THINKING OUTSIDE THE PROMOTIONAL BOX

by Lois Winston

As authors, along with writing the next book, we have to promote our current books, but promotion often feels like we’re shouting into a tsunami. Does anyone really hear us? How many people who see our social media postings will run out and buy our books? How many people show up at book signings and talks we give, let alone purchase a copy of our latest baby? How many people run out to buy a copy of our latest release as soon as it comes out? Sadly, very few. Whether an author is traditionally published, indie published, or both, competition for consumer dollars is stiff. And if your name isn’t King, Patterson, Rowling, or Roberts, it’s even stiffer. So we’re always on the lookout for new ways to get readers to learn about us and our books—and hopefully entice them to pull out their wallets and take a chance on us.

One of the newest promotional tools many authors are taking advantage of is the boxed set. Publishers have been producing boxed sets of a single author’s work for many years, especially if the books are part of a series. However, they’ve never done so with multiple authors. Recently some enterprising authors have begun to think outside the traditional promotional box. They’ve banded together to produce themed boxed sets rather than single author boxed sets. The price is set low enough to make the set an incredible bargain, which hopefully will entice readers to take a chance on authors they may not already know. If they like what they read, they might then buy more books by those authors.

Because this has proven to be such an effective marketing tool, I recently joined with nine other authors for a boxed set. Along with writing mysteries, I also write romance and romantic suspense. Because the other authors invited to participate are all romance and romantic suspense authors, I contributed Love, Lies and a Double Shot of Deception, one of my previously traditionally published romance suspense novels that had gone out of print. I had received the rights back to the book and several months ago published it myself as an ebook.

Our boxed set is titled Romance Super Bundle and is a collection of 10 full-length contemporary romance, historical romance, and romantic suspense novels. Along on the ride with me are authors Dale Mayer, Donna Marie Rogers, Edie Ramer, Amy Gamet, Linda McLaughlin, Kate Kelly, Pamela Fryer, Barbara Phinney, and Wendy Ely. Many of these authors are award-winners and bestsellers.

We priced the Romance Super Bundle at $5.99. That’s less than .60 cents per novel. However for a limited time the collection is on sale for only .99 cents. That’s mere pennies per book! Hopefully, it will entice readers to take a chance on us. Time will tell.

Buy Links:

Amazon 

Nook

Kobo

Award-winning author Lois Winston writes the critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series featuring magazine crafts editor and reluctant amateur sleuth Anastasia Pollack. Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun, the first book in the series, received starred reviews from both Publishers Weekly and Booklist. Kirkus Reviews dubbed it, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” Other books in the series includes Death By Killer Mop Doll, Revenge of the Crafty Corpse and the ebook only mini-mysteries Crewel Intentions and Mosaic Mayhem. Lois is also published in women’s fiction, romance, romantic suspense, and non-fiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name.Visit Lois at www.loiswinston.com, visit Emma at www.emmacarlyle.com, and visit Anastasia at the Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers blog, www.anastasiapollack.blogspot.com. Follow everyone on Twitter @anasleuth.

Books, Glorious Books!

By Sheila Webster Boneham


Twice a year, the Friends of the New Hanover Public Library here in Wilmington, NC, hold their humongous book sales. They take over half the large entry foyer, the large event room, part of the sidewalk, and more. I couldn't begin to guess how many books they put out, and just thinking about the organizing makes me want to take a two aspirin and a lie-down! Many of us bibliophiles look forward to THE BOOK SALE for months. Then we descend on the place like college athletes at an all-you-can-eat buffet. 

Books! Glorious books!

And it was THIS PAST WEEKEND! 

My husband and and I spent some time there yesterday. Who knows how much time? Who cares? Roger is much more controlled than I am. He came away with a movie CD (that cerebral Steve Martin classic The Man with Two Brains). He uses the library a lot, but in the conventional cost-free way. 

I bought books, but only as many as I could carry in my fully-extended arm. I was good, but don't think I wasn't tempted to grab a box (ok, several boxes) like so many of the book-sale patrons. I saw one woman at the check out with two BIG boxes full of paperbacks. I was a little envious, although I would have spread my selections across a few more genres than just the one she chose. 

I'm a pretty eccen.., er, eclectic reader. Among my choices this time....Black Elk Speaks by John G. Neihardt, which I read many years ago and had been thinking about recently - fortune smiled. Ines of My Soul by Isabel Allende, one of my favorite authors. Somehow I never read this this one. The Opposite of Fate: Memories of a Writing Life by Amy Tan. Several mysteries and thrillers. 

What is it about book sales? We have a wonderful new-and-used bookstore downtown -- Old Books on Front -- where we can find plenty of lovely books every day. We have Pomegranate Books, another Indie bookstore that has mostly new books, but a selection of used books that has served me well. (I also work with owner Kathleen Jewel to offer individually autographed copies of my books.) Maybe it's the ticking clock, or the crowd of buyers and lookers, or just the tables and tables and tables of books, glorious books. 

One of my best pleasures at these sales is encountering old friends. Oh, sure, there are the two-legged kind. I always see people I know prowling the aisles. But I mean the paper, glue, and ink kind of old friends. Books I read ten or twenty - or forty - years ago. I smiled at the 1984 spine of Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns. I remembered long-ago all-night reads with Sidney Sheldon's The Other Side of Midnight and Stephen King's Thinner and Dean Koontz's Tick Tock, and delicious hours with Annie Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek and Gretel Erlich's The Solace of Open Spaces. Some of those are still on my own shelves at home; others are like friends we meet every few years at reunions.

Speaking of those shelves at home.... I clean them out every so often and donate books I've enjoyed but know I won't reread any time soon. I think it's a good thing to do. It lightens my material load (something I've been working on for several years). It gives other people the chance to buy bargain-priced tickets to worlds I've enjoyed. And because the sales provide funds for the library, whatever few dollars our books bring in go to a better cause than that latte I don't need. 

And now I'm going to curl up with my new pile of used books. Because really, they never get old. 

Poster from Sheila's recent reading and talk about
animals in fiction at the New Hanover Public Library. 

Sheila Boneham currently lives, reads, writes, walks, paints, and plays with animals on the coast of North Carolina. You can learn more about her writing, including her Animals in Focus mysteries, and follow her blog at sheilaboneham.com or find her on Facebook. 

25 QUOTES ON THE WORTH OF READING

seen on the NY subway: stranger reading Lois Winston's ASSAULT WITH A DEADLY GLUE GUN
 from Underground New York Public Library

by Lois Winston

While I was pondering what to write for today’s blog post, I received an email that contained a group of quotes about the value of reading. I needed to look no further for a blog topic. Here are some of the quotes sent to me, along with some others I’ve come across. Let’s hear it for reading!

1. You know you've read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend. -- Paul Sweeney

2. Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers.  -- Charles William Eliot

3.  What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn't happen much, though. -- J.D. Salinger

4. In the case of good books, the point is not to see how many of them you can get through, but rather how many can get through to you. -- Mortimer J. Adler

5. Books are the plane, and the train, and the road. They are the destination, and the journey. They are home. -- Anna Quindlen

6. You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who had ever been alive. -- James Baldwin

7. The best moments in reading are when you come across something - a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things - which you had thought special and particular to you. And now, here it is, set down by someone else, a person you have never met, someone even who is long dead. And it is as if a hand has come out, and taken yours -- Alan Bennett

8. Today a reader, tomorrow a leader. -- Margaret Fuller

9. A book is like a garden carried in the pocket.  -- Chinese Proverb

10. Books serve to show a man that those original thoughts of his aren't very new after all.  -- Abraham Lincoln

11. So please, oh PLEASE, we beg, we pray, Go throw your TV set away, And in its place you can install, A lovely bookshelf on the wall. -- Roald Dahl

12. To read without reflecting is like eating without digesting. -- Edmund Burke

13. A house without books is like a room without windows. --  Heinrich Mann

14. A truly good book teaches me better than to read it.  I must soon lay it down, and commence living on its hint. What I began by reading, I must finish by acting.  -- Henry David Thoreau

15. To read a book for the first time is to make an acquaintance with a new friend; to read it for a second time is to meet an old one.  -- Chinese Saying

16. Give me a man or woman who has read a thousand books, and you give me an interesting companion. Give me a man or woman who has read perhaps three, and you give me a dangerous enemy mind. -- Anne Rice

17. The habit of reading is the only enjoyment in which there is no alloy; it lasts when all other pleasures fade. -- Anthony Trollope

18. We read to know we are not alone. -- C.S. Lewis

19. No matter how busy you may think you are, you must find time for reading, or surrender yourself to self-chosen ignorance. -- Confucius

20. The reading of all good books is like conversation with the finest men of the past centuries. -- Descartes

21. The more you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go. -- Dr. Seuss

22. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few are to be chewed and digested. -- Francis Bacon

23. Once you learn to read, you will be forever free. -- Frederick Douglass

24. Read in order to live. -- Gustave Flaubert

25. A book is the most effective weapon against intolerance and ignorance. -- Lyndon Baines Johnson

Lois Winston writes the critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries series. The first book, Assault With A Deadly Glue Gun, was a January 2011 release and received starred reviews from both Publishers Weekly and Booklist. Death by Killer Mop Doll was released this past January. Visit Lois at http://www.loiswinston.com and Anastasia at the Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers blog, http://anastasiapollack.blogspot.com.

MADE IN AMERICA (or How The Book Saved America)

Darrell James

All this past week, ABC World News with Diane Sawyer has been reporting on Made In America, a patriotic movement to encourage Americans to spend their Holiday dollars on products made in America. From renewing our infatuation with the Slinky, to rewrapping our fingers around a Louisville Slugger, all in an effort to inspire American jobs for American workers.

ABC World News website states: “The average American will spend $700 on holiday gifts and goodies this year, totaling more than $465 billion, the National Retail Federation estimates. If that money was spent entirely on US made products it would create 4.6 million jobs. But it doesn't even have to be that big. If each of us spent just $64 on American made goods during our holiday shopping, the result would be 200,000 new jobs. Now we want to know, are you in? If so, we want to hear from you. How are you planning on spending your $64?”

Well, here’s a thought: “Books” by American writers, published in America, are 100% American made. From the authors themselves, to the house that publishes them, to the printers, to the distributors, to the book retailers, paid reviewers, and even those who report on books, owe their job, all or in part, to the BOOK. American paper suppliers and lumberjacks also benefit when the book is released in print. UPS Drivers, Mail Carriers--they all get a piece of the action.

When a book winds up gift wrapped beneath the tree, it comes with America’s finger prints (figuratively, if not literally) all over it.

This, of course, is the economic view point. But consider what the gift of a book does for the recipient. It offers knowledge, entertainment, inspires imagination, and sometimes provides hope. Hope! How much closer to the spirit of the holidays can one gift be?

I often give books as presents. It’s one of my favorite things to give. But this year, I’m making a special effort to offer the gift of books to everyone I can. So, yes, count me in! A book is a wonderful, sometimes wondrous, thing.

What about you? Will you be giving books for the holidays? (Some bindery worker in Poughkeepsie may well be counting on it.)

Darrell James is an American author. His novel, Nazareth Child, was recently released by Midnight Ink, Llewellyn Worldwide, an American publisher. It is available from American bookstores and through American online retailers. “Come on America! Buy a book!”

Have I said enough?

To see the whole story and watch the video go to ABC World News with Diane Sawyer.

NATIONAL BUY A NOVEL DAY

Christmas is less than a week away. If you’re like most of us, you probably still have last minute shopping, wrapping, decorating, and baking on your to-do list. And you’ve probably spent beyond your budget. What you haven’t done, most likely, is given yourself a gift.

Today, I’m giving myself a gift.

You see, Besides Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers, my own blog, I contribute to two other blogs. I blog approximately once a month here at Inkspot and every two weeks at 7 Criminal Minds (which is a total misnomer, since there are 14 of us, so I suppose that means we each only have half a mind.)

The 7 Criminal Minds blog poses a question each week, and the 7 authors scheduled to blog that week have to answer the question. This week we were tasked with creating our own holiday, and as luck would have it, today is my day to blog both at 7 Criminal Minds and Inkspot.

Remember how I mentioned above that Christmas is less than a week away? Remember that to-do list? And here I am stuck with two blogs in one day. Hence, the gift I’m giving myself: I’m telling all of you about the holiday I created over at the other blog.

Cheating? Perhaps. But I’m going to do it anyway because it’s also my gift to my fellow Inkspot authors.

I hereby declare today National Buy a Novel Day.

For the past several months, ABC World News has featured an ongoing series called Made in America. One of the points made is that according to economists they spoke with, if everyone in America spent just $64 on goods made in America, it would create 200,000 new jobs. Given that the average person will spend $700 this year on Christmas and Hanukkah presents, it should be relatively easy to budget $64 for gifts made in America. The show even has a map on their website for finding goods made in America by state.

I propose that we create a National Buy a Novel Day to be held in December. This day would encourage people to buy novels as gifts. Most books sold in America are written (and illustrated) by Americans. Many are published by small and medium presses headquartered in America. Those publishers that are now part of worldwide conglomerates still have offices in America and employ thousands of Americans. Although some publishers are outsourcing their printing and even their copyediting overseas, for the most part, books are still printed in America.

Think about all the people whose livelihoods depends on book publishing. Not only the editors, cover artists, publicists, marketers, and salespeople who work for the publisher, but the clerks and secretaries and switchboard operators. The accountants and bookkeepers. The cleaning staff. The people who work in nearby businesses that these people frequent during their lunch hour.

Then there are the people who work for the printers, the bindery, the warehouse. The truckers who ship the books. The booksellers who sell the books. Librarians. The journalists who review the books.

If everyone in America spent just $64 on books this holiday season, we’d create 200,000 jobs in publishing and publishing related industries. How cool would that be? So cross off those must-have tchotchkes you were going to buy as gifts. They’ll go the way of the Furby and Pet Rock by the end of January anyway. Join the National Buy a Novel movement and buy books instead. Starving authors everywhere will thank you, and so will a lot of other people.

Lois Winston writes the critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries series. The first book, Assault With A Deadly Glue Gun, was a January 2011 release and received starred reviews from both Publishers Weekly and Booklist. Death by Killer Mop Doll will be a January 2012 release. Visit Lois at http://www.loiswinston.com and Anastasia at the Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers blog, http://anastasiapollack.blogspot.com.

How Do You Get Your Books?

Cricket McRae

Between e-readers, the closing of Borders, and the surge of self-published authors there has been a flurry of discussion about where the publishing industry is going. Keith posted recently about the future of independent bookstores, an excellent examination of what’s been going on with e-readers and the instant downloading of ebooks.

I’m not looking to enter into the debate about e-readers or whether reading on paper is better or not. I don’t think print books will vanish altogether, and I love, love, love them. But electronic books and their green delivery (sans fuel oil) are here, and they ain’t going away. It seems it would behoove those in the publishing industry to figure out what comes on the other side of the current ebook trends in order to leap frog ahead instead of playing reluctant catch up. What that new thing may be is beyond my ken right now, though. I feel as if I need a workshop  class advanced degree in what’s already going on with different formats and new marketing before I could venture a guess about what comes next.

But looking at the various books I’m currently reading, I realized their sources are widely mixed. And note that I don’t have a Kindle or Nook or any other e-reader, so that influences where I’ve obtained these books.

• The Dirty Life: On Farming, Food and Love by Kristin Kimball  was recommended on a blog I regularly visit called Cold Antler Farm. And there I also found a link to Farmbrarian, which lists tons of other books about small scale farming, livestock, real food, and local eating – subjects which float my boat to an unreasonable degree. I bought it immediately online from Powell’s Books. 

• I’m making a point lately of catching up with mystery series that I’ve fallen behind on or missed one in the middle. So when I saw our own Jess Lourey’s Knee High by the Fourth of July at the library, I grabbed it and headed for the checkout desk. What a fun read! At the library I also picked up Laurie R. King’s The Language of Bees .

• And even though I don’t have a Kindle, I do have the Kindle app on my I-Phone. So when one of my critique partners who keeps an eye on YA trends suggested I read The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins I downloaded it for $5.00. So far I’ve read the first two in the series, on my I-Phone of all the crazy unintuitive places, and am nearly done with the third in the trilogy. This is my middle-of-the-night, can’t-sleep, don’t- want-to-wake-up-my-partner-but-want-to-stay-under-flannel-sheets read, and I can easily see downloading another book when I’m done with this one.

• Also on my I-Phone is Die Trying by Lee Child in audio form. This I dip into when I’m cleaning, walking, or whiling away my time on the elliptical if there aren’t any good cooking shows on television.

• In honest-to-God hardcopy, I’m reading Heather Lende’s If You Lived Here I’d Know Your Name which is a collection of essays by an NPR contributor about living in small-town Alaska. I bought this book at Third Place Books in Seattle after hearing Heather speak. I’ve had it in my TBR pile for a few years but only got to it recently. Since starting it I’ve gone to her website and see she’s written another book. I’m enjoying the first, and will probably pick up the second, too.

• And then there’s Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie, which I’m rereading in part because I’m blogging on occasion about the series’ influence on my weird fascination with colonial home crafts. My parents gave me this book 37 years ago, and it’s gone through three cousins before coming back to me. Still in pretty good shape, too.

• And finally, I’m regularly referring to three books I bought for background and research for my current writing projects. These I bought via Amazon because of ease, time efficiency and free shipping, despite the fact that I’m pretty unhappy with Amazon after they dumped all their Associates in Colorado over a tax issue. 

How do you read? A mix? How do you find books? Does the targeted marketing Amazon sends to your inbox or Google pushes at you work? Do you go with recommendations from friends, Goodreads, or particular websites?

KINDLE ME BLUE

Darrell James

Earlier this month, yet another independent bookseller, The Mystery Bookstore announced its closing. So sad. Located in trendy Westwood, California, a mere block off the UCLA campus, this fabulous stalwart of the printed book has served the mystery reading community for the past 23 years, and has hosted virtually every mystery author, big name or small.

Robert Crais at The Mystery Bookstore (Wow!)
One of the last signings there.

On nearly the same day, the major book chain Barnes and Nobles announced record fourth quarter sales. How can this dichotomy exist?

Well, it seems the source of B&N’s bragging rights came not from book sales in its stores, but from the on-line sales of eBooks for electronic readers. On Christmas day alone, the chain reported that their computers had crashed as a result of being clogged with orders for eBooks for its latest reader, the color Nook. Another statistic said that more than half of all “best seller” sales were eBooks.

In the words of the song artist and poet, Bob Dylan “… the times they are a’changin’.”

For authors, it seems to ring the death knell for printed books. Yet the reality of it is that more books than ever are actually being sold. Just not in the form we’ve come to love.

I’ve come to the eBook revolution kicking and screaming. I love books. Real books. My shelves are crammed with them. My nightstand is stacked with them. I love the look and feel of them. Having spent time in the printing industry, I even love the smell of them—that heady ink-on-paper aroma.(I know you know what I mean.)

I’ve recited all my objections to owning a reader, be it Kindle, Nook, or iPad… “I don’t like reading off a screen.” OR “What happens when the battery goes dead?”

The response from the progressive minded people who already have one or more of these devises, sounds something like: “Yes, but you can’t tuck your book into a purse or pocket. You can have it with you anytime, over lunch, in line at the bank.” AND, “When you go on vacation you can carry dozens… no!… hundreds of books with you. Think about the size of the suitcase you’d need to do that. Huh? Huh? Have you thought about that?”

Okay, I have imagined trying to fit a shipping container full of books into the overhead compartment on an airplane.

The change, though, has left me feeling maybe a bit the way the scribes of old must have felt when Guttenberg first introduced movable type, making their beautifully crafted calligraphy-styled books obsolete.

The truth is, when I listen to the arguments, my objections seem rather lame. Technology has proven itself valuable to the consumer (again). People buy them because they like them. It’s progress.

I envision a day when brick-and-mortar bookstores will mostly be a thing of the past. Possibly a few will exist to service collectors and hippy-holdouts like me—those who still store their music on vinyl record albums, proclaiming… “It sounds better.”

It doesn’t sound better; it just sounds familiar.

For authors promoting their works, perhaps the rest of Dylan's lyrics apply:

“Come gather ‘round people wherever you roam and admit that the waters around you have grown. And accept it that soon you’ll be drenched to the bone. For the times…”

You know the rest.

I now have plans for a Nook, Kindle, whatever… “Uncle! I give.”

Still, my heart cries, “It’s not a book, unless its printed.”

Where do you stand on the debate? Have you gone to the darkside of eReadership. Or are you clinging stubbornly to tradition?... Join in. Let’s call it our official poll.

The Slippery Slope

by G.M. Malliet

Like most readers and writers of this blog, I LOVE books. Actually, it has become obvious to me as well as to my loved ones that I am addicted to books. If it were possible, I would probably snort books up my nose. I might even attempt some version of bathtub books, knowing it was illegal and the results almost certainly toxic.

What I am talking about here is the need to purchase and own books, especially new books, which is related to but different from the love of reading. People who simply love to read are also sensible sorts who have learned the cost-saving benefits of owning a library card. This is my downfall. I have a library card I seldom use. In fact, I have two, one for a neighboring county. No matter. If I really love a book, or even if I think I might sort of maybe like a particular book (crucial distinction), I have to buy it. 

There are telltale signs of an encroaching book-buying addiction like mine, and as a public service, I thought I would share with you what some of them are, as in one of those “Is he cheating?” articles you see in women's magazines. If any of these scenarios seem familiar to you, you may be in the first stages of a full-blown book addiction:

•    A friend asks if she can borrow your copy of Mentor, a just-released book by Tom Grimes for which you paid full price in hardcover. Intoxicated by that new-book smell, you deny having a copy or knowing anything about the book, or even knowing how to read, even though she can see you happen to be holding the book in your hands.
•    You tell your parents, spouse, or other person who cares where you will be that you are going to the library, when you are in fact again headed to the bookstore, where you will probably buy yet another book(s) you may never get around to reading.
•    Book conventions for you are the equivalent of Ben and Jerry’s for the carbohydrate deprived. You have been known to leave your shoes and heavy clothing behind in your hotel room to make room for the extra books you want to take home on the plane.
•    A box of books arrives from Amazon.com, and you sneak it into the house before anyone can say, “That isn’t another box of books, is it?”
•    You flatten the empties from Amazon.com and hide them in the neighbor’s trash bin.
•    You hide the newly purchased books in your underwear drawer.
•    You've tried to cut your book buying to an average of one a week but find you can't.
•    You pay cash whenever possible at bookstores so as to leave no paper trail.
•    You refer to your local bookstore manager as your book mule.
•    You would seriously consider trading in one of your pets or children for a lifetime B&N membership card.
•    You have installed bookshelves to accommodate your growing book collection, at a cost equal to the GDP of a small nation, rather than donate any more of your precious collection to the library.

Sound like anyone you know?

The “Potboiler” List

Lately I've seen a rash of book lists cropping up, apparently inspired by the BBC Big Read list of 100 best-loved books. Here are the top ten from that list:

1. The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, J.K. Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, A.A. Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, C.S. Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë

The Sun-Sentinel's Off the Page blogger weighed in recently with her 50 favorites to counter those of the Miami Herald's book blogger.

I have to confess I am nowhere near close to having read most of these books from any of these lists. My excuse that’s no excuse: I'm a very s-l-o-w reader.

I may as well face it--there are books I should read that I will just never get around to.

This got me to thinking, though, about the books I did mange to speed my way through, day into night, sometimes skipping meals because the story was more engrossing than food. The literal page-turners. The books (and this is the real test) that made me want to call in sick, because I was either exhausted from lack of sleep (a form of illness, it could be argued), or still reading and unable to tear myself away.

Some of these books might be considered "potboilers" - books of low quality. I would disagree. Any book that makes us forget ourselves and our troubles for a bit is a good thing, as Keith blogged about yesterday. Here are some of the page-turning, make-me-late-for-work books I remember, then, in no particular order:

Salem's Lot – Stephen King

The Stand – Stephen King

The Exorcist – William Blatty

And Then There Were None - Agatha Christie

Bridget Jones' Diary – Helen Fielding

Da Vinci Code – Dan Brown

Little Women – Louisa May Alcott

Double Indemnity - James M. Cain

Mildred Pierce – James M. Cain

The Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
– Mark Twain

Gone with the Wind - Margaret Mitchell

Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte

Rosemary’s Baby – Ira Levin

The Stepford Wives – Ira Levin

On the Road – Jack Kerouac

I'm forgetting some good ones, I know. What would you add?

Kinderbooks

Used to be when an invitation to a baby shower appeared in the mailbox -- or the inbox -- I'd hie me to the Babies R Us and indulge in tiny socks and stuffed animals and the inevitable pack of onesies for the expectant mother-to-be. Or rather, her progeny. I don't have children, so these infrequent forays were kind of fun, though my selections were safe to the point of blandness because I had little idea of what new mothers and their babies really needed.

Then I was called upon to actually organize a baby shower for a colleague at work. Ugh. So not my thing.

Luckily, this woman was down-to-earth, smart and not given to cute games or silly party themes. What would I want if I were in her practical shoes? Well, that was easy: books.

Everyone who attended the shindig brought brightly wrapped, rectangular packages, and we piled them high on a table. She had a blast opening them, and her new baby was well supplied with reading material until at least the age of five. They ranged from cushy pillow books the infant could sleep with to chapter books Mom and Dad could read to an older child. Many were classics: Mitten the Kitten, Dr. Seuss, Raggedy Ann and Andy, Goodnight Moon (okay that's a relatively recent "classic"), Maurice Sendak.

Since then I always give books when a wee one is on the way, and if I'm visiting a household with children, there's inevitably a book for them in my suitcase. Last Thanksgiving I gave my two-year-old cousin, Peyton, Skippyjon Jones. I was then called upon to read it to him. Conversations around the house stopped and family drifted into the living room where we sat. I admit I may have gotten a little carried away, with my wild gesticulations and bad Mexican accent, but the big grin on Peyton's face was well worth the embarrassment.

Recently, I visited a friend in Nashville who has a ten-year-old son. Artemis Fowl for him this time around. His parents have read to him every night since he was old enough to listen, and now, in addition to baseball and soccer and football and science camp, he reads whenever he can. He's gone through all the Harry Potter books, the Chronicles of Narnia, most of the Hardy Boys mysteries, Michael Chabon's Summerland, and a host of others.

Of course, I also give books to adults. Lots of them. I've been knows to check off my entire Christmas list at the local indie bookstore -- these days it's The Readers Cove. And it's getting to be that time of year again ...

Who do you give books to? And how do you encourage children to read?

Sign of the Times

by G.M. Malliet

This sign appeared Tuesday on the remaining Olsson's bookstores in my area. Hard to imagine sadder news for book lovers and writers, not to mention all the people who counted on the store's success for their livelihoods.

Olsson's was in business for 36 years. If you don't live in the DC area, you may not have heard of it, but it was an institution here. It was where you went when you had an hour to kill and didn't quite know where else to go. In Alexandria, there was a coffee shop upstairs with a gorgeous view over the Potomac, and you were free to sit there and dream or scribble in your notebook uninterrupted. It was not uncommon to find people asleep up there in one of the easy chairs. No one bothered them. It was that kind of place.

A small chain to begin with, Olsson's had recently dwindled to five stores. Even when they filed for bankruptcy protection in July, we figured they'd weather the storm. But no. They'd been Amazoned and iTuned, as the Washington Post said. They're not the first and sadly, they won't be the last. But they were really great about supporting this newbie author and I want the staff there to know: I will miss you guys. Thank you.

Amazon is convenient, but it doesn't have a river view.

Interview, Redux

by G.M. Malliet

They say recycling is good, so in the current time crunch I'm reprinting here one interview I gave recently. Pamela did a good job of getting me to summarize my thinking on this whole writing business.

Actually, there are a lot of interviews at this site you may want to see: http://www.mayhemandmagic.com/reviewsandinterviews.html

Here is my interview with Pamela:

What type of writing schedule do you have?

Actually, I find it essential first to spend at least an hour checking my email, reading news sites and blogs, and ordering stuff online. This may look like procrastination to the outside world, but believe me, it’s all necessary as a warm-up exercise. Besides, if I don’t order that hair product right now they might discontinue it. Seriously, this is the reason I take myself off to a coffee shop as much as possible, without a laptop. It’s the only way I’d ever get anything written.

Tell us about the best part of writing your books.

Sometimes, it all just hums along, and I can’t write fast enough to keep up with my thoughts. The characters just chatter away, the setting comes into focus, and I’m pretty much only there to write it all down—quickly. That is the very best part, but you never know when that kind of inspiration is going to strike. So you just keep slogging until it does.

How did you come up with the idea for DEATH OF A COZY WRITER?

Death of a Cozy Writer is very much an homage to Robert Barnard’s work—all of it. When he is in full flow he is one of the wittiest and most elegant writers around. But since Barnard had already written Death of a Mystery Writer, I decided to try to ring some changes on the theme of a “cozy” writer who is anything but cozy…who is in fact a mean, tight-fisted bully whose family regards him with fear and loathing.

Do you have a couple of favorite books or series that you like to read?

This is the type of question that always puts me in danger of forgetting someone who is an all-time favorite, so forgive me if I take a pass. I read widely in mystery, although quite slowly, rather like a third-grader, so I’m not a good person to go to for recommendations on current books. I’m still working on the TBR pile of five years ago. I wish it were otherwise, believe me. I recently sat near a woman on a transatlantic flight and watched her go through two and one-half books before we landed. It was amazing.

Tell us about GM the woman, the author, the friend?

Without sounding too pompous here, I try to be an authentic person. That’s the best any of us can do in terms of friendship, isn’t it?—be someone who doesn’t shift with the tides. The GM author person…well, she’s having a whale of a time just now. Writing fiction is my dream job and to finally have made it is just great. It’s not always easy, and a few things have had to be sacrificed on that altar, but I really can’t complain.

Okay, now let's talk about your publisher and your cover?

Death of a Cozy Writer actually went through two covers before the people in marketing settled on the current one, the one with the pen. I really love this cover, especially the little gargoyle/grotesque at top (my idea, so of course I love that bit). The cover for my second book, Death and the Lit Chick, just came out yesterday (it’s on pre-order at Amazon, which was quite a surprise—the book is not actually available until April 2009). It looks like a chick lit book, all pinks and reds, but it’s not – it’s a gentle send-up of the chick lit mystery genre and of the publishing industry itself. I seriously hope I am not drummed out of town by the publishing world following its release.

Who gave you the best advice on writing?

The best advice I ever read was to sit down at your desk and not get up until you’ve either written four pages or four hours have passed. I’m sorry to say I’ve forgotten who said this, but I believe it was advice he got from his writer father. Since I don’t count pages, I follow the four-hour rule…five hours minus that essential cruising around the Web as described above.

Now it's your turn.....what writing advice do you have for anyone who wants to write a cozy mystery?

My advice would be to write a thriller, since I keep hearing they are “hot” right now. I am kidding, of course. You have to write what you love, and write the kind of book you love reading…whether that book is a cozy, a suspense-thriller, a paranormal--whatever. If you have a favorite book by a favorite author, try to figure out why you love that book so much. Then go and try to do likewise.

Now for the fun questions. What is your favorite food, place to vacation and dessert?

Favorite food: Lobster.
Favorite vacation: Provence.
Dessert: Ladyfingers.

Leave us with how readers may contact you? Your website address?

I welcome all visitors to http://www.gmmalliet.com/, where there’s a sample chapter of Death of a Cozy Writer along with book club questions.

Lastly what would you like to say to your readers.

Thank you. Thank you for loving this genre as much as I do.

Livres

by G.M. Malliet

I wish the photo on the left were clearer. You will have to take my word that it's a photo of bookshop window in Rennes, France, where my husband and I vacationed recently. Now, there's something strange about these French books. If you could look closely, you'd see that many of them are translations from American books, with a few British authors thrown in.

Not only that, but the vast majority of these books in translation are mysteries.

It was the same in every store I walked into where books were sold. Now, what's with that? Is the publishing world suddenly in disrepair in France? Do they not have someone, anyone who could write a mystery novel in French? Do they think American crime is more interesting, or do they just prefer to believe there is no crime in France? I asked several people, and they could only tell me American crime novels were very popular. It's what the French like to read, especially on holiday.

The French may boast of their wine, but Americans, apparently, have cornered the market in fine crime.

Money for Nothing

by G.M. Malliet

An author with a book due out begins to divide the world into two categories of people.

The first category will say, when you tell them about your book, "That's great! When and where can I buy it?" One friend of mine was actually sensitive enough to ask, "Where should I buy it so you get the bigger royalty? Online or in the stores?" These people are going straight to author's heaven.

The second category of person (and this is rare, fortunately) will say, when you tell them you have a book coming out: "That's great! When do I get my free copy?" While you are tempted to think they're kidding - they must be kidding - they're not.

Now, think about it. Would you ask me to paint your house for free? Alter your jacket? Wash your dog? But writing a book also involves actual labor, possibly spanning many years.

I'm still working on a snappy comeback to this. After all, I think this request for a free book has everything to do with ignorance of the writing biz and nothing to do with greed. I think the request is even meant to be flattering ("I am curious to read your book, just not curious enough to pay for it" may be the subtext). But the fact is, I would rather take $14 out of my purse and set fire to it than give my work away - to treat it as something of no value.

The belief that authors receive all the free copies of their books they want may play into this. But MI authors get only ten copies of their books, and mine are long since ear-marked for people who, like, saved me from drowning. I got ONE free copy from the publisher of an anthology in which my short story appeared.

It's a simple equation: Books cost money. Selling books is how authors pay the bills. Please don't ever ask an author for a free copy of his/her book.

And don't even think about asking to borrow the book so you can read it.

Thank you. The rant has ended; go in peace.

A Creative Fugue State--A Holiday for My Brain

Blame it on Camille Minichino (aka Margaret Grace), my sister blogger on http://killerhobbies.blogspot.com/

I was on my way to Florida for Spring Break when I emailed her if she’d like some sea shells for her miniatures.

She wrote back, “Oooh, yes, I have a little beach scene on my bookcase, and it's seriously lacking shells!”

But somehow I read that as “ Oooh, yes, I have a little sea shell shop on my bookcase, and it’s seriously lacking shells!”

Funny how my mind works. I went to South Carolina and picked up tiny sea shells from the beach. But the whole time, I was thinking about a sea shell shop, which was something I’d intended to create for myself in miniature for years. In fact, I couldn’t get this project out of my brain. One night while I was listening to the ocean, I went online and found http://www.wannainelpaso.com/ I entered a fugue state, which is defined as an altered state of consciousness in which a person may move about purposely and even speak but is not fully aware. My mind was buzzing with ideas. When we got home from South Carolina, I went to Michaels, coupon in hand, and bought a paper mache “hat box” plus a wooden hutch and several bottles of acrylic paint. (Total cost about $10 with coupon.)

On Friday, my husband left town for a business trip. Since then, I’ve done nothing but work on my sea shell shop, ruining a perfectly good manicure but having a ball. It’s not entirely done…I want to add a few more things and then I’ll close it up and cover the outside and the lid. I made everything but the mermaid (I painted a statue of Ariel), the hutch, and the paintings.

I created the rug, the lights, the shell trimmed mirror, the table, the chair (except for the painted shells), the postcard stand, the plant, the shelving unit, all the shell displays and so on. In the "ceiling," I put tiny lights. (Picked these up on sale at Michaels after Halloween for $1.) Then, I draped the sparkling net over it to catch the 20 miniature "fireflies."I’m curious.

Do you enjoy more than one hobby? Do you ever get a creative impulse that’s so strong you can barely control it? Have you ever spent two days in your jammies working on a project and forgetting to eat? I feel so refreshed. I've been working on my writing for so long...I'm about 1/3 of the way through Book #3 of my scrapbooking mystery series...that this feels like a restful vacation. A holiday for my mind and my creative juices.

How do you like my sea shell shop?