Insights

Books I Enjoyed In 2013

I read (or listened to, which I count as the same thing) 60 books in 2013. As I do every year, I'm not going to make a "best of" list, but rather simply list the books I enjoyed reading. There is no particular order other than which they were read/listened. Not surprisingly, the bulk of my reading was done via Kindle. Just recently I picked up the ebook of a book I already have in hardcover, because I want to read the book and know that I'll get to it sooner on my Kindle. What does that mean for the industry at large? Absolutely nothing. That's just my own taste. Anyway, I've broken the list down accordingly. Last year I included a category for short stories, but I only read one short story collection this past year, apparently (I did read several literary journals and ebook singles, however). I hope to fix that wrong this upcoming year (in fact, I just started  Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri, which is great so far). Here we go ... Novels

  • THE GIRL ON THE GLIDER by Brian Keene (ebook)
  • THE TWELVE by Justin Cronin (hardcover)
  • LIVE BY NIGHT by Dennis Lehane (ebook)
  • THE BLACK BOX by Michael Connelly (ebook)
  • SANDMAN SLIM by Richard Kadrey (ebook)
  • A FRIEND OF THE EARTH by T. C. Boyle (hardcover)
  • THE MESMERIST by Joseph D’Agnese (ebook)
  • WAYWARD by Blake Crouch (ebook)
  • DOCTOR SLEEP by Stephen King (ebook)
  • WHOM THE GODS WOULD DESTROY by Brian Hodge (ebook)
  • UNDERSTUDIES by Ravi Mangla (paperback)

Audiobooks

  • ODD APOCALYPSE by Dean Koontz, read by David Aaron Baker
  • THE FAULT IN OUR STARS by John Green, read by Kate Rudd
  • YOU’RE NEXT by Gregg Hurwitz, read by Scott Brick
  • FIGHT CLUB by Chuck Palahniuk, read by Jim Colby
  • 14 by Peter Clines, read by Ray Porter
  • THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE by Neil Gaiman, read by Neil Gaiman
  • DELIVERANCE by James Dickey, read by Will Patton
  • KILL THE DEAD by Richard Kadrey, read by MacLeod Andrews
  • LIGHT OF THE WORLD by James Lee Burke, read by Will Patton
  • MR. PENUMBRA’S 24-HOUR BOOKSTORE by Robin Sloan, read by Ari Fliakos
  • TAKEN by Robert Crais, read by Luke Daniels
  • TELL NO LIES by Gregg Hurwitz, read by Scott Brick

Non-Fiction

  • NO EASY DAY: THE FIRSTHAND ACCOUNT OF THE MISSION THAT KILLED OSAMA BIN LADEN by Mark Owen and Kevin Maurer, read by Holter Graham

Graphic Novel

  • THE STRANGE TALENT OF LUTHER STRODE by Justin Jordan, Tradd Moore, and Felipe Sobreiro (paperback)

So, what books did you enjoy this past year?

Looking Back At 2013

2013 was an interesting year. From a professional standpoint, it certainly had its highs and lows. Let's highlight some of them chronologically:

Throughout the year there were, of course, many, many podcasts.

I also talked about neglecting the blog, and how I was going to try to update it more. I don't think I ever really reached that goal. I saw a news article recently that talked about the death of the blog, and I guess that's what's been happening here. I use it to make announcements and that's about it. In the past I would blog about a lot of different things, whether it be pop culture or what was happening in publishing, but it became tiresome. I began to limit my comments to 140 characters on Twitter, where I'm most active. And, quite honestly, I started to become bored with the blog. I see other writers sometimes blogging about one issue or topic or another, and I think, who cares? And with that in mind, I don't feel like throwing my two cents in when nobody ever asked me in the first place.

I'm not the only one, I've noticed. Many other writers have been blogging less and less. Is it true, do you think -- is the blog dying for good now?

Anyway, despite the ups and downs, 2013 was a good year. What it wasn't, however, was very productive. Don't get me wrong, I've been writing, but I didn't release nearly as much as I would have liked. And my sales this year have suffered for it. They're still good, but they weren't nearly as good as they were in 2012, when I was releasing many more books. That's the thing in publishing, whether it be indie or traditional -- velocity matters. The more books you release, the more you'll sell. That's just how it is.

But I have been working. 2014 should see the release of many new books. Besides an omnibus of Refuge, which will collect all five books of the series, I hope to release Legion, Bullet Rain, and at least one new Holly Lin book, if not two. I also hope to throw in a short horror novel or novella if time permits. And I might even try to write a few new short stories.

Yes, 2014 should be quite an interesting year.

This won't be my last post of 2013, though; that will be in the next day or two, when I'll list the books I really enjoyed reading this year.

Until then, happy Sunday!

Analysis On Seven Items

One of my favorite short stories that I've written is "Seven Items in Jason Reynolds’ Jacket Pocket, Two Days After His Suicide, As Found by his Eight-Year-Old Brother, Grady," which originally appeared via PANK and was a runner-up for the Micro Award. Recently it was also translated into Turkish. And now it has been given a very in-depth analysis by Anaea Lay, who makes me sound much smarter and more talented than I really am. Here's part of what she has to say:

This story is brilliant and beautiful and full of things I adore in my fiction (Sibling love/protectiveness! Suicide! Creepiness!) but the thing that stands out about it and makes it worth pulling apart is its sheer, relentless efficiency. Genuine efficiency, though, not the pruned and constrained soullessness or lack of development you get with inferior flash. This story chooses its moments carefully, but having chosen them, gives them lots of space to breathe and grow.

Read the rest here. And hey, if you haven't read the story yet and don't want to read it on PANK (though I can't imagine why, as it's free), you can check it out in my very short fiction collection Phantom Energy -- which is currently 99 cents for a limited time!

Reader Blurbs

There's a trend I've been noticing lately where authors use reader blurbs in their product descriptions for their books. Almost all of these are independently-published -- at least from what I've seen -- but just today when I clicked on the link for the Kindle Daily Deal I noticed that Amazon was doing the same thing. One of today's deals is The Quarry by Iain Banks, and instead of a blurb from an established author or a line from Publisher's Weekly, you find this:

Customer Review: "I quickly found myself lost in the story, laughing out loud while reading it and sympathizing intently with its protagonist Kit, his father and his father's friends."

That's not the only example. A few other books were listed as a Kindle Daily Deal, one of those being Rock Her by Rachel Cross, and the same kind of blurb:

Customer review: "This rocking book grabs you from the beginning, and doesn't let you go until its supremely satisfying end."

I know a lot of people have mixed feelings about Amazon, but one thing is for certain: they know how to sell books. So if Amazon is doing this, it must be somewhat effective, no?

Another reason this came to mind today is I happened to get a new review for my collection Real Illusions on Amazon. In part, the reviewer said:

"Once I know what the threat is I'm not scared anymore. This author knows that, and I loved these stories."

And another reader for the same book:

"Keeps me turning the pages way past my bedtime!"

And another:

"Ranking alongside the likes of Blake Crouch and Scott Nicholson as one of the best self-published thriller writers of the moment, Swartwood delivers a compelling collection of short fiction."

These are all readers who took the time to leave a simple review on Amazon. They're clearly fans of the book, and hopefully of the rest of my work. And I'd have to imagine they would be fine with me using their words to help sell the book.

But at the same time, I still question the legitimacy of doing such a thing, especially when there is always the question of writers paying for fake reviews.

I'll say it now: I've never once paid for a review. Have I offered free books in exchange for honest reviews? Absolutely. Everybody does it, independent authors and even major publishers. Half the time readers request copies and say they'll read and review, but they never do. I seem to have a core group of readers who will leave reviews for all my books, and I appreciate each and every one of them for their support.

But still, that doesn't answer the question of just how effective using reader blurbs to promote a book will be. After all, the reviews are there for readers to peruse before purchasing the book. Most times they'll check out the one-star reviews instead of reading any of the five-star reviews. Because of this, I saw one reader once give a book a one-star review, but then say that the book was actually amazing and that everyone needed to check it out and the only reason he was leaving a one-star review was because he knew everyone would look at it first. Clever, though I wonder just how effective that is, as the ranking does hurt the book overall.

Anyway, I'm curious to hear thoughts. If you come across a new book, are you more apt to believe a blurb from an author you are sort of familiar with or maybe never heard of, or a blurb from what the author or publisher claims is a reader?

Thoughts On BookTrakr

A few weeks ago I got an invitation to proceed with the beta version of BookTrakr, which I had signed up for several months ago. What the site basically does is compiles your sales figures from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iTunes, Kobo, and Smashwords. Yes, you must provide your log-in information, which many people are hesitant to do. But this isn't a fly-by-night service; they've been working on it for quite some time, and I know many reputable writers who got an even earlier sneak peek, and all of them trust the site well enough.

So anyway, once you provide your log-in information, it takes a while for the site to create a profile for you -- at least it did for me, but that's probably because I have a lot of books that have been published for a while. Then, once everything is compiled, you're able to view each of your books separately and see how many copies you've sold across all platforms or on each individual platform, as well as how much money you've made, how many reviews the books has, its best ranking, etc. It even provides numbers for all the ebooks combined. Because of this, I now see that I've sold, as of this moment, 107,627 ebooks across Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iTunes, and Kobo (I didn't bother adding Smashwords, mostly because I couldn't remember my log-in information at the time). While that number sounds somewhat impressive -- and I guess it is -- you also have to keep in mind that it stretches back to 2009 ... though most of what I sold has been since 2011, so really two years. Even so, 53,000 books a year isn't all that impressive when you consider that some authors sell that number in a single month.

BookTrakr also has a feature where every morning they send you an email of your previous day sales. It tells me how many ebooks I've sold, how much I've earned, a breakdown of the sales across all platforms, whether or not I have any new reviews, if I'm currently on any top 100 lists, and so on. If your sales are good, it's nice to wake up to those numbers. If your sales are so-so, it can be rather depressing. It's possible to turn off the daily emails, though, which might be a good idea, as a writer doesn't have much power in changing the sales. It's like checking the stock market; you can watch your stocks go up and down, but you're pretty much powerless to do anything about it, so sometimes it's best to worry about other things.

Ultimately, I've found the service to be great so far. Currently it's still in beta mode, which means that it's free, though at some point soon they'll start charging. How much the rate will be is still up for speculation, but if it's anywhere near reasonable, I think it's completely worth it. I also say this as someone who, for over a year, would take my monthly sales reports and enter them manually into a spreadsheet. That takes up a lot of time that could be better spent writing.

Is BookTrakr for everyone? Probably not. When Duotrope announced that they were going to start charging for their service, I didn't bother signing up. Why? Well, because I haven't been writing and submitting much short fiction. If I did, then I would probably find the service worthwhile and pay. The same applies here. If an author only has a handful of books that it's easy enough to track, it might not be worth signing up. The same goes for an author who has a few books that aren't selling much at all. The cost of the service might not even off-set how much that author is making. But that's just my two cents. As of right now, I'm impressed, and am curious to see where they take this service next.