"Falling Uphill:" Turning a Trunk Book into an E-Book by Wendy Nelson Tokunaga

In 2004 I was in a funk over my writing life. At last I’d landed an agent, but he wasn’t able to sell either of my manuscripts. And then he ended up firing me. (Much later I realized that he didn’t know what the heck he was doing, and I should have actually fired him, but that’s another story). One of these novels, after much revision, ended up as my thesis for my MFA program in 2008. But the other ms, called Falling Uphill—what could be described as a “chick-lit mystery with a little bit of old Hollywood thrown in”—went into my “trunk,” only to gather dust on my hard drive.

Flash forward to 2011. By now I’ve had two novels traditionally published and self-pubbed e-books are all the rage. And, I thoutht, why not take another look at Falling Uphill—maybe I could use it to jump on this indie-pub bandwagon. I hadn’t touched the ms for some seven years and as I read, I got caught up, just like a new reader. Did I write this? What’s going to happen next? I couldn’t remember how it all turned out. And, best of all, I liked it!

So I got to work. I put Falling Uphill out as part of Amazon’s Select Program under its Kindle Direct Publishing platform. This meant agreeing to sell the book exclusively on Amazon for a three-month period. Under the Select Program you get paid not only for the copies of books you sell, but also for books borrowed from Amazon’s lending library for users who have a Prime membership. But the best thing about the Select Program for me was being able to offer Falling Uphill for free for five days. When I did this (along with some self-promotion regarding the free giveaway), I garnered 35,000 downloads. This led to the book charting quite well on various Kindle free and paid bestseller charts, which gave it a visibility it wouldn’t have otherwise attained. Sales have remained steady and my Amazon reviews more than tripled. And through this people have also found out about my other books. Gaining new readers—that’s what it’s all about for me.

I couldn’t be happier with the experience. Pretty good for a trunk novel that probably never would have seen the light of day without the digital publishing revolution.

Excerpt from Chapter One of FallingUphill by Wendy Nelson Tokunaga

Ruth Fenton is dead, but I don’t know what this has to do with me.

I press the button on the answering machine once more.

            This is a message for Candace Grey. Ms. Grey, this is Sally Claiborne at the West Portal Home for the Aged in San Francisco. We’re sorry to inform you that Ruth Fenton passed away on Monday. A memorial service will be held here next Wednesday.

            Sally has left her phone number and says to call if I have any questions. Yes, I do: Who is Ruth Fenton?

            After spending four brain-numbing hours at my office correcting finals, it’s already way past ten. And I’ll still be late getting my grades in, which seems to happen every semester. As usual I’ll have to get up extra early tomorrow and finish inputting them into the computer.

Jeff’s still not home. When I saw the blinking light on the answering machine I assumed it was a message from him—not a mysterious call from San Francisco. It’s Thursday and already this is the fourth time Jeff’s arrived home later than me this week. This means every day so far. Is he going to tell me that yet another meeting with his department head required his attendance? I don’t know if I can keep buying that.

            “You sure he’s not cheating?” My friend Laney Svensson didn’t mince words over lunch today.

            “Cheating?” I put on my best that’s-out-of-the-question face, but I have to admit the thought has crossed my mind. After celebrating our fifth-year anniversary of living together just the previous month (a celebration that was all my idea—a weekend at the Rose Petal Inn bed-and-breakfast in Stevensville, with a view of Lake Michigan), there’s still no urgency on his part to set a wedding date.

“Is it really necessary to secure a piece of paper to prove our love?” is one of his favorite lines. And I get no straight answer as to why, when he’s told yes, said piece of paper is required, other than, “I’m just not ready yet and you’re so nice to be so patient with me. Give me time.” Toss in these recent bouts of lateness and it’s enough to make a girl wonder if indeed something fishy is going on.

            Ruth Fenton. Ruth Fenton. 

            I file through my brain, hoping to jog my memory into arriving at a clue as to who she could be. I forgot all about eating so I toss an individual frozen salami and sausage pizza into the microwave. I’m not about to make dinner for two for the late Mr. Jeff Sands. As the pizza pops and sizzles I hear the front door, then see Jeff in the doorway of the kitchen.

            He looks tired and a little drunk. “Sorry I’m late,” he says. “But some of the students took me out for a beer to celebrate the end of the semester.”

            “Did you eat something?”

            “Yeah.” He opens the refrigerator and takes out a hunk of Monterey Jack cheese and a Cadbury Strawberry Crème bar. “But I’m still hungry.”

            I stare at his food choices, and conclude that it really isn’t just my imagination that his eating habits have lately become increasingly bizarre.

“How come you didn’t call?” The microwave beeps and I remove my pizza, throwing it on a plate.

            “I knew you’d be sweating it out grading finals,” he says. “Did you get your grades in?”

            “No.”

            He yawns. “Well, that’s no surprise.”

            I frown. Procrastination is not in Jeff’s vocabulary—he turned in his grades a week before the deadline, as usual.

“So what students did you go out with?”

            “Just a group from my English Lit class. No one you’d know.”

            I wonder if maybe it was more like one particular student he was with. Perhaps Stephanie Filcher? I spotted him talking to her last week on campus behind the library, sitting together on a bench in the oak grove, a well-known make-out spot for students.

Stephanie has just finished my Anthropology 200 Gender, Mass Media and Society class, and is as auburn-haired, hazel-eyed, rosebud-lipped, and milk-skinned as an American Girl doll. She probably weighs more than I do, but her slight chubbiness is displayed in firm, rounded curves that are flattering on a college sophomore, but would appear downright pudgy on anyone over twenty-five.

When the semester started she made a point of telling me she had “that hottie” (her words) Professor Sands for English Lit, as if to see my reaction. It was obvious she knew he was my boyfriend, though it wasn’t something we broadcasted all over school. Very tacky for someone out of high school a good two years and enrolled in a halfway decent private college like Jonesbury (no University of Michigan, but respectable) to use words like “hottie” in front of her teacher.

            But it also might look tacky to ask Jeff exactly what he was doing with Stephanie Filcher at the oak grove, even though I’m picturing him on his outing tonight sucking down a Corona with her—in bed.

            “I have to tell you something,” he says.

            The professorial gravity in his voice nearly makes my heart stop. I’m transported back to high school, to Mr. Flack’s advanced geometry class, my knees trembling as he’s about to announce final grades. Here it comes. I brace myself for the inevitable I’m-in-love-with-Stephanie-Filcher-however-I-wish-you-the-best-of-luck-in-all-your-future-endeavors confession. I wish I were dead like Ruth Fenton. I hold my breath. “What?”

            “I just found out I’m teaching summer school so I can’t go with you to LA.”

            I consider this to be bad news, but it sounds a lot better than I’m breaking up with you. “I thought you said you couldn’t get a summer placement.”

            “Tim Gifford decided not to take the spot at the last minute. Dean Cooper asked me if I wanted it and I said yes. I figure I could use the money.”

            Notice he doesn’t say we could use the money. He insists that we keep our finances separate like roommates. I still owe him $8.75 for half of the Haagen-Dazs White Chocolate Raspberry Truffle ice cream, Milano Double Orange cookies, and Tofu Helper he bought on Monday.

            “So you can’t go with me?”

            “Sorry.” He leans over and brushes his lips against mine. Even after six years together his kisses still thrill me, though I’m not sure he feels the same. Maybe he wasn’t with Stephanie Filcher tonight. Maybe he still wants to be with me. Except not when I go to LA.

            I sigh. “Well, that kind of changes everything.”

            “This doesn’t stop you from going on your own, Candace. It’s not like I would be a big help or anything.”

            “But I thought it could be a kind of vacation for us. No school. No pressure.”

            “Well, we just went to Lake Michigan and that set us back some serious change.”

            Our LA summer together was to be half fun and half work, while I did research for my master’s thesis. No, Jeff might not be a big help with my research, but I don’t know what I would have done without him in my early days of teaching. I may still be time management impaired, but it was Jeff who saved my butt by showing me how to write a clear syllabus, deal with students who said I didn’t know what I was talking about, and helped me track down a way too familiar-sounding term paper to a website called “E-Z A” where a ready-to-turn-in paper on any subject can be downloaded for ten bucks a page. 

 “I was really looking forward to being with you.”

            He gives me a smile worthy of a hottie. He’s been wearing his brownish-blond hair shorter, which I like. It frames his face in a way that brings out the blue in his eyes, despite his gold wire-rim glasses. “I’ll miss you,” he says.

            “I guess things just aren’t going my way. You won’t be coming to LA and Ruth Fenton is dead.”

            “Ruth Fenton?” he says. “Who’s that?”

            “I haven’t the faintest idea.”

~~~

Find out more about Falling Uphill HERE.

Wendy Nelson Tokunaga is the author of the novels, “Midori by Moonlight” and “Love in Translation” (both published by St. Martin’s Press), and the original e-book novels “Falling Uphill” and “His Wife and Daughters.” She’s also written a nonfiction e-book, “Marriage in Translation: Foreign Wife, Japanese Husband.” Her short story “Love Right on the Yesterday” is featured in “Tomo: Friendship Through Fiction: An Anthology of Teen Stories” published by Stone Bridge Press, and her essay, “Burning Up” appears in “Madonna & Me: Women Writers on the Queen of Pop” published by Soft Skull Press. Wendy holds an MFA in Writing from University of San Francisco (2008) and teaches novel writing for Stanford University’s Online Writer’s Studio and has taught for USF’s MFA program. She also does private manuscript consulting for novels and memoirs. She is currently working on her fifth novel. Visit her at: www.WendyTokunaga.com and follow her on Twitter: @Wendy_Tokunaga

Ebooks: The Good, The Bad, and the Worrisome by Sara Rosett

The first eight-track tape I saw was bright orange and had my grandfather’s careful all-caps lettering of song titles on the label. I was a kid at the time and didn’t quite understand his delight at being able to transfer his vinyl records to the tape, which he could play in his car. My grandfather was a techie when it came to music. He wanted to know how things worked and he kept up with the latest trends, but I don’t think he had any idea how fast the music industry’s delivery system would change. Records to eight-tract to cassette to compact disk to digital, all in the space of about fifty years.

Books, on the other hand, haven’t changed much. Before ebooks, we hadn’t had a new delivery system for books in, oh, about 2,000 years. Sure, there had been blips in the book industry—audio books come to mind—but nothing had changed radically since the first century when a new technology made it possible to go from storing the written word on scrolls to books, or to use the technical term, manuscripts.

As an aside, I have to wonder if the change caused some of the same near-apocalyptic hysteria we’ve seen recently with e-books. Did some people refuse to ever buy a book? Were books declared “not real reading material?” Were scrolls declared the only true format for the written word? 

I suppose we’ll never know if there were “scroll holdouts” because now we look back on the book format—thin sheets of paper bound between a thick, sturdy cover—as a positive advance that spread knowledge and allowed more “common people,” particularly merchants and the well-to-do, to own their personal copies of important works.

Fast forward a few thousand years and we’re at another turning point, digital books and electronic readers.

As an author, I’m thrilled about ebooks. I have had six books traditionally published. I write cozy mysteries and each book came out first in hardcover (at a whopping $22), then eleven months later in paperback (at six to seven bucks). The hardcover editions were wonderful for garnering reviews and library sales but it was difficult to compete in a niche dominated by mass market paperback originals. It’s not an easy sale to convince new readers to shell out almost twenty-five dollars for my book when they could buy around three different paperback books for the price of my hardcover. The paperback versions seemed to get lost in the wake of the hardcovers, never generating the attention of the hardcover.

My publisher was on the leading edge of ebooks and began bringing out ebook versions of my books with a competitive price point. My early series ebooks are priced around four dollars. The more recent books are more expensive, but I feel that I’m finally on a level playing field with other books in my niche. With my latest new release in 2011, my publisher dropped the price on one of the other books in the series to ninety-nine cents, then to zero for a few days, and I had the heady sensation of seeing it climb up Amazon’s Top 100 free, which lead to a surges in other books, one of which appeared on the Top 100 Paid list.

So I’m a solid a fan of ebooks, but it’s not all sweetness and light. There are a few drawbacks. Here’s my take on the benefits and drawbacks of ebooks:

The Good

Choice:  Readers and authors have more freedom than ever before, which is one of the best things about the ebook revolution. Readers are discovering authors who they never would have found in the traditional publishing model. Turns out, readers will give new authors a chance, particularly if the price is right.

Authors are reveling in their new freedom, too. No longer are authors constricted to working through publishers. Digital delivery systems allow authors to reach a wide audience, breaking the monopoly the big publishers held on distribution. Authors are free to create their own covers (often a sticky point with authors who disagreed with what “New York” thought would sell). Authors are also exploring new genres and/or genre mash-ups. Writing once labeled “unsellable,” including short stories and cross genre novels, can be viable markets for some authors. And probably the biggest change of all:  authors are making money. Paying your mortgage out of your royalties is a possibility, not a pipe-dream.

Speed:  The ability to instantly have a copy of a book is pure joy for bookworms. As a reader, one of my favorite things about ebooks is the sample feature. I think it’s wonderful to be able to read a few pages or chapters before I make my buying decisions.

Portability: Readers love the ability to have so many books at their fingertips. For serious book lovers, an ereader is a must for long trips, doctors’ waiting rooms, and carpool lines.

The Bad

Limits on Ownership: Unlike a physical copy of a book that can be passed on to a friend or donated to the Friends of the Library, when you buy an ebook you’re purchasing  a digital copy of a book, which is linked to the seller. If the seller decides there is an issue or problem with that book, the digital copy can be removed from ereaders. If a seller goes out of business, what happens to all those digital copies sold by that retailer? It’s hard to say because we haven’t had a huge retailer/epublisher go under.

Privacy:  In this age where personal information is the holy grail of business, you know that each digital book purchase is carefully tracked. I’d also venture to say that digital retailers are linking your purchasing habits to your browsing habits, at least on their websites, if not elsewhere around the web (i.e. recent tracking Facebook embarrassment).

The Potentially Worrisome 

Future Fees?:

When I first purchased books on my Kindle there was a little line that read, “Free delivery via Amazon Whispernet.” It makes me wonder if someday there will be a delivery charge, which could be passed along to either the author, the buyer, or both.

Price Trending Towards Zero:  I know Amazon is many author’s new BFF, but I have some reservations about Kindle KDP Select program. It allows Prime members who pay an annual fee to read certain books for free. Amazon has created a pool of money that will be distributed to participating authors to draw authors to the program. I can’t help but wonder if this is a good trend for authors. I completely understand authors participating in the program to broaden their readership, but I wonder if eventually readers will expect to read ebooks for free and be reluctant to buy ebooks. I think authors should be compensated for their work, even if it is a bargain-basement price. I realize the KDP Select program is the same principal as an author lowing the price on his or her book to zero. What worries me is that Amazon may eliminate the option for authors to lower their prices to zero in the future and allow only “free” books through their Prime program. And who knows if the pool for author payment to those participating in the KDP Select Program will continue. It could be phased out, but authors anxious for wider readership will still be eager to participate. Gloomy sounding, I know, and I hope it doesn’t happen.   

Books as Product: I think of Amazon first as a bookstore, but, in reality, books are only one product they sell. They’re more like a huge department store with every conceivable item. Their approach is to have all products ranked, reviewed, and linked to similar products. That’s fine, but people feel differently about books than, say, a stockpot or an edger. That’s the specialness of books. We connect with the characters, the setting, and, sometimes, the author. I’m not sure how well that connection fits into the Amazon model. Time will tell.

I don’t want to end on a downer note. I’m thrilled to be part of a revolution in the way we buy and read books. I’d love to hear your thoughts on ebooks—positive and negative. Have you found a new author you love through ebooks? Maybe a relative unknown? A new genre? How many books do you have on your ereader? Are you buying more or less books on your ereader? Do you have an ebook TBR (to-be-read) pile? 

~Sara

P.S. In case you’re wondering, my eighty-five year old grandfather is still on the cutting edge. He now has a MP3 player and an ereader. :)

Sara Rosett is the author of the Ellie Avery mystery series, an adult “whodunit” mystery series in the tradition of Agatha Christie. Publishers Weekly has called Sara’s books, “satisfying,” “well-executed,” and “sparkling.”Library Journal says, “...Rosett’s Ellie Avery titles are among the best, using timely topics to move her plots and good old-fashioned motives to make everything believable.”

Visit http://www.SaraRosett.com for more information or connect with Sara on Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, or Pinterest.  

Paper or Plastic? (Also a Giveaway)

Usually the paper or plastic conundrum arises in the context of you standing at the checkout stand of a store.

Choose plastic and save a tree. Wait! Paper means you're reducing the pollution factor of plastic in favor of a renewable resource. OK, so paper is better. Except, all those poor trees...  Or, do you produce your own bag? I have one of those nifty Chico bags that folds up smaller than my fist and expands into quite a large bag suitable for carrying just about anything. I keep it in my purse.

Sometimes I do wish things were more straightforward. In fact, what I wish is for the groceries to magically appear in my house. When I need fresh batteries, I want to open the drawer and find exactly what I need, right there, as if I never forgot to buy AA's when I went shopping last week. It's a delivery system that has yet to be perfected, though I remain hopeful for a breakthrough. (3-D printer?)

There's a similar dilemma in the book world. Now when I make my reading purchase decision I must ask myself, paper or plastic? By which I mean, paper book or eBook? Analogue or Digital?

Resistance is Futile.  Or Is it?

Despite laughably and, it seems to me, willfully ignorant, defenses of paper books (see, eg Jonathan Franzen's remarks) there's nothing wrong with preferring to read in paper. Nor is there something evil about preferring to read an eBook.

I've compiled a table of differences that is in no way exhaustive:

Event	Paper	eBook
Read in Bath	Yes	Yes (Zip-Lock Bag!)
Read in Shower	No	Yes (Zip-Lock Bag!)
Water Disaster resistance	Poor.	Very Poor
Durability of Content	Variable	High
Complexity of Device	Low	Medium
Self-Contained	Yes	No
Can Read in Dark	No	Yes, but device dependent
Cost	Variable	Variable
Ease of updates and corrections	Low	High
Instantly searchable	No	Yes
Likelihood of Equipment failure	Pretty low	Medium
Likelihood that container will become obsolete so you have to buy a new or different one	Variable	Inevitable
Weight	Variable	Ounces
Portability	Variable	High
Durability of Container	Highly variable	Variable
Dropping disaster resistance	High	Height Dependent
Fire Resistance	Low	High (for content)
Extended Warranty for Container	No	Available
Number of stories in Container	Limited	Unlimited (assuming cloud storage)
Travel required to obtain content	Usually	No
Time between purchase and reading, including travel or delivery time	Days to Minutes	Less than 30 seconds
Space required for TBR	Out of Control	None

I could go on and on and, to be honest, doing so would be pretty amusing.

My Own Experience

For a long time, I couldn't afford a dedicated reader. Prices have come down considerably, and now I can. I have an iPhone and for an embarrassingly long time I assumed there was no point trying to read on such a small screen. How fun would that be? Then one of my favorite authors ever sent me an advance copy of one of her books. I loaded it up on my phone (easy enough to do) and I discovered I was WRONG about reading on a small screen. It was no problem at all. In fact, I LOVED it.

Then I got an iPad and whoa. Even MORE fun and convenient. With an eReader, I'm highly unlikely to run out of stuff to read. I spend much much more on books now, and I spent a lot before.

I do, however, continue to purchase research books in print. eBooks are not yet at a place where they exceed the ability of print to show and display content like photographs, diagrams etc. I recently purchased two print books on houses in London and Mayfair. Both these books rely on photographs and artwork to convey the history of houses. Though I can easily imagine a time when technology solves the display of information issues, it's not well-solved yet. I would urge you, however, to take a look at the app The Elements, which is a tour-de-force of the display of visual information in a meaningful way. It's coming...

What about You?

So, where are you on the paper vs. Plastic issue? Let me know in the comments!

The Giveaway

My historical romance, Not Wicked Enough, releases today!

Berkley Sensation
February 7, 2012
ISBN: 978-0425246603

When Lily Wellstone heads to the Bitterward Estate to comfort her widowed friend Eugenia, she certainly does not have romance in mind. In fact the playful but level-headed Lily is amused to no end when, en route, a gypsy gifts her with a beautiful medallion, claiming it will ensnare the romantic desires of a stranger.

But Fate has other plans in the form of Eugenia’s ruggedly handsome brother, the Duke of Mountjoy. One day at Bitterward and Lily can’t deny the sizzling attraction between her and the roguish duke. Nothing can come of it, of course. She’s not looking for entanglements and he's practically engaged. But whether it’s her outgoing nature and the duke’s outlandish ways sparking off one another; or the mysterious gypsy medallion working “magic”—hearts are stirring in the most unexpected and wicked ways…

Read Chapter 1 of Not Wicked Enough


Buy Not Wicked Enough

I'll send one random commenter a paper or digital copy of Not Wicked Enough. Here's the rules:

Void where prohibited. No purchase necessary. Must be 18 or older to enter. You MUST leave me a way to contact you if you win. I will send a paper book anywhere mail goes. I cannot, however, guarantee that I can send or provide a digital version to someone outside the US, as that availability is entirely controlled by my publisher. I will gift a digital version where the vendor permits such gifting, so if your preferred vendor doesn't permit that you'll be stuck with print.

Leave your comment by midnight Pacific February 14. I will select a winner at random around February 15 or 16.

HOW I GOT HERE by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

Back in 1999 when I was first trying to sell The Thin Pink Line, I used to get the most glowing rejections from editors - sometimes running to several pages - saying how much they loved the book but that humorous fiction was too hard to sell. One editor even told me that Americans don't like to laugh when they read (!!!). Then Bridget Jones hit, followed by the awful events of 9/11, and suddenly there was a boom of demand in a new subgenre that came to be known as Chick Lit because it turned out that Americans did want and need to laugh. But then publishers did what they always do and overpublished, glutting the market, and then the economy began to tank. By 2008, publishers were basically telling their Chick Lit authors to go away, that no one wanted to hear from Chick Lit anymore. It's true that consumers rarely wanted to pay $15 for paperbacks and $25 for hardcover Chick Lit books in tough economic times, but did the publishing industry really think Americans no longer needed and wanted to laugh?

My last Chick Lit novel - and my last book for adults, period - was published in 2008. It was called Baby Needs a New Pair of Shoes. Don't feel bad if you missed it. It was published just as RDI was rolling back their red carpet and I suspect that pretty much everyone in the world missed it! In the three years since, I've mostly devoted my time to writing Young Adult and children's books, because that's what the publishers have been buying from me. Two of my YA books did start out as adult novels - The Twin's Daughter and Little Women and Me - but I ended up revising both into YA, again because that's where the market was for my work.

But it wasn't as if I'd stopped having ideas for adult novels. I'd just stopped trying to get them published.

Then, sometime last year, I got the idea for a new book, one that was clearly a comedy for adults. Based on the story matter, one other thing was clear: Whatever else happened with this book, there'd be no re-tooling of it into YA.

What was that idea? It was for THE BRO-MAGNET, which is officially described thusly:

Women have been known to lament, "Always a bridesmaid, never a bride." For Johnny Smith, the problem is, "Always a Best Man, never a groom." At age 33, housepainter Johnny has been Best Man eight times. The ultimate man's man, Johnny loves the Mets, the Jets, his weekly poker game, and the hula girl lamp that hangs over his basement pool table. Johnny has the instant affection of nearly every man he meets, but one thing he doesn't have is a woman to share his life with, and he wants that desperately. When Johnny meets District Attorney Helen Troy, he decides to renounce his bro-magnet ways in order to impress her. With the aid and advice of his friends and family, soon he's transforming his wardrobe, buying throw pillows, ditching the hula girl lamp, getting a cat and even changing his name to the more mature-sounding John. And through it all, he's pretending to have no interest in sports, which Helen claims to abhor. As things heat up with Helen, the questions arise: Will Johnny finally get the girl? And, if he's successful in that pursuit, who will he be now that he's no longer really himself? THE BRO-MAGNET is a rollicking comedic novel about what one man is willing to give up for the sake of love.        

But once I'd written it, just what was I going to do with it?

Enter 2011, and the surge of the ebook. Many former Chick Lit authors, including myself, have turned to putting our books in that format, at reasonable prices. And guess what? The readers are still there. You can even see the resurgence of chick-friendly comedies in the film industry with the huge success of The Bridesmaids etc.

Probably the greatest thing about publishing in ebook is all the freedom, the greatest of which is the freedom to change: change the cover if I decide it's not working, change the cover copy, change almost anything. If the book takes off, I can even change the size on the cover of my own ridiculously long and unwieldy name and make it as large as Stephen King has his on his books. (Kidding. Kidding! [But only because it would never fit.])

So there you have it: How I Got Here, which could probably be subtitled And How Many Of You Got Here Too.

Now am I going to turn into one of these people who says, "Traditional publishing sucks; DIY ebooks rule"? Hardly. I'm rarely an absolutist in my opinions, unless they involve wine or General Hospital. Believe me, if any commercial publisher out there wants to offer me a contract for my next adult comedy, I'm happy to listen. But right now I'm just happy to have something to offer the people who do still regularly write and say, "I enjoy your YA stuff...but when will you do another adult novel???" And I hope they'll be happy too.

Your turn: If you've epubbed, how have you enjoyed your experience so far? And if you're a writer who hasn't or if you're just a reader - as if there's ever anything meagerly just about being a reader! - what's been your experience reading ebooks?

Be well. Don't forget to write. Oh, and Happy Hanukkah too!


  

Reading in The Dark

I don't know any writers who aren't also voracious readers and that means I read a lot of books. That hasn't changed at all. What has changed is HOW I read.

I've had an iPhone for a while and I assumed for far too long that it was too small to read on. WRONG! As I discovered a couple or three years ago. It was a slippery slope, my friends. Stanza reader, Kindle App, iBookstore.... suddenly I could never be out of reading material because if, for some reason, I'd read all the books in the apps, give me 2-3 clicks and I had a brand new book.



Then I bought an iPad. I'd told my son we'd get one, but an unexpected expense came up that required a different use for the money. A few months later some writing money came in and off we went to the Apple Store. I LOVE reading on the iPad. LOVE it. Since I'm in the process of self-pubbing my reverted backlist and need to view my files in the various readers, I also have a Nook and a Kindle-Fire. I really like the K-Fire's smaller footprint. The Nook is pretty nice, too. I primarily read on the iPad (because the iPad also has Quordy, a word search game I'm addicted to -- because of the sound effects. Lame, but that's how I roll apparently.)


I have a few more confessions before I get around to talking about books I've enjoyed recently. Here's one: I LOVE LOVE LOVE high fantasy. George R.R. Martin? Hook me up to the IV, baby. Brandon Sanderson, Brent Weeks? Same thing. There is, however, a downside and I can express that in a number: 900. Nine hundred effing pages. Now, I want my high fantasy to be long and involved and you can't do that in a paltry 300 pages. 600 pages? Pshaw! To steal from Romance author Candice Hern, my dears, 600 pages is barely a note in the world of High Fantasy. (Do NOT click on her website if you are a history buff because otherwise you will spend HOURS drooling over pictures of her collection of Regency-era artifacts. Let me just say that she is a serious collector. OMG. Don't click!!!! At least finish my post first okay?)


So, there I was reading a 900 page hardback fantasy ... and I got annoyed. Reading while on the treadmill? Impossible unless I wanted to be under 3mph. Reading in bed? A limited number of positions available. At one point in my reading, my hands started getting numb, I kid you not. Carrying the book around with me to read during breaks, waiting time etc? No. I vowed I would never again buy a 900 page behemoth. And guess what? I don't have to. All those annoyances go away with an eReader. I can fit 100 900 page monsters in my purse.

Promise Not To Laugh?

I read in bed just about every night and 99% of the time it's with the iPad or K-Fire. Recently, a series of unfortunate events forced me to buy a book in paper (more on that in a bit.)

That night, I got into bed with my book, and . . . .


. . . . I turned out the light.

And I lay there for at least 5 seconds, I kid you not, wondering why I couldn't see my book.


Oh. My. Lord.

The iPad and K-Fire are backlit you see. You can read in the dark.

Stop laughing.

In Which Carolyn Is REALLY Annoyed

Judith Ivory is a Romance author whose prose is stunning. Story, plot and characters, complex and full of details that make the characters real. It's hard to believe they weren't going to call on me for tea later in the day. (Ivory, alas, is not currently writing.) Since I'm on deadline, I was desperate to procrastinate and someone blogged about her book Black Silk which is 1) one I hadn't read and 2) one I'd been hearing people lavishly praise for years. Perfect timing, right? I know! The eBook was $9.99. What the Fudge?

The trade paper was marked down to $5.49 from $20 so I bought that. And when that trade paper came, the cover was crooked, front and back. I measured the type to make sure I wasn't wrong. I wasn't. Not only that, the paper was newsprint. I kid you not. A consumer who feels she's been ripped off .... not pretty. I returned the book for a refund and bought a used Mass Market Paperback (MMP) for 5 bucks. I was peeved at not being able to read it as a digital book, which was shocking to me because the MMP is physically convenient. It won't kill your hands and I can be on the treadmill at 3.5 mph or more and still read. But the type was so small and well, basically, it made me realize that E is now my preferred format.

Books

As you might imagine, Ivory's Black Silk is one of my recent recommended reads. For a Romance, it's not particularly romantic, but my Lord, what she does with her words.

There's another book that's a recent read, EL James's Fifty Shades of Gray but it's BDSM (ADULTS ONLY) except I will hasten to say it's absolutely not what you're thinking. Whatever you're thinking? No. You're wrong. The book isn't about that and that doesn't happen. This book surprised me at nearly every turn. I am not a fan of present tense, but in this book it works. There is a paper edition available but it's so outrageously priced ($30.00) they can't possibly be selling many copies in print. It is, however, very reasonably priced as a digital book.

I also read Barry Eisler's The Detachment because I love spy books with killers and lots of fighting and hot Black Ops dudes. Check.

Rachel Herron's My Life In Stitches was a wonderful, wonderful memoir, framed through stories about her knitting. Rush out and buy it.

So, what have you read lately that you liked, loved, hated, or were meh about?

Do you read eBooks? Do you prefer paper? Spill in the comments.

Carolyn Jewel is an award winning writer of historical romance and paranormal romance. Catch Not Wicked Enough, a Regency-set historical romance from Berkley Books, coming February 7, 2012.

Questioning Our Relevance: Fear, Change & the Digital Revolution

by Marilyn Brant

I totally wanted to blog about something light and fun and uncomplicated enough to have fairly clear-cut answers, like the best birthday cake you ever had or your favorite kind of appetizer (do I talk about food too much?!), but this topic kept needling me. I figured if I had it on my mind, a few other people here might be thinking about it, too... So, let me just state the obvious: This is a pretty unsettling time in the publishing industry.

No matter what your opinions are regarding what constitutes a book or who qualifies as an author, changes like the bankruptcy of Borders, the shrinking of print runs and the explosion of digital-only or digital-first releases (both self-published and through major NY houses, such as Bantam's revitalized "Loveswept" line or Avon's new "Impuslse" line) have been wreaking havoc on the professional lives of booksellers, publishers, editors, agents and writers alike.

There is some very real excitement out there, too, by the way. New opportunites are emerging almost hourly, and many entreprenurial souls have been quick to hop aboard the digital train in hopes of striking gold. Some have found it in the literary realm and are shouting their gratitude and their Amazon rankings from the rooftops. Others are still striving and hopeful and secretly trying to crack the logarithm for ebook bestsellerdom. And yet others are capitalizing on the author accessories needed for a successful digital experience -- the creation of book covers, the proofreading skills, the uploading and conversion know-how.

In my opinion, More Opportunties + More Choices = Something Good. I may not utilize every service available to me out there, but I love having options. Getting to self-publish a few of my light romantic comedies alongside my traditionally published women's fiction has been both an interesting venture and a fun one. But then, I'm a big fan of a good Asian buffet, too. You tell me I can have Thai satays and Chinese egg rolls and Japanese teriyaki chicken and Mongolian barbequed beef...all on my plate at once? What's not to love about that?!

Food fantasies aside, though, I'm also an observer by nature, and I've been watching and listening to everyone. Attentively. I've been reading their posts and their tweets and their messages. And for every public comment that unabashedly praises the Digital Revolution, there are at least five more -- ranging from whispered concerns to infuriated accusations -- that express in some way a powerful and pervasive sense of fear.

For me, trying to uncover the source of that fear has been occupying a lot of my mental energy this summer. Best I can figure, I think it comes down to a persistent questioning of our relevance and how well we think we'll fare in the publishing world of the future.

Whether our job is that of an author or an agent, an editor or a bookseller, we're united by worries about what these changes mean and who we are now if the original hierarchy and gatekeeping system we'd grown accustomed to is no longer in effect. Where is our industry going? Will readers abandon paper books in order to make the digital leap? Will the skills we've all worked so laboriously to acquire be relevant in this evolving publishing landscape? And, even if we fully embrace the lightning-like changes that have struck publishing hard in recent years, will we be able to roll with whatever comes next in an industry that has transformed so rapidly in such a short period of time?

Just about everyone I know is asking themselves some version of these questions. Publishers are wondering if they need to add a digital branch to their company or expand the one they already have. Literary agents are fielding a slew of queries from their clients about rights reversion or assistance in the self-publishing of backlists. Writers across the genres are wrestling with the decision of whether or not to dip their toes in the digital waters and, if they do it, then they're struggling to adjust to a different method of manuscript formatting and online marketing and the panic/elation of having daily updates on their sales numbers. Brick-and-mortar booksellers aren't sure where to go next or how to use their valuable skills.

To top it off, there's a social-media windstorm brewing around all of us, amplifying the collective fear and setting off an onslaught of comparisions between authors. (Whose downloads are higher?) Or between publishing professionals. (Whose services or distribution methods are better?)

It's been kind of exhausting.

So, I wanted to brush all the discord and confusion away for just a moment and say, à la Oprah, the one thing I know for sure... It's something I bet you know, too: Yes, change is hard (and frustrating and scary and, sometimes, exciting), but there will always be a need for stories. And what drives us to read those stories -- whether it's to feel that sense of connection with others, to be entertained, to escape, to learn something new -- that part is constant. That part will always be relevant.

I think we need to hang tight to this truth until the dust settles, even as we learn new skills and face the challenges that come with navigating our careers in this ever-shifting publishing environment and this not-exactly-stable global economy. How stories will be packaged, sold and delivered in five years or ten is still a point of some debate, and I suspect many of us are going to have to adjust far more than we may feel comfortable doing (sigh), but the craving for stories will live on. No revolution -- digital or otherwise -- will change that.

What's a story you've read this summer that you really loved? Did you read it in print or in ebook form? If you're a writer, have you self-published anything digitally -- reissued novels, new fiction or short stories? In honor of both print and digital books, I'll give away two novels today: a PDF copy of my first romantic comedy On Any Given Sundae (June 2011, ebook) to one commenter, and a bound advanced reading copy of my upcoming women's fiction book A Summer in Europe (December 2011, Kensington) to another commenter. Drawing Monday the 15th, just before midnight, Central Time! Will post the winners' names in the comment section.

Marilyn Brant lives and writes in Chicago suburbs. She compulsively checks her Amazon and B&N sales numbers (when she's not procrastinating on Twitter or Facebook) and is forever in search of the perfect dessert.