#authors – Page 2 – Rosepoint Publishing

#AmReading – Another One Bites the Crust by Ellie Alexander

Welcome to my #AmReading feature! I am highlighting an author and their book currently visible in the “Fair Weather” widget celebrating blue skies, following seas, and my Goodreads (currently reading) list.

Another One Bites the Crust by Ellie Alexander

This week I am presenting Ellie Alexander and her book Another One Bites the Crust. This is a download from the publisher and NetGalley. The book will be released on January 2, 2018 by St. Martin’s Paperbacks. Amazon classifies the novel as a mystery, thriller & suspense, culinary, and amateur sleuths and is only 316 pages.

I will be presenting my review on Sunday, December 24, 2017, and can tell you that so far it’s a cozy mystery very different than I’ve read before. In the meantime (from Amazon), here is the

Book Blurb:

Torte—the beloved small-town bakeshop run by Jules Capshaw—is set to hit the stage. But who would have guessed that murder would makes a surprise appearance?

It’s the role of a lifetime for Jules. The Shakespeare Festival has returned to Ashland, Oregon, for the season and Torte has been cast as the supplier of Elizabethan-era treats for the main event. But on the eve of opening night, a brawl between Jules’s friend Lance, the artistic director, and a strapping young thespian named Anthony almost brings down the house. . .and the next morning, Anthony is dead. Jules knows that Lance loves his drama—and his just desserts—but she also knows that murder is way off-script for him. Now it’s up to Jules to cut through a bevy of backstage betrayals and catty co-stars who all have their own secrets—before the curtain drops on someone else. . .

About the Author: (From Amazon Author Page)

“Ellie Alexander, author of the Bakeshop Mystery Series (St. Martin’s Press), is a Pacific Northwest native who spends ample time testing pastry recipes in her home kitchen or at one of the many famed coffeehouses nearby. When she’s not coated in flour, you’ll find her outside exploring hiking trails and trying to burn off calories consumed in the name of research. Another One Bites the Crust is the seventh in the Bakeshop mystery series.”

Find out more about Ellie and her books by visiting her here:
Blog: http://www.bakeshopmystery.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/elliealexanderauthor
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/BakeshopMystery
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ellie_alexander

A Murder for the Books – a Book Review

Title: A Murder for the Books: A Blue Ridge Library Mystery

Genre: Currently #2672 on Amazon Best Sellers Rank in Books, Mystery, Thriller & Suspense, Amateur Sleuths

Publisher: Crooked Lane Books

Publication Date: To be released December 12, 2017

Source: Crooked Lane Books and NetGalley

Title and Cover: A Murder for the Books – Cozy Mystery cover hints at library setting

Seems like this is the third book I’ve read recently with a library setting. I had no idea that libraries could be such a hotbed of intrigue!

This particular plot centers around Amy Webber who has moved in with her aunt in rural, historic Taylorsford, Virginia where she becomes the library director. She is escaping a disastrous affair. She’s found a good friend at the library in Sunny, and is introduced to the new man in town, choreographer Richard Muir, who inherited the farmhouse next door. He’s on a quest to uncover some old history involving his great-uncle, Paul Dassin, from whom he inherited the old house. He engages Amy to help with research and she soon realizes some of the history may include her family history as well. Together, they shortly discover a murder victim in the archive section of the library. Continue reading “A Murder for the Books – a Book Review”

Cat Fanciers Get the Spotlight

Okay, I’ll admit it…

I’m more a dog person than cat. (Not that I haven’t had a cat in residence before, and if you own one, you know that she/he is not your pet–you are hers/his.) Continue reading “Cat Fanciers Get the Spotlight”

What State Are These Authors From?

I’ve spoken before of the “Grand Ole Lady” (the Lake County Courthouse), resplendent with the striking brick red facade (love this building!), but probably not The John Dillinger Museum, a focus of the 1930’s with Dillinger memorabilia enclosed within the building in Crown Point. If you recognized that as being in northwest Indiana, you’d be correct.

Admitted to the union in 1816, Indiana can claim a number of authors, many of whom hail out of Gary, about as far north as you can go without wading out into Lake Michigan. Of the well-known Jackson family born in Gary, Janet gained fame as a singer/songwriter and LaToya as both author and songwriter.

Alex Karras, who gained fame as a pro-ball player, wrote a journal that was published in the Detroit Free Press and much later, a novel entitled “Tuesday Night Football.”

Kurt Vonnegut Jr, born 1922 in Indianapolis, wrote for more than 50 years and although he published many novels, plays, short stories, and non-fiction, was probably most famous for the dark “Slaughterhouse-Five.”

Vonnegut dropped out of Cornell University to enlist in the army and was deployed to Europe to fight in WWII. Captured by the Germans during the Battle of the Bulge, he survived the Allied bombing by seeking safety in the meat locker of the slaughterhouse in which he was imprisoned.

Of course, there are whole alphabetized lists of authors from Indianapolis from Charles W. Akers, also a (WWII–navy) veteran, wrote what is called one of the three best books about Abigail Adams, “Abigail Adams, an American Woman,” Marguerite V. Young, American writer and academic and Dan Quayle, former VP, who wrote his memoir, “Standing Firm” in 1994.

Lest you think the famous authors of Indiana were only from the big cities, there are also lists of writers from Anderson to Terra Haute. Disappointed though, I didn’t see any from Crown Point. Do you know the authors of your area? ©2017 Virginia Williams

Is It Time To Dump Smashwords For Kindle?

I gave up on Smashwords this week.

Their Wide Variety of Formats

I’ve monitored my stats almost every day since I downloaded the first manuscript for my grandfather back in 2012–and the stats are dismal. At the time, Smashwords seemed like a good addition to my marketing plan when I published with Amazon and their Kindle site. If you aren’t already aware of Smashwords, they publish and make available ebooks bestowing freedom to authors to set their own prices. Smashwords further makes available your digital downloads to Nook (Barnes & Noble), Apple IBooks, Scribd, Oyster, and Kobo, and allows downloads in EPUB, PDF, and MOBI formats.

It’s not as if they aren’t busy trying to help promote their authors and introduce them to new readers. When writing this post, they were currently running (July 1 – July 31) their annual Summer/Winter Sale. In view of the complete lack of activity (probably not their fault) on any of my listings, I declined to join the sale. They keep up dialog in their “Site Updates” as well as “Press Releases” in which they recently noted Smashwords and Publishers Weekly joined to launch an ebook best seller’s list.

Free Downloads

I have to hand it to Mark Coker. It is not as if he hasn’t tried getting some of us off the sidelines. His free downloads, “Smashwords Style Guide” and “The Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success” are comprehensive and indispensable for an Indie author as the publishing format on Smashwords is neither as easy nor forgiving as Kindle.

Spoiler Alert: You have to sell at least $10.00 in royalties to warrant payment. After the first blush of sales were over, I was still under that amount and will apparently carry the embarrassing sale record to infinity. This is no small entity. They are dynamic; have published over 416,638 books in all genres with over 65,000 of those books free.

So, what’s a mother to do? Guess it’s time to begin a new campaign!

Editorial Reviews

It all began this week with a review for a new author buddy of mine who introduced me to a couple nifty little Amazon website author page opt-ins I hadn’t previously noticed. Sometimes, you just have to hit me upside the head! Carlyle Clark, author of Children From Dark Houses, immediately included in his “Editorial Reviews” a couple sentences from my recent review of his book. Those Editorial Reviews show up prominently near the top of the book information. It succinctly brings to the surfer’s attention pertinent blurbs from your reviews. I loved it!

Reviewers Information

Also, I got to looking at (Amazon) Reviewers information. As I mentioned before, I’ve been receiving many requests for reviews. Therefore, the time came for me to expand my reviewer information and add a link to connect me from Amazon. Learning new stuff is exciting, isn’t it? Ah, but as seniors sometimes tend to do, I digress.

So then, what was the whole point of “unpublishing” my books from Smashwords? Have I succumbed to KDP? It’s just easier. Smashwords didn’t make sense for my little books and having that link also limited some promotional abilities from Amazon. I needed Amazon more.

Writing-The Short Of It-Is There Anything Faster Than Flash Fiction?

Writing-The Short of It

Every occupation has its own buzz words, general or common to the specific endeavor and writing is no different. Whether writing for fun or profit, fiction or non, there are terms–probably too many to try and cover here–that pertain to the profession.

The subject of this particular article is the word length given to those published documents that denote the specific type of creation. It used to be anything that was not a book or full-blown novel was a short story. Not any more!

Now we have:

Flash Fiction
Short Story
Novelette
Digital Novel
Novella
Book

They break down roughly as follows:

The format that holds the fascination for me is “flash fiction.” Just the word “flash” immediately conjures the imagination. The internet is so full of flash these days, why not coin a new term to apply to that little story which is generally thought to be a minimum of 100 words but no longer than 1,000.

Gee, seems deceptively simple, huh? But you know in your heart nothing is simple. This must be a novel with a plot, characters, dialogue, and climax. It has to contain a complete story: a beginning, a middle, and an end.

It is said that the story should be contained within the time it takes to smoke a cigarette. WOW! The possibilities! Read a flash fiction story on the elevator, before your next stop off the subway or bus, or in a bank line; not while waiting for the doctor.

There are contests now for flash fiction such the Flash Fiction Competition by Pigeon Review as noted on Reedsy.com. Entry fee is $5 and first place wins $125.00. This one with a July 31st deadline. Another with a free entry. There are whole books containing flash fiction or very short-short stories on Amazon.com–what they are, how to write them, or anthologies of the best.

We’re in an age of instant. It has to be fast to hold our attention, keep us in a movie, riveted to a book. Does it get any faster than FLASH?