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.OOPS! Scotsdale Garden Centre wants to display and sell tents. South Cambridgeshire planners are being canvassed. – CAMBRIDGE EVENING NEWS.
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Booktaste.com
A reading feast every weekend with Cathy Macleod
Off to war at age 4
NEWLY released in paperback, Brat is comedy fiction that enshrines the situation of military children during the peak of the British Raj. When soldier dads went off to defend an empire embracing the whole world, mum and the kids went too.
This may have been great for family travel, but it was a bewildering and often dangerous environment for young minds. It was also a frustrating burden for the British Army's top brass. Author Bryce McBryce recalls this "family baggage" in a book of nostalgic and hilarious tales. His Brat grows from age 4 to age 9 trying to understand the weird protocol pervading a fighting force in an occupied land.
In this instance the location is the strategic colony of Ceylon in the 1930s, eve of World War 2.
The tender-aged son of a junior rank, Charlie is labelled a bigger menace than militant Japan. In the far British fortress where he innocently interferes, the Colonel trembles with rage and the nuns pray. Charlie meanwhile is fighting his own battles -- against Life's monsters. The Colonel is his enemy, the adult species a puzzle.
Originally published 2006 as Wee Charlie's World, this second edition was retitled to bring it closer to the dedication. This is to "the children of military personnel, then and now, the children history ignores". The reprint quotes an added philosophy at the end of each chapter as the growing kid learns a new truth about the world.
This is a literary gem, spiced with Wodehouseian farce, rampaging elephants, natives evil and natives divine, the ghosts of battles past, a child's vision of grownups and, ultimately, the Japanese invasion. It is $11.99 retail. Online buyers pay extra for postage (about $7). Click to access its Amazon page. Or, get a free sample at Kindle.
Happy reading! from Cathy, week ending 18 May 2012.
Migrant's Tale Delights Brits
MAYBE it's the prospect of getting away from Britain's crippled economy! For some strange reason, books about Australia pulled a heavy tide of readers to Kindle last month (April). Both fiction and non-fiction found rapid downloads, comprising both historical and modern.
The most popular was a migration account involving a British family, Gone To Bed.That's what made me wonder if Australia suggests a fresh start to people trapped in Europe's fiscal agonies. The Great Southland, of course, is booming while the rest of the world slumps.
Furthermore, it's crying out for migrants to cope with a massive surge in the mining and export of minerals.
Gone To Bed, by Charles Bryce, describes the migrant family's experience, and Dad's dismay when his promised job turns sour. With a wife and two kids to support, and no savings left, his solution was bold and triumphant. He started a newspaper!
The battles and the bliss of this smalltown rag make a great read. Based in a haunted hotel, the Darling Advertiser recorded odd events and quirky characters as it grew to wealth and its own custombuilt premises.
And the historical Australia that Kindle users lapped up? Same author, with an exciting history book for schools. The Fabled Swan fits Mark Twain's famous comment that "Australian history reads like beautiful lies."
Kindle enthusiasts, too, seem to enjoy the heritage of this nation. April's popular fiction on Kindle included:
Kill, an 1830s adventure that hastens a young swordsman to Australia.
Invade America! (true biography of an Oz hero).
Both the above are by John Ivor, whose short story, Reverend Rapist, was also among the top April reads.
More Australian delights read on Kindle (all historical adventure) were Java's Dream, Captain Striver, No Kiss For A Killer, Amateur Rebel, and Eden's Deadly Shore. And maybe I should also mention Run Maggie Run. It is not set in Australia, but Maggie, age 9, is fleeing that way after escaping the hangman in Scotland.
Happy reading! from Cathy, week ending 11 May 2012.
Puzzling twist in Amazon's tale
LIAR, liar, pants on fire! (maybe Kindle Fire). A schoolyard jeer greets Amazon's fiscal tale for the first quarter of 2012. Hang on – other cries sound investor delight. What's going on? Is Amazon's announced progress fact or fiction?
Just like book readers, the financial world floats differing tastes. When Amazon reported that its revenue rose 34 percent to $13.18 billion, there were opposing interpretations.
Publishers Weekly burbled: "It's hard to find a weak spot in Amazon's strong first quarter, in which total revenue rose 34%, to $13.18 billion. While net income fell 35%, to $130 million."
Financial analysts hailed the good news. CNN Money declared: "It was much better than the 7 cents per share forecasts from analysts".
The BBC noted that profits beat Wall Street forecasts.
It was left to a shrewd editor to spot the flaw. Dennis Johnson at Melville House Publishing saw the Amazon press release as "astounding plunge in earnings".
"Utter devastation was predicted, and the company beat expectations by delivering simple disaster," he commented.
Read his cold-water assessment. It ignores the frenzied lunatics who gamble in stockmarkets.
Best Bard’s Birthday Read
WITH Shakespeare’s birthday approaching, a recommended whodunit is The Killing of Hamlet by Ann Morven. It’s a pageturning mystery full of chills and chuckles, as is usual from this author. Available in either paperback or Kindle.
Happy reading!from Cathy week ending 4 May 2012.
Publishers! Grab a lifeline
WHEN all the writers in all the world self-publish, who will write the books? It won't be those authors − they have all become publishers and marketeers!
You think I joke? Okay, just peep into my crystal ball.
The work in producing a book does not end with penning the final chapter. What follows is designing, copy-editing, formatting, proof-reading, printing, distributing, promoting, and keeping track of sales. No author can do all that at professional level. No author can even attempt it without abandoning the biggest and most essential chore of them all − writing.
So are we going to see the demise of decent reads? Heaven forbid!
And yet, when you take a long hard look at what's happening, such is the obvious end result. Self-publishing and self-promotion has to cause massive Writers Block.
Brilliant writers will soon be joining the ranks of the disappeared, after the present vanishing of bookshops, literary agents and traditional publishers. Unless the still existing publishers take action now.
To date, the book industry has kept itself barely afloat by desperate marketing of The Greatest Book Ever (one a year since the century began!). Frustrated readers, like me, seeking a ready source of books that satisfy, have discovered the same secret as self-published authors. It is this: Books no longer need literary agents, nor fulltime publishers, nor even a physical bookstore.
The bookworld has moved online. Digital books and printed books are all there in abundance, and increasingly self-produced by their writers.
Direct from Writer to Reader is low-cost and easy. Yet it is also a trap that will self-destruct writers and appal readers as professional book production dies out. Amateur layout and frequent misprints already bring hasty turnoff.
Traditional publishers, long ago, shot themselves in the foot by rating sales above a good read. I'd hate to see self-published writers doing the same. Hopefully, this is the time for a fresh industry pattern.
Maybe traditional publishers can save themselves from ultimate oblivion by encouraging writers rather than exploiting them. So far, Amazon and Smashwords seem alone in successfully nurturing new talent.
Royalty of 70 percent? This is now the self-published norm. And there's online help to ease writers through the proofing and promotion chores. Covers can be created, markets assailed, earnings quickly advised.
It's wonderful but it is too much for a writer to take on alone. Writers still need editors and publishers, provided those publishers adapt to the changed demands that are at present monopolised by Amazon, Smashwords and a few less-famous others.
Happy reading! from Cathy, week ending 27 April, 2012.
Publishing's petal-strewn milestone
The Easter launch of The Seventh Petal in paperback confirmed a milestone in the booktrade and the future of print-on-demand.
Listed at $12.99 on Amazon and qualifying for free postage, Ann Morven's whodunit returns pricing to an attractive level for readers. Furthermore, it apparently leaves the publisher without economic pain. This was achieved because print-on-demand requires no big printrun and no distribution of unsold copies. The book is bought and paid for before it is printed.
Ann Morven's publisher, The Darling Newspaper Press (1971), allowed this title to sell at 99c as an ebook during the April promotion of Kindle Touch in Britain. Is there a profit in such a miserable retail price?
"Not by itself," said publishing executive Charles Bryce. "The main value is in spreading an author's name and popularity. It builds reader confidence in that author before they risk spending on the author's higher priced creations."
And The Seventh Petal? It's a page-turner from the opening sentence, with good character conflict and clever plotting. There are several murders ('One by one they die' says the cover blurb). But included in the chuckles and chills that occur within a creepy Scottish castle is one murder method wholly original. Ann Morven sure knows how to keep her readers baffled to the thrilling end.
Happy reading! from Cathy week ending 13 April, 2012.
It's murder with a British ‘Touch’
HERE comes murder with a British touch! British readers love a good murder, so it makes sense that whodunit diva Ann Morven is leading a Kindle promotion this month (April). It brings Kindle Touch to the United Kingdom.
Kindle offers her crime novels at $2.99 each, with one (The Seventh Petal) at 99c. These low prices are aimed at winning new Kindle readers who like operating the screen with their fingers. Kindle Touch is priced at £109 for a wi-fi model and £169 for the 3G model. But content remains king in digital reading formats, which is why Ann Morven's chill-and-chuckle mysteries are getting big play.
Amazon has yet to reveal a date for UK release of its colour Kindle Fire, an entertainment tablet. This goes beyond ebooks to provide music, video and various applications.
Ann Morven's publisher, Darling Newspaper Press, recently launched a collection of her popular short stories titled Crime Please. The cover’s a ripper! This joins the novels on Kindle Touch at $2.99.
Meanwhile, with pedophile priests scandalising news channels these days, John Ivor has a piece of short fiction that suits the public mood.
Small spenders, big readers
HERE'S an interesting statistic. A survey of readers in Britain concluded that since owning a Kindle they bought four times as many books as they did before. It's a figure announced by Amazon, which is also Kindle, and therefore should be swallowed with a pinch of salt. Nevertheless, ease of access using an ereader (not necessarily Kindle, there are other brands) could be one reason for a reading surge. To this add the low cost of an ebook and the claim becomes credible.
Happy reading! from Cathy, week ending April 6, 2012.
Hating Sherlock Holmes
REAL detectives of a bygone era hated the fictional master sleuth Sherlock Holmes, according to a new book. When I came across it I was reminded of another knowall, perhaps of lesser fame yet probably more entertaining than the genius of Baker Street.
I refer to author Ann Morven’s homicide investigator in Murder Piping Hot. Inspector Sheryl Holmes in remote southwest Australia is descended from the pedantic London detective and has inherited his sweeping knowledge of the criminal mind. But she’s on the wrong track against amateur sleuth Sheil B. Wright, who is a dunce at deduction yet well versed in human frailty and traumas of the heart. Get a sample of this pageturner.
And if you wish to learn why Scotland Yard hated the original Sherlock Holmes, click here.
Booktaste.com is owned and operated by The Darling Newspaper Press, a small independent publisher in Western Australia. Its principal is Charles Bryce (charles.bryce@optusnet.com.au), lifelong journalist, Scottish born, formerly of The Sunday Post, The Straits Times, Reuters, The Sunday Times (Australia) and creator of The Darling Advertiser newspaper.
Blogger Cathy Macleod (cathy.macleod@optusnet.com.au) is an independent literary critic who monitors the Internet for good reads, bookworld views and news.
For Darling Newspaper Press email danpress@optusnet.com.au or post to PO box 176, Kalamunda, Western Australia 6926.
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