of your series and offer a few sentences about the character or premise.

Catch all of Morgan Mandel's mysteries and romances at

http://www.amazon.com/author/morganmandel

Check out Morgan's mystery website at:

http://morgandoesmystery.com 

Connect with Morgan on Facebook at:

http://www.facebook.com/morgan.mandel

Twitter:@MorganMandel 

I'd Rather Be Writing...

by Janis Patterson

I’ve been happily self-publishing for a while, and love the sense of control it gives me over my books. There are few greater feelings than seeing a book which you have written, gone through multiple editing rounds with, had final say over the cover and worked with your formatter coalesce into a real book that goes out for sale and is the equal of any book published by anyone anywhere.

There are few worse feelings than to realize now you have to publicize the book. Of course, this is not a problem specific to self-published authors. Over the past few decades every publisher has pushed more and more of the publicity chores off onto the authors until, unless one is a mega-best-seller, they do little more than list the books in some catalogues. The more unknown you are, the more likely it is you will disappear, which means as an author you are pretty much responsible for your own publicity.

I hate doing publicity. I would rather write two or three books than do the publicity on one. Unfortunately, I cannot afford a publicist, though I dream of having one. It’s the same with book signings – I love doing them; it’s almost like having a literary salon. But… there is the hassle of setting them up, and there are so few places now who will host them unless you pay them money for the privilege of doing so. Unless, of course, you are one of those mega-best-sellers. Them that has, gets!

So – I know what I must do.

A KILLING AT EL KAB is now on pre-order at Amazon for the bargain price of $2.99. It will go up to the regular price of $4.99 on 20^th March, the official release day. There will be a paperback, but that will be in a little while.

Bet you saw that coming, didn’t you?

Ten Ways to Use Reviews to Advantage

Reviews are a great help to an author. Yes, bad ones really smart, but if they're constructive, they can still lead us in the right direction.

And, the good ones, well, those not only make us feel good, encourage us to keep writing when the going gets tough, but are also great fodder for promotions.

Some ways to use a good review, or even part of a not-so-good review:

1. Pluck a short phrase from a review and place it on Twitter, along with your book link, and a copy of the book cover. Add a few hashtags where they may apply, such as #amwriting, or #mystery, or #thriller, #review, etc.

2. Place the review link on your Timeline at Facebook. If you're lucky, at least a few of your followers will see it. Facebook has become stingy about sharing links, but even if one or two people notice, the ball can still get rolling.

3. Share the review on any groups you belong to at Facebook. Again, if you're lucky, some of the others who are also posting promotions at the groups will notice yours.

4. Try not to be too pushy, but casually mention your new review with the link at one or two of your Yahoo groups, if you belong to any.

5. Post the review at Goodreads. I confess to not paying attention to Goodreads as much as I should. I really need to follow this advice.

6. Place the link and a teaser from the review on your website.

7. Make a Review Board on Pinterest and add our review links there, or use a different board for each of your books, and put the review link on the appropriate board. If you want, you could do both.

8. Include part of the review in a blog.

9. Remember, if you're doing a special promotion, many promotional sites require at least 4 stars or more. That's your goal.

10. Post a review of a book you liked. Maybe, later that author will reciprocate after reading one of your books. Since Amazon is a little strict about buddy authors doing reviews, I don't mention I'm an author in my review profile, and my reviews have so far not been taken down.

Can you think of any other ways to use reviews to advantage?

Find all of Morgan's books at
http://www.amazon.com/author/morganmandel

Excerpts are at:
http://morgansbooklinks.blogspot.com

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/morgan.mandel

Twitter: @MorganMandel

A Word to the Wise

Since this week is a busy one, I thought I'd just offer a word to the wise for those who are self-publishing on Amazon.

If you need to update your book, if you can, convert it first for your own kindle by using the Amazon convert feature, after saving the book by using a similar, but not the same name as the real title. When it appears on your kindle, read it over and make sure it's how you want it to be. Do this up to the very, very end.

Also, if you're on the KDP Select program at Amazon, when you do have a freebie promotion, make sure to give yourself a free copy as well. If you don't do freebie promotions, it's a good idea to buy a copy of your book, so you'll see what others are getting. In the manage you kindle section at Amazon, click for an automatic update.

Then, after your update is done, see if the book automatically appears updated. If not, remove the old version from your kindle, and then have the new version delivered to your kindle from the Cloud.

Why am I mentioning this? Well, for some reason, both on my convert version and on the real version, when I tried to go to the next page when there were only a few sentences left in the About the Author section at the very end, I got an error message telling me to remove the book and get it again from the Cloud. I did that, but it didn't work.

Well, after over 3 days, and with the help with the KDP people at Amazon, the error message finally went away. That was yesterday. Today, it was back.

So, this morning, I changed things around at the end of my book, and re-sent it to convert. It looked okay, so now I'm downloading it again to Amazon, and am awaiting the results. Will it be right this time?

One never knows what kind of strange things might happen, so we need to be on guard, and do our best to get a quality product out to our readers.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

Find all of Morgan Mandel's romances & mysteries at 

http://www.amazon.com/author/morganmandel

  Twitter: @MorganMandel

The Quixotic Phenomena Called a Review

By Chester Campbell

Book reviews are an interesting phenomena. They are so subjective that you have to evaluate them with care and and in many cases take them with the proverbial grain of salt. There has been a flood of posts on various blogs and listserves recently about Amazon's treatment of reviews. And much of it derives from the fake review exposes of late.

Many writers have complained of Amazon's recent practice of taking down reviews from their book pages for various reasons. There is a lot of disagreement about what is taking place. Some say the massive retail site has removed reviews by other authors. Some say it doesn't like reviews put  up by friends of the author.

Happily I haven't noticed any reviews removed from my books except for one, Secret of the Scroll, my first published book and the first in my Greg McKenzie mystery series. However, it's easy to see what they did. The novel was originally published in 2002 by Durban House. I parted with the company after my third book and got my rights back. I also got a large supply of books from their inventory, which I used to keep the books on Amazon and sell at various venues.

I ran out of Secret of the Scroll copies this year and got it printed in a second edition by Night Shadows Press. The  inside of the book is virtually identical, but the cover has several changes, one of which I had wished was there from the start. With nothing but the title and artwork of an ancient scroll on the original cover, many people thought it was a religious book about the Dead Sea Scrolls. The new cover includes copy identifying the story as an international thriller.

The Amazon page contained around eight reviews submitted back in 2002 and 2003. After the new edition was put up, Amazon gained another batch of reviews when I did three free days for the Kindle edition. Recently I found that the reviews for the 2002 edition had been removed. I thought that was a little picky, but I haven't complained.

Back to my original premise about the subjectivity of reviews, I found it quite interesting to read a few recent reviews for the second Greg McKenzie book, Designed to Kill. Several reviews were added after I ran its Kindle edition free. Here are three that appeared one after the other. First came a 3-star review titled "It's OK":

"In a nutshell, I felt like this story was a little predictable. I figured out early on who the bad guy was. I continued to read it though, hoping that I would be surprised in the end. Sadly, I wasn't."

Under that appeared this 1-star review titled "I Didn't Even Finish It":

"It is rare that a book is so bad, that I don't finish it. I have pushed through some terrible books in the past, but this one was an exception. I didn't like anything about this book. I didn't like the characters. I didn't like the story line. I found it boring, and rambling. This was my first and last Greg McKenzie Mystery."

Following that came this 5-star review titled "Killer out there":

"Greg McKenzie retired and living in Nashville with his wife Jill find themselves as amateur sleuths, after their close friends son is found dead from a head wound in Pensacola Florida, the evidence suggest he committed suicide by a gunshot to his head.
Greg and Jill decide to go to Florida to take a look at the evidence as the family believe he was murdered. So the story begins ranging from Nashville Tenn. to Pensacola Flo. This is an interesting book as it teams up a husband and wife who are retired and in their early 60's. A well thought out and plausable plot that will keep you guessing to the end."

You'd have thought they read different books. Fortunately for my ego, the page contains seven 5 stars, including one from Midwest Book Review that ends with:

"A plot that moves along at a rapid clip with plenty of cliffhangers and well-defined characters. Greg McKenzie and his wife Jill are likeable characters who manage to transform retirement into a series of exciting adventures, all the while dealing with aging bodies and minds. A fine second effort!"

Visit me at Mystery Mania.

A Shift in Book Signing Methods

By Chester Campbell

I've done hundreds of bookstore signings all around the country since my first Greg McKenzie mystery came out in 2002. I've attended dozens of mystery conferences and conventions where I sat at a table hoping someone would come along with a book to sign, but I don't recall a store event when I didn't sell a book. There have been some where the number was terribly few, but many others have produced a decent amount of sales.

I've noticed a change in the climate over the past couple of years. Fewer bookstore patrons seem interested in trying a new author they're unfamiliar with. And working closely with my current small press publisher, I've learned more about the industry's problems. Like when a store orders twenty copies and the author sells only ten, returns decimate the profits.

As a result, I have just about stopped my bookstore signings. I can make more money and avoid the returns problem by concentrating on festivals and fairs and similar events. So far this year I have done a library author day, the Southern Kentucky BookFest, Franklin (TN) Main Street Festival, and Cool Springs (Mall) Festival of Art, Music and Books. Upcoming are the RC Cola & Moon Pie Festival, Horse Cave (KY) Bookfest, Gallatin (TN) Main Street Festival, and Kentucky Book Fair.

I'll add others as the opportunities arise. I find people at events like these more willing to try new authors, and happily I've had an increasing number of readers stop by to add more of my books to their collections. Although the book fairs usually will order your books for the event, I volunteer to bring my own, thus avoiding the problem of returns.

Since I've made all of my books available as ebooks, I'm selling a lot more online than on paper. And though I price my books low, with Amazon and Smashwords' royalty rates, I still come out okay. I suppose this is part of the changing paradigm of the book business. I do a lot less traveling and spend less on book promotion.

I remember back in my early days I kept hearing that you should break even on your fourth book. Now that I have eight out, I can assure you it ain't necessarily so.

Visit me at Mystery Mania

Changes in Publishing by Christine Duncan

Some of the buzz this week appears to be about a decision by Barnes and Noble. They have decided not to stock books published by Amazon Those of us who have been e-published a while thought we could side step the war between giants. Ebooks, or so the theory went, would always be available, did not depend on big publishing houses, were not as subject to things like recession. The theory failed to take into account the sheer mind-boggling amount of stuff out there on the internet. Ebooks, are many times, lost in the huge vastness of the information age. I keep having this discussion with one of my sons, who is in a band. He sees all of this as the "artist" taking back his own. The music industry was fundamentally changed, he says, by the internet, the iPhone, the MP3. Bands can go around the big recording companies and get exposure. They can find an audience. The question is, in my mind, is it a good change? Do those bands finding an audience make any money at it? Can I as a writer in a ever changing industry do so? So does it matter that one big titan is battling another big titan in the book industry? Will it make any difference to those of us who are writing today? You tell me.

Who has a kindle? Who doesn't? By Morgan Mandel

I broke down and ordered the Kindle3 and am quite psyched up about getting it. I've already bought Marilyn Meredith's kindle edition of Lingering Spirit. Someone who has a kindle had mentioned on an egroup that she had ordered tons of books before her kindle was delivered and they were all on there when it arrived. That sounded pretty handy, so I tried it. Actually, so far Marilyn's is the only one I've paid for. The others are freebies.

This is coming from someone who has a large TBR pile of traditional books, which I plan to read one of these days. (g)

What about you? Do you have a kindle or plan on getting one? If you have one or pre-ordered the latest, what do you like about the kindle?

If not, why don't you like the kindle?

Morgan Mandel
Link to my books on kindle

Macmillan and Amazon War by Morgan Mandel

I've been watching with interest the developments in book price wars. This one is a battle between Macmillan and Amazon. Macmillan's demanded higher prices for kindle, when apparently $9.99 is the highest Amazon would go.

Amazon pulled all the buy buttons from Macmillan books and was only selling books offered by third party vendors, none bought through Amazon itself.

Then, Amazon gave in under strong protest and decided it would agree to offer bestsellers at $12.99 to $14.99, under strong protest, saying Macmillan had a monopology over its own books.

I'm not sure what to think of this. In a way, it's a good idea for Macmillan to decide and stick to a price. That means authors will get compensated for their hard work, as well as other people involved in production and selling of books. Also, it sounds like Apple will be charging more for Ibook material than the going rates at most books at Amazon.

I actually dropped the kindle price for Killer Career to $3.99 to stay competitive in the ebook and kindle market.

Will the insistence on higher prices help or hurt authors? That's the question. In this poor economy, it's a good thing for books to be readily available at affordable prices. Still, these prices have dropped extremely low. Some authors give away their ebooks or kindles, while others offer them at $.99 or $1.99 in the hopes of attracting volume sales.

Will readers buy at the higher prices? Are publishers like Macmillan pricing themselves out of the market?
What's your take?

Morgan Mandel
http://morganmandel.blogspot.com/
Killer Career available at http://digital-bookshop.com/ , at Amazon and other venues.

E-book breakthrough?

There is e-book news from several fronts this week. First, the Texas legislature has passed a bill that allows school districts to use their textbook money for e-readers. Second, news leaks tell that Amazon will unveil a new, larger size Kindle for reading newspapers and textbooks. The unveiling is set for tomorrow (as I write this) or today (as you read this.).

The textbook news out of Texas should cheer all e-book lovers. Texas is the second largest purchaser of textbooks. Now, school kids in Texas may get their books electronically. The savings will be felt by the districts who won't have to store textbooks, who will be able to replace them easier and cheaper when they wear out or become outdated. Children will feel the weight of all those books removed from their bookbags. I have always believed the spear point of the e-book revolution is in textbooks. The generation that goes to school on e-books will be the e-book market of the future.

The Kindle news is also exciting in this regard. The large format of the new Kindle is intended for textbooks, which are printed in a larger format than trade books. The larger screen will allow for presentation of graphs and other illustrations. It's also rumored to have the ability to make annotations to the text—to write in the margins, in other words. The large format will make reading newspapers easier, too.

Is this the breakthrough e-book authors have been waiting for? Perhaps. It's certainly a significant step. However, I believe the biggest breakthroughs are yet to come and they are not in technology or legislation, but in marketing. The breakthrough will be in the selling of e-books, or more specifically, getting the book in front of a potential buyer's face.

The genius of the Kindle, in my opinion, is not in the electronic ink or other razzle-dazzle, nor in the ability to carry your entire library in your hand. No the genius of the Kindle is that you carry an entire bookstore in your hand. With a Kindle, you can buy a book whenever the mood strikes. Say you've just finished a Michael Connelly. You can immediately purchase the next one and within minutes plunge ahead into the series. No having to head to a bookstore, or start up your computer. A flip of the switch and you're connected. Another book purchased. Genius.

The shortcoming of the Kindle is that it connects to the Amazon store, which is not an inviting store. I like bookstores and drugstore racks and airport displays and newsstands as a means of selling books. A bookstore with shelf after shelf and tables piled with books and end displays with the covers facing out is a pleasure palace, full of temptations. The Amazon store, on the other hand, is like a bookstore with sheets over the shelves and tables. You can see what's inside only if you peek behind the sheets. Even then, you only see a small part of the stock. That's what the Amazon search engine feels like to me.

You sell a book by putting the cover in the reader's face. That's what a bookstore does. That's what a book signing does. Until publishers, booksellers and writers can figure out how to put the book cover in front of a reader's face, instead of at the end of a search function, we won't have a breakthrough in e-books.

What do you think?

Mark Troy
http://hawaiian-eye.blogspot.com
http://www.marktroy.net