Lunch Bucket Paradise by Fred Setterberg

If, like me, you're a Baby Boomer, the suburbs probably played a role in your early life, either as the culmination of your parents' postwar material dreams, or as a green-lawned magical oasis that you could only visit. Cheap suburban real estate was a boon to the working class of the 50's and early 60's, though, as with any new enthusiasm, personal problems did not disappear, and an increasingly unstable economy gave the lie to the concept of easy modern living.

But many books have been written about life in the suburbs (Michael Cunningham's Flesh and Blood comes to mind), and many go unread. Fred Setterberg's sparkling prose and ear for dialog power this autobiographical novel like a vintage T-bird. Setterberg's book has brief, serious (they must be serious; they're in sans-serif) intros to the chapters, which then unleash crackling dialog between the protagonist's autodidact father and his war-hero brother, Win, as well as between the aforementioned older man and the protagonist, called “Little Slick.” The Dad is quite a character: “Too often on Sunday mornings, my mother and I would return home from Mass to find Dad cooking breakfast for the Jehovah's Witnesses, fattening them up for debate.” The Dad and uncle have no illusions and take no prisoners. The Mom is also quite independent, working for political candidates of her own choosing and putting campaign signs up on the lawn over her husband's objections. These are people who know they work for the man and are determined to express their disdain and their heretical ideas when out of the workplace. Of course, some express better than others; another father, a pompous Scoutmaster, gets his comeuppance, but his son pays the price.

The younger generation, playing rock 'n roll and Motown while residing in all-white neighborhoods, of course grow up confused, admiring their parents' resourcefulness but desiring more individuality, living under the shadow of the Vietnam war (which, if you were a teen and time passed slowly, seemed infinitely longer than our longest conflict in Afghanistan seems now), arguing its appropriateness, thinking about going on to college, wondering about their place in what is slowly becoming a service economy. There are dates with girls, hiding extra people in the trunk at drive-in movies, moments of homoeroticism. At the end, our protagonist quits the job his uncle obtained for him (in a ketchup factory) and sets out on a quest for something more. Of course, like the rest of us Boomers, there will be revelations and disappointments, and white-collar work will turn out to be the same as blue-collar toiling for management. The flower beds and barbecue grills will cease to be bourgeois trappings and become for a new generation small avenues for self-expression as the country lurches from one conflict to the next and the economy swings wildly up and down. Though settling down into middle age, the children of the working-class suburbs remember their quarrelsome roots.

For more information, check out the author's website.

Waking the Dreamer by Andy Kaiser

Tyler and Zack are thirteen- and fifteen-year-old brothers. Tyler sees himself as an out-of-shape video gamer, while looking up to Zack as a natural athlete and ladies' man. There are moments of tension between them, but their brotherly solidarity, and Tyler's own inner strengths, are affirmed when they go to a rustic lakeside resort with their parents for vacation and Tyler is attracted to a mysterious girl named Eena. The brothers are quickly swept up in a plot involving programmed human subjects, transferable supernatural powers, and a mysterious metal box. Their aloof survivalist father and hysterical ADD-afflicted mother are well fleshed-out, though they mostly stay out of the way of the two boys. Kaiser is good at character development and dialog; we see Tyler tap both his native and his newly conferred powers without jealousy on the part of Zack, who is less concerned with being #1 than Tyler realizes.

Much of the action takes place in darkness, adding to the spookiness of the narrative (though I kept having trouble figuring out the levels of darkness when sometimes two characters made “eye contact” but other times couldn't see in front of their faces). This is book one in a series, so there are plenty of loose ends dangling at the end of the story, but enough of them are tied up so as not to leave the reader feeling manipulated.

This book is for Young Adults. Perhaps they will not mind the editing problems that cropped up from time to time: “seaweed” and “waves” being used to describe things in a lake, the use of “lead” instead of “led.” Fairly minor stuff, all in all.

The book is currently available on the Kindle. See the author's website for further details.

Ebook Pricing Wars: Episode 1,209,843

Zoe Winters wrote a thoughtful and reasoned post on ebook pricing the other day that's worth the read for all you indie publishers struggling with the pricing question. An excerpt:

I am bolding this next part because if you don’t hear any of the rest of this, please hear this:

99 cent and free ebooks are not glutting the ebook market. They are glutting the BARGAIN ebook market.

If you are selling to that market or you are a reader in that market, it’s very easy to imagine it’s the only market and OMG we all have to price at 99 cents because other people are MAKING US with their low-priced ebooks.

Not so.

My own experience corroborates Zoe here. I almost fell into this trap last year when I considered tinkering with the price of my fantasy novel, THE LAST KEY.

Should I go high or should I go low?

If I go high, I thought, why would anyone pay $4.99 for my book with all the 99-cent/free books out there?

But then I wondered, If I go low, how would anyone notice my book with all the 99-cent/free books out there?

I decided to go high and priced THE LAST KEY at $4.99 (a common price-point for novels with 75,000+ words). Since I did that in December, my sales rates have...stayed the same.

And that's good. It means I'm getting the same number of sales and making more money than when the book was priced lower. I may not be tapping into the BARGAIN market, but I am getting noticed by a different market. I like to think it's the LOVERS OF HIGH QUALITY FANTASY market...

Originally posted at Quarkfolio by Rob Steiner.

Superliminal by Andy Kaiser

Superliminal is the first book in a (hopefully successful) series of stories about Dev Manny, an Information Technology Private Investigator (ITPI).

Manny is called in by local law enforcement to help uncover an explanation for the trashing of some computer equipment. A VHS tape is discovered in a PO Box and reveals a psychotic manifesto from the missing owner of the computer gear. He rants about a virus whose release could lead to horrific consequence for humanity. The police need Manny to get to the bottom of this. Is the guy a crank or a terrorist?

Don't let the IT part throw you. While Kaiser is clearly credentialed to set a detective loose in the world of IT, he doesn't beat his reader over the head with it. If you don't know http from ftp or a router from a server, it won't impede your ability to enjoy the story. For IT geeks though, Kaiser offers them an access port into mystery fiction (much like Rob Steiner did with Aspect of Pale Night).

I wasn't sure what approach Kaiser was going to take here: satire or thriller. It turns out he does a bit of both. When the threat turns real, Kaiser dials up the tension. Despite going for a bit of Sam Spade, Manny's self-deprecating and wry sense of humor defuses the situation and his ego before either get too serious.

Kaiser really shines when Manny is "under duress" (I don't want to spoil the story). Manny is forced to complete a vital part of his investigation while suffering through the equivalent of a bad acid trip. The details of Manny's experience are exceptionally well written and the poor guy lapses into a depression brought on by an existential crisis. It's as if he's living through a Descartes' philosophical proof. It was the highlight of the novel for me. After dropping a couple Lovecraft and Dalí references along the way, I was sold.

As for the technicals, the book is tightly edited. The pacing is fast and Kaiser's writing is tight and efficient. Only a couple of typos and one formatting error got through. By the time you pick up the book, these may already be removed.

Andy Kaiser's Superliminal is a wonderful ITPI mystery. It is a fast-paced story driven by a protagonist whose IT knowledge is matched only by his wry sense of humor. The IT spin on detective fiction is akin to what Stross' Laundry series does for spy thrillers, though without the Lovecraftian horrors. Highly recommended.

Superliminal is available from Amazon through the book's website.

The Best of 2011

Like last year, each reviewer here at the New Podler Review of Books picks the book (or books) which he/she feels are the very best independently published (or small press) work. Before, when it was just Podler, it was very easy to come up with one book to receive the Independent Novel Award. One reader, one judge. Getting four people with very different tastes, not to mention genre interests, to agree on one book out of thirty-three as being the very best would be impossible.

First up is S.B. Jung.

My pick for 2011 is Flaming Dove by Daniel Arenson. This book is a great read that I highly recommend to anyone who loves a different kind of fantasy fiction.


Libby Cone had two picks.

I nominate Helen Smith's Being Light - a tale well-told, with interesting characters of real depth.

and

Gunshot Stigmata by Scott C. Rogers: It takes a great deal of talent to employ a highly unreliable narrator, explore his delusions, and keep the narrative from flying apart altogether. A very sensitive treatment of the world of a very damaged soul.


Rob Steiner picked Oathbreaker Book 1: The Knight's Tale by Colin McComb.

Vivid language, unique characters, and a compelling story combined to put it far above the other books I reviewed last year. It's the first of a planned series, so I hope to read more of McComb's work in 2012.

For me, the 2011 winner, hands down, was Mirror Shards. This anthology, about the impact of augmented reality upon society, featured a diverse array of authors. Indie author, Thomas Carpenter, assembled the stories from both traditionally published and indie writers and published it under his Black Moon Books imprint. The end result was a highly entertaining and thought provoking read.

...

We reviewed 33 books last year. Over 150 submissions were rejected due to various reasons. Time is a big factor. We rejected some well-written stories because we didn't have the time to stick with a book that didn't grab us right away. When we were open to submissions, we received 20-30 submissions each month. It's just too much for us to handle. We need more reviewers to handle the flood. Until then, we'll finish up the remaining submissions from 2011 before we open the submissions window for a new batch.

Thanks for reading!

\_/
DED

Lacuna: Demons of the Void by David Adams

Lacuna: Demons of the Void by David Adams starts with a bang. Literally.

One day in the year 2029, three Earth cities -- Beijing, Tehran, and Sydney -- are destroyed in a sudden and vicious alien attack. Accompanying the attack is a brief transmission from the aliens: “Never again attempt to develop this kind of technology.”

Fast-forward eight years. Earth has ignored the alien threat and used its naughty technologies to build three massive starships, each armed to the teeth with nukes, rail guns, and blast cannons for close fighting. Each ship has anti-gravity technology that enables normal Earth gravity on board. And each has the ability to “jump” to any position in the universe. It's that jump technology that has the aliens so annoyed.

Chinese Navy Commander Melissa Liao captain's one of the starships, the Beijing. Her mission -- hit back at the aliens and make them sorry they kicked the human hornet's nest.

Adams has written an action-packed story that doesn't get bogged down in detailed descriptions of the science behind his contraptions. To many SF readers, that's a bug and not a feature. But I'm among the SF fans who feel story trumps gadgets, and Lacuna does that with just enough plausible science when it's appropriate to the story.

The tale is told exclusively from Melissa Liao's point of view, and her actions are consistent with her motivations throughout the novel. Among the other primary characters are James Gregoire, the Belgian captain of the Beijing's sister ship, Tehran, and Liao's love interest; Summer Rowe, an Aussie scientist with a nerdy (and typically foul-mouthed) rejoinder to any attempt to order her around; and Saara, a captured alien that adds insight into the Toralii, the aliens who attacked Earth.

While Lacuna is a solid first effort by Adams, it could have been better in a couple of ways.

First, it could've used another round of copy editing. The version I read had numerous places where words and periods were repeated and/or missing, a few instances of awkward phrasing, and inconsistent italicizing of the ship names.

Second, I was looking for a brief explanation on how the world could build three, 500-meter-long, interstellar warships in the year 2037 with an America in economic collapse. Now I can buy that, but I would've liked a quick paragraph on how the EU, China, and Australia survived the elimination of a quarter of the world's GDP, yet still had the resources to build these warships from scratch. It's not a huge deal in relation to the story, but it's something I wondered throughout the book.

Lacuna: Demons of the Void is a fast-paced, entertaining read that kept me hooked all the way to the end. Highly recommended for fans of straight-forward alien invasion stories.

Lacuna: Demons of the Void is available on Amazon Kindle.

Derby Scribes 2011 Anthology

Anthologies typically have some theme or common element to them. It could be something specific like the impact of augmented reality upon society or Lovecraft mythos stories in a futuristic setting. It can also be something very general like "space opera" or "horror stories with an erotic element." You get the idea.

But in the case of the Derby Scribes 2011 Anthology the common element is that all of the writers are members, or guests, of the Derby Scribes writing group, a mix of veterans and the newly published, in Derby, England. As such, the stories are a mixed bag of genres and quality. Reading this anthology was a bit like going to a restaurant and asking for a sample of everything on the menu.

The anthology opens with an excellent piece, "In the Spirit of Darwin" by Simon Clark. In the story, Lloyd Jefferson encounters the eminent biologist while sitting in a park on a sunny day. But the dark secret Darwin reveals, and his subsequent offer, belie the pleasantness of the afternoon.

"Brylcreem and Pipe Tobacco" by Stuart Hughes follows it up rather well. In it, A widow seeks the blessing of her dead husband in her decision to re-marry. The outcome was a pleasant surprise.

"Stump" is a very short piece about a little girl whose pets tend to meet unfortunate ends. I was expecting a dark finish to this story, but the author kept it light all the way through. I admit I was let down by the course the author chose. After the first two stories, this was a sudden turn.

"Leaving Jessica" by Jennifer Brown was a really good thriller that left me wanting more. It seemed criminal that this was just a short story and not the first chapter in a novel.

"Last Respects" by Richard Barber is a somber, World War One piece. It has a Twilight Zone feel to it, which is good but a little predictable.

I didn't like "The Wake Up Call". It got off to a good start: Some bloke is pouring gasoline on his car and setting it ablaze, which instantly gets the reader to wondering, "Why is he doing this?" As the protagonist moves on from here, we get conflicting reports from reality as to what's truly happening. In the end, the author gave us a variance of the "it was all just a dream" story (I won't spoil the variation for would be readers).

These sorts of stories are tired and have been done to death. Several pro zines have gone so far as to state in their submission guidelines that they don't want "just a dream" stories because they've been so overplayed. Even Stephen King failed with his variance on it with Dreamcatcher and ruined an otherwise good story.

"The Gallery" by Conrad Williams is the longest piece in the anthology and just as excellent as the opening story. Williams drags us into a post-apocalyptic Orwellian future where the reading of unsanctioned books ("litcrime") is punishable by death. While the topic has been visited before, Williams puts his indelible stamp on it. Told in the first person, we get a visceral look at a ruined world, pockmarked with additions to the English language that come from the culture that precipitates out of rubble, brutality and cybernetics.

"Dave's Dinosaur" is a very short piece involving a couple out camping who are waylaid by a dinosaur. It plays on the absurd and attempts to resolve the situation with humor.

"An Interstellar Taxi Ride" tells us about a snooty interstellar diplomat who is forced to ride in a space taxi for various reasons. The author plays on the culture clash for humor.

"Obsolete" gets off to a good start. We're introduced to an old man who lives alone in a big house with a sprawling garden in the back. We learn that he's a prisoner here but we don't know if it's a figment of his imagination or true. Ultimately, when the "reveal" comes, it's handled rather awkwardly. The story ends not in resolution so much as the author just stopped writing.

The anthology ends with "The Smell of Fear". In this one, a bully terrorizes a neighborhood and everyone wants to get back at him. The author tries so hard not to reveal the nature of the characters of the story until the end that, except for the bully, we're left with faceless nobodies. It's a ham-fisted mess.

The Derby Scribes 2011 Anthology is a mix of stories comprising several genres and authors of varying skill level. While there are a few gems therein, the reader will have to sift through the slurry to get to them.

The book is available through in several formats. Check out the Derby Scribes website or from their publisher, Stumar Press, for your preferred platform.

He Who Shall Remain Shameless by David Michael Ewald

In He Who Shall Remain Shameless, the protagonist roams the world with his electronic companion on a mission to rescue ghosts from obscurity (personified by the Meritocrat). Most of these are no ordinary ghosts, but rather those who enjoyed some celebrity or notoriety in life and have become largely forgotten in death. Our protagonist, who shares the same name as the author of this book but definitely isn't him (and that's explained in the book), believes that the internet can keep the memory of people alive forever. All he needs to do is convince them to embrace it.

Sometimes he succeeds. Sometimes he doesn't.

That kind of describes Ewald's story too. Each chapter is about a ghost the protagonist encounters and some were better than others. In some chapters, Ewald successfully builds suspense; particularly with those who died a violent death. These are his better chapters. Other chapters fall short when Ewald abandons suspense in favor of a satirical approach, as when the protagonist encounters King Aegeus of Greek legend. It's as if Ewald isn't certain what type of novel he's trying to write.

Ewald deserves credit for his research. As each ghost was introduced, I couldn't help but see what I could learn of them from a couple of quick searches (I discovered Mr. Ewald's fingerprints on multiple occasions). While I knew of a couple of these figures, most of them were unknown to me. Ewald deftly collects fragments and scraps of these lost souls and builds believable characters out of them. Again, those in the suspenseful chapters proved to be the most memorable.

The strength of the protagonist varies too. His cause is noble, but his various methods waver on their propriety. At times, he seems genuinely concerned about the dead and consoles them as they wrestle with their fate. Other times, he resorts to trickery or mockery to boost his chances of success (the end justifies the means). The latter behavior casts a shadow over the former. Perhaps if there had been more transition, the shifts in the protagonist's behavior would've been easier to understand.

Despite these quibbles, I found He Who Shall Remain Shameless to be an entertaining read. Ewald is at his best when he plays the suspense card. His historical ghosts are well researched and have believable personalities. But the story's strongest element is its exploration of death and obscurity. As we ponder his assertion that the Internet can (and should) be used to remember everyone, celebrity and average person alike, he reminds us that we're mortal. And death is a lesson we should all remember as we conduct our lives.

He Who Shall Remain Shameless is available in many formats that can be found on the author's website.

Oathbreaker, Book 1: The Knight's Tale by Colin McComb

Oathbreaker, Book 1: The Knight's Tale by Colin McComb, is a riveting debut fantasy from an author who knows what fantasy fans love (he wrote adventures for TSR, after all) – visceral prose; logically sound and creative world-building; and fascinating characters that do not follow genre conventions.

Sir Pelagir, a Knight Elite in the Empire of Terona, faces a terrible choice – serve the Empire or serve the King. There is no middle ground. Either choice means he will break an oath and be hunted for the rest of his life. But a choice he makes, and it is one that makes him a marked man and sets the Empire on a destructive path from which it may never recover.

Right from the beginning, we know we're reading an author who knows what the heck he's doing. From the Prologue:

He rode, his proud face bleeding and grim in the light of the setting sun. He cradled a sleeping baby in the crook of his left arm, the reins of the metal horse in his right fist. With a few swift kicks, he urged the steed ever faster westward. His eyes squinted into the setting sun, and beads of perspiration—or were they tears?—coursed down his unlined cheeks. The gleaming hooves of the steed tore great clumps of sod from the grassy hills as it sped through the spring dusk.

Miles behind him, the city burned on its mountain. Steel-clad knights thundered from the great city’s gates into the dying day on their own metal stallions or took to the air with mechanical wings. The military dirigibles Retaliator and Heaven’s Will rose slowly from the heart of the city, flames spitting from their engines, and turned their massive noses to the west.

The knights sought the oathbreaker, the thief of their princess, the betrayer of their king. They swore bloody vengeance on Pelagir of the King’s Chosen, son of Pelgram, and raced to be the first to have his head. He had betrayed the most sacred of their oaths, and their rage burned as brightly as the flames in the capital city.

I dare any fantasy fan to stop reading at this point. I mean, the whole book is like this. And don't worry, McComb's prose serves the story, and not the other way around like so many first-time authors. Not a word is wasted.

The dialogue is unique to each character – you'd know who was speaking even without attribution. Some of the characters even tell their own tales in first person narration, giving the reader better insight into their goals and desires.

The settings are not overly described, but given one or two descriptive elements that lock them firmly into your mind, enabling your imagination to fill in the rest. While Oathbreaker was a short book – around 40,000 words – I did not feel like it was a “thin” book. McComb gave me a thorough introduction to his Empire of Terona, yet left enough mystery for me to look forward to the next book.

The only nitpick I had was that the ending felt more like the end of the first act rather than the climax of a complete story. I know, this is only Book 1 and, yes, that Tolkien fellow did the same thing, but it's never been one of my favorite novel structures. Plus, I had to find some nit to pick in this otherwise spectacular fantasy novel. My credibility as a reviewer demanded it. :-)

Highly recommended.

Originally posted at Quarkfolio by Rob Steiner.

Thinking of KDP Select? Read the fine print...

Amazon just gave a big fat middle-finger to all the other ebook stores out there with the announcement of their KDP Select program. It sounds great:

KDP Select gives you access to a whole new source of royalties and readers - you not only benefit from a new way of making money, but you also get the chance to reach even more readers by getting your book in front of a growing number of US Amazon Prime customers: readers and future fans of your books that you may have not had a chance to reach before! Additionally, the ability to offer your book for free will help expand your worldwide reader base.

But as with all things that "sound great," you need to read the fine print:

1 Exclusivity. When you include a Digital Book in KDP Select, you give us the exclusive right to sell and distribute your Digital Book in digital format while your book is in KDP Select. During this period of exclusivity, you cannot sell or distribute, or give anyone else the right to sell or distribute, your Digital Book (or content that is reasonably likely to compete commercially with your Digital Book, diminish its value, or be confused with it), in digital format in any territory where you have rights.

In other words, if you also published your ebook on Smashwords, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, etc., you'll have to remove it from those sites while you're in the KDP Select program.

Now this is a brand new program, so I don't pretend to know if placing my ebooks in it is worth the lost sales from the other online bookstores I use. I'll wait for all the first-adopters to be my guinea pigs.

But the program's costs/benefits aren't the most interesting thing about it to me.

What's interesting is that KDP Select's "Exclusivity" clause means Amazon has just declared war on every other ebook store. Now authors will have to think about whether their ebooks will get more exposure/sales from KDP Select's -- admittedly -- large marketing mega-phone, or if they'll do better on the virtual shelves of multiple ebook stores. Many authors will choose KDP Select and give up placing their ebooks elsewhere.

The other ebook stores must respond to this. They have no choice. Whatever they do, though, it'll only benefit authors. They're fighting over us and want to lure us into their stores with the better deal. Without authors, they have no product to sell.

Feels nice to be fought over.

Originally posted at Quarkfolio by Rob Steiner.