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In Which I Read Chapter 3 From The Inner Circle

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Before I present this week's chapter, I want to show you my new toy:

I figured if I was going to do this whole podcasting thing, I might as well try to do it right. Still working on some other technically stuff, but I think the investment in this mic is definitely a step in the right direction.

Now, in case you didn't know, every Friday I'm reading a new chapter from The Inner Circle up until whenever it's finally released. You can listen to the first week here, and the second week here. Now enjoy chapter three, and have a great weekend.

The Inner Circle Chapter 3

EERIE By Blake & Jordan Crouch

My friend Blake Crouch has released a new ebook along with his brother Jordan. It's a horror novel, as you can probably guess from the great cover designed by Jeroen ten Berge. Here's what it's about:

From newcomer Jordan Crouch and Blake Crouch, author of the runaway bestseller Run, comes Eerie, a chilling, gothic thriller in the classic tradition of The Shining and The Sixth Sense.

TRAPPED INSIDE A HOUSE

On a crisp autumn evening in 1980, seven-year-old Grant Moreton and his five-year-old sister Paige were nearly killed in a mysterious accident in the Cascade Mountains that left them orphans.

WITH A FRIGHTENING POWER

It's been thirty years since that night. Grant is now a detective with the Seattle Police Department and long estranged from his sister. But his investigation into the bloody past of a high-class prostitute has led right to Paige's door, and what awaits inside is beyond his wildest imagining.

OVER ANYONE WHO ENTERS

His only hope of survival and saving his sister will be to confront the terror that inhabits its walls, but he is completely unprepared to face the truth of what haunts his sister's brownstone.

Eerie will be available exclusively on NOOK until June 12, when it will be available on all other electronic platforms.

The Man On The NOOK

Just a quick note that The Man on the Bench is now available on NOOK for all you ePubbers out there. What's notable about this is that it was my last ebook title that was a Kindle exclusive. My experience with the Kindle Select Program was mixed. I had some great results and some not so great results. It can definitely help breath new life into a book that is lagging, but it can also do nothing for the book at all except tie it up on Amazon exclusively for three months. Not that that's necessarily a bad thing -- the bulk of the my sales are through Amazon, but the truth is if the book isn't selling well to begin with, then there won't be many units borrowed, so you have to wonder if the cost of keeping it on only one platform is worth it. Again, the only reason I think it is worth it is the ability to make a title for free for up to five days, though I have begun to worry that this is training a select number of readers to simply wait for when an author makes the book free. Is this a bad thing? Well, that depends on your point of view. I never have a problem giving away my work, but in exchange I'd at least like the reader to help spread the word or review the book. But to give your work away for the sake of giving your work away? That doesn't interest me much. Does this mean I'm completely done with the Kindle Select Program? I wouldn't say that, because, again, if I need to help breath new life into a lagging book, I might give it a try. But it's a gamble, just like everything else. For now, I want to make my work available on as many platforms as possible, even if for right now most of my sales come from Amazon.

Also, going back to The Man on the Bench, I should note that my experiment of pricing it at $2.99 is having great results. You see, I didn't think 99 cents was a fair price, and while $1.99 might be better, I would still only be making 70 cents per unit sold. So I figured, what difference is there really between $1.99 and $2.99? Not much, so I decided to price the novella at $2.99 (earning me two bucks per unit sold), and guess what -- it's selling pretty well. In fact, it outsells the rest of my 99 cent short stories and novellas, and it's making me a hell of a lot more money than them too. Not only that, readers seem to really like the story, which is even better. I'd worried that because it was a novella, some would balk at the price point, but so far so good. Now, of course, having just said that, I no doubt jinxed myself, but what are you going to do?

Wanna Hang Out?

I love pretty much all things Google, so when Google+ debuted last year, I was really excited ... for, like, a month. Then, I don't know, I just found I couldn't keep up with it, not with already trying to stay active on Twitter and Facebook (and I'm not even that active on Facebook), so I eventually just forgot all about it. Every once in awhile when I'm using Gmail I'll remember, and want to post something, but will have nothing worthwhile to say. One thing I do like about Google+, however, is the ability to "hang out" with others. And I thought: Wouldn't it be cool to do that with readers and other fellow writers? So how about it, folks? If I hosted a hang out, would you be up for stopping by? It would be a week night, probably either seven or eight or nine o'clock eastern time. All you would need is a computer with Internet access and a Google account. If you don't have a webcam, that's no problem -- you can still participate via chat. So if you're interested let me know in the comments section, and we'll try to set something up.