I Will Work Harder

Yesterday, I felt like a rock-star teacher. We held revision camp in two of my classes, both college-prep composition courses. I cheered students efforts, challenged their fledgling skills, and knocked a few proverbial home-run lessons about showing/telling and waste words out of the park.

Writing for publication--and all the effort involved--has made me a better teacher. A far better teacher. Thanks to each and every editor who has given a minute or two to push my words through the meat-grinder.

I'll have a few words and some numbers about The Big Experiment soon, but for now, I feel pretty good about this:

As of this writing, it's #9 at Amazon UK under Horror>Short Stories.  Books above it? M.R. James, Edgar Allan Poe, H.P. Lovecraft, and Tim Burton.  I'm humbled.

And this is okay, too:

As of this writing, it's #11 at Amazon US under Horror>Ghosts.

Thanks, readers. I will work harder. I will keep writing. I will work harder.

Monsters Among Us

I've collected four of my 99 cent e-books into one 115K word/39 story omnibus, Monsters Among Us. The price? $2.99.

Why would I guy do a thing like that?

1. Readers can purchase the content of four books for less than they would pay individually.

2. It would take six copies at 99 cents to equal one copy at $2.99 thanks to the 70% royalty rate.

3. J.A. Konrath told me to. *

Think about items 1 and 2: readers gain and I gain. Sounds good. But Aaron, you say, what about those 99 cent books? Aren't you cannibalizing their sales?

Maybe.** But I suspect bargain hunters will still pick them up. Monsters Among Us includes every story in The Bottom Feeders, Thirteen Shadows, and Violent Ends as well as "Black Medicine Thunder and the Sons of Chaos". It's all linked with a handy-dandy table of contents. It's also my first legitimate foray into the $2.99 price point. In the next 24-36 hours my second foray goes live. I'll talk about that come Monday... If you're observant, you'll find out sooner.

It's all a big experiment, after all.

* No, he didn't. But I did take the idea from him.
** Remember what I said about this being an experiment?

Redundancy and Self-Promotion: Now with Coupons!

*Bottom Feeders (print) is good to go. Check the bottom of the post.*

Twitter. Forums. Facebook. This blog.

I've kicked up a little extra self-promotion of late, and, like many authors, fear I've talked about my "stuff" too much. But have I? Who knows. I hope you, dear readers, will tell me if I'm being a boar. Really.

What I do know is that, when marketing, one must put something in front of potential buyers for them to know about it. Most buyers must see a product several times before they purchase. I haven't mentioned Violent Ends on the blog yet, but I am now. Yes, it's another e-book endeavor, but this time I'm pricing it $1.99 (after much soul-searching and self-debate). Of course, the coupon code WY56K will score 50% off at Smashwords. Violent Ends is also available for Kindle at Amazon.com. This is part of the big experiment. This is about planting seeds rather than leaving them in their little paper pouches (see Monday's post).

These are some of the most...well, violent of my stories. Three of them are brand new/never published before including "The Hustle", a story originally slated for an ill-fated anthology. I hope you enjoy.

The Bottom Feeders is ready to purchase in print (at least through Createspace--Amazon will take a few days to list the book). I've put a fairly reasonable tag of $7.99 on the dead tree edition. Of course, you can buy a copy directly from Createspace with a 15% off code: 7Y2MQK7E. Here's the site: https://www.createspace.com/3588544

Thanks for your support. Now go hug a writer.