Reviews from Random Readers

One of the disadvantages of publishing your own books is getting them reviewed. If I had signed with a publisher, and they thought I had a good chance of making them some money, they would have sent my books to professional reviewers. Then, when the glowing reports came back, they'd use them for dusk jackets and other marketing. This is called third-party validation. In other words, I wouldn't be tooting my own horn when I said my books were great.

(Mind you, if your publisher didn't think you stood a good chance of making them some money you'd have to do this kind of legwork yourself.)

As an Indie (independent publisher) you have two options. Well, three.

1. Give a copy of your book to your friends and relatives and ask them to read and review it for you. This is usually frowned upon as few people think friends and relatives would say anything negative about your writing. Reviews of this nature are typically easy to spot and are ignored by astute book buyers.
2. Ask a fellow Indie to read and review your books. I don't think there's anything wrong with this provided an honest review is requested. Fellow writers can be shills as well as friends or relatives, but they can also be objective. If you gave them a copy to read for free, then a review should not be expected, IMO. You'd hope a review written by a writer would be better written than a review from a reader, but that's not always the case.
3. Wait until someone buys your book and reviews it on their own. I call these reviews from "real" readers or "random" readers. These people don't know you and couldn't care less if they hurt your feelings. Good or bad, these can be some of the best reviews. They may not be written as well as a professional review or a review from another writer, but they're honest (or should be). 

I received two such reviews for my horror novel CANALS recently. They either bought the book off Amazon or got it free during my promo in January. Here they are:

"Canals" starts off with an interesting and grabbing premise. A different sort of monster. But the story soon goes off on tangents that really catch one off-guard. By the time you have finished with this book, you will wonder where Powers ever got his ideas from? Is he trying to tell us something? Is he an...Advocate? An exciting and quite gory story that you just sit back and enjoy. "Canals" is well worth the read."

Mr. Powers does a fine job blending elements of horror and science fiction in this fast-paced and often gruesome tale. The story reminded me of those good old monster movies that I loved as a boy, updated with plenty of splatter. Mr. Powers presents some nicely developed characters in a satisfying and fun little thriller that I would certainly recommend to anyone who enjoys the horror genre."

I don't know either of them and after looking at some of their other reviews, they hand out 4 stars with a light hand.

Now, I know I won't get all 4 or 5 star reviews but as long as I satisfy most of my readers I'm okay.

Incidentally, the last time my mother stopped by my office she bought both of my books in paperback, against my protestations. "Mom, I can't charge you!" She insisted. A week or so later she told me she was reading CANALS. I cringed. My mom is an angel mistakenly sent to Earth almost 80 years ago; I can't imagine her reading a horror novel. As you read in the review above, there is some gory stuff in CANALS.

Anyway, she said she love it (I assume not the rougher parts) and found it very difficult to put down toward the end (because she was anxious to get it over with?). And, she found an additional 13 typos or improper word usages—thanks Mom. I've already uploaded them to Amazon. The print version will have to wait.

Review: "A King in a Court of Fools"

I finished reading this delightful book last night. You can find it and my review on Amazon here.

I "met" the author, Larry Enright, on Twitter, and wondered how he'd gotten so many rave reviews for his books. A King in a Court of Fools has 29 reviews and 28 are five stars, the highest rating Amazon allows. No one has that many friends and relatives willing to write glowing reviews for a book.

Well, I can now say that Larry has earned every five-star review he's received for this book.

A King is set in the 1950s in Pittsburgh, PA. The main character, Harry Ryan, is the youngest in a family of seven (or eight, I'm not positive--a lot of kids). The premise is, the oldest child, Tom, is made to keep a journal that chronicles the adventures of "The Caswell Gang," a group of neighborhood kids that includes the Ryan siblings. Later in life Harry picks up the journal and recounts the story
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At this time in their lives, the gang has found a pink Corvette in the woods. How did it get there? Did someone crash or was it stashed there, hidden from view? The kids want to know and set about doing just that, under Tom's leadership.

As they solve the mystery, we learn about life in their family, school, and neighborhood. There are streetcars, strict Catholic nuns running the parochial school, bullies and brats, bravery and cowardice, drive-in movies, old-time candy and ice cream, and a little romance for Tom, who is a sixth grader.

At $1.99 for the ebook, A King in a Court of Fools is a steal. Pick it up and you'll get hours of entertainment for less than an order of large fries at McDonald's.

I've been interviewed by author Lorna Suzuki!

I had the pleasure of being interviewed by author and screenwriter Lorna Suzuki today.

Check it out here:

Lorna's post

Lorna is the author of eleven books, several of which have been optioned for a motion picture. Lorna has been hired on as a consultant for the film and is living my dream: a full time writer.

(The blurry mug shot of me was my fault, not Lorna's. I sent her the wrong photo.)

My Report On Amazon's KDP Select Program

I thought I take a few minutes to report on my experience with Amazon's KDP Select program, and some thoughts on my goals as an author.

In case you don't know, Amazon's digital publishing service, Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), began a "select" program last November for authors. In exchange for an author agreeing to sell their ebooks only on Amazon, and allowing Amazon's Prime members to borrow their ebooks for free, Amazon sets aside a pool of money it divvies up between the authors whose books are borrowed, based on how many borrows the author had that month, and lets the author give their ebook away on five separate days in a three month period. (How's that for a masterfully-constructed sentence?) An author cannot even sell his or her ebook on their own web site, but the agreement doesn't apply to print books.

Amazon has captured about 60% of the ebook market in North America, down from about 80%. They've faced competition from Barnes and Noble, Apple, Kobo, and a few other small-time players. Their biggest rival, for ebooks, is the Nook from Barnes and Noble, which has about 27% of the market. Amazon's KDP Select program is obviously a ploy to recapture some of the market share they lost.

Normally I wouldn't give such a anti-competitive move a second thought, until I took a look at my sales. But before I get into that, let me first explain my author business plan.

I'm in this for the long haul. My goal is to retire from my day job and write full time in 2013. For me to do that, I need to build a lot of momentum in 2012. If I'm not able to retire completely by 2013, I'll at least practice part time. To build the momentum I think I'll need, I plan on publishing two Grant Starr thrillers this year. I'm almost 80K words into the first so I think my chances are good.

With that in mind, I don't care much that my sales were flat in 2011. While I would have loved for my book sales to be bringing in thousands a month, I'm not disappointed they haven't because I know they will, eventually. And then they'll pay forever.

Back to my sales: I made so little on Smashwords that they don't have to pay me. I made no sales on the Nook at all, and as far as I know I made nothing on the other sales avenues Smashwords uploads to. iBooks is one and Kobo is another. What little royalties I'd made by the end of 2011 came from Amazon. So it was kind of a no-brainer to me. I'll try the KDP Select program for three-to-six months and reevaluate.

I had my first free promo days in January for Canals. I had about 1,200 downloads and sold about $100 worth of ebooks after the sale. Not a lot, but I'll be getting my biggest royalty payment ever from Amazon. I've received one review so far from the promo, and it was good: 4 stars. I don't expect many of the free copies to be read.

Today was the second day for my The Mighty T free promotion. My biggest surprise is, I've had almost as many downloads from the UK as I have in the US. In fact, as of about 5:00 p.m. PST I think the UK is ahead. They've all gone to bed by now so I think I'll end up with 903 UK downloads. And it made to #1 on their free list for Action/Adventure. I'm pretty happy about that.

The US stats are sitting at about 900, I think. It's difficult to tell because today is March 1, and the stats for the US reset to zero today. Oddly, they didn't for the UK. Maybe I'll hit 1,000 tonight, maybe I won't. I'd be lucky to get 2,000 total downloads.

So far only one copy of my books has been borrowed; not enough to breakfast at Del Taco.

Hopefully I'll see some nice follow-up sales for The Mighty T over the next week or two, longer than that would be nice. We'll see. I'll report via comment on how it goes.

Using Alternating Points of View in Fiction

They pulled up in front of Mayor Dutra's insurance office, killed the engine and walked to the front door. Grant could see the man inside at his desk, watching them through the glass door.

They entered and the mayor said, "How you guys doin'? You here about Marina?"

"Sure are," McKay said. "You heard about her murder, Mayor?"

"Everyone calls me Manny."

"Okay Manny. I guess you heard about the murder."

Manny shrugged. "Stevinson ain't a big town. Real tragic, losing a good council member like that." Then he quickly added, "And she was a good person. Why don't you guys take a seat. You need some water or something? I got instant coffee somewhere." He looked around the office, as if looking for the coffee.

"No thanks," McKay said as he and Grant sat. "How well did you know Ms. Terra?"

"Who?"

"Marina Terra, the woman who was murdered last night."

"Ah shit. I been calling her Marina for so many years, I forget her last name."


Manny offered them a toothy smile, stalling while he tried to recall if he'd told anyone about his and Marina's affair. He didn't have any close friends, so who would he have told? Had he bragged about it to someone? He might have, he never had much to brag about when it came to sex, but couldn't recall for sure if he had.

He stood. "I'm gonna get a cuppa water. You guys sure you don't want something?"

"Since you're having some, I'll take some water," the taller detective said, the one whose eyes bugged him.

Manny plodded to the back of the little office and stepped behind the partitions to get the water. He drained a cup, then another, trying to remember if he'd told anyone. He didn't think so, but thought it best to not bring up the affair. That way if she hadn't told anyone it'd be like it had never happened.

He wadded his cup up and dropped it in the wastebasket, filled a cup for the cop and returned to his desk.


Grant took the water and said, "Thanks," and took note of the mayor's appearance: he didn't look so good, like he'd had a rough night. Like he'd been up all night drinking cheap liquor. And there was something else that bugged Grant, something he couldn't put his finger on.

He decided to bring it up. "Did we come at a bad time Manny? You look a little... Ragged."

Manny averted his eyes and said, "I had better days. This thing with Marina got me shook up a little. Stevinson ain't used to people gettin' murdered." He tugged at his collar with a fat finger; Grant noticed his hand was shaking.

And then realized what about the mayor's appearance bothered him: he was wearing a necktie, and it was strangling him.
"So," McKay said, "you've known her for a while..."

"Yeah. We got elected the same year so we've worked together on the council for a couple'a years. She had a stubborn streak, Marina did, but in the end she usually came around."

"Argumentative, huh? She have any run-ins with other council members?"

"Sure. Like I said, she could be stubborn."


Sorry he'd said anything negative about Marina, Manny felt sweat trickle down his forehead. He gave them another smile and said, "But what Portagee ain't?"

"Anything specific come to mind?" the tall cop said.

Manny shook his head. "Nothin' important. Hell, Stevinson council don't ever discuss anything important 'cause there ain't any money to do anything." He forced a chuckle, unconsciously pulled at his collar again then quickly dropped his hand back to his lap. He was beginning to think the tie was cutting off the oxygen to his brain.

McKay said, "The council ever have heated arguments that could lead to ill feelings?"

Manny shrugged. "Naw. We hash things out, vote, then go home. If there's any bitching, the next day everyone goes to work and forgets about it." He shrugged again, which this time had the effect of tightening his tie, which made him tug at his collar again.

The cops paused for a few uncomfortable moments, seemed to stare at him, which made more sweat run down his face, then the shorter one said, "Do you know if she was seeing anyone?"

"Marina? Hell, I don't know. We weren't close or anything and I never heard no one talk about her seeing anyone."

The tall cop said, "Did you know she was married once?"

Manny had to think again. He knew Marina had been married, she'd told him once before sex, but if he told the cops wouldn't they wonder how he knew? It was kind of personal. He decided to give them a weasel answer: "I don't think so, but maybe. With her working for the church, she wouldn't exactly want anyone to know. Catholics ain't too hot about divorce."

"When was the last time you saw her?" the tall one said.

"At the council meetin' Wednesday night."

The shorter one jumped in, "You haven't seen or talked to her since Wednesday night?"

It felt like they were tag-teaming him, and it was pissing him off. "That's what I said, ain't it?" As soon as the words left his mouth, he knew he'd made a mistake; the cops' eyes drilled holes through his head.

The shorter one said, "You were seen talking to her yesterday, at the church."

"Right. I forgot about that." He offered the smile again. "I stopped by for a few minutes to chat with her about the meetin' the night before."

"Oh?" the tall one said. "Unfinished business?"

It was then that Manny realized the cops would find out about the pot deal when they talked to the other council members, which they would eventually do because Marina was on the council. They might already know but were playing dumb to see if he would lie about it. He felt things spiraling out of control.

This is a scene from the first, and rough, draft of the novel I'm working on, the second Grant Starr thriller. I have no working title, sadly. I'm not worried, though. I didn't think of The Mighty T until several months after the book was done. One of my sons called my original title "dumb," so, wisely, I changed it. The text will certainly change in edits, hopefully for the better.

The scene is an example of alternating points of view in fiction. Used sparingly, it can add dynamic variety for the reader who may grow tired of straight narrative and dialog. Used too frequently, it would likely lead to confusion: who's saying and thinking what?

If you use this technique, be careful to keep track of whose point of view you're writing in. When writing in Manny's point of view, I refer to Detectives Starr and McKay by a rough description: the tall one and the shorter one. Hopefully the reader will remember that Grant Starr is six-six. They may not; I'll have to keep that in mind in edits.

(As a side note, because I'm using Scrivener, I went to the scene I copied from for this post and made a note to make sure the reader remembers Grant is six-six. When writing in Word, I'd have had to write that in my draft notebook and hope that I'd see it when editing.)

When writing in the detective's point of view, I called the mayor Manny because he asked them to.

Try it sometime in your writing. I think you'll like it and it will expand your skill set.