Pub News : Biz advice, biz gathering, biz deals
$ According to Forbes, if you want to succeed in business, read more novels!
© The movers and shakers of the publishing business gather at this year’s BookExpo America.
∞ Amazon buys Avalon … and gets thousands of backlist books in the bargain.
♥ Wool author Hugh Howey explains how his self-published book became a hot film rights property.
Cenolithic releases J. Nelson Leith’s “Winterfesto” on Nook!
Now on Nook!
Cenolithic is proud to announce the release of J. Nelson Leith’s “Winterfesto : America Needs a National Winterfest Holiday” (previously only available for Kindle) on Barnes & Noble’s Nook ereader!
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There is a common sentiment (scientifically confirmed by psychologist Dr. Cliff Arnall) that January is the saddest month of the year. Yet, the typical American pattern is simply to collapse in a festivity coma immediately after New Year’s Eve, plunging into the cold, wet numbness of January with the momentum of a skydiver without an emotional parachute.
This manifesto lays out the emotional, political, and economic reasons America should establish a federal Winterfest holiday in late January or early February celebrating the arts, sports, food and other joyous aspects of the winter season.
A quick but inspiring read, the Winterfesto is chock full of ideas for transforming the post-holiday slump into a bright cap on the holiday season. It’s a holiday with something for everyone, conservatives and liberals, sports fans and arts fans, businesses and consumers, foodies, outdoorsy folks, and history buffs alike!
Pub News: Green books, good books, ebooks, and no new books!
¿ To protest a bookselling duopoly, an Israeli publisher is refusing to accept new writers. How do you say “displaced risk” and “moral hazard” in Hebrew?
♣ The ever-unretired Oprah Winfrey restarts her famous Book Club. Whose vision board was this on?
∞ Macmillan is determined to make book production more environmentally friendly. I hope this doesn’t mean an end to the feel and smell of real dead trees!
≠ And for more about the ongoing ebook pricing struggle between Amazon and Apple et al.
What Do You Think? Love in detective stories.
The quote of the day is:
“Love interest nearly always weakens a mystery because it introduces a type of suspense that is antagonistic to the detective’s struggle to solve a problem.” – Raymond Chandler
“On the Head of a Pin” free for Memorial Day Weekend!
It’s the first three-day weekend of the American summer, and you’re looking for a nice free read for your Kindle or app-enable phone or computer… something with a little heat, a bit of intrigue, a lot of spirit, and a peek into the American story.
Private detective Chuck Oliver thinks he’s taking another safe and easy missing-person case, but he’s been hired to locate the angel of Despair, one of the original eight Deadly Sins who has gone missing. Her seven party-loving Sisters seem none too eager to help, the angel of Curiosity uses her wiles to distract him, Misfortune bounces him from world to world, and even his client has her own ulterior motives. But, the greatest threat to his investigation turns out to the be the most seductive femme fatale of all: the angel of Death.
As C. R. Oliver digs deeper into the mystery, he also descends into the shadowy depths of the spiritual world, and walks backward through the cultural, musical, and literary history of America’s 20th Century from the “Safe New World” of today’s pampered club-hoppers to the rough, hard-boiled streets of the Jazz Age.
“Can you despair of finding Despair? The moment you’re convinced you’ll never find Her, there She is! And then, hope renewed, you lose Her again…”
From midnight to midnight Pacific Time on Saturday, 26 May, you can get On the Head of a Pin for free at Amazon.com!
Kindle version
PRAISE FOR ON THE HEAD OF A PIN FROM AMAZON:
“Very engaging, slightly shocking and yes it is quite literary … but the sex scenes are actually really HOT!”
“This isn’t your common mystery … it’s one of THOSE books. There are plenty of sexy stories out there, but I haven’t read one that blended so many worlds, so effortlessly.”
“This story had all the trappings of Mickey Spillane, except more depth and subtlety than I’ve seen a long while. Leith carries the metaphor, seemingly without effort, and manages not to spill a drop. The story was rich with texture and ambiance and the author shamelessly addresses the camera and makes you laugh for having done so. A successful straddling of two worlds and at least two genres, a brilliant convergence of language and ideas.”
“Such rich, vivid detail; ample depth and seductive language.”
“A breath of fresh air from the mainstream books out there. Mr. Leith has managed to tie together mystery, fantasy and thriller into one great read!”
The Unveiling project begins!
A few writer friends are gathering for The Unveiling, a collaborative fiction project based on a simple, compelling premise: What if we had to face a Zombie Apocalypse and a Machine Apocalypse at the same time?
As the stories come in, we’ll post them to The Unveiling page.
Cenolithic release J. Nelson Leith’s latest, the novelette “Heather Hadrigal”
Cenolithic announces the release of the latest story by John Nelson Leith, a horror novelette “Heather Hadrigal,” available for both Kindle and Nook.
“She wasn’t beautiful, and certainly could not be described as sexy. But, she was disarming. She had a round face, a smile more fit for a little girl than the grown woman she obviously was, and hair coiled like black springs over her shoulders.”
When hard-working Will first met Heather Hadrigal, he thought she was just a curious stranger with a playful demeanor … or perhaps a very vivid dream. But then, Will’s room-mate warns him that she’s being hunted by the authorities. Is she a stress-induced hallucination? A “manic pixie dream girl” gone bad? A mass delusion? Or a seductive chimaera from the ancient past?
Cenolithic releases two new Observer Tales : The Woman Who Wouldn’t Die (novella) and The Chameleon Missive (short story)
Cenolithic is proud to announce the release of two more stories set in John Nelson Leith’s world of the Observer: “The Woman Who Wouldn’t Die” [Kindle | Nook] and “The Chameleon Missive” [Kindle | Nook].
These join “The Dun Cat Of Mill Bridge” [Kindle | Nook] among The Observer Tales. More are on the way!
Charles Stross explains the current kerfuffle over ebook pricing
Most of what you hear about the publishers vs. Amazon skirmish from online chatter and in the media (and, apparently, in the halls of the Justice Department) lacks economic sophistication. There’s a complete failure to understand, or articulate, the dangers of monopolies, monopsonies, loss-leading, and all other “Too Big To Exist” threats to free market competition.
Never fear! Author Charlie Stross does a fantastic job of clearing it up in “What Amazon’s ebook strategy means.”