Glow-in-the-Dark Radio: Kindle

Showing posts with label Kindle. Show all posts

Saturday, November 05, 2011

And So It Begins... AGAIN!

As I work on the rewrite of my 5th novel - tentatively titled Alibi Jones and The Sunrise of Hur - I didn't know what I was going to offer you next on my podcast. Decided to offer you a fresh take on some work you may or may not have heard before, to go back to the beginning and see if I can convince any new friends to come on board for the ride... as I bring you a new presentation of VATICAN ASSASSIN!

It's the chapters of the remastered audiobook, written and read by me - you may have heard those before. But there is also new background material before and after the fiction, to offer old fans something fresh.

Hope you'll join in my blatant attempt to bring Vatican Assassin to a whole new wave of fans by linking to this blog or this podcast, posting a link on facebook or Twitter... please share the science fiction fun and help expose Vatican Assassin to a whole new wave of fans!

IT ALL STARTS HERE! Science Fiction Adventure - Politics - Religion - War - And Humankind's expansion into the stars! Come along for the ride - hear the story of our future! It's 2109 and Bernard Campion - BC - is the VATICAN ASSASSIN!

Hear Chapters 1 & 2 of the Vatican Assassin audiobook on today's episode of Glow-in-the-Dark Radio! Get the chapters as FREE downloads at iTunes and at Podiobooks.com, too. Those will be just the chapters - on this podcast there's also exclusive background material. Get the background on BC - his biography. And ponder the perils of prognostication with a consideration of extrapolating "future history" - plus you'll hear some of the future history behind VATICAN ASSASSIN! And be sure to join us in coming weeks for more chapters and exclusive background material!

Links: http://vaticanassassin.com - http://glowinthedarkradio.com - http://mikeluoma.com

Saturday, July 16, 2011

The First Part of the Next-to-Last Chapter of ALIBI JONES!

We are nearing the end of the science fiction adventure Alibi Jones on the Glow-in-the-Dark Radio Podcast! Listen to the first half of the second-to last chapter - Chapter Nineteen Part One - on today's episode. I'm writer and reader Mike Luoma - I'll give you a quick rundown of where we are at in the story, a little news, and then we'll get into the chapter!

Alibi has been captured by the Eldred on the planet De'Ramanar. He wakes up in the clutches of the man he's come to know as his enemy - and possibly IS one of the Ancient Enemy - Ashumeth!

http://glowinthedarkradio.com

The NEW Glow-in-the-Dark Radio facebook Page: http://www.facebook.com/glowinthedarkradio

Glow-in-the-Dark Radio Comics at Graphic.ly: http://graphicly.com/glow-in-the-dark-radio-comics

http://alibijones.com

Alibi Jones on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Alibi-Jones/142797717510

Alibi Jones Paperback & eBook $13.98 combo pack at Drive Thru: http://scifi.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=89354

Saturday, June 25, 2011

A Major Character DIES on Today's ALIBI JONES episode!

A Major Character Dies On Today's Episode! The Glow-in-the-Dark Radio Podcast returns with more from my science fiction adventure novel Alibi Jones. Mike Luoma with you once again, writer and reader of the audio books featured herein. Get a rundown of the story so far & some news - including news of a NEW facebook Page! - and then Chapter Sixteen of my Alibi Jones - with that aforementioned significant plot development!

Everything has fallen apart! Katie has just taken off, leaving Alibi's apartment on Cat's Eye - even though Piccolo is out there somewhere on the loose. Maybe Katie has her own plans for dealing with him...

http://glowinthedarkradio.com

The NEW Glow-in-the-Dark Radio facebook Page: http://www.facebook.com/glowinthedarkradio

Burlington Social Media Day: http://burlingtonsocialmediaday.com

http://alibijones.com

Alibi Jones on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Alibi-Jones/142797717510

Alibi Jones Paperback & eBook $13.98 combo pack at Drive Thru: http://scifi.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=89354

Get my VATICAN ASSASSIN eBook for just 99 Cents - And Vote for Me for #BTVSMD!

Mike here - I've been nominated in the radio "category" in the Burlington Social Media Day "Royalty" Awards - cool, huh? To celebrate, I've given them a coupon for $2 - Two Bucks! - off of the eBook for the original Vatican Assassin novel - get the eBook for just 99 cents!

Head to this page of their site to get the coupon code for the 99 cent Vatican Assassin eBook: http://burlingtonsocialmediaday.com/btvsmd-deals/

If so inspired, you can then click on their Vote! link in the banner at the top of the page and lend me your support for the awards - Thanks!

By the way - If you're on Twitter, the hashtag for all things Burlington Social Media Day is #BTVSMD

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

On Self Publishing

I have things I should be doing. Still have to get my tax stuff together. Could be writing the next Alibi Jones novel - just cracked the 49K mark on the first draft. I could be working on the next Vatican Assassin comic book – Cristian Navarro is up for the art duties once again. He just needs me to get him a script. Could even be revising the script to a romantic comedy I'm working on, based on the feedback from last week's writer's group. Instead, I find myself writing this blog post.

Why? There's been a flare-up online this week involving a self-publishing writer who lost her temper on a blog reviewer. Her outrageous reaction and behavior - and her poor quality product – reflect badly on all of us trying to put our work out in front of the public. Instead of rehashing the exchange, you can read it for yourself here: http://booksandpals.blogspot.com/2011/03/greek-seaman-jacqueline-howett.html - Be sure to read the comments, at least the first few exchanges between the author and other commenters – gets redundant after a bit. Almost makes me wonder if it's faked...

I've received my share of bad reviews, and they do sting, especially the accurate ones. Big Al's review of Ms. Howett's eBook was accurate and fair – kind, even. Her reaction was uncalled for and unprofessional. I was embarrassed for her at first, but also angered that she was making self-publishing writers look bad through her comments.

Then I took a look at her eBook. Oh My Lord...

It was poorly formatted. BUT... It's unreadable! Its worst offenses are grammatical. This supposed writer is guilty of doing horrible things to the English language in this work. I was again angered – she compounded the earlier offense caused by her reaction by drawing an enormous amount of attention to a shining, negative example of everything wrong with self-publishing! Ms. Howett's "book" gives tinder and fuel to every critic who wants to dismiss self-published works as trash, to every apologist for old school publishers insisting that only what they bless is important, only what they publish is worthy.

With her selfish, immature and public fit, Ms. Howett erodes the progress we self-publishing writers have been making with the online reading public. With the inferior product she releases, she has no right to demand serious consideration, and her attempt to do so is insulting to those of us who have taken the time and effort to release books that will stand up alongside any published work.

Grrr... I've been trying to gather my thoughts and calm my anger. Figured the best way to do that was to write about it. I did feel some empathy for Ms. Howett at first – as I said, I felt embarrassed for her. I've been doing this for a while - there's a lot to learn if you're doing it all yourself. I've been putting out my own books since 2005, and I'm still learning all the time. For example, just updated the cover art and design of my latest novel, Alibi Jones, after coming to grips with the fact the original art and design were horrible – or at least bad enough they weren't doing the book inside any favors.

I think my design skills are catching up with my writing skills. My writing has certainly improved book to book, and that's thanks to a lot of work – both on my part, and by others who help me improve my work. I've got five people who read my books when they're still in manuscript form – some might call them "beta readers". They serve, in some ways, as my editors. Each has a different strength in the mistakes they find, whether it's grammar, continuity, repeated words and phrases, etc. Each of my novels is read through several times by several sets of eyes before I do my final corrections and rewrite.

I've recently taken an additional step in preparing the final, print ready file. My "day job" is in radio. Years ago I began narrating and offering my novels as free audiobooks, applying my professional skills to my publishing. Now, I read and record the raw audio for the eBook using the final draft of the manuscript. There's nothing like reading text word-by-word aloud to help you find your final mistakes!

Guess what I'm saying is... It takes a lot of work to put a book out. I'm still trying to get it right. As a writer, I'm still struggling to find more readers and listeners. DIY means a lot of self-promotion. But I'm out there working at it – been able to sell about six hundred "dead tree" books and five hundred eBooks. The free audiobooks have been downloaded over four thousand times – those who do find my work seem to like it. There have been both good and bad reviews. If I've replied at all, I've tried to do so graciously.

I love it- but it's hard work to get it right. That is what is most galling about this whole incident. Ms. Howett has obviously NOT done a whole lot of work putting her book out. Yet my efforts get lumped in with hers just by dint of us both being self-published. Grrr.

What can I do about it? Not much. I didn't comment on the original blog yesterday when I could have – why pile on? But it has been bothering me enough to try to process it in public here. Guess the best thing I can do is concentrate on making my books better. As a self-publisher, my name is my brand... So? Strange as it sounds, I've got to do all I can to prove that "Mike Luoma" is a quality brand. Hate the way that sounds, but it's true. When I finally have as many people posting and tweeting about me as Ms. Howett does, my hope is they will be saying good things...

Monday, November 23, 2009

Latest update...

Just sending out this email:

Happy Thanksgiving!

There's a lot going on with my books to share with you – lots to be thankful for as we head towards Thanksgiving. Also added some names to the email list, so if this is the first time you're getting one of my updates and wish to be taken off my list, please reply and let me know. Heck, if you've been getting these but are fed up, let me know and I'll take you off the list. Don't mean to annoy.

As you know, I'm still trying to make a name for myself, so any recognition that comes my way is very cool. ProjectFanboy.com gives out the Project Fanboy Awards – and a couple of group efforts I'm involved with have been nominated for this year's awards! The anthology comic book I'm writing “Souverain” for – Lady Fight: Escalation – is up for Best Black and White Title. And the web site for which I've been writing features and my column – http://www.cosmicbooknews.com – is up for two awards: Best Comic Book News Source and Best Comic Book Web Site! You can vote for this year's awards through December 31^st at http://www.projectfanboy.com. I hope you'll stop over there and cast your vote. Speaking of my column, the latest one is here: http://www.cosmicbooknews.com/articles/mlmakingup11. And my most recent “Cosmic Spotlight” was on Monark Starstalker, here: http://cosmicbooknews.com/articles/csmss.

ALIBI JONES continues to come out as an audio book – you can get the free chapters weekly in their “pure” form at Podiobooks.com (http://www.podiobooks.com/title/alibi-jones) and with commentary and news on my Glow-in-the-Dark Radio Podcast. The 80^th episode went up last Friday with chapters seven and eight of ALIBI JONES: http://glowinthedarkradio.podomatic.com/.

My apology – the discount code I shared with you for Lulu.com last month was not a good one. Lulu messed up. They've given me a new 10% off code for November. I double-checked it – seems to work fine, this time: GREATBOOK. You can use it to get 10% off of any book you buy at Lulu.com when you check out. My books are here: http://stores.lulu.com/mikeluoma

Actually, my books are a lot of places. My thanks go out to fellow Podiobook author and publisher Brian Rathbone. Brian not only interviewed me for an upcoming Podioracket podcast, he also got my books up on Mobipocket! The Vatican Assassin Trilogy and my new ALIBI JONES are available for reading on your phone through White Wolf Press, LLC: http://www.mobipocket.com/en/eBooks/AuthorDetails.asp?authorId=117289&authorName=Michael+Luoma. ALIBI JONES has been available for the Kindle – now you can get the paperback through Amazon.com as well. Thanks to Smashwords.com, my books are available as eBooks from Barnes & Noble, too. Mark Coker of Smashwords is actively forging beneficial new partnerships – glad my eBooks are on Smashwords – you'll even find some of them there for free, with set-your-own pricing.

Finally, a couple of holiday-related items: Thanks to Podiobooks author A.P. Stephens for organizing “The Gift Of Lit” – you can find books of many genres from independent authors for holiday giving all gathered in one place – my Vatican Assassin Trilogy Omnibus Edition Hardcover is featured: http://glowinthedarkradio.blogspot.com/2009/11/gift-of-lit-holiday-2009.html. If you're looking for unique gifts, you also might want to check out my doodle-rama store. I just went through and updated the designs for T-Shirts and prints: http://www.cafepress.com/doodlerama.

Again, Happy Thanksgiving – I'm especially thankful to have friends and fans like you. Thank you for your support!

Mike