Interview with Katie Davis about the Brain Burps App!

Today, in my ever-ongoing quest to try and figure out how this whole interweb thing works, I'm going to interview Katie Davis, author/illustrator extraordinaire. She is the author of Who Hops, I Hate To Go To Bed, Kindergarten Rocks, and the middle grade novel The Curse of Addy McMahon. More importantly, she has an app! Brain Burps About Books. Here's the link. Isn't the cow cute?



And now the interview:


First off, I think Brain Burps is such a great title. No one forgets it. Did it take long to come up with that? And is the purple-blue cow there because cows often burp?


It’s SO funny you say that because I’ve been advised by smart marketing type guys that it doesn’t take me seriously enough…not that I’m ever going to stop laughing at myself, heaven forbid! But more in terms of will I be taken seriously as someone in the business with that name.

But I love it! So I don’t know what to do, and plus, people often tell me how it makes them laugh and I’m a sucker for making people laugh.

As for how I came up with it, it started as the name for my blog. My mind pops from thing to thing all the time and add to that I didn’t want to be locked into talking about one specific thing, so I figured it covered anything to do with children’s literature. That way I can talk about specific books, but also, the business end of things, libraries and librarians, how to read books, how to write them, school visits, craft, you name it, it’d come under that umbrella! And it worked for the podcast, too.

The cow comes from my first book, WHO HOPS? which has a hopping cow on the cover.

I love hopping cows. Or Kangacows as we call them in Saskatchewan. Why an app in the first place?

The app kind of came along with the podcast. As I got my show structure and equipment together (for good sound quality), I found out about Liberated Syndication, or Libsyn for short. Libsyn is my podcast server, and I pay a monthly service fee to upload and store my files, which can be very large, or about 1.5 mb per episode minute. For my service fee, there is an app included. All I had to do was create the art.

To be clear, anyone can hear the podcast free via my blog (soon to be within my redesigned site) or iTunes. But if you want it automatically downloaded to your iPod, iPhone, Android or Blackberry, you need to buy the app. I didn't have anything to do with the pricing of $1.99, either - that was Libsyn (I get a few cents per app sold...my kids won't be paying for college with the app). As a sort of thank you for buying it, I make the podcast available to my app owners a full day early. That’s an advantage when there is a contest! I’ve also included PDFs only available on the app, like the first chapter of Nancy Werlin’s latest book before it came out.

Who's your audience? Bovines? Teachers? Anyone with $1.99?

I am pretty sure you can’t text without thumbs so probably no bovines have purchased my app, sad as that makes me. Anyone who wants to learn about the business of children’s lit and wants to hear the show before everyone else buys it.

Whether you’re an established author or a hopeful, there is content for you. Teachers and librarians have liked it too, as they can hear their favorite writers and illustrators talking about the creation of books they’ve read, or their students are reading. I feel so lucky to do this - I love my guests! I get to support my friends' books, I’ve had Newbery and Caldecott winners, app creators, eBook publishers, bestselling authors and illustrators and school visit experts.


What was the "app" process like? Do they take a cut of the $1.99 or do you pay them upfront? Is it an expensive endeavour for authors to consider?

It was very easy but I’m an illustrator so that wasn’t a big leap – though I give props to Janie Bynum who gave me valuable graphic design input, as I am definitely no graphic artist! And as I mentioned above, the app is part of the monthly $20 fee. Knowing how much it would cost me elsewhere, it seemed like a great deal to me.

Do people think you're cooler because you have an app? Just curious. I need to work on my coolness. I think you're cooler, in case you're wondering.

What are you talking about? You are the coolest guy I know. After my husband and Justin Timberlake. Sorry. But third place isn’t so bad.

And to answer your question, I am actually 17.5% cooler than I was before. Except to my teenaged kids who probably think I’m not even in the same state as cool.

Seriously, I think I am the only one who thinks it’s cool. And now you. So now there are two of us.

Justin Timberlake? Is he another YA writer? Anyway, what has the reaction been to the app? Was it better than you imagined?

Nope. It’s actually way worse. 8-)

I get the statements and it’s embarrassing. Meanwhile, the show grows by leaps and bounds every day! As I write this I’m just about to pass the 15,000 download mark and have been heard in 67 countries. By the time you print this, those numbers will have gone up by a lot. So the app not selling isn’t that big a deal to me but ONLY because it’s not a book app. That would be a completely different story. And I will be doing a book app, so let’s talk again then!

I didn't even know there were 67 countries in the world! Now that the app is out there, you still have work to do. Interviews, cutting and splicing of digital tape, etc., Is it time consuming? And what tools do you use to do all your podcasting?

I have good sound equipment, including my favorite thing, an Edirol digital recorder, about the size of an iPhone, only fatter. I’ve gotten more streamlined as I become more experienced, but it still takes anywhere from a couple of hours to 6 hours, depending on the episode. I do research, read the books by my guests (I’m not counting reading time), then I write my show notes. The interview usually lasts about an hour, maybe more “off camera” if we’re having fun, and then I edit the show, which means listening to it, and adding music, the reviews by Betsy Bird and Jennifer Hubert Swan (Reading Rants) and the new feature, Take5 Marketing Tips, submitted by Dianne de las Casas. I also delete things, like too many “ums” or if I interrupt someone.

Um, I see. So you should cut out the ums. Ummm, that's a great tip. I assume one of the advantages to having the podcasting app is that you can react to changes in the industry instantly. Do you pursue topics that are...uh...topical? Or is it more general?

You are so right! I’ve had timely episodes, including one with the editor who removed the N-word from Huck Finn, Bruce Coville’s escape from Egypt during the recent revolution, and one of my first episodes was with Ellen Hopkins, right after she was “uninvited” from a Texas book festival. I had her on and two other authors, one of whom boycotted the festival and one who decided to go.

I see that people can also phone in with questions. That is so great. It's kind of like being able to talk directly to Oprah. Have you found this interactive aspect of the podcast useful? Do you get crank calls?

I love that I can do that. People can also email me an mp3 message recorded on their iPod or iPhone – it has better quality. And yep, that number has gotten some crank calls. But that’s okay – I got the service to make it easy for people to ask questions. It’s been pretty dead lately on the question front, though so I don’t know how much longer I’ll keep paying for that!

Did I mention that you're now 90% cooler because you have an app? Anyway, has anything really surprising come out of the whole app thing? Like, perhaps, Brain Burps the movie?

The most surprising thing is that you think I’m 90% cooler because of the app.

Ha! So what are the net benefits? Are they measurable? Does this sell books or is it more a way of reaching out and growing your audience (which we hope in turn will sell books). And, most important of all, is it fun?

It’s so much fun I can’t even believe it. The benefits are multi-fold: I get to support other people’s books, I feel good supporting literacy and spreading the kidlit gospel, my name is associated with respected book reviewers who contribute to the show, and I’m going more speaking engagements because of it. I was just asked by Chautauqua to interview Candy Fleming for their website, I will be podcasting the New England SCBWI and the Rutgers One-on-One conferences this year and I’m appearing at the NY Reading Association, presenting “How to Turn Reluctant Readers Into Stars Through Podcasting.”

So, though I don’t know if it directly is selling my books, through these appearances and associations, maybe it is. Most of all, it’s really fun and very fulfilling.


One thing I know for sure, this interview was fun! Thanks Katie, I really appreciate you sharing your time and information and laughing at my jokes. You were laughing right? Please check out Katie’s Website and buy all of her books. Err, wait, first buy mine. Then hers! Oh, and don't forget to watch her very cool video FAQ's. All your FAQ's will be answered! Finally!

Art

Shades on iBooks (a poem)

Dear mighty iBooks
Thank you for giving Shades, my book, a look
As an Apple fanboy
This has produced in me
Plenty of joyous joy
Oh, frabjous happiness
Oh, iPadded deliriousness
May the sales be blessed
May the downloads outlast the reign
Of Ozymandias.


Notice how I add that deep literary stuff at the end?

Yep, Shades, my collection of short stories is out on iBooks. Click on the link if you want the various worldwide links.



Art

I blame my 4th grade teacher

I blame my grade 4 teacher for turning me into a writer. His name was Mr. Fitzgerald and he came to our small town of Tompkins right out of Education. He was only there a year, but in that year he did two things that changed my life forever. The first was he read The Hobbit to us. That book blew my mind! I was amazed by the dwarves and spiders and, of course, Bilbo himself. Wow, this book didn't have the Hardy Boys in it! It had swords! I remember staring at the cover for hours.

The second thing he did was teach us how to play Dungeons and Dragons. The year would have been 1976. At that time no one had heard of the satanic, amazingly fun game. Only college geeks played it. I have no idea how he started teaching us, or why, but I do have memories of going on "adventures" during math class. I may not know my multiplication tables, but I can tell you the percentage chance of a 20 hit point strike with a +2 sword on a green dragon! The game, like The Hobbit, suddenly made my imagination explode. The game taught me that anything could be imagined. And I blame it (and my grade four teacher) for turning me into a writer.


SO thanks Mr. Fitzgerald!

.99 cent books and the apocalypse

.99 cent eBooks will destroy publishing!
.99 cent eBooks will save writers!
.99 cent eBooks are the 4th horsemen of the apocalypse!
.99 cent eBooks will save the Toronto Maple Leafs (or fill in your favourite sports team here _______)!



Okay, I don't know which (or if any) of these statements is true. The more I dig into the world of ePublishing the more arguments I hear for and against pricing eBooks as low as .99 cents (or free!). One argument is that this devalues books. Hey, that makes sense to me. eBooks should be worth something! I spent a year writing this book and I want money (preferably truckloads of money)! Another argument is that if you sell a book at 99 cents you make 35 cents. That's essentially a 35% royalty. Wow, I'd kill for a 35% royalty! Plus, the .99 cents opens up the purchaser to make an impulse buy. I love it when people follow their impulses...especially if their impulse is to buy my book.

Should I sell a book for .99 cents? I wondered. Will it devalue my book? Will it launch my books into the stratosphere? I meditated. I scattered the bones and read the pig livers (oink).

And the answer came back: yes.



I chose Dust because it is my most valuable book. It has won the most awards and has been the most successful and it would make the best impression on new readers. And that's who I am aiming the .99 cent price at. The eBook of Dust is only available in the U.S. and U.K. I am relatively unknown to the general public in these markets, so by lowering the price I am essentially saying, "hello, I'm over here. Pick me! Pick me!" Kind of like when I'd jump up and down hoping to be picked for the baseball team.

My hope is that the book will catch on and climb up to a steady sales rate. If I sell two copies that's almost the same amount that I make for selling a paperback version of the book. If I sell six copies then I am equalling the 2.01 that I was making when the ebook was priced at 2.99. If the book does gain traction I will have a choice to make, either to keep it at .99 cents or to put it back to $2.99 or $3.99 and hope the sales stay steady (I've seen both large publishers and small epubbers have success at this strategy).

The main reason I'm testing this is because if I didn't I'd always be curious. And it is a no risk situation for me. I make the vast majority of my income from my paper books (like 99.9%).


Art

P.S. for a great argument for keeping books above .99 read Write to Publishing. For a great argument for pricing at .99 cents read this John Locke interview. For another great blog post on .99 cent books read Nathan Bransford's blog post. For a laugh read this.
P.P.S. I believe that the .99 cent book is an oddity of our times. I think Amazon/iTunes/B&N are letting it exist because they are trying to sell more and more Kindles and iPads and Nooks and the more easily available the content for their devices the more they will sell. But the profit margin is too small for them to continue with the .99 cent price forever. It does cost money to upload and download books. Once they've saturated the market they'll likely raise the price of books. Of course, I base this theory on no stats or charts or anything tangible. The pig liver told me.
P.P.P.S. I realize at the beginning of this post some people might get the impression that the Toronto Maple Leafs are my favourite team... they aren't. I have a soft spot for them. But I'm an Oilers fan. So please don't start a flame war. Or a Flames war.
P.P.P.P.S For those who have never received a real letter, P.S. stands for post script. It was something you added to the end of a letter that you forgot to write in the main text. In the old days people used pens and so words were permanent. Unlike now. : )

Using Project Wonderful ads to sell eBooks

For those keeping track I recently posted about using Facebook for advertising here. In that "campaign" I spent 15 dollars and received 49 clicks and may have sold one book due to the ad.

An artist friend of mine, Christopher Steininger, has had tons of success with Project Wonderful, so I gave it a try. Project Wonderful is a site where you can create an account, create an ad and have your ad displayed on various websites. You are able to search for websites that might have potential customers then bid on the ad space (which comes in various sizes). It's a system that looks complicated in the beginning, but after about twenty minutes makes sense (plus they have a clever tutorial, though the best way to learn is from doing). So I came up with two ads.
and
Both are quite small, as you can see. I was hoping the cover of Draugr would intrigue
"clickers" and the Dust ad does let them know that it is an eBook. Then I deposited 15 dollars in my account using paypal and bid on several websites (some to do with comics, others to do with fiction).
Here are the results for Draugr

I have two ads because I changed the ad slightly. Overall you can see that I spent $5.24. The websites I advertised to over the 10 day stretch had 360,000 visits and received 98 clicks that took people to my website. So already this is much cheaper than Facebook per click.
Here are the results from Dust :

I spent $9.84 and the websites I advertised to had over a million hits and I received 73 clicks to my website.

So the total for both campaigns was 171 clicks. A higher number than I received from Facebook (which was 49 clicks).

Number of sales from these clicks = 1 or 2. That's about all I can attribute to the campaigns. So I didn't earn my money back. What's up with that? I thought advertising was the answer to everything! : )

I do feel that there is more potential at Project Wonderful. If I were to do another campaign I would use larger banner ads with better designs. I also understand the bidding system a bit better now and you can literally spend pennies a day (even nothing--that's right your ads run for free) and get a good return if you're willing to do a bit more "poking" around at various websites. In the future I would rather do a long-term campaign (for pennies a day) to get attention and "branding." Most people don't just click and buy. They click then go away. But if they keep seeing your ad for two or three months then they are more likely to click again and go "Oh what the heck" and buy.

Meanwhile I'm going to go back to writing!


Art

Shades--an eBook of short stories

I'm continuing on with my eBook adventures. For those curious I posted about the creation of both
and as eBooks here.
So as my next project I decided to gather all of my short stories together under one name and release them (very few anthologies get published in the print world, so it was a chance to bring these stories back to life). First, I hunted through all my files and came up with 17 short stories that I thought were presentable. Many had been published previously or broadcast on radio and a few were orphans whom I believed deserved their moment on stage. It's a really eclectic collection--fantasy, horror, literary fiction, humorous, irreverent, violent and, well, weird. They do span the length of my career. I rarely write shorts stories (only 17 so far that are publishable) whereas I've written 16 published novels (and 6 unpublished novels). The curious thing is that they almost all ended up for an older YA/adult audience.

I gave the collection the title Shades in an attempt to describe the eclectic styles (there are all different shades of stories) and I bought an image at http://www.istockphoto.com and made my own cover. I'm pleased with the cover, though I feel it's utilitarian, but it shows some of the mystery of the stories. I may give it a new cover further down the road.



Here's a short description of a few of them and a guesstimate of when they were written.

Stubb This is my most recent short story. All about a boy who may be a werewolf. (2007)
Snow White and the Seven Elves a snarky retelling of the fairytale. (1997)
Garbage Day A young boy has a tough home life. He wants revenge. Exactly what does he put in the garbage? (1992)
Fairytale I seem to be channeling Ray Bradbury in this story. I could draw a direct line from it to Dust. (1993)
The Jesus Trilogy Three short looks at Jesus. Two have to do with the resurrection and one with Pontius Pilate and a rodeo. They are written in a bluesy style. (1997)
Virtual Dragon A cyberpunk kung fu story. Because...well...the world needs more cyberpunk.(1995)

And that's just a few of them.


They're available at Amazon (kindle) and Smashwords (most every eReader). Just visit the links here. It's fun to have the stories out there again. They usually have such brief lives.

Art

Read an eBook week

It's read an eBook week! Both my titles:
and (short stories)
are available this week at Smashwords for 50% off. Err, which makes them only $1.99.

Of course, every week is "read a book in general" week, right?


Art

Does Social Networking Work?

I've recently released two ebooks unto the world.
and
As part of my awareness campaign I did several things. I blogged about both books. My blog appears on Livejournal, Blogspot and Myspace (aka deadspace) and it is "fed" to Facebook, Goodreads, Amazon, and Jacketflap. So my rough estimate is that around 5000 people have friended or follow me on these various networks. So that's a potential audience of 5000 (or 10,000 eyeballs if you're counting).
Arthur Slade's Profile


I also tweeted and "Facebooked" about the books, exposing them to about 4800 people (many of them the same people as the first group). These tweets were also re-tweeted by several others for even more exposure.

Total sales in the last two weeks: 25

That may seem like a small amount but I'm actually extremely pleased by it (hey, there was even one sale in the UK). If I examine just my Facebook friends alone I have around 3200. But only a small part of them would be actual fans -- the rest are other writers, people who collect Facebook friends, other writers, teachers, other writers, etc. Only a certain portion of them would own eReaders and only a small portion of those owners would be interested in Draugr and Dust. Not everyone wants to read YA. And not everyone wants to read horror. Add to that all the other "noise" out there (how many tweets can you read in a day?).

Actually if the sales pattern continues of 12 copies a week by the end of a year I'll have sold 624 copies and made $1248. Hey, that's not too bad. Add to that the fact that I intend to release two more books in the Northern Frights series, a book of short stories and maybe even a novelette--all of that can only help sales.

So does networking work? It depends on what you hope it will achieve. I see it as a way to both join the community of other writers and readers out there (and the heavy metal/starwars/startrek/geek community) and a way to be able to communicate directly to people who enjoy my work. "Friends" won't just purchase something the moment you tweet about it. They have lives of their own (apparently!). I rarely like seeing a direct sales message (unless it's something I'm dying to get) so I don't expect others to want to see too many of my own. In fact, I think you're far more likely to sell books if you're a good online citizen and nice to people (hey, maybe that could be a t-shirt--be nice to people...it sells books!)

So the social networking works for me.

And it's a great way to procrastinate from writing...

Art

Empire of Ruins -- out today in Canuckland, eh!

Finally! Book III of the Hunchback Assignments is out in stores all across Canada. Empire of Ruins is the story of Modo, a trip to Australia, crocodiles, and, of course, airships. There's also a sabre involved. Oh, and 3% more romance, 5% more bromance, and 117.7% steampunk.

Art

The (BOX) of Empires Strikes Back

My author's copies of Empire of Ruins: The Hunchback Assignments III have arrived. Don't they look all comfy in the box? Very colourful!



It's in stores in Canada on Monday.

Facebook Ad sells a Bazillion Books!

Well, a long time ago (April 21st, 2009), I tried out Facebook's ad campaign to mixed results. Enough time has passed and I've saved up enough cash that I decided to try again.

I chose to advertise my recently released eBook DUST.


As you can see I made up a clever ad (which is relatively easy to do with Facebook Ads) and pressed the "go" button. Facebook allows you to choose your target audience, so I selected America (because the eBook is only available there) and young adult/horror. I chose to pay $5.00 a day for three days. Because I published this version of DUST it meant that I could track sales exactly. My hope was that people would see the ad, click on it and go directly to the Amazon kindle site, then voila--buy the book. And I'd pay off my mortgage (okay that's more of a long term goal).
Here were the results:

As you can see there were 91,000 impressions and 49 clicks. And the number of books sold during that time period = 1. Yep, only sold one. I needed to sell at least 8 to break even.

Now I didn't expect the ad to sell bundles of books. First the person who clicks on the ad would have to own an eReader, then they'd have to have $2.99 to spend, and finally be willing to take a chance on an unknown book. So obviously this ad wasn't hitting the impulse buyers (all I need is about 100,000 impulse buyers...is that too much to ask).

I have been told that advertising usually takes 3 months to imprint onto your audience's brains. At that point they are more likely to buy the "product." But I'm not prepared to buy 3 months worth of ads. I may try Project Wonderful next, which is much cheaper. And have been itching to give Goodreads a try, too.



Art

iDraugr on iBooks

Well, Steve Jobs is pleased to announce that Draugr is available on iBooks. That's right -- 40,000 words of YA fright is waiting to spring into creepy life on your iPad (or iPod Touch or iPhone or iBrain). Just click the corresponding link.
iAustralia! iCanada! iUS of A! iUK! iFrance!

Yep, I'm a Macgeek. Sorry.


Art

Browse inside Empire of Ruins

Dust on iBooks Worldwide (mostly)

G'day Australia! Howdy US of A! Bloody top of the morning UK! Bonjour France!

Dust is officially up for sale on iBooks in the above countries. I am enough of a Mac geek that I find this thrilling (alas, again I must mention it is not for sale in the Canadian store because of "negotiations" etc--I can't even download my own book!).

It has been ten years since the book was released. When I talk to students they often ask me which of my 15 books is my favourite and I always answer Dust. It is the one that I feel "worked" the best out of all my novels.


Art

The Ebook Experiment...so far

Well, yesterday I launched (or resurrected) my first novel, Draugr, as an ebook.

A few weeks before that I released Dust as an ebook (available only in the US and UK because I don't have the Canadian rights).

Total sales so far: 6
I'm actually very pleased with that. I don't see this as a massive sales rush, but more a long term project that (I hope) will pay off over time. If I only make $1000.00 a year from the experiment...then that's ten grand after ten years (because the books will not be taken off the shelves unless something major happens to the internet or people start downloading them into their brains).
Why bother? Well, two main reasons. One is that these books were out of print in various countries, so I could at least be making an income from them. The second is that right now in the publishing world there is great, numbing fear about the changes coming to the industry via ebooks (umm...update the changes are here) and, frankly, the e-rights being offered by major publishers are not very generous (to make it simple if I sell an ebook through a publisher I make $25% of net which on a $10.00 book would be $1.75. If I upload that same book to amazon myself I make $7.00). Obviously there are a multitude of factors on why a traditional contract is still very much in the cards for a new book ("paper" books are the vast majority of my sales and, at this moment, the sales of the Children's market, publishers have promotion budgets, editors, sales staff, etc.) For my out-of-print books it was an easy decision to go it alone.
I am a bit of a techie and I like to have control over my own work. I was inspired by blogs by people such as JA Konrath


and Robin Sullivan of Ridan Publishing.


Read those blogs. They are very inspiring and eye-opening about the ebook world (Konrath has a long list of authors who have been successful on the epublishing front--some heady stuff, to be sure, though of course I can't find a corresponding blog about failures of e-pubbing--then again you can't win if you don't play).

So armed by inspiration, I researched how to make an eBook. And you know what, it's relatively easy. First I signed up at Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP)(Amazon's ebook publishing program). Then I converted my book into html following this guide by Derek Canyon:

Then I asked an artist friend to do the cover for a fee (in the case of Dust it was Christopher Steininger and Draugr was done by Derek Mah--hire them, they're great). Then I uploaded my file to KDP and within 24 hours it was for sale worldwide (C'mon brits...buy a book...I dare you!).
Of course, Amazon isn't the only game in the ebook market. There are many others including B&N, Apple, Sony etc. I am in the process of getting my books on iTunes myself, but for the rest of the distributors I used Smashwords. What Smashwords does is take a word file (prepared exactly to their specifications) and put it through their "meatgrinder" which spits out your book in various formats (epub/pdf/html) and then distributes it on their website and to all the major ebook sellers (Amazon/B&N etc.,). For a fee, of course (15% of net). This is likely the easiest way to go--I chose to put up my book on iTunes and Amazon on my own because it was easy enough to do and I kept that 15%.

Anyway, that's been the journey so far...

Hmm in the time it's taken to write this blog another sale appeared on Smashwords. That's 7 total. I'm gonna open the bubbly when it hits double digits. Err, maybe I'll wait until after 11 AM.


Art

Draugr, my first book, comes back from the Dead!

Good news! Books can come back from the dead! Today is the official re-release of my first novel Draugr. All three books in the Northern Frights series have been out of print for several years now, so I'm glad to see the first book rise out of the grave and roar to undead life. It has a lovely new "chilling" cover by Derek Mah. It's being released in ebook format only and I am the publisher (I started a company called Dava Enterprises named after my grandmother, because well...everyone should have a company named after their grandmother). At a future date I'll post about all the reasons why I decided to put the book out on my own (like, err, I get a 70% of cover price royalty instead of a 25% of net royalty) and explain some of the process (if you're interested in that sort of thing).

Draugr came out in 1997. It was my first book to be published after writing six unpublished books. So it does hold a dear, frightful place in my heart. But, as part of the publishing process, I had to read the book again. It is an odd experience to read your own writing fourteen years (and fifteen books) later. I decided to keep the text as original as possible and only fixed a few grammatical mistakes and misspelling of Icelandic names (don't get the Vikings mad, that's a general rule of mine). I'm glad that the book still holds up--at gut level it's a very scary book. And that was the point, of course. I must say I'm still proud of the opening line: "Grandpa was going to murder us. Not with an ax. Not with a shovel. But with words." Just click on this link if you want to see the web page I've put up about the book.

I've priced Draugr at $2.99. That may seem amazingly cheap (or expensive depending on your view), but the reality is I make $2.01 on every copy sold. Which is more (per book) than I've made from the sale of any of my hardcover, trade paperback, or paperback books.

Anyway, if you have one of those fancy Kindles, or iPads, or iPod touches or eReaders of any sort I'll now provide links for you (I'm the publisher, I have to sell the book, right...err and get that author to write another one). The rest of the series will be coming out over the next few months.

Kindle link (US & Canada)
Kindle link (UK)
All other eReaders.

Thanks for joining the party!

Art

The French Hunchback edition (Part Deaux)

Today, La Cité Bleue d'Icaria d' Arthur Slade is out in France (and Quebec, home of the Montreal Canadiens). Yes, it's the French version of The Dark Deeps, 2nd book of The Hunchback Assignments. Of course, they called the series The Brotherhood of the Clock and changed the title of the second book to "The Blue City of Icaria." But that's the great thing about the French...they have a different word for everything. Viva la France!

Art

Dust Sample Chapter

I'm taking part in #samplesunday, which is a "tweeted" promotion for authors (if you want to find a few interesting excerpts from novels or stories, just search #samplesunday on twitter). I decided to feature the first chapter of DUST, my supernatural/mystery/dark horror novel, which has just been released as an ebook in the U.S. and U.K. (alas not Canada yet--but of course, the unelectronic version AKA a paper book is available.). The cover is done by Christopher Steininger--I love his interpretation of the story.

So, if you haven't read the first chapter of Dust before...here it is. Honestly, it's probably the best chapter I have written so far.

Dust

Copyright 2001 Arthur Slade All Rights Reserved

Chapter 1

Matthew Steelgate had five cents in his pocket and a yearning for chewing gum and licorice. He wasn't sure which he wanted most, but knew he could buy both and have at least a penny left over. He walked along the edge of the grid road, three miles from his family's farm and about two miles from Horshoe. The sky was cloudless.

The sun had shifted nearer to the earth in the last half hour, so near that the air crackled with heat. Matthew, following his mother's bidding, had worn a straw hat. Like his father, his neck was tanned brown, along with his face, hands, and forearms to the line where he rolled up his sleeves. The prairie had marked Matthew as one of its own. He understood the connection between himself and the land, understood that he belonged there; when the wind blew, when the rain dotted his face, when the snow fell, he belonged. When the sun darkened his skin, he knew the invisible rays were also working on the field of wheat beside him.

He patted his shirt pocket and was rewarded with a muffled clinking. He had spent three weeks saving this cache of coins, payment for helping his older brother Robert with chores. Three weeks dreaming about town. About candy.

A daddy longlegs darted out of a crack in the road and Matthew squashed it underfoot, then examined the flattened body. It looked like a gray flower pressed and dried between pages in a book. Its insides were outside now. A friend had said that killing a spider meant seven days of rain, so Matthew squished any he could. Next, he crushed a few grasshoppers inching across the road, but he quickly grew bored.

Even though he was tired, he quickened his pace. He had a good head start on his parents, but if he dawdled he'd soon hear the clop clop of the horses and the rattling of chains on the wagon, followed by his father's voice, saying, "Hello there, partner. Going our way?"

He hoped to reach town before his parents. That would be an accomplishment. He would stand proudly on the corner of the street, waving as they arrived to pick up nails and tractor parts. He'd shout out, "See, Mom, I made it. My legs aren't too short." That'd show her. She had told him to ride in the wagon, but he'd convinced her that he could travel on his own, by running three times around the table as fast as he could. He'd only knocked over one chair. His father had laughed. His mother had relented.

A low, distant rumble made him think of thunder. But thunder needed clouds, didn't it? And the sky was clear as glass.

The sound came from behind him. He turned and saw a truck on the horizon, a black, sun-streaked square that wavered in the heat. It vanished into a gully, then appeared again seconds later. He walked into the shallow ditch, wading through the belly-high yellow grass, and watched the truck approach.

A grasshopper, holding tight to a strand of swaying grass, banged its head against Matthew's back, making a small tobacco spit stain. When the truck neared, the grasshopper leapt into the air, wings clicking.

Matthew didn't recognize the truck. Very few people around Horshoe drove their vehicles; most saved the gas for tractors. The truck looked old, an ancient vehicle from a far-off time, its big knobby tires spinning. The sun flashed across the windshield, making him squint.

He stared at the curved fenders, watched as the steel-spoked wheels turned more and more slowly. The truck stopped, rocked back and forth; the grumbling noise died, and the prairie was silent. No crickets singing. No grasshopper wings whirring. All was still. Matthew breathed in, waiting for a sound. For motion.

Then the door on the other side opened, hinges screeching. In the ditch, Matthew was low enough to see under the truck. A dark boot hit the ground, then another.

A man walked around the front of the vehicle and stopped near the edge of the road. He gazed across the prairie, like he was just catching a breath of fresh air. He was tall and lean, wearing a long, beige trench coat. His shoulders were a wide crescent. His face, even under the shade of his circular brimmed hat, was pale.

He must be hot, Matthew figured.

The man looked toward the ditch, almost as though his name had been whispered. His eyes were hidden behind round, dark-lensed glasses.

"Hello," the stranger said. His voice reminded Matthew of dry leaves rustling across autumn earth. "How are you today, young man?"

"Good," Matthew answered.

The man smiled. "What's your name?"

"Matthew." Matthew shifted his weight from one foot to the other. He clutched a handful of grass.

"Well, Matt, where are you traveling to?"

"Town."

"Why you going there?"

"To buy gum ... and ... and licorice."

The tall man nodded. "Now, that's a very noble pursuit." He ran a finger below his eye as if wiping away a tear. He was wearing black leather gloves. Matthew wondered if his hands were soft. He didn't know anyone who wore gloves during summer. The man smiled again. "Tell me, Matt, have you ever ridden in a truck?"

"Sure, lots of times," he said, nodding.

"Would you like to ride in my truck?"

Matthew let go of the grass. He looked to the east, down a long, straight road. "Mom and Dad are coming along soon," he explained.

The man was silent, as if what Matthew had said required deep thought. "Wouldn't you like to beat them to town? Wouldn't that be nice?"

Matthew narrowed his eyes.

"It would, wouldn't it?" The man's soft voice carried easily across the space between them; it seemed to Matthew that the stranger was whispering right into his ear. "I can see that gum too, Matt. It's on the second shelf in the pool hall candy counter. Red Hand Chewing Gum. It's pink, it's wrapped in waxed paper, and it's in the shape of a cigar. It's waiting for you. Would you like to see it?"

Matthew's tongue explored his moist cheeks. He shifted his weight from side to side.

The man opened the passenger door and gestured. "Your place is here." He paused. "The gum is waiting for you."

Matthew breathed in and walked slowly up the ditch. He stopped on the road, looked in the door.

"Go ahead."

Matthew peered at the dusty seat. He pictured the gum sitting on the shelf, saw himself pointing, saw Mr. Parsons reaching for it. He would get to town so much faster with a ride. He stepped onto the mud rail, then pulled himself into the truck.

The door closed softly.

The stranger was seated on the driver's side. How had he gotten there so quickly? The man sat still momentarily, humming softly and rubbing his chin as though pondering deeply. Then he slid the gearshift down. They rolled smoothly ahead. Matthew couldn't remember him starting the motor.

The man's skin, which showed between the glove and the sleeve of his coat, was the color of the moon. Muscles writhed beneath that ivory layer as the stranger turned the wooden steering wheel and they headed to the middle of the road. The truck accelerated gracefully; weeds became a yellow blur. The engine was a distant hum.

Matthew heard a muffled rattle. He peeked through the oval-shaped back window. A stack of red clay jars, about the same size as his mom's honey pots, were all tied together. They glowed. Or was it the way the sun caught their sides? A pink hair ribbon was trapped under one, flapping. Beside them were several bundles wrapped in burlap. Strips of shiny metal, about six inches wide and six feet long, sat piled on the far side.

"Do you like being young?" the man asked.

Matthew didn't understand the question. He examined the stranger's smiling face. After a moment's thought he answered, "Yes."

"I was never young," the man said. He tipped his hat back, showing glistening white hair. "Do you believe me? I was never young."

Everyone was young at one time—Matthew knew that. His father had once been a little boy and his mother a little girl, and even his grandma had been a kid long before her skin wrinkled and sagged and her teeth fell out. But he also knew that adults understood more about the world than he did, and he trusted in the wisdom of the giants who hovered above him.

"I think I believe you."

The pale man nodded. The windows were rolled up; the cab grew hot and the air smelled stale. Sweat lined Matthew's forehead.

They drove on, and over time he grew more comfortable with the stranger. They passed an abandoned farm, the house gray and paintless, windows black like empty eye sockets. The wind had ripped the shingles from the roof. The barn leaned to one side, threatening to collapse. Matthew knew the drought had killed this place. It was a monster made of dust—it had dried up the crops so the cows couldn't eat and driven away the folks who had once lived there. His mom worked hard to keep that same dust out of their house, stuffing rags in the bottom of the door and along the windowsills. Despite her efforts, the grit always found its way into the cupboards, the beds and their food.

The truck's motor lulled him and time shifted to a slower speed. He watched roads go by, more ghost farms, as though they were traveling in a loop. He pictured the gum again, tried to keep the image in his head.

Then towering grain elevators appeared on the horizon. The rail yard and a collection of houses became visible as the truck cleared an incline.

"What is this town called?" the man asked. Time snapped back to normal speed.

"Horshoe," Matthew answered, scratching at his arm. The man nodded.

They drove past the access road and the stranger studied the town as they went by. Matthew stared too, his heart speeding up. He peeked through the back window as the elevators were eclipsed by a hill.

"Why don't we stop?" Matthew asked.

The man smiled. "Because you're a child. And you know what it's like to be young." He paused. "I was never young. I was never, ever young."

To be continued

Sales pitch to follow...

The full book is available on Amazon.com and Amazon.uk

And, of course, the "paper" book is available at a store near you.

...here endeth sales pitch. Happy Sunday to you.

Art

canuck launch

Sales Rankings

Okay, I admit it. I have Amazon sales ranking fever. Every once in a while (or every two seconds) I check to see what ranking my various books have on Amazon. It's a horrible, time-consuming illness. But I need to know exactly where my career is at! Of course, just checking Amazon isn't enough. I actually use three different websites to keep track of the rankings.

The first is Aaron Shepard's Sales Rank Express. Doesn't Aaron look friendly? This allows the user to look at the rankings in "top selling" order and get a quick look at other countries. C'mon Japan, just buy one book. One book, that's all I'm asking.

The second website I use is TitleZ. Here you can sign up your books and see the "historical" sales of your various novels and even compare up to five of them at once. It's a good way to look back at your career and see where the high point was and then watch your slide into oblivion (also known as 5 millionth bestseller on Amazon).

By far my favourite is NovelRank. At this site you have to register your books and it will keep track of them from that day forward. At first I didn't see how effective the site was until my books were tracked for a couple of months. Now I can look at their total sales (and it does actually break down how many copies you sell, using a complicated x-y-market=geewhiz formula). You are able to choose in which order you want the books ranked (Sales/RecentSales/Monthly sales) and you can see how your books are doing head to head. 

As you can see by the graphic above Jolted is outselling The Dark Deeps by 26-24! What an exciting battle. It's like a football game without the action. Who will win at the end of the month? Which book will sell better over time? Which will make me the most money (right now I'm cheering for Dark Deeps since it's in hardcover).  As you can see the NovelRank keeps tabs on the last time one of your books sold. 20 Hours! That's a lifetime (for a gnat, anyway). Good golly, my career is already on the way down.

Anyway, kidding aside I appreciate the way NovelRank works and how it allows me to change the format.

Hmmm....maybe I should just be seeing a therapist instead...

Art

SiWC and TD CCBC Book Award Bash in Coquitlam

This past weekend I was at the Surrey International Writer's Conference in Surrey, BC. It was an energizing, tiring, overwhelming, frenzied and wonderful conference. 500 attendees. Agents. Editors. Writers Galore and more classes than you can shake a stick at. I did a presentation on "Making Money with your Writing" and "Fantastically Speaking: weaving fantasy with reality (in novels)." Oh and two Blue Pencil sessions and a Keynote speech. Very busy and rewarding time. And this is the only pic I took.

Boring, eh?

Then on Monday I was off to Scott Creek Middle School. They had won an "appearance" by me through CBC and provided by TD Bank in honour of the TD CCBC Children's Lit Book Award that The Hunchback Assignments is nominated for. It was a wonderful time. And hour in a gym with 600 or so excited students while being interviewed by CBC and the students. Many of them were JOLTED fans:

 One of the teachers in JOLTED outfit--he had a cool first name: Arthur!

One of the many Posters

And librarian extra-ordinaire Tu Loan Trieu!

It truly was one of the highlights of my career. At one point about 100 of the students came in wearing tinfoil hats...just like Newton in JOLTED.

Stay tuned for the show on CBC Radio in Vancouver on Nov. 7th.

Cheers,

Art

Copy Edited MSS

This is what I'm doing today (and for the next week at least)--going through the Word version of the copy edited manuscript for Empire of Ruins, the third Hunchback Assignments book. Isn't it colourful? Sometimes confusing. And yet I feel a bit like a kid with a new set of crayons.

Well back to scribbling electronically...

Art

JLG and Shout Line

First off, I'm pleased to report that The Dark Deeps is a Junior Library Guild selection in the US. It is so cool to have a book that features The Clockwork Guild be recognized by The Junior Library Guild. Long live the guilds! On top of that I get a neat JLG badge and award certificate. It's like I've joined a superhero club! A nice mixture of books there. I'm especially looking forward to reading fellow Canuck writer Erin Bow's Plain Kate.


Also received a jpg of the Australian cover for Empire of Ruins, the third Hunchback Assignments book. I love this cover (the Canadian version will have the same cover) and I like the font choice, too. As you can see it says "shoutline here" on the bottom. A shoutline has appeared on the other two Hunchback Assignments books, the first being "Unmask the Truth" and the Dark Deeps shoutline was "Unravel the Lies." I've asked for "Uncoop the Chickens" but no one seems to like it. I'm sure we'll find something...

Art

The Dark Deep Blogs Tour is Over!

Whew, what a tiring tour. I mean I was everywhere, man. And I didn't even leave my home (except to get milk). Here's the recap.

First I started off at Home Base...err, my blog.

Then I was off to Cynsations discussing how to write steampunk in two easy steps.

I then zipped over to Free The Princess and answer a few Q&A's.

Last Monday I was at Steamed. Where I discussed the creation of the book trailers for The Hunchback Assignments.

I then airshipped over to Steampunk Tribune to discuss villains! Villains! Villains.

This was followed by a musical interlude at Suvudu to let you all know the playlist behind The Hunchback Assignments.

Then I waxed all philosphical at Steampunk Scholar.

And the tour ended with a bang at Looking Glass Review .

Now, I'll sleep.

Art

Dark Deeps Blog Tour--Day 4

The Dark Deeps blog tour is at Steamed! Today's topic: groovy, cool book trailers.

Art

Dark Deeps Blog Tour--Day 3

The Dark Deeps blog tour is at Free The Princess today!

Art

Dark Deeps Blog Tour Day 2

The Dark Deeps blog tour is at Cynsations today! Join me and learn how to write steampunk and make millions.

Art