On Going Direct

Although I've tried using Kindle Unlimited a couple of times for my books, I prefer to go wide with them to serve as many readers as possible. In the past, I've used distributors such as Smashwords and Draft2Digital (I highly recommend the latter over the former). Distributors make it easy to reach multiple sites with one process. However, publishing directly to sites such as Barnes and Noble, Kobo, Google Play, and Apple also has advantages. You can have greater control over pricing, gain access to special site-only promotions, and receive higher royalties. So last month, I stopped using Draft2Digitial for the distributors listed above and started going direct.

So far, it's been a tedious process republishing my work at different vendors. Kobo and Barnes and Noble were the easiest, since they accepted the files I'd used elsewhere. Google and Apple are more complicated. I have to submit my manuscripts to Google as PDFs and to Apple as epubs. While Word does a straightforward job of creating PDFs from Word documents, I have to use a conversion program like Calibre to create EPUB files. This worked for some of my books, but others got rejected for embedded font errors, and I haven't figured out why. So Apple currently has only one book out of my five-book fantasy series and Lyon's Legacy but not the sequel, Twinned Universes. I'll have to do some more research to figure out what the problem is.


Once I get everything republished properly, then I have to convince Amazon to set the first books of my series back to permafree. Then I can promote them to encourage readers to get the rest of the series.

If you plan to publish your books on multiple sites, I recommend gathering all the information and files you need before you start. It's not just manuscripts and covers; it's blurbs, ISBNs, and other information such as original publication dates. I wound up collecting some of this information in a single document I can use as reference later.

If you're an indie author, do you publish just on Amazon or other sites too? What's your favorite store for ebooks? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.

Amazon's Upload: Is the Near Future Futuristic Enough?

Although I don't spend a lot of time watching TV, occasionally I'm able to squeeze in some time around dinner when I'm crocheting or cutting fabric for masks. I was intrigued by the ads for Amazon's new show Upload, about Nathan, a young man who's killed in an accident and uploaded to a digital afterlife represented by a fancy hotel. Helping him adjust is his customer service representative "angel" named Nora. The show is set in 2033, which is only thirteen years away. Technology has advanced to the point where people print food, use self-driving cars, and, as the premise implies, have the ability to upload a human's consciousness to digital format.

I'm in the middle of Episode Three, so it'll take me a while to finish this series. However, I have noticed a few things that don't seem realistic to me. For example, in the first episode, we see a woman with a black-and-white avatar, which was based on an old photo. This was probably put in to be funny and appeal to the audience. In practice, we can already add color to photos, so why wouldn't that be done for her? For that matter, why not allow people to customize their avatars or even choose non-human forms? There's also a pretty big plot hole in the first episode where a dangerous section of the afterlife has less security than a chapel in that same setting. The dangerous area is key to the climax of the first episode; however, I think it could have been set up to make the character work harder to gain access, which would have proven he was truly desperate instead of hangry and annoyed about a bad hairstyle. Perhaps I'm more critical of these things because I'm a storyteller and used to nitpicking my own work.

One of the biggest dangers of writing about the near future is that it can be so hard to predict. You can reference current popular culture, but will the songs and movies you use be a flash in the pan or still be popular a decade or two later? Your audience may appreciate the throwback, but would a movie from 2004 be meaningful for a character who could have been born that year? What new disruptions will occur in the next thirteen years that we couldn't have foreseen?

Anyway, as I keep watching, perhaps some of these "glitches" will make more sense. (I'm trying to avoid spoilers, so please don't add any in the comments.) It will be interesting to look back at this show in thirteen years and see how well it compares to reality.

Third Flatiron Best of 2019 Now Available!

I mentioned a couple of months ago that my short story, "Specimen 1842," had been selected for Third Flatiron's Best of 2019 anthology. This anthology is finally available, though currently only as an ebook on Amazon. It's free if you're in Kindle Unlimited or only $2.99 if you're not. Here's the cover, and below is the description from Amazon:

Third Flatiron Anthologies presents fourteen of its best speculative fiction stories from the year 2019. Contributors include Tom Pappalardo, J. D. Blackrose, Brian Trent, Bruce Golden, Mack Moyer, Arthur Carey, Maureen Bowden, Edwina Shaw, Elizabeth Beechwood, Evan A Davis, K. G. Anderson, Philip John Schweitzer, Sandra Ulbrich Almazan, and Samson Stormcrow Hayes. Edited by Juliana Rew.

I'm still waiting to get my copy, but I'm looking forward to reading it. Here's hoping you check it out too.

Amazon Prime Video Recommendations

Although I've used Amazon Prime Video before, this weekend I discovered that they have the entire series of Star Trek: The Next Generation, which I started watching in college. I plan to work my way through the series again, starting at the beginning. It'll give me something to do while I crochet. I also plan to watch the original Star Trek series, and I've tried some of the Amazon original historical series. Do you have any recommendations? It doesn't have to be science fiction or history. Feel free to share in the comments.

KU--To Renew or Not to Renew

I've never had much luck with Kindle Unlimited (KU) as an author, but last year, I decided to try it as a reader during Amazon Prime Day last year, when it was available at a reduced price. Soon I'll have to decide if I want to renew it or not.

Although I consider myself a voracious reader, it's hard for me to get my money's worth of reading out of KU each month. Part of this is because if I discover a book during its free period, I'll "buy" it instead of borrowing it. Since my Kindle and Kindle apps display the newest books first, the books I do borrow will get buried quickly if I don't read them immediately. The Kindle and Kindle apps aren't set up for me to manage my KU books there, so I have to log into my Amazon account if I want to find and return any KU books. The exception is when I try to borrow an eleventh book; the Kindle or app will prompt me to return one of my ten books I already have and continue. Of course, having access to all the books in the KU library doesn't stop me from buying plenty of other books outside the library.

All the complaints aside, I will say that my use of KU comes and goes in spurts. While I may go for a while without using it, I've read at least two books (maybe three) in KU recently. There are some authors I follow in KU, so it's convenient for binging on their books. I like to think they will get more money for a $0.99 book if I borrow it instead of buying it.

Are you (or have you been) part of KU or other subscription service for books? If so, what did you think of it? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.

Young Seasons Now Available--Free Today and Tomorrow!

Young Seasons went live on Amazon yesterday. You can download it here. (Sorry, Alex, it's currently in Select, but I plan on wide distribution to iTunes and other stores in October.) It'll be free today and tomorrow to celebrate Prime Day. Afterwards, it'll be $0.99. If you like the stories, please consider leaving a review on Amazon or Goodreads. Thanks!

Amazon Bestseller Status--Empty Brag or Not?

Yesterday, one of the science fiction authors (who shall remain nameless) I follow on Facebook posted a mini-rant about how some (presumably "indie scum") authors claim bestseller status from Amazon sales when those numbers don't compare to the ones needed to make bestseller status in the NY Times or USA Today. I didn't post a response then because I needed to focus on my writing and not argue with someone on his own Facebook page, but I think the topic merits further discussion.

Lyon's Legacy has made Top Ten in the Time Travel category on Amazon a few times, mostly when I put it on sale and advertised it on Book Gorilla. The first weekend it was permafree it also moved a lot of units without paid ads and reached #170 on Amazon overall for free books. Granted, each time there were only a few hundred units involved, and of course after a few days the novella slipped down the charts again. Other works of mine, such as "Letters to Psyche," Life at Seventeen Syllables a Day, and even SF Women A-Z also made it into the best-seller list for more obscure categories briefly with only a couple of sales. So, yes, I will grant this author the fact that Amazon bestseller status for an hour or two for a subcategory does not necessarily match numbers with bookstore sales generated over a week.


Is Amazon bestseller status misleading or meaningless, though? The author who complained about this is a well-known, award-winning author who shouldn't feel threatened by indie authors like me, who only make a handful of sales each month. For me, it is exciting to see a book climb the charts, even if I know it won't last. (However, when overall sales are slow, Lyon's Legacy can still linger for a while on the free Time Travel bestseller list with few sales, albeit near the bottom.) I do list Lyon's Legacy Top Ten Time Travel bestseller status in its book description on Amazon since I think that is a significant accomplishment. Maybe it came about after an ad, but then publishers pay bookstores for prominent placement of featured books, so they also invest in that status.

As for other bestseller lists, they can be gamed by people who know which bookstores are counted when compiling those lists, and the list-makers have been known to manipulate the lists to keep eBooks and the Harry Potter series off of the lists. Barnes and Noble has been accused of deliberately suppressing the ranks of indie books in certain genres so they don't compete with traditionally published books. Amazon can be gamed too, but in my opinion, it is the most honest, transparent store when it comes to its bestseller lists.

Bestseller status is important to big publishers and their authors, since they profit most when they sell lots of copies of a single title in a short time. Indie authors with lower overheads can make money off of fewer sales sustained over a long period of time. While it looks nice to be a bestseller, in the long run, I would like to have sustainable sales supported by true fans and word-of-mouth. It may take a lot of sales to many different people to reach my target audience, however.  I will only mention bestseller status for my works in the book description if it makes it to the Top Ten of its category. And while it's hard to avoid comparing yourself with others, for my own career, I'd rather focus on writing and publishing the best books that I can. As a reader, I'm too independent to read something just because it's a bestseller, but I realize others might value that popularity.

How do you feel about bestseller status for books? Does it matter to you as a reader? Do you care how the bestseller status was earned?

Selecting KDP Select or Not?

A couple of days ago, Amazon announced a major change to how authors in the Kindle Unlimited program would be compensated. When KU was formed last year, authors were paid if a reader read past 10% of the book length. This led to a lot of authors putting short stories and serials into the program. To encourage authors to add longer books, Amazon will start paying them next month by the number of pages read.

Currently, I only have one short story, "Letters to Psyche," in Select. I prefer to put my work in wide distribution, both to benefit readers and to make sure each book has the potential to give me multiple income streams. That said, most of my sales do come from Amazon. I get a few by distributing through Draft to Digital, even less via Smashwords, and so far none through Google Play. I have put some of my work in Select for brief periods of time. For example, Seasons' Beginnings was in Select for the first three months before I put it in wide distribution. I got a few borrows, but it wasn't hugely popular. However, I put Scattered Seasons in wide distribution from the start because the first book was available everywhere. Since there is a big shift in the Season Avatars series between books One and Two, I plan to write a short story collection featuring the characters from Scattered Seasons and use that as a way to introduce readers to the series. The question now is whether I should make the collection perrmafree everywhere or put it in KU first and see how it works. I face the same decision with "The Unnumbered World," the next story in the Catalyst Chronicles series. All novels from both series will be in wide distribution, but at some point, I may write another series and keep it exclusive to Amazon.

What do you think of the KU Program? Are you signed up for it as a reader or writer? Please let me know in the comments.

Twinned Universes on Sale for $0.99 From 9/10/14--9/17/14

Quick update on the computer situation: the new hard drive arrived last night. I'm still not sure if I'll install it myself or have someone else do it. I may use PCMover to set up the new hard drive.

Nine years ago, Eugene and I got married. Happy Anniversary, sweetie! May all our days together be as sweet as our wedding cake--with far fewer calories, though.

To celebrate, I'm putting Twinned Universes on sale for one week. Normal price is $2.99, but from today through next Wednesday it'll be $0.99 on Amazon. If you haven't grabbed it yet, now's a good time to do so.

Paul Harrison always wanted to play Hamlet, but he never expected he’d live the role first.
In the aftermath of a family tragedy on 21st century Earth, Paul discovers he’s the clone of Sean Lyon, his great-great-grandfather and a famous TwenCen musician. Suspecting his mother’s death was no accident, Paul comes up with a plan to trick the answers out of the great-uncle who had him cloned. But in order to make his plan work, Paul needs help from Sean himself—and Sean’s time is running out in the TwenCen universe next door. Although Paul’s family lives on the spaceship that travels between the universes, he’s never been allowed on TwenCen Earth. Now, with the help of his friends, his disguise-creating holoprojectors, and a quantum quirk, Paul must make his way to Sean while evading other time travelers who fear he’ll change the history of the TwenCen universe. If Paul is to achieve justice, he must not only risk his own life, but the wormhole connecting the universes. “To be or not to be” was a simple question in comparison....

Seasons' Beginnings Available for Pre-Order!

Last week, Amazon gave indies the ability to make their books available for pre-order. Naturally, I decided to try this new feature. It involves uploading a draft file, but luckily I already had that formatted. I just have to have the final draft uploaded ten days before the due date. Hopefully my beta readers will get back to me on schedule so I have time to make any last-minute changes.

The publication date is October 21, 2014. You can pre-order the eBook for $2.99 at this link. The paper version will be $14; I'll try to make it available close to 10/21. Here again is the cover and blurb:

Kron Evenhanded is an artificer, able to enchant any man-made object, but he finds people more difficult to work with. When he visits the city of Vistichia, he encounters Sal-thaath, an extremely magical but dangerous child created by Salth, another magician Kron knew at the Magic Institute. Kron attempts to civilize Sal-thaath, but when his efforts lead to tragedy, Kron is forced to ally himself with a quartet of new deities and their human Avatars. Together they must defend Vistichia as Salth attempts to drain its life and magic. But Salth has Ascended halfway to godhood over Time. Will Kron’s artifacts be enough to protect the Avatars, especially the woman he loves, or will Time separate them?

Submission Call--First Annual Indie-pendence Day Anthology

This is a repost from Indie Writers Monthly.

Announcing the first ever 

COMING ON THE FOURTH OF JULY, it's the first-ever anthology of stories by indie writers to bear the INDIE WRITERS MONTHLY stamp of approval*, and we want YOU to be a part of it.

The anthology is going to be a collection of stories about Time Travel, and here is HOW YOU CAN GET IN ON THIS:

A. Have a story about time travel, or write one.

2.  Submit that story to us, by June 15, 2014.  (send submissions to litaplaceforstories[at]gmail.com** and label them "IWM TIME TRAVEL ANNUAL" or something like that.)

THIS IS IMPORTANT: paste the story directly into the of the email.  

I'M NOT OPENING ATTACHMENTS.  

III. Make sure you have the rights to the stories and it'd be nice if it hadn't been published somewhere else.  

Word limits? Who do you think you're talking to, here? Because there'll only be a few weeks to read them, shoot for somewhere between 1 and 1,000 words, but if you go longer, by all means, go longer.

Still reading?  Good.  Here is WHY you want to get in on this!

8(a)2.: The stories we like the best will get put into the anthology and you'll be a published writer! 

and

C: There are prizes! Specifically, the story picked as best by the IWM gang will win a $15 Amazon Gift Card and the Runner Up will get a $10 Amazon Gift Card. 

So there you have it!  I look forward to getting those stories.

PSST? Want to read some of my own time-travel stories? Check out 

"the natural order of things is largely determined by what direction we are headed and how fast," or 

HEADLINE: “Time Travel Is Only Possible In One Direction, Scientists Say.” Subhead: “Balderdash,” Tim says.

And here's a link to five 250-word time travel stories (and an essay on another one) 

Lyon's Legacy--A Bestseller!

As I've mentioned before on this blog, Lyon's Legacy is on sale on Amazon for $0.99 this month. If you're going to have a sale, you need to promote it. I therefore bought a couple of ads in BookGorilla, Kindle Books and Tips, and Kindle Nation Daily. The ads aren't cheap, but as my dad pointed out, I can write them off on my taxes as business expenses. This isn't my first time running ads for my books, and while they do move books, so far I haven't made a profit from them. So I wasn't sure what to expect today. When I checked my sales at noon, I'd sold a few books, but my sales rank hadn't changed. However, later on, this is what I saw on Amazon:

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #50,158 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

#79 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #50,158 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

#79 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Time Travel

As it was my first time in a paid best seller list, I was excited. "Letters to Psyche" did rank higher in its category (I think it had something to do with Myths and Legends), but that was when it was free through KDP Select.

Of course, since then I've been constantly checking my stats. Although Lyon's Legacy fell off the overall Science Fiction list, it continued to rise on the Time Travel list, climbing to #44. Here's what I saw around 10:00 last night:

Here's a close-up:

 
This morning, I'm up to #10 in time travel. Who knows what will happen today with the Kindle Nation Daily ad? 

Admittedly, it doesn't always take a lot of sales to make it to a best seller list, especially in a subcategory. I'm sure Lyon's Legacy will fall off the charts again when the promotions are over. But it's still exciting, and hopefully some of these readers will go on to read Twinned Universes and my other stories too. 

Of course, this celebration calls for a Beatles video:



 Enjoy your weekend, everyone, and see you Monday!

"The Mommy Clone," A Catalyst Chronicles Short Story, Now Available

Actually, I published this story Sunday evening, but since I already had pre-scheduled posts for the last couple of days (and I needed to tweak something), I'm making the official announcement today.

For some time, I've wanted to write something in my Catalyst Chronicles universe set between Lyon's Legacy and Twinned Universes. I finally got an idea and a setting for a story late last year. Since I was sick and in bed Sunday, I had enough time to revise and format the story. Anyway, here's the cover and the blurb:

All Joanna wants to do is entertain her children for a couple of hours while her husband is busy. The multi-story bouncy house promises to be fun, but someone else stalks them, someone wearing Joanna's face. Will Joanna escape with both children, or will her son fall prey to the Mommy Clone?

(The cover was done by Meghan Derico of Derico Photography. She also designed the covers for Lyon's Legacy and "The Book of Beasts.") 

The story is currently free on Smashwords and $0.99 at Amazon and B&N. Please report the lower price to Amazon so they price-match. I want to use this story as a loss leader (at least for now) to encourage readers to try my other books. I'm also going to run an experiment with this short story and the next one I publish (which will initially be in the Kindle Select program for three months): is it better to use Select or price-matching for promotion? I'll report results when I have them. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy the story!