Publishing on Kindle Vella

Last year, Amazon launched Kindle Vella - a platform for episodic writing. Basically, instead of publishing a complete story all at once, you publish in "episodes." 

Recently, I took the plunge and now have a story on Kindle Vella. It's called The Grayven, and it's a scifi horror story about an alien monster that boards a spaceship and begins killing the crew one by one. (In fact, it's a story that I was originally going to publish as a novel, but instead decided to use it to try out Vella.)

Amazon has constructed Vella so that the first three episodes of all stories on the platform are free. After that, you have to unlock episodes using tokens that you buy. 

Fortunately, Amazon is giving away tokens for free at the moment (I think they gave me 500), which will allow you to read a fair number of episodes.  (As I understand it, unlocking stories will cost you a token per hundred words, so a 700-word episodes will cost you seven tokens.)

Long story short, it's an opportunity to check out some new reading material for free. And, should you read The Grayven and decide you like it, please give it a thumbs up or a fave. (By way of explanation, readers have the ability to show that they like an episode by giving it a thumbs up or a "fave." Unfortunately, you can only give a fave if  you've purchased tokens and used them to unlock an episode. Also, you can only grant one fave per week, so grant them with care.) 

I Got a BookBub!

As just about every author knows - every indie author, at least - BookBub is the pinnacle of book promotion.  Getting a BookBub promo usually means a massive leap forward in terms of sales (and quite often a #1 ranking in your category) - and I just got one!!!

My BookBub deal is for EON (Chronos Ring #1), and is set for later this month. Moreover, it's an international deal (meaning that BookBub will not promote the book to their U.S. subscribers), but I'm still stoked!

BookBub deals of any kind are hard to get, so I feel incredibly blessed. Now I'm just trying to line up some promos around my BookBub so that I get the most bang for my buck.  Frankly speaking, the international book promotion sites aren't as familiar to me as the ones in the U.S. 

That said, I'm committed to making this promo as successful as possible.  Again, it's not every day that one gets a BookBub, so it's an opportunity I intend to get the most out of.  Wish me luck!

Audiobook Release

The audiobook of Eon (Chronos Ring #1) is now available!  Producing an audiobook is a bit of a different experience than creating an ebook or print version, but it's just as much fun.

There's just something about having your characters brought to life in a different medium that's really exciting! (Can't wait to do Book 2!)


In addition, I've been given a limited number of promotion codes that will allow me to gift copies of the audiobook for free.  If anyone is interested, please let me know (as well as whether you prefer the UK or US Audible Store), and I'll be happy to send you one.

My thanks again to all my readers for your support.

New Book Release: Infinity (Chronos Ring #2) is Now Available!

I am happy to report that Infinity (Chronos Ring #2) is now available!  As the name implies, this is the second book in the series and I hope readers will enjoy it.

Needless to say, I am having a great time writing the series. And, although I can't take credit for it, I really like the cover for this second book.

(Of course, I like the cover for the first book as well - no favorites here!)

And now, with the second book all wrapped up, it's on to book  number three.  (And after that, #4, 5, 6 and so on.) I guess that's the thing with this writing gig: the minute you finish one project, there's always another one waiting in the wings.

But in my opinion (and for someone in this line of work) it's not a bad problem to have.

Infinity (Chronos Ring #2) Cover Reveal

Okay, so I recently finished the second book in the Chronos Ring series and look forward to publishing it - hopefully around mid-month. In the meantime, I thought it might be fun to share the cover that I had made for the second book:

Needless to say, I'm having fun writing this series. I'm also embracing the opportunity to put my work out there for readers to (hopefully) enjoy.  Now, of course,it's on to Book 3 in the series (although I'll probably finish The Grayven first).

Excerpt From "Infinity (Chronos Ring #2)"

I've been working like a madman on the second book in the Chronos Ring series, and I'm happy to report that it is almost ready for prime time. For now, though, I thought I'd simply post an excerpt from the book, which I hope readers will enjoy:


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Despite his explanation, Matreen just continued to look at him like he was a useless sack of rotten potatoes that she was being asked to eat.

“I find it hard to believe my father thinks you will fulfill this prophecy,” she finally said.

“Well, I’m certainly not laying claim to it, if that’s what you’re wondering,” Lotus said. “Maybe your father sees something that neither of us do.”

“I know what I saw – you almost drowning in the river, almost getting washed away, and almost getting captured by Sentinels. An auspicious start for a prophesied deliverer.”

“Hold on,” Lotus said, a little miffed. “I just said that–”

Suddenly alert, Matreen made a curt gesture with her hand, cutting him off in mid-sentence as she ducked down low. Lotus followed her example. He still hadn’t really heard or seen anything that would make him wary, but he did feel a certain amount of tension building in the air.

After tapping his shoulder to get his attention, Matreen pointed. There, about a hundred yards away, he spied something moving through the trees. After a moment, he realized what it was: an airboat, similar to the one he had seen on the river. As he watched, he noticed that it was headed in their direction, with a Sentinel guard and an Enforcer on board.

Matreen grabbed his hand and, staying low, headed to a nearby tree that was exceptionally large – maybe eight feet in diameter at the base. Once there, they hunkered down, trying to stay out of sight. Releasing his hand, Matreen let out a soft sigh of relief.

After a few seconds, she inched towards the side of the tree and ventured a glance around it. Almost immediately, Lotus saw her tense up and understood what she must be seeing.

She slid back into hiding and whispered, “It’s headed this way.”

Instinctively, Lotus did a quick assessment and realized that they were at a distinct disadvantage. They had no weapons or armor, and thus lacked any offensive or defensive capability. Their best option seemed to be staying hidden.

Matreen evidently came to the same conclusion, because – after peeking around the tree once again, she began backing up slowly and gesturing for Lotus to do the same. As the front of the airboat became visible to them, they covertly crept backwards, using the radial shape of the bole of the tree to stay out of sight.

Their plan seemed to work. As the airboat went past their hiding spot, Lotus leaned around Matreen and saw the guard on board with his back to them, standing alone in the interior of the vehicle. The man didn’t seem to have noticed them, which should have been cause for celebration. Instead, something about the situation nagged at Lotus’ brain for a few seconds, and then it came to him like a bolt from the blue.

Alone?! Lotus shouted to himself. Where was the–

Klaxons going off in his brain, Lotus spun to his rear defensively without finishing his train of thought – only to find himself immediately snatched off the ground and then slammed into the tree that had been their hiding place hard enough to knock bark off the thing.

As he slid to the ground, everything went dark.

My Kindle Countdown Deal Experience

I mentioned in my previous blog post how necessary marketing is to having a successful career as an indie writer/publisher.  (At least it's a requirement for most of us. I do recognize that there are a few outliers who will achieve success without it.) That being the case, I thought I'd try my hand at offering a Kindle Countdown Deal.

A Kindle Countdown Deal refers to the ability to offer your book for sale on Amazon at a discounted price for a limited time. The way it typically works is that you might discount your book from, say, $3.99 to 99 cents.  From there, the price will move up incrementally - for instance, from $.99 to $1.99 to $2.99 - over a period of several days until it's back at full price.  (While it's discounted, a clock on the book's product page counts down the amount of time left until the next jump in price.)

The theory behind a Countdown Deal is, of course, that your book is on sale for a limited time, so hopefully that will spur readers to purchase it. (On a side note, you do have to be in KDP Select in order to run a Kindle Countdown Deal, and Select requires that your book be available only on Amazon.) Hoping to juice sales a little, I decided to run a Countdown Deal on my novel EON to see what would happen.

My KCD began on July 1 and will run through tomorrow (July 8).  Thus far, I'm really pleased. EON had its highest number of 1-day sales (23) during the countdown and also picked up a few more nice reviews.  In all honesty, however, some sales were undoubtedly the result of me also doing a few promos during the countdown. (Remember, you have to market/promote.) Page reads did not increase in numbers that I would consider to be proportionate with sales, but I'm thinking - hoping, really - that a lot of people may have snagged it via Kindle Unlimited and simply haven't gotten around to reading it yet.

The thing that really got me excited, however, was the dramatic increase that I had in my mail list.  Frankly speaking, it's still a very small list, but it's grown exponentially during the course of the countdown. That alone has pretty much made the countdown a success in my book.

In short, I believe that the Kindle Countdown Deal has a place in my marketing strategy.  I think it's important, however, to not simply focus on the direct return on investment, but also the long-term effect, like readers enjoying your work and expressing their interest in reading more of it (such as by subscribing to your mail list).  I think having a long-term vision and outlook is important and will definitely lend itself to success.