Author News - July

July 14th - Mike Reeves-McMillan released The Well-Presented Manuscript, a guide for authors looking to improve their chances of getting published by avoiding the most common issues.

July 20th - Horror maven Michaelbrent Collings released The Deep.

July 24th - Cold Fusion Media, the folks who published the Shared Nightmares anthology, offers Christmas in July. Sort of. The Last Christmas Gift: A Heartwarming Holiday Tale of the Living Dead written by Nathan Shumate is released today. Special book launch party on Facebook!

August 3rd - John Vorhaus will release How to Live Life, his philosophy on—you guessed it—how to live life.

Author News - June

Anne Charnock announced the title of her next book and how it came about.

Mike Reeves-McMillan announced that a story of his has been selected for the Terry Pratchett In Memory anthology. Proceeds go to benefit research into finding a cure for Alzheimer's.

Rob Steiner has been busy lately. Two of his stories have recently appeared in Orson Scott Card's Intergalactic Medicine Show: "The Oath Breaker's Daemon" and "The Cloaca Maxima". He also published the third story in his Codex Antonius series, Muses of the Republic.

Michael J. Sullivan started a Kickstarter campaign to fund a third Riyria Chronicles novel entitled The Death of Dulgath. The campaign was successfully funded in just under 48 hours. I find it interesting that after signing a major book deal, he still feels the need to self-publish.

Author News - May

April 15th: John Vorhaus co-wrote a documentary with Kevin Pollak entitled Misery Loves Comedy. It was featured at the Tribeca Film Festival. Starting this month, the film will be available nationwide.

April 20th: M. Terry Green revealed the cover to Trapped, the second book in the Chronicles of White World series.

April 23rd: Scott Semegran, author of the Simon Birchwood series, released Good Night, Jerk Face, a novelette.

April 29th: Michaelbrent Collings released his latest novel, The Ridealong.

May 14th: Jeremy Robert Johnson will be at Powell's Hawthorne on Thursday, May 14th at 7:30pm to promote his latest novel, Skullcrack City, which was published on February 1st.

May 19th: Steve Anderson took a break from historical fiction to write the contemporary novel, The Other Oregon: A Thriller. The book drops on this day.

Author News - April

March 28th: Scott Semegran, author of the Simon Birchwood series, released "The Great and Powerful, Brave Raideen", a short story.

April 10th: Helen Smith's novel, Beyond Belief, has been nominated for three awards at this year's CrimeFest.

May 14th: Jeremy Robert Johnson will be at Powell's Hawthorne branch on Thursday, May 14th at 7:30pm to promote his latest novel, Skullcrack City, which was published on February 1st.

May 19th: Steve Anderson took a break from historical fiction to write the contemporary novel, The Other Oregon: A Thriller. The book drops on this day.

Author News: March

February 11th: Michael Sullivan, author of The Crown Conspiracy, announced on his blog that he signed a four-book deal with Del Rey. Congratulations, Michael!

March 11th: Kris Kramer, author of Sanctuary, has partnered with Alistair McIntyre and Patrick Underhill to pen the Rise of Cithria series. More info can be found at their website.

May 14th: Jeremy Robert Johnson will be at Powell's Hawthorne on Thursday, May 14th at 7:30pm to promote his latest novel, Skullcrack City, which was published on February 1st.

Author News: February

We're a little light in this first edition of Author News, but I wanted to make good on that promise.

February 1st: Richard Levesque, author of Strictly Analog, released his latest novel, Foundlings.

Jeremy Robert Johnson, author of We Live Inside You, released Skullcrack City.

February 10th: Iced, the first novel in a new series from 2012 INA Winner, M. Terry Green, will be released.

February 15th: Steve Anderson, a 2010 INA Winner for The Losing Role, will be at the Barnes & Noble Tanasbourne in Beaverton, Oregon at 2PM. Anderson is in the midst of promoting his latest work: Liberated and Under False Flags.

That's all for now.

New Feature: Author News

I may be opening up a can of worms here, but I want to try something new.

If you're an author whose work has been reviewed by us, we'd like to do a little more for you. Typically, our relationship with authors ends after we review their work. Some authors like our reviews and stay in touch with us, even if there is little reason beyond hoping we'll review their next book.

We want to do something more. Promoting indie authors is tough. Very few get the recognition they deserve. Some get more than they deserve, but that's another topic entirely. So let's work on that author promotion stuff. If you have something newsworthy to share, let us know. What do I mean by newsworthy? Yeah, I'd better clarify that. What might seem important to you might not be important to us. So I'm going to list what we do consider newsworthy.

Here's what you can share with us:

• Awards and nominations for awards. Real ones. Not those awards that you can buy: "Send us $20 to be entered in our contest! Surprise! You won!" While it doesn't have to be a prestigious as a Philip K Dick Award, it should be legit. Yes, we consider unsolicited "book of the month" (or year) nods from bloggers acceptable. Include a link with this news.
  
  
• Author Appearances. These should be of the in-person variety. Blog tours don't count. If you're going to be somewhere (book signing, book fair, etc.) with the intention of having your book signed or you're guest lecturing or answering questions, let us know. Be sure to include the where and when. No, hanging out at Starbucks doesn't count. It has to be official. We'll need a link or a picture of a flyer. For example, "Abigail Author will be at the Arkham Library signing copies of her latest release: Sleeping With Pomegranates."
  
  
• New Releases. Publishing something new? Let us know. This is separate from the submission process. We might be closed. You might not want us to review another book of yours. We might not be interested, or the reviewer who read your book might not be available. We can pass the information along to interested readers even if we can't take you up on the opportunity to review your next book. Send us a short blurb along with the release date and where readers can go for more information.

We DON'T want routine stuff like sales, new versions of old books, free giveaways, personal news, sales milestones, a list of your blog posts, links to other reviews, website updates, marketing hype, and so on. This is targeted towards promoting authors, not publishers. We don't want publishers telling us about all the books they're promoting each month. The only exceptions are for those authors whose work we've actually reviewed. If XYZ publishing sent us a book from Abigail Author, we'll accept news from them on her behalf. That goes for PR firms too.

We reserve the right to reject anything that we deem sketchy or doesn't fit in with our idea of the above definitions.

The plan is to promote author news once a month. But we'll change the frequency as we see fit. Plan your announcements accordingly. If you have something coming up on February 1st and you send it to us January 31st, you'll have to wait until we get around to it. Put Author News in the subject line so that we can filter it accordingly.

If this unleashes a tsunami of email, we'll shut it down. There's only so much we can do.

\_/
DED

Adam Copeland's Kickstarter

Adam Copeland, fantasy author and friend of the blog, has launched a funding campaign for Ripples in the Chalice, the sequel to his debut opus, Echoes of Avalon, on Kickstarter.

If you read Echoes of Avalon or are a fan of historical fantasy a la Marion Zimmer-Bradley, you owe it to yourself to check it out.

Mainstream Praise for an Indie Author

The 2013 Philip K. Dick Award nominees were announced on Friday. Have a look at the first book on the list. Go ahead, I'll wait.

Nah, I can't wait.

Readers of this blog will recall that A Calculated Life by Anne Charnock was reviewed here last year. Several weeks later, it was picked up by 47North, Amazon's publishing imprint. And now, it's been nominated for the prestigious Philip K. Dick Award. Congratulations, Anne!

Anne's success is yet more proof that indie authors should not be shunned merely because they lack the backing of a traditional publisher. I don't deny that indie publishing is a veritable haystack full of poorly edited manuscripts and lousy covers, but there are needles, make that diamonds, that can be found.

\_/
DED

Nutmeg Book Festival

This Saturday, November 23rd, is the first Nutmeg Book Festival in New Milford, CT. The NPRoB's own David Drazul will be one of twenty indie and small press authors gathered together to meet the public and hopefully interest some of them in their work.

Please visit the website for more information including location, author roster, and genres covered.

While there are gatherings of this nature all over the world, if you're an indie author or small press whose work has been featured here on the blog and you're participating in a similar event, let us know and we'll throw a shout out here on the blog and Google+.

Erasing the Stigma of Self-Publishing

If you read this blog, you know all about the stigma of self-publishing. I won't waste your time rehashing the debate. We know that there are gems in the indie publishing world and we like to dig them up. Every so often, one of the traditional publishing companies realizes that they're out there too and snatches them up.

Really. It happens.

For instance, Kristen Tsetsi had two books picked up by an undisclosed publisher. Kristen's novel, Homefront was one of those two books and it was reviewed here by Podler three years ago.

Good things come to those who persevere. Congratulations, Kristen!

Self-publishing news: PEN/Faulkner winner to release his short stories via Lulu

From Entertainment Weekly comes this report:

But now a two-time PEN/Faulkner winner and National Book Award finalist is stepping into the mix. John Edgar Wideman will be releasing his latest collection of short stories via Lulu, a self-publishing company that releases submitted work either as an e-book or printed-on-demand. Briefs: Stories for the Palm of the Mind, available starting March 14, will be one of few works from an already established author to bypass the mainstream industry entirely. Another is JA Konrath, who, after having a collection of his stories rejected by publishing houses, turned to the Internet and self-published his own  Kindle ebook. Less than one year later, Konrath has sold nearly 30,000 copies and he expects to earn as much as $43,800 this year on that e-book alone.

When it comes, the shift to self-publishing will liberate authors.

News: Inside the Writer’s Studio

Kristen Tsetsi and R.J. Keller have joined forces and created Inside the Writer’s Studio. They have a Facebook page.

Authors Kristen Tsetsi and R.J. Keller like to make videos when they should be writing. Their show is called "Inside The Writers' Studio."

They are Paper Rats: http://www.twitter.com/paperrats

Newsbreak: Deadly Exchange recognized by L.A. Book Festival

Geoffrey Gluckman’s novel Deadly Exchange won an honorable mention at the L.A. Book Festival.

HATER by David Moody

David Moody's zombie novel Autumn was reviewed in this blog some time ago. It was a compelling story and a well written novel and I thought that Mood had talent. I wasn't too far off the mark. Like a number of self-publishing graduates, Moody has been picked up by a major publisher and seems on his way to mainstream recognition.  On the 17th of this month David's new novel HATER is coming out from Macmillan/Thomas Dunne. Not only that,  but it's also been optioned for a movie.

THURSDAY

i

Simmons, regional manager for a chain of main street discount stores, slipped his change into his pocket then neatly folded his newspaper in half and tucked it under his arm. He quickly glanced at his watch before leaving the shop and rejoining the faceless mass of shoppers and office workers crowding the city center sidewalks outside. He checked through his date book in his head as he walked. Weekly sales meeting at ten, business review with Jack Staynes at eleven, lunch with a supplier at one-thirty...

He stopped walking when he saw her. At first she was just another face on the street, nondescript and unimposing and as irrelevant to him as the rest of them were. But there was something different about this particular woman, something which made him feel uneasy. In a split second she was gone again, swallowed up by the crowds. He looked around for her anxiously, desperate to find her among the constantly weaving mass of figures which scurried busily around him. There she was. Through a momentary gap in the bodies he could see her coming toward him. No more than five feet tall, hunched forward and wearing a faded red raincoat. Her wiry gray-white hair was held in place under a clear plastic rain hood and she stared ahead through the thick lenses of her wide-rimmed glasses. She had to be eighty if she was a day, he thought as he looked into her wrinkled, liver-spotted face, so why was she such a threat? He had to act quickly before she disappeared again. He couldn’t risk losing her. For the first time he made direct eye contact with her and he knew immediately that he had to do it. He had no choice. He had to do it and he had to do it right now.

Dropping his newspaper, briefcase, and umbrella Simmons pushed his way through the crowd then reached out and grabbed hold of her by the wide lapels of her raincoat. Before she could react to what was happening he spun her around through almost a complete turn and threw her back toward the building he’d just left. Her frail body was light and she virtually flew across the footpath, her feet barely touching the ground before she smashed up against the thick safety-glass shop window and bounced back into the street. Stunned with pain and surprise she lay face down on the cold, rain-soaked pavement, too shocked to move. Simmons pushed his way back toward her, barging through a small crowd of concerned shoppers who had stopped to help. Ignoring their angry protests he dragged her to her feet and shoved her toward the shop window again, her head whipping back on her shoulders as she clattered against the glass for the second time.

“What the hell are you doing, you idiot?!” an appalled bystander yelled, grabbing hold of Simmons’s coat sleeve and pulling him back. Simmons twisted and squirmed free from the man’s grip. He tripped and landed on his hands and knees in the gutter. She was still on her feet just ahead of him. He could see her through the legs of the other people crowding around her.

Oblivious to the howls and screams of protest ringing in his ears, Simmons quickly stood up, pausing only to pick up his umbrella from the edge of the footpath and to push his wire-framed glasses back up the bridge of his nose. Holding the umbrella out in front of him like a bayonet rifle he ran at the woman again.

“Please...” she begged as he sunk the sharp metal tip of the umbrella deep into her gut and then yanked it out again. She slumped back against the window, clutching the wound as the stunned and disbelieving crowd quickly engulfed Simmons. Through the confusion he watched as her legs gave way and she collapsed heavily to the ground, blood oozing out of the deep hole in her side.

“Maniac,” someone spat in his ear. Simmons spun around and stared at the owner of the voice. Jesus Christ, another one! This one was just like the old woman. And there’s another, and another...and they were all around him now. He stared helplessly into the sea of angry faces which surrounded him. They were all the same. Every last one of them had suddenly become a threat to him. He knew there were too many of them but he had to fight. In desperation he screwed his hand into a fist and swung it into the nearest face. As a teenage boy recoiled from the sudden impact and dropped to the ground a horde of uniformed figures weaved through the crowd and wrestled Simmons to the ground.

In Bookstores This January

If you've been reading this blog religiously, and maybe if you only come here now and again, you'd remember a writer whose work we reviewed here: N. Frank Daniels. Well Frank's book, Futureproof, will be published by Harper Perennial on the 27 of January this year.

If you want to support self-publishing and mainstream writers who have emerged from it, go ahead and buy the books on the day of the release.

Also coming out in January (the 20th) is Jeremy Robinson's Kronos. Though I have not been given a review copy—was it something I said? From the descriptions of the book on Amazon, I can say that it certainly seems like an awesome novel to me. The concept is certainly blockbuster material. I wonder when they will make a movie based on it.  Read the first chapter here. More from Amazon product description:

Two years after his wife's death, oceanographer and former navy SEAL, Atticus Young, attempts to reconcile with his rebellious daughter, Giona, by taking her on the scuba dive of a lifetime-swimming with a pod of peaceful humpback whales in the Gulf of Maine. But the beauty of the sea belies a terror from the deep-a horrific creature as immense as it is ancient. There is no blood, no scream, no fight. Giona is swallowed whole by the massive jaws. Only Atticus remains to suffer the shame of the survivor and his inconsolable grief turns to an unquenchable thirst for revenge.

Drawn by the spectacle, Trevor Manfred, a ruthless billionaire, approaches Atticus with a proposition: Trevor will make available all the advanced technology of his heavily armed mega-yacht, the Titan, to aid Atticus in his death-quest. In return, Trevor is to receive the beast's corpse as the ultimate hunting trophy. But in the midst of the hunt, Atticus makes a terrifying discovery that changes the way he sees the ocean's creatures and begs the question: what is Kronos? The answer sets him on a new and much more deadly course.

Where Are They Now: Henry Baum

There is a new POD book review site out there, The Self Publishing Review (http://selfpublishingreview.com/) and it's run by Henry Baum, the author of North of Sunset.

I really like the look of the site and the fact that it seems to cover more than just reviews: there are columns that deal with cover design, a news section, and a review of publishers in the self-publishing world.

Henry decided to create a review site in order to help legitimize self-publishing.

I've been meaning to do this for a while - one of my complaints about self-publishing is how little it's taken seriously.  I wanted to create a place that will hopefully legitimize self-publishing to some degree and get writers some attention.  It doesn't just cover book reviews, but every facet of self-publishing - news, how-to's, and the like.

Henry is also working on a new book.

I'm gearing up to release my next novel and I don't really have the heart or desire to deal with submitting it to publishers.  I've been working on this novel for a few years and it has some of the same issues as North of Sunset - it's not well-defined in any one genre.  The closest thing would be science fiction, but I'm not a science fiction writer, so I could see some negative responses.

Where Are they Now: Kristen Tsetsi

Another writer whose work Homefront was reviewed by the original Podler blog was the talented Kristen Tsetsi. Here's what she wrote in response to the burning question--

Since having Homefront reviewed by PODler, I've begun a new novel, The Year of Dan Palace. It's been slow-going. Work and life got in the way for a while...I started Palace shortly after Homefront's review, and shortly after that moved to Connecticut and became a newspaper staff writer. And it's difficult—for me, at least—to write fiction after a day filled with other writing. I've since left the job, however, and am happily once again able to immerse myself in a fiction zone. In the time since Homefront's review I've also founded and currently co-edit Tuesday Shorts, an online journal of very short fiction that includes original pieces by Jacquelyn Mitchard, Kris Saknussemm, and Richard Grayson—who, incidentally, was also reviewed in The PODler. I also began work as a freelance correspondent for online magazine Women's eNews, and will co-edit American Fiction, an anthology of fiction by emerging writers (deadline March 15 - visit www.newriverspress.com or Tuesday Shorts for prize amounts and guidelines). [/plug] When in need of a break from the characters I'm working on in Palace, I write short pieces for Six Sentences.

As always, be sure to support this and other talented independent writers whose work was reviewed by the blog by purchasing their work.

IM optioned

According to POD People, Rick R. Reed's IM was optioned by Panic Productions. Congratulations! Go ahead and check out his book now, IM is available through Amazon.com. Want to know more about Rick? Check out his website at http://www.rickrreed.com/